Sir John Cavendish (c. 1346 – 15 June 1381) was an English judge and politician from Cavendish, Suffolk, England. He and the village gave the name Cavendish to the aristocratic families of the Dukedoms of Devonshire, Newcastle and Portland.
Biography
John Cavendish was descended from the Norman noble Robert de Guernon, who lived during the reign of Henry I and who gave a large amount of property to the Abbey of Gloucester.[1] A little later a son of a Robert de Gernon, Roger de Gernon, of Grimston Hall, in Trimley St Martin, Suffolk, married the heiress of John Potton of Cavendish and obtained a landed estate in the lordship and manor of Cavendish. In consequence, his four sons exchanged their father's name for that of the estate each inherited. Until about 1500, this family are recorded as Gernon alias Cavendish.[2][3]
Sir John Cavendish married Alice de Odingsells, became a lawyer and was appointed as a Justice of the Common Pleas in 1371 and Chief Justice of the King's Bench in 1372.[4] He had one son, Andrew, who succeeded his father in the manor of Overhall, together with the advowson of Cavendish church, and the Suffolk manor of Fakenham Aspes. [5]
^The Visitation of Suffolk 1561, made by William Hervey, Clarenceux King of Arms, edited by Joan Corder, F.S.A., Harleian Society, London, 1984, part 2, p.209.
^The father of Sir John Cavendish (senior) was not Robert de Gernon, it was Roger Gernon of Grimston Hall. Roger Gernon was born in Stansted, Essex, in 1274. His father Geoffrey was born at the Gernon Lordship of Bakewell, Derbyshire, in 1231. The first family seat of the Gernons was at Stansted Mountfitchet in Essex. They held the Lordship of Bakewell. Chatsworth which became the seat of the Dukes of Devonshire, ran adjacent to Bakewell. The Gernons also held the Lordship of Lexden in Essex. Sir John Cavendish was born long before 1346, it was more likely his son, John who was born then.
^Sir John Sainty (comp.) The Judges of England, 1272-1990: a list of the judges of the Superior courts (Selden Society: Supplementary Series 1993), p. 88.
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