John Hales (–1490)Date of birth c.1400 as died "aged about 90" per Vivian, p.439 (alias Hals, Halse, etc.) was Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield (1459–1490). He was one of the Worthies of Devon of the biographer John Prince (d.1723).Prince, John, (1643–1723) The Worthies of Devon, 1810 edition, London, pp.455-7
Origins Hales was the second son of John Hals (fl.1423) of Kenedon in the parish of Sherford, Devon (a Justice of the Common Pleas and in 1423 a Justice of the King's Bench) by his first wife, a daughter of the Mewye (alias MewyPole, p.288) family of Whitchurch near Tavistock, Devon.Vivian, Lt.Col. J.L., (Ed.) The Visitations of the County of Devon: Comprising the Heralds' Visitations of 1531, 1564 & 1620, Exeter, 1895, p.439 His great-uncle was Richard Hals (d.1418), a Canon of Exeter Cathedral in Devon, and Treasurer of Exeter Cathedral in 1400, who in 1414 was sent as Ambassador to Brittany.Vivian, p.439 Bishop Hals appointed his kinsman Edmund Hals as Archdeacon of Salop from an unknown date until 1485 and as Archdeacon of Derby from 1485, probably until his death.Southworth, Carol M., Pluralism and Stability in the Close: The Canons of Lichfield Cathedral in the Last Quarter of the Fifteenth Century, Thesis, University of Birmingham, January 2012, University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository, p.18, footnote 40, quoting: "Le Neve, John, Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae 1300-1541 X Coventry and Lichfield Diocese, compiled by B.Jones (London 1964), p.17; Emden, A.B., A Biographical Register of the University of Oxford to 1500, 3 volumes (Oxford 1957-9), p.856"; "Edmund Hals" not listed in the family's pedigree in the Visitations of Devon (Vivian, p.439) The mansion house of the Hals' at Kenedon, originally quadrangular in form, is today represented by a small 16th c. farmhouse known as Keynedon, about 1 mile south of the village of Sherford.Pevsner, Nikolaus & Cherry, Bridget, The Buildings of England: Devon, London, 2004, p.727 The early 15th century gate-tower of the house was demolished in about 1850.Hoskins, W.G., A New Survey of England: Devon, London, 1959 (first published 1954), p.475
Career Hales was Provost of Oriel College, Oxford, from 1446 to 1449.‘Oxford College Histories: Oriel College’ Ranie, D.W. p57: London; F.E. Robinson & Co;1900 He was Dean of Exeter between 1457 and 1459.Ursula Radford (1955). "An Introduction to the Deans of Exeter". Report & Transactions of the Devonshire Association 87: 1–24. In 1470, during the reign of King Henry VI, Hales was appointed Keeper of the Privy Seal, but lost the office on the restoration of King Edward IV in 1471.Fryde, et al. Handbook of British Chronology p. 96 Hales was nominated as Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield on 20 September 1459, and was consecrated on 25 November 1459. He died between 15 and 30 September 1490,Fryde, et al. Handbook of British Chronology p. 254 aged about 90,Vivian, p.439 and was buried in Lichfield Cathedral.Prince, p.457
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