Sir Thomas Offley (c. 1500/05 – 1582) was a Sheriff of London and Lord Mayor of London during the reign of Queen Mary I of England. A long-serving alderman of London, he was a prominent member (and once Master) of the Worshipful Company of Merchant Taylors,Consult: A. Saunders and M.P. Davies, The History of the Merchant Taylors' Company (Maney Publishing, 2004). thrice Mayor of the Staple, and a named founding Assistant of the Muscovy Company.J.H. Lupton, 'Offley, Thomas', Dictionary of National Biography; E.L. Furdell, 'Offley, Thomas (c.1505–1582), mayor of London', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
Origins and early life
Thomas Offley was the elder of two adult sons of William Offley, a mercer of Stafford, by his first wife, probably of the Dorrington family of Stafford, whose sister (aunt of Thomas) was married to a member of the Cradock family prominent in Stafford.Both DNBs make Thomas Offley's mother a Cradock by birth. The Offley Manuscript states that she was born Dorrington, and that William Offley's mother Margery became Dillarne by a second marriage. The Chester inscription (of 1600) makes Thomas's mother Elizabeth Dillorne. Consult: G.C. Bower (ed.), 'A Manuscript relating to the family of Offley', in H.W. Forsyth Harwood (ed.), The Genealogist (Quarterly), New Series XIX (London and Exeter 1903), pp. 2–11, 83–88, 149–53, at pp. 2–3. ('The Offley Manuscript.') Also: G.C. Bower and H.W.F. Harwood, 'Pedigree of Offley', The Genealogist (Quarterly), New Series XIX (London and Exeter 1903), pp. 217–231; New Series XX (1904), pp.49–56, pp. 78–86, and pp. 268–74 (the Chester tomb inscription). William Offley was Bailiff of Stafford in 1510–11,A. Thrush, 'Offley, Sir John (1586–1645) of Madeley, Staffs. and London', in A. Thrush and J.P. Ferris (eds), The History of Parliament; 1604–1629 (Cambridge University Press 2010), History of Parliament online and after the family moved to Chester he was alderman of that city, and Sheriff in 1517. William Offley remarried to a widow Elizabeth Wright (née Rogerson), and had altogether 26 children, many by his second wife, several of whom made careers in London.See his (lost) tomb inscription at St Peter's church, Chester, set up c. 1600, in Bower and Harwood, 'Pedigree of Offley' (1904), at pp. 270–72. See also Wilson's Pedigree of Offley, in H.B. Wilson, A History of the Parish of St Lawrence Pountney, London (C., J., G. & F. Rivington, London 1831), pp. 230–31.The inscription on a supposed portrait of William Offley at Chester (G. Ormerod, The History of the County Palatine and City of Chester, 3 Vols (Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor and Jones, London 1819), I, p. 286, note h.) is apparently derived from the tomb inscription recorded by Elias Ashmole in Bodleian Library (Oxford) MS Ashmole 584, p. 280, which was set up under the terms of the Will of his son William Offley of London, P.C.C. 1601, who left the wording of the inscription to the discretion of his executors. The evidence is therefore not contemporary with William Offley.
When aged about 12 Thomas was sent to London to study under William Lily at St Paul's School. Under Lily he acquired an excellent understanding of Latin and was taught to sing pricksong with the choristers of St Paul's.The Offley Manuscript, pp. 2–11, at pp. 2–3. Thomas became bound for 13 years to Merchandize of the Staple with the Merchant Taylor John Nechylls,His name is spelled in many ways in first sources, but is often differentiated from any variant of 'Nichols' by use of the letter 'e', with or without the terminal 's', and seldom or never with 'o'. Merchant of the Staple at Calais, who was 'of great acquaintance' with Lily.The Offley Manuscript, p. 3. Nechylls was married to Katherine, daughter of Sir Stephen Jenyns (Lord Mayor 1508–09, founder of the Wolverhampton Grammar School 1508–15),W.J. Thoms, A Survey of London written in the year 1598, by John Stow (Chatto & Windus, London 1876), p. 194. who in 1501–02 married Margaret, sister of lawyer and M.P. John Kirton.For John Kirton (c. 1450–1529), see J.C. Wedgwood and A. Holt,The History of Parliament: Biographies of the Members of the Commons House, 1439–1509 (HMSO, London 1936), pp. 517–18. His connection with Edmonton arose through his second marriage, to Anne (née Ruskyn), widow of John Leake of Wyer Hall. Nechylls, Master of the Merchant Taylors in 1522,H.L. Hopkinson, Report on the Ancient Records in the possession of the Guild of Merchant Taylors (Waterlow and sons Limited, 1915), Appendix B, p. 117. was elected alderman of London in 1525 for the Broad Street ward but made suit to be discharged of office,See Petition of 14 February 1535 for diminution of the expenses of the shrievalty, in J. Gairdner (ed.), Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, Henry VIII Vol. 8, January–July 1535 (H.M.S.O., London 1885), p. 78, item 208. (British History Online. Retrieved 19 January 2017). and was not admitted.A.B. Beavan, The Aldermen of the City of London Temp. Henry III to 1912 (Corporation of the City of London, 1913), II, p. 26 (Internet Archive). Some relationships described in this work are unreliable.
Offley summoned his sisters to London, one of whom, Margaret, was in service in Nechylls's household. On Katherine's death Nechylls married her, and promised his daughter and sole heir Joan in marriage to Thomas. Offley was still in Nechylls's service when he died in 1530,Inquisitions post mortem: John Nychill, London (1531–32), T.N.A. C 142/52/81. See G.S. Fry (ed.), Abstracts of Inquisitiones Post Mortem for the City of London: Part 1 (British Record Society, London 1896), 'John Nychills', British History Online (accessed 9 September 2016). and married Joan at about the time of her father's death.J.J. Howard and G.J. Armytage, The Visitation of London in the Year 1568, Harleian Society Vol. I (1869), p. 64. Offley's tomb inscription of 1582 records that they were married for 52 years, see 'Pedigree of Offley' (1904), p. 270. Margaret his sister remarried to the Merchant Taylor and Merchant of the Staple of Calais Stephen Kirton,D. Richardson, ed. K.G. Everingham Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 2nd Edn., Vol. I (2011), pp. 503–04 (13). John Kirton's son, who had been Jenyns's apprentice and godson.Will of Sir Stephen Jenyns (PCC 1523). John Offley, Thomas's full brother, married Alice Rogerson, his own step-sister, and kept house for John Nechylls at his country residence, the Brick House at Hackney.The Offley Manuscript, p. 83. The wealthy brothers Nicholas Leveson (died 1539), Stapler of Calais and Mercer,Admitted to livery of Mercers 1517; Warden 1519–20, etc., see L. Lyell & F.D. Watney (eds), Acts of Court of the Mercers' Company 1453–1527 (Cambridge University Press, 1936), p. 310, and passim. and James Leveson (died 1547),For whom see R.F. Wisker, 'The estates of James Leveson of Wolverhampton (d. 1547)', Staffordshire Archaeological & Historical Society Transactions XXXVII (1995–1996), pp. 119–138. of a prominent Wolverhampton mercantile family,Further information on the Leveson family available at The Sutherland Collection (Staffordshire and Stoke on Trent Archive Service). were engaged in the same circle:See, e.g., a Hackney land transaction between James Leveson with John Offley, and Thomas Offley with Joan his wife, Hilary 24 Henry VIII, in W.J. Hardy and W. Page (eds), 'London and Middlesex Fines: Henry VIII', in A Calendar To the Feet of Fines For London and Middlesex, Vol 2: Henry VII – 12 Elizabeth (London 1893), p. 40 (British History Online, accessed 24 April 2018). Margery Offley, sister of John, Thomas and Margaret, having gained a fortune by a first marriage to Thomas Michell, Ironmonger, remarried to James Leveson around 1530.Bower and Harwood, 'Pedigree of Offley', p. 225. See note to 'Offley of Madeley', in H.S. Grazebrook (ed.), The Heraldic Visitations of Staffordshire made by Sir Richard St George, Norroy, in 1614, and by Sir William Dugdale, Norroy, in the years 1663 and 1664 (Mitchell and Hughes, London 1885), pp. 224–26. (HathiTrust.)
Civic office Offley prospered in business, and his eldest son (of three), Henry, was born in around 1536.Inquisition post mortem: Thomas Offley, knight, Middlesex (1582–83), T.N.A. C 142/200/23.
Despite being disfranchised in May 1546 by certain merchants of the Staple for colouring of wools,T.N.A. Discovery Catalogue: piece description SP 46/5/Part1fo95d-96 and Part1fo96d-97 (State Papers: John Johnson Letter Book). Thomas rose steadily in the Merchant Taylors, becoming Master of the Company in 1547.'Note as to the Offley family', in C.M. Clode, The Early History of the Guild of Merchant Taylors, 2 Vols (Harrison and Sons, London 1888), II, pp. 172–73, 341. In that year he purchased the manor of Madeley, North Staffordshire, from Sir Edward Bray (then Lieutenant of Calais CastleR.J.W. Swales, 'Bray, Sir Edward (by 1492–1558), of Henfield and Selmeston, Suss. and the Vachery, Shere, Surr.', in S.T. Bindoff (ed.), The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1509–1558 (Boydell and Brewer, 1982), (History of Parliament online).) and Dame Joan, daughter and heiress of Sir Matthew Brown,Feet of Fines (Staffordshire), Trinity term, 1 Edward VI, cf. Bower and Harwood, 'Pedigree of Offley' (1903), p. 218 & n. 1. It had formerly been leased to Sir Francis Poyntz. and this remained the family's country seat for several generations.
The many-gabled Tudor manor house, since demolished, is illustrated by Michael Burghers as it appeared in 1686 in Plot's History of Staffordshire, together with the formal gardens and a later east frontage.R. Plot, The Natural History of Stafford-shire (Oxford: printed at the theater, 1686), Table XVI, at p. 223. See Staffordshire Past Track, Madeley Manor House: engraving. He received a grant of arms on 3 May 1547.'Argent on a cross fleury azure between four Cornish choughs sable beaked and legged gules a lion passant guardant or. Crest: a demi lion rampant and azure collar counter-charged holding in his paws an olive branch vert fructed or.' British Library Add. MS. 16940, fol. 202 b, cited in W.A. Thorpe and J. Maynard, 'An Elizabethan Connoisseur', Transactions of the London and Middlesex Archaeological Society, New Series VIII Part 1 (Bishopsgate Institute, London 1938), pp. 31–47, at p. 43, n. 5.
Alderman and sheriff Offley was elected alderman for Portsoken ward in 1549, and transferred to Aldgate ward in 1550, which he represented continuously thereafter until his death in 1582.Beavan, The Aldermen of the City of London II, p. 33. In 1553 he was (as one of six aldermen required of the Mayor George Barne) summoned by the Duke of Northumberland to sign the King's Letters Patent for altering the royal succession.Clode, Early History of the Guild of Merchant Taylors II, p. 106-07. See 'Letters Patent for the Limitation of the Crowne' from the transcript of Ralph Starkey in MS Harl. 35, fol. 364: J.G. Nichols (ed.), The Chronicle of Queen Jane, and of Two Years of Queen Mary, Camden Society Vol. XLVIII (1850), pp. 91–100, at p. 100. In the first year of the reign of Queen Mary I, 1553–54, he served as Sheriff of London, together with William Hewett, Clothworker, in the mayoralty of Sir Thomas White, a foremost figure among the Merchant Taylors. He was the Mayoral nomination of George Barne on 23 July 1553, immediately following the death of King Edward VI, the reign of Lady Jane Gray, the proclamation of Queen Mary and the arrest of the Duke of Northumberland.W.D. Hamilton (ed.), A Chronicle of England During the Reigns of the Tudors, by Charles Wriothesley, Volume II (of 3), Camden Society, New Series Vol. XX (London 1877), p. 90.J.G. Nichols (ed.), The Diary of Henry Machyn, Citizen and Merchant-Taylor of London, Camden Society (London 1848), Original Series Vol. XLII, pp. 35–48.