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John Yorke (c.1566–1634)

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John Yorke or Yorke (c.1566–1634) was an English landowner and mining entrepreneur.

Career

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He was a son of Peter Yorke and Elizabeth, daughter of William Ingleby of Ripley Castle.[1] He was knighted at Windsor Castle in 1603.[2]

Yorke's right to hunt at Appletreewick was disputed by Francis Clifford, 4th Earl of Cumberland, who contended it was part of the Forest of Skipton. Local landowners quarrelled over the ownership of lucrative lead mines, especially at Bewerley,[3] which Yorke disputed with Stephen Proctor.[4]

Yorke built a smelting mill at Heathfield for his Appletreewick and Stonebeck Down mines, possibly around 1599 when he made an agreement with Thomas Benson for transporting ore across Bewerley common.[5]

Yorke's name was mentioned in investigations following the Gunpowder plot. It was said that Robert and Thomas Wintour had visited his house in Nidderdale shortly before Michaelmas 1605, before visiting Ripley Castle.[6]

Stephen Proctor complained that Yorke hosted Catholic recusant players, led by the Simpson brothers, at Gouthwaite Hall at Christmas 1609 and Candlemas 1610.[7] They performed an illegal interlude which showed a debate between a Catholic priest and minister. The testimony of one of the actors, William Harrison, mentions their repertoire, including King Lear and Pericles.[8][9] The minister of Thirkleby, Robert Fairbank, had a warrant for the arrest of the players. He sent one Robert Brown to take them at the house of the Danby family, but the hosts let them escape.[10]

Proctor claimed that Yorke had harboured Jesuits in priest holes, including John Gerard, and was involved in the Gunpowder Plot. His servants were said to disrupt church services with merry making, "theire piping and revellinge wolde make such a noyse in time of praier, as the mynyster colde not well be heard".[11]

George Abbott, Archbishop of Canterbury took charge of the case because of the mention of John Gerard, and he wrote to James VI and I about progress on 25 January 1612. He thought "new advertisements from Yorkshire" would "give us good light to the powder treason itself". Reports of Gerard in Yorkshire or at Gouthwaite proved illusory, though a further search revealed hidden accommodation in the attic.[12][13] The case came before the Star Chamber, and Yorke was fined £3,000.[14] Yorke and his wife, Lady Julian, were held in the Fleet Prison until their release in February 1617 after their fines were paid.[15][16]

Yorke married Julian Hansby, a daughter of Ralph Hansby of Beverley and Tickhill. She was a Catholic recusant and a great aunt of the diarist Alice Thornton. John Yorke died in 1634. His executors included Christopher Wandesford. He left Gouthwaithe to a nephew, also called John Yorke.[17]

References

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  1. ^ Bernard Jennings, A History of Nidderdale (Huddersfield, 1967), p. 382.
  2. ^ Christopher Howard, Sir John Yorke of Nidderdale, 1566–1634 (London, 1939).
  3. ^ Arthur Raistrick, Lead mining in the mid-Pennines (Truro, 1973), p. 29: John Trevor Cliffe, The Yorkshire Gentry from the Reformation to the Civil War (London, 1969), p. 63.
  4. ^ Andy Wood, "Subordination, Solidarity and the Limits of Popular Agency in a Yorkshire Valley c. 1596-1615", Past & Present, 193 (November 2006), p. 69
  5. ^ Bernard Jennings, A History of Nidderdale (Huddersfield, 1967), p. 154.
  6. ^ Phebe Jensen, "Recusance, festivity, and community", Richard Dutton, Alison Gail Findlay, Richard Wilson, Region, Religion and Patronage: Lancastrian Shakespeare (Manchester, 2003), p. 106: M. S. Giuseppi, HMC Calendar of the Manuscripts of the Marquess of Salisbury at Hatfield, 18 (London, 1940), p. 13.
  7. ^ G. W. Boddy, "Players of Interludes in North Yorkshire in the Early Seventeenth Century", North Yorkshire County Record Office Journal, 3 (Northallerton, 1976), pp. 95-130.
  8. ^ Siobhan Keenan, "The Simpson players of Jacobean Yorkshire and the professional stage", Theatre Notebook, 67:1 (2013), pp. 16–35.
  9. ^ MacDonald P. Jackson, Defining Shakespeare: Pericles as Test Case (Oxford, 2003), p. 38.
  10. ^ G. W. Boddy, "Players of Interludes in North Yorkshire in the Early Seventeenth Century", North Yorkshire County Record Office Journal, 3 (Northallerton, 1976), pp. 107-108.
  11. ^ Phebe Jensen, "Singing Psalms to Horn-Pipes: Festivity, Iconoclasm, and Catholicism in The Winter's Tale", Shakespeare Quarterly, 55:3 (Autumn, 2004), p. 288.
  12. ^ Christopher Howard, Sir John Yorke of Nidderdale, 1656–1634 (London, 1939), pp. 24, 29–33.
  13. ^ John Trevor Cliffe, The World of the Country House in Seventeenth-century England (Yale, 1999), p. 141.
  14. ^ John Southerden Burn, Star Chamber: Notices of the Court and Its Proceedings (London, 1870), p. 78: Cora Louise Scofield, A Study of the Court of Star Chamber: Largely Based on Manuscripts in the British Museum and the Public Record Office (Chicago, 1900), p. 47
  15. ^ Martin Wiggins & Catherine Richardson, British Drama, 1533–1642: 1609–1616 (Oxford, 2012), p. 15.
  16. ^ Bernard Jennings, A History of Nidderdale (Huddersfield, 1967), p. 391.
  17. ^ H. W. Forsyth Harwood, The Genealogist, 20 (London, 1904), p. 25: William Grainge, Nidderdale (Pateley Bridge, 1863), pp. 47–49
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