John Markham

Sir John Markham (died 1479) was an English judge and Chief Justice of the King's Bench.

Origins

Markham was the son of John Markham, a judge of the Common Pleas, by either his first or second wife. Francis Markham, in his manuscript 'History of the Family’, written in 1606, Thoroton in his 'History of Nottinghamshire', and Wotton in his ' Baronetage’ described him as the son of the second wife, but the writ of dower which she brought in 1410 against 'John, son and heir of her husband by his wife Elizabeth,' seems to point the other way. His extreme youth when his father died, however, makes it almost certain that he was a son by the second marriage.

Career

He does not appear as an advocate until 1430, having studied the law, according to a doubtful authority, at Gray's Inn. At Easter 1440 he was made a serjeant-at-law, served the king in that capacity, and on 6 February 1444 was raised to a seat on the king's bench. In the subsequent troubles, though he probably took no active part, he was popular with the Yorkists. He and his elder brother Robert were both made knights of the Bath at the coronation of Edward IV. In October 1450 he reproved an enemy of John Paston for the injuries done to Paston, and for 'ungoodly' private life. On the accession of Edward IV he was immediately promoted to the office of chief justice of the king's bench, 13 May 1461, in place of Sir John Fortescue. He was credited with having procured a knighthood for Yelverton, 'who had loked to have ben chef juge,' to console him for his disappointment. On 23 January 1469 Markham was superseded by Sir Thomas Billing.

John Markham (Royal Navy officer)

Admiral John Markham, (13 June 1761 – 13 February 1827) was a Royal Navy officer of the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries who is best known for his service at the Admiralty as a supporter of Earl St Vincent and later as MP for Portsmouth.

Life

John Markham was born in 1761 at Westminster, second son to William Markham, the Archbishop of York, and Sarah. He was educated at Westminster School. In March 1775, he joined the Royal Navy at the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War. He served under George Elphinstone in HMS Romney and HMS Perseus.

Going to the West Indies in February 1777, the Perseus captured another privateer, to which again young Markham was sent as prize-master, and a third time, in May, he was appointed in a like capacity to a large merchant-ship, captured on the coast of Carolina. He had with him four men and a boy from the Perseus, and four of the prisoners, americanised Frenchmen, to assist in working the ship. During a violent gale the ship sprang a leak, and became waterlogged. The English seamen, growing desperate, got dead drunk, and the Frenchmen, arming themselves as they best could, attacked Markham, who was at the helm. He succeeded, however, in beating them below. The ship, too, though waterlogged, was laden with barrel-staves, and kept afloat until her crew were rescued by a passing vessel. Some months later, he arrived in England, to find his family in mourning for him, Elphinstone having written that he had certainly been lost with the ship.

John Markham (disambiguation)

John Markham was an English judge.

John Markham may also refer to: