John Hotham VIII, Esquire

John Hotham VIII esquire, of Scorborough, Yorkshire, son and heir of Sir John Hotham VII and his wife Elizabeth Eure was probably born about 1435.

He married, about 1457, Isabel, daughter of Sir Robert Hildyard of Winestead, Yorkshire by his wife Katherine, daughter and one of the heirs of Sir Thomas de la Haye of Spaldington, Yorkshire [1]. In November 1458, when his son and heir John was born, John Hotham VIII and Isabel were living in Ladythorpe in Fenwick, Yorkshire [2]. Isabel's brother Robert Hildyard was holding the manor of Ladythorpe of John Hastings at his death in 1501 [3].

According to the Kingston upon Hull inquisition post mortem of his father taken on 11 September 1461, "The jury say that the said John Hotham son and heir of John Hotham miles, died on Palm Sunday last" [4], which shows that he died in the battle of Towton, Yorkshire on 29 March 1461, together with his father Sir John Hotham VII. He left a son John Hotham IX, aged two years who was heir to his father and grandfather.

Isabel married secondly, as his second wife, Sir Thomas Metham who died on 12 September 1498 [5]. Isabel survived her second husband and is said to have died in 1505. In Hilary term 1505, Isabel Metham, widow, executrix of Sir Thomas Metham, knight, sued Nicholas and William Girlington in a plea of debt [6].

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[1] Blair, Visitations of the North, Part III, 136,“Isabella filia Roberti Helyard = Iohannes Hotham = renupta Dominus Thomas de Metham miles.”

[2] TNA: C 140/78/101 as cited in Saltmarshe, History of the Hothams, 86.

[3] Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, Series 2, Henry VII, vol. 2 (1915), 422, No. 669.

[4] TNA: C 140/2/20 as cited in Saltmarshe, History of the Hothams, 80.

[5] Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, Series 2, Henry VII, vol. 2 (1915), 113, No. 169.

[6] Court of Common Pleas, CP 40/971, m. 462d.