Henry of Wingham

Henry of Wingham († July 13, 1262 in Stepney ) was an English clergyman. From 1255 to 1260 he was royal chancellor and from 1259 Bishop of London .

Origin and rise to royal chancellor

Henry of Wingham was from Wingham in Kent . As a royal official he bought clothes and horses to help Henry III's campaign. to prepare for Gascony in 1242 . From 1246 to 1251 he administered as escheator the fallen royal fiefs south of the Trent . To this end, he served in 1248 as administrator of the vacant diocese of Bath and Wells . On behalf of the king, he traveled to France in 1252 and was apparently in Gascogne , which belonged to the English king, until the summer of 1254 . After returning to England, he was appointed royal chancellor on January 5, 1255.

Service as Royal Chancellor and election as Bishop of London

However, due to a recurring illness, Wingham was often unable to exercise his office. Walter of Merton then served as Keeper of the Great Seal and as his representative . As a nobility opposition to Heinrich III in 1258 . rebelled, Wingham was involved in the formulation of the Provisions of Oxford , the reform program of the rebels. He had to swear that as Chancellor he would only seal current business and otherwise no papers without the approval of the new State Council. Unlike in the Provisions of Oxford, Wingham was not reassigned to his office annually. In November 1259 he accompanied the king to France, where the latter sealed the Treaty of Paris . He received a new seal, which showed a king with a scepter but no sword. In 1260 he was a member of a committee of six bishops investigating allegations against Simon de Montfort , one of the leaders of the aristocratic opposition . The king thanked him for his services by awarding him spiritual offices. Wingham held several benefices in Kent, and from 1257 he was Chancellor of the Diocese of Exeter and Dean of the collegiate church of St Martin's-le-Grand in London. In 1256, however, the attempt by the king to have him elected Bishop of Ely instead of Hugh of Balsham failed .

Bishop of London

In February 1259, Wingham was elected Bishop of Winchester in place of Aymer de Lusignan , the king's half-brother who had been elected bishop in 1250 but was still not consecrated. However, this choice was not recognized by Pope Alexander IV . Instead, Wingham was elected Bishop of the Diocese of London on June 29, 1259 . Already on July 11th, the temporalities of the diocese were handed over to him, but his episcopal ordination did not take place until February 1260. With the handover of the temporalities he had resigned his other spiritual offices, and on October 18th, 1260 he resigned as royal chancellor. It is unclear whether he resigned from office due to illness or whether he wanted to take more care of his diocese. Beginning in 1261 accompanied Wingham the Princess Beatrix , than this to her husband John in the Brittany traveled. In May 1261 he took part in a synod of the Canterbury ecclesiastical province in Lambeth . After his death, Wingham was buried in St Paul's Cathedral in London.

Web links

• AJ Musson: Wingham, Henry of (d. 1262). In: Henry Colin Gray Matthew, Brian Harrison (Eds.): Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , from the earliest times to the year 2000 (ODNB). Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004, ISBN 0-19-861411-X , ( oxforddnb.com license required ), as of 2004

predecessor	Office	successor
William of Kilkenny	Lord Chancellor of England 1255–1260	Nicholas of Ely
Fulk basset	Bishop of London 1260–1262	Henry of Sandwich