Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 62.djvu/199

 Wingfield was in 1533 one of the commissioners appointed to inquire. In the autumn and winter of 1530–1 he largely added to the defences. His successor, Lord Berners, was appointed deputy of Calais on 27 March 1531 upon the terms that he should pay Wingfield a hundred marks yearly during his tenure of office. He continued to reside in Calais, of which he became mayor in 1534. He had a valuable property in the outskirts of the town, four thousand acres in extent, which he had rented of the crown since 1530 for 20l. per annum. It had been a marsh, which Wingfield drained, thereby impairing the defences of the town. Upon the adverse report of a commission on the matter, the houses Wingfield had built were destroyed and the sea let in. Wingfield's grievance against Lord Lisle, who had succeeded Berners as deputy, culminated in a quarrel in December 1535 as to the relative rights of the mayor and deputy. The king supported Lisle, and Wingfield was threatened with expulsion from the council. This was followed in July 1536 by the introduction of a bill into parliament for the revocation of Wingfield's grant. The bill passed the commons, but with difficulty, and was withdrawn, Wingfield being persuaded to surrender his patent to the king on 25 July. In return for this, and as a very inadequate compensation for his losses, Wingfield received a grant on 1 Feb. 1537 of lands in the neighbourhood of Guisnes of the yearly rental value of 56l. Wingfield, however, now brought an action at Guisnes against the minor officials concerned in the destruction of his property. Lisle stayed the proceedings, and Wingfield retaliated by procuring the election of Lisle's enemy, Lord Edmund Howard, as mayor of Calais. Howard was, however, displaced, and Wingfield in January 1538 renewed his action before the courts at Westminster.

Wingfield died on 18 March 1539. His will, dated 25 March 1538, was proved on 12 Nov. 1539. Its provisions are set out in Anstis (ii. 229). He married Joan, widow of Thomas Clinton, lord Clinton and Say, who survived him, but left no issue.

Wingfield's credulity, pedantry, pride, and contentiousness are graphically described by Brewer. He was, like his brothers, a man of superior education and proficient in French as well as in German. He is said by Anstis to have caused to be printed at Louvain about 1513 a book entitled ‘Disceptatio super dignitate et magnitudine Regnorum Britannici et Gallici habita ab utriusque Oratoribus et Legatis in Concilio Constantiensi.’ He was patron of the college of Rushworth or Rushford, Norfolk. In 1520 he was specially admitted at Lincoln's Inn (Registers, i. 39). During the greater part of his life he was a strenuous opponent of Lutheranism, but on 25 Feb. 1539, shortly before his death, he wrote Henry a letter extolling his ecclesiastical policy and lamenting his own ‘former ignorance.’

[Brewer and Gairdner's Cal. of Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, contains hundreds of despatches to and from Wingfield and other references to him. See also Cal. State Papers, Spanish and Venetian series; Grafton's Chron., ed. H. Ellis, 1812; Chron. of Calais (Camden Soc.), 1846; Bernardi Andreæ Annales Hen. VII (Rolls Ser.), 1858; Polydore Vergil's Historiæ Anglicæ (Leyden), 1651; Ashmole's Institution of the Garter, 1672; Anstis's Register of the Garter, 1724, 2 vols.; Lodge's Peerage of Ireland, ed. Archdall, 1789, vol. v.; Collectanea Topographica, 1837 vol. iv., 1838 vol. v.; Visitation of Huntingdonshire (Camden Soc.), 1849; State Papers of Henry VIII (1830–52), vols. i. ii. vii. viii.; Brewer's Reign of Henry VIII, 1884, 2 vols.; Creighton's Hist. of the Papacy, 1887, vol. iv.; Powerscourt's Wingfield Muniments.] 

WINGHAM or WENGHAM, HENRY (d. 1262), bishop of London, was born at Wingham in Kent. He was probably at first a clerk in the exchequer, as 200l. was entrusted to him in 1241–2 to be expended in the king's service, and in 1245–6 he and John de Grey, justice of Chester, were assigned to assess the tallage of that city. He was then one of the king's escheators (Excerpt. e Rot. Fin. i. 458–64, ii. 4–36). He was appointed chamberlain of Gascony, and in 1252 he was sent to inquire into the complaints of the Gascons against the government of Simon de Montfort. The king seems to have suspected him of being too favourable to the Gascons, for he sent another commission to make renewed inquiry (, v. 277, 288–9;, Simon de Montfort, p. 339). Wingham was also employed on two embassies into France. As early as 2 July 1253 he was probably connected with the chancery, and on 5 Jan. 1255 the great seal was delivered into his custody (, i. 68–9;, v. 485).

When, on 10 May 1256, the election of Hugh de Belisale to the bishopric of Ely was quashed by the efforts of the king and the archbishop of Canterbury, Wingham was recommended by Henry without his consent. He dissuaded the king from pressing the matter (, v. 589, 635). He received, however, in 1257 the chancellorship of Exeter, and soon after