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COCKSON (COXSON), Robert (by 1524-54 or later), of Wallingford, Berks.
Available from Boydell and Brewer
Constituency
Dates
Family and Education
b. by 1524.1
Offices Held
Mayor, Wallingford 1553-4.2
Biography
Robert Cockson was a Wallingford mercer, whose goods were valued at £7 for the subsidy assessment of 1545. The statement that he was mayor in 1547 seems to rest on a misreading of the corporation minute book, which names him as mayor only in 1553-4. By 1547 he was the occupant of a house and garden owned by John Pollington, who under his will of that year left them to one Jeremy Smith of Wallingford. Within six months Smith sold the property to another townsman who petitioned Chancellor Rich for redress when Cockson refused to surrender the title deeds in his possession: Cockson answered that he had leased the property on 27 July 1547 from Pollington’s brother Ralph, with whom the freehold remained. He was mayor when returned and held his court at Wallingford on 8 Nov. 1554, four days before the assembly of Parliament. Nothing is known about his part in the House, and in the absence of a will or inquisition post mortem the date of his death cannot be established.3