Son of John, schoolmaster. Born at Thaxted, Essex. School,
Tilty (private). Admitted sizar at St John's, May 28, 1686; B.A. 1689-90; M.A. 1693; B.D. 1701; D.D. 1718. Fellow, 1694-1722. Senior Bursar 1715-1720.
Ordained deacon (London) 4 March, 1693-4. Vicar of Patrixbourne, Kent, 1698-1752.
Rector of Staplehurst, Kent, 1719-52. Died 5 January, 1753, aged 85. Buried at Patrixbourne. Author, Sermons. Brother
of Charles (1695).
Studied at Shrewsbury School, later admitted to St. John's College as sizar and awarded B.A. in 1680/1. Awarded M.A. in 1684 and DD (Lambeth) in 1716. Consecrated as Bishop of Chichester in October 1722.
Thomas Bourchier was an English cardinal and Archbishop of Canterbury. He was the son of William Bourchier and Anne of Gloucester, and the half-brother of Humphrey Stafford, 1st Duke of Buckingham (father of Lady Margaret Beaufort’s third husband, Sir Henry Stafford). Educated at Oxford University, Thomas was appointed Chancellor of the University in 1434. In the same year, he was made Bishop of Worcester and in 1443, consecrated as Bishop of Ely. In 1454, Thomas was appointed Archbishop of Canterbury and also served briefly as Lord Chancellor of England from 1455. He was made a cardinal in 1467 and died in 1486 at Knole House, Kent. He was buried at Canterbury Cathedral.
Admitted as sizar (aged 15) to St. John's in 1637. Born in Lincolnshire.
Robert Booth matriculated as a sizar at St John's, 1565, graduated BA 1571, MA 1574, and was made a Fellow of St John's in 1573, where he also served as Bursar. He came from Cheshire and was probably the son of John Booth of Dunham Massey. Booth seems to have been in the household of the Countess of Shrewsbury and it was through his advocacy that St John's Second Court was built. He made a bequest of £300 to pay for a fountain in Second Court, but the money was used for other purposes
Henry Dawes Bonsey was born the third son of William Henry Bonsey, of Slough, Buckinghamshire. He earned his BA from St John’s College, Cambridge in 1874. He was admitted to the Inner Temple in 1872, and called to the bar in 1875. He was a reporter for the Law Times, Queen’s Bench Division, and also stood as Recorder of Bedford from 1910-1912, and Judge of County Court No. 2 from 1911.
Bonsey married his wife, Helen Jane, in 1898. He died in Newcaste-upon-Tyne on the 12th of May 1919, aged 68.
William Bolton was a canon of the Augustinian order, prior of St. Bartholomew’s in West Smithfield, London, and master of the king’s works. While little information survives concerning the early years of his life, Bolton is known to have attended St. Mary’s College, Oxford, between 1501 and 1503, with his election at St. Bartholomew’s confirmed by the bishop of London in 1505. As a royal adminstrator, Bolton oversaw a number of important building projects, including the chapel of Henry VII and the monument to Lady Margaret Beaufort in Westminster Abbey, and from 1517, the reconstruction of New Hall in Boreham, Essex. He is cited as master of the king’s works in the will of Henry VII (1509), but is likely to have occupied this position from around 1504 onwards. In addition to his royal engagements, Bolton also oversaw important reconstruction of the priory church at St. Bartholomew’s between 1513 and 1517. In 1522, he received preferment as rector of Harrow on the Hill in Middlesex. He died in London in 1532 and was buried at St. Bartholomew’s.
Geoffrey Blythe was educated at Eton College and King’s College, Cambridge, the latter of which he is recorded as having entered in 1483. He was ordained as a priest on 4th April 1496. From 1503 until his death, Blythe served as the Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield. He was appointed president of the Council of Wales and the Marshes from 1512 to 1524.
Dr. Sandra Billington was born on 10th September 1943. After working in theatre including gaining a scholarship to RADA and working with Mike Leigh, she attended Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge. There, she became fascinated by folklore, theatre and disorder in the Middle Ages. She was Lecturer and Reader in Renaissance Theatre at the University of Glasgow from 1979 to 2003, a specialist in Shakespeare and folklore. She was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh from 1998 to 2005.
Her books include ‘Mock Kings in Medieval Society and Renaissance Drama’ (1991), ‘Midsummer: A cultural sub-text from Chretien de Troyes to Jean Michel’ (2001), and ‘Coming up for the third time’ (2011). She also edited ‘The Concept of the Goddess’ with Miranda Aldhouse-Green in 1986. Her book ‘A Social History of the Fool’ won the Folklore Society's Katharine Briggs Folklore Award in 1984. She also wrote an article on 16th Century Drama in St. John’s College, Cambridge which was published in February 1978 in the ‘Review of English Studies’ Vol. XXIX, Issue 113.
Third son of William Billingsley (d. 1553), haberdasher, and his wife, Elizabeth Hardy (or Harlow). Matriculated pensioner at St John's College in 1550; scholar, 1551. Billingsley did not take his degree, and was apprenticed to a haberdasher in London and rose to serve four terms as Master of the Haberdashers' Company. He was alderman of two London wards, was senior alderman in 1596, and elected Lord Mayor of London in December 1596. He was knighted in 1597. Billingsley translated works including Euclid's Elements of Geometry (1570). A 'Mathematical preface' was contributed to this by John Dee, in which he classified and described the mathematical arts, and corrected the translation of passages which Billingsley had failed to understand. Billingsley married first, Elizabeth Bourne (1541/2-1577), with whom he had five children; secondly, Bridget (d. 1588), daughter of Sir Christopher Draper and widow (husband's name not known); thirdly, Kathleen Killigrew, widow of [first name unknown] Trappe; fourthly (in 1598) Elizabeth (d. 1605/6), daughter of Richard Peacocke of Finchley and widow of Rowland Martyn; fifthly, Susan Tracey (d. 1633), widow of [first name unknown] Barger. As well as leaving money to St John's to found scholarships he left money to Emmanuel College to buy land.
William Bill was Master of St John's (1546/7 to 1551), Vice-Chancellor of the University (1548) and twice Master of Trinity College (1551-1553, 1558-1561), Provost of Eton College (1558-1561) and Dean of Westminster (1560-1561).
Bill was born in Ashwell, Hertfordshire and had two brothers and two sisters. His brother, Thomas became physician to Henry VIII. William was educated at St John's and was elected a Fellow in 1534. He received his B.D. 1544-1546.
Admitted to St. John's in 1696; matric. 1699; B.A. 1699/1700. Judge of the Prerogative Court, 1714-1751.
Dr George Colin Lawder Bertram was born in Worcester in April 1911, the son of Frank Bertram, Deputy Director of Civil Aviation, Air Ministry. He read Natural Sciences at St John’s College, Cambridge, graduating BA in 1932 and gaining a PhD in 1939. He was awarded the Polar Medal in 1937, after taking part in the British Graham Land Exhibition from 1934-37 as Biologist.
Bertram was appointed Tutor at St John’s in 1945 and became Senior Tutor in 1965, serving in this position until 1972. During his time as a Tutor he was the Director of the Scott Polar Research Institute for eight years between 1949 and 1957. Throughout his life he published numerous papers and books on the arctic, zoological and population. He remained a Fellow of the College from 1972 until his death in 2001.
He married Kate Ricardo in 1939, and was survived by four sons.
Obituary in The Eagle: Vol 83, 2001, p. 69
Admitted pensioner (age 15) at St John's, June 24, 1664. Son of William, deceased, of Ely, Cambridgeshire. Born there. School, Perse, Cambridge. B.A. 1667-8; M.A. 1671; LL.D. 1679. Fellow, 1674-1723. Senior Bursar 8 March 1694 to 21 March 1715. Died Oct. 29, 1723. Buried at Chesterton.
Benians was born in Goudhurst, Kent in 1880. His father was the headmaster of Bethany School in Goudhurst, and it was here that Benians received his schooling. He was admitted to St John's in 1899 and achieved his BA in 1902. He became Lightfoot Scholar in 1903, Allen Scholar in 1903, and achieved his MA as well as being the Adam Smith Prizeman in 1906. He also became a Fellow in 1906, and then in 1911 he was elected to the Albert Kahn Travelling Fellowship. For the period 1913-19, Benians was a Local Adviser to Indian Students. He was appointed Lecturer in History in 1910, became a Tutor in 1918, and Senior Tutor in 1927. In the same year he was made University Lecturer in History, specialising in the history of the British colonies and dependencies, and the United States of America. He was Master of St John's from 1933 until his death in 1952, and served as Vice-Chancellor of the University 1939-41. In 1939 he was awarded an honorary LittD from Trinity College Dublin, before then also becoming an Honorary Fellow in 1947.
Benians married Sylvia Mary Dodd, daughter of J. Thoedore Dodd, at St Giles', Oxford in 1918, and together they had one son and two daughters. He died on 13 February 1952.
Sister of John Hay Beith, alias the writer Ian Hay (B.A. 1898).
A trusted official in the household of Lady Margaret Beaufort, treasurer to Thomas Wolsey, and bailiff of Cheshunt, Hertfordshire and possibly also of Kimbolton in Huntingdon. Bedell married Cecily Crathorne around 1506. He died in July 1518 and was buried in Westminster Abbey. In his will, Bedell attributed all of his wealth to Lady Margaret Beaufort.
Beaufort, Margaret, Countess of Richmond and Derby
Lady Margaret Beaufort was mother to King Henry VII of England and foundress of St. John’s College. Born on 31st May 1443 at Bletsoe Castle in Bedfordshire, she was the daughter of Margaret Beauchamp of Bletsoe and John Beaufort, 1st Duke of Somerset, and a descendant of John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster. Margaret’s first marriage to John de la Pole, Duke of Suffolk, took place c.1450, although this marriage was never recognised by Margaret herself and was dissolved in 1453. Her second marriage to Edmund Tudor, half-brother of King Henry VI of England, took place on 1st November 1455, when Margaret was twelve years of age. Soon after, Margaret fell pregnant with Edmund’s child. In November 1456, she was widowed when Edmund, fighting on the Lancastrian side of the Wars of the Roses, was captured by Yorkist forces and died in captivity at Carmarthen. A few months later, Margaret gave birth to her only son, the future Henry VII of England, at Pembroke Castle in Wales, where she was protected by her brother-in-law, Jasper Tudor.
In 1458, Margaret married Sir Henry Stafford, the son of Humphrey Stafford, 1st Duke of Buckingham. While the couple bore no children, Margaret enjoyed a long and close relationship with her husband until his death in 1471. Margaret’s fourth and final marriage to Thomas Stanley, the Lord High Constable and King of Mann, took place in June 1472.
After the success of her son, Henry, in securing the crown at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485, Margaret benefited significantly from her newfound authority as the King’s mother and wielded considerable power within the royal court. She was highly influential and a wealthy landowner and patron, generously donating money for the foundation of schools and colleges, including God’s House, Cambridge, which was refounded in 1505 as Christ’s College, and St. John’s College, founded in 1511 after her death with money from her estate. The Lady Margaret Professorship in Divinity, held respectively at Oxford and Cambridge universities, was established in her name in 1502.
Margaret died on 29th June 1509 and was buried in the Henry VII Chapel at Westminster Abbey, in a tomb created by the Florentine sculptor, Pietro Torrigiano. She remains a central figure in the history of the early Tudor dynasty and in the foundation of St. John’s College.