Individual Details

http://homepages.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~clopton/peche.htm

John Clopton was Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk. Born 1423 in Long Melford, County Suffolk, England, about 3 miles northwest of Sudbury and 10 miles south of Bury St. Edmunds, and died Bet. November 4, 1494 and November 16, 1497 in Long Melford, County Suffolk, England and buried Holy Trinity Church, Long Melford. He married Alice Darcy, of Maldon, County Essex, daughter of Robert Darcy and Alice Fitzlangley. She was born in Maldon, County Essex, probably, and baptized at All Saints' Church, Maldon, about eight miles east of Chelmsford, and died Bef. April 1454 in Long Melford, probably, and buried Holy Trinity Church, Long Melford.

A widower with five children, John Clopton, courted young Elizabeth Paston. She refused his marriage proposal, and her parents locked her in a dark room without food and almost beat her to death. Bloody but definitely unbowed, she held her ground. John would spend the rest of his long life overseeing the construction of Long Melford's Holy Trinity Church. And Elizabeth, why, she married twice, and became one of the wealthiest women in England. In 1485, John was summoned to be made a Knight of the Bath at the coronation planned for the young Edward V. However, while John was shining his armor, his kinsman was busy plotting murder, and John's chances of becoming a knight died along with the little Princes in the Tower.

Birth	1423
Death	Bef 16 Nov 1497	Long Melford, Suffolk, England
Marriage		Alice Darcy

Spouse	Alice Darcy ( - 1454)
Child	William Clopton (1450 - )

Father	William Clopton ( - 1446)
Mother	Margery Francis ( - 1424)