Court of Chancery plea

To the very reverend father in God, the bishop of Winchester, Chancellor of England

[Henry Beaufort]

Your poor servants, if you please, John Craven and Simon Irby pray very humbly that whereas they took certain prisoners at the battle of Agincourt [Achyngcourt], it is so that one William Buckton [Bukton’], esquire, by force and wrongfully, has [taken] the said prisoners from the said supplicants and has, against their will and assent, ransomed and released them, without having made any satisfaction to the king for that which pertains to him, which would be to the great damage and prejudice to the rights of our same very sovereign lord the king, and, beyond this, to the loss of the poor [estates] of the said supplicants, if they should not have your very helpful aid and lordship now. And whereas, also, the said supplicants have come to understand that a certain quantity of money, amounting to around the sum of 200 marks, a parcel of the ransom of the said prisoners, is still in the hands of one Maud Salveyn, wife of the treasurer of Calais, may it please your very reverend father in God to grant to the said supplicants a writ addressed to the said treasurer of Calais, firmly charging and enjoining him that the said sum in the hand of his said wife be kept and delivered to no one until it be tried by right and law to whom it shall appertain, and that our said lord the king shall have [what is due to him] of that, and, moreover, that of your very abundant grace you will cause the said William Buckton to come before your very gracious presence in order to declare to you the names of the said prisoners, for God and as a work of charity.