Sir John Tong to Sir Robert Plumpton

118 Sir John Tong to Sir Robert Plumpton, 11 March [?1495/6]      (No. 211,
        p. 148)

Right worshipfull & my right entyrely beloved Sir and father,¹ I
recomend me vnto you, & thanks the same for your loving dealing in
myne absence, shewed to my tenaunts & servants, & especiall to my
servant Tromton, this bringer, for the good mastership shewed to him
at Yorke, to your cost & charge. My sayd servant shall shew you my
further mynd, to whom it will please you to give credence; & also þat
I may be recomended to my good lady & mother, your wyfe. Jhesu
preserve you. At London þe xith day of March.²

Your owne son Sir John Tong commander of Rybston &
Mownt S. Johns^a

Endorsed: To my right worshipfull & my right hardy welbeloved
neghbor & fadyr Sir Robt Plompton knight

     ^a Appended: Copied the 12th day of May 1613.

     ¹ Sir Robert and Dame Agnes stood sponsors at the birth of the writer, Stapleton,
12on.

     ² After the suppression of the Templars in 1312, Great Ribston, near Plumpton, was
the only one of their seven Yorkshire preceptories to retain an independent position,
VCH, Yorks, iii, 262.

LETTER XCIII.

To my right worshipfull, and my right hartely welbeloved neghbor
and fadyer, Sir Robart Plompton, knight.

    Right worshipfull and my right entirely beloved Sir and father,
I recomend me unto you, and thank the same for your loving deal-
ing in my absence shewed to my tenaunts and servants, and espe-
cially to my servant Tromton, this bringer, for the good mastership
shewed to him at Yorke to your cost and charge. My sayd ser-
vant shall shew you my further mynd, to whom it will please you
to give credence, and also that I may be recommended to my good
lady and mother, your wyfe. Jesu preserve you. At London,
the xith day of March.

                                           Your owne son, Sir JOHN TONG,
                        commander of Rybston an Mownt S. Johns.^a

    ^a At Great Ribstone, in the parish of Hunsingore, near Knaresborough, and at Mount
St John, in the parish of Feliskirk, north riding of Yorkshire, the Knights Hospitallers
of St. John had commanderies. A John Tong was mayor of York in 1477, so that the
writer of this letter was probably his son, to whom at his birth Sir Robert and Lady
Plumpton had stood sponsors. We learn, from the preceding letter and elsewhere,
that he was nephew to Sir John Kendal, prior of St. John's, Clerkenwell, the chief
house of the Order in England, and in the list of burials in the Priory Church are the
names of William Tong, Margaret Tong, and Isabel Tong, the first being also a brother
of the Order. in the volume of the Arch?ologia referred to in the proceding note,
Sir Frederic Madden has printed a curious document, which purports to be the con-
fession of one Bernard de Vignolles, dated at Rouen, 14 Mar. 1495-6, and wherein he
accuses "Sir Jehan Quendal, grant prieur de l'ordre de Saint Jehan de Roddes, Sire
Jehan Thonge, son nepveu, pareillment chevallier du dit ordre," and others, of treason-
able designs to compass the death of the King by necromancy, and of entertaining a
correspondence with Perkin Warbeck, and wishing for his establishment on the throne.
(Vol. XXVII. p. 205.)