Sir Thomas Bromley (died 1555) was an English judge of Shropshire landed gentry origins who came to prominence during the Mid-Tudor period. After occupying important judicial posts in the Welsh Marches, he won the favour of Henry VIII and was a member of Edward VI's regency council. He was appointed Chief Justice of the King's Bench by Mary I.
Family-background
Bromley was of a Shropshire gentry family, which traced its origins to Eccleshall in the neighbouring county of Staffordshire and the family had acquired land through marriage in other neighbouring counties. In the mid-15th century, Thomas's grandfather married an heiress from Malpas, Cheshire.Grazebrook and Rylands Part I, p.70 Their allies, the Hills, had married apparently into the same family,Grazebrook and Rylands Part I, p.243 not disdaining marriage for gain, although the family concerned had declined from the medieval nobility Rylands, p. 159-161 to merely yeoman status. Thacker and Lewis, Section 2: Dee corn mills Thomas's uncle William was married to a Hill and the two families were to prosper together in the 16th century.
A number of the Bromleys attained note as lawyers and politicians in the 16th century: Thomas's cousin George was a distinguished member of the Inner Temple: the later Lord Chancellor, Sir Thomas Bromley (1530–1587), and Sir George Bromley (c.1526–89), the justice of Chester, were Thomas's first cousins, once removed.Grazebrook and Rylands Part I, p.77-8
However, Thomas Bromley's own beginnings were not auspicious, as his family was a cadet branch of a then relatively minor family. The dates of his legal training suggest he was born in the early years of the 16th century, probably at the Shropshire home of his parents. He was the second son of Roger Bromley, third son of Roger Bromley of Mitley, Shropshire Jane Jennings, daughter of Thomas Jennings of Walliborne Hall, Church Pulverbatch.
Family tree: the Bromley dynasty
The relationship between the Bromley politicians and lawyers of the 16th century, and between them and their allies in the Hill, Corbet and Newport families, is illustrated in the family tree, c.1450–1650. Based primarily on the Heraldic Visitations of Shropshire and Cheshire, with assistance from the History of Parliament Online.
Legal training The Bromleys were already involved with the Law. George Bromley, Thomas's elder cousin, was an important member of the Inner Temple and had been appointed Autumn Reader for 1508Inderwick, p.11 and Lent Reader for 1509,Inderwick, p.12 although he recused himself when so honoured for Lent 1515.Inderwick, p.35 The first evidence of Thomas Bromley's legal career dates from May 1519, when he was suspended by the parliament of the Inner Temple for offensive behaviour toward the chief governor: "Order that Widdon and Brumley, the younger, be sent out of commons because they evilly behaved themselves towards Master Sutton, the chief governor, at the time of the last vacation."Inderwick, p.46 His penitence was duly recorded in the Law French still widely employed by lawyers at the time: "Thomas Bromele permitte et graunte all compeney de le Inner Tempell de paier mes commons et auteres duetes en le dit Tempell, et de etre goveryn et redresse par les governers et par le dit compeney, et de obaier et performer totes maners ordnaunces de le compeney de le dit Tempell, sur payne detre oust a tous jourz. Pleg, John Whiddon, Thomas Newton"Inderwick, p.47 This was followed by a similar undertaking from Whiddon.
Despite his "youthful indiscretion", Bromley rose fairly quickly to positions of trust and responsibility at the Inn, while presumably making a living primarily from private practice and, increasingly, public appointments to judicial posts. In 1526 the parliament of the Inn appointed him one of the auditors for the building of a wall by the River Thames.Inderwick, p.85-86 In November 1528, as Whiddon, his former accomplice, was reappointed Reader for the following Lent, Bromley was appointed as one of the auditors to the Treasurer of the Inner Temple.Inderwick, p.91 After attending the Lent Reader for two successive years,Inderwick, p.99Inderwick, p.101 in May 1533 Bromley was at last elected Reader for the following autumn.Inderwick, p.102 By February 1534 his standing was such that the Inn admitted one William Walter on his recommendation, free of all charges apart from the cost of his wine.Inderwick, p.110 In June 1539 Bromley was appointed serjeant-at-law by Henry VIII. He was immediately declared the next Autumn Reader, as was the custom. The records of the Inner Temple show that he refused the honour and was fined £10.Inderwick, p.123 However the entry recording this is crossed out, and it is not recorded whether Bromley retracted and performed the office or was pardoned. In November 1539, he was appointed Reader for Lent 1540, but two others were nominated as reserves.Inderwick, p.124 All three were honoured in this way in recognition of their appointment as serjeants-at-law. In the event, Bromley did not lecture for the full term but was replaced by one of his attendants after the second week, "in consideracion that it apperyd suche debylete in the seyde Thomas Bromley that he was not lyke too have keppyd owte the hole redyng in the seyde vacacion of Lente."Inderwick, p.125 The precise nature of his "debility" is unknown but it appears to have affected him often.
Judicial and political career Throughout his time of gradual academic and administrative advancement at the Inner Temple, Bromley was also advancing his political and judicial career.
Member of Parliament
It seems likely that Bromley served as an MP in the English Reformation Parliament of 1529–36. This was first suggested by the historian Albert Pollard. The History of Parliament Online suggests that he might even have served in the succeeding parliaments, a view made plausible by the scantiness of records on the identity of members. The main evidence for his sitting in the English House of Commons is a list of MPs drawn up by Thomas Cromwell, the powerful chief minister and parliamentary fixer of Henry VIII, in 1533. It is headed by Sir George Throckmorton, a prominent religious conservative, and those on it were either of similar opinions or heavily committed to the wool trade, both groups being generally opposed to a break with the Papacy.Bindoff: Appendix VII: Members opposed to a bill in 1533 – Author: S. T. Bindoff Hence it probably lists those likely to oppose the Statute in Restraint of Appeals, a key piece of Reformation legislation. Bromley is listed twice: an entry near the head has been crossed out and he is named again at the foot of the list. His presence on the list means that he had displeased Cromwell. It is also fairly certain evidence that he did sit as an MP for at least some of the parliament after being returned in a by-election. His constituency is unknown but Lostwithiel and Lancaster have been suggested.
A local power base However, Parliament was not to be the main theatre of Bromley's political life. His own native county offered opportunities for gaining political advantage. As there was no resident aristocracy, the Shropshire gentry were the main power in the county and also exercised considerable influence in the cloth town of Shrewsbury, where merchants and lawyers ruled.Coulton, p.40 Once again, his cousin George had beaten the path, becoming Recorder of Shrewsbury and High Sheriff of Shropshire in 1522.Grazebrook and Rylands Part I, p.78
Thomas Bromley secured the freedom of Shrewsbury in 1528 and in 1529 admission to the Drapers' Company of Shrewsbury. Chartered by Edward IV in 1461,Coulton, p.19 it was one of the two guilds that dominated this cloth town (the other being the Mercers). Around 1532 he became Warden of the Company, and at about the same time he was made an alderman – one of the council of 12 that assisted the two bailiffs in running the town.Coulton, p.17 – a post he was to hold until his death. In 1536 he was appointed a Justice of the Peace in Shropshire. By 1537 he had been appointed Recorder of Shrewsbury: its senior legal and judicial officer. As this carried a heavy responsibility for representing the interests of the town in London, it fitted well with his activities at the Inner Temple, requiring him to spend only a little time in Shrewsbury itself.
Bromley was a close friend of Rowland Hill, who was an uncle of George Bromley. Hill's career ran parallel to Bromley's but with even greater success, pairing a regional power base in Shropshire with a spectacular career as a mercer in London: by 1541, the year before he was knighted, he was paying at least 5000 marks a year in tax and in 1549 became the first Protestant Mayor of London.Bindoff: HILL, Sir Rowland (by 1498–1561), of London and Hodnet, Salop. – Author: Helen Miller Between 1539 and 1547, Hill invested a substantial part of his commercial wealth in great quantities of landed property in Shropshire and the neighbouring counties that had been made available by the dissolution of the monasteriesBaugh and Elrington (1989): Domesday Book: 1540–1750 or the abolition of chantries and colleges. Bromley speculated in some of Hill's deals and, like other prominent lawyers, built up considerable estates in his native county, including land at Wroxeter, which became his seat. Among properties he purchased in the area were Eyton on Severn and Aston, both manors formerly belonging to Shrewsbury Abbey. On its sale to Bromley by the Crown in 1540, Aston was attached as a member of Eyton and was passed on along with it to his heirs.Baugh and Elrington (1985): Wellington: Manors and other estates Similarly, near Stanton Long, he bought Oxenbold, partly in the parish of Monkhopton, and a former manor of Wenlock Priory, from John Jennings,Currie: Monkhopton and in 1545 added to it the neighbouring estate of Patton.Currie: Stanton Long
As his status nationally rose through judicial preferment, Bromley was able to shift and consolidate his regional power. He became a Justice of the Peace in the Marcher counties of Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and Herefordshire during 1540–1. At the succession of Edward VI his importance in government reached a stage where the recordership of Shrewsbury was no longer appropriate and he relinquished it to Reginald Corbet, another Hill ally. By this time he had been appointed Custos Rotulorum of Shropshire, the senior post in the county's civil government. By 1552 he had joined the Council in the Marches, the regional representative of central government in much of Wales and the border counties.
Judicial promotion From 1534 Bromley was Justice in Eyre for South Wales. At about the same time, Thomas Cromwell installed Rowland Lee, the Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, as Lord President of the Council in the Marches of Wales.Jones, p.63 Lee was a ruthless reformer, determined to stamp out corruption and to establish a reputation for the organs of justice in his region. Seeing Bromley as a natural ally, he wrote to Cromwell in 1536 and 1537, recommending him for promotion. Lee was the former tutor of Cromwell's children and had considerable influence with him but could not win his support for Bromley, so his continued preferment came only with the loosening of Cromwell's grip on power.
Bromley received his call to the coif, i.e. his writ to become a serjeant-at-law, in the summer of 1539, although it was not to take effect until the day after the Nativity of St. John the Baptist, i.e. 25 June, in 1540. Significantly, another Inner Templar so-honoured at the same time was William Coningsby, an older lawyer who had also earned the hostility of Cromwell and had recently spent ten days in prison.Bindoff: CONINGSBY, William (by 1483–1540), of the Inner Temple, London and Lynn, Norf. – Author: Roger Virgoe The parliament of the Inner Temple decreed a traditional ceremony of leave-taking for them.