John Vesey - Life

Life

He was born John Harman, probably about 1462, the son of a yeoman farmer, in a farmhouse now known as Moor Hall Farm, Sutton Coldfield. He was educated at Magdalen College, Oxford where he was awarded a doctorate in Canon and Civil Law and after ordination was appointed Rector of St Mary's, Chester.Bishop Vesey Grammar School was named after him

He became a friend of Thomas Wolsey, also educated at Magdalen. Until 1508 he was Archdeacon of Barnstaple. In 1509, Wolsey became a Canon of Windsor and Chaplain to Henry VIII of England, and Vesey was appointed a Canon of Exeter. Vesey was promoted Bishop of Exeter in 1519 and the King awarded him the temporalities of the see, worth about £1,500 a year. The town of his birth was to benefit greatly from his wealth. In 1527, he obtained permission to enclose a large plot of land close to his birthplace and built a grand house, (which is now the site of Moor Hall Hotel) where he occasionally lived, in great style.

The township of Sutton Coldfield had fallen on hard times and he took it on himself to restore the fortunes of the town and its inhabitants. He prevailed upon the King to grant the town a Royal Charter of incorporation for Sutton in 1528 which entrusted the government of the town to a warden and 24 local inhabitants known together as the Warden and Society of the Royal Town of Sutton Coldfield.

He is credited with rebuilding the aisles of the church, reviving the markets and building a Market place, paving the town, building two stone bridges, founding and endowing a Free Grammar School, Bishop Vesey's Grammar School, and building 51 stone houses.

He survived the fall of Wolsey in 1529 and prospered reasonably under Thomas Cromwell until 1551, where his opposition to Protestant reform caught up with him. He was deprived of his see, and its temporalities, in exchange for a pension of £485 a year. He was restored to the see of Exeter when Queen Mary came to the throne in 1553. He died in 1554 and was buried in Holy Trinity Church on Trinity Hill, Sutton Coldfield, which is annually visited by the school in a ceremony.

Sutton Coldfield was granted the Royal Tudor Rose by King Henry VIII in thanks for being aided by a young lady who shot dead, with an arrow, a wild boar which was charging at the King. He asked for the person responsible to come forward and a young lady of Sutton Coldfield came out of the trees. He also granted the town his Tudor Rose. Bishop Vesey, a close friend of the King, was in attendance at this incident. They also returned dispossessed land to the young lady's family.