Boteler, Ralph, first Baron Sudeley (c.13941473)
Boteler, Ralph, first Baron Sudeley (c.13941473), soldier and administrator. Boteler had been made a Garter knight by April 1440, and on 6 June 1441 he became chamberlain of the king's household (a post he held until 1 April 1447). Three months later, on 10 September 1441, he was created Baron Sudeley by a royal letter patent which was authorized by parliament. He was the first peer to be created by Henry VI. He could have been Lord Sudeley by prescription and inheritance rather than by royal act, for his ancestors were lords of the barony of Sudeley, and John Sudeley had been summoned individually to parliaments in the reigns of Edward I and Edward II, but honouring Boteler as a baron by patent may have been prompted by his mother's still being possessed of the manor of Sudeley, the caput of the barony. On 7 July 1443 Sudeley became treasurer of England, in succession to Ralph, Lord Cromwell, holding that office until December 1446. By this time he had become a close associate of the earl of Suffolk, whom he replaced as steward of the royal household on 3 February 1447. He protested when Suffolk fell from power in 1450, but remained steward until 20 July 1457, even during the first protectorate of the duke of York, Suffolk's bitter rivalno doubt it helped that Sudeley had served with York in France. Sudeley did, however, stand with the king against York at the first battle of St Albans in 1455. After the accession of Edward IV in 1461 Sudeley fell out of national politics, though he attended Edward's first parliament, and remained a JP. (Reeves)
Biographical source include;
- A. C. Reeves, Sept 2004, Boteler, Ralph, first Baron Sudeley (c.13941473) Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press) online edn, Jan 2008 online copy (subscription may be needed)