Nicholas Wadham (1472–1542)

[2][3] His inherited landholdings over three counties included Merryfield in Ilton in Somerset,[2] Catherston Leweston in Dorset,[4] and Edge in Branscombe in Devon.

[2] From 1509 to 1520 he was Captain of the Isle of Wight, responsible for the island's defence, and although he is not known to have fought in the French and Scottish campaigns of 1512 and 1513, as a commissioner of array for Hampshire from 1511 he held musters on the mainland at Southampton in 1512 and Portsmouth in 1514.

[2] In 1520 he accompanied King Henry VIII to his meetings with King Francis I of France at the Field of the Cloth of Gold and with the Emperor Charles V. Made a JP for Dorset in 1521,[2] both Sir Nicholas and his uncle, Sir Edward Wadham, were jurors in Bristol at the indictment for treason in May 1521 of Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham.

[7] After serving again as Sheriff of Somerset and Dorset in 1534, in October 1535 he asked Cromwell if he could be continue for another year, in order not to lose the revenues of the post, but his request was turned down.

[2] However, he was probably re-elected as MP for Somerset in 1536, when his link with Queen Jane Seymour, who was his niece by marriage, would have been relevant, and in 1540 was named JP for all the western counties.