Richard Assheton of Middleton

Richard's grandfather was Sir Ralph Assheton who was knighted by the Duke of Gloucester at the capture of Berwick (1482) and married Margaret Barton, the heiress of Middleton.

An heraldic visitation in 1533 by Clarenceux King of Arms Thomas Benolt noted that Richard had captured the courtier John Forman, sergeant porter to James IV of Scotland and Alexander Burnett, Sheriff of Aberdeen, at Flodden.

He commissioned the "Flodden Windows" depicting himself and his wife, and seventeen captains of the archers, and the priest Henry Taylor who blessed them before the battle, commemorating them each by name in stained glass.

[3] The main inscription on the glass was, as described in 1845; "Orate pro bono statu Richardi Assheton et eorum qui hanc fenestra(m) fieri fecerunt quoru(m) no(m)ina et imagines ut supra ostendatur.

Anno d(omi)ni, MCCCCC(X)V", meaning "Pray for the wellbeing of Richard Assheton and those whose names and images they caused to be made in the window shown above, 1515."