[1] There is difficulty in determining if the MP and a Robert Skerne of Yorkshire who served as royal clerk to both Richard II and Henry IV were the same individual.

[1] The earliest record of Skerne's career come from 1389 when he was rewarded by the crown with the keepership of St. Ellen’s hospital (Bracefordspittle) in Yorkshire and the farm of the manor of Willoughton in Lincolnshire which he was still paying rent for in November 1420.

[1] Bray says, in his History of the County of Surrey that Robert lived at Downhall in Canbury, Kingston upon Thames, styled a 'capital messuage' or 'manor', held of Merton Priory situated to the south of the present day railway bridge.

[2] After Joan’s death, some time before January 1431, Skerne gifted one of the messuages to Osney Abbey in return for admission into the fraternity, and arrangements for prayers to be said in memory of his late wife.

[3] The brass bears the Latin inscription: Roberti cista Skerni corpus tenet ista, Marmorie petre, conjugis atque suæ, Qui validus, sidus, disertus, lege peritus; Nobilis, ingenuus, persidiam renuit: Constans sermone, vitâ, sensu, ratione, Communiter cuique justitiam voluit.

The tomb constructed here of marble stone contains All that of Robert Skerne and of his wife remains, He being valiant, faithful, cautious, skilled in law, Noble, ingenious, did treachery abhor: Constant in speech, in life, in feeling and in thought, That justice freely and to all was due, he taught.

May he in heaven rejoice, who lived on earth sincere, Who died upon the fourth of April in the year Of Christ one thousand twenty score and thirty seven.