John Sutton, 1st Baron Dudley, Knight of the Order of the Garter was an English nobleman.
Background
His father was Sir John de Sutton V and his mother was Constance Blount, daughter of Sir Walter Blount. John 1st Baron Dudley married Elizabeth de Berkeley, of Beverstone (died 1478), widow of Edward Charleton, 5th Baron Cherleton and daughter of Sir John Berkeley, of Beverstone, Gloucestershire (1349–1428) and Elizabeth Bettershorne and sister of Eleanor FitzAlan, wife of John FitzAlan, 6th Earl of Arundel, sometime after 14 March 1420.
Career
A diplomat and councillor of Henry VI, he fought in several battles during the Hundred Years War and the, and acted as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland 1428–1430. Born on 25 December 1400, John Sutton was baptised at Barton-under-Needwood, Staffordshire, became 1st Baron Dudley and a Knight of the Garter, and died at Stafford, Staffordshire. The sons of Dudley by this marriage were:
Sir Edmund Sutton
John Sutton Dudley, Knight
William Dudley, Bishop of Durham, 1476–1483.
Oliver Dudley. Dudley was summoned to Parliament from 15 February 1440, by writs directed to "Johanni de Sutton de Duddeley militi", whereby he obtained a Barony by writ as Lord Dudley. He was the first of his family to adopt the surname of Dudley as an alias for Sutton.
"John Dudley, Knyght, Lord Dudley" died testate in his 87th year. His will is dated 17 August 1487.
As Lord Steward in 1422 Sutton brought home the body of King Henry V to England, and was chief mourner and standard bearer at his funeral.
From 1428–1430 he served as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. Dudley fought in several campaigns throughout the period of the wars with France, and on several occasions acted as a diplomat in the mid-1440s, when he also met Charles VII of France. In 1451 he became a Knight of the Garter.
Early on in the he was a resolute defender of the House of Lancaster, but changed his allegiance to York before the Battle of Towton in 1461.
Dudley was wounded and again captured. At Towton (1461) he was rewarded after the battle for his participation on the side of Edward, Earl of March, son of Richard, Duke of New York
On 28 June that year, Edward IV was proclaimed King in London.