Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Perburn, John
PERBURN, JOHN (fl. 1316–1343), admiral, son of Robert Perburn, was a native of Yarmouth in Norfolk, and for many years collector of the customs at that port. Between 1312 and 1339 he was fourteen times bailiff of Yarmouth. He seems to have taken an active part in the private war which Yarmouth waged against the Cinque ports in the end of the thirteenth and beginning of the fourteenth centuries, and to have received the king's pardon in 1316. In May 1317 he was appointed admiral of the king's fleet north of the Thames, an appointment repeated in 1321, in which year the town of Lynn petitioned against his seizure of some fishing-smacks. In the same year and again in 1324 he was elected to parliament as one of the burgesses of Yarmouth. In 1326 he was ordered to attend the king's council to give information respecting vessels to be provided by Yarmouth. In 1327 he sided with Edward III, and on 2 April received pardon for his acquiescence in Mortimer's rule; in the same month he received a grant of the king's ship La Cristofore, and was confirmed in his post as admiral then and in 1333. In 1335 one of his ships was plundered by the people of Gascony, and at his instigation Edward III demanded restitution. In March 1340 he was one of those summoned to Westminster to advise the king on mercantile affairs. He probably fought at Sluys in the same year. He is last mentioned in 1343 as one of the burgesses for Yarmouth summoned to parliament.
[Rymer's Fœdera, orig. ed. iv. 647, Record ed. II. ii. 1114; Cal. Patent Rolls, 1327–30, passim; Rolls of Parl. i. 306 b, 406 a, 414 a; Palmer's Hist. of Great Yarmouth, i. 297–9, 326, ii. 5, 190, 247, 253, 294–5; Nicolas's Hist. of the Royal Navy, i. 418, 439–40, ii. 2, 6, 524.]