Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Savage, John (d.1492)
SAVAGE, Sir JOHN (d. 1492), politician and soldier, was son of Sir John Savage (1422–1495) of Clifton, by Katherine, daughter of Thomas, lord Stanley, and sister of Thomas Stanley, first earl of Derby [q. v.] Thomas Savage (d. 1507) [q. v.], archbishop of York, was his brother. John Savage, junior, as he was usually styled, was created a knight of the Bath by Edward IV on the occasion of his queen's coronation on 26 May 1465 (Letters and Papers illustrative of the Wars of the English in France under Henry VI, ed. Stevenson, Rolls Ser. ii. [784]). On 17 April 1483, as a knight of the royal body, he was one of those selected to bear Edward's body into Westminster Abbey (Letters and Papers illustrative of the Reigns of Richard III and Henry VII, ed. Gairdner, Rolls Ser. i. 5, 8). Savage was mayor of Chester in 1484 and 1485, and in the former year was made a freeman of the city, with eight of his brothers.
Richard III bestowed much preferment upon him, delegating him to take the oaths of allegiance in Kent, and placing him in the commission of the peace (Harl. MS. 433, ff. 90–4). Nevertheless he had a secret understanding with the Earl of Richmond. His treachery came to light through the arrest of Lord Stanley's son, Lord Strange, and Savage joined Richmond on his march through Wales. At the battle of Bosworth he is said to have commanded the left wing of Henry's army. For his services Henry VII granted him a number of forfeited estates in Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, Leicestershire, and Shropshire, on 7 March 1486. On 16 Feb. 1488 he received fresh grants, and on 16 Nov. was elected a knight of the Garter (Materials for the Reign of Henry VII, ed. Campbell, Rolls Ser. ii. 245). He took part in the siege of Boulogne in October 1492, and, being intercepted by the enemy while reconnoitring, refused to surrender, and was in consequence slain (Bacon, Hist. of Henry VII, ed. Lumby, p. 102; Hall, Chronicle, 1809, p. 459).
By his wife Dorothy, daughter of Sir Ralph Vernon of Haddon, he had a son, John, who succeeded him, and four daughters. Sir John had also an illegitimate son George, rector of Davenham, Cheshire, who is said to have been the father of Edmund Bonner [q. v.], bishop of London.
[G. F. A[rmstrong]'s Savages of the Ards; Addit. MS. 6298, f. 290; Gairdner's Life of Richard III, 1879, pp. 288–9; Ramsay's Lancaster and York, 1892, ii. 540; Notes and Queries, 8th ser. vi. 397.]