John Clavell

John Clavell (1601–1643) was a highwayman, author, lawyer, and doctor. He is known for his poem A Recantation of an Ill Led Life, and his play The Soddered Citizen. His life is mainly split into two parts: his early life in England, where he grew up, lived as a highwayman, and started his reformation, and the latter part of his life in England and Ireland where he was a lawyer and physician.

John Clavell was the youngest of six children. He was baptized at Wootton Glanville and grew up in Sherborne, England where he spent 18 years of his life. Clavell's heritage comes from a 14th-century family known as the Dorsetshire family.

John Clavell's parents were Frances and John Clavell Senior. Clavell's father was plagued by a life of financial trouble; he borrowed money from his son-in-law Robert Freake, but never paid off the loan. He was said to have attended "Spiritual Court" for "moral bisheavior"; allegedly he engaged in an affair while married to Frances. Clavell Sr. played an important role in pardoning his son later in life.

Clavell's mother, Frances, married three times and outlived all of her children. Unlike her husband, she did not take part in requesting a pardon for her son when he was jailed. Frances also disapproved of John's first wife, Joyce, which led Clavell to address his mother in the second edition of "A Recantation of an Ill Led Life," where he asks both her and his sister Elizabeth to accept Joyce as a good wife.

John Clavell's uncle was Sir William Clavell (1568–1643). He was a knight banneret and gained this title in 1599. He was active in commercial and industrial ventures, and was John Clavell's connection to Ireland, where Clavell spent part of his life.

John Clavell attended Brasenose College, Oxford from 1619 to 1621. In 1621, he left the college without a degree. During this period, Clavell is noted to have stolen a golden or silver plate. He was sentenced to time in jail, but was pardoned in April 1621 and released without bail. It is theorized that his uncle Sir William played a major role in his receiving the pardon, and that the theft is the reason Clavell left Brasenose without a degree.

After he left school in 1621, Clavell spent the next five years in London, where he lived a life of crime, poverty and ill health. In 1623 he became the administrator to his father's estate. In 1625 he married his first wife, Joyce. It is believed that she was of low standing and little inheritance; in the second edition of "A Recantation of an Ill Led Life" Clavell appealed to his mother and sister to accept Joyce as a good woman.

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