John Clifford, 9th Baron de Clifford

John Clifford, 9th Baron de Clifford
The Murder of Rutland by Lord Clifford by Charles Robert Leslie (1794-1859)
Born	8 April 1435
Died	28 March 1461
Occupation	Lancastrian military leader
Title	Baron de Clifford Baron of Skipton

John Clifford, 9th Baron de Clifford, also 9th feudal baron of Skipton (8 April 1435 – 28 March 1461), was a Lancastrian military leader during the Wars of the Roses. He was one of the strongest supporters of Queen Margaret of Anjou, consort of King Henry VI. Clifford is notorious for the slaying of Edmund, Earl of Rutland, younger brother of the future King Edward IV, following the Battle of Wakefield in 1460.

John Clifford was born at Conisborough Castle on 8 April 1435, the son of Thomas Clifford, 8th Baron Clifford (d.1455) by his wife Joan Dacre, the daughter of Thomas de Dacre, 6th Baron Dacre of Gilsland and Philippa de Neville, daughter of Ralph Neville, 1st Earl of Westmorland.

He had three younger brothers and five sisters:

Clifford was a beneficiary under the will, dated 15 August 1446, of his godmother and great-aunt, Maud Clifford, the widow of Richard of Conisburgh, 3rd Earl of Cambridge, executed on 5 August 1415 for his part in the Southampton Plot. At the age of twenty, following his father's death at the First Battle of St Albans on 22 May 1455, Clifford inherited the barony of Clifford, the family seat at Skipton Castle and the hereditary office of High Sheriff of Westmorland. He proved his age in order to obtain livery of his lands on 16 June 1456, and in February 1458 'with a grete power' demanded compensation for his father's death. He was summoned to Parliament on 30 July 1460.