John Wolton

John Woolton (or Wolton) (1535?–1594) served as Bishop of Exeter in Devon, England, from 1579 to 1594.

He was born at Whalley, Lancashire in about 1535, the son of John Woolton of Wigan, by his wife Isabella Nowell, a daughter of John Nowell of Read Hall near Whalley, and sister of Alexander Nowell (c. 1517 – 13 February 1602), Protestant theologian and Dean of St Paul's.

He was admitted as a student of Brasenose College, Oxford, on 26 October 1553, when aged about 18, and supplicated for the degree of B.A. on 26 April 1555. Soon afterwards he left for Germany with his uncle Alexander Nowell and remained abroad until the accession of Queen Elizabeth I in 1558. On 25 April 1560 he was ordained a deacon by Edmund Grindal, Bishop of London, and he proceeded to priest on 4 June 1560.

Woolton found patrons in William Alley, Bishop of Exeter, and Francis Russell, 2nd Earl of Bedford, Lord Lieutenant of Devon (1584-5). He was appointed to the rectory of Sampford Peverell (16 August 1561), to the rectory of Whimple, the vicarage of Braunton (4 May 1570), and to the rectory of Kenn (15 October 1573), all in Devon. A canonry at Exeter was conferred on him in March 1565; he read a divinity lecture there twice a week and preached twice every Sunday, and during the plague in the city during the summer of 1570 he attended the sick.

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