Sir John Bridgeman

Sir John Bridgeman, SL (1568/1569 – 5 February 1638) was a barrister of the Inner Temple, serjeant-at-law and local magnate in the West of England during the early 17th century.

Bridgeman came from a minor gentry family settled at Littledean, Gloucestershire. He matriculated from Magdalen College, Oxford in June 1582, and after some years at Clifford's Inn, was admitted to the Inner Temple in June 1591. Sometime during this period, he married Frances Daunt. When her brother Giles died in 1596, he became embroiled in a dispute with her uncle Thomas Daunt over the manor of Owlpen. He lost the case when he was accused of forging deeds before Sir Edward Coke, the Attorney General. They had at least two children:

Bridgeman was called to the bar in 1600. Most of his work was in the Court of Common Pleas, a report of whose proceedings between 1613 and 1621 he compiled. In 1613, he purchased the manor of Nympsfield, Gloucestershire, with Luke Garnon. He was counsel for the city of Gloucester in 1614, and in 1615 he was made a bencher of the Inner Temple. In 1622, he served as counsel for Exeter in a successful attempt to block the inclusion of Bishop Valentine Carey in the city's commission of the peace, and was engaged as counsel by Lord Zouche.

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