'Mr. Charles North said that King Charles was a traitor, and when he was put to death, had but his due; whereupon Mr. Staunton tooke the said North a boxe of the eare.'
John the old war veteran at 55 continued to visit his property in Nottinghamshire [from York] from time to time.
On one such visit to Everton a bizarre episode took place, which led to John [Stanford], using his Nottinghamshire alias, Staunton, bringing a charge against one Charles North of Awkley, Gent. of using 'seditious words' in his hearing. The charge was heard before Godfrey Copley Esq. at York Castle on 8th August 1662, and reads as follows - 'John Staunton said that being in company on Saturday last with one Charles North at Widow Atkins house in Blaxton, he heard him say that he was for those men that hath murthered the last King, and he would be for them as long as he had life; and that they were honest men; and that the last King did deserve the death he had.
'Anthony Barton, of Blaxton, yeoman, heard Mr. Charles North say that King Charles was a traitor; whereupon the said Mr. Staunton tooke the said North a boxe of the eare. And the said North said that the ould King, when he was put to death, had but his due.'
Mr. Charles North was bound over to keep the peace, himself in the sum of £80, and in two sureties of £40 each i.e. Francis Thornhill of Misterton, Gent., and Nicholas Hexop, Clerk, of Finningley. Charles North's end was tragic and violent being shot dead on 28th February 1662/4 by Nicholas Curtis of Doncaster, apothecary.
The fact that this charge was heard at York Assizes, and not at Nottingham, suggests that John's normal place of residence was at York, as we know, and not at Everton. He had to use his alias, however, because that was the name by which he was known prior to 1642 in the south.
At the beginning of Charles II's reign, the royalists composed a list of over 6000 names of officers who had suffered fines or financial loss at the hands of parliamentary forces during the war. This is known as 'the List of Officers claiming to the Sixty Thousand Pounds etc. granted by His Sacred Majesty for the relief of His truly loyal and Indigent Party.' John Staunton, Cornet, appears on the London list.... The list does not, however, indicate how much they claimed, or whether they were ever paid. Money was just as tight during Charles II's reign as it was during the Commonwealth under Cromwell. It does provide, nevertheless, the only Roll of Honour of those loyal knights and country gentlemen who served their King during the most unhappy period in our history, and we must be proud that John Stainforth, alias Stanford or Staunton, was numbered among them.
Not Found Wanting, pp.168-69