Ralph Hastings was the third son of Sir Leonard Hastings and Alice Camoys, daughter of Thomas de Camoys, 1st Baron Camoys, by his first wife, Elizabeth Louches. He had three brothers and three sisters:
Anne Hastings, who married Thomas Ferrers, esquire.
Joan Hastings, who married John Brokesby, esquire.
Career
During the Wars of the Roses, Ralph Hastings was a committed supporter of the House of York. He was both an esquire and a knight of the body to Edward IV. He fought at the battles of Barnet on 14 April 1471 and at Tewkesbury on 4 May 1461, where he was knighted. In the same year the King appointed him joint keeper of Rockingham Castle in Kent, and granted him an annuity of 50 marks. In 1462 he was granted the manor of Great Harrowden, forfeited to the crown by the attainder on 4 November 1461 of Sir William Vaux, later slain at Tewkesbury. He held numerous offices during the reign of Edward IV, including Keeper of the Lions and Leopards in the Tower of London. In 1470 he was Controller of Customs in Lynn, Norfolk, as well as Controller of Petty Customs in London. He was High Sheriff of Northamptonshire in 1471, and represented the county in Parliament as Knight of the Shire in 1472. In 1472 he and his eldest brother, William Hastings, 1st Baron Hastings, were granted licence to found a guild at the church of St Gregory in Northampton. In 1475 he was with the English forces in France, and from 1474 to 1483 was Lieutenant of Guisnes. He also served as Captain of Calais, where his eldest brother, William, was Lieutenant, and in 1483 was granted an annuity of £40 from the town's revenues. Edward IV died on 9 April 1483, and two months later, on 13 June 1483, the future Richard III had Hastings's eldest brother, William, beheaded at the Tower of London for allegedly conspiring against him. Despite this, on 6 July another of Hastings' brothers, Richard Hastings, Baron Welles, was among the thirty-five peers who attended Richard's coronation. Hastings died before 1 December 1495. In his will, dated 17 September 1495 he left his manors in Wanstead, Essex, and Woolwich, Kent to his wife, a marriage portion to his daughter Amy, his 'little primer' to his granddaughter, Anne Longueville, and his best horse to his brother, Richard Hastings, Baron Welles. He requested burial at St Bridget of Syon in Middlesex, and failing that, at Barking Abbey.
Marriages and issue
Hastings married Amy Tattershall, the daughter and co-heir of John Tattershall, esquire, of Woolwich, Kent, and Wanstead, Essex, by Agnes Chicheley, the daughter of John Chicheley, Chamberlain of London and nephew of Archbishop Henry Chicheley. Agnes Chicheley's sister, Margery Chicheley, married John Roper, by whom she was the grandmother of William Roper, son-in-law of Sir Thomas More. Sir Ralph Hastings and Amy Tattershall had six daughters:
