CHAPTER I.

De Builli, the First Norman Lord of the Honour of Tickhill, and Founder of the Monastery of Blyth.

Among those great warriors who fought under the standard of the Duke of Normandy at the battle of Hastings, and who were enriched, either through the gratitude or policy of the Conqueror, with the subsequently confiscated estates of the English proprietors, stands the name of Roger de Builli. We no where meet with him in the public transactions of the kingdom which followed that victory; but that he was a man who stood high in the estimation of William is clear from the very extensive grants which he conferred upon him. He was a man of high birth and lineage, being related to Roger de Montgomery, who accompanied the king on his expedition into England, and was by him created Earl of Shrewsbury and Arundel, for Robert, the son and heir of this earl, claimed and received from Rufus the possessions of De Builli as his kinsman,—Montgomery himself being related to the Conqueror. So that, in this way too, De Builli was connected with Odo Bishop of Baieux, and Robert Earl of Mortaigne or Morton, maternal brothers of King William I., both of whom took a very prominent share in public affairs during this and the following reign; as also with Alan Fergent, Earl of Britanny, afterwards Earl of Richmond, who married the Conqueror's daughter, Constantia, and with William Earl of Warren and Surrey, who married another daughter. The three first-named of these eminent men were joint lords with De Builli in the county of Nottingham, and the Earls of Morton and Warren adjoined him in Yorkshire.

It is probable that Roger de Builli derived his name from Busli or Builli, near Rouen; and this probability receives additional strength from the nature and constitution of his monastery of Blyth, an alien house, the appointment of whose prior was vested in the Abbot of the Holy Trinity at Rouen; and from the concluding clause in his charter of foundation, in which he ordains that a pension of 40 shillings per annum shall be paid by his monks to that church.

Those four mighty men, the lords of the Honours of Richmond, Pontefract, Conisborough, and Tickhill, literally spanned the country from the Trent to the Tees, nay, even reached beyond the southern river; for the last-mentioned Honour spread over portions of no less than five adjoining counties, those namely of York, Nottingham, Lincoln, Derby, and Leicester, and even comprised one distant manor in Devonshire. It contained in all sixty knight's fees and three-fourths of a knight's fee.

The Posessions of De Builli.

I shall here lay before my reader a list, extracted from Domesday, of the places which, in whole or in part, owed feudal allegiance to De Builli in the county of Nottingham. They are arranged under wapentakes.

Newark Wapentake.
Elston. Flodberge (Flawborough). Spaldford.
Shelton. Clifton. Brodholm.
Bernesedelawe (Bassetlaw) Wapentake.
Markham. Thorp. Odesach (Hodsock).
Tuxfarne (Tuxford). Gledthorp. Blyth.
Schidrinton (Kirton). Egmanton. Carlton.
Walesby. Headon. Lound.
Grove. Upton. Serlby.
Ranby. Gamston. Turdeworde (Torworth)
Hayton. Misna (Mlsson). Bucheton (Boughton).
Upton. Clipston. Alretun (? Rayton).
West Markham. Warsop. Cotune (Cotham).
Drayton. Clumber. Ordshall.
Elksley. Odesthorp. (?) Ættune (Eton).
Babworth. Redford. Barnby.
Morton. Werchesope (Worksop). Harworth.
Caldecotes ( ? Cotes). Rolneton. Martin.
Cuckney. Bilby. Estirape (Styrrup).
Lide Wapentake.
Calun (Kelham). Gresthop. Scachebi (Skegby).
Hockerton. Sutton-upon-Trent. Normanton.
Carlton. Marnham, N. and S. Weston.
Thurgarton Wapentake.
Ghellinge (Gedling). Gunthorp. Oxton.
Eperston. Beeston. (?)  
Udesburg. Loudham.  
Riseclive (Rushcliff) Wapentake.
Stanford. Plumptre. Staunton.
Turmodeston (Thrumpton). Ruddington. Cauorde (Keyworth).
Holme. Normanton. Leghe (Leke).
Brolneston (Broxtow) Wapentake.
Wishou (Wisoe). Thorp Regis. Rempston.
Wilgebi (Willoughby). Costock.  
Binghameshov (Bingham) Wapentake.
Roclavestune (Tollerton). Chenivetone ( ?) Coleston.
Lambcote. Saxendale. Flintham.
Bingham. Clipston. Elton.
Newton. Wareberg. ( ?) Owthorp.
Shelford. Escreventone (Screveton).  
Bridgeford. Basingfield.  
Oswardebec Wapentake.
Fenton. Bollam. Clayworth.
Estreton (Sturton). Beckingliam. Clarborough.
Wheatley. Walkeringham. Treswell.
West Burton. Ministretone (Milsterton). Cledretone (Leverton).
Everton. Gringley. Rampton.
Harwell. Bole. Madressei (Mattersea).

These wapentakes have undergone some slight change since the Domesday survey. Oswardebec is now the North Clay Division of Bassetlaw, which contains also two other divisions, those namely of South Clay and Hatfield; and Lide is incorporated with Thurgarton.

From an inspection of this schedule it is clear that Roger de Builli possessed a considerable portion of North Nottinghamshire; and his estates in Derbyshire and Yorkshire were contiguous to this portion and to each other. Whether this contiguity influenced the selection of Tickhill, a central situation, as the capital mansion of the fief, or the previous choice of Tickhill guided the allotment of his estates, is of course matter of conjecture. His Yorkshire manors were situated at—

Laughton. Wickersley. Wath.
Thropum. Brinsforth. Swinton.
Dinnington. Tinsley. Wentworth.
The two Anstans. Orgrave. Hoyland.
Thorpe Salvin. Greasborough. Hampole.
Wales. Grimesthorpe. Frickley.
Slade Hooton. Newhall. Stotfold.
New Hall. Billingley. Brodsworth.
Wadworth. Bolton. Haldworth.
Dadesley. Marr. Ughill.
Wombwell. Goldthorpe. Worral.
Melton. Thurnscoe. Wadsley.
Wildthorp'e. Bramwith. Arksey.
Cadeby. Barnby-on-Don Bentley.
Sprotborough. Kimberworth. Adwick-on-Street.
Cusworth. Hooton Roberts. Hallam.
Balby. Dennaby. Attercliff.
Houghton. Mexborough. Sheffield.
Stainton. Adwick-on-Dearn. Scausby.
Hellaby. Barnborough.  
Maltby. Ecclesfield.  

I will state very briefly that Laughton, with its aula and an extensive tract of country around it, had belonged to Edwin Earl of Mercia, the brother of Morcar, Earl of Northumberland. The sister of these two powerful men was married to Harold; and in his reign, as well as in that of the Conqueror, Edwin and Morcar played a very distinguished part. They rallied the English after the battle of Hastings, submitted to William, and were confirmed in the possession of their estates; the king promising Edwin his daughter in marriage. The breach of this promise, added to other causes of irritation, again incited them to rebellion, and again they were obliged to throw themselves on the clemency of William. But their position was an unhappy one, exposed as they were to the distrust of the King and the malignity of his courtiers; and they once more resorted to hostile measures against him. Edwin was betrayed by his own followers whilst attempting to make his way into Scotland, and was slain by a party of Normans in 1071. The fate of Morcar is uncertain. William of Malmesbury states, that he was slain through the perfidy of his own friends in the lifetime of the Conqueror. Hoveden, that he was released by William, when on his deathbed, out of prison.

Like every other large proprietor, De Builli divided his very extensive estates into two, and those very unequal, portions. Of the smaller portion, which went by the name of demesne, he retained a part for his own use, cultivating it by the hands of his villeins and board-men, and gave part to his sochmen, a class very similar to our copyholders.

The second and by far the larger portion he parcelled out into knight's fees, and bestowed on men of high family who had accompanied him from Normandy into England, with the obligation of supplying in cases of emergency a certain number of mounted soldiers, in proportion to their estates. And the sub-vassal pursued a course substantially analogous to that of the vassal in chief.

Of his Nottinghamshire possessions Roger reserved in demesne lands at Clipston, Warsop, Worksop, Lound, Harworth, Styrrup, Hockerton, Marnham, Plumptre, Normanton, Tollerton, Bingham, Bridgeford, Saxendale, Wheatley, Misterton, Bole, Leverton, and Hampton.

The rest he parcelled out among his sub-infeudatories, the chief of whom were Roger, who was succeeded in his extensive grants by William de Lovetot, Lord of Sheffield and Hallamshire, through the gift of Henry I.; Fulc Lizours, Torald Lizours his brother (of both of whom we shall have occasion to speak more fully hereafter), Goisfrid, Gislebert, Ernulf, William, and Ralph.

Of the above enumerated manors the chief were those of Bingham, held in demesne with four carucates, twenty-six villeins, five board-men, fourteen sochmen, holding twelve carucates and a half; previous and present value 10l. Wheatley, held in demesne with four carucates, four sochmen, and twenty-five villeins, having twelve carucatcs and a half, and five acres of meadow; previous and present value 8l. Worksop, where de Builli had one carucate in demesne and twenty-two sochmen, holding twelve bovates, twenty-four villeins, and eight board-men, with twenty-two carucates and seven acres of meadow; previous value 8l., present 7l. Gringley, owned formerly by seven Saxon thanes. Here Roger (homo Rogeri) had three carucates, ten villeins, and six board-men, holding eight carucates; as also a church and a fish-pond with a thousand eels, and forty acres of meadow; value in time of Confessor 10l., now 4l. Warsop, in which the Norman lord paramount held in demesne three carucates and a half, six sochmen possessing two bovates, fifteen villeins and eleven board-men, holding three carucates; as also a priest, a church, and a mill; previous value 64s., present 60s. Carlton (in Lindrick), where resided in Saxon times six thanes, each in their own hall, and paying altogether for two carucates to the geld, the land containing four carucates. At the time of the Survey Torald had one carucate, two sochmen, sixteen villeins, and three board-men, holding four carucates. There was a church, as also two mills and twenty acres of meadow; previous value 4l., present 3l. Eaton, where ten thanes enjoyed each their own hall, and where subsequently Fulc Lizours had one carucate, fourteen villeins, nine board-men holding seven carucates, and sixty acres of meadow. Headon, once the residence of seven thanes, in which William the sub-infeudatory under de Builli had two carucates, fourteen sochmen, nine villeins, and six board-men, holding sixteen carucates; there were also twenty-six acres of meadow. And lastly, Marnham, held in demesne with four carucates, two sochmen on forty acres, and twenty villeins holding seven carucates and twenty-four acres of meadow.

Churches are specifically mentioned, in addition to those just referred to, at Harworth, Bole, Leverton, Rampton, and Misterton, or as it is termed in the Survey, Minster-Reyton, to distinguish it from East-Reyton, now Sturton, and from Cled-Reyton, now Leverton. The prefix minster carries us back to a period of remote antiquity, antecedent to the formation of our present parochial system, when the church at Misterton was the only church throughout a large district in which the ministrations of religion could be obtained.

There is one more circumstance, not only of an interesting but of an affecting character, which deserves to be noticed. Elmer, and Elwin, and Osbern, and Edric, and Stenulf, and Godric, and all the other proprietors in this district, with one exception, were removed from their antient patrimonies and homes, and succeeded by men who were strangers to them and to the country in which their feudal superior placed them. The one solitary exception to which I allude was that of Ulchil of Clarborough, who before the Norman came owned here a small estate with manorial rights appertaining thereto; and who, rather than leave for ever his home and the inheritance of his fathers, submitted to become the vassal of another, and, in the words of Hume, when speaking of similar cases, "to load himself and his posterity with a grievous burthen for estates which he had received free from his ancestors."

O Lycida, vivi pervenimus, advena nostri,
Quod nunquam veriti sumus, ut possessor agelli
Diceret, haec mea sunt, veteres migrate coloni.

I conclude my account of the lands forming the great fief of De Builli by stating that the honour of Tickhill was divided into five bailiwicks, which were entitled,—

The bailiwick of Tickhill and the soke of Tickhill.
The bailiwick of the liberty of Tickhill in Strafford.
The bailiwick of Basset, in the county of Nottingham.
The bailiwick of the liberty of Ultra Trent.
The bailiwick of Scarsdale, in the county of Derby.

The Family of de Builli.

The manor of Sandford in Devonshire is said to have been given to Roger de Builli by Matilda, the queen of the Conqueror, with his wife Muriel. We may infer from this that she stood high in court favour. Who she was is not known. Roger was dead in 1098; and he left a son who died without issue in 1102, as also a brother Arnaldus, and a sister Beatrix. Arnaldus was

one of the witnesses to the charter of foundation of Blyth monastery. He and his descendants held six knight's fees and a half of the honour of Tickhill, a considerable portion of which was in the county of Nottingham, and the remainder at Maltby, Brodsworth, Scawsby, and Kimberworth, in Yorkshire. At the last place they had a mansion and park. They held Bawtry and Austerfield also under the Fossards, subinfeudatories under the Earls of Morton of a large portion of their Yorkshire possessions, and among others of the manor of Hexthorpe, of which Bawtry and Austerfield were members.

The line of descent of Arnaldus ran as follows.

Descent of Arnaldus

I shall pursue the history of this branch of the family of De Builli more at length under Bawtry. Suffice it for the present to state that these persons all have an interesting history attached to them. The first, Jordan, wearied probably with the world and its corroding cares, and anxious to obtain that peace which never fails to flow from the exercises of devotion, entered his uncle's newly-erected monastery of Blyth as a monk, giving at the same time a donation of land to the convent.

On the day of his burial (die depositionis) his eldest son Richard, in the presence of several witnesses, laid his father's deed of gift upon the altar of the church, and attached his seal to it by way of confirmation. The charter in the Blyth Register (f. 105), from which we obtain these facts, is as follows:

"Notum sit omnibus Christi fidelibus tam futuris quam praesentibus, quod Iordanus de Bulleio annuentibus filiis suis et amicis dedit Sanctae Mariae de Blida, quando monachum induit, terrain Levini de dumo solidam et quietam, ab omni consuetudine liberimam. Postea vero Ricardus filius ejus major veniens ad praedictam Ecclesiam die depositionis patris sui coram multis astantibus hanc donationem super altare posuit et sigilli sui impressione roborando confirmavit sub testibus."

This was early in the 12th century.

We come to Richard his son. He, as lord of Maltby, and Richard Fitz-Turgis, lord of Hooton-Levet, were the joint founders of Roche Abbey, in the immediate vicinity both of Maltby and Hooton, in the year 1147; a convent of Cistercian monks, whose desecrated and ruinous church, standing as it does at the confluence of two streams, and sheltered by massive overhanging rocks of limestone, on which nature has placed her deepest tints, is still an object of lively admiration and interest, as well as of heartfelt regret, to every well-constituted mind.

John de Builli, the son of Richard, built the two churches of Bawtry and Austerfield, and gave them to the monks of Blyth. Idonea, his daughter, confirmed his gift. She married, in the reign of John, Robert de Vipont, a great Westmorland lord, and a man who was deeply concerned in the proceedings of those troubled times. She died in 1235, and with her ended the name of De Builli in England.

I must now take up the history of Beatrix, the sister of our great Norman lord Roger. She married Robert Earl of Eu in Normandy. The Earls of Eu of the old line were an illegitimate branch of the ducal house of Normandy, a circumstance which brought them much into England. Robert, the husband of Beatrix, was in Yorkshire in the early years of the Conqueror's reign, and was left by him in joint command there with the Earl of Morton. From this marriage sprang Henry, father of John, father of Henry, father of Alice Countess of Augi or Eu, a lady of great eminence, of whom we shall have occasion to speak more fully in what follows.

The Castle of Tickhill.

The gateway of Tickhill Castle (1844).
The gateway of Tickhill Castle (1844).

No mention of Tickhill occurs in Domesday. The Survey states that in Dadesley, Stainton, and Hellaby, Elsi and Seward had been previous proprietors; that then Roger held in demesne seven carucates; that there were fifty-four villeins, twelve boardmen, holding twenty-four carucates, and thirty-one burgesses (burgenses); as also a priest and a church; that the old value was 12l., present 14l.

By Dadesley we are undoubtedly to understand Tickhill, for the extract above given stands in Domesday between Wadworth and Maltby, agreeably to the position which Tickhill actually occupies with reference to those places, and the name of Dadesley still survives, as applied to what may be called the suburbs of Tickhill. In a deed bearing date 1664 land is conveyed lying "in the north field of Tickhill, at a place called All-Hallows Church." This doubtless was the site of the ancient church of Domesday, where even in the present century fragments of gravestones have been found.

But whence the change of name from the one to the other? I believe that Tickhill—Ticcanhill—the hill of the kid, as Tickles, Ticklees, is the leys of the kid, and Titchfield the field of the kid, adjoining Dadesley, was a place natura et operibus munitus, in other words, that there was a natural elevation there, which in times antecedent to the Conquest, perhaps in some of those interminable contests which our Anglo-Saxon ancestors carried on with each other, or subsequently with their Danish invaders, had been strengthened by artificial works for purposes of defence; that the Norman de Builli took advantage of this already existing position, and upon it erected his castle, around which the population insensibly gathered, and from which their town naturally took its name, just as Castleton in Derbyshire, and Barnard Castle, derive their names from ancient fortresses erected there. That some fortress existed here before the Conquest may I conceive be not unreasonably concluded, from the high value at which the place stood in the time of the Confessor, from the mention of tradesmen (burgenses) in the Survey, and from the large population, exceeding probably that of every other place in South Yorkshire, with the exception of Doncaster, which would naturally derive security and protection from it.

But the existence of such a population could not be entirely due to such a cause, and perhaps may, in some measure, be explained by the conjecture that in ancient Dadesley were located a number of small merchants who carried on the business of export in such matters as the building-stone of Roche, long before the name of Roche was known, the grindstones of Wickersley, and perhaps the cloth and cutlery of the West Riding; and of the import of coal and various raw materials, to be worked up in the shops of the burgenses, and sold out among the farmers and villagers of South Yorkshire and North Nottinghamshire. Such import and export would readily be conducted through the neighbouring and very ancient port of Bawtry. The monuments of mercatores in the churches of Tickhill and Bawtry—representatives doubtless of a long-established class—seem confirmatory of this conjecture.

The Norman fortress of Tickhill then was erected upon a natural elevation. It was surrounded by a deep moat, encircled by a high and thick wall, and, unlike that noblest of all our old castles, that of Eichmond in Yorkshire, where the keep adjoins the entrance gateway, but precisely like those of Barnard Castle and Conisborough, its keep was at the most remote point from the gateway. Camden describes Tickhill as "oppidum vetustum, vetusto castro satis magno, sed simplici moenium ambitu, et mole edita cui arx rotunda imponitur, munitum."

The keep appears to have been in existence in Leland's time. "The castel (he writes) is well dichid and waullid with a very hard suart stone hewid; the dungeon is the fairest part of the castel; all the buildings withyn the area be down saving an old haulle." It was circular, like those of Barnard Castle and Conisborough, not quadrangular, like that of Richmond; and portions of its masonry, the work of Builli, still remain, as also the old gateway, and nearly the whole of the surrounding wall, upon whose massive and weather-beaten sides the sun sheds an uncertain light through the trees with which the sloping banks of the moat are planted.

The whole area, including the moat, covers very nearly seven acres, and within this area kings and queens, and the highest nobles of this and other countries, ecclesiastics and courtiers, knights and vassals, have assembled in days now long gone by, at one time amid the festivities of the banqueting hall, at another in the straitness of the siege.

Eleanor, the queen of Henry II. founded within the walls a chapel dedicated to St. Nicholas for a warden and four chaplains, and endowed it with the tithes of Harworth, Wheatley, East Markham, West Markham, Walesby, and Loudham.

In the Pipe Roll of 1st of Richard I. there is an account of the revenues of the Honour of Tickhill for three-quarters of a year, before it was granted by the king to his brother John. It comprises inter alia the following items:—"Radulphus de Wirecestre reddit compotum de xxxvi li. vi s. viii d. de exitu capellarum de Tikehill de dimidio anno. In Thesaurario xxxiiili. vis. viiid. et in stipendiis capellani de Tikehill vis. viiid., et pro bladis colligendis liiis. ivd. et quietus est." In the second year of his reign, John, on the petition of his mother Queen Eleanor, and in consideration of his father and brother Henry—rex junior, as he was called—having been buried there, confirmed the gift previously made by him, when Earl of Morton, of this chapel within the castle of Tickhill to the canons of St. Mary of Rouen, together with the churches of Harworth (including the chapels of Serlby and Martin), Wheatley, West Markham (including the chapels of Kirton, Walesby, Houghton, Bevercotes, Drayton, Gamston, and Egmanton), East Markham, Bridgeford, Loudham, with the chapel of Gunthorp, Gunnalston, and various lands.

The following entry respecting the chapel of Tickhill Castle occurs in the close roll of 8th of John:—

"Hajc sunt quas petunt Canonici Rothom Ecclesia: a domino Rege." Inter alia "Capellariam de Tikehull datam a domino Rege Joanne, quando fuit Comes, ad quatuor prebendas ad facienda anniversaria patris sui et fratrum, quae valet C.m., unde lx.m. assignata; sunt ad quatuor prebendas, et xl.m. assignatae sunt ad obitum Regis Henrici et R. et J. Regum faciendum."

The patronage held by foreign ecclesiastics in England was suspended during the wars between this country and France, and the chapel royal of Tickhill reverted to the Crown, and appears to have remained there; for in 1504 it was settled by Henry VII. on the abbot and convent of Westminster as part of the endowment of his new chapel, and an annual pension of 5l. was by them paid to each of the priests.

It fell in the 1 Edward VI., being then granted to Mary Countess of Northumberland for her life, with remainder to her brother Francis Earl of Shrewsbury. Hence it is that the patronage of Harworth is to this day vested in the Duke of Norfolk.

Among the names of the wardens collected by Torre occurs that of Cardinal Beaufort in 139..

To return to the castle. In the 1st of John the custody of the castle and honour of Tickhill was committed to Hugh Bardolph, sheriff of Nottingham and Derby.

In the 6th of John, Robert de Vipont was constable of the castle of Tickhill, which he was commanded to put into a proper state of repair. The repairs were completed the following year, and the expenses allowed out of the Exchequer. Further repairs were made two years afterwards. In the 7th of John two tuns of wine were removed from Nottingham to Tickhill, and various stores supplied to the granary and stable at the latter place.

In the 9th of the same reign 20 "dolia" of red wine, "vini endurabilis," were purchased, of which 15 were ordered to be conveyed to Nottingham and five to Tickhill.

At the commencement of the Rebellion Tickhill Castle was put in a state of defence for the king and occupied by Sir Ralph Hansby, on whose death, in 1643, Major Monckton was placed in command, and held the fortress till a short time after the disaster of Marston Moor, when he was compelled to surrender it.

The letter of Simeon Ashe, one of the chaplains of the Earl of Manchester, printed by Vicars in his Parliamentary Chronicle, informs us that the earl "sent (from Doncaster) 200 dragoons under Colonel Lilburn to quarter at Tickhill, where was a strong castle, which was pallisadoed and invironed with a broad moat and a counterscarp, in which were 80 musquetiers and a troop of horse, armed, which did great injury and oppression to the country thereabout, both by laying heavy burthens and taxes on them, and which did much interrupt the trade and transportation of cloth from Leeds, Halifax, and other parts to Bawtree; their horse also bringing in frequently 20, 30, 40 horses at a time loaden with cloth, which oftentimes, upon payment of 20 shillings the horse-load, they again released. Now, upon the dragoons coming into the house, they took prisoner a captain, a cornet, a quarter-master, and some other soldiers, and about 30 horses belonging to the said castle. The governor of the castle understanding hereby that my lord's army was so near, and being now summoned the next day to surrender the same to the king and parliament, did admit parley with the said Lieut.-Col. Lilburn. Which conference produced this conclusion, that three of the chief gentlemen therein should come to my lord's quarters at Doncaster, upon a safe convoy granted for their return, which being done, and the gentlemen coming accordingly, on Thursday, July 25, 1644, it was agreed that the said castle should be yielded up the next day, upon four or five fair and honourable articles befitting gentlemen and soldiers; which articles were sealed by both parties accordingly, and then his lordship, with lieut.-gen. Cromwell, major-gen. Crawford, and many other chief officers, guarded by a brave troop of horse, rode to Tickhill the Friday following, in the afternoon, to take possession of it, and to see the articles on our side exactly performed. Whither being come, the drawbridge let down, and alarm made by our dragoons (to whom his lordship had given strict charge not to offer offence in the least measure by word or deed to the soldiers of the garrison who were to pass by them), they all came out with passes in their hands to the several places of their desired abode, who also were safely convoyed by our troops of horse; and so his lordship and his officers, with 20 musquetiers only, entered, and, possession being taken and some hurries appeased, my lord with his attendants gave solemn thanks to God there for giving us that place of so much concernment upon most easy terms and without the loss of one drop of blood. There were in the castle major Monckton, governor, col. Redhead, major Redhead, and divers captains, with some of their wives. There was left in the castle one iron piece mounted, about 100 muskets, 60 horse and arms, some powder and match, about 100 quarters of grain, many barrels of salt butter, store of cheese, powdered beef, and some beasts and sheep, with other necessary provision."

The Earl of Manchester left a garrison in it. One of the conditions of surrender of Welbeck, which General Poyntz took in 1645, was that Tickhill should be dismantled—which very probably took place accordingly either then or certainly two years later, when the House of Commons ordered all northern fortresses in which there had been garrisons to be demolished.

And thus the old Norman keep, the chapel of Queen Eleanor, the court where suit and service were rendered by the tenants of the fief in five counties, and civil and criminal jurisdiction exercised, the great state apartments and all other members of the castle of Builli have almost or altogether disappeared. The present residence is a house built in the seventeenth century, which has been occupied since that time by the different Crown lessees of the castle and demesne lands, such as the families of Hansby, Fitzwilliam, and Lumley—the last of whom now hold it under lease, their tenant being Captain Bower.

The Honour of Tickhill.

We must now retrace our steps back to early days, and endeavour to relate the descent of this Honour. Whilst we are thus occupied, vivid and animating scenes will pass before us.

From the pleadings in the suit between the families of Vipont and Eu respecting the Honour of Tickhill in the reign of Henry III., we learn that Roger de Builli left a son who died in 1102. Robert de Belesme, Earl of Shrewsbury and Arundel, obtained possession of the Honour from Rufus by paying a large sum for it. This we learn from Ordericus Vitalis, whose words are— "Blidam* quoque totamque terram Rogerii de Buthleio cognati sui jure repetiit et a Rege grandi pondere argenti comparavit." On the death of Rufus, Belesme, with William Warren Earl of Surrey, Robert Mallet, and others, incited Robert, the Conqueror's eldest son, to aspire to the Crown. Hoveden and Florence of Worcester record that in 1102 he garrisoned Shrewsbury and the castles of Arundel and Tickhill against Henry I., who, resorting to vigorous measures, and among other things sending Robert Bishop of Lincoln to besiege Tickhill, within thirty days recovered all the fortresses from the hands of his rebellious subject, banished him from the kingdom, and resumed his large estates. Henry I. retained Tickhill Castle throughout his reign, in the 29th year of which the castle and honour were in the wardship of Eustace FitzJohn, lord of Alnwick and Malton, who renders account of 23l. 11s. 10d. "de firma de Blida" (i.e. Tickhill) for half a year; has in the treasury 13l.; spends upon corrody to the king of Scotland 1l. 10s.; and "in operibus castelli de Blida" (i.e. Tickhill) 9l. 1s. 10d., and is quit.

On the accession of Stephen it would appear that the Earl of Eu in company with William de Clairfait or FitzGodric, ancestor of the Fitzwilliams of Sprotborough, with the sanction of the king, held this honour. At the battle of Lincoln in 1141 between Stephen and Randolph Earl of Chester and his brother William de Romara and Robert Earl of Gloucester, the partisans of Matilda, the King and Barnard Baliol, Roger Mowbray, Richard Courcy, William Fossard, William Peverel, William Clairfait, and many others, were taken prisoners. William Clairfait however (writes John of Hexham, from whom I am quoting), cleverly escaping from the hands of Earl Randolph, betook himself to his castle of Tickhill, and by constant alarms harassed the Earl and his company.

But the Earl of Chester was a powerful man. Like many other great men, he had his price, and a compromise was made between the royal rivals Stephen and Henry Duke of Normandy, afterwards Henry II., by virtue of which they gave the Earl "totum honorem de Blia ubicunque sit in Anglia," by which expression we are to understand the Honour of Tickhill.

Henry II. when he came to the throne resumed the castle and honour into his own hands. His queen Eleanor probably enjoyed them as her jointure, for, as already stated, she founded the chapel royal of St. Nicholas within the castle. During this reign the Lacis, Lords of Pontefract, were tenants in capite of the honour and castle. We learn from Hoveden that in 1186 the king nominated Paulinus of Leeds bishop of Carlisle, and on his refusing the see offered him an annual pension of 300 marcs to issue from the churches of Bamborough and Scarborough, the chapel of Tickhill, and two royal manors near Carlisle.

From Henry II. the castle and honour descended to Richard I., who at the commencement of his reign gave his brother John the earldoms of Morton, Cornwall, Dorset, Somerset, Nottingham, Derby, Lancaster, and Gloucester; the castles of Marlborough, Ludgershall, Bolsover, and Peak; and the Honours of Wullingford, Tickhill, and Eye. He reserved however certain castles in his own hands, among which were those of Tickhill and Nottingham, which in his absence abroad and in the turbulent proceedings of John and his partisans experienced great vicissitudes of fortune, being sometimes in the hands of the king and at other times surrendered to or taken by his brother.

At the time of the release of the king from his captivity in Germany, namely, in the year 1194, and just before his return home, the great men of the kingdom, lay and ecclesiastical, had, as we know from history, determined that John should be stripped of all his possessions in England and the castles which he held besieged. Accordingly Hugh Pudsey, bishop of Durham, then nearly seventy years of age, collected a large army in the North, and laid siege to Tickhill, then in the hands of John's party. When the king's return was announced, the beleaguered party sent with the bishop's permission two knights to ascertain the truth of the rumour, and if it proved correct to offer him the castle. Richard would take nothing short of an unconditional surrender, and on this answer being reported to Robert de la Mare the constable, and his party, they held a conference with Pudsey, and on promise of their lives delivered to him the fortress.

The king had by this time arrived at Nottingham to conduct in person the siege of the castle there. Roger Hoveden's account of Pudsey taking his prisoners from Tickhill to Nottingham, of the king meeting and kissing him, and going to see Clipston and Shirewood forest, which he had never seen before, and with which he was vastly pleased, is very quaint and graphic: "Vicesima septima, die mensis Martii Hugo Dunelmensis Episcopus et illi qui cum eo erant in obsidione castelli de Tikehil venerunt ad Regem apud Notingham, adducentes secum captivos, qui capti fuerant in castello de Tikehil, et Rex processit obviam illis. Et viso Rege Episcopus Dunelmensis descendit, et Rex similiter obviam ei, et osculatus est eum . . . . Richardus Rex Angliae profectus est videre Clipestone et forrestas de Sirewode, quas ipse nunquam viderat antea, et placuerunt ei multum."

I must be pardoned for making a short digression in order to speak a few words concerning Bishop Pudsey. Like many other prelates of that day, the warrior prelates of a stern age, he wore the sword by the side of the crozier; but, unlike any other prelate, he wore also, and that by creation and not inheritance, the coronet by the side of the mitre. He was Bishop of Durham from 1153 to 1195. He is said to have been nephew of King Stephen, but it is not clear how the consanguinity could arise. He was Archdeacon of Winchester and Treasurer of York when he was promoted to the see of Durham, at the age of 25. The nomination was resisted by the Archbishop of York, and Pudsey in consequence made a personal appeal to the Pope, accompanied by a splendid train of ecclesiastics and lay vassals of the bishopric, and was consecrated by him on the vigil of St. Thomas, A.D. 1153. In the war which Henry II. waged against Scotland, Pudsey's loyalty was, not without reason, suspected, inasmuch as he had permitted a Scotish army to cross the bishopric with impunity, and 500 of their Flemish auxiliaries to land at Hartlepool. He was heavily fined, and surrendered to the Crown his castles of Durham, Norham, and Northallerton, the last of which was demolished.

When Richard I. was ransacking the treasures of the kingdom for the crusade, Pudsey purchased of him the earldom of Northumberland for life, and the shire of Sadberge in perpetuity to the see. The price was 11,000l., an enormous sum in those days. Wendover tells us, "Versum est omnibus in miraculum videre Episcopum gladio militari accinctum de veteri Episcopo novum Comitem factum. Hugo de Puzaz emit sibi et Ecclesia: suae Northumbriae Comitatum in vita sua. Quo gladio cincto Eex cum cachinno astantibus dixit, 'Juvenem feci Comitem de Episcopo veterano.''

Pudsey had intended to have joined the Crusade, and had accordingly made splendid preparations, including, among other things, a beautiful galley with a throne of silver, and culinary utensils of the same costly material, for his own special use. But the king offered him a situation of trust and honour at home. He was made Justiciary of England, Governor of Windsor, and of all the kingdom north of the Humber. The ambitious Longchamp, Bishop of Ely and Governor of the South of England, decoyed him, through jealousy, to London, sent him to the Tower, and only released him on condition of his ceding the government of Windsor, Newcastle-on-Tyne, and the earldom of Northumberland.

He contributed 2,000l. towards the ransom of Richard I., and redeemed for the sum of 100 marcs the plate of his cathedral, which was doomed to the same purpose. He contracted again with the King at the price of 2,000 marcs for the restitution to himself and his successors of the earldom of Sadberge, which accordingly continued in the see of Durham from that day till the time of the late Bishop Van Mildert, the last Bishop of Durham, who as Count Palatine and Earl of Sadberge received on entering his diocese at Croft Bridge suit and service as lord paramount from the lady of the manor of Sockburn, was welcomed by the congratulations of the mayor and corporation of the city in their town-hall in his attire of a temporal peer with a sword at his side, and in after life occasionally opened the proceedings of the assizes with the judges on each side of him as custos rotulorum of the county palatine.

Pudsey was on his way to the South when he was seized with illness at Craike. In spite of sickness he proceeded as far as Doncaster, but was obliged to return by water to his manor of Howden, where he soon after died in 1195, and by his own desire was interred in the chapterhouse at Durham.

He was a munificent benefactor both in a spiritual and temporal sense to his diocese. He built that most beautiful chapel, the Galilee, at the west end of the cathedral, whose massive Norman arches appear to press the light clustered early-English columns on which they rest into the earth—which things are an allegory. He founded and richly endowed the hospital of Sherburne for lepers, about three miles distant from Durham, which till 1833 "exhibited in the house appropriated to the master much of coeval and subsequent architecture, in general of excellent character, and the more interesting and valuable on account of the rarity of such early specimens of domestic arrangement."** In the above year the whole of this ancient and venerable building was swept away under the mastership of the Rev. G. S. Faber. The late Mr. Rickman on visiting the place found only one room remaining "with a stone roof, which for simplicity, beauty, and excellent preservation, he pronounced to have no equal in the whole range of his experience. Earnestly did he beg that this room might be suffered to remain, but without success."†

Pudsey also built Elvet Bridge in Durham, completed the city wall, and added " the donjon keep" on " Norham's castled steep." He built the beautiful church of Darlington, together with a mansion for occasional episcopal residence, and left in excellent repair all the other manorial residences of the see. In his capacity of Prince Palatine he granted to the citizens of Durham their first charter, and incorporated the boroughs of Sunderland and Gateshead.

To return. At the death of Richard I. John succeeded to the castle and honour of Tickhill; but in his troubled reign the great men of the kingdom were in open rebellion against their sovereign; and at its close Robert de Vipont, the husband of Idonea de Builli, had succeeded in making himself master of Tickhill, which he held at the accession of Henry III.

In the fourth year of Henry's reign the conflicting claims of Vipont in right of his wife, and of Alice Countess of Eu, her relative and contemporary, were tried in the Exchequer; and two years after this a fine was passed between them, whereby the Viponts ceded the castle and honour of Tickhill to the countess, with the exception of the six knight's fees and a half in Maltby, Sandbeck, and Kimberworth, in the county of York; Stanford on Soar and Perlethorp in Nottinghamshire, and in other places. As however the claim of Idonea de Vipont was clearly a stronger one than that of the countess—for the one was descended by the male line, the other by the female only, from Roger de Builli, we may conclude that the concession was not made without some recompense; and such recompense appears to have been the gift from the King to Vipont of the Crown revenues in Cumberland.

The Lady of Eu formed a strong attachment to this neighbourhood: and naturally. For she was struggling for and at length obtained the possessions of her ancestors, which lay in and were in fact nearly co-extensive with it. There exist charters of her benefactions to the religious of Blyth and Roche. As a matter of course she was, under the Crown, lady paramount of the honour: and hence it is that we find John de Orreby and Thurstan the steward holding under her in Bilby a third and a twelfth part of one knight's fee; William, son and heir of Roger Cressy, her ward, holding in Hodsock again under her the whole vill with soc by service of one knight's fee; and in Styrrup, Ingeram the son of Galfrid and others occupying one knight's fee under her also. She left England in 1225.

In 1254 the castle and honour were given in dower to Eleanor, the wife of Prince Edward, afterwards Edward I. Nine years after this the Prince gave them to his cousin, Henry of Almaigne, with a view of detaching him from the party of Montfort.

In the 18th Edward I., 1290, the claims of the house of Eu were revived. Alice had left a daughter and heir, who married Alphonso, son of John King of Jerusalem, and in his wife's right Earl of Eu. Their grandson, John Earl of Eu, in this year came before the King and Parliament and demanded restitution of the castles of Tickhill and Hastings, with their dependencies, which had belonged to his great-grandmother, Alice. The answer, a truly English one, made to him was, that he was an alien, and that when the King of France should restore to the English nobility their possessions in his dominions his claims should be taken into consideration.

This was the last attempt made by the house of Eu to gain possession of Tickhill, and henceforth the castle and honour were vested in the Crown or in temporary grantees under it. The connection however was remembered so late as the reign of Henry V., who created William Bourchier, Earl of Eu and Lord Bourchier of Tickhill.

In the reign of Edward II. Tickhill Castle witnessed another siege during the turbulent and rebellious proceedings of Thomas Earl of Lancaster.

This unfortunate but criminal person was on the Monday before the Feast of the Annunciation, 1322, brought at Pontefract Castle before the king and court, consisting of Edmund Earl of Kent, John Earl of Richmond, Adomar de Valence Earl of Pembroke, John de Warren Earl of Surrey, Edmund Earl of Arundel, David Earl of Athol, Robert Earl of Anegos, and others; and charged with coming to Burton-on-Trent with Humphrey de Bohun, late Earl of Hereford, Roger Damony, and others, stopping the King for three days from passing the bridge there, and burning part of the town, from whence he fled, "cum equis et armis ao vexillis explicatis," to Boroughbridge, where he was taken. For all which crimes he is sentenced to be drawn, hanged, and beheaded.

It is added that, in time past, the said Thomas conducted himself wickedly and maliciously towards the lord the king; as for example:

1.   He stole and carried off the king's victuals, horses, jewels, and other property at New Castle on Tyne; which the king pardoned.

2.   When the king commanded his barons and others to meet at York to consult with him concerning an expedition into Scotland, the said Thomas, then being in his Castle of Pontefract with a large force, sent his men to stop the road near that town, and to hinder the barons from going to the Parliament at York: and when the king with his family came southwards, Thomas and his men came out of the castle and "acclamaverunt in ipsum regem vilissime et contemptibiliter cum magno tumultu, in maximum contemptum ipsius domini regis, ac si dominus Rex fuisset eorum inimicus et non rex, neque eorum dominus."

3. "Et misit homines suos una cum prædictis comproditoribus suis ad obsidendum castrum domini regis de Tikhull, et quædam ingenia ad projiciendum petras grossas super castrum prædictum, et homines in eodem castro ex parte domini regis existentes; qui quidem proditores castrum illud per tres septimanas continue insultando et debellando obsederunt, et quosdam homines regis ibidem interfecerunt."

The king remitted the drawing and hanging on account of the earl's excellent and most noble parentage, but, as is well known, he was beheaded near Pontefract Castle: and very soon acquired the title and honour of saint, especially among the poor, whose wrongs he was thought to have vindicated.

By Edward III. Tickhill castle and honour were settled on his queen Philippa. Three years after her death, namely, in 1372, he gave them to John of Gaunt, "time-honoured Lancaster," with other estates, in exchange for the Earldom of Richmond. At the duke's death they were given in dower to his widow Catharine Swinford: and during the ascendancy of the house of Lancaster remained distinct from the Crown, as something in case of disaster to fall back upon, although the Crown enjoyed their revenues. So they continue to this day.

There are two objects more connected with Tickhill on which I will add a few words before I conclude this chapter. I mean the church and the priory of St. Augustine. The church, with the exception of the lower stage of the tower, which is early-English, is of Perpendicular character, and contains one feature which is not very common, and that is, a clerestory window over the chancel arch. The armorial bearings of several of those who contributed to the fabric of the tower, especially those of John of Gaunt, (the arms of Castile and Leon,) and of John Sandford, (Ermine, two boar's heads in chief,) who died in 1429, leaving by will "to the makyng of the stepell of Tykhill cs., a cart with iiij hors," appear on the western front of the church.

The priory of Austin Friars, portions of which still remain, stood about half a mile from Tickhill, and is supposed to have been founded in the reign of Edward I. by John Clarel, prebendary of Southwell and rector of East Bridgeford, in the county of Nottingham. It was the place of sepulture of several of the Clarels and Fitzwilliams, and stood in a singularly secluded spot.

Domesday; Proceedings in Exchequer, 4 Henry HI., copied by Dodsworth and bound up with his MSS. in the Bodleian Library; Pipe Roll 1 Richard I.; Monasticon Anglic. sub Blidâ; Close and Charter Rolls 1, 6, 8, 9 John; Hoveden, Florence of Worcester, John of Hexham, William de Newburgh, sub variis annis; Surtees' History of the County Palatine of Durham (General History); Raine's History of Durham Cathedral; Hunter's History of the Deanery of Doncaster, vol. i.; Foedera, vol. ii. p. 1; Testamenta Eboracensia, published by the Surtees Society in 1836, p. 417.

* It is worthy of remark, that in some of the earliest instruments Blida or Blia stands for Tickhill. Thus, Henry I., in a charter confirming to the monks of Blyth the tithes of Laughton, speaks of "Castellum de Blyda"; the charter of Stephen, referred to immediately, speaks of "honorem de Blia"; and John in the second year of his reign confirms to the cathedral of Rouen "capellariam de Blya;" in all which instances Tickhill undoubtedly is to be understood. Tickhill was evidently a name which at that early period possessed no importance and was little known; whilst Blyth, whether from the existence of its monastery or from the great antiquity of the place, was well known. If Blyth possessed an ancient castle of its own, a point which I shall consider in a subsequent chapter, that would be an additional reason for a confusion of names, the two places being near each other.
** Raine's History of Durham Cathedral, p. 139, note.
† Ibid.