The Battle Abbey Roll. Vol. I.
by
The Duchess of Cleveland.

Prepared by Michael A. Linton
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Brent : from Breaunt, Breant or Breaute, near Havre. "The family remained in Normandy in the sixteenth century as Viscounts of Holot (La Roque, Maison d'Harcourt, ii. 1583-4). Fulco de Breaute or de Brent was of great power, temp. Henry III. (Roger Wendover)."—The Norman People. William Mareschal, Earl of Pembroke, gave him the honour of Luton in Bedfordshire, and he obtained a confirmation of it from King John, with whom he was high in favour, in 1216. "It is probable," says Lysons, "that the castle built at Luton in 1222, which is represented in the chronicle of Dunstaple as having been very prejudicial to the neighbouring town, was one of the fortresses of this haughty and oppressive baron." In 1216, he had obtained possession of one of the strongest castles in the kingdom, Bedford, then held by William de Beauchamp for the rebel barons. "The King having sent his favourite, Faukes de Brent, to summon the castle, it was surrendered within a few days, and given to him for his good service. Matthew Paris informs us that (being thus possessed of the barony by the King's gift) he re-built and fortified the castle, for which purpose he pulled down the collegiate church of St. Paul; and that the Abbess of the neighbouring convent of Elstow, hearing of his sacrilege, took the sword out of the hand of that saints' image in her church, and would not replace it till justice had overtaken the offender; but a charter of I Henry III. entirely exonerates Faukes de Brent from this charge."—Ibid. The church had, it then appears, been demolished by order of King John. "It is certain that Faukes, presuming upon the impregnable strength of his castle, set at nought all law and authority; and having been fined by the King's justices itinerant at Dunstaple in 1224, for his various outrages and depredations upon the property of his less powerful neighbours, he sent a party of soldiers, who seized Henry de Braybroke, one of the King's Justices, and after treating him with great barbarity, brought him prisoner to the castle of Bedford." Upon this the King himself, attended by Archbishop Langton and the "principal peers of the realm," marched to "this nursery of sedition" (as Camden calls it), and laid siege to it with all the engines of war then in use;—Petrerias, Mangonellas, and tall wooden towers for the crossbow-men and scouts. It sustained four assaults; first, the barbican, next the outer bail, and then the inner bail were carried; lastly the keep tower, being fired, began to yawn asunder in ominous cracks, vollying smoke and flame, and the garrison surrendered at discretion. Fulk himself had fled to Wales; but two of his brothers were taken prisoners, and one of them, William de Brent, was put to death; Culmo, the other, received the King's pardon. "Faukes hastened to Bedford to crave for mercy, under the protection of the Bishop of Coventry, and was pardoned on condition of being banished the realm." The castle was dismantled by the King's order, and the ditches filled up. Several years before, this audacious rebel, whom the King had to put forth his whole power to subdue, had received a sound whipping from the monks of Warden. A dispute had arisen concerning his rights to a wood; during which according to his usual practice, he had carried off and incarcerated thirty of the brethren in Bedford Castle. But "such was the ascendancy of the Church at that period, that he who set the civil power at defiance, was glad to make his peace by submitting to receive manual discipline from the monks in the chapter house at Warden, at the same time confirming to them the wood, and promising them his protection ever after."—Ibid. Dugdale tells a somewhat similar and extremely characteristic story. One night at Luton, Fulk dreamed that a great stone fell, with the crash of a thunderbolt, from the tower of St. Alban's Church upon his head, shivering every bone in his body; and awaking terror-stricken, he recounted the vision to his wife. She duly interpreted its meaning, reminding him how grievously he had offended St. Alban by the plunder of his Abbey; and exhorted him forthwith to reconcile himself with the Holy Martyr. "Whereupon he went to St. Alban's, and having sent for the Abbot, fell upon his knees with tears, and holding up his hands, besought leave to ask pardon of his Covent in Chapter. Whereunto the Abbot consented, admiring to see such Lamblike humility in a Woolf; therefore, putting off his apparel, he entred the Chapter-house, bearing a Rod in his hand; and confessing his fault, received a lash by every one of the monks upon his naked Body: And when he had put on his cloathes again, he went and sate by the Abbot, and said, 'This my Wife hath caused me to do for a Dream; but, if you require restitution of what I then took, I will not hearken to you.' And so departed, the abbot and monks being glad that they were so rid of him, without doing them any more mischief."

This pious wife was Margaret de Redvers, a widowed heiress whom King John had married to him sorely against her will; and who, when judgment was passed upon him, threw herself at the King's feet, entreating that, "in regard she had been taken by violence, in time of hostility," she might now be divorced.

Fulk, "entering the ship with tears," was conducted to Normandy, whence being signed with the cross, he was permitted to go on a pilgrimage to Rome; and there, with "large gifts" and oblations, made his peace with the Church. The Legate then interposed on his behalf, and he was actually on his way back to England when he died at St. Ciriaco—some say, of poison taken in a fish he had eaten at supper.

Of his posterity, Dugdale can only tell us that he had a daughter named Eve, married to Llewellyn-ap-Jorwerth, Prince of North Wales. His former residence, Fawke's Hall, is now known as Vauxhall.