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

Prepared by Michael A. Linton
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Fitz Roger : Walter Fitz Roger held Barington and Cerney in Gloucestershire, and some manors in Hampshire, of the King in 1086 (Domesd.). He was the son and heir of Roger de Pistres, Viscount of Gloucester, and, on the death of his uncle Durand (see Vol. I. p. 345), succeeded to his father's office. He had the custody of the castles of Gloucester and Hereford, and has been styled "Constable of all England under Henry I.," though it is not quite clear whether this title actually belonged to him. But his son Milo, the famous Earl of Hereford, undoubtedly held the great hereditary office of Constabularius Regis, which passed through his eldest daughter to the Bohuns. Milo had succeeded in 1131; for Walter, some time before, renounced the world and its vanities, and became a canon of Llanthony Abbey, where he died.

I do not think that he can possibly be ranked among the combatants at Hastings, or that his name, for that reason, ought to be inserted here. There are good grounds for concluding that he was a minor when his father died about 1072, and he must therefore have been a mere child in 1066.