The Battle Abbey Roll. Vol. III.
by
The Duchess of Cleveland.
Prepared by Michael A. Linton
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Peito : the mediaeval spelling of Poitou. Roger de Poitou, one of the great magnates of the Conquest, was the third son of Roger de Montgomeri, Earl of Shrewsbury, and bore the name of his wife, Almadis de Poitou, in her own right Countess de la Marche, "which title was used by him and his descendants as Count de la Marche and Poitou."—Bain's Lancashire. He received one of the most magnificent grants made by the Conqueror—the whole county of Lancaster, comprising the six hundreds lying between the Ribble and Mersey,[1] or three hundred and ninety-eight manors in all, with the (free jurisdiction of an Earl Palatine. "The barons who held of him were called Barones Comitatiis (barons of the county) and held free courts for all pleas and complaints, except those belonging to the Earl's sword."—Ibid. Among these palatinate barons the territory was parcelled out; each having his appointed post assigned to him for the defence of the frontier, and the protection of its communications. Roger's chief care seems to have been to secure himself from any aggression by his powerful neighbour Hugh Lupus; for the whole course of the noble river that formed his southern boundary bristled with fortifications. At Liverpool, in a strong castle built to command the estuary of the Mersey, he installed his trusty comrade, Vivian de Molineux, as the first castellan. Higher up the river, opposite Runcorn, he placed Yardfrid, Baron of Widnes; and next to him (still ascending the stream) Paganus de Vilers, Baron of Warrington, mounted guard over the ford of Latchford, one of the principal passes into Cheshire before Warrington Bridge was built. Somewhat to his rear, but still within striking distance, "to strengthen him in time of need," was stationed Warin, Baron of Newton; while, further east, Albert Greslet, Baron of Manchester, held another ford called High Fare Passage, leading to the Cheshire barony of Stockport. Albert must have governed a large extent of country, for he and his neighbour Roger de Busli "were co-parceners in the lordship of Blackburnshire at the time of the Domesday Survey." Roger was Baron of Penwortham, where another castle guarded the mouth of the Ribble, which then formed a broader channel than it does now. There is a little uncertainty as to the original number of the Lancaster barons, and I have left out several others, given in the county history, that are evidently errors or interpolations, such as Ilbert de Lacy, Byron of Rochdale, and William de Lancaster—a name first assumed three generations after.
Roger appears to have chosen Clitheroe as the head of his Honour, and to have built his castle there before the date of Domesday, as his Yorkshire lands were then held of it. "It is not stated that he held either Halton Or Whittington, but it is certain that he, in the next reign, was lord also of these, and had fixed upon Lancaster in the former, then an all but deserted Roman site, for another castle."—A. S. Ellis. In 1094, he founded Lancaster Priory as a cell to St. Martin's Abbey at Sees in Normandy.
During the Conqueror's reign, he had lost the whole of his great principality: for, "in the interval between the first division of property under the Norman dynasty and the Domesday Survey, all his possessions were forfeited to the Crown. The honour of Lancaster was, however, restored to him in the time of William Rufus, but it was finally alienated in his banishment of 1101."—Bain's Lancashire. He undertook this second abortive rebellion in concert with his brother, Robert de Belesme, Earl of Shrewsbury, whose close ally he had ever been. "These brothers became too powerful to remain long faithful subjects to the King, with whom they ranked among the great feudatories of France.[2] It was found that their influence was sufficient to give preponderance to the side they espoused, and Henry I. must have been greatly relieved when he was able to banish them from England."—A. S. Ellis. This opportunity was afforded him the year after his accession to the throne. The insurrection failed: Robert de Belesme surrendered his castle and himself at the King's mercy; and both the obnoxious Earls, stripped of their honours and estates, with their younger brother Arnulph de Montgomerie, were removed from the scene. "Outlawed, and banished from England, Roger and Arnulph naturally went to Robert, a man of vast resources and wealth, having no less than thirty-four strong castles in his county of Alencon alone; however, they were but ill received by him, though it was to their support of him they owed all their misfortune. Roger then retired to the castle of Charroux, near Civray, which he possessed in right of his wife, and it is not probable that he ever visited England again. His troubles, however, did not cease, for Hugh the Devil, Lord of Lusignan, son of his wife's aunt, disputed the county of La Marche with him, and there were constant hostilities between them, which, as a feud, their descendants continued. Almadis died 1116, but Roger was surviving in 1123, being present at the installation of Claras, Abbot of Ahun (Gallia Christiana, ii., col. 619). By Almadis, Roger had three sons;—Count Aldebert IV., Eudo, and Count Boson IV.; and the French genealogists say also two daughters, Ponce, wife of Wulfgrim 'Taillefer' II., Count of Augoulesme, and Marquise, wife of Guy IV., Viscount of Limoges."—Ibid.
The great honour of Lancaster was granted to Stephen, the King's nephew: and I cannot find that any part of Roger's English possessions ever reverted to his descendants. They could have no motive for returning to this country; and most likely, as was the case with Robert de Belesme's posterity, remained Frenchmen. Yet more than one family named De la Marche existed in England during the fourteenth century (see vol. iii., p. 370), and Dugdale speaks of the Petos, long seated at Chesterton in Warwickshire, as "so eminent in ancient times," without affording us any clue to his meaning. One of them served as Lt. Gen. of the Marshalship and Captain of the Bastille under the famous John Talbot in 1448: and two Petos occur as Sheriffs of Leicestershire, 15 Ed. III., and 7 and 15 Henry VI. There is a curious similarity between the coats of some of these families: for instance, Peyto bore Barry of six counterchanged; one of the De la Marches four bars on a field Azure; another, Barry of eight: but none of them in the least resemble Roger de Poitou's, Ermine, three chevrons Gules, as given by Bain. It was a mysterious coat, for it was certainly never borne by his father, nor, according to the same authority, was it that of his wife. I have met with a family of Peyton in Burke's Armoury that bore the same Ermine three chevrons Gules.