Sir Baron Philip de Braose

Notes:

Philip confirmed his father's gifts to the abbey of St Florent in 1096. He was the first Braose Lord of Builth and Radnor, their initial holding in the Welsh Marches. Philip returned from the 1st Crusade in 1103. He built the Norman Church of St Nicolas at Old Shoreham and founded the port of New Shoreham. His lands were confiscated by Henry I in 1110, due to his traitorous support of William, son of Robert Curthose, but they were returned in 1112. Philip de Braose went on 2nd Crusade and died in Palestine.

Philip confirmed the gifts of his nephew, Philip de Harcourt, to the newly established Knights Templar. Philip de Harcourt, Bishop of Bayeux, bestowed the manor and church of Shipley on the Templars between 1125 and 1130 and in 1154 added St Mary's, Sompting.

See St Nicolas, Old Shoreham

Philip married Aenor de Toteneis in 1099 in Bramber, Sussex, England. Aenor was born in 1084 in Barnstable, Devonshire, England; died in 1153 in St. Mary Magdalen, Barnstaple, Devonshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: William Beauchamp. William (son of Walter Beauchamp and Emeline de Arbitot) was born about 1105 in Elmley Castle, Worcester, England; died about 1170 in Elmley Castle, Worcester, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

William was very fortunate in his marriage to Berta. All of her brothers died young without heirs, so she brought a number of important lordships to the de Braoses in 1166. These included Brecon and Abergavenny. William became Sheriff of Hereford in 1174. His interest in Sussex was maintained as he confirmed the grants of his father and grandfather for the maintenance of Sele Priory and extended St Mary's, Shoreham. See St Mary's, Shoreham, Sussex. William m. Berta, dau. of Milo de Gloucester, Earl of Hereford, and co-heir of her brother, William, Earl of Hereford, by whom he acquired Brecknock, with other extensive territorial possessions. He had two sons, William and Reginald, and was s. by the elder. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p. 72, Braose, Baron Braose, of Gower]

William married Heiress of Brecon Bertha FitzMiles de Gloucester about 1150 in England. Bertha (daughter of Earl of Hereford Miles Fitzwalter and Sybil de Neufmarche) was born about 1130 in Gloucester, Gloucestershire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Joan de Walene. Joan was born in 1134 in Elmley Castle, Worcester, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Walter Beauchamp. Walter (son of William Beauchamp and Joan de Walene) was born in 1173 in Elmley Castle, Worcester, England; died in 1235 in Elmley Castle, Worcester, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Sybil married 3rd Earl of Derby William de Ferrers about 1167 in Sussex, England. William (son of 2nd Earl of Derby Robert de Ferrers and Margaret Peverel) was born in 1130 in Tutbury, Stafforshire, England; died on 31 Dec 1189 in Siege of Acre, Jerusalem, Palestine. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

At his peak Lord of Bramber, Gower, Abergavenny, Brecknock, Builth, Radnor, Kington, Limerick, and the three castles of Skenfrith, Grosmont, and Whitecastle.

William inherited Bramber, Builth, and Radnor from his father, Brecknock and Abergavenny through his mother. He was the strongest of the Marcher Lords involved in constant war with the Welsh and other lords. He was particularly hated by the Welsh for the massacre of three Welsh princes, their families and their men which took place during a feast at his castle of Abergavenny in 1175. He was sometimes known as the "Ogre of Abergavenny". One of the Normans' foremost warriors, he fought alongside King Richard at Chalus in 1199 (where Richard was killed).

William received Limerick in 1201 from King John. He was also given custody of Glamorgan, Monmouth, and Gwynllwg in return for large payments.

William captured Arthur, Count of Brittany at Mirebeau in 1202 and was in charge of his imprisonment for King John. He was rewarded in February 1203 with the grant of Gower. He may have had knowledge of the murder of Prince Arthur and been bribed to silence by John with the city of Limerick in July. His honors reached their peak when he was made Sheriff of Herefordshire by John in 1206-7. He had held this office under Richard from 1192-1199.

His fall began almost immediately. William was stripped of his office as bailiff of Glamorgan and other custodies in 1206-7. Later he was deprived of all his lands and, sought by John in Ireland, he returned to Wales and joined the Welsh Prince Llewelyn in rebellion. He fled to France in 1210 via Shoreham "in the habit of a beggar" and died in exile near Paris. Despite intending to be interred at St John's, Brecon, he was buried in the Abbey of St Victorie, Paris by Stephen Langton, the Archbishop of Canterbury, another of John's chief opponents who was also taking refuge there.

His wife and son were murdered by King John-starved to death at Windsor Castle.

See Castle of Grosmont

William de Braose inherited the large estates of his grandmother, Bertade Gloucester, and besides possessed the Honor of Braose, in Normandy. This feudal lord was a personage of great power and influence during the reigns of Henry II and Richard I, from the former of whom he obtained a grant of the "whole kingdom of Limerick, in Ireland," for the service of sixty knight's fees, to be held of the king and his younger son, John. For several years after this period, he appears to have enjoyed the favor of King John and his power and possessions were augmented by divers grants from the crown. In the 10th of the king's reign [1209], when the kingdom labored under an interdiction and John deemed it expedient to demand hostages from his barons to ensure their allegiance should the Pope proceed to the length of absolving them from obedience to the crown, his officers who came upon the mission to the Baron de Braose were met by Maud, his wife, and peremptorily informed that she would not entrust any of her children to the king, who had so basely murdered his own nephew, Prince Arthur. de Braose rebuked her for speaking thus, however, and said that if he had in anything offended the king, he was ready to make satisfaction according to the judgment of the court and the barons, his peers, upon an appointed day and at any fixed place without, however, giving hostages. This answer being communicated to the king, an order was immediately transmitted to seize upon the baron's person, but Braose having notice thereof fled with his family into Ireland.

This quarrel between de Braose and King John is, however, differently related by other authorities. The monk of Llanthony stated that King John disinherited and banished him for his cruelty to the Welsh in his war with Gwenwynwyn, and that his wife Maud and William, his son and heir, died prisoners in Corfe Castle. Another writer relates, "that this William de Braose, son of Philip de Braose, Lord of Buelt, held the lands of Brecknock and Went for the whole time of King Henry II, Richard I, and King John without any disturbance until he took to wife the Lady Maud de St. Walerie, who, in revenge of Henry de Hereford, cause divers Welshmen to be furthered in the castle of Bergavenny as they sat at meat; and that for this, and for some other pickt quarrel, King John banished him and all his out of England. Likewise, that in his exile, Maud his wife, with William, galled, Gam, his son, were taken and put into prison where she died the 10th year after her husband fought with Gwenwynwyn and slew three thousand Welch." From these various relations, says Dugdale, it is no easy matter to discover what his demerits were, but what usage he had at last, take here the credit of these two historians who lived near that time. "This year, viz. anno 1240," quoth Matthew of Westminster, "the noble lady Maud, wife of William de Braose, with William, their son and heir, were miserably famished at Windsor by the command of King John; and William, her husband, escaping from Scorham, put himself into the habit of a beggar and, privately getting beyond sea, died soon after at Paris, where he had burial in the abbey of St. Victor." And Matthew Paris, putting his death in anno 1212 (which differs a little in time), says, "That he fled from Ireland to France and, dying at Ebula, his body was carried to Paris and there honorably buried in the abbey of St. Victor." "But after these great troubles in his later days," continues Dugdale, "I shall now say something of his pious works. Being by inheritance from his mother, Lord of Bergavenny, he made great grants to the monks of that priory, conditionally, that the abbot and convent of St. Vincent, in Maine (to which this priory of Bergavenny was a cell) should daily pray for the soul of him, the said William, and the soul of Maud, his wife."

This great but unfortunate personage had issue by his wife, Maud de St. Walerie, I. William; II. Giles: III. Reginald; IV. Sir John; I. Joane; II. Loretta; III. Margaret; IV. Maud.

When the contest between King John and the barons broke out, Giles de Braose, bishop of Hereford, arraying himself under the baronial banner, was put in possession by the people of Bergavenny and the other castles of the deceased lord, and eventually King John, in the last year of his reign, his wrath then being assuaged, granted part of those lands to the bishop's younger brother and heir. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p.72, Braose, Baron Braose, of Gower]

Buried:
Abbey of St Victorie, Paris, Seine, France

William married Maud de St. Valery in 1169. Maud was born about 1155 in Bramber, Sussex, England; died in 1210 in Corfe, Windsor Castle, Berkshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Bertha de Braose. Bertha (daughter of 1st Baron of Gwentland William de Braose and Heiress of Brecon Bertha FitzMiles de Gloucester) was born in 1151 in Bramber, Sussex, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Unknown. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Ralph de Mortimer. Ralph (son of Roger de Mortimer and Hawise de Vexin) was born about 1055 in Wigmore, Herfordshire, England; died in 1100. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Gather married King of England John I "Lackland" Plantagenet in 1188. John (son of King of England Henry II "Curtmantlel" Plantagenet and Duchess of Aquitaine Eleanor) was born on 24 Dec 1166 in Kings Manor House, Oxford, Oxfordshire, England; died on 19 Oct 1216 in Newark Castle, Nottinghamshire, England; was buried in Cathedral, Worcester, Worcestershire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

This nobleman, upon the return of King Richard from captivity, took arms in his behalf and, joining the Earl of Chester, besieged Nottingham Castle, which, after a brief resistance, surrendered. For this and other acts of fidelity, he was chosen by the king to sit with the rest of the peers in the great council held at the said castle in Nottingham in the ensuing March. Moreover, at Richard's second coronation he was one of the four that carried the canopy over the king's head. Upon the accession of King John, his lordship, with the Earls of Clare and Chester, and other great men, swore fealty to the new monarch but upon the condition that each person should have his right. His lordship was present at the coronation of King John and 7 June following, being solemnly created Earl of Derby by special charter dated at Northampton, he was girt with a sword by the king's own hands (being the first of whom in any charter that expression was used). He had also a grant of the third penny of all the pleas before the sheriff throughout the whole country whereof he was earl, to hold to him and his heirs as amply as any of his ancestors had enjoyed the same. Moreover, in consideration of 4,000 marks, he obtained another charter from the king of the manor of Higham-Ferrers, Northampton, with the hundred and park; as also of the manors of Bliseworth and Newbottle, in the same shire; which were part of the lands of his great grandfather, William Peverel of Nottingham. King John also conferred upon him a mansion-house situated in the parish of St. Margaret within the city of London, which had belonged to Isaac, a Jew, at Norwich, to hold by the service of waiting upon the king (the earl and his heirs), at all festivals yearly without any cap, but with a garland of the breadth of his little finger upon his head. These liberal marks of royal favor were felt so gratefully by the earl that in all the subsequent struggles between the king and the refractory barons, his lordship never once swerved from his allegiance, but remained true to the monarch; and loyalty to the interests of his son, King Henry III. His lordship assisted at the coronation of the new monarch and immediately after the ensuing Easter, he took part with the famous William Marshall(governor of the king and kingdom), the Earls of Chester and Albemarle, and many other great men in the siege of Mountsorell Castle in Leicestershire, then held by Henry de Braybroke and ten other stout knights. And the same year was likewise with those noble persons at raising the siege of Lincoln, which place the rebellious barons with Lewis, King of France, had invested. His lordship m. Agnes, sister and one of the co-heirs of Ranulph, Earl of Chester, by whom he had two sons, William and Thomas. He died of the gout in 1246 and his countess d. in the same year after a union, according to some authorities, of seventy-five, and by others, of fifty-five years. His lordship was s. by his elder son, William de Ferrers, 5th Earl of Derby. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited, and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p. 196, Ferrers, Earls of Derby]

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There is substantial confusion over his name. See The Complete Peerage Vol. 4, p 193 for an account. Personally, I feel there could have been two brothers, William and Robert, Robert being the Earl and when he died at Acre his nephew William son of his brother William succeeded, but no documents support this theory either! In The Complete Peerage vol. XIV, p.250 it is suggested that Robert is a fabrication by Vincent, Earl of Ferrieres. [Brian Tompsett, Directory of Royal Genealogical Data]

William married Agnes de Meschines on 2 Nov 1192. Agnes (daughter of 3rd Earl of Chester Hugh de Kevelioc, 5th Earl of Chester and Bertrade de Montfort) was born about 1174 in Chester, Cheshire, England; died on 2 Nov 1247. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: 4th Earl of Leicester Robert IV de Beaumont. Robert (son of 3rd Earl of Leicester Robert III de Beaumont and Petronella de Grandmesnil) was born about 1150 in Leicestershire, England; died in 1204 in Leicestershire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

William did not accompany King Richard on Crusade but fought with King John against Philip in Normandy (1203/4). King John demanded William as a hostage for his father's loyalty in 1208. His mother Maud refused and they fled to Ireland. In 1210 John prepared an expedition to Ireland. Maud and William escaped Ireland, but were apprehended in Scotland. William the father was in Wales at the time. It is believed that Maud and William were starved to death at Windsor Castle (Some say Corfe).

William, who perished by starvation with his mother at Windsor m. Maud, dau. of the Earl of Clare, with whom he had the town of Buckingham, in frank marriage, and left a son, John. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, ENG, 1883, p. 72, Braose, Baron Braose, of Gower]

William married Maud de Clere in 1197. Maud (daughter of 4th Earl of Hertford Richard de Clare and Countess of Gloucester Amicia) was born about 1176 in Lincoln, Lincolnshire, England; died in 1213. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Giles' younger brother, Reginald, s. him in the representation of the family. Eventually King John, in the last year of his reign, his wrath being then assuaged, granted part of those [confiscated] lands to Reginald, which grant was confirmed by King Henry III, and he had livery of the castle and honour of Totness, with the honour of Barnstaple, having had previous possession of other estates. He m. GoÅicia, dau.... offff William de Bruere, and dying in 1221, waaas sss. by his son, William de Braose. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, England, 1883, p. 72, Braose, Baron Braose, of Gower]

Family/Spouse: Princess of Wales Gwladys "The Dark" verch Llewelyn. Gwladys (daughter of Llywelyn Fawr ap Iowerth, Prince of Wales and Tangwystl verch Lywarch) was born in 1205 in Caerarvonshire, Wales; died in 1251 in Winsor, Berkshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]