♂Robert de Grey

Robert de Grey (died before 27 May 1295) was an English landholder of Rotherfield Greys in Oxfordshire, with manors in Oxfordshire and Yorkshire. His mother was an heiress whose guardian, Walter de Grey, Archbishop of York^W, married her to his own nephew, Robert’s father. He was the twentieth great-grandfather of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006) by two separate lines of descent, both through his son John de Grey (1266–1311).

Early life

Robert was the son of Walter de Grey of Rotherfield and Isabel de Duston. Isabel was the eldest of the three daughters and heirs of William de Duston, who left them under age when he died. Their wardship passed to the archbishop, who arranged the marriages of all three, and Isabel’s went to the archbishop’s nephew Walter. Robert’s father was dead by January 1268, when Robert is said to have done homage for his lands.

Service under Edward I

Robert de Grey was reportedly summoned for military service repeatedly between 1276 and 1287, the years of Edward I’s wars in Wales. He is also said to have been summoned in June 1283 to attend the King at Shrewsbury, where the captured Welsh prince Dafydd ap Gruffudd^W was tried that autumn. At home, a commission was said to have been issued in February 1290 on his complaint that his park at Rotherfield had been broken into by night and his deer carried away.

Marriage and family

Robert married Joan de Valoines, the daughter of Thomas de Valoines. Thomas de Valoines gave the couple half the manor of Winterbourne in Berkshire in frank-marriage^W, the form in which a father endowed a daughter and her husband at their marriage, and his manor of Shabbington in Buckinghamshire later came to Joan as his heir. They had two sons, John and Thomas, and a daughter, Margaret.

Death

Robert de Grey died before 27 May 1295, when the first writ for the inquests^W on his lands was issued. The inquests covered Rotherfield and Hardwick in Oxfordshire and Sculcoates and Kettlewell in Yorkshire. Hardwick reportedly owed no service at all: Henry I had given it to the abbey of Sées in Normandy, and the monks had passed it to Robert’s forebears to hold as freely as they had held it themselves. The juries named his son John as his heir but disagreed on his age. The Yorkshire jurors made him 23 and more, while those in Oxfordshire called him “his first born son, aged 28 and more”. Joan outlived Robert by seventeen years.

Lines of descent

Both lines run through his son John de Grey (1266–1311). One comes down through Thomas Dudley^W (1576–1653), later governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, to Nathaniel Dudley (1763–1844); the other reaches Nathaniel’s wife, Anna Smith (1764–1825). The two lines meet again in their daughter Sarah Dudley (1795–1839).

Notes

Parentage and his mother’s marriage

The inquest on William de Duston, taken on 24 April 1271, found that “he had 3 daughters his heirs, who were under age when their father died”, that “Walter, sometime archbishop of York, who afterwards had the wardship of the heirs, married them”, and that “Isabel, the eldest daughter, who was married to Walter de Grey”, was in seisin (Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, vol. 1, no. 760). A royal grant of 1246 names “Walter de Grey son of Robert de Grey, nephew of W. archbishop of York” (Calendar of the Charter Rolls, vol. 1, p. 292). Under Edward II, John de Grey, Lord of Rotherfield, Robert’s grandson, petitioned concerning the advowson of St James, Northampton, which had been held “until the time of Isabel, daughter and heir of William de Duston, his great-grandmother” (The National Archives, SC 8/17/838). The Complete Peerage (2nd ed., vol. 6, p. 144) makes Robert “s. and h. of Sir Walter de Grey … by Isabel, eld. da. and coh. of William de Duston”, and gives his homage for his father’s lands on 5 January 1267/8 from the Fine Rolls.

Service and the park at Rotherfield

The summonses for military service from 12 December 1276 to 14 June 1287, the summons of 28 June 1283 to attend the King at Shrewsbury, and the commission of 11 February 1289/90 on his complaint “that his park at Rotherfield had been entered by night and deer carried away” (citing the Patent Rolls) all come from the Complete Peerage (vol. 6, p. 144). The trial of Dafydd ap Gruffudd at Shrewsbury in the autumn of 1283 is general history.

Marriage

The Complete Peerage (vol. 6, p. 144) gives his wife as “Joan, da. of Thomas de Valoines”, from a plea of 1330 in which his grandson sued for land in Shabbington “which Thomas de Valoines gave to Robert de Grey and Joan his wife and the heirs of their bodies”. The inquest after Joan’s death in 1312 found that Shabbington had “descended to the said Joan after the death of Thomas de Valoignes her father”, and that she held the Winterbourne moiety “for life in free marriage, because Thomas de Valoynes thereof enfeoffed the said Robert and Joan” (Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, vol. 5, no. 398). Robert’s own inquest names no wife.

Death and heir

The writs for the inquests on his lands are dated 27 May and 11 June in the twenty-third year of Edward I (1295). At York the jurors found “John his son, aged 23 and more, is his next heir”; in Oxfordshire, “his first born son, aged 28 and more” (Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, vol. 3, no. 284). The account of Hardwick, which “Hen. I gave to the Abbot and Convent of Sées in frankalmoign”, so that “the manor is charged with no service”, is the Complete Peerage’s summary of that inquest (vol. 6, p. 144).