♂Sir William de Braose

William de Braose^W (died about 1290) was an English knight and lord of the rape of Bramber^W in Sussex who settled lands of his barony on the four children of his third marriage, to Mary de Ros. He was the twentieth great-grandfather of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006) by two separate lines of descent, both through his son Peter de Braose (about 1273–1311).

Early life

William was the son of John de Braose, lord of Bramber and Gower, and his wife Margaret. Margaret is said to have been a daughter of Llywelyn ap Iorwerth, prince of North Wales, so William was a grandson of Llywelyn the Great^W. His father is said to have died after a fall from his horse in 1231 or 1232, while William was still under age. During his minority, on an order of Henry III, Robert le Savage, whose family held a leading place in the rape, was made keeper of the castles of Bramber, Knapp and Pevensey when a war with France seemed to threaten them.

Lord of Bramber

The Second Barons’ War^W left a quarrel on William’s own lands. Sedgwick, a manor and castle held under him by the le Savage family, had fallen into the hands of John de Maunsel and then of Simon de Montfort the younger. When Maunsel died abroad, William claimed that Sedgwick had escheated to him, but John le Savage, who had taken it back after the battle of Evesham, won the suit between them in 1266. In 1272 the two settled the matter by exchange: le Savage gave up Sedgwick for other lands held of the honor of Bramber.

A Victorian historian of Sedgwick wrote that in 1268 William was, “from his unthrifty habits in need of money”. That year he raised it by releasing the estates held under him from murage^W, the charge for the repair of his castle, and Hawisa le Savage paid 96 marks to free her manor in Broadwater of it forever. On 23 May 1269, by a deed dated at Durford Abbey^W, he granted the abbey a water-mill, with four acres of meadow and pasture for six animals in the wood of Brokeswode in West Grinstead, for thirty silver marks.

Marriages and children

William married three times, last to Mary de Ros. His heir, his son William, was the child of an earlier marriage. William and Mary had four children: Richard, Peter, Margaret and a younger William, born between 1281 and 1286. In two settlements of lands in his rape of Bramber, made in 1281 and 1286, William provided for them after his death, naming Richard, Peter and Margaret in the first and Richard, Peter and William in the second. He also gave Peter the manor of Tetbury in Gloucestershire, to hold to him and the heirs of his body. The settlements were long contested: between 1308 and 1343 William’s heir, and after him that son’s heir John de Mowbray, went to law to recover the settled lands.

Death

William died in 1290 or 1291 and is said to have been buried at Findon. Sedgwick, with other manors and estates, passed to his son William. Mary held her dower “by the death of Sir William de Brewosa sometime her husband”, and she outlived him by some thirty-five years, dying in 1326.

Lines of descent

Both lines run through William and Mary’s son Peter de Braose (about 1273–1311), his son Peter de Braose (died 1377) and Peter’s daughter Beatrice de Braose (died 1440), then through Beatrice’s son Ralph Shirley and his daughter Beatrix Shirley (died 1483), and from Beatrix through the Bromes, Dentons, Purefoys and Thornes to Thomas Dudley (1576–1653) and his son Samuel Dudley (about 1608–1683). One comes down through Samuel’s son Stephen Dudley (about 1654–1735) to Nathaniel Dudley (1763–1844), and the other to Nathaniel’s wife, Anna Smith (1764–1825); the two lines meet again in their daughter Sarah Dudley (1795–1839).

Notes

His parents and his wives

His parents are from F. N. Craig, “Whose Son was Peter de Braose?”, New England Historical and Genealogical Register, vol. 150 (July 1996), Table 1 (p. 322), which makes his mother Margaret a daughter of Llywelyn ap Iorwerth and names William’s three wives as Alina de Multon, Agnes de Moeles and Mary de Ros. A Braose pedigree in Sussex Archaeological Collections, vol. 8 (1856), also makes Margaret a daughter of Llywelyn, “Prince of North Wales”, and records that John de Braose died “by fall from horse” in the sixteenth year of Henry III (1231–32). That pedigree names the first wife as Isabel, daughter of Gilbert de Clare, and makes the younger William her son; Craig counts four children by Mary (p. 316), none of them the heir. The family accounts, not a record, carry the parentage and the wives’ names.

Sedgwick, murage and Durford

The minority, the Sedgwick dispute, the murage of 1268 and the deed of 1269 are from the papers on Sedgwick Castle and on Durford Abbey in the same volume, which cite the feet of fines of 52 Henry III and a deed in the Chapter House at Westminster. The phrase about “unthrifty habits” is the 1856 writer’s own judgment.

The settlements and the lawsuits

The settlements of 1281 and 1286 are from Craig, p. 316, citing the Sussex feet of fines (Sussex Record Society, vol. 7, nos. 935 and 986); the lawsuits are his reading of a King’s Bench case of 1308, a plea of 1317, the Patent Rolls of 1327 and the Year Books of 1343. The gift of Tetbury to Peter is recited in the inquisition taken after Peter’s death (Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, vol. 5, no. 321).

His death

Craig’s table gives his death as 1290–1; the 1856 pedigree has him “buried at Findon, 1290”. Mary’s dower is named in the inquisition on Peter, 1312 (Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, vol. 5, no. 321).

His name

Records of his own time write him William de Brewosa or de Brewes; this page keeps the familiar form Braose.