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Judge Sir Richard Bingham of Watnall
and his wife Margaret Freville¹ |
One of old Watnall's most eminent residents was Sir Richard Bingham, the illustrious judge and "Justice of the King's Bench" during Edward IV's reign in 1474. He married a rich widow Margaret Freville and moved from his Watnall Chaworth manor to her estate of Middleton in Warwickshire. It was while living there in his old age that he was called upon to adjudicate in a tale of young love and fair maids...
An Olde Love Story
"ON a steep eminence overhanging the river Thame in Warwickshire, not far from the ford which gives the hundred of Hemlingford its name, is the fortified mansion of the Bracebridges and the church of Kingsbury. In the time of the Heptarchy, some of the Mercian kings held their Court on this fair spot.
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The seven kingdoms of England
during the Anglo-Saxon heptarchy |
In later times it was the early home of the Bracebridges, the descendants of that Lincolnshire squire, Peter de Bracebridge, who, in the Norman times, left his home in the fens and came wooing to Warwickshire, where he wedded the fair Amicia, granddaughter to the oft-quoted Turchill, the Sheriff of Warwickshire during the time of the Confessor. During the troublous Plantagenet days, the Bracebridges fought bravely and held their heads amongst the proudest knights and squires of the land. They fortified their home at Kingsbury, and the existing fortifications show an interesting example of the crenelated house of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
Within these romantic walls during the time when the feuds of Yorkist and Lancastrian disturbed the land, and the bear and ragged staff was the universal cognizance of the midlands, fair Alice Bracebridge dwelt and loved. She thought that she was loved also, and that John Arden, the heir of Peddimore, dreamed of her fair face as he wandered round Park Hall and thought of his Saxon ancestry and the misfortunes of his house. His mother belonged to another race, for his father, Walter Arden, had wedded Eleanor, the daughter of John Hampden, the ancestor of the famous Buckinghamshire squire. They did not look with favour upon the alliance of their son with the poor and proud Bracebridges, who owed to the Ardens their estates and position in Warwickshire.
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The Bracebridge's fortified manor house
on its "eminence" above the River Thame
at Kingsbury, Warwickshire |
Richard Bracebridge, of Kingsbury, was not made of that yielding stuff to brook in silence or in disdain the rejected alliance of his family by his kinsmen, the Ardens of Peddimore.  |
The bear and ragged staff - emblem
of Warwickshire |
The lover was pining by the side of the Thame, and Alice was watching the flowers brought down by the slow stream from her absent lover. Her sighs and tears melted the old squire's heart, and early one morning he called his retainers to boot and saddle and rode to the hall of the Ardens and brought away the unreluctant heir to his moated house at Kingsbury. The raid was unexpected, and the disconsolate parents on their return home were loud in their demands for redress. To steal a man's daughter was a venial offence, but to abduct a son was unpardonable. The Ardens appealed to law - they represented the matter to King Edward IV, to the lords of the land, and demanded justice and the restitution of their son and heir, but in the meantime, John Arden remained within the strong walls of Kingsbury and comforted himself with the company of Alice Bracebridge.
It was a soft imprisonment, and it mattered but little to them what kings, lords, and lawyers might say or do. They little cared when Sir Simon Montford of Coleshill and Sir Richard Bingham, the judge, then living at Middleton, took the matter into their grave deliberation and decreed that the pair should be married in February, 1474, and that the lady should have a portion of 200 marks as a jointure settled upon her.
Richard Bracebridge, in expiation of the trespass he had committed, was ordered to give Walter Arden the best horse that could be chosen in Kingsbury Park. When Walter died he made John Bracebridge one of his executors. For many years - for more than two centuries - the descendants of John Arden and Alice Bracebridge lived lords of Peddimore at Park Hall, and then founded the Staffordshire family of that name.
The double moat yet remains at Peddimore, and the home of the Bracebridges is silently going to decay, like the family. Within the fortified walls there remains the dwelling house erected in the time of Elizabeth, when the last Bracebridge, of Kingsbury, sold his paternal estate, and the death of the last of the Bracebridges was recorded when Charles Holte Bracebridge, of Atherston Hall, was laid in his grave".
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Peddimore's double moated manor house
where John and Alice lived happily ever after... |
Sir Richard Bingham's LifeIn 1476, just two years after adjudicating on Alice Bracebridge's love life, Sir Richard Bingham died at his wife's manor of Middleton in Warwickshire aged around 76. He was buried in the church of St John the Baptist Church in Middleton where his brass tomb effigy can be seen. He stands to the right of his wife Margaret (nee Freville) which is unusual. The left hand figure is usually the more prominent person. In this case it is perhaps because his wife was a rich widow from her first marriage to Sir Hugh Willoughby.
Sir Richard's life is discussed in the book "The Wollaton Medieval Manuscripts: Texts, Owners and Readers"...
"Bingham was a distinguished lawyer who served on the Nottinghamshire bench from 1430, and was appointed justice of the King's Bench in 1445. He had long association with Sir Thomas Chaworth, since he was named as a feoffee as early as 1426. After the death of Richard Willoughby's father Hugh in 1448, Bingham married Hugh's widow Margaret and lived at her manor at Middleton, Warwickshire. When Richard Willoughby successfully disputed Hugh's over-generous provision for Margaret and her children to the detriment of the children by his first wife, including himself, it presumably ruptured relationships between him and the Binghams. If so, they had made it up by the time of Richard Willoughby's death, since he appointed Bingham supervisor of his will. Bingham was constantly in demand for arbitrating in disputes, and appears frequently in the Willoughby documents, acting for both Hugh and Richard. In 1434, for instance, Bingham and others, as Hugh's feoffees, handed over the manor of Wymeswold, Nottinghamshire, to Richard and his wife Anne, in a document witnessed by Chaworth."
The importance of knowing the law - Sir Richard's wealthy extended family were keen on reading the law... "Hugh Willoughby took no time in restoring the family fortunes. In about 1395 he had married Isabel Foljambe, and his second marriage (by 1419) to the heiress Margaret Freville brought him the rich manor of Middleton and the other valuable Warwickshire estates. His will shows that by the time of his death he had amassed a vast quantity of silver, much of it acquired from Thomas Beaumont, seigneur de Basqueville, who had evidently looted it while soldiering in France.
After Hugh's death, his widow married a prominent lawyer, Richard Bingham (d. 1476), justice of the King's Bench, who lived and was buried at Middleton, and played a significant part in the legal affairs of the Willoughbys. Hugh's son, Richard Willoughby (d. 1471) evidently had legal training, as no doubt had other Willoughbys, since the family would have shared the view expressed by the Norfolk gentlewoman Agnes Paston. In 1445 she wrote to her son Edmund, then training at Clifford's Inn, that he should remember daily his father's advice 'to lerne the lawe, for he seyde manie tymis that ho so euer schuld dwelle at Paston schulde have nede to conne ('know how to') defende hymselfe." Even in the 16th century Henry Willoughby (d. 1528) intended to keep up the family's connection with lawyers, and married his daughter Dorothy to Anthony Fitzherbert in 1507. However, she died within months.
Fitzherbert went on to become the leading lawyer of his generation, justice of the Common Pleas and author of three classic treatises on the law, including La Graunde Abridgement, a three-volume collection of legal Year Books."
Mystic Religion - Sir Thomas Chaworth bequeaths Sir Richard a distinguished Christian mystic book, Suso's Orilogium Sapienciae...
"All the surviving manuscripts are appropriately plain and without illustration. A typical example (without the prologue) is BodI. MS e Museo 111, which has 34 leaves of poorly finished parchment measuring 235x165 mm in a parchment wrapper. If Chaworth's copy was similar, he must have known that Bingham would have valued the book for its content rather than its appearance, though whether Bingham had much time for contemplation in his busy legal life is doubtful. In 1440 he bought the manor of Watnall, very close to Beauvale, where his descendants were to live. He died in 1476, but his wife lived on until 1493. They were both buried in Middleton church, where their brass survives. His will shows conventional piety; he left 'vnum antiphonarium abbreviatum' to the chapel at Middleton, a portiforium to his chaplain Henry Blakelache to remain in his chapel at Watnall, and all his other liturgical books to Margaret."
Sir Richard's confusing marriages and lineage
Sir Richard's first marriage to Helena/Elena as recorded on Greasley church's plaque below is in contrast to other sources such as the one below that list wife#1 as "Margeria Rempston (dau/heir of Sir Thomas Rempston)". The Remstones took over the manor of the village of Bingham in Notts from the earlier Bingham family, specifically Sir Richard de Bingham a famous knight, when they fell on hard times. In Shakespeares's Richard II a Remstone is the "Nottingham Knight" now a well-known local traffic roundabout and pub.
Helena/Elena died in 1448 according to her plaque at Greasley church.
His second wife Margaret Freville is more definite and is confirmed by several sources...
1. (Sir) Richard Bingham of Watnow Chaworth, Nottinghamshire (judge)
m1. Margeria Rempston (dau/heir of Sir Thomas Rempston)
m2. Margaret Frevill (dau/heir of Sir Baldwin Frevill)
https://www.stirnet.com/genie/data/british/zwrk/temp22.php
Main source(s):
(1) For Bingham of Watnow : Visitation (Nottinghamshire, 1569, Bingham)
However, 'History and Antiquities of the County of Leicester' (John Nichols, vol 2, part 1, 1795, 'Pedigree of Charnell of Muston', p 295) shows John (a 1461), husband of Elizabeth Charnell and father of Richard father (by Anne Strelley) of Anne & Margaret, as son of Sir Richard (by Margaret de Rempston, he m2. Margaret Frevile) son of John of Warnow (a 1444).
| This section first uploaded 30.11.10, reviewed 20.01.23 using Nichols. |
| The following follows the Visitation. However, 'History and Antiquities of the County of Leicester' (John Nichols, vol 2, part 1, 1795, 'Pedigree of Charnell of Muston', p 295) shows John (a 1461), husband of Elizabeth Charnell and father of Richard father (by Anne Strelley) of Anne & Margaret, as son of Sir Richard (by Margaret de Rempston, he m2. Margaret Frevile) son of John of Warnow (a 1444). |
| John Bingham of Nottinghamshire (a 1444) |
| m. Elizabeth Charnells (dau/heir of Norman Charnells of Muston) |
| 1. | (Sir) Richard Bingham of Watnow Chaworth, Nottinghamshire (judge) |
| m1. Margeria Rempston (dau/heir of Sir Thomas Rempston) |
| | m2. Margaret Frevill (dau/heir of Sir Baldwin Frevill) |
| | A. | John Bingham 'of Watnow' |
| | i. | Richard Bingham of Watnow |
| | m. Anna Strelly (sister/heir of Sir Nicholas Strelly of Linby) |
| | a. | Anne Bingham |
| | m. Ralph Purefoy (d 1550-1) |
| | b. | Margeria (Margaret) Bingham |
| | m. Ralph Rolleston of Rolleston |
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One of several slightly different bios for Sir Richard
on ancestry.com. This one correctly has his 2nd marriage post 1448
but does not mention the first marriage and Helena's death in 1448 |
The engraving of Sir Richard Bingham and his wife
This is an engraving depicting the tomb effigies of Sir Richard Bingham and his 2nd wife, Lady Margaret Bingham (née Freville).
Sir Richard Bingham (d. 1476) was a Justice of the King's Bench.
- Lady Margaret (c. 1401-1493) was a wealthy landowner who lived for over 40 years after her husband's death.
- The original effigies are located at St John the Baptist Church in Middleton, North Warwickshire, England.
- The image itself is a 16th-century print, part of a series illustrating various religious and civic costumes.
- Translation - Here lies Richard Bingham, knight, Justice of the King's Bench, who died on the 17th day of May in the year 1476, and Lady Margaret, his wife, whose souls may God have mercy upon. Amen.
The original brasses at Middleton which the engravings are probably based on with some artistic licence...
Comments by Rosie Bevan...
https://www.facebook.com/groups/735389799823006/posts/6397403363621593/
Rosie Bevan
This drawing accentuated the fur trimming on his cloak. His arms above him denote Bingham impaling Freville. His personal arms are at bottom left, Or on a fess gu 3 bougets ermine. Gold background, with a red stripe (fess) with 3 ermine bougets on the stripe. As the drawing is from the brass, the bougets may have worn off by the time the drawing was made. The arms at the bottom of Margaret Freville do seem to have worn down and possibly showed Willoughby impaling Freville to denote her first marriage. The Freville of Tamworth arms are given above her.
Rosie Bevan
Chris Appleby Yes, the drawing is supposed to be of the Middleton brass but the figures are the wrong way round. Usually the husband is placed on the left and wife on the right, but it has been observed that when the wife's status is higher than the husband's, the wife goes on the left, and impalements are reversed. This may be the case here.
Sir Richard at work on the King's Bench. This is one of the earliest images of the English justice system from c.1460 when Sir Richard would have been on the bench. One if the figures is probably him...
First wife Helena/Ellen - whose memorial brass plaque at Greasley church is the oldest one there dated 1448.
Latin date conundrum - The 1450 church tower at Greasley St. Mary's in Nottinghamshire has a faded brass memorial to Helena the wife of Judge Richard Bingham (pictured) that I would like help interpreting. The date in particular is proving difficult to translate from the Latin as it does not seem to conform to regular Roman numeral rules. Perhaps it was done incorrectly? I assume it means 1468 and was done digit by digit. "Hic jacet Helena qui fuit uxor Rici Bingham militis unus justicarum de Banco dni regis qui obit xii die mensis ffebruarii ao dni Millium ccccxiviii Cui aie ppiciet dues an"
Google Translate says "Here lies Helen, who was the wife of Ric Bingham, a soldier, one of the justices of the King's Bench, who died on the twelfth day of the month of February, ao the day of Millium ccccxiviii. To whom shall he pay his dues?"
Chris ApplebyUPDATE - the consensus is that the date is Mccccxlviii - 1448. The first letter i is in fact a letter L. It is difficult to see on the original brass plate due to the fading and the font used.
Rosie BevanApparently, Ellen was widow of William Wastner who died in 1420.
Rosie BevanThe surname is Wasteneys, not Wastner, as reported from my first source. They lived at Headon. Possibly this individual. "In 1409 William Wasteneys was charged in Chancery with aiding and abetting his servant in violent and lawless conduct against the citizens of Retford. A complaint was made to the Chancellor that Ralph and Thurstan Puncherdon, servants of this Wasteneys waylaid Robert de Beghton, near Headon Cross. The report says that they “did lie in wait on the high road of our lord the king near Headon Cross and there they did encounter one Robert de Beghton, a tenant of our lord the king and did assault him as if they purposed to have killed or murdered him, and so they would have done if it had not been that by the grace of God the said Robert perceived where Dame Katherine Hercy stood on her watchtower in that part, and he fled to her presence for help, and so was rescued and delivered out of their hands.”
https://southwellchurches.nottingham.ac.uk/.../hhistory.php
Rosie BevanThe best source is Simon Payling, 'Political Society in Lancastrian England: The Greater Gentry of Nottinghamshire'. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991. p.180, note 93 "His [i.e. Richard Bingham's - RB] first wife was Elena, the widow of William Wastnes (d.1420) of Headon in north Notts. CP25(1)/292/68/153" The latter reference is from The National Archives. Wastnes is a derivation of Wasteneys.
Rosie BevanIt explains this 1334 fine. John Wasteneys is possibly her son who has come of age and is making a formal settlement of dower on Ellen and Richard. CP 25/1/292/68, number 153.
Link: Image of document at AALT
County: Nottinghamshire. Yorkshire.
Place: Westminster.
Date: Three weeks from St Michael, 13 Henry VI [20 October 1434].
Parties: John Wastenesse, esquire, querent, and Richard Byngham and Ellen, his wife, deforciants.
Property: 1 messuage, 1 acre of land in Hedon' in the Cley and [a third] part of the manor of Hedon' in the Cley in the county of Nottingham and a third part of the manor of Todwyk', of 5 messuages, of 2 tofts, of 200 acres of land, of 20 acres of meadow and of 20 shillings and 10 pence of rent in Laghton', Morthyng, Brokhous, Thurcroft, Brampton', Hoton', Thropun, Seint Joh'n Kirk' and Anston' in the county of York.
Action: Plea of covenant.
Agreement: Richard and Ellen have acknowledged the tenements and third parts to be the right of John, and have rendered them to him in the court, to hold to John and his heirs, of the chief lords for ever.
For this: John has given them 100 marks of silver.
Standardised forms of names. (These are tentative suggestions, intended only as a finding aid.)
Persons: John Wasteneys, Richard Bingham, Ellen Bingham
Places: Headon, Todwick, Laughton en le Morthen, Morthen (in Rotherham and Whiston), Brookhouse, Thurcroft (both in Laughton en le Morthen), Brampton en le Morthen (in Treeton), Slade Hooton (in Laughton en le Morthen), Throapham (in St John's), St John's, South Anston
Chris ApplebyRosie Bevan It never ceases to amaze me how much stuff is on the historical record and how accessible it is now becoming with technology. I also found this illustration of the Court of the King's Bench from c.1460 during Sir Richard Bingham's time on it. There were only a few judges so one of the judges could well be him.
Rosie BevanChris Appleby Yes, more and more sources are coming online. It pays to know where to look, but I've been doing this for over 20 years and know my way around them.
Rosie BevanChris Appleby They aren't very clear, but at first glance they look like the royal coat of arms to me, which would make sense being the king's court.
Memoires of the Binghams book 1915
| This section first uploaded 30.11.10, reviewed 20.01.23 using Nichols. |
| The following follows the Visitation. However, 'History and Antiquities of the County of Leicester' (John Nichols, vol 2, part 1, 1795, 'Pedigree of Charnell of Muston', p 295) shows John (a 1461), husband of Elizabeth Charnell and father of Richard father (by Anne Strelley) of Anne & Margaret, as son of Sir Richard (by Margaret de Rempston, he m2. Margaret Frevile) son of John of Warnow (a 1444). |
| John Bingham of Nottinghamshire (a 1444) |
| m. Elizabeth Charnells (dau/heir of Norman Charnells of Muston) |
| 1. | (Sir) Richard Bingham of Watnow Chaworth, Nottinghamshire (judge) |
| m1. Margeria Rempston (dau/heir of Sir Thomas Rempston) |
| | m2. Margaret Frevill (dau/heir of Sir Baldwin Frevill) |
| | A. | John Bingham 'of Watnow' |
| | i. | Richard Bingham of Watnow |
| | m. Anna Strelly (sister/heir of Sir Nicholas Strelly of Linby) |
| | a. | Anne Bingham |
| | m. Ralph Purefoy (d 1550-1) |
| | b. | Margeria (Margaret) Bingham |
| | m. Ralph Rolleston of Rolleston |
|
Previous Binghams
http://www.nottshistory.org.uk/articles/tts/tts1924/effigies/effigies3.htm
https://southwellchurches.nottingham.ac.uk/bingham/hmonumnt.php
IX. BINGHAM.
This knight wears a round topped cervelière under the coif of mail, which is fastened with a plain fillet. The head rests on the usual double cushion. The hands are joined in prayer on the breast, and are withdrawn from the mail mittens, which hang down in front. This feature is unusual in English effigies, though it is found in French ones. Other English instances of the suspended mittens are the minature Purbeck marble effigy at Bottesford in Leicestershire, an early effigy at Pershore and the well-known Septvans brass. The surcoat, confined at the waist by a narrow girdle, is folded back displaying the hauberk, which is split up the front for convenience in riding. The feet rest on a lion, prick spurs are worn, and the knee-caps evidently of cuirbouilli, are quite plain. The sword has a circular pommel and the sword-belt is fastened with interlocking thongs. The plain shield is suspended by a guige passing over the right shoulder.
This is undoubtedly the effigy of Sir Richard Bingham, who held a knight’s fee in Bingham in 1285.3 From 1296 till his death, in or about 1310, he was one of the most important personages in the county. He served on the commission of peace, was a commissioner for the collection of lay subsidies and a commissioner of array. In 1301 be had a licence, in consideration of a fine, to alienate in mortmain a rent of five marks from property in Nottingham to pay a chaplain to celebrate in the chapel of St. Elena at Bingham. In 1310 he was appointed to take a survey of the Castle of Nottingham.3
The date 1310 accords quite well with the style of the effigy, which was probably set up about the time of his death.
Notes and sources
The story is from "Historic Warwickshire: its legendary lore, traditionary stories, and romantic episodes" by J Tom Burgess 1876
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