According to the Middleton pedigree in the 1664-5 visitation which I've
cited previously, the Sir William Middleton mentioned below had a will which
was proved, not dated, 11 March 1552 - the will was dated 2 Aug 1549. Clay
cites Testamenta Eboracensia, v. 6, which has also been previously cited.
Sir William Middleton is indicated as the son of Sir Peter and his wife Anne
Vavasour of Hazlewood and thus a brother of the previously mentioned Alice
Middleton who mar. Richard Peck. According to the visitation pedigree, Sir
William was married three times and had children (and probably further
descendants) by all three marriages.
At a quick glance, the information below for Sir William's ancestor Sir
Peter, who mar. Eustacia Plumpton, appears to be in sync with the limited
information on him in the visitation pedigree.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Bill Arnold" <billarnoldfla@yahoo.com>
To: <gen-medieval@rootsweb.com>
Sent: Sunday, October 14, 2007 8:33 AM
Subject: MIDDLETON: Sir Peter de Middelton (c.1290-1335) - A
ProminentFourteenth Century Knight from Ilkley
I would appreciate gen-medieval list members' thoughts on
who was the William Middleton mentioned in the following article:
"...the will of Sir William Middelton, dated 11 March, 1552, in
which he requests to be buried under the stone where his ancestor
Sir Peter Middelton lay in Ilkley Church...." This clearly shows me
that at least in Ilkley, East Yorkshire, this pedigree is common
enough knowledge to make it the subject of a 1993 article.
Does anyone know of a book written about this Middleton
lineage?
Bill
**************************************************************
http://www.angelfire.com/ms/middelton/peterm.htmlSir Peter de Middelton (c.1290-1335) - A Prominent Fourteenth Century Knight
from Ilkley
An edited version of this article was published in the Ilkley Gazette on 1
April 1993
Tucked away in a quiet corner of the ancient Parish Church in Ilkley is one
of the town's greatest
historical treasures. Under an arched recess, in the small chapel off the
north aisle, lies a
finely carved effigy of a knight, which is over six hundred and fifty years
old. We must thank
Eoian Lewis for his recent drawings of this monument which are, I believe,
the first to accurately
portray it.
A description of c.1929, by Mr. William I'Anson, runs:
The knight, whose head rests upon pillows which are supported by angels,
wears a round-topped
skull-cap under a hood of mail; his hands, uplifted in prayer, are protected
by mail gauntlets
secured at the wrists by buckled leather straps; a guige [a strap for the
shield], passing over
the right shoulder, carries the shield; the surcoat, which reaches almost to
the ankles, is girt
at the waist by a narrow buckled strap, the pendent tag of which is looped
up and tucked away at
the right side; below and beneath the skirt of the hauberk [the coat of
mail] is seen the lower
extremity of the padded and quilted gambeson [a coat for wearing underneath
chain mail]; the
cuir-bouilli [boiled leather] knee-cops are ridged and decorated by
miniature shields; the
mail-clad legs are crossed; short prick spurs are worn, and the feet rest
upon a lion.
The knight's shield carries the arms of Middelton but for many years there
has been uncertainty as
to which member of the Middelton family it represented. The Middelton
family, who took their name
from Middleton in Wharfedale, can be traced back to the twelfth century and
continued their
association with Ilkley until the twentieth.
Camden, writing in the late sixteenth century, attributed the effigy to Adam
de Middelton, who
died in 1317. But the will of Sir William Middelton, dated 11 March, 1552,
in which he requests to
be buried under the stone where his ancestor Sir Peter Middelton lay in
Ilkley Church, throws
doubt on this attribution. Collyer and Turner, in 'Ilkley: Ancient and
Modern' decided that the
effigy belonged to Adam's father Peter, but I'Anson, who looked at many
monuments in the county,
believed it was of a later date.
I'Anson's suggested date for the effigy of c.1335 indicates that it was made
for Sir Peter de
Middelton, nephew of Adam and grandson of Adam's father Peter. However, some
scholars thought that
I'Anson was dating monuments too late, and discussion on this issue was cut
short by the
destruction of I'Ansons library by fire and his death before the publication
of his work. At the
moment, however, we must give his opinions the benefit of the doubt until
further work is done.
Sir Peter was the son of William de Middelton and Agnes, daughter of Nigel
le Boteler of North
Deighton. He must have been born c.1290, but we know nothing of his early
life. He was married
c.1319 to Eustachia, daughter of Robert de Plumpton, knt., who settled on
them lands in Nesfield
and Plumpton. Peter and Eustachia had several children, and Peter's eldest
son and heir Thomas was
born c.1321.
Peter's uncle Adam de Middelton was lord of Middleton, and joint lord of
Draughton and Askwith. He
also became the lord of Stockeld, near Wetherby, after a series of
transactions in the last decade
of his life. Adam was a justice of the king, and rector of Arncliffe, and
other public positions
he held included the offices of keeper of the town of Kingston-upon-Hull,
custodian of the Abbey
of Furness, warden of the Hospital of St. Leonard in York, and keeper of the
seal of the bishopric
of Durham. Sir Adam died on or about 24 February, 1317, leaving Sir Peter as
his heir.
Sir Peter followed his uncle's lead into the legal profession, and we hear
of him in 1327 being
asked to investigate an assault at Ellerker near Hull. He was subsequently
recorded as a justice
for the county of Northampton, and in 1332 was appointed with others to be
'keeper of York
Castle'. In 1334 he was appointed a Justice in Eyre of the forest of the
county of
Nottinghamshire, and later that same year of the county of Yorkshire. His
last position was that
of Sheriff of York, which he was granted in 1335.
The effigy of Sir Peter makes it plain he was seen as a man of arms. We know
of several episodes
in his life which would today be seen as 'incompatible with his public
duties'.
In May, 1316, commissioners were sent to investigate a complaint by John de
Goldesburgh that Adam
de Middelton, Peter de Middelton and many others had assaulted him at
Stockeld, killed three of
his horses to the value of £100, and carried away his goods and assaulted
his men and servants.
Later that year a further commission investigated the death of John
Folbaroun of Goldesburgh
[possibly the 'John de Goldsburgh'] which was said to have been caused by
Peter and others,
several of whom had been involved in the earlier offence. Sir Peter was
later acquitted. A payment
of 10 marks, in part payment of 100 marks, to Alice, widow of John
Folbaroun, from the executors
of the will of Adam de Middelton, recorded in Nov. 1318, was perhaps related
to this murder.
In 1317, a further complaint was made against Peter by John de Stockeld that
with others he had
burned his houses, hedges, and hays at Stockeld, and three horses to the
value of £10, 'broken his
park there', and felled and carried away his trees.
Later, in 1329, John de Moubray made a complaint against him and others that
they had driven away
40 horses and 300 sheep of his in Ingleton, and committed trespasses at his
hunting grounds at
Kirkby Malzeard, Burton in Lonsdale, Hovingham and Thirsk in Yorkshire.
In arms for the Government he was equally active. After Robert the Bruce led
the Scots incursion
into Yorkshire in 1319, when Ilkley and many other places were badly burnt,
he was ordered in
November of that year to raise arms against the Scots. It is unlikely that
any further fighting
took place that year, as shortly afterwards King Edward II agreed to peace
terms with the
invaders.
In 1330 he was appointed with others by Henry de Percy, at his manor of
Spofforth, to array all
men-at-arms and men on foot, and to bring them to him suitably equipped to
go on the King's
service, giving him power to punish rebels and contrariants.
Three years later, in May 1333, King Edward III ordered Peter de Middelton
and William de Mohaut
to raise twenty light horsemen and two hundred foot soldiers, either bowmen
or others, to fight
the Scots and in June was ordered to take them to Richmond or Northallerton.
A grant by Edward I
of Scotland [Edward Bailiol] to Sir Peter of several manors in Scotland, was
probably made as a
result of Sir Peter's role at the battle of Halidon Hill [near Berwick], on
July 19, 1333, when
David II, King of Scotland, was defeated by Edward III in support of
Bailiol.
Back home, carrying out his duties as Sheriff of York, Sir Peter was again
in trouble in 1335:
....when Peter de Middelton, the Sheriff, went into the West Riding to hold
his Tourns [the
Sheriff's twice yearly tour of the courts of the county], on Saturday the
vigil of Palm Sunday,
1335, Robert de Stopham, with other malefactors, viz. John le Vavasour of
Weston, Mauger le
Vavasour the younger, Alan le Venour of Storthes and Simon son of Peter del
Chirche of Oxton, and
others unknown, by procurement of John Vavasour, came against the King's
peace, and lay in wait
for Peter to slay him, at Ottelay and divers other places, so that the
Sheriff could not hold his
Tourns, and scarcely escaped death through their malice....
There seems to have been something of a blood feud between the Middeltons
and the Vavasours, for
Peter son of Richard de Middelton [I believe this Peter was first cousin of
Sir Peter] had been
murdered near Dacre Grange in Nidderdale in 1333 at the instigation of
Thomas son of Mauger le
Vavasour. Peter's son Richard avenged his father in 1345 when he mortally
wounded Thomas Vavasour
by stabbing him sixteen times about the heart as Thomas was walking in his
orchard at Denton.
By 1335 Sir Peter was back in Scotland as is shown by an order to the
Exchequer to pay Sir Peter
and his household their expenses and wages to cover their recent trip from
York to Edinburgh and
back to attend the king.
We last hear of Sir Peter at the castle at Wark on the Tweed, on 11 Sept.
1335, when Michael de
Presfen, one of the king's yeomen and keeper of the castle, gave him a
receipt for £100 in silver
which Sir Peter had been assigned by the bishop of Lincoln, treasurer of
England, to deliver to
Sir Michael's lord, Sir William Montague.
A receipt for monies paid by his executors shows us that by 24 October 1335
he was dead. No
details have yet come to light as to the manner of his death, but perhaps
future researches will
tell us more of the history of this prominent fourteenth century knight.
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