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The Ancient Feudal Manor and Lordship
of Winterborne St. Martin (Dorsetshire)

The family of de Lincoln

Alured de Lincoln was noted for his loyalty to King William I. In 1087, many Earls, Counts and Barons including Alured de Lincoln attended the King at Lacock Manor in Wiltshire. From these men the King could obtain first-hand information about every part of England. This association between the King and his leading barons is shown by every substantial witness list that has come down from the Conqueror's reign. This relationship determined the whole character of his government. By the end of his reign, Normans of the baronial class were in office in all parts of the country.

In the time of Henry 1 we find de Lincoln exercising a right of ownership over some property comprised in this barony by granting to the church of Tewkesbury two tithes in Tachtona and Le Harpine (Acton in Langton Maltravers and Harpstone in Church Knowle) which gift was confirmed by the king in 1106. After this nearly all the property found at one time or another comprised in the barony in the Domesday Survey is found in the possession of the de Lincoln family or their descendants

Hutchins writes, "In the Domesday Book Winterborne St. Martin cannot be distinguished from the many Winterbournes that occur there. In the earliest account of this place, the manor was a member of the Barony of Alured de Lincoln, or de Nichol".

This is the Alfred de Lincolne described by de Seriana who claims a barony of Winterborne St Martin existed. This conflicts with Hutchins who states the manor was simply a member of de Lincoln's Barony. At the time of the General Survey Alured de Lincoln held Wimentone in Bedfordshire and 51 properties in Lincolnshire. Such a group of manors were known collectively as an honour. None of them formed a compact territorial unit, and many of them consisted of isolated manors or groups of manors scattered widely over the country. An honour was a number of manors that devolved together. But over the centuries the significance has changed. The title of Baron was a title of Nobility. This title, unlike those on the continent, were purely honorific and was lost if the Baron lost his landed status.

Hutchins follows the view of Dugdale's Baronage in his description of Alured de Lincoln. He was certainly a baron who held very numerous manors in Lincolnshire at the time of Domesday, but the precise relationship is not established. Dugdale treats the Lincolnshire and Dorset Alureds as identical, but it appears to be improbable. The Dorset Alured might have been a younger son of the Lincolnshire baron, although Kirk prefers to consider him to have been the son of Colswain de Lincoln, who, he supposes, was brother of the first Alured.

Alured held the park of Dunelsshe (Duntish) and Tyley from the Abbot of Cerne, by the service of holding his stirrup when the Abbot was to mount his horse. The Manor of Winterbourne St Martin belonged to the Abbot of Abbotsbury, Roberto de Monasteris. Alured de Lincoln held the Manor from the Abbot. The Abbey was founded in 1026 by King Canute and like The Abbey of Cerne; it belonged to the Benedictine Order . The grant of an honour or land for the chivalrous act of sustaining a cleric was not uncommon. Nicholas de Mynyll held the Manor of Whorlton in the West Riding of Yorkshire from the Archbishop of Canterbury by serving him with a drink on the day of his consecration . This manor subsequently passed to the Strangways family who in centuries to come, would appropriate the abbey lands and honours at Abbotsbury as commissioners acting for King Henry VIII.

He was justicar of Dorset in the reign of Henry I. He gave land near Weymouth to Montacute Priory. In 1115 Alured de Lincoln was a signatory to a charter of King Henry 1 laying the foundation to the presbytery of Heytesbury near Warminster in Wiltshire. This event is recorded in the register of Saint Osmund the first Bishop of Sarum (Salisbury).


Saint Osmund
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The font

 

It was at this time that the original Church of St Martin's was built in the manor. The other remaining Norman features are the piers and arches, which are stern and simple without the elaborate carvings of later work. They lend a simple calmness that gives a sense of tranquillity and peace when the church is empty. The Norman font, thought to date from about 1125, is of Purbeck marble with decoration of lead arcading.

In 1131, he is seen to receive pardon for a debt of six pounds, which he owed for Danegeld in Dorset. This shows that he was then in possession of the barony. In that year he was excused the payment of forty shillings for his share of a fine for a murder imposed on the Hundred of Winford, and a like sum in respect to a similar offence in the Hundred of Newton in Dorset; in both of which Hundreds the family held Manors. Also in 1131, Alured de Lincoln gave to the King 60 marks of silver that he might have the Manor of Pulham for his life


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Wareham Castle

He fought in the civil war supporting the Empress Matilda against King Stephen. The war came about following Stephen's succession in 1135 when he crossed the channel and took control of England following the death of Henry 1.

For two years Stephen had little trouble but finally lost the support of Anglo-Norman knights. In 1138 Geoffrey of Anjou invaded Normandy, King David of Scotland (Matilda's uncle) invaded the north, and Robert of Gloucester (Matilda's half-brother) raised the standard of rebellion in the west country. There became two rival courts in England, though Stephen was generally in a better position than the Empress who rarely held more than a few west-country shires. For his part, Alured de Lincoln seized Wareham Castle in July 1138 on her behalf. Robert, his son was installed the new governor of the castle. Their relative strengths are indicated by the number of surviving charters: 720 issued by Stephen, only 88 by Matilda.


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Empress Matilda

After Alured's death Robert, founded the priory at Holme as a cell of Montacute, and among his donations were the tithes of Langton Herring near Abbotsbury and those of Okeford Alured (later Okeford Fitzpaine). By his wife Beusa, Robert had issue (besides Andrew and Peter, both of whom witnessed the foundation charter of Holme Priory, and Albreda, who because a nun at Clerkenwell). Alured II was his son and heir. Alured II was lord of this barony in 1166, when he certified his knights fee in Dorset as amounting to £30. In 1170 he was Sheriff of Dorset following an inquest of the sheriffs.

1164 saw the passing of the Constitutions of Clarendon. They were highlighted the initial stages of the struggle between Henry II and archbishop Thomas a Becket. The Constitutions were an attempt by Henry II to define the royal prerogatives. As Justicar of Dorset, Alured de Lincoln held an important role in enforcing these rules. They also saw the beginnings of the modern jury system, albeit in very basic form. Article 6 of the constitution stated that laymen ought not to be accused other than by dependable and legal accusers and witnesses in the presence of the bishop. It further provided for the sheriff to find twelve men of the neighbourhood to determine the truth of the matter in accordance with their conscience. Article 7. No one who held land from the King could be excommunicated or his lands or his land confiscated unless the king, or his justiciar first gave his consent at which point the matter would be decided by the church court. Article 8 provided for an appeal to the Archbishop.

The power of the Barons including de Lincoln was limited by Article 13. If anyone should forcibly prevent archbishop, bishop, or archdeacon from administering justice in which he or his men were concerned, then the king should to bring him to justice. If any one should prevent this he could be arrested and tried. There were a total of 16 articles that formalised relations between the church and the crown

Pestilence and plague played an important role in the history of Dorset's villages, because not only could they be a major cause of depopulation but they could, and did, result in the long-term or even permanent abandonment of sites. Pestilence is highlighted in the 1204 records of King John. They show that William de Newmarket of Martinstown held land in the counties of Dorset and Somerset. He contacted leprosy and was committed to Godfrey de St Martin "so that he might answer for them to the exchequer". William de Newmarket was unable to pass any of his lands to his friends or relatives after he fell sick and they had to revert to the de Lincoln Barony.

Opinion is divided as to whether leprosy was a bar to descent, and the record casts no light upon the point. It seems there was a nervous anxiety that a leper should respond in person at the Court of the Exchequer and carry infection there. As a consequence the lands of lepers were taken into the King's hands or in this case the barony. The temptation was that the afflicted man would try to give away his lands to his friends and relations, with whom he could make a private arrangement, rather than they should be farmed by a stranger appointed by the King. The fear of the spread of infection throughout a very mobile nobility was particularly pertinent as the King visited Dorchester in that year and personally collected taxes and dues at the local Court of Exchequer

The King had an insatiable desire for hunting. He possessed the Royal forests of Blackmoor, Gillingham and Bere Regis and had converted the whole of Isle of Purbeck from a hare warren into a forest . The king's huntsman was Robert de Winterbourne although it is not know in which of the Winterbourne Valley villages he lived. He was paid £23 a year for his services. William de Montacute was the sheriff at that time and he had custody of the woods by the road that ran between Dorchester Powerstock and Bridport. He had the impossible task of keeping them guarded because the King also had them well stocked with game for his pleasure.


King John deer hunting
Poaching of the King's dear was common amongst the villagers. It is on record that Adam, brother of Osbert from Winford Eagle was fined ½ a mark for poaching the king's deer. It seems likely that much of the King's venison came from the Manor of Martinstown. It is thought a deer park existed on land in the northeast quadrant of the manor. This was in a rectangular area bounded on the north by the Bridport Road (A35), on the west by the road leading due north from the eastern end of Martinstown village (Batt's Lane), on the south by the lane running through Clandon Farm and on the east by the parish boundary between Winterborne St. Martin and Winterbourne Monkton beneath the embankments of Maiden Castle.

The suggestion of a deer park is supported by a group of 'park' field names in the Tithe Apportionment; two fields in the extreme corner were named 'Park Corner' and 'Park Corner Close'. Today much of this former medieval deer park is in the hands of the Duchy of Cornwall.

Few animals were kept over winter. In the autumn the surplus stock of sheep, cattle and venison was killed and salted for winter use.


Duchy of Cornwall

Large sums were paid for conveying and salting the King's venison. The salt diet throughout the winter and lack of vegetable food was thought to be the cause of scurvy, and also considered to account for the prevalence of leprosy in England in those days.

The Manor passed through two further generations of the de Lincoln family who were all named Alured. His son and heir was Alured de Lincoln (III) who in 1212 held Langton Herring and this manor.

1215 saw the signing of the Magna Carta at granted (under considerable duress) by King John at Runnymede on June 15. This document contained 63 clauses or articles and determined how land was to be held and inherited. It was an important document that would determine the rights of landholders and remove interference of the crown from the barons.


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Magna Carta

In 1216 Inquisitions post mortum were introduced by King Henry 111 and continued to be held for nearly 450 years. When a person died, whether male of female holding land from the Crown (in capite) an inquisition was held to determine what land was held at the t ime of the death and who should be the next heir. If the heir happened to be a minor, the lands descending to him were held in ward by the Crown until he came of age. The wardships were generally a very lucrative business as the rents and profits of the estate went to the person having charge of the heir until coming of age.

The de Lincoln's association with the church continued throughout this time and the Manor finally passed to Alured IV. He was to be found in court in Sherborne before six judges. The matter of issue was the rent he should pay to the Abbot of Glastonbury for the Manor of Child Okeford. The rent was fixed at 3 shillings a year. He together with Simon de Montfort and others were founder of the priory at Wareham.

The power of the Barons was the cause of considerable concern to the Crown and in particular, the power of the Barony of Alured de Lincoln and his successors was in question. At his death in 1264 there was an inquisition in the Counties of Dorset, Somerset and Wiltshire to determine the extent of the lands under his control and that of his heirs and of the grants of the same lands by subsequent owners of the Priories of (East) Holme in Dorset and Montecute in Somerset. He died without male heirs. The author maintains a copy of this inquisition.

So it was that the land of Alured IV passed to his three sisters and their heirs. Margery, the eldest, married Robert Fitz Pain. William de Govis was the son of the middle daughter, Beatrice. The third sister was Albreda de Lincoln (Aubrey in some references) whose land passed on her death to the heirs of her sisters. The de Lincoln barony was broken up and dispersed, and finally became extinct.

Henry III was increasingly unpopular because of his foreign expeditions and the Crown's concern of this family's power was justified. This was the time of the Baronial Wars, a rebellion of the nobility against the King, staged between 1263 and 1267. The rebellion was led by Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester who was also the lord of the Manor of nearby Bere Regis. It was precipitated by Henry's refusal, abetted by Pope Urban IV, to effect the Provisions of Oxford, amendments to the Magna Carta that had been adopted by the nobility in 1258 in an effort to curb Henry's abuse of his powers. In 1263 the dispute between the barons and Henry was submitted for arbitration to King Louis IX of France, whose decision favoured the English sovereign. Refusing to accept the decision, de Montfort and his supporters, resorted to arms. They inflicted a severe defeat on Henry's forces at Lewes in 1264

The Nephews of Alured de Lincoln IV were Robert Fitz Pain and his cousin William de Goviz.

The record shows that for their good service at the Battle of Lewis they gained Royal consent to hold the land that was to pass "Pro Bono" (without cost or tax) to them following the death of their uncle Alured de Lincoln IV in consideration of the following:

the losses they sustained in battle (this presumably refers to the loss of the knights they were obliged to supply under their various land holdings)

the waiver of payment of an early form of inheritance tax

doing their homage (to the King).

The more accurate version of events was that the rebellious Barons under the banner of Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, took King Henry III prisoner. They also stole his seal and ordered as they pleased in his name. They were recompensed for its return and for the King's release.


fitz Pain shield


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Simon de Montfort

De Montfort, who became virtual ruler of the kingdom, summoned a Parliament for 1265, establishing principles of representation that figured significantly in the eventual development of the House of Commons. Price Edward, later to become King Edward I, raised an army and defeated de Montfort's forces at Evesham. It is said the Prince caught de Montfort's forces off guard as he attacked under a false banner. De Montfort was killed and "the vipers brood" was removed from the list of great landlords and barons. All of De Montfort's lands, including those in Dorset lapsed to the Crown. His association with the county ended in 1275 when Aimery and Eleanor de Montfort were taken at sea off Bristol and imprisoned at Corfe Castle

The Manor (one among many in an estate that covered much of the County of Dorset and beyond) passed to Margery (or Margaret) the eldest sister of Alured de Lincoln and the last of the family. Margery has two husbands on record. Most of her land holding including the Manor of Winterborne St Martin passed on her death her husband Robert Fitz-Pain.

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Copyright Gerald Duke 2002 - 2005