Herbert Morham

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The coat of arms of Herbert Morham's father Thomas Morham the Elder

Sir Herbert Morham († September 7, 1306 in London ) was a Scottish knight and rebel.

origin

Herbert Morham came from a sideline of the Malherbe family who named themselves after Morham in East Lothian . He was a son of Thomas Morham the Elder , a landowner with estates at Stenhouse , Dunipace , Garth and Castlerankine . He was knighted, and he was considered the greatest and best-looking Scottish knight of his time.

Role in the Scottish War of Independence

During the Scottish War of Independence he fought on the Scottish side at the Battle of Falkirk in 1298, while his father fought on the English side. He escaped Scottish defeat and in 1299 commanded the Scottish troops who besieged Stirling Castle under the command of his father and his related Gilbert Malherbe . During the siege he kidnapped the widowed Joan de Clare, Countess of Fife , who was related to the English king and who was en route to Edinburgh without an escort . He took her to his brother Thomas Morham the Younger's house in Castlerankine. There he tried in vain to force her to marry him in order to get hold of her property. Before April 22, 1299 at the latest, Morham fell into English captivity and was forced to submit to King Edward I of England . In February 1300 he was believed to be part of the English garrison of Edinburgh Castle . In the summer of 1301, however, the successful guerrilla war led by the Guardian John de Soules against the English moved Morham and other barons to switch back to the Scottish side. Morham as commanders of part of the Scottish Army when two English armies invaded southern Scotland in 1301. Together with Simon Fraser and Alexander Abernethy , he disrupted the connections between the two English armies from Stonehouse near Strathaven in Lanarkshire . This means that the armies could not unite as planned.

Imprisonment and Execution

In the fight against the English, Morham and his father Thomas, who had also fought on the Scottish side again, were captured by the English. You were incarcerated in the Tower of London . When almost all of the remaining Scottish rebels submitted to the English king in early 1304, Herbert Morham and his father were exempt from surrender. When in March 1306 Robert Bruce declared himself King of the Scots and thus continued the rebellion against English supremacy, Morham's former comrade Simon Fraser joined him. Morham reportedly wagered his head that Fraser would not be captured. When Fraser was captured anyway, the vengeful English king ordered his execution. Morham and his squire Thomas du Boys were hanged a few hours before Fraser's execution .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Geoffrey WS Barrow: Robert Bruce and the Community of the Realm of Scotland . Eyre & Spottiswoode, London 1965, p. 149.
  2. ^ Geoffrey WS Barrow: Robert Bruce and the Community of the Realm of Scotland . Eyre & Spottiswoode, London 1965, p. 218.
  3. ^ Geoffrey WS Barrow: Robert Bruce and the Community of the Realm of Scotland . Eyre & Spottiswoode, London 1965, p. 150.
  4. ^ Geoffrey WS Barrow: Scotland and its neighbors in the Middle Ages . Hambledon, London 1991, ISBN 1-85285-052-3 , p. 163.
  5. ↑ Michael Penman: Robert the Bruce. King of the Scots . Yale University Press, New Haven 2014, ISBN 978-0-300-14872-5 , p. 67.
  6. ^ Geoffrey WS Barrow: Robert Bruce and the Community of the Realm of Scotland . Eyre & Spottiswoode, London 1965, p. 171.
  7. ^ Matthew Strickland: Treason, Feud and the Growth of State Violence. Edward I and the War of the 'Earl of Carrick', 1306-07 . In: Chris Given-Wilson, Ann J. Kettle, Len Scales (eds.): War, government and aristocracy in the British Isles, c.1150-1500 . Boydell & Brewer, Woodbridge 2008, ISBN 978-1-84383-389-5 , p. 108.
personal data
SURNAME Morham, Herbert
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Morham, Sir Herbert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Scottish knight and rebel
DATE OF BIRTH 13th Century
DATE OF DEATH September 7, 1306
Place of death London