Robert Harcourt (Knight)

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Coat of arms of Sir Robert Harcourt, KG

Sir Robert Harcourt of Stanton Harcourt , KG , (around 1410 - November 14, 1470 ) was an English knight .

Life

Sir Robert Harcourt was a son of Sir Thomas Harcourt and Joan Francis.

He was Sheriff of Warwickshire and Leicestershire in 1445 and was part of the delegation that brought Margaret of Anjou to England on her marriage to Henry VI. directed.

In May 1448, an incident occurred in Coventry that led to a decades-long feud between the Harcourt family and the Staffords. A group around Humphrey Stafford of Grafton and his son Richard passed Robert Harcourt and his men, whereupon Richard Stafford stopped and started a conversation with Harcourt. Suddenly guns were drawn and Sir Robert hit his opponent in the head, but not fatally. Stafford attacked Harcourt with his dagger, but was stabbed from behind by one of Harcourt's men. Humphrey Stafford, meanwhile ridden up, was pushed and injured by his horse. In addition to Richard Stafford, two men from Harcourt's followers died.

Sir Robert was charged with murder and imprisoned at Chester Castle , but was released shortly afterwards. He was able to avoid a court hearing, successfully submitted a petition to the king and received from Henry VI in 1450. Sorry for this incident. It is believed that William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk , of whom Harcourt was one of his followers, may have exercised his influence, or perhaps even Queen Margaret of Anjou intervened.

In the following years Sir Robert served as Sheriff of Berkshire and Sheriff of Oxfordshire (1455) and was entrusted in 1457 as Justice of Array with various regulatory tasks in Oxfordshire.

During the Wars of the Roses , Sir Robert first fought for Henry VI. and the House of Lancaster in 1455 at the First Battle of St Albans . By 1459 Harcourt was accused of sympathy and collaboration with the House of York and fought for York at the Battle of Towton in 1461 . One reason for the change of sides could have been that after the death of William de la Pole in May 1450 Sir Robert was looking for new clanships to offer him protection. On the same day that de la Pole died, Sir Robert had to barricade himself in Harcourt Church because Humphrey Stafford of Grafton and his men attacked Harcourt's house and church to lynch him.

Sir Robert found a powerful patron in Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick, and became steward of some of Warwick's estates. King Edward IV appointed Sir Robert Knight of the Order of the Garter . The year of this appointment is given in some sources as 1461, in others as 1463. In 1462 Sir Robert fought for Edward IV in the siege of Alnwick Castle and was commissioned by the King in 1464 with a mission to protect the northern borders. Harcourt traveled with the Earl of Warwick in 1467 as ambassador to King Louis XI. to France to hold talks on a peace treaty.

When the Earl of Warwick opposed the king and married his daughter Isabelle to George Plantagenet, 1st Duke of Clarence , a younger brother of the king, in 1469 , Sir Robert is said to have been present at the wedding.

One month after Edward IV had to flee to Flanders , Sir Robert was murdered on November 14, 1470 by William Stafford, an illegitimate son of Humphrey Stafford. Sir Robert has his final resting place in St Michael's Church at Stanton Harcourt, Oxfordshire.

Marriage and offspring

Sir Robert Harcourt was married to Margaret, daughter of Sir John Byron

The couple had the following offspring

  • John ⚭ Anne, daughter of Sir John Norris
  • Robert (fought for Henry VII at Bosworth in 1485 and, like his father, is buried in St Michael's Church in Stanton Harcourt)
  • Thomas
  • George
  • Margaret

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Towton Battlefield Society
  2. ↑ a b c d e f Egerton Brydges: Collins's Peerage of England. Vol. IV, London 1812, p. 436, p. 437.
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k Douglas Richardson: Plantagenet Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families. 2nd Edition. 2011, ISBN 978-1-4610-4513-7 , p. 208.
  4. ^ A b c d e William E. Baumgaertner: A Time-Line of Fifteen Century England 1398-1509. Trafford Publishing, 2009, ISBN 978-1-4269-0638-1 .
  5. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Peter Bramley: A Companion and Guide to the Wars of the Roses. The History Press, 2013, ISBN 978-0-7524-9691-7 .
  6. ↑ John Fenn: Paston Letters. Vol. I, Charles Knight & Co, London 1840, p. 6.
  7. ^ John Fenn: Original Letters written during the Reign of Henry VI., Edward IV. And Richard III. Vol. I, London 1787, pp. 14-15.
  8. ↑ Richard III. Foundation Inc. ( Memento from January 22, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
  9. ^ Nicholas Harris Nicolas: History of the Order of Knighthood of the British Empire. Vol. II, William Pickering, London 1842, p. 499, p. Lvii.
  10. ^ George F. Beltz: Memorials of the Order of the Garter. William Pickering, London 1841, Appendix S. clxiii, S.clxiv.
  11. ^ William A. Shaw: Knights of England. Genealogical Publishing, 1971, ISBN 0-8063-0443-X , p. 14.
  12. ↑ Sylumanns Urban: Genteleman's Magazine and Historical Chronicle. Vol.CI, JB Nichols & Son, London 1831, p. 395.
personal data
SURNAME Harcourt, Robert
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Harcourt, Sir Robert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English knight
DATE OF BIRTH 15th century
DATE OF DEATH November 14, 1470