Robert de Ferrers, 6th Earl of Derby

Robert de Ferrers, 6th Earl of Derby (* around 1239, † around April 27, 1279 ) was an English magnate and rebel. During the Second War of the Barons , Ferrers, one of the richest English nobles, acted politically inept and even foolish. In doing so, he evidently pursued less political goals than just his own interests. With no allies, he eventually became a victim of the royal family, whom he had made enemies. Against their interests, Ferrers was also legally unsuccessful, so that in his short life he lost almost the entire huge family property. Most of his possessions fell to the younger king's son Edmund and formed the basis for the later Duchy of Lancaster .

Origin and marriage

Robert de Ferrers was the eldest son of William de Ferrers, 5th Earl of Derby and his wife Margaret de Quincy. His father, who was in high favor with the king in the 1230s, was seriously ill with gout and therefore no longer played a major political role in the 1240s. As a token of his favor, King Henry III. that the young Robert at the age of about ten years in Westminster in 1249 with the seven-year-old Marie, a daughter of the French Count Hugo XI. married by Lusignan , the king's eldest half-brother. Before 1254, Ferrers, although still a minor, was knighted.

Heir to the Ferrers family

Upon the death of his father in 1254, Ferrers inherited an extensive estate and the title of Earl of Derby . The king handed over the management and the income from the property until Ferrer's legal age to his eldest son Eduard , who in 1257 sold the rights to manage the property for 6,000 marks to his mother Queen Eleonore and her uncle Peter of Savoy . Ferrers, on the other hand, received only £ 100 a year from the king until he came of age. It was not until he came of age in 1260 that he was allowed to take over the management of most of his estates and received the title of Earl of Derby. Nevertheless, part of his property remained under the administration of the heir to the throne, Edward.

Derby now took over a huge possession. From his ancestors of the Ferrers family , he took over a closed estate that encompassed large parts of northern Staffordshire , southern Derbyshire and western Nottinghamshire with Tutbury Castle as its center . His grandfather, the 4th Earl of Derby , had inherited parts of the estates of the last Earl of Chester through his wife . After his death in 1232 he inherited Chartley Castle in Staffordshire and extensive lands in Lancashire . In addition, Robert de Ferrers owned other estates in other English counties. However, out of all these estates, from which his father had had annual income of about £ 1,500, he had to concede a third, including Chartley Castle, to his mother as Wittum , who only died in 1281. In addition, Derby had to take care of his younger brother William , and his wife Marie was entitled to two goods under the marriage contract. He also inherited debts of £ 800 from his father, which is why he had to borrow money from Jewish moneylenders in 1262 under pressure from the Treasury. Although he was actually one of the richest magnates in England in terms of his inheritance, Derby's financial opportunities were therefore severely limited. After the death of his father-in-law Roger de Quincy, 2nd Earl of Winchester , who died in 1264 without male heirs, he was entitled to part of his lands.

Involvement in the war of the barons

Initial disinterest in the power struggle between the king and the aristocratic opposition

Allegedly, Derby is said to have devastated Tutbury Priory , founded by his ancestors, as early as 1260, shortly after he received his possessions . The exact course of this is not documented, but in the next few years Derby made several foundations for the monastery, which can be interpreted as reparation. In the next few years he committed attacks against some of his vassals and exploited the forests and cities. He was obviously very much involved in the administration of his estates, with Tutbury Castle serving as his headquarters. Politically, however, he played no role in these years, despite the power struggle that had come between a noble opposition and the king. His youth and inexperience certainly contributed to this, perhaps also an impairment from gout , from which he suffered like his father. The king regarded him as one of his loyal followers, but evidently he was rarely at the royal court, as he did not witness any documents from the king. On the other hand, Derby kept in contact with Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester and Richard de Clare, 2nd Earl of Gloucester , the leaders of the aristocratic opposition.

Feud with the heir to the throne Edward

Even when Montfort became the leader of an armed rebellion against the king in April 1263, Derby was reluctant to approach the rebels. In May or June he is said to have occupied three castles belonging to the heir to the throne, Lord Edward , allegedly Grosmont , Skenfrith and White Castle in southeast Wales. In December 1263 he was part of Montfort's retinue in London. When the French King Louis IX. In January 1264 in the Mise of Amiens denied the legality of the claims of the aristocratic opposition, there was an open war of the barons against the king in England . Derby now took on an active role in the Welsh Marches in the fight against the supporters of the king. His main drive was obviously not his desire to reform the rule of the king, but his hatred of the heir to the throne, Lord Edward. The reasons for this hatred are unknown, but the probable causes lay in the administration of Derby's property while he was a minor and Lord Edward's claim to the inheritance of the Peverel family in northern Derbyshire, which was also claimed by Derby . Derby's grandfather had to hand Peak Castle over to the Crown in 1222 , although he had an inheritance claim to the castle. Henry III. then handed the castle over to his son Eduard in 1254.

In February 1264 Derby captured Worcester . There he plundered the Jewish quarter, murdering numerous Jews. He had the looted promissory notes brought to Tutbury, apparently in retaliation against the Jewish moneylenders. Derby then turned to Gloucester , which was besieged by Lord Edward. Before Derby reached the city, Henry de Montfort surrendered the city, whereupon Lord Edward moved to Oxford to reunite with his father. On the way there he had the Stanford Estate , one of Derby's holdings in Berkshire , ransacked. In March 1264, Lord Edward Derby's possessions in Staffordshire were attacked. His troops captured Chartley Castle, and after capturing Northampton in April , turned directly against his opponent. He captured Tutbury and then forced cash payments from Derby's vassals. Meanwhile, in London, Simon de Montfort waited for Derby to arrive, until he finally set out south without him and defeated the king's army at the Battle of Lewes in May . In this battle, Lord Edward was captured. Derby immediately took advantage of this opportunity and began attacking his opponent's possessions in revenge. He captured Bolsover and Horston Castle in Derbyshire, Tickhill Castle in Yorkshire and supported Baldwin Wake's attack on the royal Fotheringhay Castle in Northamptonshire. In late June or early July 1264, he finally captured Peak Castle, which was one of Lord Edward's most important castles. In the fall of 1264 he presumably occupied Chester , which also belonged to Edward. He was evidently determined to keep these properties for himself instead of handing them over to the government of the barons under Montfort.

Imprisoned by the government of the barons

After the danger of an invasion from France in southern England had been averted, Montfort openly demanded that Derby hand over the castles conquered by Lord Eduard to the government. In December 1264 Derby was summoned to parliament that was to take place in mid-January 1265. Although he had already fallen out with Montfort over the transfer of Peak Castle, Derby traveled to London. There Montfort had him arrested in February 1265 and imprisoned in the Tower . Perhaps this was a gesture by Montfort to the king who was in his power, and the arrest was publicly justified on the grounds that Derby had broken the ceasefire agreed after the Battle of Lewes and had committed numerous acts of violence. In fact, Montfort now planned to keep the estates of Derby, who had few friends among the barons due to his violence and selfishness, or to hand them over to his eldest son Henry de Montfort. However, Montfort never got around to implementing his plans. Both the vassals of Derby and Lord Eduard defended themselves against the representatives of Montfort, who wanted to occupy the properties. In the spring of 1265 the conflict between the government of the barons under Montfort and the supporters of the king broke out again. Montfort was killed in the decisive battle of Evesham in August 1265.

Reconciliation with the king and renewed rebellion

After the victory of the king's supporters at Evesham, Derby was released. He offered the king a fine of 1,500 marks in return for his pardon. To this end, he wanted the king to mediate in the dispute with Lord Eduard, and above all he wanted the inheritance he had still withheld to be handed over. Surprisingly, the king accepted this offer. This gave Derby a completely different treatment than almost all other rebels, whose expropriation the king had already decided at that time. The reason for this was probably the previous resistance of Derby's vassals against Montfort, which had thwarted his plans, for this the king needed both the money and the support of Derby's in the northern Midlands.

Although Derby was reconciled with the king, Derby joined the struggle of a group of the remaining rebels, the so-called disinherited , who had Chesterfield in Derbyshire as a base in the spring of 1266 . Those disinherited included Derby's former ally Baldwin Wake and John de Deyville . After falling into the trap of Montfort at the beginning of 1265, Derby proved his obvious political ineptitude with this action. The reasons why he sided with the defeated in the civil war that had already been decided are unclear. Derby had lost part of his estates like Chartley because of his volatile demeanor, but unlike other rebels who had lost all of their property, he had survived the war of the barons almost unscathed. As early as May 15, 1266, Derby and the rebels were defeated by royal troops at the Battle of Chesterfield . The derby, affected by gout, was captured wounded and taken to Windsor Castle .

Expropriation by the royal family

Derby remained a captive in Windsor until after the Barons' War finally ended. Shortly after his capture, the king had expropriated him as a rebel and in June and August 1266 gave Derby's possessions to his younger son Edmund as a fief. After his release, Derby could have repurchased his property under the terms of the Dictum of Kenilworth . As a repeated rebel, he would have had to pay seven times the sum of his annual income to the king. Although it was hardly possible for Derby to raise this sum, Edmund was not sure of his new possession. Therefore, Derby was now the victim of an intrigue that Edmund carried out with the help of his brother Lord Eduard and other allies. On May 1, 1269 Derby had to appear before the King and the Privy Council in Windsor. There it was decided that he should only get his lands back against payment of the immense sum of £ 50,000 to Edmund. Should Derby not be able to raise this sum by July 9th, it should be paid by levies from his lands. On the same day, however, Derby was brought to Cippenham in Buckinghamshire to an estate of Richard of Cornwall , the king's brother. There he had, as he later stated, under duress and in the presence of Chancellor John of Chishall, as security for the payment of the £ 50,000, to hand over his lands to eleven trustees, all of whom were partisans of the heir to the throne. He was then taken to Wallingford Castle , which also belonged to Richard of Cornwall. He was not released until the end of May. When he had not raised the money on July 9, as expected, the trustees handed the lands over to Edmund, with which Derby had lost his title and his possessions.

Attempts to reclaim the lands

Ferrers lived on his mother's estates in Northamptonshire after losing his property. He tried to get his property back until his death. However, the King and Privy Council confirmed the transfer of ownership of Derby's lands to Edmund, and when Eduard and Edmund embarked on the crusade in 1270 , they and their property were under the protection of the Church as crusaders. Henry III died at the end of 1272, and Eduard succeeded him as king. Shortly after Edmund's return from the crusade in 1273, Ferrers occupied Chartley Castle without authorization , from where he was quickly driven out by Edmund. He now turned to Gilbert de Clare , the powerful Earl of Gloucester for help. In May 1273 he promised this essential parts of his possessions in Lancashire if Gloucester helped him to regain the other goods. Through protests in the Privy Council, Gloucester only achieved that Chartley fell not directly to Edmund, but to the king, his brother. Ferrers was now judicially skilful, and in October 1274, shortly after King Edward's return to England, a preliminary investigation began as to whether Ferrers could buy back his possessions in accordance with the provisions of the Dictum of Kenilworth. Ferrers stated that he wanted to raise seven times the annual income, but Edmund refused to do so. In return, Edmund referred to the Cippenham agreement, which Ferrers would not have kept. Ferrers objected that he had to accept this agreement under duress and in captivity. Edmund then referred to the presence of the Chancellor , according to which the agreement had been legally concluded. The procedure was then terminated. Ferrers received a small reparation in 1275 when he got the Chartley estate back, although Chartley Castle remained in the possession of Edmund. This estate, from which he had an annual income of only £ 55, was the only part of his former estate that he still owned when he died. Before his death, he made foundations for the Augustinian priory of St Thomas near Chartley in Staffordshire, which made it the new family foundation of the Ferrers family instead of Tutbury Priory. He was probably buried there too.

Family and offspring

Ferrer's first marriage to Marie de Lusignan had been childless. After Marie died between 1266 and 1269, Ferrers married on June 26, 1269, one month after his release, Eleanor de Bohun († 1314), a daughter of Humphrey V. de Bohun, who died in the War of the Barons . He had several children with her, including:

• John de Ferrers, 1st Baron Ferrers of Chartley (1271-1312)
• Thomas de Ferrers (* before 1274)
• Eleanor ⚭ Robert Fitzwalter, 1st Baron Fitzwalter

His widow Eleanor claimed against Earl Edmund a Wittum from her husband's former lands. Edmund eventually granted her the Godmanchester estate in Huntingdonshire .

Web links

• JR Maddicott: Ferrers, Robert de, sixth earl of Derby (c.1239–1279). In: Henry Colin Gray Matthew, Brian Harrison (Eds.): Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , from the earliest times to the year 2000 (ODNB). Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004, ISBN 0-19-861411-X , ( oxforddnb.com license required ), as of 2004
• Robert de Ferrers, 6th Earl of Derby on thepeerage.com , accessed July 7, 2016.
• Cracroft's Peerage: Derby, Earl of (E, c. 1138-forfeited 1266)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Richard D. Oram: Quincy, Roger de, earl of Winchester (c.1195-1264). In: Henry Colin Gray Matthew, Brian Harrison (Eds.): Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , from the earliest times to the year 2000 (ODNB). Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004, ISBN 0-19-861411-X , ( oxforddnb.com license required ), as of 2004
2. ^ Michael Prestwich: Edward I. University of California, Berkeley 1988, ISBN 0-520-06266-3 , p. 92

predecessor	Office	successor
William de Ferrers	Earl of Derby 1254-1266	Revoked title