Walter Devereux (knight, † 1402)

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Sir Walter Devereux († June 25, 1402 ) was an English knight and politician .

Origin, youth and marriage

Walter Devereux came from an old Anglo- Norman gentry family from Herefordshire . He was the son of his father of the same name, Walter Devereux, and his wife Maud. His father was a vassal of the Bohuns , the Earls of Hereford . After the death of his father around 1376, Devereux inherited the Bodenham estate . Perhaps through the relationships of his relative and alleged uncle, John Devereux , a member of the Regency Council for the underage King Richard II , young Walter came into the royal household as an esquire . On February 8, 1382 he was appointed constable of Builth Castle in West Wales, whose owner Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl of March was still a minor.

Before November 1382 Devereux married the young Agnes Crophill (1371-1436), the eleven-year-old daughter of Sir John Crophill . By marriage he received the estate of Newbold Verdon in Leicestershire . When his father-in-law died in June 1383, his wife became her father's heir as the only daughter. Apart from the Wittum of his mother-in-law, Devereux was initially administrator of the property of his father-in-law. In September 1385 his wife was declared of legal age, whereupon Devereux finally received the Crophill property including the Wittum of his mother-in-law, who had since died. These included Sutton Bonnington and other estates at Arnold in Nottinghamshire , the estates of Cotesbach , Braunston and Hemington in Leicestershire, properties at Market Rasen in Lincolnshire and the estate of Weobley in Herefordshire. The Weobley estate became Devereux's new principal residence.

Life

Devereux took on various offices such as that of a justice of the peace in Herefordshire, but still belonged to the household of Richard II. In the summer of 1385 took part in the king's campaign to Scotland. However, when the political crisis arose in 1387, Devereux did not support the king, but the Lords Appelalnt . In March 1388 he was commissioned by these to receive the oath of loyalty from the representatives of Herefordshire. Presumably his attitude was influenced by his relative John Devereux, who was one of the main supporters of the Lords Appellant.

It is unclear whether Devereux stayed at court afterwards. Before 1391 he had been knighted . In September 1394 he was part of the army with which Richard II moved to Ireland. Little is known about the next few years, when the king took action against the former Lords Appellant in 1397 and was finally overthrown by Henry Bolingbroke in 1399 . After Bolingbroke became the new king as Henry IV, Devereux was again Justice of the Peace in 1401 and in 1401 took part in Parliament as Knight of the Shire . From May 16 to November 8, 1401, he served as Sheriff of Herefordshire. Around this time, the Owain Glyndŵr rebellion had begun in Wales , and in May 1401 Devereux was part of the contingent that appalled Abergavenny Castle , which was threatened by the rebels . The following year Devereux was part of the English army, which, under Sir Edmund Mortimer, was supposed to repel an attack by the rebels on Radnorshire . He was mortally wounded in the Battle of Bryn Glas and died three days later.

With his wife Agnes he had at least one son and one daughter. His son Walter Devereux (around 1387-1420) became his heir . After his death, his widow married John Parr and finally, thirdly, John Merbury .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Bernard Burke: A genealogical history of the dormant, abeyant, forfeited, and extinct peerages of the British empire . Harrison, London 1866, p. 169
personal data
SURNAME Devereux, Walter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English knight and politician
DATE OF BIRTH 14th Century
DATE OF DEATH June 25, 1402