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Soon after the accession of Heney V, the De Bohun estates 

 were divided by Act of Parliament between the King, as heir of 

 his mother (the younger daughter of Humphrey De Bohun), 

 and the Countess of Stafford, as heiress of the elder daughter, 

 who married the Duke of Gloucester. The Castle in this 

 division fell to the share of the King. 



On the attainder of Heney YI (about 1461), Caldicot Castle 

 was transferred to Edward IV, who granted it to Lord Herbert 

 of Kaglan, for his services against the House of Lancaster. He 

 was killed at the battle of Banbury, when the Castle reverted 

 for a short time to Henry VI, and then it was again taken 

 possession of by Edward IV. 



EiCHAED III restored Caldicot to Henry Duke of Buckingham, 

 who was lineally descended from the Countess of Stafford, and 

 therefore from the De Bohuns. He was beheaded at Salisbury, 

 for his opposition to Richard, and his son Henry became heir 

 to Caldicot. When the latter was beheaded, through the 

 intrigues of Cardinal Wolsey, in 1521, the Castle was annexed 

 by Henry VIII to the Duchy of Lancaster, to which it has ever 

 since belonged, being leased from time to time like the other 

 estates of the Duchy. During the reigns of Elizabeth, James, 

 and Charles the First, it was leased to the Earls of Worcester ; 

 but it could not have been kept in use, since in 1613 a jury, 

 who had to report on its value to a court then held, stated it 

 was "ruinous and decayed," that it had been in this condition 

 before their memory, and that they could give no account of the 

 cause of its decay. This, we may reasonably infer, would carry- 

 back the period of its ruined condition to the beginning of the 

 reign of Elizabeth — she ascended the throne in 1558, three 

 years before this court was held. 



Now as the Duke of Buckingham was beheaded in 1521, it 

 appears very probable that from the time of the Castle being 

 confiscated to the King it had never been used; so that we 

 may conclude it fell to ruin in the latter part of the reign 

 of Heney VIII ; say 350 years ago. Besides this, the sum at 

 which it was leased, even after allowing for the difference in 

 the value of money, looks more like a payment for the lands 

 t2 



