WEST DERBY HUNDRED 



WARRINGTON 



SHREWSBURY ABBEY 

 Aaure, a lion ramfan 

 debruised ivith a erotic; 



Banastre, first lord of Makerfield. In 1246 a later 

 Robert Banastre, by fine and for 2 marks of silver, 

 released two brothers, Hamon and Robert, his natives 

 of Poulton, from all manner of nativity and servitude. 1 

 A little before 1285 Robert 

 Banastre enfeoffed Alice, daugh- 

 ter of Gilbert de Haydock, of 

 the whole vill of Poulton, to 

 hold in fee and inheritance, 

 as freely as the grantor or his 

 ancestors had held it, render- 

 ing a pound of cummin at the 

 Nativity of St. Mary. 8 In 

 1285, at Newton in Maker- 

 field, after the said Alice's 

 marriage to Richard de Mos- 

 ton, the same Robert confirmed 

 this grant to them. 3 In 1292 



Richard son of Emma de Woolston recovered seisin 

 of a tew acres of land here against Richard de 

 Moston. 4 



Richard de Moston seems to have been son of 

 Richard de Moston of Moston in the parish of Man- 

 chester. 5 By Alice his wife he had issue William, 

 who in 1323, describing himself as 'dominus de 

 Morleys,' conveyed all his lands in Poulton and Wools- 

 ton to Robert his brother. 6 William de Moston, son 

 of this Robert, was living in 1366 when he gave to 

 John de Haydock an acquittance for 500 due upon 

 a bond. 7 In 1377 he conveyed the manor to feoffees, 

 by whom it was settled upon his brother Richard, 

 with remainder to four sisters (?) or their issue, repre- 

 sented in 1393 by John son of John de Sutton, 

 Katherine wife of Gilbert de Bruche, Emma wife of 

 John son of Robert de Assheton, and Agnes daughter 

 of Thomas Kynsy, afterwards the wife of Henry 

 Berry. 8 To these persons Matthew son of Gilbert 

 de Southworth in 1394 released his right in the 

 manor, which he had acquired by a demise made to 

 him by William de Moston in I384- 9 



From this time the reputed manor ceases to exist, 

 the estates belonging to it descending in the repre- 

 sentatives of the families named. In 1432 John 

 Hawarden and Elizabeth his wife held one of the 

 pourparties. 10 Another descended in the family of 

 Bruche, and seems to have been conveyed to Thomas 



Norris in 1 576, with lands in Orford and Warrington, 

 by Hamlet Bruche. 11 A third share, consisting of 

 3 messuages, 120 acres of land, meadow, and pasture, 

 420 acres of wood, moor, and heath in Woolston, 

 Poulton, and Fearnhead, was conveyed by fine in 

 1567 by Sir John Atherton, Margaret his wife, and 

 William Culcheth, base son of Ralph Culcheth, to 

 Thomas Walmesley," and was in the possession ot 

 Robert Walmesley of Coldcotes, who died in 1612, 

 holding it of Sir Richard Fleetwood, as of his manor 

 of Newton in Makerfield by a yearly rent of 2s." 

 The fourth was probably subdivided into small 

 tenements. 14 



Long before the manor ot Poulton was granted out 

 of his demesne by Robert Banastre the mesne manor 

 of BRUCHE " appears to have been given to the 

 Botelers of Warrington, as 2 oxgangs of land. In 1 2 1 9 

 the southern half of this estate was conveyed by fine 

 by William le Boteler to Thomas Waleys, possibly a 

 brother of Richard Waleys, lord of Uplitherland." 

 The immediate descendants of Thomas Waleys have 

 not been traced. At some subsequent date the same 

 oxgang of land seems to have been granted to the 

 ancestor of Bruche," while the mesne lordship of the 

 other oxgang was conferred upon the family of Hay- 

 dock, of Bradley, the lords of which are subsequently 

 found to have been mesne lords of one moiety of 

 Bruche under the Botelers of Warrington, who in turn 

 held this mesne manor of the lords of Newton in 

 Makerfield. 



Whilst Richard Fitton was seneschal of Makerfield, 

 circa 1280, Robert Banastre gave a parcel of ground 

 lying between the moss and Woolston Brook, on the 

 south side of the Levynges croft, in Woolston, to 

 Robert de Samlesbury, and to his tenants dwelling in 

 La Bruche he gave common of pasture for all cattle 

 within the bounds of Poulton and Woolston for 1 8</. 

 at Midsummer.' 8 In 1288 Richard de Samlesbury re- 

 covered, against Richard de la Bruche and Margaret 

 his wife and others, his seisin of common of pasture 

 belonging to his free tenement in Warrington. 19 



Richard was living in 1305,* and was probably 

 father of Thomas de Bruche, who with Agnes his wife 

 was a defendant in pleas in 1325 and 1328," and of 

 Henry del Bruche, the elder son, who was receiver of 

 the honour of Halton in 1317" and in possession of 



