THE HAMPSHIRE ANTIQUARY &> NATURALIST. 



These local Courts not only punished those who com- 

 mitted offences, but were the original safeguards of the 

 liberties of the poorer people, who by appealing to custom 

 defended themselves against oppression, for local customs 

 as regulated by local courts were in olden time the defence 

 of the weak against the strong, and it must be remembered 

 that such an official as the King's Provost 

 or Bailiff of Odiham, could not exercise his 

 authority contrary to the custom of the Hundred 

 Court of which he was the presiding officer. 

 The men of Odiham, at a very early date, appear to have 

 improved their social condition considerably by obtaining 

 from the King the privileges of soc-men, by which they 

 were relieved from many customary manorial services, 

 such as ploughing, sowing, reaping, &c., on and for the 

 King's land, in consideration of the payment of a fee farm 

 or rent for the land they collectively held. There is a 

 record of the year 1205, in which the Odiham soc-men are 

 stated as paying ^35 45. per annum for the old fee farm, 

 and 14 i6s. for the new, making 50 in all. The fee farm 

 was at that time ancient, for it is described as " antiquam 

 firmam," and from this payment being ancient in the time 

 of King John, and from the similarity of the total amount 

 to the recorded value of the King's interest in the Dooms- 

 da}- Survey, it is probable that the old fee farm paid by 

 the men of Odiham was of Saxon origin. 



As might have been expected, from its ancient associa- 

 tions with our kings and queens, Odiham has been closely 

 connected with several leading events in English history. 

 It was here that King John lived during the early 

 summer of 1215, while he was making up his mind what to 

 do in the matter in dispute with his subjects. From 

 Odiham, as is shown by his itinerary, he set forth to meet 

 his barons at Runnimede, where he signed Magna Charta, 

 after which he returned to his Castle here, and remained 

 for some days very much out of humour. 



Odiham Castle played a very conspicuous part during 

 the invasion of England in the next year, 1216, by a French 

 army under Prince Louis, the Dauphin of France, who 

 took Guildford, Farnham, and Winchester, and then 

 turned his attention to Odiham Castle, which refused to 

 surrender. He besieged it for a week, and the garrison 

 made some successful sallies, and obtained the honourable 

 terms of surrender, of being allowed to march out with 

 their arms and horses, which they did to the admiration 

 of the French, who counted the defending force, and were 

 amazed to find only three knights, three squires, and 

 seven fighting men, 13 in all, and they had lost none in 

 the defence. 



During the next reign Odiham was a favourite residence 

 of Princess Eleanor, who subsequently became Countess 

 of Leicester. It was granted to her as Countess of 

 Pembroke in 1237, and subsequently as Countess of 

 Leicester. She kept a large hunting establishment of men 

 and dogs at Odiham. In the civil war which took place 

 in this reign her husband, De Montfort, was the leader of 

 the popular party. Odiham Castle appears to have been 

 held for him, and from a lawsuit in 1260 we learn that after 

 the battle of Evesham, when the constable of the Castle 

 gave it up to the king, he took away with him all the 

 documents relating to the place, a convenient way probably 

 of settling his accounts. 



Odiham Castle and Manor formed part of the dower 

 which Edward I settled on his second wife, Margaret of 

 France. In a succeeding reign it is said to have been part 

 of the dower of a more famous Queen Margaret her of 

 Anjou given her by her husband Henry VI. In the time 

 of Edward III Odiham Castle was selected as the place of 



confinement for David Bruce, King of Scotland, who had 

 been taken prisoner at the battle of Neville's Cross in 

 1346. He did not regain his liberty till 1357, when, on pay- 

 ment of the heavy ransom of 100,000 marks and giving 

 other security, he was set free, glad no doubt to turn his 

 back on Odiham for ever. 



The National Records not only contain references to 

 Odiham and its castle in connection with historical events 

 and important persons, but some entries of less import- 

 ance, although of more local interest ; for example, we 

 know that the buildings on the manor and the houses in 

 the town probably must have been allowed to tall into 

 decay in the isth century, for in the 3gth year of Henry VI 

 there is the record of an Inquisition to report on the dila- 

 pidations within the manor of Odiham. There are also 

 many records of earlier centuries relating to the convey- 

 ance of wine belonging to the king from Southampton to 

 Odiham, to repairing the park fence, to stocking the castle 

 ditches with fish, to hiring carts for conveying the king's 

 wardrobe and moveable effects, to the supply of farming 

 implements for the demesne lands, and other matters of 

 local interest. An Inquisition was held in 1275 to report 

 on the pasture which the men of Odiham had in the " bosco 

 de Whytmondsley." 



Odiham Castle and forest had many notable custodians 

 in successive reigns. In 1225 Hubert de Burgh, Earl of 

 Kent, was bailiff, afterwards the King's sister, who be- 

 came Countess of Leicester, had it granted to her. Sub- 

 sequently the manor was held by Gilbert de Eversley, 

 Thomas de Warblington, John Beauchamp, Henry de 

 Sturmy, Margaria de la Bergh, John de Foxle, John de 

 Meriet, John atte Berwe, Robert Thorpe, Hugh le Des- 

 penser, Robert le Ewer, Nicholas Brook, Henry Esturmy, 

 Joanna wife of John Mohun, John Berewe, William 

 Sturmy, Thomas de Camoys, Hugh Camoys, B. Brocas, 

 Lord Beaumont, Richard le Strange, William Warbelton,. 

 Roger Leukenore, John Lestrange, Isabella Seymour, and 

 many others until the time of James I, when that king, 

 being in want of money and having some financial difficulty 

 with his parliament, allowed the ancient royal domain' of 

 Odiham to pass into private hands, and thus was severed 

 the direct connexion of Odiham with the Crown which had 

 lasted for so many centuries. 



Some of the manors in the neighbourhood appear to have 

 been held by the tenure of defending Odiham Castle, such 

 as the manor of Polling, which in the 5th of Henry VI is 

 stated to have been held " ut de castro de Odiham," i.e., by 

 the tenure of defending the castle. 



The government and town life of Odiham in the middle 

 ages was so far peculiar as to be one of very few instances 

 of its kind which existed in England. It had the privileges 

 of a borough, without being incorporated, and the town is 

 cited by Maddox in his work " Firma Burgi," as a peculiar 

 instance of its kind, showing that the men of a town not 

 corporate might hold their towns at fee farm as well as 

 corporate towns. 



At the conclusion of the paper Lord Basing said that 

 the history of the place which had been so suc- 

 cinctly put before them by Mr. Shore deserved to be 

 expanded and dealt with fully, and mentioned that 

 there was an interesting inventory of the contents of 

 that house (the " Priory ") at the time it was taken 

 by Cromwell. The curate of Greywell (the Rev. 

 F. C. Cole) took the opportunity to make an 

 appeal for funds towards repairing the tower 

 of his church, which, he said, is now so 

 unsafe that they are afraid to ring the bells. 



