150 Rev. Wm. Procter, Jan., on Doddington. 



Grey, probably the same person, held Doddington and Weet- 

 wood as subfeudatory to Henry de Percy for half a knight's 

 fee, the annual value being a hundred marks, and 13s. 4d. 

 yearly was paid for Castle Ward. 



From this date the family of Grey are mentioned in the 

 various inquisitions, &c, as holding Doddington. In the 

 tenth year of Elizabeth, 1568, Sir Thomas Grey, of Chilling- 

 ham, a minor, inherited it, with other lands, from his father, 

 Sir Ralph Grey * Lastly, William Grey holds Doddington, 

 Nesbit, and Evvorthe, as freef tenants from the Barony of 

 Alnwick, in 1664. 



The extent of the village must have been considerable in 

 these early times. As in other ancient manors, the villans, 

 or villagers, acquired a right by their service, on the payment 

 of some small due, to the cottage and plot of land which they 

 occupied ; and these lands they and their representatives 

 held perpetually, with power to leave by will, or alienate by 

 sale -X " For though in general, they are still said to hold 

 their estates at the will of the lord, yet it is such a will as is 

 agreeable to the custom of the manor, which customs are 

 preserved- and evidenced by the Rolls of the several Court's 

 Baron in which they are entered, or kept on foot by the con- 

 stant immemorial usage of the several manors in which the 

 lands be." The owners of such property are the ancient 

 customary freeholders, sometimes called copyholders, because 

 they shew as title to their property, the copy of the entry in 

 their Court Roll, which describes the land, and the " custom" 

 by which it is held. 



My information about these ancient " holdings," in Dod- 

 dington, is vague and traditional. It is said that one Culbert- 

 son saved the life of a Grey at Flodden Field, who granted 

 him, in reward, a piece of ground adjoining the Till near that 

 bridge which is still called " Cuddie's Bridge," because it was 

 built on Culbertson's holding. Another tradition says, that 

 on the occasion of a Doddington man dying at Belford, forty 

 lairds of Doddington, each riding his own horse, went over to 

 attend his funeral. By degrees these old holdings have 

 become extinct. Within the last hundred years the large 

 common, to the north and east of the village, has been en- 



* Eschaet de anno., x Eliz, 



t A.D. 1660, the year of the Eestoration, feudal tenures were converted 

 into Freeholds by Statute 12, Ch. II., c. 24 ; Copyholds were not included. 

 % Sims' "Manual," p. 86. 



