132 



DEER AND DEER PARKS. 



Ch. VI. 



1 316, by the license of the King (Ed- 

 wai-d II.) ; and in the same year the King 

 granted to him in fee all the land and 

 tenements of Foli-John at Hyermere, 

 within the bounds of the forest. But this 

 park and lands were subsequently re- 

 united to the Castle and Manor of Wind- 

 sor, by Edward III., in the thirty-third 

 year of his reign.' From this period the 

 park of Foli-John belonged to the Crown, 

 and the names of its keepers often figure 

 among the grants preserved in the Patent 

 Rolls. In 1630 it passed from the Crown, 

 having been granted to Henry Hene, Esq., 

 created a baronet in 1642.'' 



The Park oi Easthamstead\st&co%;ci\%e.6, 

 as a Royal park in the thirty-ninth of Ed- 

 ward III.; ' it was formany years a Royal 

 residence. Here, according to Holing- 

 shed, Richard II. resorted for hunting, 

 in August 1381. In 1531 it was the resi- 

 dence of Queen Catherine, when the Lords 

 of the Council were sent hither to per- 

 suade her to be conformable to the King's 

 will and consent to a divorce. It was en- 

 larged by James Lin 1615; 250/. having 

 been paid by his Majesty for that pur- 

 pose.^ It was granted by Charles I. to 

 William Trumbull, Esq., whose son peti- 

 tioned Charles II. in 1661, setting forth 

 that ' the grant was on condition of his 

 keeping 200 deer for his Majesty's recre- 

 ation: the deer there,' he adds, ' have been 

 universally destroyed, and it is almost im- 

 possible to procure any.' * 



There appear to have been several other 

 parks within the precincts of Windsor 

 Forest, as we find by the licenses in the 

 Patent Rolls. Thus,in the fortieth of Henry 



' Annals of Windsor, vol. i. pp. 1 30, 187. 

 " Lysons' Magna Brittannia, Berks, p. 436. 

 " Annals of Windsor, vol. i. p. 178. 

 ' Original papers /«j«r the Baroness North. 



III., Henry de Haia had license to as- 

 sart and impark 240 acres of his domain 

 lands of Hexington within the Forest of 

 Windsor. And in the tenth of Edward I. 

 the Priory of Ankerwyke was allowed to 

 impark 100' acres of the waste of the 

 Abbey of Chertsey, in Egware, within the 

 bounds of the same forest. Again in the 

 fourteenth of Edward II. John de Foxley 

 was licensed to impark certain lands in 

 Bray, within the forest of Windsor, called 

 ' Pokemere ' (Puckmere, near Foxley- 

 farm, in Bray). In the eleventh of the fol- 

 lowing reign the King restored to the Bi- 

 shop of Salisbury and his successors their 

 free chase of Bishopsbeere (Billingbere, 

 near Maidenhead), in Windsor Forest. 



The Bishops of Salisbury had also a 

 palace and park at Sunning, near Read- 

 ing, which is alluded to by Leland in his 

 ' Itinerary ; ' it was exchanged with Queen 

 Elizabeth in 1574.* Near Reading also 

 was Whitley Park, which is laid down in 

 Saxton's map of 1574. This, before the 

 Reformation, belonged to the Abbot of 

 Reading, and is also noticed by Leland. 

 It was granted by Queen Elizabeth to Sir 

 Francis KnoUys.' At Stratfield Mortimer, 

 seven miles to the south-west of Reading, 

 on the borders of Hampshire, were two 

 parks which originally belonged to the 

 Mortimers Earls of March, and after- 

 wards became vested in the Crown : they 

 were with the Manor granted by Queen 

 Elizabeth, in 1564, to Henry Lord Huns- 

 don.^ Another ancient and still existing 

 park in this neighbourhood is at Alder- 

 marston, for a long period the seat of the 

 Forster family. It is noticed in Saxton's 



« Cal. State Papers, 



« Lysons, p. 379. 



' lb. p. 341. 



' lb. p. 375. 



[661, Aug. 20. 



