154 



DEER AND DEER PARKS. 



Ch. VII. 



nearly connected with Henry de New- 

 burgh, the first Earl of Warwick of the 

 Norman line, brother of the Earl of 

 Mellent ; and here their chief castle, 

 called from its pleasant situation Belde- 

 sert, was erected. Two parks, occupying 

 probably the site of the ancient ' Hay,' 

 are mentioned in connection with the 

 manor in the first year of Edward VI. 

 In Dugdale's time ' the castle with the 

 park wherein it stood ' is recorded, but it 

 is not found in Saxton's map, and I con- 

 clude had really been disparked soon 

 affer the extinction of the principal branch 

 of the Montfort family in the latter half 

 of the fourteenth century. 



The ancient parks of Wedgenock, Hase- 

 ley, and Grove should next engage our 

 attention ; these parks from a very early 

 period were attached to the castle of 

 Warwick, and are noticed in Leland's 

 ' Itinerary,' and in the ancient maps of 

 the county. Wedgenock is expressly 

 mentioned by John Rous, the antiquary, 

 in his ' History of the Kings of England,' 

 as having been made by Henry de New- 

 burgh, Earl of Warwick, after the example 

 of the park of Woodstock, imparked by 

 King Henry the First.' It still exists, 

 though greatly reduced in size,'' containing 

 at present but 45 acres, with a herd of 

 70 fallow-deer, and is the property of the 

 Earl of Warwick. During the middle ages, 

 in consequence of the frequent forfeitures 

 of this earldom, Wedgenock was often at 

 the disposal of the Crown. In the twenty- 

 first year of Richard II. it was granted 

 to Thomas Earl of Kent, on the attainder 



' Joannis Rossi Hist. Reg. Anglise, 2nd ed. , 

 8vo. Oxon, 1745, p. [38. 



^ In the 26th of Edward I. it contained, 

 however, but twenty acres ; but it was enlarged 

 by Thomas Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, 



of the Earl of Warwick. In the first 

 year, of Edward VI. it was granted to 

 John Dudley Earl of Warwick, on whose 

 attainder it came again to the Crown. 

 The following notices respecting it are 

 derived from original evidences in posses- 

 sion of Lord Willoughby de Broke. It 

 was eventually granted to the Greville 

 family, the ancestor of the present Earl of 

 Warwick, in the fourteenth year of Queen 

 Elizabeth.^ 



Indenture of the 20th of October, ist 

 Elizabeth, 'between Richard Dennys of 

 Cold-Aston in the county of Gloucester, 

 Esq., and S' Richard Verney, K"',' being 

 a lease of ' the herbage and pannage of 

 the Queen's Majestie's Park of Wedge- 

 nock in the County of Warwick, and of 

 the fishery, and also the herbage and pan- 

 nage of the Queen's wood called Ferne- 

 hill, adjoining to the said park, and" also 

 the deputy-keepership of the Queen's 

 Majestie's Manor-House or Lordship of 

 Goodrest in the park of Wedgenock ; and 

 also the said Richard Dennys to be 

 paler or walker of the said park, and to 

 be keeper and woodwarde of all the woods, 

 &c.' The house called Goodrest, observes 

 Dugdale, ' was built by Thomas Beau- 

 champ, Earl of Warwick, in part of Ed- 

 ward III. and Richard II.'s time. I sup- 

 pose it was so called in respect that some 

 of the Countesses of Warwick, to avoyd 

 much concourse of people, retired hither 

 when they were near the time of child- 

 birth ; for it is plain that many of their 

 children were born here.' 



Indenture of the 22nd of December, 



with certain woods called Wedgenock Donele, 

 in the parish of Hatton. Can this be the 

 Donnelie of Domesday which Dugdale fixes at 

 Beldesert ? 



' Dugdale's Warwickshire, vol. i. p. 272. 



