POLITICAL HISTORY 



position to object, but when in December Robert de Holland obtained an 

 order for the restoration of his estates in accordance with a Parliamentary 

 decision in favour of those who had been ' of the quarrel ' of Earl Thomas, 

 Henry disputed the right of the man who had deserted his brother to benefit 

 by this decision."*' Lancaster may not have been personally responsible for 

 the murder of Holland in October, 1328, but it was certainly the work of 

 his partizans, who sent the unhappy man's head to the earl, then in revolt 

 against Isabella and Mortimer,'** and it was one of the things which created 

 a temporary coolness between Lancaster and the earl Marshal. Holland's 

 estates passed to his eldest son, then under age.''** 



Holland's murder is but one instance of the general lawlessness which 

 the internecine strife of the late reign left in its train. As early as 1328 

 steps were taken to restore order. The statute of Winchester of 1285 was 

 reinforced by the statute of Northampton ; and keepers of the peace were 

 appointed in every county. But it was not until Edward III had got rid of 

 Mortimer (1330) that the work of grappling with anarchy could be fairly 

 begun. The state of Lancashire was no better, probably worse, than that of 

 the kingdom at large. In 1333 orders were issued for the pursuit and arrest 

 of John de RadclifFe and many other Lancashire men who, to escape trial for 

 the death of Sir William Bradshaw, had wandered into divers parts of the 

 realm, committing breaches of the peace and terrorizing the people.***^ 



The disturbed state of the county is clearly reflected in the large num- 

 ber of local cases which came before the King's Bench which sat at Wigan in 

 June, 1334, while the king was at Newcastle-on-Tyne.'** Robert Foucher, 

 the sheriff, was presented for extortion and for sending his own clerks and 

 relatives to Parliament and putting a share of the wages paid to them by the 

 county in his own pocket. But he was acquitted on most of the charges, 

 including the last. 



For several years from 1338 commissioners of oyer and terminer con- 

 stantly sat in the county to inquire touching felonies and trespasses against 

 the peace and oppression by officials.'*^ They found their task no easy one. 

 In 1339 they received orders to suspend their labours for a time, as many in 

 the county were much aggrieved by the commission and had withdrawn to 

 Scotland to join the king's enemies.'*' This recalcitrance, unfortunately, too 

 often took the more violent form of armed confederacies to prevent the king's 

 officers from executing his commands, terrorize litigants and witnesses, and 

 break up the sessions of the justices. 



^" Rot. Pari, ii, i8. 



'•' Leland, Collect, i, 275, where the murder is said to have been committed in a wood near Henley, not 

 far from Windsor, on 1 5 Oct., which suggests that Holland was on his way to the Parliament, that met at 

 Salisbury the followmg day, and which Lancaster had refused to attend. The story of the Monk of Malmes- 

 bury {Chron. Edw. I and Edtv. II, i, 342) that he was escaping to London from Berkhampstead Castle, and was 

 caught and beheaded by Sir G. Wyther and his men near Harrow, sounds less probable. 



'" On whose death (1373) they were carried by marriage to the Lovels of Titchmarsh and Minster 

 Lovel; Complete Peerage, iv, 236. The greater fortunes of the family were founded by his younger brother 

 Thomas, who married (c. i 348) the daughter and heiress of Edmund earl of Kent, fifth son of Edw. I ; 

 ibid. 351. 



'" Cal. Pat. 1330-4, pp. 178, 573. Bradshaw was slain at Newton in Makerfield on 16 Aug. in this 

 year ; Coram Rege R, 297, Rex m. 24. 



"1= Coram Rege R, 297. 



**' Cal. Pat. 1 3 30-47, passim. Under the latter head the master of the Forestry of Pendle and the steward 

 of Penwortham were convicted of wrongfully exacting puture from the abbot of Whalley and the prior of Pen- 

 wortham ; ibid. i330-4> PP- 2°4> ^^S- "' Cal Close, 1339-41, p. 94, 



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