Manor and Ancient Barony of Castle Combe. 



141 



speedily taken, and twelve knights found therein hanged on the 

 spot. Badlesmere himself was taken prisoner at the subsequent 

 battle of Boroughbridge, so fatal to the flower of English chivalry, 

 and executed at Canterbury. His estates being confiscated were 

 immediately granted to the elder Despenser, who thus in the year 

 1322, became owner of the Barony of Castle Combe with its depen- 

 dencies. The desertion of the queen, however, disgusted with the 

 excessive favour shown to the Despensers, soon turned the tables 

 upon them, and the deposition of their wretched master in 1326 

 was followed by the reversal of the attainder of the families of 

 those barons who had suffered at Boroughbridge. The Lady 

 Margaret, widow of Badlesmere, was consequently reinstated in 

 the possession of his estates pending the minority of her children. 

 This gallant and noble lady, who thus for a 

 time held the Barony of Castle Combe, was 

 one of the coheiresses of the great earldoms 

 of Clare and Gloucester, and as such inhe- 

 rited the capital Manor of Thaxsted in Essex, 

 which had belonged to the Clares at the time 

 of the Conquest. On her death in 1333, 

 Castle Combe which had been assigned to her 

 by way of jointure, reverted to Giles Lord 

 Badlesmere, only son and heir of herself and 

 her husband Bartholemew. He, however, 

 died in the year 1338, married but childless, 

 upon which event his large possessions were divided between his 

 four sisters and coheiresses. These comprised no less than eighty- 

 five manors and seventy-six knights' fees in England, and large 

 estates in Ireland inherited through his mother from the marriage 

 of Strongbow to Eva, daughter of Mac Morough, King of Leinster. 

 His four sisters had been all married at a very early age by their 

 father, no doubt with the view of strengthening himself by alliance 

 with the most powerful persons of the time ; the eldest, Margery, 

 to Lord Eoos of Hamlake; the second, Maud, to Vere, Earl of 

 Oxford ; the third, Elizabeth, to Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March ; 

 the fourth, Margaret, to John Lord de Tibetot. One of the 



SEAL OF LADY MARGARET 

 DE CLARE — 1328. 



