VOL. XIX. (3) EXCURSION— MORKTON \ ALENCE 
199 
MORETON VALENCJ': MEETING. 
July jist, 1917. 
Ihc fourth mccliug was arranged at a seldom-visited village .situated 
but a short distance from the Gloucester and Berkeley Canal, and, with 
the sanction of the Directors of the Dock Company, those who attended 
were able to have the use of the launch Sahvina, which conveyed them to 
Parkend Bridge, from whence they walked across the fields to Moreton 
Valence Church. 
Those pi’esent were : — The President, F. H. Bretherton, O. A. Brown, 
W. R. Carles, J. M. Collett, C. A. Crane, F. J . Cullis, Colonel Duke, T. S. 
Ellis, G. Embrey, Ernest Hartland, Rev. P. M. C. Johnstone, J. H. Jones, A. 
S. Montgomrey, J. F. ]\Iuir, Surgeon-Major Newton, A. E. Smith, C. Upton, 
E. N. Witchell, and Roland Austin. 
Before entering the Chui'ch the President referred regretfully to the 
very sudden death of the Rev. Walter Butt, and spoke of the great loss 
which the Club had thus suffei'ed. He mentioned that though neither he, 
nor the Secretary, were able to attend the obsequies, Mr Ernest Hartland, 
IMr Haigh, and IMr Thompson represented the Club, and that he had written 
to Mr. Butt’s family, conveying the sense of the loss which all felt. 
In the Church, Mr Baddeley stated that the population of Moreton 
Valence could never have been large, and in the Middle Ages possibly amounted 
only to some 80 or 90 people. Records show there were 64 gallows in 
Gloucestershire in the year 1290, and one of them was erected at Moreton, 
probably just outside the church-yard. The place-name (to which De 
Valence was added in 14th c.) was derived from the character of bare, or 
marshy, land, the suffix ton indicating the usual enclosure, or farm. The 
road from Bristol to Gloucester was an ancient one developed from a track of 
Romano-British times, and near this Moreton \'alence became established. 
The moated mound (as at Harcsfield) gave rise to the questions : Why 
adopt the, in this county, not frequent method of strengthening the position 
of a mansion house by a moat ? Was this moat a necessary increase of 
protection, perhaps, owing to the propinquity of the Severn-raiding Danes ? 
The Church from the 12th century onward formed the endowment of a pre- 
bend in Hereford Cathedral, showing clearly that jMilo, Earl of Hereford, 
and his De Bohun descendants — who also held extensive other lands nearby — 
were the part-owners in descent from Durandus the Sheriff. On the mound 
before them they had owned a castellated mansion, the foundations of which 
are doubtless there still. In the Inquisitiones ad quod damnum the o\vners 
of Moreton Valence were asked by what right they used a gallows and 
whipping-post ? They answered by the right granted to their predecessors. 
In 1246 the manor descended (by marriage) to William de Pont-l’arche, who 
became suddenly outlawed for either felony or treason. His forfeited lands 
fell to the Crown, which in turn bestowed them upon William de Valence, 
half-brother to Henry III. His widow, Joan (De Monchensi) resided here 
on her journeys from Goodrich to London. She was here in June, 1297, with 
a suite of 16 people, and went on to Painswick and Cirencester. Pont-l’arche 
