Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 57.djvu/330

 wall [q. v.] had distracted the country, and Turberville found his task by no means an easy one. His correspondence with Henry III (printed in, Royal Letters, i. 317–21, 327, 332, 344, and Fœdera, i. 182, 190, 191, 192) shows him contending with want of money, a revolt in Bayonne, a conspiracy in Bordeaux, disputes with the viscount of Béarn, and unsettled relations with the French king. In June 1228 he was the chief negotiator of a truce with France signed at Nogent (ib. i. 192). He importuned the king to relieve him of his governorship; but Henry answered that he must retain it until the king himself visited Gascony. Despite their disobedience to him at the time, the Gascons afterwards contrasted Turberville's mild rule very favourably with the strong government of Simon de Montfort, describing Turberville as ‘custos pius et justus qui nobis pacifice præerat’ (, v. 295). However, on 1 July 1231 Turberville was superseded, and in 1232 he was again in England (Fœdera, i. 203). In 1233 he distinguished himself in the Welsh war that resulted from the revolt of the Marshals [see, third ]. Carmarthen was besieged by Rhys Grug and the Welsh, who had risen in the interests of the Marshals. Turberville took a force of soldiers on shipboard from Bristol and sailed up the Towy to the beleaguered castle and town. The bridge over the river, which was immediately below the castle, was held by the Welsh rebels. Turberville broke the bridge by the impact of his ship and captured its defenders or immersed them in the river (Tewkesbury Annals, p. 92; Annales Cambriæ, p. 79; Brut y Tywysogion, p. 323, Rolls Ser.).

Turberville was reappointed seneschal of Gascony on 23 May 1234, and was ordered to be at Portsmouth by Ascensiontide to command a force destined to help Peter, count of Brittany (Fœdera, i. 211). He fought vigorously in this cause, but Peter proved faithless, and Henry was soon again in Gascony (ib. i. 214). He was seneschal, with a short break in 1237, until the end of November 1238. After Easter in the latter year he was sent by Henry III at the head of an English force destined to help his brother-in-law, the Emperor Frederick II, against the rebellious Lombards (, ii. 485; Flores Historiarum, iii. 227). He was subsequently joined by William, bishop-elect of Valence, Queen Eleanor's uncle, who seems to have assumed the command (, iii. 486). They fought for the whole summer against the Lombards, and inflicted great loss upon them. A victory over the citizens of Piacenza on 23 Aug. was their most noteworthy exploit (, Chronique Rimée in, xxiii. 68). They were recalled before the renewal of Frederick's excommunication. The emperor testified by letter his great obligations to Turberville (, iii. 491). Turberville returned to England, and on 12 Nov. 1239 was one of the numerous band of nobles who, headed by Richard of Cornwall, bound themselves by oath to go on crusade. He died, however, on 21 Dec. 1239 (, iii. 624).

Turberville is described as ‘præclarus miles,’ ‘vir in re militari peritissimus,’ and as ‘in expeditionibus expertus et eruditus’ (, iii. 29, 485, 620). He had a wife named Hawise, who survived him, and had her dower assigned from his Devonshire estates (Calendarium Genealogicum, p. 5). He also left a daughter named Edelina, who married a Saintongeais named Elie de Blénac. Grants of money and kind from the Bordeaux exchequer were bestowed on her after her father's death ( and, Rôles Gascons, Nos. 840, 1407). She was apparently illegitimate, for the Melcombe estates of her father went to the Binghams through Lucy, Henry's sister, who married into that family, and must therefore have inherited after her nephew's death (, Dorset, ii. 426). Moreover, Matthew Paris, in his lamentation over the decay of so many knightly families at this time, expressly mentions the Turbervilles as among the ‘shields laid low’ (Hist. Major, iv. 492).

[Matthew Paris's Historia Major, Flores Historiarum, Shirley's Royal Letters, Annales Cambriæ, Brut y Tywysogion, Annales Monastici (all in Rolls Series); Rymer's Fœdera, vol. i.; Bémont and Michel's Rôles Gascons, in Documents inédits sur l'Histoire de France; Hutchins's Dorset; Clark's Limbus Patrum Morganiæ et Glanmorganiæ, pp. 448–9.]  TURBERVILLE, HENRY (d. 1678), Roman catholic controversialist, received his education in the English College at Douai, where he was ordained priest. Although he had no academical degrees, and was never employed as a professor in the college, yet his sound judgment and constant application to books rendered him one of the ablest controversialists of his time. Being sent on the English mission, he acted as chaplain to Henry Somerset, first marquis of Worcester [see under, second ], during the civil war, and for some time he served Sir George Blount of Sodington in the same capacity. He is also styled archdeacon of Berkshire. ‘The clergy,’ says