Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 59.djvu/37

 1327. He received a commission of oyer and terminer as late as 28 March 1330, but died before 26 June 1331 (Pat. Rolls, pp. 558, 146).

[Authorities cited in text; Abbr. Rot. Orig. pp. 50, 52; Foss's Judges of England.] 

WALERAND, ROBERT (d. 1273), judge, was the son of William Walerand and Isabella, eldest daughter and coheiress of Hugh of Kilpeck (Excerpta e Rot. Fin. ii. 252; Calendarium Genealogicum, p. 770). The family claimed descent from Walerand the Huntsman of Domesday Book (, Modern Wiltshire, ‘Hundred of Cawden,’ iii. 24). Robert's brother John, rector of Clent in Worcestershire, was in 1265 made seneschal and given joint custody of the Tower of London. His sister Alice was mother of Alan Plugenet [q. v.]; and another sister, also named Alice, was abbess of Romsey.

Walerand was throughout Henry III's reign one of the king's ‘familiares’ (Chron. Edw. I and Edw. II, i. 68;, Chron. de Bello, p. 118, Camden Soc.). Among the knights of the royal household he stands in the same position as his friend John Mansel [q. v.] among the clerks. In 1246 he received the custody of the Marshall estates, and in 1247 of those of John de Munchanes (Excerpta e Rot. Fin. i. 458, ii. 14). In Easter 1246 he was appointed sheriff of Gloucestershire (List of Sheriffs to 1831, p. 49;, Baronage, i. 670). In 1250 the castles of Carmarthen and Cardigan were granted to him, together with the lands of Meilgwn ap Meilgwn and the governorship of Lundy (Excerpta e Rot. Fin. ii. 87; and, Rôles Gascons, vol. i. No. 2388). From June 1251 till August 1258 he was a regular justiciar (Excerpta e Rot. Fin. ii. 107–286). As early as 1252 he is described as seneschal of Gascony (Royal Letters, Henry III, ii. 95), and in 1253 he accompanied Henry III thither, sailing on 6 Aug. 1253 from Portsmouth and reaching Bordeaux on 15 Aug. Walerand was present at the siege of Bénauges (Rôles Gascons, vol. i. No. 4222). The affairs of Bergerac seem to have been especially confided to him (ib. Nos. 3773, 4301), and he was one of the deputation sent by Henry III to the men of Gensac on the death of Elie Rudel, lord of Bergerac and Gensac (ib. No. 4301). Throughout the Gascon campaign Walerand steadily rose in Henry's favour. He was one of the most important members of the king's council in Gascony.

On Henry accepting for his second son Edmund the crown of Sicily from Innocent IV and Alexander IV, Walerand was in 1255 associated with Peter of Aigueblanche [q. v.] as king's envoy to carry out the negotiations with the pope (Cal. of Papal Registers, Papal Letters, i. 312). Walerand was an accomplice of Peter's trick of persuading the prelates to entrust them with blank charters, which they filled up at Rome, and so compelled the English church to pay nine thousand marks to certain firms of Sienese and Florentine bankers who had advanced money to Alexander on Henry's account (‘Ann. Osney’ in Annales Monastici, iv. 109, 110;, Chron. p. 203; , Hist. Angl. p. 135; , Chron. Majora, v. 511). At the parliament of Westminster on 13 Oct. 1255 Richard of Cornwall bitterly rebuked the bishop of Hereford and Walerand, because they had ‘so wickedly urged the king to subvert the kingdom’ (, Chron. Majora, v. 521).

Walerand now resumed his work as judge. In 1256 he was the chief of the justices itinerant at Winchester (‘Ann. Winchester’ in Ann. Monastici, ii. 96). He was one of a commission of three appointed to investigate the crimes of William de l'Isle, sheriff of Northampton, in the famous case of 1256 (, Chron. Majora, v. 577–80). On 12 June 1256 Walerand was associated with Richard, earl of Gloucester, in an embassy to the princes of Germany (Fœdera, i. 342). About this time he was entrusted with the custody of St. Briavel's Castle and manor (, Baronage, i. 670), and a little later (1256–1257) he was made steward of all forests south of the Trent and governor of Rockingham Castle (ib.) On 20 Feb. 1257 Simon de Montfort and Robert Walerand were empowered to negotiate a peace between France and England (Royal Letters, Henry III, ii. 121;, Chron. Majora, v. 649, 650, 659).

At the beginning of the troubles between king and barons in 1258 Walerand, though supporting the king, took up a moderate attitude. He witnessed on 2 May the king's consent to a project of reform (Select Charters, p. 381; Fœdera, 370, 371). He was so far trusted by the barons that he was appointed warden of Salisbury Castle under the provisions of Oxford (ib. p. 393). Other preferments followed, some of which at least must have been given with the consent of the fifteen. In 1259 he became warden of Bristol Castle (, i. 670), while a little later he was again created warden of St. Briavel's Castle, and on 9 July 1261 made sheriff of Kent, an office he held till 23 Sept. 1262,