Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 61.djvu/206

 held at Baccanceld, probably Bapchild, near Sittingbourne in Kent ( and, Councils, iii. 238 seq.).

To Wihtred also we owe one of our earliest extant codes of law. It was drawn up at a ‘convention of great men’ held at Berghamstede or Bersted, near Maidstone, in the fifth year of the king's reign, and was chiefly ecclesiastical in character. It was still found necessary at the close of the seventh century to prohibit ‘offering to devils.’ The code also regulates the relations of the lords with the different classes of the unfree, and even condescends to enjoin the use of the horn by strangers when off the highways (ib. pp. 233 seq.).



WIKEFORD, ROBERT (d. 1390), archbishop of Dublin, is said to have belonged to the family of Wickford or Wykeford of Wickford Hall, Essex (, p. 142; cf., Essex, i. 253–4). He was a fellow of Merton College, Oxford, and a doctor of laws in 1344. He became a king's clerk, and in or before 1368 was appointed archdeacon of Winchester (, Fœdera, Record edit. ii. 850, 892;, iii. 25). He also held other preferments in the north and west of England, and was admitted by Urban IV to a prebend of York in 1370. On 18 May following he was commissioned to arrange with Wenceslaus, duke of Brabant, the pay for his army while serving under Edward III in France, and in 1371 he was again sent on an embassy to Flanders (, Fœdera, Record edit. III. ii. 892, 920, 921). On 7 March 1372–3 he was appointed constable of Bordeaux (ib. p. 972). He had resigned this post before 26 June 1375 (ib. pp. 1030, 1039). On 12 Oct. 1375 he was promoted by papal provision to the archbishopric of Dublin. On 18 July 1376 he was appointed chancellor of Ireland, and he was reappointed on 26 Sept. 1377, after the accession of Richard II (Cal. Pat. Rolls, p. 27).

In 1384 he seems to have paid a visit to England to inform the king and council of certain matters to the advantage of the king and prosecute business of importance to himself and his see (ib. p. 383), but he cannot have still held the office of chancellor during all the period of 1377–84, as he was reappointed to the office on 10 Sept. 1384 (ib. p. 455). He was relieved of the office before 27 March of the following year (ib. p. 550). He died on 28 Aug. 1390. According to Wood and the catalogues, he left to Merton College altar-cloths for the high altar; according to Astry they were for the hall.



WIKES, THOMAS (fl. 1258–1273), chronicler. [See .]

WILBERFORCE, HENRY WILLIAM (1807–1873), Roman catholic journalist and author, the youngest son of [q. v.], was born at Clapham on 22 Sept. 1807. [q. v.] and [q. v.] were his elder brothers. When nine years old Henry William was entrusted to the care of the Rev. John Sargent, rector of Graffham, Sussex, and at the age of fifteen he was transferred, with his brother Samuel, to the Rev. F. R. Spragge, who took pupils at Little Bounds, Bidborough, Kent. He was afterwards entered at Oriel College, Oxford, matriculating on 16 March 1826 and going into residence in Michaelmas term following. During a portion of four long vacations he read with [q. v.] In 1830 he graduated B.A., being placed in the first class in classics and in the second in mathematics. He was admitted a student of Lincoln's Inn in 1831, but he continued to reside at Oxford, where he gained the Ellerton theological prize, and graduated M.A. in 1833. He was at one time president of the university debating society, called the ‘Union,’ and for several years took a prominent part in its debates.

At the suggestion of Newman, Wilberforce abandoned the study of the law and took holy orders. In 1834 he was appointed perpetual curate of Bransgrove, on the skirts of the New Forest; in 1841 he became vicar of Walmer, near Deal; and in 1843 he was presented by the lord chancellor, at the instance of the prince consort, to the well-endowed vicarage of East Farleigh, near Maidstone, which some years previously had been held by his brother Robert (, Life of Bishop Wilberforce, i. 222). Seven years later he resigned his vicarage, and on