Page:The Complete Peerage Ed 2 Vol 1.djvu/293

 ARUNDEL COMPLETE PEERAGE 243 ^. about 13 13. He was in (i 330-1) 4 Edw. Ill, fully restored in blood and honours (confirmed 1351 and again 1354), and in Dec. of that year obtained restitution of the Castle and Honour of Arundel from the widow of John, Earl of Kent. By such restorations he doubtless became Earl of Arundel (") He was made Justiciar of North Wales for life 1334; Gov. of Carnarvon Castle, 1339 ; Sheriff of Shropshire for life 1345. He took a distinguished part in the wars with France, was Admiral of the West 1340-41 and 1345-47, commanded the 2nd division C') at the battle of Cr^cy, and was at the fall of Calais in 1347. He had shortly before, viz., on 30 June 1347, sue. to the vast estates of the family of Warenne, by the death, s.p. kg., of his mother's br., John, Earl of Surrey and Sussex. By fine levied (1349-50) 23 Edw. Ill, he settled the Castle, town, and manor of Arundel on himself and his (then) wife Eleanor, for their joint lives, with rem. to the heirs male of his body by his said wife. On the death of Joan, the widow of his said uncle, John, Earl of Surrey, in 1361, but not before, C) he assumed the title of Earl of Surrey, and in 1366 settled the Warenne estates on his issue. He m., istly, 9 Feb. 1 320/1, in the King's Chapel at Havering-atte-Bower (he about 7, she about 8), Isabel, da. of Sir Hugh le Despenser the younger, [Lord le Despenser], by Eleanor, da. and coh. of Gilbert (de Clare), Earl of Gloucester. He obtained, 4 Dec. 1344, a Papal mandate for the annulment of this marriage, on the ground of his minority and of his never having willingly consented to the match. (■*) He ;«., 2ndly, 5 Feb. 1344/5, at Ditton, (a lady with whom (*) See note " e " on previous page. (") During almost the whole of his long life he was taking a leading part in warfare either by land or sea. As heir to his mother he was a man of enormous wealth. V.G. C^) See third sentence of note " b, " p. 241. (*) By his 1st wife he had a s. who was said to have been 20 in 1347, and who, if this be true, must have been begotten when his father was still very young, about 15, and 2 daughters. The grounds on which the divorce was obtained were that ' pre- fatus Ricardus cum eadem Isabella in eodem thoro per metum et verbera positus eandem cognovit carnaliter et filium ex ea etiam procreavit. ' (Grandisson's Register, ed. Hingeston-Randolph, p. 988). The same story is told in the Papal Mandate. — ' On the petition of Richard, Earl of Arundel and Isabel, daughter of Hugh Despencer, who at the respective ages of 7 and 8, not by mutual consent, but by fear of their relations, contracted espousals, and on coming to years of puberty expressly renounced them, but were forced by blows to cohabit, so that a son was born. — Mandate by canonical procedure to annul the marriage, they having constantly lived apart, and providing for their son, so that they may be free to intermarry with others. ' It is not very easy to accept all this indecent stuff as a satisfactory explanation of a son having been born to the parties, and though in none of the documents bearing on the case is there any mention of daughters, yet there appear to have been two (see note C") next p.), and if so, the * per metum et verbera ' tale breaks down altogether, unless indeed, the boy and girls were triplets ! Obviously, what really happened, was this. The powerful Earl desired to get rid of the woman to whom he had been married as a child, and who, since her father's attainder and execution, had ceased to be of any importance, that he might marry the woman with whom he was then living in