Philip Beaumont (1432-1473)

Arms of Beaumont of Youlston, Shirwell, adopted at the start of the age of heraldry, (c. 1220-1215): Barry of six vair and gules.[1] These arms can be seen on the monument in Gittisham Church, Devon, to Henry (Bodrugan-) Beaumont (d.1590/1), also on the monument in Atherington Church, Devon, of Sir John Bassett (d.1529) of Umberleigh. They are the same arms as quartered for de Coucy 1st & 4th as shown in the Gelre Armorial (c. 1370-1414) by Enguerrand VII, Lord of Coucy, 1st Earl of Bedford (1340–1397). The only previous holder of that Earldom was Hugh de Beaumont, 3rd son of Robert de Beaumont who held Shirwell, Ashford & Loxhore

Philip Beaumont (1432-1473), lord of the manors of Shirwell in North Devon and of Gittisham in East Devon, was a Member of Parliament for a constituency in Devon and was Sheriff of Devon in 1469.[2] He was the rightful heir of his elder brother William Beaumont (1427-1453), a substantial landholder, but faced claims to his inheritance from his bastard nephew, John Bodrugan, "The Beaumont Bastard", the illegitimate son of Joan Courtenay,[3] William's wife.

Origins

Philip Beaumont was the 3rd son of Sir Thomas Beaumont (1401-1450) of Shirwell by his first wife Philippa Dinham, a daughter of Sir John III Dinham (1359-1428)[4] of Hartland in North Devon, Kingskerswell and Nutwell in South Devon, Buckland Dinham in Somerset and Cardinham in Cornwall.[5]

Sir Thomas Beaumont (1401-1450) married twice and produced seven sons none of whom left legitimate male progeny to inherit the lands, name and armorials of Beaumont, and the eventual splitting up of his estates, many of which had been held by his ancestors since the Norman Conquest of 1066, between his heirs through female lines was a process which was complex and lengthy and of significance to the history of several Devon manors and to the history of two prominent and long-enduring North Devon families, namely Basset and Chichester, and involved a further family, a branch of Bodrugan of Cornwall which later adopted the Beaumont name and arms.

Early ancestry

The Beaumont family of Devon, generally said to have been seated at the estate of Youlston within their manor of Shirwell in North Devon, is supposed by that family's historian Edward Beaumont in his 1929 work The Beaumonts in History. A.D. 850-1850, to have descended from Hugh de Beaumont, 1st Earl of Bedford (b.1106),[6] the 3rd son of the Norman magnate Robert de Beaumont, 1st Earl of Leicester, Count of Meulan, one of the proven Companions of William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings in 1066, to whom had been granted by William the Conqueror about 91 English manors in several counties for his service in the Norman Conquest of England.

This was a logical deduction as the descent from Robert's eldest two sons (Waleran IV de Beaumont, Count of Meulan, 1st Earl of Worcester (b. 1104) and Robert de Beaumont, 2nd Earl of Leicester & Earl of Hereford (b. 1104)) is well recorded, both families having died out rapidly in the male line. Surviving records do not however allow a definite familial link to be made between the Norman Beaumonts and the Beaumonts of Shirwell, Ashford and the two Loxhores of North Devon.

Beaumont of Beaumont-le-Roger, Normandy

In the Domesday Book of 1086 Ascerewelle (Shirwell) was one of at least four manors held in Devon, but merely as a mesne lord from Baldwin de Meulles, by the Norman magnate Robert de Beaumont, 1st Earl of Leicester, Count of Meulan[7] (c. 1040/50-1118), to whom had been granted by William the Conqueror about 91 English manors in several counties for his service in the Norman Conquest of England. These four manors tenanted by Robert are listed consecutively within the section in Domesday Book listing Baldwin's holdings, as Shirwell, Ashford and two manors called Loxhore, thought to correspond to today's adjacent settlements of Higher Loxhore and Lower Loxhore.

Robert is listed as the tenant of Shirwell simply as "Robert", but his next three holdings are listed in the Exon Domesday with Robert's appellation de Bello Monte added (the Latinised form of de Beaumont), in the form "Robert de Beaumont also holds..." This leaves no doubt that Shirwell too refers to Roger de Beaumont. There exist many other Devon manors held by persons called "Robert" but none can be identified with certainty to Robert de Beaumont. These four manors stayed for many generations within a line of the Beaumont family, seated at Youlston within the parish of Shirwell.

Marriage

Effigy of Blanche Bourchier (d.1483), Shirwell Church

Philip Beaumont married Blanche Bourchier (d.1483),[8] of whom a stone effigy exists in Shirwell Church, daughter of William Bourchier, 9th Baron FitzWarin (1407-1470) of Tawstock, feudal baron of Bampton and heir to a moiety of the feudal barony of Barnstaple, both in Devon. The marriage was without progeny. She survived her first husband and remarried secondly Bartholomew St Leger "of Kent",[9] probably a relative or descendant of Sir John St Leger (c.1404-1441) of Ulcombe, Kent, Sheriff of Kent in 1430, whose 3rd son was Sir James St Leger (c.1441-post 1509) of Annery in the parish of Monkleigh, North Devon, who married Anne Butler, daughter of Thomas Butler, 7th Earl of Ormond, and was therefore an uncle to Thomas Boleyn, 1st Earl of Wiltshire. Another son was Sir Thomas St Leger (c.1440-1483), the second husband of Anne of York (1439-1476), daughter of Richard Plantagenet, 3rd Duke of York, thus an elder sister of Kings Edward IV (1461-1483) and Richard III (1483-1485). One of the daughters and co-heiresses of Bartholomew St Leger was Margaret St Leger, 1st wife of John III Copleston (1475-1550), "The Great Copleston",[10] of Copleston, Devon.

Death & burial

He died on 12 June 1473. His will was dated 1 January 1472/3 and requested "That a marbell stone should be layde on his body with his arms graven on it and his portraiture in copper with an inscription on it of two verses nearly identical with those on the Lincoln brass". Clearly this had not been performed by 1488 as in that year his younger half-brother and heir Thomas Beaumont (d.1488) repeated the request in his own will: Also that I will that my deceased brother Philip Beaumont have a marbill stone leyd upon hys grave with these verses graved in the same:

Testis tu Christe,
Quod non jacet hic lapis iste,
Corpus ut ornetur,
Sed ut spiritus memoretur.

The rhyming Latin verse may be translated as: "Thou art a witness O Christ that this stone is not an adornment for the body but a memorial for his soul".[11] Whether it was eventually laid down is not known, but no such brass survives.

A similar inscription is said by the Devon historian John Prince[12] (d.1723) to have been engraved on the ledger-stone of one of the early Bishops of Crediton (he suggested possibly Bishop "Eadulph" (died 932/4)) in Crediton Church. It also appears on the brass of Thomas Heywood (d.1492), Dean of Lincoln,(sic) in Lincoln Cathedral[13] and on the brass of John Booth (d.1478), (alias Bowthe), Bishop of Exeter, on his monument[14] at East Horsley, Surrey.[15] It also appears on the brass of Giles Daubeney, 6th Baron Daubeney (1393–1446) in the Church of St Peter and St Paul, in South Petherton, Somerset, as follows:[16]

Sis testis Xpe,[17] q(uo)d non jacet (hic) lapis iste
Corpus ut ornetur, sed spiritus (ut) memoretur
Quisquis eris, qui transieris, sta perlege plora
Sum q(uo)d eris, fueramq(ue) q(uo)d es, pro me p(re)cor ora

Translated literally line by line as:

"Be a witness, O Christ, that this stone does not lie here
To adorn the body, but that it might commemorate the soul.
Whoever thou art who will pass by, stand, read, weep:
I am what you will be, I was what you are. I beseech you, pray for me!"

Prince made a verse translation thus:[18]

"Christ! bear me witness, that this stone is not
Put here t'adorn a body, that must rot;
But keep a name, that it mayn't be forgot.
Whoso doth pass, stay, read, bewail, I am
What thou must be; was what thou art the same;
Then pray for me, e're you go whence ye came"

This verse epitaph in Latin is of the so-called Quisquis variety,[19] (i.e. "Whoever...") which developed from the mediaeval legend of the Three Living and the Three Dead.

Succession

Philip died without progeny and bequeathed his estates in two directions: firstly to his nephew Sir John III Bassett (1441-1485)[20] of Whitechapel in Devon, the son of his sister Joan Beaumont who had married John II Bassett (1374-1463) of Whitechapel, Bishops Nympton, Devon, and of Tehidy in Cornwall, Sheriff of Cornwall in 1449.[21] The Bassetts received from this bequest the manors of Umberleigh and Heanton Punchardon. The other part of Philip Beaumont's bequest, including Shirwell, went to his eldest half-brother Thomas Beaumont (d.1487/8), whose eventual heir was his niece Margaret (or Maud) Beaumont and her husband John Chichester (1472-1538) of Raleigh. The Chichester family later made Youlston, the chief estate in Shirwell, their principal seat.

Sources

References

  1. ↑ Vivian, Heralds' Visitations of Devon, 1895, p.65, in which given erroneously as Vairé azure and argent, over all two bars gules
  2. ↑ Beaumont, T, p.64, exact constituency not stated. No entry as yet for him in History of Parliament on-line. Quoting: "Transactions of the Devonshire Society, Vol.50, p.445"
  3. ↑ Pole, Sir William (d.1635), Collections Towards a Description of the County of Devon, Sir John-William de la Pole (ed.), London, 1791, p.408, Shirwell; also p.167, Gittesham, with omission of "of Powderham" (Neither "Sir William Courtenay" nor a daughter Joan are mentioned in Vivian's Heraldic Visitation of Devon (1895), p.246, pedigree of Courtenay of Powderham)
  4. ↑ Vivian, Lt.Col. J.L., (Ed.) The Visitation of the County of Devon: Comprising the Heralds' Visitations of 1531, 1564 & 1620, Exeter, 1895, p.46, pedigree of Basset, p.65, pedigree of Beaumont of Gittisham
  5. ↑ GEC Complete Peerage, Vol.IV, p.377
  6. ↑ Beaumont, Edward T., The Beaumonts in History. A.D. 850-1850. Oxford, c. 1929, p.58
  7. ↑ Thorn, Caroline & Frank, Domesday Book, Vol. 9, Devon, Morris, John, (general editor), Chichester, 1985, Part 2, (notes) 16,65
  8. ↑ Blanche Bourchier died 4 January 1483 (Vivian, p.106); Pevsner, Nikolaus & Cherry, Bridget, The Buildings of England: Devon, London, 2004, p.728 "said to be Blanche St Leger (d.1483)"
  9. ↑ Vivian, p.106: Latin: de Com. Cantii ("from the county of Kent")
  10. ↑ Vivian, p.224; Prince, John, (1643–1723) The Worthies of Devon, 1810 edition, p.235
  11. ↑ Beaumont, T., pp.65-6
  12. ↑ Prince, John, (1643–1723) The Worthies of Devon, 1810 edition, p.343, apparently relying on A View of Devonshire by Thomas Westcote (1567?–1637?)
  13. ↑ He appears to have been Dean of Lichfield
  14. ↑ (Victoria County History: Surrey, Vol.3; Parishes: East Horsley', A History of the County of Surrey: Volume 3 (1911), pp. 349-352. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=42982): "There are several interesting brasses, the most important being a small one on the north wall of the chancel, on which is represented a kneeling bishop in mass vestments and with a mitre and his pastoral staff. On a shield opposite him are the arms of Booth—Three boars' heads razed with a label. Below is an inscription: 'Quisquis eris qui transieris sta p[er]lege plora. | Sum qd eris fuerā q[uia] qd es: pro me precor ora. | Hic jacet Johēs Bowthe quōdā E[pus] Exoni[ensis] qui | Obiit vo; die me[nsi] Aprelis Ao d[omini] mocccco lxxviii.'
  15. ↑ Sherlock, Peter, Monuments and Memory in Early Modern England, pp.79-80
  16. ↑ The rhyme within the first line is on Xpe (pronounced Christe) with iste; the second line ornetur with memoretur; the last two lines rhyme internally with eris, transieris and eris, es and also in their endings: sta perlege plora with pro me precor ora
  17. ↑ Xpe, abbreviation of Greek form, pronounced here as in Latin Christe
  18. ↑ Prince, Worthies of Devon, 1810 edition, p.343, "Eadulph, Bishop of Devon"
  19. ↑ Sherlock, Peter, Monuments and Memory in Early Modern England, pp.79-80
  20. ↑ Vivian, p.46
  21. ↑ Vivian, p.46, regnal year 28 Henry VI (1449)
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