The Strife of the Roses and Days of the Tudors in the West. W. H. Hamilton Rogers
arcade, brings the eye at once to the memorial we are in search of.
The monument is under the second arch of the nave, west of the transept, in the south aisle. It consists of a high tomb with canopy, flanked by an entrance-doorway forming part of one composition, extending the whole breadth of the arch. This was originally one of the enclosing screens of a Chantry, the other two, east and west, dividing it from the aisle having been removed. In the wall of the aisle opposite the tomb, is a two-storied piscina, which was formerly within the area of the Chantry, and against the east division doubtless stood the antient altar.
The cover-stone of the tomb is Purbeck marble, and on it are the indents of a knight and lady, but not of large size. The knight's head appears to have rested on a helmet with lambrequin, and an animal was at his feet. The lady in long robe and head on a cushion. Two shields were above their heads, and two more below their feet. There was no ledger-line.
Below the tomb are traceried panels with shields in their centres, on them is carved these arms:—1. A rudder.—2. Four fusils in fess, each charged with an escallop (Cheney).—3. Four escallops, two and two (Erleigh?). These charges are exactly repeated on both sides.
The canopy is of square form, flanked by buttresses pinnacled on their faces, and the groining within shews five fan-traceried pendants. At the east end is a large niche, the west is open. The doorway is surmounted by a rich ogee crocketted canopy with finial, and is panelled above.
A continuous cornice surmounts both tomb and doorway, of vine foliage and mouldings, crested originally by the Tudor flower, only a part of which now remains. It is broken on each side by four angels holding shields. On the north side are two single angels supporting the arms of Cheney, at the west corner are two angels holding a larger shield quarterly of four:—1 and 4 (Cheney); 2 and 3, a cross fleurie (Paveley). On the south side the single angels display the arms of Paveley, and the pair at the end Cheney impaling Paveley. Over the inner doorway the rudder is again carved—here at Edington its earliest appearance.
In the churchyard, near the porch, is a large broken Purbeck marble stone, probably removed from the pavement of the Chantry within. On it are the indents of a knight, and lady in horned head-dress, under an ogee crocketted canopy, flanked by pinnacles, evidently of contemporary date with the tomb. Above the figures are two shields, below their feet the space is powdered with scrolls, and a ledger-line enclosed the whole.
CHENEY MONUMENT, EDINGTON CHURCH, WILTSHIRE.
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As usual with influential families resident near large ecclesiastical foundations, and having considerable landed property in the district, the Paveleys, who were the Lords of Westbury Hundred, were doubtless largely connected with the welfare of the Monastery, and as liberal donors toward the building of the Abbey Church. The armorial story told on the tomb, points to its being the memorial of Sir Ralph Cheney, who married Joan, one of the daughters and coheiresses of Sir John Paveley, and succeeded in her right to Broke. He died 2 Henry IV., 1401. The great William of Edington, consecrated Bishop of Winchester, 1345, and afterward Chancellor and Treasurer to King Edward III., was born here, and became a considerable benefactor to the village and Monastery. His surname has not been recovered, but surmised to have been Cheney—at any rate in a deed dated 1361, the Bishop is described as "guardian of the heiresses of Sir John Paveley,"—and one of these, Joan, as we have observed, married Sir Ralph Cheney, and as a consequence with great probability she found sepulchre here with her husband, in their Chantry in the Abbey Church.
Back to the railway station again, and a place among the cohort of the iron horse, for a long journey is before us, even from the open, breezy chalk-plains of Wiltshire, to the marge of the majestic Tamar in westernmost Devon, and the granite-bouldered precincts of east Cornwall, where we hope to get further clue to the haunts of Willoughby when in the flesh. Here, we are leaving what was probably his first home and earliest associations before ambition dawned on his future path; there, we shall visit his later possessions when the sun of fortune had shone on him, and he basked in its rays of honours and wealth. There also our pilgrimage will eventually lead us to that last house, the which he in common with earth's humblest denizen must share.
Before, however, we proceed further on our way to what we may term his second home, it behoves us to say something anent the antecedents and coming of the knight himself, and how the name of Willoughby originally became located in the west country. Like many a younger son rejoicing in a titled extraction, coupled with probably only a slender portion of the family patrimony, the wooing of a distaff—who, beside let us hope, being endowed with her full share of love's talisman, personal attractions, enjoyed also the further potent charm of being an heiress to boot—brought the father of our knight from the fens of Lincolnshire to the distant altitudes of Wilts, and in winning the hand of Anne Cheney for a wife, subsequently became in her right the Lord of Broke. A similar errand sent his son away to the boundary line that divides Devon from Cornwall, and with the well-dowered Blanche Champernowne of Beer-Ferrers for his helpmate, there to find his future home, and where we propose to look for him again, after we have gossiped over his lineage awhile.
In common with many of our old titled names, Sir John de Willoughby its first possessor in this country was a Norman knight to whom the Conqueror gave the manor of Willoughby in Lincolnshire.[2] His descendant Sir William in the reign of Henry III. married Alice daughter and coheiress of John Bec or Beke of Eresby, summoned to Parliament as Baron Beke of Eresby 1295–6. He was succeeded by his son Robert, who inherited at the decease of his grand-uncle Anthony Beke, Bishop of Durham, the great possessions of that prelate, and 7 Edward II., was summoned to Parliament as Baron Willoughby de Eresby.
His great-grandson was Robert, fourth Lord Willoughby; he married first Alice daughter of Sir William Skipwith, and secondly Margaret daughter of William, Lord Zouch, who died in 1391.[3] His third son Sir Thomas by Alice Skipwith, married Elizabeth daughter of John de Nevill, Lord Nevill of Raby, and Elizabeth Latimer his second wife, only daughter of William, fourth Lord Latimer of the first creation, who died in 1388. Sir Thomas was succeeded by his son Sir John Willoughby, who married Joan Welby, described as an heiress, and their son was the Sir John Willoughby, who married Anne daughter of Sir Edmond Cheney, of Broke, Wilts; whose son was Sir Robert Willoughby, the first Lord Willoughby de Broke, and subject of our little memoir. There were three other sons, William of Turners-Piddle, Dorset, who died in 1512, and was buried at Bere-Regis; Thomas, who married Isabel Bedyke of Silton, Dorset, died 1523, and ordered his body to be buried in the church there; and Edward, Dean of Exeter Cathedral, and Canon of St. George's, Windsor, who died in 1508. Also two daughters, Cicely, Abbess of Wilton, who died in 1528, and Elizabeth, married to William Carrant, of Toomer in Henstridge, Somerset.
Thus far for the coming of the knight; our next care will be to trace, as far as means available enable us, his progress and actions during the eventful days in which he lived. The strife between the contending factions of the Red and White Roses, in his younger years was strongly predominant, and so thoroughly had the fierce rivalry for supreme power permeated society, that probably it was almost impossible to remain neutral, while men so blindly, yet withal so devotedly, risked their lives and fortunes in partizanship with the contending claimants of the divine right. To choose a side was an absolute necessity—
"Under which king, Bezonian? speak or die!"
was the question of the hour, and had to be answered with all its contingent risk. In the west country the adherents of the Red Rose seemed to have the preponderance, the detestable craft and cruelty of Richard III. doubtless had its effect of estranging from sympathy with him, all except just those who were allied to his rule by the hollow tie of self-interest, and the usual glamour of adhering to the powers that be, no matter how arrived at or constituted, or what its actions were.
The first important social function we find Sir Robert Willoughby discharging, is that of Sheriff of Devon, 21 Edward IV., 1481, being the year preceding the one in which his friend Sir Giles Daubeney held the same office. And then, in harmony with the prevailing distracted state of public affairs we have described, we next observe him in active