15/11/2024
The Royal Forest of Knaresborough.
In 1372 an event occurred which had profound significance for Harrogate, as well as the nation in general. King Edward III granted the Royal Forest to his younger son, John, Duke of Lancaster, also known as John of Ghent, or Gaunt. The Earldom of Lancaster had been translated into a Duchy on 6 March 1351, when Henry Grosmont, the fourth Earl - a soldier, diplomat and administrator - was created first Duke of Lancaster.
Henry died ten years later, in 1361, without a direct male heir, so the Duchy reverted to the King, Edward III, who in the following year of 1362 created his son, John of Ghent, or Gaunt, second Duke of Lancaster. The new Duke acquired valuable additions to his territory in 1372, when he surrendered the Earldom of Richmond to his father, King Edward III, gaining in exchange the Honours of High Peak, Pevensey, Tickhill and Knaresborough, which last Honour contained the Royal Forest and Harrogate. Duke John witnessed the end of the reign of King Edward III, and lived through the reign of the succeeding monarch, Richard II, but his son, Henry Boling-broke, was banished by the latter King.
When the Duke died in 1399, King Richard tried to confiscate the Duchy inheritance, but the new Duke returned from exile and landed on the Yorkshire coast at Ravenspur in June or July. He was met by a band of loyal followers, among whom Duchy historian Sir Robert Somerville includes two hundred from the Forest of Knaresborough.
Henry Bolingbroke then marched on Pickering, Knaresborough and Pontefract castles, which he seized, his triumphal progress ending with the surrender of Richard II at Flint, and his subsequent coronation in Westminster Abbey on 13 October 1399. The first act of the new King, Henry IV, was to declare that the inheritance of the Duchy of Lancaster should be held by the monarch separately from other Crown possessions, descending directly to his male heirs. This decree was of incalculable good fortune for Harrogate, the importance of which cannot be over-emphasised.
One of the most important sources of information about Harrogate in the later fourteenth century is the register drawn up by Henry IV's father, John of Gaunt, between 1372 until 1383. Compiled at the London palace of Savoy, with entries in French, the register contains several interesting references to Bilton Park, Harlow, Haverah Park and Oakdale, whose management was clearly a matter of concern to the Duke. An entry for 1380 records that the keeper of the Royal Forest was ordered to give to the tenants of Bilton and Harrogate enough brushwood to enclose a place in Bilton Park, which it is their duty to do, and ... see they do it quickly'. The repairs were needed to keep the livestock within the park, rather than exclude unauthorised persons, for whom a regular palisade would have been no deterrent.
During the twelfth and thirteenth years of the reign of Richard II (1388-89 and 1389-90) a series of outrages brought great unrest to Harrogate and the surrounding Royal Forest. A number of men attempted to murder the acting master forester, Robert Doufbiggyng, who had been appointed by Robert de Rokley, the King's master forester for Knaresborough Forest and all its parks and woodlands. Doufbiggyng's appointment appears to have been part of a strategy by de Rokley to end certain malpractices that had resulted from a foresters' gathering, or Parliament, known as 'Dodelowe.
In November 1388, an armed band visited Haverah Castle, probably via Harlow Hill, and besieged Doufbiggyng, who had taken refuge within. The plotters had already failed to silence their enemy the previous Palm Sunday, when they had ambushed Doufbiggyng at Fewston Church, which resulted in the victim and five other men being set upon and assaulted, the severity of which may be judged by the fact that, subsequently, some died of their wounds.
The patent rolls relate that the unofficial 'parliament' had appointed several foresters to unordained posts, and that they had been in
subversion of the law and oppression of the people, disinherison of the ... duke and loss of life of his ministers; also for destroying ... the park of Haverah and doing mischief in other parks and chases ... entering the house and destroying the goods and utensils of Robert Doufbiggyng, value forty shillings, abducting the groom of Robert de Rokley, knight, and his greyhound, and detaining them for two days; and for coming with others on ist June [1390] ... to the house of Robert Doufbiggyng.. and slaughtering sixteen oxen and cows and destroying household utensils, value eight pound’s.
These details were recorded in a pardon of 1393 issued to one of the accused, Richard Walthewe, whose co-accused, John Stubbe, obtained a similar pardon two years later, which related further outrages committed against Doufbiggyng, including the murder of his son Edmund, on the first Sunday after Michaelmas 1390. This series of outrages had probably been the result of the foresters' mounting resentment at the Master Forester's efforts to control their illicit activities, especially by his appointment of the unfortunate Doufbiggyng, on whom fell the full fury of their displeasure.
Whatever the cause, a vendetta developed which was prosecuted with a ferocity which even for those violent times was remarkable for its disregard of life and property.
Before we continue our narrative into the fifteenth century, it is necessary to refer to the folk hero figure of Robin Hood, if only because many readers
concern themselves with the history of England's royal forests only because of the pervasive charm of his story. The separation of the literary, historical and mythical figures of Robin Hood is a task that has engaged several historians, for many years. The outcome is that so far as the historical figure is concerned, the most likely period in which Robin Hood existed was that covered by the reigns of King Edward II (1307 to 1327) and King Edward III (1327 to 1377).
Medieval historians now admit Yorkshire's forests are better candidates as settings for the exploits of the historical Robin Hood than anything in Nottinghamshire, most particularly the West Riding's Forest of Barnsdale, long notorious for its dangerous passage. The antiquary Leland stated that,
'Along the left hand, about three miles betwixt Milburn and Ferrybridge, I saw the wood and famous forest of Barnsdale, where they say that Robyn Hood lyvid like an outlaw. The former royal parks and woodlands which formerly ringed and penetrated medieval Harrogate are further possible settings for the Robin Hood story, precisely because they were royal, and consequently well endowed, and also because, as historians such as Dobson, Taylor and Walker have pointed out, Plumpton Park has several connections with Robin Hood. The British Library's Department of Manuscripts contains a reference to Robin Hood hunting in Barnsdale Forest and Plumpton Park and indeed the earliest and most detailed account of Robin Hood, printed in 1495, affirms that:
When he came to Plompton Parke'. It is known that both Bilton and Haverah Parks lost deer to poachers, and that they were not unfamiliar to the brigand and robber.
Edward II certainly visited Haverah Park in May 1322 and September 1323, at the very time when he was greatly concerned about the depredations to his northern forests. It may be that some local folk legend of Robin Hood led to the name being adopted for a Harrogate inn sign, as recorded by author David Lewis:
I’ll send all my friends to the famed Robin Hood',
which later became the Wellington Inn in Cold Bath Road. Indeed, the earliest known name for Cold Bath Road was Robin Hood lane, and as late as 1902 the name of Robin Hood Field was used in a lease. All this, however, proves nothing, but merely hints at possibilities.
Malcolm Neesam.
