THE MANOR OF WOODBURY OR WESTHORPE
Woodbury manor is a roughly
rectangular estate stretching from the Roman Road on the clay soils of the Ivel
valley, up the scarp slope of the Greensand Ridge to the sandy heath lands on
top of the ridge. The manor of Canons or Tetworth lay to the north, Everton
manor to the south and Gamlingay manor to the east. The Victoria County History
for Cambridgeshire provided information on the origin of the manor of Woodbury
or Westhorpe. It originated in a grant made by King Stephen’s wife, Queen Maud,
between 1136 and 1147 to Gervase of Cornhill. It was security for a loan that
was unredeemed. (D.L. 10/22; Round, J. H. Geoffrey de Mandeville, pp.120-1)
Gervase’s son, Henry, married Alice de Courcy, and following his death by 1193,
the property descended to Joan, his granddaughter who was married to Hugh de
Neville of Essex. It remained in the
Neville family’s posession until 1358 when, before he died, John de Neville
granted the estate in to a group of ‘feoffes’, the medieval term for trustees.
It was described as worth three knight’s fees. In other words, the King
expected three knights to provide him with military service whenever he called
for their help in times of war. (C.P. 25(1)/288/46 no. 570; Essex Feet of Fines,
1327-1433, pp.126-7; Morant, Hist. Essex, ii. p.515; Sanders, I. J. Eng.
Baronies, pp.143-4; Complete Peerage, ix. pp.479-86)
The descent was then
obscure. The VCH suggests John Neville’s feoffes gave the estate to an unnamed
woman, the granddaughter of William de Bohun, the earl of Northampton (d.1360).
She married Thomas Mowbray, the Duke of Norfolk, after his first wife died and,
when he died in 1399, it remained part of his manor of Weston in Hertfordshire
until John Mowbray’s death in 1474. (C140/48/4; Morant, Hist. Essex, ii.
p.515) Woodbury manor continued to be held by the lords of Weston until at
least 1628. (C142/445/15; V.C.H. Herts. iii, p.515)
The Nevilles were absentee
landlords, renting out Woodbury manor to tenants from the nobility. By 1236 it
was occupied by Gilbert, son of Thomas, the grandson of Sir Gilbert of
Ilketshall in Suffolk. (Bk of Fees, i, p.485; Blomefield, Hist of
Norfolk, ix. pp.403-4, x. p.141) Gilbert was still holding the manor in
1248 when he was granted free warren, the right to all the rabbits on his
demesne. (Cal. Chart. R. 1226-57, 329) By 1265, his son James had
inherited the tenancy. He supported Simon de Montfort’s opposition to Henry III
taking away the barons’ privileges they had gained through the Magna Carta.
After the King’s forces were defeated at Lewes in 1264 Simon de Montfort
summoned a parliament which included not only barons but knights, clergymen and
two citizens of every borough of England. Maybe James or his father were there
as in 1265 the King’s forces defeated de Montfort’s supporters at Evesham and
Woodbury manor was briefly confiscated. (Cal. Inq. Misc. i. P.194; Rot.
Selecti. i. (Rec. Com.) 247) James got it back but, in 1279 sold the 275
acre ( 112.24 ha.) estate to Sir High Babington. (Rot. Hund. (rec.Com),
ii. pp.534-4) Hugh died in 1296, the estate passing to his son Richard who held
it in about 1302 and 1316 at half a knight’s fee. (Cal. Fine R. 1272-1307, pp.375-6; Feud. Aids, i.
pp.149,157) Following Richard’s death in 1326 it passed to his son Hugh
Babington, but, possibly as he was too young, it was occupied in 1352 by Sir
John Morice, the lord of Everton Manor. (Cal. Close, 1323-7, 449; Caius
Coll. Libr. MS. 498/267; Feud. Aids, i.169; E.D.R. (1893), p.136; V.C.H.Hunts.
ii. p.372) By 1377 it had come to John Babington, said in 1421 to have been the
son of William, the son of Hugh Babington. (Cal. Close, 1377-81,
pp.39-40; Wrottesley, Pedigrees from Pleas Rolls, p.310 The Babington
pedigree in Visit. Oxon. (Harl. Soc. V.), pp.145-7, gives John a
different ancestry.) The tenancy then passed to his son, Sir William Babington,
Chief Justice of the Common Pleas between 1423 and 1436. He died in 1454
leaving Woodbury to his second son, William. (Cal.Inq. Misc. v. p.96; E.D.R.
(1897), 117;Feud. Aids. i. 174, 188; vi. 408; Foss, Judges of Eng .iv.
pp.283-5)
The younger William’s son
and heir Sir John Babington, died without children in 1501, leaving his sister
Audrey Delves as his heir. When she died, the Babington estates which then included
the manor of Canons in Tetworth, passed to their daughter Ellen. She married
Sir Robert Sheffield, speaker of the House of Lords in 1512. (Cal. Fine R.
1485-1509, p.305; Cal. Inq. p.m. Henry VII, ii, p.573; D.N.B. s.s.
Sheffield: Sheffield was apparently dealing with land in the manor as early as
1492-3: Trans. R.H.S. N.S. viii, p.303 ) When he died in 1518,
Sheffield’s son, also Sir Robert, added to the estate by acquiring a 99-year
lease of 240 acres of Woodbury belonging to Sawtry Abbey. This is thought to be
Shakledon Manor, the land between White Wood and Gamlingay. (C 142/56/108) When
he died intestate, without leaving a will, in 1531, Woodbury passed to his
widow, Margaret, who married John Caundish. In 1534 it passed to Sir Robert’s
heir, Edmund, who died two years after being created Lord Sheffield in 1549. (Complete
Peerage) At the Dissolution of the monasteries Henry VIII granted the
Sawtry property to Richard Williams, alias Cromwell.
By 1672 the Woodbury estate
had been divided into fourteen units. The two largest were Great Farm held by
Thomas Luke for £45 and Great Dairy held by John Thornley for £100 but not all
units could be let. It included houses and closes in Gamlingay as well as a
well-stocked and timbered deer park. The park was valued at £3,300 and the
underwood at £50. (C.U.L. Doc. 1437)
For further information
see the Manor of Canons
or Tetworth
Also see Woodbury Hall