The Beauchamp family ( ... continued)

The Domesday Book supplies us with sufficient information to justify us in admitting the probability, that it was a Hugh de Bexuchamp who for his services at the time of the Conquest, received four lordships in Buckinghamshire, and forty-three, or the greatest portion of them, in Bedfordshire, and was the immediate ancestor of the Beauchamps of Bedford.

Of his own parentage I have found no note, but he was most probably descended from the Norman lords of Beauchamp of Avranches, seated between that city and Granville, and a kinsman of the Robert de Beauchamp, Viscount of Arques, in the reign of Henry I, who is first mentioned by Orderic under the year 1171, when by the King's order he seized the castle of Elias de Saint-saens, who had the guardianship of the young heir of Normandy, William Clito, with the object of arresting that prince and consigning him to captivity.

One of Hugh's son was Payne, to whom William Rufus gave the whole barony of Bedford with the castle, which was the caput or head of the barony. WhenKing Stephen, against the advice of his brother Henry, Bishop of Winchester, laid siege to Bedford Castle, the sons of Hugh de Beauchamp strongly defended it, and until the arrival of the Bishop, the King's brother, rejected all terms of submission to Stephen. Not that they resolved to deny the fealty and service they owed to him as their liege lord, but having heard that the King had given the daughter of Simon de Beauchamp to Hugh, surnamed the Poor, with her father's lordships, they feared they should lose their whole inheritance.

A different version of the siege of Bedford Castle is told by the anonymous author of the Acts of King Stephen:

"The King having held his court during Christmas with becoming splendour, despatched messengers to Milo de Beauchamp, who by royal licence had the custody of the Castle of Bedford, with orders that he should hold the castle of Hugh, and do service to him instead of the King. If he readily obeyed this command he should have honour and reward, but if he withstood it in any manner, he was to be assured that it would be his ruin. On receipt of the royal message, Milo replied that he was willing to serve the King as his true knight and to obey his commands, unless he attempted to deprive him of the possessions which belonged to him and his heirs by hereditary right; but if that was the King's intention, and he endeavoured to execute it by force, he would bear the King's displeasure as best he could; and as for the castle, he would never yield it unless he was driven to the last extremity. Finding how things stood, the King's indignation was roused against Milo, and he raised an army from all parts of England to lay siege to Bedford. Aware of his approach, Milo swept off all the provisions he could lay his hands on, making violent seizures both from the townsmen and the inhabitants of the neighbourhood, with whom before he had been on good terms, as belonging to his lordship. These supplies he stored in the castle, and securely closing the gates he for this time excluded the King's people without any loss on his own side. The King, however, after carefully reconnoitring the fortifications, placed under cover bands of archers at convenient posts, with directions to maintain such a constant discharge of arrows against those who manned the battlements and towers, as should prevent them keeping a good lookout and hold them always in a state of confusion.

"Meanwhile, he exerted all his energies to have engines constructed for filling the trenches and battering the walls. All that skill and ingenuity, labour and expense could compass was effected. Night watches were posted at all the castle gates to prevent any communication by the besieged with their friends without, or the introduction of provisions or necessaries within the fortress. By day every means were employed to distress and annoy the enemy. But the castle stood on a very high mound, surrounded by a solid and lofty wall, and it had a strong and impregnable keep, containing a numerous garrison of stout and resolute men, so that the expectation of soon taking it proved abortive, and the King having other affairs on his hands which required immediate attention, withdrew, leaving the greater part of his army to carry on the siege, with orders that in case the engines could not effect the reduction of the place, a blockade should be maintained till want and hunger compelled its surrender. After the King's departure the besieging army continued their hostilities, till the garrison, having exhausted their provisions and finding their strength failing, confessed that they could hold the place no longer, and therefore surrendered it to the King according to the laws of war."

What was the relationship of Milo de Beauchamp to Hugh and his sons Payn and Walter? Was he another son of Hugh, or one of their cousins - we don't know.

The Beauchamp Earls of Warwick

Based on a thesis by Sebastian Barfield

The Beauchamps derived their fortune from the marriage of their ancestor Walter Beauchamp to the daughter of Urse D'Abitot, the 'Conqueror's notorious sheriff of Worcester', around the year 1110. D'Abitot, along with his brother Robert, had seized a great part of his land from the church in Worcester during the years of the conquest, and Walter Beauchamp inherited half of D'Abitot's estates, including the castle of Elmley which was their principal centre of power in the period from 1110 to 1268.

From the twelfth to the fifteenth century, the Beauchamps owed much of their pre-eminence to a number of fortunate marriages, and the marriage to D'Abitot's heiress was the first of these. There is no doubt that the Beauchamp family would have continued to be only of regional historical importance were it not for the marriage between William Beauchamp of Elmley and Isabel Mauduit. The Mauduits were a 'respectable official family' in the same mould as the Beauchamps. One of Isabel's ancestors had been chamberlain of the exchequer under Henry I, and the Mauduits inherited that hereditary office from him. What made Isabel such a prized catch, however, was that her brother, William Mauduit, earl of Warwick, lacked legitimate issue, making Isabel his heiress. Mauduit had inherited the title from his mother, a member of the twelfth-century Beaumont earls of Warwick. The inheritance of the earldom can perhaps be viewed as more of a fortuitous accident than a planned marriage; Earl William was said to be between the ages of 26 and 30 in 1268, placing the marriage of William and Isabel in the late 1230s or early 1240s. At this time, the chances of the earldom passing to Isabel must have seemed remote at best: Thomas Beaumont was married to Ela, countess of Salisbury (who nearly lived on until the very end of the thirteenth century), and if their union failed to produce any issue, then it was likely that the marriage of his sister Margery to John de Plessis probably would. It was only on Margery's death in 1253 that it was clear the earldom was going to descend to the Mauduits, and even then any issue from the marriage of William Mauduit and Alice de Segrave would have prevented the earldom coming into William of Elmley's hands. In effect the earldom descended by chance and by default, for it was the failure of both the Beaumont and Mauduit lines to produce male heirs that allowed the earldom to pass into the hands of the Beauchamps in 1268, and not the result of a cunning marriage policy on the part of William of Elmley.

By January 1268, William of Elmley and Isabel Mauduit had produced at least seven children. Of the three sons, all of them were to found important branches of the family which survived into the fifteenth century. William was the eldest of the three, and not only inherited the earldom, but also most of the Beauchamp estates that had been built up in the past 150 years. However, generous endowments were given to the two younger sons, Walter and John: John began the line of the Beauchamps of Holt, who were based in the Severn valley, north of Worcester, and Walter was granted lands in south-west Warwickshire. The Beauchamps, throughout this period, were well known for their military accomplishments: William of Elmley had fought in Scotland and Wales, and all three of his sons appear to have followed in the family's martial tradition. William proved himself on the battlefields of Scotland and Wales; Walter, it would appear, had an ambition to go on a crusade. His father's will describes him as a 'crusader', and William left his son a debt of 200 marks in aid 'of his pilgrimage to the Holy Land for me and his mother'.

The fate of Isabel Mauduit, wife of William of Elmley, and mother to Walter, William, and John is much disputed. Cokayne insists that she died at some point before 1268 whilst Dugdale insists that, as the foundress of the nunnery of Cookhill, she 'betooke herself to a religious life there'. … Isabella would appear to have become a nun at least several months before the death of her husband, and not after his death as was usual. … It is possible that Isabel took her vows out of concern for the state of the Warwick earldom. Matriarchs connected to the earldom of Warwick had an unnerving ability to outlive their husbands by a considerable margin; in 1268 there were no less than three of these women, Countess Ela, Angaret, and Alice, who between them soaked up valuable demesne lands in the earl's possession. From the time of the Beauchamp accession in 1268, it was not unusual for surviving widows and unmarried daughters to enter the convent instead of being a potential drain upon the family's resources, and what is certain is that the Beauchamps could not afford a fourth dowager. In the context of this situation, Isabel's entering the convent of Cookhill does seem to be a very likely possibility.

Of the first three Beauchamp earls of Warwick, Earl William is the most shadowy figure. Clearly a great and important figure in his day, no chroniclers have left us any personal picture of the man. William was a soldier of considerable importance; he was frequently summoned against the Welsh between 1277 and 1294, and from 1296 to his death in 1298 was involved in the Scottish wars. He was a vigorous and innovative military commander, and it is in this role that he is best remembered by historians and chroniclers; his tactics at the battle of Maes Moydog over the Welsh forces commanded by Madog ap Llywelyn have been credited as anticipating the successful use of crossbow men at Falkirk. He was also present at the siege of Droselan, and with John, earl of Surrey, helped recover the castle of Dunbar. Apart from his military exploits, William appears to have had a tendency toward hot-headedness; particularly demonstrated by his exhumation of his father's corpse in the middle of the church of the Friars Minor in Worcestershire, because he had given credence to the rumour that someone else had been buried in his stead. After his brothers, who were present and identified their father 'by certain markings', the earl was excommunicated for his sacrilegious actions. Despite this episode, and the lifelong enmity between him and Bishop Giffard, William appears to have been a conventionally religious man; he added 'crosse-crosslets' to his coat of arms, which Dugdale interprets as possibly implying a 'testimony of....pilgrimage by him made into the holy land, or a vow to do so'. By the end of his life the earl had resolved any quarrel with the Minorites, and, under the influence of Brother John de Olney, bequeathed his body to their church.

It was also William who began to cultivate the association of the Beauchamp earls with the legendary tale of 'Gui de Warwic'. The tale of Guy de Warwick is an Anglo-Norman romance, which has been dated from between 1232 and 1242, and is thought to have been written to flatter Thomas Beaumont, the contemporary earl of Warwick. William's appropriation of the name 'Guy' for his eldest surviving son was undoubtedly influenced by the mythical figure of Guy of Warwick. Previously the most common male family names were either William or Walter, with James and John also being used occasionally for younger sons. The Beauchamp family grew increasingly attached to the legend of Guy of Warwick as our period progressed: not only was Guy used as a name for the firstborn son of Earls William and Thomas (I), but Thomas (I) named one of his younger sons 'Reinbrun' after the son of the mythical Guy. 'Un volum del Romaunce du Guy' is listed in the collection of books which Earl Guy gave to Bordesley Abbey in 1305, and he was reputedly buried there with the relics of his legendary namesake. By the time of Thomas I's death in 1369, the egend of Guy of Warwick was so interwoven into the Beauchamps' psyche that he bequeathed his son 'the coat of mail sometime belonging to that famous Guy of Warwick' as the most highly treasured of his possessions; in his will, this mythical relic took precedence over other caskets of gold, and ornate crosses containing pieces of Christ's cross.

William had married Maud, the daughter of Sir John Fitz-Geoffrey whose lands were concentrated in Surrey and Essex, and was the widow of Sir Gerard de Furnivalle. Furnivalle died in 1261, and it would appear likely that she had married Earl William by the time of his accession as earl; their son Guy is described as '30 or more' in 1301, placing his birth in 1271, and there is no reason at all to suppose that he was among the first born of William and Maud's seven children. In fact it would make sense for Maud to have married William soon after the death of her first husband, well before the succession to the Warwick inheritance had been determined. McFarlane refers to the Fitz-Geoffrey as a 'very minor baronial house', and it would seem likely that this marriage was at least arranged before the succession of the earldom of Warwick had been properly secured. The notion, sometimes put forward, that William married Maud for financial gain can also be dismissed. Maud is frequently referred to as an heiress; indeed she was one of four co-heiresses to the Fitz-Geoffrey estates after her brother died without issue in 1297. However it is most unlikely that this chance windfall had been a factor in the arrangement of their marriage thirty years previously.

Whatever the circumstances of the marriage, Earl William was clearly fond of his wife. Judging by his will, William does seem to have possessed a sentimental side; he requests that if he should die oversees, his heart be removed from his body and buried wherever his wife ('his dear consort') should choose to have herself interred, and their surviving son Guy was present when she was buried next to her husband. She certainly seems to have suffered from a disabling infirmity toward the end of her life, which made travel impossible, but this does not appear to have been a hindrance earlier on, for they had seven children that we are aware of. Of the three sons, Guy was the only one to outlive his father; Robert died in infancy and Dugdale maintains that John 'died in the life of his father', although it does not seem likely that he survived long into his childhood. By the time of the earl's death, two of his daughters were nuns at Shouldham in Norfolk, a remote monastery with close links to the FitzGeoffrey family, taking up a cloistered existence like so many women in the Beauchamp family. After Guy, their sister Isabel was the most fortunate of that generation. She firstly married into the Gloucestershire family of Chaworth; Sir Pain de Chaworth had fought with Prince Edward in his crusade and his heir Patrick, whom Isabel married, was a man of reasonable importance, possessing land or property in Berkshire, Wiltshire, Wales and Southampton. This marriage yielded one child, Maud, who went on to marry the king's nephew, Henry of Lancaster. Dugdale reports that, following Chaworth's death in 1286-7, Isabel had four manors in Wiltshire, and two in Berkshire, assigned to her 'until her dowry should be set forth' along with the livery of Chedworth in Gloucestershire, and the Hampshire manor of Hartley Mauditt, which had been granted to her and her husband in frankmarriage by her father. Shortly afterwards, she married the elder Despenser, without the king's licence, for which Hugh Despenser was fined 2,000 marks.

The figure of Guy Beauchamp, the second Beauchamp earl, is a much clearer than that of his father, largely due to his outspoken political criticism of the failings of Edward II, which attracted much attention from contemporary chroniclers. He possessed an education 'seldom found in the higher nobility of his age'. Guy's extensive library is well known, and we have a catalogue of what would appear to have been 'one of the most interesting book collections of the fourteenth century'. The majority of the works in the list are 'romaunces', meaning they were written either in French or Anglo-Norman, and concern such diverse topics as the lives of Titus and Vespasian, physiology and surgery, biblical tales, legends of the holy grail, lives of the saints, and historical stories concerning figures such as Charlemagne and Alexander. This was not lost on his contemporaries: the author of the Vita Edwardi Secundi claims that 'in wisdom and council he had no peer', and that 'other earls did many things only after taking his opinion'; the author of the Lanercost chronicle credits him with 'equal wisdom and integrity', whilst the Annales Londonienses describes Beauchamp as 'homo discretus et bene literatus per quem totum regnum Angliae sapienta praefulgebat'. A streak of simple piety, in an age unrenowned for its modesty, is evident in Guy's will, in which he requests that he be buried in Bordesley Abbey in a simple ceremony 'without any great pomp', especially when we compare it with the preparations made for the funeral of his grandson, William Beauchamp, Lord Bergavenny, who requested that five tapers be hung about his body from the moment of death, and that twenty-four poor men be cloaked in black, and each carrying torches, before 10,000 masses are said 'by the most honest priest that can be found'.

What makes Earl Guy interesting is the contradictory nature of his character, perhaps best summed up by Tout when he compared the earl to the 'cultivated aristocratic ruffians' found in the later renaissance. This apparently 'discreet' and 'well-read' man was also a highly skilled soldier and ruthless politician; he served frequently in the Scottish wars under Edward I, and was present at Falkirk, the siege of Carlaverock and the siege of Stirling Castle. He clearly cut a very impressive figure on the battlefield, and the author of the Siege of Carlaverock claims that:

'De Warwik le Count Guy
Coment ken ma rime de guy
Ne avoit voisin de lui mellour
Baniere ot de rouge coulour
O feasse de or et croissilie'

in a clear reference to the Beauchamp coat of arms. His single-mindedness can be seen in his activities during the reign of Edward II, when, despite Lancaster's de jure leadership of the baronial opposition, Earl Guy seems to have been the most active opponent of Edward and Gaveston. The Vita Edwardi Secundi sees Earl Guy as the 'brains behind the Ordinances', when it claims that it was 'by his advice and skill the Ordinances were framed'. Earl Guy also merits the distinction of being the only earl to have opposed Gaveston's influence at court consistently from Edward's coronation until Gaveston's death in 1312, which was largely engineered by the earl himself. His nick-name of 'the black dog of Arden', reputedly coined by Gaveston, probably refers to more than his swarthy complexion. Indeed the Chronicle of Lanercost claims that 'when this was reported to the earl, he is said to have replied with calmness: "If he call me a dog, be sure that I will bite him so soon as I shall perceive my opportunity"'.

Guy, it would appear, married twice. He first married Isabella de Clare, daughter of the earl of Gloucester, at some point prior to May 1297. The two were related in the 'third degree of consanguinity', and so had to obtain a papal dispensation which was granted to them on 11 May 1297, stating that the marriage had, on an unspecified date, already taken place. How long the marriage survived is not known, but divorce proceedings were in motion by June 1302, and the marriage had probably been dead for some time before that. Perhaps the reason for the failure of the marriage was Isabel's age; she was at least ten years the senior, and in 1302 she would have been in her early forties, making the chances of her producing an heir most unlikely, and the marriage, for however long it survived, does not seem to have produced any children. In 1306, apparently concerned that his lands would be split up if he died without issue, Guy entailed his entire estates to his nephew, Philip Despenser. The earl remarried in 1310, to Alice de Tony, sister and heiress of Ralph de Tony, and therefore the heiress of the Tony inheritance. The value of the Tony inheritance is much disputed, for Alice already had issue by Thomas de Leyburn, her first husband, and McFarlane maintains the earl 'merely enjoyed her inheritance from their marriage in 1310 until his death five years later'. However, this is patently untrue as a glance at the Inquisitions Post Mortem of Earls Guy and Thomas will demonstrate. The manors of Walthamstow in Essex, Abberley in Worcestershire, Flamstead in Hertfordshire, Stratford Tony and Newton Tony in Wiltshire, Kirtling in Cambridgeshire, and the lordship of Painscastle in the Welsh Marches, were all to become valuable and important parts of the Beauchamp inheritance, although, as Sinclair rightly points out, the presence of a surviving Tony dowager meant that the earldom had only two-thirds of the inheritance until she died in 1340.

The marriage seems to have been successful in more than just the property which it brought into the family; during the time of their marriage, Alice was constantly pregnant, supplying Earl Guy with at least six children in the space of five years, all of whom survived infancy and subsequently married. After Guy's death, Alice went on to marry William Zouche of Ashby, with whom she had more children, and was married to him until her death in 1324.

When Earl Guy died in 1315, which contemporary rumours claimed was from poison administered on the orders of Edward II, Alice was bequeathed a portion of his plate, a crystal cup, and half of his bedding, plus 'all the vestments and books pertaining to his chapel', while Thomas, his eldest son, was left a coat of mail, helmet and suit of harness, and John, the younger son, received his second coat of mail. His daughter Maud received a crystal cup, and Elizabeth, another daughter, received the marriage of the Astley heir. However, there was a very serious problem. Thomas, the eldest son, was between one and two years old at the death of his father, meaning that, as was the practice in these circumstances, the estates of the earldom would be taken into the possession of the crown. The abuse of lands taken into the hands of the crown was common at this period, and a lengthy period of minority could have produced long term repercussions for the inheritance, with lands being exploited and neglected by those charged with their maintenance. The dying earl was certainly aware of the dangers which a prolonged minority could bring, and was successful in wringing a very valuable concession from Edward II, that, on the event of the earl's death, the executors of his will should have full custody of his lands 'until the full age of his heirs'. It was fully in keeping with Edward II's character, that the crown's assurance was soon disregarded, and the Warwick lands were taken into the crown's hands within two years of Guy's death, and remained out of the control of the executors until Thomas came of age.

Possession of the Warwick estates from this point, until 1329, was determined by the whims of royal patronage. The Despensers were the prime beneficiaries in Edward II's reign, with the elder Despenser gaining wardship of all Guy's lands except for a few which had already been granted, for which he agreed to pay 1,000 marks a year, an arrangement soon commuted in Despenser's favour, allowing Despenser the custody of the Warwick estates in consideration of £6,770 which the king owed him. The issue of custody of the Warwick lands was brought up in 1321 in the articles against the Despensers. The agreement that the Warwick earldoms should be handled by Guy's executors is said to have been repealed 'without reason' except to deliver to the elder Despenser 'the wardship of those lands for his own profit, so defeating by [the Despensers'] evil counsel what the king had granted in his parliaments by good counsel with the assent of the peers of the land'. The only long term effect which the events of 1321-22 had on the Warwick lands was to remove Elmley Castle from the hands of the elder Despenser and take it back into the hands of the crown, with the rest of the estates remaining in the Despensers' possession until Isabella and Mortimer's invasion in 1327. Afterwards, the lands passed to Roger Mortimer, who was able to capitalise on his predominance at the royal court by taking custody of Thomas' wardship.

It was at this time that the marriage of Thomas to Katherine Mortimer seems to have finally taken place. The marriage itself was worth 1,600 marks, and had originally been granted to Roger Mortimer as far back as 20 July 1318. There were problems with this arrangement, for the king had arranged a dispensation from the pope, granted 19 April 1319, on account of the two being related 'in the third and fourth degrees of consanguinity'. The purpose of the union was to put an end to the 'great discord' that existed between Earl Guy and Mortimer over the manor of Elvel, in the marches of Wales, although it should be noted that the Mortimers gained more from the arrangement than the Beauchamps, for Katherine did not bring with her any marriage portion. This arrangement seems to have been permanently shelved by Edward, following the troubles of 1321-22, which resulted in Mortimer's dramatic fall from royal favour and imprisonment, and arrangements were made for Thomas to marry one of the daughters of the earl of Arundel, either in 1324 or 1325. Arundel was executed along with the Despensers in the reprisals which followed Isabella and Mortimer's invasion, and with Mortimer back in royal favour, the original plans for the marriage between Katherine and Thomas were back in place, and they were almost certainly married between 1328 and 1330.

Thomas, like his father and grandfather, served in Scotland frequently during the 1330s, being captain of the army against the Scots in 1337, but is most remembered for his service in France, which constantly preoccupied him from 1339 up until his death in Calais thirty years later. Most notably, he was at the battle of Crecy in 1346, where he was one of the two marshals of the army, and held joint command of the Prince of Wales' division. The Complete Peerage provides an effective summary of the earl's exploits, which are far too extensive and of too little relevance to merit inclusion here. His loyalty to the king's cause was certainly very lucrative and he frequently enjoyed one-off payments of cash after major excursions. In 1347 he enjoyed a £1,366 11s 8d 'gift from the king'. Eventually, in 1348, Earl Thomas was retained for life by Edward III, at a cost of 1,000 marks per annum, ostensibly 'for his fee for his stay with the king with 100 men-at-arms', but also undoubtedly for his loyal and faithful service. In addition to these monetary rewards, Thomas enjoyed royal patronage with grants of offices and decoration. Alongside his brother John, he was one of the founder Knights of the Garter, and served as Marshal of England from 1343/4 until his death, a post that was held at the discretion of the king. In addition to these gifts, we have to add the spoils of war, which appear to have been considerable. In the aftermath of the battle of Poitiers, for instance, we know that Thomas captured the archbishop of Sens who eventually paid £8,000 for his freedom, whilst he also won three-quarters of the ransom of the Bishop of Le Mans, which netted the earl a further £3,000.

Given that his family's crusading tradition was amongst 'the longest and the most consistent' of all the higher nobility, it is hardly surprising that the most martial of our three earls should have chosen to further enhance his family's crusading credentials. In 1365, Thomas took advantage of the lull in hostilities between England and France by embarking on a three year expedition to join the crusades of the Teutonic knights in Lithuania, bringing with him an army of no less than '300 horse for his attendants and train; which consisted of knights, esquires, archers, friends and servants', supposedly returning with a son of the Lithuanian king, who was christened in London with the name Thomas, with the earl acting as godfather. By the time of his death in 1369, Beauchamp had undoubtedly earned a reputation as the most feared soldier in the English army, and it was in this year that he oversaw the devastation of Caux whilst serving as a member of John of Gaunt's expedition. Beauchamp was clearly seen by chroniclers and opponents alike as the most formidable of Edward II's commanders: 'a man who possessed a military élan of a kind which can never be attributed to John of Gaunt' who, on arriving at Tourneham, on the French coast, to find a stand-off between the English and French armies, mocked Lancaster and Hereford by asking how long they intended on doing nothing, and boasted 'that if the French remained as they were for two days, he would have them dead or alive'. Walsingham goes further in his account, claiming that the French were so terrified by reports of the arrival of the earl of Warwick, that they fled even before he had time to disembark.

Earl Thomas died of plague whilst on this expedition, in November 1369. In his will, dated two months previously, he requested that he be buried in the collegiate church of Warwick, the first Beauchamp earl to request this, and bequeathed that his executors build a new choir in the same church which in Dugdale's time still boasted pictures of Thomas' daughters 'curiously drawn and set up in the windows'. He requested that every church in each of his manors be given 'his best beast to be found there, in satisfaction of tithes forgotten and not paid', a distinct sign that he did not trust his own officers, the reeves or bailiffs, who should have paid the tithes. A further demand that his executors 'should make full satisfaction to every man, whom he had in any sort wronged' shows that he might well have turned a blind eye to the abuse of power by those who acted in his name. He also asked that his executors cause masses to be sung for his soul and distribute alms for its health, 'especially at Bordesley, Worcester and Warwick'. The list of Beauchamp's goods which he bequeathed gives some idea of the opulence which he enjoyed: amongst them 'twenty-four dishes and as many more saucers of silver', golden rings, ornate crosses and religious relics were all to be distributed. The bequests also give an idea of the supreme social circle in which he existed: his son William inherited a casket of gold with a relic of St George which Thomas of Lancaster had given him at his christening; John Buckingham, bishop of Lincoln, gained a cross of gold, which the Lady Segrave had given him, and reputedly had 'sometime been the good King Edward's; and his daughter Philippa de Stafford received "an ouche called the eagle" which had been given him by Edward the Black Prince alongside "a set of beads of gold, with buckles" which the queen had given him'.