Part 52

To him, Mr. Hodgson is of opinion, is to be ascribed the first foundation of the manor. The descendant of Dolfin, Robert Fitz-Maldred, lineal heir to Ughtred, Earl of Northumberland, was described as “Dominus de Raby,” when, early in the thirteenth century, he married Isabel de Nevil (daughter to Geoffrey de Nevil, the grandson of Gilbert de Nevil, who came over with the Conqueror, by the daughter and sole heiress of Bertram de Bulmer), who, by the death of her brother, the last male of his line, became sole heiress and representative of the great Saxon house of Bulmer, Lords of Brancepath and Sheriff-Hutton. Their son Geoffrey assumed his mother’s surname of Nevil, and thus laid afresh the foundation of the great house of that name. He had issue two sons—Robert, who succeeded him, and Geoffrey, who became Constable of Scarborough Castle and Justice Itinerant, and from whom the Nevils of Hornby, afterwards merged in the Beauforts, descended. Robert de Nevil, who was Governor of Norham, Werke, York, Devizes, and Bamborough Castles, Warden of all the King’s forests north of the Trent, Justice Itinerant, General of all forces beyond the Trent, and Sheriff of Yorkshire, joined the rebellious barons, but was afterwards restored to favour. His son Robert, called the “Peacock of the North,” dying without issue during his lifetime, this elder Robert was succeeded by Ralph de Nevil, who took a prominent part in the troublous internal wars of his time. He in turn was succeeded by his son, John de Nevil, Baron of Raby, who was Admiral of the King’s fleet from the Thames northward, Warden of the East Marches, Lieutenant of the Duchy of Aquitaine, and Seneschal of Bordeaux. He died 12th Richard II., and was succeeded by his eldest son, Ralph, his second son being Thomas, Lord Furnival. This John, Lord Nevil, was the builder of the present castle of Raby.

Ralph, Lord Nevil of Raby, held many important offices, and founded the collegiate church of Staindrop. By his first wife, Margaret, daughter of Hugh, Earl of Stafford, he had issue two sons—John, who died during his father’s lifetime, and Ralph, “who married the daughter and heir of Ferrers of Oversley, by whom he had John Nevil, called Lord Ferrers, whose daughter Joan (heir to the baronies of Oversley and Newmarch), being married to Sir William Gascoigne, brought forth Margaret Gascoigne, their daughter and heir, wife to Wentworth; whence the Barons Raby of that surname do descend”—and seven daughters: Maud, married to Baron de Mauley; Alice, to Sir Thomas Grey; Philippa, to Baron Dacres of Gillesland; Margaret, to Baron Scrope; Anne, to Sir Gilbert de Umfraville; Margery and Elizabeth, nuns. His second wife was Joan, daughter of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, “by whom he had issue eight sons—Richard, Earl of Salisbury; William, Baron Falconberg; George, Baron Latimer; Edward, Baron Bergavenny; Robert, Bishop of Durham; Cuthbert, Henry, and Thomas, which three last died issueless. Also five daughters—Catherine, married first to John Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk, secondly to Thomas Strangways, Esq., thirdly to John, Viscount Beaumont, and lastly to Sir John Widville, Knight; Eleanor, or Elizabeth, to Richard, Baron Spencer, secondly to Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland; Anne, to Humphrey, Duke of Bucks, and afterwards to Walter Blunt, Baron Mountjoy; Jane, a nun; and Ciceley, to Richard Plantagenet, Duke of York.” He was created Earl of Westmoreland, being “the first who was made earl of this county;” and at his death, in the 4th of Henry VI., he was succeeded by his grandson, Ralph Nevil, as second Earl of Westmoreland and Baron Nevil of Raby, who in turn was succeeded by his cousin, Ralph Nevil, son to Sir John Nevil, as third Earl of Westmoreland. He married Margaret, daughter of Sir Roger Booth, by whom he had issue, with others, one son, who died in his father’s lifetime, leaving a son, Ralph, who in turn succeeded his grandfather.

Ralph, fourth Earl of Westmoreland and Baron Nevil of Raby, married Catherine, daughter of Edward Stafford, Duke of Buckinghamshire, by whom he had issue seven sons and five daughters, and was, at his death, succeeded by his eldest son, Henry Nevil, as fifth earl. This earl married Anne, daughter to Thomas Manners, Earl of Rutland, by whom, amongst others, he had issue a son, Charles, who succeeded him as fifth Earl of Westmoreland and Baron Nevil of Raby.

This nobleman, Charles, fifth Earl of Westmoreland, having taken an active part in the rebellion against Queen Elizabeth, known as the “Rising in the North,” was defeated, and all his possessions confiscated to the Crown. He left only female issue.

Raby, having passed into the hands of the Crown, was afterwards sold to the Vanes, to which family we now draw attention.

It will thus be seen that Raby Castle holds a very high rank among the ancient castles of England, and is one of the few of its old glories that continue to be the habitation of its lords.

The family of Vane, of which the Duke of Cleveland, the owner of Raby Castle, is the head, is of very high antiquity, and, unlike many of our noted families, has been continued in unbroken succession from at least the time of the Norman Conquest down to the present hour. The first of whom we have any authentic record—although doubtless the family might be traced much further back still—is Howell ap Vane, who was living in Monmouthshire antecedently to the Conquest. His son, Griffith ap Howell Vane, married Lettyce, daughter of Bledwyn ap Kynvyn, Lord of Powys, who was founder of three noble tribes of Wales, and by usurpation sovereign of North and South Wales. Their son was Enyon, or Ivon, “the Fair,” who married a daughter of Owen ap Edwyn Meredith. Passing on through the next three generations, we come to Sir Henry Vane, knighted at the battle of Poitiers, in 1356, where he claimed to have assisted in taking prisoner John, King of France, who, in token of his captivity, took off his dexter gauntlet and gave it to Vane: from that moment he adopted it as his cognisance, and it has been continued both as a crest and as a charge on the shield of arms.

He married Grace, daughter of Sir Stephen de la Leke, and was succeeded by his son, John Vane, whose great-grandson, Henry Vane (his elder brother having died without issue), married Isabella, daughter of Henry Persall, or Peshall, by whom he had a family of eight sons and two daughters, and, in default of issue of the eldest two, was succeeded by his third son, John Vane (whose younger brother, Sir Ralph Vane, married Elizabeth, known as “the good Lady Vane,” and was knighted at the siege of Bulleyn, in 1544; he afterwards purchased Penshurst, was attainted 4th Edward VI., executed on Tower Hill, and his estates forfeited). John Vane, who was of Hilden, in Kent, assumed the name of Fane in lieu of Vane, and married Isabella, daughter of John Darknoll, or Darrell, and was succeeded by their second son, Richard Fane, of Tudeley, at whose death, in 1540, he was succeeded by his only son, George Fane, of Badsall, who married Joan, daughter of William Waller, of Groombridge, from whom the present Earl of Westmoreland is descended. The fourth son of John Vane, or Fane, of Hilden, was John Fane, who was in possession of Hadlow when his uncle, Sir Ralph, was executed. He married Joan, daughter and co-heiress of Sir Edward Hawte, of Tonbridge, by whom, with others, he had a son, his successor, Henry Fane, of Hadlow, who took part in Wyatt’s insurrection, was committed to the Tower, but afterwards pardoned and released.

His grandson, Sir Henry Fane, resumed the ancient patronymic of his family, Vane, in lieu of Fane, and this has continued to the present time. This Henry Fane, or Vane, was knighted in 1611, and was constituted one of the regents of the kingdom for the safe keeping of the Queen, Prince Charles, and the rest of the royal children. In 1616, on the disgrace of Robert Carr of Fernyhurst, Earl of Somerset, Sir Henry Vane received a lease from the trustees for support of the household of Charles, Prince of Wales, for the remainder of the term granted to Carr. He was principal Secretary of State to James I., and Cofferer of the Household to Charles I. In 1626 he purchased the castle and manor of Raby, and in 1632 was sent as ambassador to Sweden to expostulate with Gustavus Adolphus in favour of the Elector Palatine. In the following year he nobly entertained the King at Raby, on his journey to and from Scotland, on the occasion of his coronation. He married Frances, daughter of Thomas Darcy, of Tolleshunt Darcy, and died at Raby Castle in 1654. By this union he had seven sons—viz. Thomas and John, who died in infancy; Sir Henry Vane, who succeeded him; and Sir George Vane, from whom the Marquis of Londonderry, who sits as Earl Vane, is descended; Sir Walter Vane, Charles Vane, and William Vane—and eight daughters, among whom were Margaret, married to Sir Thomas Pelham, from whom are descended the Duke of Newcastle and the Earl of Chichester; and Frances, wife of Sir Robert Honeywood.

Sir Henry Vane (third son), who succeeded his father in the estates of Raby, Fairlawn, Shipborne, &c., in 1654, had a very chequered, but historical life. He was educated at Westminster and Oxford, proceeded to Geneva, and afterwards to America, where he was elected Governor of Massachusetts. He was also M.P. for Hull and other places, and was knighted in 1640. He is characterized as “one of the most turbulent enthusiasts produced by the rebellion, and an inflexible Republican,” by some, but by Milton as

“Vane, young in years, but in sage counsel old.”

In 1659 he was, in Pepys’s own words, “this day voted out of the House, and to sit no more there; and that he would retire himself to his house at Raby.” And again, a month later, “This day, by an order of the House, Sir H. Vane was sent out of town to his house in Lincolnshire.” In 1661 he, with Lambert and others, was sent prisoner to Scilly. He had in former years been joined with Sir William Russell in the office of Treasurer of the Navy, which yielded an annual income of £30,000; but although, as survivor of Russell, the whole of this was his by patent for life, he voluntarily and disinterestedly gave it up to Parliament, reserving only a salary of £2,000 a year for an agent. A series of charges having been drawn up against Vane—principally arising out of his just indignation at the title of Raby having been bestowed upon the Earl of Strafford—he was, on the 6th of June, 1662, found guilty of high treason, and, on the 14th of the same month, beheaded on Tower Hill. Of this execution it is needless to give any particulars beyond those written, the same day, by Pepys. He says, “Up by four o’clock in the morning and upon business at my office. Then we sat down to business, and about eleven o’clock, having a room got ready for us, we all went out to the Tower Hill; and there over against the scaffold, made on purpose this day, saw Sir Henry Vane brought. A very great press of people. He made a long speech, many times interrupted by the sheriffe and others there; and they would have taken his paper out of his hand, but he would not let it go. But they caused all the books of those that writ after him to be given the sheriffe; and the trumpets were brought under the scaffold that he might not be heard. Then he prayed and so fitted himself, and received the blow; but the scaffold was so crowded that we could not see it done. But Boreman, who had been upon the scaffold, came to us and told us, that first he began to speak of the irregular proceeding against him; that he was, against Magna Charta, denied to have his exceptions against the indictment allowed: and that there he was stopped by the sheriffe. Then he drew out his paper of notes, and began to tell them first his life; that he was born a gentleman, that he was bred up and had the quality of a gentleman, and to make him in the opinion of the world more a gentleman, he had been till he was seventeen years old a good fellow, but then it pleased God to lay a foundation of grace in his heart by which he was persuaded, against his worldly interest, to leave all preferment and go abroad, where he might serve God with more freedom. Then he was called home and made a member of the Long Parliament, where he never did to this day anything against his conscience, but all for the glory of God. Here he would have given them an account of the proceedings of the Long Parliament, but they so often interrupted him that at last he was forced to give over, and so fell into prayer for England in generall, then for the churches of England, and then for the City of London: and so fitted himself for the block, and received the blow. He had a blister, or issue, upon his neck, which he desired them not hurt: he changed not his colour or speech to the last, but died justifying himself and the cause he had stood for; and spake very confidently of his being presently at the right hand of Christ; and in all things appeared the most resolved man that ever died in that manner, and showed more of heate than cowardice, but yet with all humility and gravity. One asked him why he did not pray for the King? He answered, ‘Nay,’ says he, ‘you shall see I can pray for the King: I pray God bless him!’ The King had given his body to his friends, and, therefore, he told them that he hoped they would be civil to his body when dead; and desired they would let him die like a gentleman and a Christian, and not crowded and pressed as he was.”

This unfortunate, but gifted member of the family of Vane had married, in 1639, Frances, daughter of Sir Christopher Wray, Bart., of Ashby and Glentworth, in Lincolnshire, by whom he had issue seven sons, five of whom died young. The fifth son was Sir Christopher Vane, who was knighted in 1688, made a Privy Councillor, and in July, 1699, created Baron Barnard of Barnard Castle, county of Durham. He married Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Gilbert Holles, third Earl of Clare, and sister of John Holles, Duke of Newcastle. By her Baron Barnard had issue, with others, a son—Gilbert Vane, who succeeded him; and another son—William Vane, who was created Viscount Vane and Baron Duncannon. This Viscount Vane married Lucy, daughter of William Jolliffe, Esq., of Caverswall, in Staffordshire, and was father, by her, of William Holles Vane, second Viscount, whose wife (Frances, daughter of Francis Hawes, of Purley Hall, and widow of Lord William Hamilton) was the notorious Lady Vane, whose intrigues and disreputable course of life form the subject of the “Memoirs of a Lady of Quality” in “Peregrine Pickle,” which were “written by herself, which she coolly told her lord to read.”

Gilbert Vane, second Baron Barnard, who succeeded his father, the first baron, in 1723, and died in 1753, married Mary, daughter and heiress of Morgan Randyll, of Chilworth, by whom he had six sons and three daughters. His eldest son and successor was Henry, third Baron Barnard, a Lord of the Treasury, who, in 1754, was advanced to the dignity of Viscount Barnard and Earl of Darlington. This nobleman, of whom Lord Orford wrote, “He never said a false thing nor did a bad one,” married, in 1725, the Lady Grace, daughter of Charles Fitzroy, first Duke of Cleveland, by whom he had issue three sons and three daughters. The eldest son was Lord Henry Vane, who succeeded his father as second Earl of Darlington and fourth Baron Barnard; he married Margaret, sister of the first Earl of Lonsdale; and, dying in 1792, was succeeded by their eldest son, William Henry, as fifth baron and third earl.

This nobleman, who held many important appointments, was born in 1766; in 1827 he was advanced to the dignity of Marquis of Cleveland; and in 1833 was again advanced to the title of Duke of Cleveland, and had the barony of Raby conferred upon him. He was married twice: first, in 1787, to the Lady Katharine Margaretta Powlett, daughter and co-heiress of the sixth and last Duke of Bolton, and a co-heiress of the barony of St. John of Basing; and secondly, in 1813, to Elizabeth Russell, of Newton House, Yorkshire. By his first marriage the Duke had issue three sons (who have each in succession become Dukes of Cleveland) and five daughters—one of whom, Lady Louisa Catherine Barbara, married a brother of the first Lord Forester, and another, the Lady Arabella, married the third Lord Alvanley. The Duke was succeeded at his death, in 1842, by his eldest son—

Henry Vane, second duke and marquis, third earl and viscount, and sixth baron, who was born in 1788, and died, without issue, in 1864, having married, in 1809, Lady Sophia, daughter of the fourth Earl Powlett. He was succeeded by his brother, William John Frederick Vane, as third duke and marquis, fourth earl and viscount, and seventh baron, who assumed the surname of Powlett in lieu of that of Vane, but in 1864 resumed his original patronymic of Vane. His grace married, in 1815, Caroline, fourth daughter of the first Earl of Lonsdale, but died without issue in 1864, when he was in turn succeeded in his titles and estates by his brother, the present Duke of Cleveland.

The present noble head of this grand old family, whose genealogy we have thus briefly traced, is Harry George Powlett (late Vane), Duke of Cleveland, Marquis of Cleveland, Earl of Darlington, Viscount Barnard of Barnard Castle, Baron Barnard, and Baron Raby, a Knight of the Garter, &c. His grace is, as has been shown, a son of the first Duke of Cleveland, and brother of the second and third dukes. He was born in 1803, and succeeded to the titles and estates in 1864, when, by royal license, he assumed the surname and arms of Powlett in lieu of those of Vane. His grace, who was educated at Eton and at Oriel College, Oxford, was attached to the embassy at Paris in 1829, and was appointed Secretary of Legation at Stockholm in 1839. In 1854 he married Lady Catherine Lucy Wilhelmina Stanhope, daughter of the late Earl Stanhope (President of the Society of Antiquaries), and widow of Lord Dalmeny, son of the Earl of Rosebery, by whom, however, he has no issue, so that at his decease—his brothers, the second and third dukes, having also died without issue—the titles, with the exception of that of Baron Barnard, will become extinct. The heir to the barony of Barnard is Morgan Vane, Esq. (only son of the late Rev. Robert Morgan Vane), great-grandson of the Hon. Morgan Vane, brother of Henry, third Baron Barnard, who, as we have shown, was created Viscount Barnard and Earl of Darlington. This Robert Morgan Vane married, as his first wife, Margaretta, daughter of Robert Knight, and ultimately heiress to Robert, Earl of Catherlough, from which marriage the present heir-presumptive is descended.

The arms of Vane are (as already explained, from the circumstance of one of the family taking the French king prisoner at the battle of Poitiers)—_azure_, three dexter gauntlets, _or_. These were borne by the Duke of Cleveland quarterly with those of Fitzroy, being the royal arms of King Charles II., viz.—one and four France and England quarterly, two Ireland, three Scotland; the whole debruised by a baton sinister, componé of six pieces, _ermine_ and _azure_, the supporters being dexter, a lion guardant, _or_, ducally crowned with a ducal coronet, _azure_, gorged with a collar counter-componé, _ermine_ and _azure_; sinister, a greyhound, _argent_, gorged with a collar, counter-componé, _ermine_ and _azure_, being the supporters of Fitzroy, Duke of Cleveland, granted to Vane on being advanced to the marquisate in 1827. Crests: Vane—a dexter arm in a gauntlet grasping a dagger; Fitzroy—on a chapeau, _gules_, turned up, _ermine_, a lion passant guardant, _or_, crowned with a ducal coronet, _argent_, and gorged with a collar, counter-componé, _ermine_ and _azure_. Motto—“Nec temere, nec timide.” On the assumption of the name and arms of Powlett, the arms, as now borne by the Duke of Cleveland, are—_sable_, three swords in pile, points downwards, _proper_, pomels and hilts, _or_. Crest, on a wreath, a falcon rising, _or_, belled of the last, and ducally crowned, _gules_. Supporters and motto as before. The arms of the Earl of Catherlough, which the heir-presumptive is entitled to quarter with his own of Vane, are—_argent_, three bendlets, _gules_; on a canton, _azure_, a spur with the rowel downwards, strapped, _or_. Crest, on a wreath, _argent_ and _gules_, a spur, _or_, between two wings erect, _gules_. Motto—“Te digna sequere.”

The Duke of Cleveland is patron of twenty-four livings, thirteen of which are in Shropshire, one in Northamptonshire, two in Durham, two in Somersetshire, one in Yorkshire, two in Devonshire, two in Dorset, and one in Cornwall. His principal seats are Raby Castle, Durham, and Battle Abbey, Sussex.

The present castle of Raby, it would appear, was built by John, Lord Nevil, who died in 1388. In 1379 he had license from Thomas Hatfield, Bishop of Durham, to crenellate. Whether the old castle was mainly pulled down and rebuilt by John Nevil, or whether he simply added to it fresh towers and fortifications, is a matter we have not space, nor is it necessary to our purpose, to inquire into. That it could not all have been taken down is, however, pretty evident, as the lozenge-shaped tower in the centre is said to have been built by Bertram de Bulmer, or Bolemes, in 1162. The Nevils, who were at the same time Lords of Raby, Brancepath, Sheriff-Hutton, and Middleham, were all described as “Dominus de Raby;” and thus it is evident that Raby was their chief residence and stronghold.

Raby, says the Rev. Mr. Hodgson (who has done more than any other antiquary in searching into and elucidating the history of this grand old pile, and to whom we express our deep obligation for much of the critical description of the building we are about to give), in its present state (although some parts of the older edifice were left and incorporated in it) “presents essentially the work and ideas of one period,” the fourteenth century. Leland speaks of it as “the largest castell of logginges in al the north cuntrey, and is of a strong building, but not set other on the hill or very strong ground;” but he does not mention the moat, which was probably filled up and the water drawn off before his time.

The general arrangement of the castle is as follows:—First, the central nucleus, or castle proper, consisting of a compact mass of towers connected by short curtains, and of which the block shape may be described as something between a right-angled triangle and a square, having the right angle to the south-west. Next, a spacious platform entirely surrounding this central mass; then a low embattled wall of enceinte, strengthened by a moat-house, and perhaps a barbican, as well as by numerous small square bastions rising from its exterior base; and then the moat. The south front of the castle being so amply defended by water, its structural defences were naturally less important.