Land Owners

These are the family shields, emblems or flags of important land owners in the Northfield area over the last 600 years. Look them up, some fascinating stories to be found. Lady Joan De Botetort, William Fitz-Anculph, Franchelie or Frankly (means untitled land belonging to Franka in Anglo Saxon),  Ben Greaves, George Middlemore and John De Somery.

LADY JOAN DE BOTETORT. Heir of the Someri's, Lady Joan, Botetort's mate, thou makest no moan. Botetort dead, Botetort's son Shall rule the lands that his sires have won. In Weoley Castle, thine own good hold,  Thou keepest thy state as thy sires of old. Each knight that holdeth his lands in.fee, Doth render thee homage and fealty. Know'st thou, Henry de Erdington,  Thy dues shall be paid to the Lady Joan.  The pence that are named, or the silver spurs,  Or thy lands shall be told with the tale of hers. Henry de Erdington, welcome be,  That bringest the pledge of thy fealty. Lady Joan, at her castle gate Doth greet thee fair in her fair estate, With her maidens sleek, and her steward tall,  And the men that stand at her beck and call. The lordly moat with its waters wide,  Doth mirror the armed men beside. Now welcome thee, Henry de Erdington ;  welcome thou art," saith Lady Joan. He hath leaped from his horse and gently kissed  A hand as white as a knight hath wist. In the banquet hall at the table high,  He sitteth the Lady Joan anigh. Stout men-at-arms are ranged arow, As the goodly cheer and the wine doth flow. The loving cup high, that is filled to the brim,  She takes in her hand and doth drink to him. " I pledge thee peace," saith the Lady Joan, "  And health and the good, God gives alone." " Henry de Erdington's fealty, Be thine, Lady Joan, in this pledge to thee." " And the gift of the silver spurs be thine, That the lands that I hold may be counted mine!'' " Yea, the lands are thine!    By the splendid spurs,  I trow that they be good harbingers," ' Thy faith true faith, and thy shield true shield,  When Botetort rides to take the field. "Or else by my Someri sires of old, I will break thee e'en in thy strongest hold. " Botetort dead, Botetort's son Shall rule the lands that his sires have won." E. M. Rudland: Ballads of Old Birmingham. William's date of birth is not known, though it was likely in Picquigny, Picardy, now in the Somme department, France, in the mid 11th Century. William inherited many lands in central England that had been granted to his father, Ansculf de Picquigny by William the Conqueror after the Norman conquest in 1066. William made his base at the Saxon, Earl Edwin’s, castle in Dudley, Worcestershire. He and his successors were overlords of the manors of Selly Oak and Birmingham both of which had previously been owned by Wulfwin. His ownership of Selly Oak was challenged by the Bishop of Lichfield using a nuncupative (oral) will made by Wulfwin as evidence. It would appear that William Fitz-Ansculf died during the First Crusade. Henry of Huntingdon in his ‘History of the English People’ writes that: “Then from the middle of February they besieged the castle of ‘Arqah, for almost three months. Easter was celebrated there (10 April). But Anselm of Ribemont, a very brave knight, died there, struck by a stone, and William of Picardy, and many others.”. Lands held The Domesday Book of 1086 shows William holding from the Crown around one-hundred estates in twelve counties. Many of these were estates formerly held by King Harold Godwinsson, Lady Godiva, Earl Algar and Ulwin, a thegn based in the Midlands. William was either Lord, or tenant-in-chief.

HAZELWELL HALL, ROAD, FORD ROUGH AND LANE. The word Hazelwell is of Anglo-Saxon origin— hcesel, meaning hazel and wiell—a well or spring. It was called a manor during the 17th century, when a William de Hazelwell is mentioned in connection with lands in King's Norton. Grant from William Eggebaston, Vicar of the Church of Hales Oweyn. William Taillour, of Bir-myngeham, and James Cluddok, executors of the will of William Sy to John Middlemore and Alice his wife of the whole manor of Haselwall with all appurtenances.Given at Kyngesnorton 15 February 35 Henry VI. (1456-7). George Middlemore succeeded to Hazelwell, and in 1637 the hall was plundered by the Cromwellians, It was held by a branch of the Middlemore family until the beginning of the 18th Century. The present hall was built on the site of the old " manor " house, and is a modern structure belonging to the Cartland family. The moat can still be traced. Kings Norton was the scene of a couple of minor episodes during the English Civil War. In the first of these, a force led by Prince Rupert of the Rhine, numbering some 300, was resting on Kings Norton Green. There, they were surprised by a smaller group led by Lord Willoughby of Parham. A skirmish took place, in which fifty of Prince Rupert's men were killed, and twenty were taken prisoner. The Parliamentarian force lost twenty men. This took place on 17 October 1642. In a later episode, Queen Henrietta Maria arrived in Kings Norton with an army of around 5,500 men that she had raised in Yorkshire. It is believed that she stayed the night in the Saracen's Head, while the army camped on land behind the church, now Kings Norton Park (giving rise to the modern road name "Camp Lane"). There is also a public house on this road named The Camp Inn. The parish of Frankley lies 3 miles south-east of Halesowen and was a subsidiary chapelry of St John the Baptist, Halesowen parish church, probably from Saxon times. There only ever was and still is a tiny hamlet clustered around the church. Perhaps the earliest surviving record of the chapel is a document, written in Latin and dated c1220, which records the grant of a rent of four shillings per annum by Simon, lord of the manor of Frankley to the church and canons of Hales to pray for the souls of his wife and his mother, Rose and Elicia respectively. One of the witnesses was Ralph, chaplain of Frankley. With its mother church it came under the jurisdiction of Halesowen Abbey probably sometime during the 11th century. Although churches with extensicve parishes were happy to set up chapelries which had a certain degree of independence, one of the privileges most jealously guarded by the mother church was the right of sepulchre, the right to bury the dead of the parish and to receive the consequent dues. A deed of 1236 records a meeting of the Dean of Kidderminster and the Chapter to adjudicate in a dispute between the Abbot of Halesowen and Ralph, the chaplain of Frankley, who admitted that he had wrongly to buried a parishioner in his chapel to the detriment of the church of Hales. He swore he had never done it before and would not do it again, and returned to the Abbey the offerings made by relatives of the deceased.