The
Grenville family descend from Rollo, a noble chieftain
of Norway, who being driven thence by the King of Denmark,
attempted with his followers a descent on England, but experienced
a repulse from Alfred. In the year 870, he made an irruption
into Normandym which conquest he completed in 912. He was
afterwards invested with the title of duke of Normandy, and
married Gilbette, daughter of Charles the Semple, king
of France, by whom he had two sons, From William, the
eldest, descended William the Conqueror, and the succeeding
kings of England; and from Robert, the second son,
created earl of Corbeil, descended Hamon Dentatus, the sixth
earl of Corbeil, who had two sons, by Elizabeth D'Avoye,
his near kinswoman, widow to Hugh the Great, and sister to
the emperor Otho. The eldest was called after his own name,
Robert Fitz Hamon; the second son, Richard, (as
is still the custom in those countries) after the name of
one of his lordships, Granville which surname of Granville,
or by corruption Grenville, Greynville, Grenfel, Greenfield,
Graynefield, and Granvilia, has remained to his posterity
ever since.
The
two brothers, Robert Fitz Hamon, and Richard de
Granville, accompanied William the Conqueror in
his expedition into England, and were present with him at
the great battle near Hastings in Sussex, where king Harold
was slain. For their signal services, the Conqueror bestowed
on them large gifts and honoursm particularly to Richard
de Granville, the castle and lordship of Bideford, Devon,
with other lands, lordships, and possessions, in Cornwall,
Devon, Somerset, Gloucestershire and Buckinghamshire.
After
the death of the Conqueror, the said Robert Fitz Hamon, choosing
twelve knights for his companions, of whom his brother Richard
was one, entered Wales with an army, slew Rheese, their
prince, in a pitched battle, and making an entire conquest
of Glamorganshire, obliged the rest of the country to pay
tribute to the king of England. To reward these and other
great services, and being his near kinsman, William Rufus
made the said Fitz Hamon, a free prince in all his conquered
lands, holding them in vasalage of the king, as his chief
lord, which the said Fitz Hamon divided between himself and
his twelve knight companions, William Rufus dying, he was,
by Henry 1, sent as a general of his army against France,
where he received a wound from a pike on his temples, of which
he died; and leaving a daughter Mabel, the wife of Robert
de Council, natural son to Henry 1, he in her right, enjoyed
great part of his lands in England.
Richard
de Granville, as the heir male, inherited by the Norman
laws, all the estate and honour of his family in Normandy,
and thereby became earl of Corbeil, baron of Thorigny and
Granville. He had also for his share of the lands taken
from the Welsh, the old castle of Neath, in Glamorganshire,
and Juia Regalia, in that territory: there he founded an abbey
for religious monks, and endowed it with all the lands he
held in Wales. Leland says, that the town of Neath (so called
by the Welsh) had the name of Granville. In his old age, according
to the devotion of those times, he took on him the sign of
the cross, and setting forward for Jerusalem, died on his
journey, thither, leaving issue by his wife Constance,
only daughter of Walter Giffard, earl of Buckinghamshire and
Longueville.
Richard,
his son and heir, who held in the reign of Henry 11, the lordship
of Bideford, Devon, by half a knight's fee of the honour of
Gloucester. In the second of king John, being stiled lord
of Bideford and Kilkhampton, he paid forty marks and a palfrey
to have an assize of the advowson of these two churches, against
the abbot of Tewkesbury. In the twelth of the same reign,
he held three knights' fees and a half in the counties of
Cornwall and Devon and died in the first of Henry 111. He
married Adeline, widow of Hugh Montfort, eldest daughter
of Robert de Bellemont, earl of Mellant in France and the
first earl of Leicester in England, after the conquest,
by Elizabeth, daughter of Hugh, the great earl of Vermandois,
son to the king Henry of France: to him succeeded Richard
de Granville, his son and heir, under age at his father's
death. He married Jane, daughter to William Trevint.
Richard his eldest son married Catherine, daughter of Josceline,
of Mount Tregiminion, and died without issue. Bartholomew
de Granville, his brother became his heir. By his wife
Anne, daughter of Sir Vyell Vivian, of Trevideren,
in Cornwall, he left Henry his son and heir, who enjoyed
the manor of Kilkhampton and Winkleigh, with the honour
and manor of Bideford etc. He left issue by his wife
Anne, daughter and heiress to Wortham.
Sir
Theobald, his son and heir, under age, who became ward
to Sir John Carew. He married Joice, daughter of Sir Thomas
Beaumont, knt., by whom he had Theobald, his son
and heir, who married Margaret, daughter of Hugh Courtenay,
earl of Devon, and had two sons; John, who married Margaret,
daughter and heiress of Sir John Burghursh, (her sister Maud
was married to Thomas Chaucer, the writer). He lived at Stowe
and was knight of the shire, for the county of Devon, in several
parliaments, but died without issue, leaving William
his brother and heir, to succeed him, who died about the twenty-ninth
of Henry V1, leaving issue by Phillipa, his second wife,
sister of William Lord Bonville, Thomas his son
and heir, (ancestor of Prince William) and two daughters, Ellen who married William Yeo of Heanton
Satchville, (ancestor of most
of the Yeo descendants), and Margaret who married
John Thorne of Thorne in Cornwall. Thomas was knighted in
the seventeenth year of Henry V11 reign and married Elizabeth
Gorges, sister to Theobald Gorges, knt.
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