Buckton



Buckton castle stands on the western edge of the Peak District a little over a mile east of Mossley and under 4 miles from the Domesday vill of Ashton under Lyne.  Like most northern castles its early history is mostly obscure and consequently conjectural.  The area seems to have lain in Salford Hundred in Cheshire and was therefore held by Earl or Count Roger of Poitou (d.1123) at Domesday.  This apparently wasted hundred included the vill of Manchester and its 2 associated churches at Ashton-under-Lyne and Radcliffe, as well as Rochdale.  Unfortunately the other 20 manors between the rivers Ribble and Mersey were only mentioned as held by Saxon thanes, but not differentiated.  Further there was the royal domain which accounted for about a third of the district and was concentrated in the centre of the region. 

Count Roger's other Domesday possessions straddled Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, what was to become Lancashire, Nottingham & Derby, Suffolk, Essex and Hampshire.  More relevant to Buckton, Roger had supported King William Rufus (1087-1100) in his annexation of Cumberland in 1092 and reaped rewards in the North as well as the honour of Eye by 1096.  In what was to become Lancashire his control after 1092 advanced from the River Ribble north to the River Lune allowing him control as far north-west as Furness in Cumberland. 

In 1102 Earl Roger lost all his English lands during the rebellion of his elder brother, Earl Robert Belleme.  In consequence Roger retired to his wife's lands in Poitou and King Henry I (1100-35) disposed of his escheated English lands as he saw fit.  Buckton may have part of the lands of Roger Poitou (d.1123) that the king passed onto a man called Robert as this person was certainly given Anley, Otterburn and Scosthorp from Roger's domains.  This Robert was later known as Robert Romiley and is probably identical to the Norman Robert who was apparently the son of Remfry (Rainfred, d.c.1086), the first Norman abbot of Whitby.  Robert possibly took the surname Romiley from the Cheshire Domesday vill of that name which lies only 8 miles from Buckton.  This suggests that the English vill of Romiley is more likely the province of that family's surname than one of the multitude of Romillys in France as has usually been claimed without contemporary evidence.  However, there is also a possibility that he came from Remilly sur Lozon as a Rumilleio in Lower Normandy was granted to Aunay sur Odon by his descendants.  Presumably the Remfrys came from Le Mesnil Rainfray some 40 miles south of Remilly sur Lozon.  Before 1103 Robert had also acquired various other English lands including Mappowder in Dorset, Molland, Spitchwick and Warkleigh in Devon and Wheatenhurst in Gloucestershire, all of which he had given to Troarn abbey in Normandy before 1103, but after 1086.  The first 2 of these places were rich royal vills, while Wheatenhurst was not a royal vill and Warkleigh did not appear in Domesday.  This suggests that Robert was well in the favour of either William Rufus, Henry I, or both kings.

The suggestion that Robert's surname came from the English Cheshire Romiley is strengthened by the Domesday Book name of Rumeli being used in exactly the same form by Robert's daughter, Cecilia, in the mid twelfth century.  Her sister, Alice was recorded as Rumeili.  The French Remilly sur Lozon was granted to Aunay abbey by Jordan Say (d.1151) and his wife Lucy, the daughter of Robert Romiley.  Consequently it cannot be proved as to whether this Rumilleio was the property of Jordan or his wife.  That said Remilly sur Lozon was latter associated with the Say and Hommet families.  In any case the Remfry/Romiley landholdings in Normandy have not yet been fully explored.

In England, Romiley was held by Earl Hugh of Chester (d.1101) in 1086 as part of Hamestan hundred and contained 1 virgate of land.  The hundred ran from Bosley beneath Macclesfield in the south to Tintwistle, just 3 miles from Buckton castle, in the north.  North-west of Hamestan hundred lay the lands of Roger Poitou and north-east the lands of William Peverel of Peak castle.

If Robert Romiley was the lord of Buckton castle he also seems to have been the founder of Skipton castle, which began life as a motteless partial ringwork lying against a steep fall of land.  This is somewhat similar to the position of Buckton on top of its mountain.  Robert died before 1120 when one of his 2 surviving daughters, Cecily Romiley (d.1151/55), founded Embsay priory with her husband, William Meschin of Egremont.  Embsay had been linked to the royal vill of Skipton in 1086 and had been apparently granted to Robert Romiley with the crushing of the Shrewsbury rebellion in 1102 by Henry I.  William Meschin, both with and without his wife, seems to have granted Skipton church to 2 independent religious houses in an unusual move.  Henry I confirmed the grant of William Meschin alone of his land of Dena and the church of St Trinity of Scipeton to Huntingdon at some point between 1125, when one of the witnesses, David (d.1153), became king of Scotland and before 1134 when William himself was dead.  Some time earlier between August 1100 and 1107 he and his wife, Cecily (d.1151/55), had granted the church of St Trinity of Skipton of her honour of Skipton to Troarn abbey.  As Skipton was the inheritance of his wife it is most unusual that William made the latter grant without his wife's permission, as had appeared in the first charter to Troarn.  As William's wife survived him and went on with her second husband, Henry Tracey of Barnstaple (d.1165), to confirm the first grant to Troarn, it is possible that Henry was acting against his wife's wishes after 1124.  Possibly this is why the first grant eventually prevailed, although there was a long running dispute over Skipton church with the cannons of Huntingdon.  The implication of the second grant is that William Meschin was courting the favour of King David of Scotland (d.1153), who from 1113 had been earl of Huntingdon.

Buckton castle, its style suggesting it had an eleventh or early twelfth century origin, may have been destroyed by William Fitz Duncan (d.1153), the onetime heir to the Scottish throne, in the late 1130s.  This may have occurred after the battle of Clitheroe on 10 June 1138.  Alternatively, the castle may have met its end, again at the hands of Fitz Duncan, in 1151 when Symeon's chronicle noted:
And then the king [David] with his army confirmed William Fitz Duncan, his nephew, in the honour of Skipton and Craven and broke into the small fortresses that had been built by the enemy and destroyed them after ejecting the knights.

Possibly then, this was the fate of Buckton castle, but it should be noted that both Skipton and Clitheroe were just over 30 miles north of Buckton and the boundary between Fitz Duncan's land and Earl Ranulf of Chester (d.1153/54) seems to have been set at the River Ribble, some 20 miles north of Buckton. 

Regardless of the historical evidence, the castle never seems to have been mentioned in the Norman era, which suggests that it was destroyed before records began to proliferate in the mid twelfth century.  If it simply faded away it may just have passed with the Romiley holdings to William Fitz Duncan (d.1153), even though this was well south of the Ribble.  The fate of the Romiley fees are looked at under Skipton.  It is possible that with the reorganisation of the northern counties on the fall of the earl of Chester in 1153/4 and the expulsion of the Scots from Lancashire soon afterwards, the castle might have passed to the earldom of Cheshire where it remained as the north-eastern extent of the honour.  The Henrician rearrangement of the Scottish border is discussed under Cumberland and its associated castles.

It has also been suggested that Earl Ranulf of Chester (d.1153/4) may have built the castle to protect the Cheshire plain from his Scottish enemies who lay north of Buckton at Skipton and Clitheroe and from William Peverel who held lands immediately south of Buckton as well as Peak castle some 15 miles away.  Although possible this is an extremely simple castle in a highland position, so an earlier date than the 1140s seems more likely for its construction.  Further in 1173, when the earl of Chester revolted against Henry II, such minor castles as Dunham Massey and Ullerwood in Cheshire were recorded as garrisoned by Hamo Mascy and Chester itself by Earl Hugh (d.1181).  If Buckton were then in the sphere of Earl Hugh it would probably have been mentioned as defying Henry II.  Certainly it would seem more powerful than the other 2 minor Cheshire fortresses.  This, and its simple design, suggests that the castle was already ruined and indefensible before the great revolt of 1173.

The idea that William Neville (d.bef.1211), who was granted the lordship of Longdendale by the earl of Chester in 1200/03, built the castle seems most unlikely as he would have been building a fortress roughly a hundred years out of date in both style and position.  Similar castles in style to Buckton exist at Hay on Wye and Lydney, although the motte and bailey castles of Egremont and Tickhill bear some similarities too.  Although it has been claimed that the thirteenth century Beeston castle resembles Buckton some 40 miles away, there is little to recommend this theory in size, history or design.

By 1360 the site of Buckton castle was within the old Neville/Burgh lordship of Longdendale, a part of the earldom of Chester, just granted to the Black Prince (d.1376).  A survey of that year described it as a ruined castle and hinted at it having had a chapel.  Obviously it was no longer functional, but it is impossible from this to state at what time the fortress had been destroyed or abandoned.  All that is certain is that when Ormerod saw it in 1817 there was no trace of masonry at the site or indication that it had been a castle, rather than a hill fort.

Description
Buckton castle stands on a shoulder of Buckton Moor projecting strongly to the north-west and commanding the northern Cheshire and southern Lancashire plains.  On the south-western side of the summit is an irregular D shaped ringwork varying between 115' and 130' in diameter.  It's south-western face is straight, while the curved section is elongated to the north-west to accommodate an odd rectangular gatetower.  The rest of the enceinte is enclosed by a simple 6' thick curtain wall, whose foundations are still exposed here and there, especially to the west.  The site is protected to the south-west by the scarp of the hillside, while on the other sides there is a ditch up to 30' across and 20' deep.  The supposed bailey to the ringwork has been shown by excavation to have been a second world war decoy site.

The gatetower would appear to have been an unusual rectangular structure, about 31' by 25' with a guard tower to the west and a gate passagway to the east.  The walls were considerably thinner than the adjoining curtain at about 4' wide.  Presumably it was of 2 storeys, although the narrow walls may preclude this. This is an unusual structure and is not parallelled elsewhere in the British Isles.  As such applying a late eleventh century date to the structure seems more reasonable than one a hundred years later.

The only right angle in the enceinte was to the west and this suggests that the great hall was here, alongside the gatehouse guard tower and running south-east along the straight south-west curtain.  A well is supposed to have existed against the south curtain along with further buildings that were still standing some 6' high in the eighteenth century.

Excavations earlier in the century revealed that the castle had 3 identifiable phases.  First came the digging of the ditch and the building of the masonry castle.  This survived long enough for the ditch to be recut and building work to take place in the interior.  Finally the castle was deliberately demolished.  Taken together this suggests that the castle was probably built for Roger Poitou before 1102, refortified by Robert Romiley or another lord in the early twelfth century and then destroyed in 1138 or 1151 by Scottish forces.  Consequently the castle saw no action in the war of 1173-74.  Sadly little dateable material was recovered from the site, which may indicate little activity.  What was found, merely 4 shards of Pennine Gritty Ware, could only be broadly dated as twelfth century.  Paleoenvironmental evidence also showed that the mountains had been deforested by the ninth century and that the fortress was constructed on land clear of woodland.  This was claimed to be the reason for this ‘early castle' being built in stone from the first.  However, if you dig a rock cut ditch, what are you supposed to do with the resultant stone?  Building a wall seems a pretty good method of disposing of the rock whatever the amount of timber available in the district.
 

Copyright©2021 Paul Martin Remfry