Leeds
Leeds is a large castle set within a large artificial lake in a bend of the River Len in Kent half way between Dover castle and the Tower of London. It is one of the largest castles in England due to its massive water defences.
At the time of Domesday (1086) the estate of Leeds (Esledes)
was held
by Aethelwold the chamberlain from Bishop Odo of Bayeau, the king's
half-brother. There was the land for 12 ploughs there of which 2
were in the lordship. There were also 28 villagers and 8
smallholders living in the manor with 7 ploughs. There was also a
church, the remains of which are built into
the current structure within the village some distance from the castle,
though the fortress is not mentioned in the survey. Leeds church
consists of a large rectangular tower in the dimensions of a tower keep
and contains Romanesque windows and archways and is currently not
securely dated. Within the vill there were 18 slaves, 2
arpents of vines, 8 acres of meadow, woods and 20 pigs. Of more
import to the castle there
were also 5 mills belonging to the villagers. Quite possibly one of these mills was situated where the
mill in the castle barbican now stands. The total value of the
estate before 1066, when it was held by Earl Leofwin (died at
Hastings), had been £16, although this had now risen to £20 in
1086.
Between 1086 and 1100 the manor of Leeds came into the hands
of a Norman, Hamo Crevequer. Possibly this happend immediately on
the forfeiture of Bishop Odo
in 1088. In 1119 his son and successor, Robert, together with his
wife, Rose, and their son Adam, founded Leeds priory in honour of St
Mary and St Nicholas. It is said that they transferred 3
churchmen living on the castle site to the new priory at this time and
that this is the first certain mention of the castle, although where
this statement originates from is currently unknown.
Certainly no original documentation to this effect has come to light.
In 1138 Earl Robert of Gloucester rebelled against King Stephen
and
fortified the castles of Bristol and Leeds (Slede) against the crown. Leeds was
quickly reduced by King Stephen soon after Christmas and apparently
returned to Robert Crevequer, who was apparently still holding the
fortress at the time of his death around 1154. As the fortress remained
in the Crevequer family it is to be presumed that they reverted to a royal alliegence, if they had ever left it.
In 1215 the castle was again besieged
and taken during the barons' war at the end of King John's reign.
During another Baron's war in 1264-67, the castle was again lost to
royal forces and this time the lord of the manor, the last Hamo
Crevequer of Leeds
castle, was forced to exchange the castle with Roger Leybourne in
October 1268. His son, William Leybourne, in turn sold the
castle, which
was called 'The Moat' (la Mote) to Queen Eleanor for 500 marks in June
1278. It has occasionally been suggested that 'la Mote' meant
that there was a motte at the castle on the site of the gloriette.
In reality it is far more likely that the site was actually known
as 'the moat'. This far more describes the site and suits the
etymology.
After 1278 the queen made the Crevequer fortress into a royal home. This was
visited by King Edward I in 1279, 1281, 1285, 1288 and 1289. Then,
on 28 November 1290, when his first queen died, the king took over its
maintenance and in November 1291 paid for 6 carts of lead bought and
sent to Leeds by his own writ for his baths, £17 2s, plus 57s
carriage. There was a further charge of 1s 8d for transporting
the lead to the ship. He also paid for 100 Ryegate stones being
bought and taken to the castle for 6s. This was then made into
the pavement of his baths by Thomas Lamberhurst for 20s. Adam
Lamhurst was also paid 40s for some of his work in this ‘paving
of the baths and other things at Leeds'. Thomas (the Porter) was
also paid four pennies (or shillings - the account is unclear) for various works made in the
castle at the same time, while Adam Lamberhurst received 20s in part
payment for the pavement and other things he had done at Leeds. After this, the king frequented the place rarely, the
duke of Burgundy and other French ambassadors were prepared for in
1291, but did not appear, although the count of Bar stopped here in
1293. By this time the castle was held by Edward's second wife,
Margaret (d.1317).
In 1314 a violent storm damaged the glass windows of the castle to
such an extent that it required 105s to reinstate them. On Queen
Margaret's death in 1317, her step-son, King Edward II, exchanged the castle
with Bartholomew Badlesmere in 1318 without taking into account the
wishes of his wife, who appears to have had a claim upon the fortress
as heir to her step-mother-in-law. According to the official
documentation the king agreed to grant Bartholomew Badlesmere the
castle and manor of Leeds, which Queen Margaret of England, deceased,
held for life by grant of Edward I, as of the value of £21 6s 8d
yearly (32 marks) next of fixed alms, to have in return for 100 marks yearly
in land to be given to the king. For this the king received the
manor of Adderley, Salop, which was worth only £99 19s 8¼d
per annum, but its church was worth 60 marks and thus greatly exceeded
the £100 per annum required. As a result of the exchange,
in 1321 it was said that Isabella attempted to enter the castle for her
night's rest and was stoutly repulsed when on her way to
Canterbury. In consequence, on 16 October 1321, the king ordered
the sheriffs of Essex, Southampton, Surrey and Sussex to raise 1,000
men a piece and bring them to Leeds castle on the Friday after St Luke
next, with horses and arms, as the king proposed going against the
castle with Earl Aymer Valence of Pembroke, Earl John Britannia of
Richmond and other earls and magnates, to punish the disobedience and
contempt against the queen committed by certain members of the
household of Bartholomew Badlesmere and others staying in the castle by
his precept, in refusing to allow the queen to enter the castle and
hindering her doing so by armed force, which Bartholomew afterwards
approved by his letters to the queen to have been done by his knowledge,
whose familiars afterwards slew certain men of the queen's
household. The action was also said to be a personal matter and
not a matter for other barons to become involved in.
Despite this the rebel barons of Edward II moved towards the
castle but dared not fight the king with the consequence that the
castle surrendered on 1 November 1321 and 13 of the garrison were
summarily hanged by the king who resumed possession of the
fortress. On 4 November the king announced the capture of
Bartholomew Burghersh, Thomas Aldon and John Bourn, because they had
detained the castle of Ledes against the king, hindering the king's
entrance thereof, and in the surrender of the castle surrendered
themselves also to the king's will. The castle then remained a
royal fortress.
In 1413 Archbishop Thomas of Canterbury went to the
‘greater chapel of Ledys castle' and called on the castle's
holder, Lord John Oldcastle of Cobham, to answer for his adherence to
Lollardism. Sir John, despite being called in a loud voice,
refused to attend to the archbishop and instead shut himself up in his
castle which he fortified. This strongly suggests that the
greater chapel lay in the outer island and that Oldcastle was in the
gloriette, also known now as the ‘old castle'! Sir John was therefore deemed contumacious and was
excommunicated in writing. He was later imprisoned, but escaped
to Wales, before finally being executed by Henry V in 1413 after a
failed uprising. In 1422 Queen Joanna, the widow of Henry IV, was
released from captivity after accusations of witchcraft and retired to
Leeds castle where she celebrated her freedom by giving alms ‘at
the cross in the chapel within Leeds castle' worth 6s 8d. However
two celebratory feasts with her family set her back over £4
each! At the same time over £56 was spent on stocking the
castle with wine. The castle remained nominally in her hands
until it was granted to Katherine of Valois, widow of Henry V, in
1425. Probably in 1436 King Henry VI ordered the repair of the
lead work in the gloriette whilst he was staying there. In 1438-9
a survey recorded the repairing of the kitchen next to the foot bridge
to the gloriette within the castle. A further £10 was spent
on remaking a corner of the tower within the castle called the
Gloriette which had recently collapsed to the ground as well as for
repairing the defects of the said tower.
In 1441 the revamped castle saw the political trial
of Eleanor Cobham, wife of Duke Humphrey of Gloucester. She was
imprisoned for life, while in 1446 her husband too was arrested for
high treason and conveniently died soon afterwards. In 1442,
after the trial of Eleanor Cobham, a plumber worked for 25 weeks in
covering the house roofs within the gloriette. Also various earth
walls were repaired. Presumably these were half timbered walls of
wattle and dawb which graced the interior of the gloriette.
Similar walls were present at the back of the outer ward towers, of
which only one
still survives to the E. The castle survived the Civil War of
1642-46 and continued as a home into the twentieth century, being much
rebuilt and altered in the nineteenth century.
Description
The castle was divided into five separate enclosures set in an
artificial lake of nearly 15 acres, the enclosures being set against
the south-west bank. When the moat was partially drained in the nineteenth century it
was found to be over 17' deep and the only way to drain it properly
would have been to demolish a channel through one of the
barbicans. This obviously was not done.
The first portion of the defences to be encountered
when approaching from the land side was the outer barbican to the south-west of
the castle proper. This controlled the dam which kept the lake
flooded. The castle is currently approached from three
directions, west, south and east. The south and east causeways currently lead
directly to the inner barbican, thereby suggesting that they are late
additions. The approach from the west passed through an outer
barbican. This therefore was surely the original approach,
otherwise the building of the outer barbican becomes superfluous to the
defence of the castle, unless it was merely built to bring the mill
into the fortifications.
Outer Barbican
The outer barbican apparently has no protecting ditch to the north-west where
the entrance lies. Further, the gateway shows no evidence of a
drawbridge. This is a strange design considering the gateways
into the rest of the castle. It is possibly explained by the
nineteenth century suggestion that the causeway to the north-west was fortified
by weak walls
for a distance of some 180-200 feet from the gateway. Such a long
barbican is unusual, but not impossible. The main outer entrance
to the castle consists of an internally projecting rectangular
structure with a deeply recessed doorway protected by two murder holes
behind a reinstated portcullis. Such a design could be twelfth
century and
is echoed at the north gate at Chepstow castle. The stonework of the
barbican consists of large rectangular blocks that tend towards
squareness, with the holes between the blocks filled with much smaller
fragments. The inner barbican is built in the same style and the
implication is that both were planned and executed
simultaneously. They also both have regular putlog holes spaced
throughout their outer surfaces.
Next
to the gate in the east corner of the outer
barbican was a large rectangular tower which is obviously of one build
with the rest of the barbican. This tower housed the mill and was
powered by a sluice from the lake. The mill wheel was set in a
basement chamber, while above was a rectangular room with large
embrasures and loops to the west. Above this was a further room
having much smaller embrasures of a less pointed nature holding
rectangular windows. These embrasure sizes are the reverse of
what is normally expected in towers and again emphasises how dangerous
it is to date structures upon the perceived or alleged dates of their
styles. The tower would seem to date from before
1314 when repairs to the structure and mechanism of the mill in the
castle cost 16s. Presumably the whole is twelfth century with
additions.
A spiral stair remains in the wall south of the tower. This
allowed access to the upper floor and wallwalk. To the SE the
outer barbican has been largely destroyed and the protecting ditch
apparently filled in. The surviving inner walls of the barbican
and mill tower are only a couple of feet thick, compared to the more
defensible 5' of the outer walls. Some part of this was
already decayed in 1314 when the stone wall at the head of the interior
lake next to the mill was found to have collapsed and the jurors could
not estimate the cost of repairs as the foundations were under water
and they could not work out an easy way to get to them.
Inner Barbican
From the outer barbican gatehouse a right-angled turn brings you to an
arched stone bridge with a loop above on the outer wall. This
bridge crosses to the inner barbican which is entered through another
gatehouse, similar to the outer barbican one, but with the internal
protrusions thickened to make two small, irregular rectangular
turrets. The gate itself is slightly recessed between the internal
towers.
On this island the irregular inner barbican rises
directly from the moat, occasionally with a strong batter. The
enceinte is also pierced on the landward side with cruciform crossbow
loops of a thirteenth century design. The whole bears some
resemblance to the barbican at Whittington, Shropshire.
Interestingly both castles were known to the Maminot family in the mid
twelfth century. The north front of the barbican has collapsed, a
state possibly dating back to before the survey of 1314 when some form
of collapse was mentioned.
There are currently two further drawbridges which
led into the inner barbican island from south and east. These are
probably later than the most powerful entrance via the outer
barbican. It is therefore likely that both are late
medieval. From the inner gatehouse a fortified bridge ran east to
the main castle island. This bridge has two arches, the
easternmost one having a drawbridge immediately before the main outer
gatehouse. One of these many bridges was the southern outer
bridge (pons exterior australis castri) that was repaired at a cost of
24s in 1314.
Outer Ward
The outer gatehouse is at the point of a ravelin-like projection on the
island and consists of a rectangular gatehouse tower, in line, but not
proud of, the outer curtain wall. This outer ward wall is again
heavily battered like the barbican walls to the south and west, though that to
the east may be buried under the current gardens which are outside the
medieval defences and were added when the island was extended in modern
times. It also had loops in it, two to the south-west still partially
remaining. The gatehouse is obviously of a different build to the
rest of the outer ward enceinte as the stonework is different.
The main curtain walls and towers consist of a rubble ashlar, while the
gatehouse has reasonably regularly laid rubble walls. The
implication is that the gatetower is the older of the two and the
island defences were built sometime after the gatehouse in better
quality stonework.
The outer gateway has two pilaster buttresses to the
front, flanking the entrance. The main gate is recessed between
these. A few feet above the gate arch the pillasters join to form
a solid front just above two holes for the drawbridge chains. A
few feet higher the front is topped by the remnants of a corbelled out
machicolation. Behind this the tower continues for a few more
feet before being truncated at what was probably battlement
height. The gatetower entrance seems always to have been
protected by gate and portcullis. Behind these the gatepassage
now runs all the way into the site of the main ward and it is uncertain
how much this has been altered over the years.
Within
the outer gatetower at first floor level was
a chamber from where portcullis and drawbridge were operated. Two
blocked up loops covering the approach could still be discerned in the
nineteenth century. Behind the gatetower and adjacent to it are a
series of
more modern buildings which make the original layout of this area
difficult to interpret. Judging from Buck's sketch, this
gatehouse backed directly onto the entrance to the inner ward.
This is an unusual design and has probably developed over the centuries
as inner and outer ward were of different builds. The rear of the
original outer ward gatetower was probably where a doorway now leads
north
into a guard's lodge. Through this to the west is what may be a
small rectangular internal turret set tight against the north wall of the
gatetower. This room is vaulted and has a crude ‘chimney'
cut through the wall. This is similar, but larger than the north
turret of the inner barbican gatehouse. The wall to the south of the
gatetower was rebuilt in the nineteenth century, so its original layout is suspect.
The large island, created by artificially raising
the waters by means of the barbican dams, was surrounded with a high
wall, with a strong batter to the S&W. This currently rises
some 15', directly out of the lake and still has four projecting
semi-circular towers on the north portion of the island and the remains of
a further, smaller one to the south adjoining the gatehouse block.
The best preserved tower to the NE shows that these were originally of
two storeys and the others have subsequently been lowered to battlement
level. The northtower
in the early eighteenth century had battlements, but as
these were at curtain wall height it is probable that these were post
medieval. There were also rectangular towers to the south-west,
west and south-east. The south one was of two storeys and 30' by
27'
internally,
with walls some 5' thick, but this was mostly demolished in the
nineteenth century. It appears to have held King Edward I's baths
which were built
there at a cost of some £24 towards the end of 1291. Today
only the mortar base of the 100 Reygate paving slabs remains, but the
fact that they were placed in an obviously pre-existing tower shows
that the outer ward was standing many years prior to 1291. A
sluice allowed water to flow in or out from the surrounding lake.
The upper part of the tower was removed in 1821-2, but the lower
portion was retained as a boathouse, which may have been the tower's
original purpose. Certainly there was a boat on the lake
maintained from the royal coffers in the fourteenth century.
Inner Ward
Within the outer ward was another irregular ward with a wall which was
some 8' thick and over 20' high. This enclosed the large summit
of the island. Virtually nothing of the defences of this inner
ward now remains, although a portion of its wall was still standing in
1822. This contained chimneys in the thickness of the wall and
lay under the site of the current 'new castle' or great house to
the north. The only surviving portion of the inner wall is now
thought to be the north wall of the kitchen which made up the rear wall of
the mostly destroyed rectangular NW inner ward tower.
However, underneath the ‘new castle' were some cellars which
contained two arches of ‘Caen stone'. These are thought to
be Norman.
The inner gatehouse to the south-west appears to be another
rectangular tower, similar to its now co-joined outer gatehouse.
It would appear that this originally projected inwards from the
curtain. This is adjudged as the line of the original inner
curtain wall was found to underlie the later spiral stair just over
half way along the co-joined gate passageway. The stairway now
leads up to the first floor of the rooms and over the gate passageway is
the constable's chamber. This is linked to the portcullis and
drawbridge chamber in the outer gatetower by what has been described as
a squint. This allowed the constable contact with the defenders
of that room, but not access. This room would seem to have been
in existence a long time before 1367 when a survey mentions the two
guard rooms and portcullis room, presumably of the outer gatehouse,
were covered in lead, while the constable's chamber and his stable were
tiled. This suggests that the joint inner and outer gateways were
conjoined by the mid fourteenth century at the very latest.
On the ground floor, opposite the spiral stair, is a
bench which probably dates back to the time of the construction of the
elongated gate passageway. The layout of the buildings on either
side of the gatehouse post date the destruction of this part of the
inner ward curtain. Probably they are all Tudor or later,
although the possibility remains that they are earlier. Certainly
it is evident to the rear that the entire range has been raised in
height, the original roof line being below the tops of the current
windows. It is possible that some part of this structure belonged
to the religious community that it has been suggested lived within the
castle site. If so, they would have been removed to the current
site of Leeds priory in 1119. In this case it would seem likely
that a religious community occupied this portion of the area of the
outer ward island, while the Crevecour castle was placed on the island
which is now the gloriette. Certainly the 1735 Buck's print of
the castle shows a much ruined barbican fronting the outer ward, which
looks like one long tithe barn like building with battlements only over
the N end and a gable roof running down the whole structure from there
to the S. This is only broken half way down where the internal
gatetower rises above the roof to form a dormer type roof with a window
within.
Gloriette
From the site of the gatehouse a bridge of two arches, each with a
drawbridge over them, led to the old castle or gloriette, set on a
small, artificial island. The bridge to the gloriette was
repaired in 1367 as too was the water conduit pipe that ran from the
park to the castle. As this was repaired again in 1439 the
implication is that the pipe was probably installed, or repaired,
around the end of the thirteenth century. Running water also seems to have
been installed at Goodrich castle around this time. Once over the
drawbridge the shell keep of the gloriette was entered via a
shoulder-headed doorway set in a small projecting rectangular tower,
now known as the clock tower. The tower originally had a boldly
projecting batter, like the outer gate, as well as the rest of the
gloriette. This batter was at least 17' high.
The ground floor of the gatetower could have been no
more than a gateway, just like the outer gate, but above this was a
chamber or two of which two blocked rectangular windows remain to the
west. These windows also exist to the east, with a third lower
one on
the ground floor. Both upper windows to east and west have been
curtailed by the later string course. The bulk of the masonry
above this string course is later, although the 1822 sketch of the
castle shows that the rectangular windows to east and west at the upper level
are original before the top storey of the tower was added after that
date, replacing a wooden superstructure. The upper string course
is probably later than the lower one, which probably predates the
rebuilding of the corner of the keep in 1438-41 as the course changes
height at this point. The uniform battlements from the new work
onto the bridge to the gloriette are obviously Victorian and are
lacking in the sketch of 1822. The battlements on the gloriette,
however, would appear to be medieval.
A close examination of the bridge suggests that it
originally consisted of a single, tall, central rectangular tower,
similar in dimensions to that of the clock tower. The voids
before and behind this tower were later filed in with masonry to make
the current bridge to the gloriette. The tower, now a part of the
bridge, still stands proud of the masonry that fills the gaps in over
the later arches. There also appears to be a horizontal junction
just above the level of the crown of the arches. It therefore
appears that the entrance to the gloriette began as a rectangular
gatetower with a drawbridge chamber above. These two drawbridges,
one operated from the bridge tower and the other from the clock tower,
were then fitted with stone archways. At a later date still the
gaps between the outer ward and the gatetower and the gatetower and the
clock tower were filled in with masonry which became the rooms visible
today. As the ‘footbridge' to the gloriette is mentioned in
1367 it presupposes that the two drawbridges had become a single bridge
by that date. Presumably it was later still that the bridge was
converted into the long narrow building we see today.
The walls of the gloriette, like the main medieval
castle walls, rise from the lake on a fine batter. This forms an
irregular curve to the N, although the walls rising from the batter are
straight, forming an irregular polygon. Unfortunately the
fenestration has been much altered, but several rectangular loops to
the north could well be original. To the north-west a small semi-circular
turret rises proud with the base of the batter up the wall, the only
noticeable probably medieval portion of the gloriette that projects
from the enceinte further than the gatetower. The projecting bay
windows next to this turret are much later in date and are thought to
be the work of Henry VIII. To east, west and north are corbelled out first
floor chimneys. These are unusual, but the ones at Whittington
barbican can be tentatively dated to the mid thirteenth century. Presumably
these are of a similar date.
The internal buildings of the gloriette have been
much damaged and rebuilt and little of them appears to be
medieval. To the west of the entrance was the chapel, alleged to
have been built or rebuilt by Edward I around 1280, although the castle
was then held by his queen. Such a proposition is just as likely
as not. Regardless, the chapel was heavily rebuilt and altered
into various rooms including a staircase allegedly inserted for Henry
VIII before the death of Sir Henry Guldeford in 1527. The Henry
VIII banqueting hall lay on the west side of the gloriette where the
kitchen was built after the fire caused by Dutch prisoners during the
reign of Charles II. It is possible that this chapel was also
used - or built - as the chantry founded by Edward I soon after the
death of his wife on 28 November 1290.
Central in the east wall of the gloriette is a
rectangular doorway reached from internal ground level via a spiral
stair. From here steps lead down to a vanished wooden causeway
that led to a small, now submerged, island in the lake, which roughly
marked the half way mark to the shore some 100' from the
gloriette. Presumably this was a sallyport of some description
and may date back to the earliest times of the castle. During
Charles II's reign the upper section of the gloriette between the
chimney above the sallyport and the SE corner of the keep collapsed at
first string course level. This was subsequently rebuilt soon
after
1822. The sallyport bridge was rebuilt in the 1930s for easy
access to the gloriette, but was later demolished again.
Although not a fashionable description, the gloriette has all the
attributes of a shell keep, although, like Berkely, it does not stand
on a motte.
Why not join me at Leeds and other British castles this October? Please see the information on tours at Scholarly Sojourns.
Copyright©2017
Paul Martin Remfry
