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THE WARRENNES. 285
He was buried with his wife in the Priory Church, at Southover,
near Lewes. An account of the discovery of their coffins on making the
railway is given in Archceologia, vol. xxxi.
His son William succeeded him. He was a supporter of Stephen
in his struggles against the Empress Maud, and, together with Gilbert
de Clare and other famous knights, ran away at the battle of Lincoln,
Candlemas day, 1141, where Stephen was defeated and taken prisoner,
"as soon as they saw their own side shrink." He seems to have then
changed sides, but with equal unsuccess, for he was taken prisoner by
Stephen when he defeated Maud's army near Winchester.
The Earl engaged in one of the Crusades, and died abroad, Lord
the Turks after their
Lyttelton says, when the French were defeated by
leaving Laodicea, his heart only being brought to England and buried at
Lewes. Watson says of him :
" He was a man who may be said not to
"have been a favourite of fortune, for he had the ill-luck to be always
" on the losing side, though when he joined it there was an appearance
" of its being the stronger."
He married Adela, or Ela, daughter of William Talvace Earl of
Ponthieu, and left one daughter, his heiress, Isabel, who married William
de Blois, third and youngest son of King Stephen, who is said to have
been " Dapifer Regis Angliae," i.e. steward of the King's household. He
attended Henry II. in his expedition against Thoulouse, and died there,
October, 1160. At his decease Isabel married Hameline Plantagenet,
natural son of Geoifry Earl of Anjou, and, therefore, illegitimate brother
of the King.
He supported Henry in his disputes with his sons, but carried the
sword of state before Richard at his coronation, and was one of those
who had charge of the 70,000 marks of silver raised for his ransom. He
granted to the Church of St. Mary, of York, thirty wether sheep, and
to the free burgesses of Wakefield a toft of an acre of free burgage for
sixpence rent per annum, with liberty of free trade in all his lands in
Yorkshire, and leave to take from his
wood of Wakefield dead wood for
fuel. Isabel died, 1199, the Earl, 1202, leaving two children, William,
his successor, and Adela, married to Sir William Fitz-William Lord of
Sprotborough. Earl William's memory is still cherished amongst the good
people of Stamford, as the donor to that town of the two meadows* in
which he saw from the castle walls two bulls fighting, in order that
annually, on St. Brice's day, six weeks before Christmas, a bull may be
baited for the diversion of the inhabitants.
I do not know whether the barbarous custom prevails, but in the
History of Stamford, 1822, it is mentioned and defended as "an opportunity
for display of personal courage."
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