Bernard de Brus

Text: It is sometimes stated in print that Bernard de Brus (died 1268), of Exton, Rutland was a younger son of Robert de Brus, Knt. (died 1295), Lord of Annandale (nicknamed The Competitor), by his 1st wife, Isabel de Clare [see, for example, Burke, Gen. Hist. of the Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited & Extinct Peerages (1866): 80-81 (sub Bruce)]. VCH Rutland 2 (1935): 128 and VCH Rutland 3 (1936): 144-151, however, correctly place Bernard as a child of the previous generation of the Brus family, he being the son of an earlier Robert de Brus, Knt. (living 1221, died before 23 Jan. 1225/6), lord of Annandale in Scotland, by his wife, Isabel of Huntingdon (died 1252) [also see Wright Hist. & Antiqs. of Rutland (1684): 51 (Brus ped.); Wright, Rutland Mag. & County Hist. Rec. 3 (1908): 97-106; Blakely "Scottish Bruses and the English Crown" (13th Cent. England 9) (2003): 101-113]. Bernard de Brus married Constance de Merston, widow of John Morteyn, and daughter of Ralph de Merston, of Merston, Bedfordshire [see NEHGR 79 (1925): 135]. At some unknown date, VCH Rutland indicates Bernard de Brus was enfeoffed by his mother, Isabel of Huntingdon, of the manors of Conington and Exton, Rutland, which estates were part of Isabel's inheritance. He subsequently forfeited his lands by taking part against the king in the Barons' War [see Cal. Inq. Misc. 1 (1916): 239, 262; Hunter, Rot. Select. p. 253; Rot. Hund. (Rec. Comm.), ii, pp. 652-653]. Presumably Bernard was also enfeoffed by his mother with her share of lands in Buecesford, Donington, and Golksby, Lincolnshire, as in 1266 Bernard was holding lands there with his cousin, Henry de Hastings, Knt., son of Ada of Huntingdon, who was another of the Huntingdon co-heirs [see Cal. Inq. Misc. 1 (1916): 239]. Blakely, Brus Family in England & Scotland 1100?1295 (2005): 162 states that the evidence for Bernard de Brus being the brother of Robert de Brus the Competitor is "purely circumstantial." In 1283 Bernard's son and heir, Bernard de Brus, Knt., gave the monks of St. Andrew of Northampton the church of Exton, Rutland and also confirmed an earlier gift of pasture in Exton for eight animals given to the monks by his grandmother, Isabel de Brus, which gift was made in her widowhood. For transcripts of the charter of the younger Bernard de Brus and also that of his grandmother, Isabel de Brus, see Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, 14 (1880): 345-346, which may be viewed at the following weblink: http://books.google.com/books?id=6I0vAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA345. The 1283 charter confirms that the elder Bernard de Brus was the son of Isabel of Huntingdon.