Sir Ralph de Gorges, 1st Baron Gorges of Wraxall

Was made Baron by the Westminster Parliament on March 4, 1309. He was a great soldier and close companion of the King. His role as one of the foremost Chieftains who in 1300 assisted in the assault that came to be known as the 'seige of Carlaverock' was celebrated in minstrelry with the following:

• "Sir Ralph de Georges there I saw
• One newly bound to Knighthoods law
• Down on the earth was prostrate thrown
• More than once struck by some great stone
• Or staggered by the rushing crowd
• Still to recede he was too proud
• Upon his arms and surcoats fold
• Was Mascally of blue and gold."

(see "De Georges from Gaurges in the Cotentin, Normandy, 1065", p. 17)

He was marshal of the army under Edward I. in the wars in Gascony in 1293, at which time he was made a prisoner by the French. In 1301 he held a Knight¹s fee in Braunton, co. Devon. At the siege of Caerlaverock in 1300 he was one of the foremost in the assault. In 1303 he had a grant of a yearly market in his manor of Siditon, co. Dorset, attended tournaments in 1308 and 9, the latter in opposition to Gaveston: was summoned to Parliament as a Baron (Lord Gorges) by writs 1308 to 1322, is mentioned in the ŒNomina Villarum,¹ 1315-16, as in possessio of Wrokeshale with the hamlets of Charleton, Bratton, and Naylese. He died in 1323-4, 17 Edward II., seixed of the Manor of Wrokeshale, which he held by Knight¹s service of Hugh de Courtenay, feudal Baron of Oakhampton, and of two Knight¹s fees to the King in capite.

Sources

1. Complete Peerage of England Scotland Ireland Great Britain and the United Kingdom, by G. E Cokayne, Sutton Publishing Ltd, 2000. Page: VI:9-12

LinksFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Baron Gorges was a title created in the Peerage of England in 1309 for the soldier Sir Ralph de Gorges (died 1323) of Wraxall in Somerset, who was summoned to Parliament from 4 March 1309 by writs directed Radulpho de Gorges, whereby he is held to have become Baron Gorges.[1] Following the death of his son the childless 2nd Baron in 1344, the title became abeyant between the descendants of the latter's two younger sisters Eleanor Russell and Joan Cheyney.[2]

Barons Gorges (1309) Ralph de Gorges, 1st Baron Gorges (died 1323), who in 1301 married a certain Eleanor,[3] according to Gorges (1944) "rather a formidable dame" and probably the daughter and heiress of Sir John Ferre, of Gascon ancestry, who held lands in Lincolnshire and bore as canting arms a fer-de-moline similar in appearance to a cross moline, a motif which appears on Eleanor's seal surrounding a shield of Gorges modern.[4] Following Gorges's death she remarried to Sir John Peche. Ralph de Gorges, 2nd Baron Gorges (1308-1344), only son and heir. In 1330 he married a certain Elizabeth but died without issue, leaving his three sisters as his co-heiresses, namely:[5] Elizabeth de Gorges, wife of Sir Robert Assheton I of Pitney, Somerset, and mother of Sir Robert Assheton II (d.1384), Justiciar of Ireland, Treasurer of the Exchequer, Chancellor, etc. She inherited the Gorges manors of Bradpool and Litton in Dorset, but died without surviving issue;

1356 seal of Eleanor de Gorges, widow of Sir Theobald Russell, drawn from seal in British Library ("Cotton Charter XXIX, 37 Charter and seal of Eleanor de Gorges, 14th c. f.37") Eleanor de Gorges, wife of Sir Theobald Russell of Kingston Russell in Dorset. She inherited the Gorges manors of Wraxall and Knighton in the Isle of Wight. Her eldest son and heir Ralph Russell was the father of Sir Maurice Russell (1356-1416) of Kingston Russell and of Dyrham in Gloucestershire, twice a Member of Parliament for Gloucestershire and four times Sheriff of Gloucestershire. To her younger son Theobald de Gorges, she gave her paternal manor of Wraxall, on condition that he should adopt the surname and arms of Gorges in lieu of his patronymic.[6] He is the ancestor of Sir Thomas Gorges (1536-1610) of Longford Castle in Wiltshire (son of Sir Edward Gorges of Wraxall, by either his first or second wife, namely Mary Newton or Mary Poyntz), Groom of the Chamber to Queen Elizabeth I and father of Edward Gorges, 1st Baron Gorges (1582/3-1652) of Dundalk; also the ancestor of Sir Ferdinando Gorges (c. 1565/88-1647) a naval and military commander, the second son of Edward Gorges of Wraxall, by his wife Cicely Lygon. Joan de Gorges, who inherited the Gorges manor of Tothill in Lincolnshire, and married (as his second wife) Sir William Cheyney (d.1345), by whom she had a son Ralph Cheyney (born 1338).[7] See also Gorges family Sources Gorges, Raymond & Brown, Frederick, Rev., FSA. The Story of a Family through Eleven Centuries, Illustrated by Portraits and Pedigrees: Being a History of the Family of Gorges, Boston, USA, (Merrymount Press privately published), 1944. (RG also editor of The letters of Thomas Gorges, Deputy Governor of the Province of Maine, 1640-1643 and author of Ernest Harold Baynes: Naturalist and Crusader, Boston, 1928) Cokayne, G. E., H. A. Doubleday, Duncan Warrand, Lord Howard de Walden, eds., The Complete Peerage, or a history of the House of Lords and all its members from the earliest times (Gordon to Hustpierpoint), Vol.6, 2nd ed., London, 1926, pp.9-15, Baron Gorges References

Cokayne, Complete Peerage, Vol.VI, pp.9-10

Cokayne, Complete Peerage, Vol.VI, p.13

Cokayne, Complete Peerage, Vol.VI, p.11

Gorges, p.33

Cokayne, Complete Peerage, Vol.VI, p.12

Cokayne, Complete Peerage, Vol.VI, p.13

Cokayne, Complete Peerage, Vol.VI, p.13

* http://www.celtic-casimir.com/webtree/19/35959.htm

• http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=jweber&id...