Richard de Redvers - Life To 1100

Life To 1100

Little is known for certain of the Redvers family before Richard. In his Baronage of England (1675–6), William Dugdale wrongly identified Richard de Redvers with Richard the son of Baldwin FitzGilbert (also known as Baldwin de Meules) who was sheriff of Devon under William the Conqueror. This error was still being repeated in the late 19th century. In around 1890 The Complete Peerage advanced the alternative theory that Richard de Redvers was the son of William de Vernon, but later research has cast doubt on this too, suggesting that all that can be said is that his father may have been Baldwin, one of three brothers named Redvers in Normandy in 1060; the other brothers being William, and Richard, who died in that year. Similarly nothing is known of Richard's early life. The Norman poet Wace, writing c.1170, mentions a "sire de Reviers" as one of those who accompanied William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings, but it is not known if this was Richard de Reviers.

The first clear references to Richard start to appear in the mid 1080s. In the Domesday Book (1086) he is recorded as holding one manor, that of Mosterton in Dorset which he may have been given for serving in William the Conqueror's army of 1066. Mortestorne (as Mosterton was then known) was held by Almer before 1066. It had arable land, a mill, 30 acres of meadow and a large area of woodland and was valued at £12.

According to Wace, in 1089 de Redvers was in the service of Robert Curthose, but was allowed to join his younger brother Henry's retinue at Henry's request. William the Conqueror had bequeathed Normandy to his eldest son Robert, but Henry had bought parts of it from him—including the Cotentin where Néhou, the de Redvers principal possession, was located. Since de Redvers also owned land in the Vexin which was retained by Robert, he had two lords, and evidently chose to support the one under whom his main property lay. From 1090 when Henry fell out with both his older brothers, Richard de Redvers was unswerving in his support of Henry, so much so that he was mentioned by both Orderic Vitalis and William of Jumièges in their chronicles.

Richard's manor at Mosterton does not appear in the Redvers family records after about 1090 and it may therefore have been forfeited due to his support of Henry against William II. The manor passed to the Blount family which held it until the end of the 14th century.