Robert de Umfraville

Background and early life

Robert Ufraville was the youngest son of Sir Thomas Umfraville, who died in 1387, and his family had been an important one in Anglo-Scottish relations and on the border since the twelfth century, and had once been styled lords of Angus. They owned much land around the Redesdale area, although both the Scottish wars and the growth of other, newer regional families, such as the Nevilles, had led to a decline in their status by the fifteenth century. Indeed, Sir Robert himself, whilst a minor falling his father's death, served his wardship under the first Neville Earl of Westmorland

Robert Umfraville's career was predominantly a military one. The chronicler John Hardyng reports that Umfraville fough at the Battle of Otterburn in 1388, as part of the contingent of Henry Hotspur (the son of the earl of Northumberland) . This, says Hardyng, was followed by the first of many border raids Umfraville led into Scotland in 1390. These continued following the deposition of King Richard II, and he probably took part in the Battle of Homildon Hill in 1402. In fact, notwithstanding the regime change of 1399, Umfraville's duties remained very much unchanged, and "old truths remained:royal service, local administration and the defence of the realm." He was indentured to join Henry IV's invasion of Scotland in 1400, and continued in defence of the border through the next decade, when Umfraville's expertise in local politics helped him advise the Warden of the Eastern March, the king's son, John, Duke of Lancaster. Umfraville probably acted in the capacity of 'sub-warden' to the duke, in the now by now largely defunct 'middle march.' In 1407, with his young nephew Gilbert Umfraville, he attended the enthronement of the new Bishop of Durham, Thomas Langley.

Umfraville's loyalty to the new regime was appreciated by King Henry IV, who retained him for life for a annuity of forty pounds. At some point he was also knighted by the king; historian Henry Summerson has said this helped 'to ensure his loyalty against the Percys, his former lords' who were growing increasingly dissatisfied with Henry. This paid off for the king, for, in 1405, when Archbishop Scrope rebelled, Umfraville joined the earl of Westmorland in suppressing the uprising at Shipton Moor. Uncommonly for a younger son in the middle ages, and probably another reflection of the high standing in which he stood with the king, in 1408 Umfraville was elected to the Order of the Garter. Umfraville's association with John Harding came about in 1402, when Harding's previous patron, Hotspur, was killed at the Battle of Shrewsbury, and Harding joined Umfraville's service after receiving a royal pardon to do so.

In the 1390s that Umfraville began sitting on Royal Commissions in his home county of Northumberland, and was appointed its Sheriff in 1401. Three years later, the earl of Northumberland gave him the command of Berwick Castle, and Umrfraville received the keeping of Warkworth Castle in 1405, and appointed Hardyng his constable there. He was also granted the lordship of Langley the same year. Following the earl of Northumberland's defeat and death at the Battle of Bramham Moor in 1408, and in acknowledgment of the role Sir Robert played in it, Westmorland re-appointed Umfraville to the keeping of Warkworth.

Robert Umfravile had a close relationship with his nephew Gilbert, the son of Robert's elder brother Thomas, who had died in 1391. Through Gilbert, Robert also had a permanent connection to Ralph, Earl of Westmorland, as Gilbert married Ralph's daughter Anne. Robert was probably responsible for Gilbert's martial training, as the two spent the years of the late 1400s on the border; in 1408 they jointly-led a raid into Teviotdale: Hardynge describes how, Robert was like an "olde dogge [that] hath grete joy to bayte his whelpe." The raids continued, with another soon after on Jedburgh. Robert's service for the king was not confined to the northern border:His service was also not just confined to fighting on land. In 1410, he was appointed lieutenant to Sir Thomas Beaufort,the Admiral of the seas. In this capacity Umfraville commanded a naval force that destroyed Scottish ship sheltered in the Firth of Forth.

The 'Southampton Plot' and service in France

In 1415 he was part of the Agincourt expedition with Henry V of England, fighting at that battle and at the Siege of Harfleur. Henry confirmed him in his £40 annuity at this time. However, Henry Summerson has suggested that the reason for his presence in France rather than on the border was the result of the Southampton Plot. This had been exposed to Henry just before the expedition sailed. Umfraville had been summoned- 'by name'- to the King in August 1415, due to his military importance. This, says Summerson was because Henry suspected Umfraville of "harbouring a residual loyalty to the Percys" and of "thus of being sympathetic to the Southampton plot of 1415, whose aims included a Percy restoration." In July 1411, Umfraville had been appointed Captain of Roxburgh Castle for a six-year term. However, he had been relieved of his appointment just prior to his summons to the King. Since Umfraville was indentured by the king to serve abroad in the following year's campaign, he presumably had cleared himself of suspicion in the king's eyes, and in any case, by 1417 he had returned to the Northumberland and the border. The duke of Albany had launched a "foul raid"- which broke the existing truce- against Berwick that year, and Sir Robert led a series of retaliatory raids against Scotland in revenge.

Later career

Sir Robert had married a woman named Isabella by 1419, when he is recorded as taking membership of the Durham confraternity. He also appears to have been friends with the Prior of Durham, John Wessington, who had not only granted him his letters of confraternity, but had been entrusted by Umfraville with important family title deeds. Umfraville had a certain religious devotion; in 1428, he was licenced to grant his manorof Farnacres, near Newcastle upon Tyne. This, he charged, should be devoted to the souls of himself, his wife, Kings Henry IV and V, and to each past, present and future member of the Order of the Garter.

In 1421 Robert acted as his nephew's executor, following Gilbert's death in the disastrous English defeat at the Battle of Baugé. From his nephew, Umfraville inherited the Redesdale and Kyme estates; he had already lost his lordship of Langley in 1414 when the second Earl of Northumberland was restored to his patrimony. It was with this Henry Percy that Sir Robert spent much of the remainder of his military career. His duites involved presiding over the Warden's Marcher Court, negotiating temporary truces, attending peace conferences, and travelling on embassies. He also continued to keep the peace in his home county as well, for example helping to arbitrate the dispute between the Northumberland gentry families of Heron and Manners between 1428 and 1431, although as a feoffee to Sir William Heron, Sir Robert took the part of his wife after Heron was killed. In this arbitration, Prior wessington acted as a umpire. In Umfraville's own words, he wished to see 'gude rest and pece to be had in the cuntre.'

Since Gilbert had been his closest relative, and Rbert and Isabelle had had no children, his estates passed to a distant relative, Sir William Tailboys. How much these lands were actually worth, however, Summerson has queried: although his manors around Redesdale covered over 25,000 acres, Scotland and England were in a state of war, and so it is likely, he suggests, that they had been greatly ravaged. Possibly the only lands of Umfraville's that were worth their full value at the time, he says, were those in Lincolnshire, which could have been worth up to £400 per annum.

Death and contemporary perception

He by now something of a fifteenth-century hero: in 1426 the King's Council, on behalf of the then four-year old King Henry VI, had written to him, thanking him for his "great and notable services … to your most renowned honour and praise and to the advantage of us and our whole realm," whilst John Hardyng called Umfraville "a Jewell for a kynge, in wyse consayle and knyghtly dede of werre." Sir Robert received his last commission to organise a truce with Scotland in March 1436 and died on 27 January the following year. He was buried in Newminster Abbey, where his wife, who died less than two years' later, 1438, was buried beside him.