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1. Shuffling the sheriffs, 1234 and 1236

Richard Cassidy is a doctoral student at King’s College London. His thesis, an edition of the Pipe Roll for 1258–1259, will be published by the Pipe Roll Society. Here, he demonstrates how important the fine rolls are in understanding the management of the shires and the shifting policies and personalities of the 1230s, a period of intense innovation at the heart of government.

⁋1The personal rule of Henry III began with a major reshuffle of the sheriffs, in May and June 1234. Two years later, there was another reshuffle, combined with a redefinition of the sheriffs’ responsibilities. The patent rolls record the sheriffs’ appointments, but the fine rolls provide more information about the terms on which the sheriffs took office, and the way in which this changed in the course of these two years.

⁋2Robert Stacey drew attention to the information on sheriffs’ appointments in the 1235/36 fine roll, but little use has been made of the rolls for other years in this period. ¹ The pipe rolls reflect the terms of appointment, but none have been published for the years between 1230 and 1242. With the Fine Rolls Project making the images and translation of the rolls for these years available, it is now much easier to gather together some of this scattered information.

⁋3The table below shows the sheriffs’ appointments recorded on the patent rolls for the regnal years 1233–37, and the corresponding entries on the fine rolls, as well as a few patent roll entries referring to sheriffs who were appointed earlier, but who crop up in the fine rolls of these years. As will be seen, there were new sheriffs for all except the few anomalous counties which stood outside the normal pattern of local government. ² The table should serve both as a checklist, and as an alternative to excessive footnoting, by providing the relevant references. ³

⁋4The 1234 reshuffle followed the dismissal of Peter des Roches and Peter de Rivallis, who had briefly secured a near-monopoly of office and power. Their regime ended with the revolt of Richard Marshal, and the threat of renewed civil war. Marshal and Prince Llywellyn seized Shrewsbury. Marshal’s supporter Richard Siward freed the former justiciar Hubert de Burgh from prison, and raided southern England, destroying the manors of the king’s ministers. Peace was restored by the intervention of the newly-elected archbishop of Canterbury, Edmund Rich. The hated ministers were dismissed, and new sheriffs were appointed in most counties.

⁋5The sheriffs were significant, indeed vital, elements in the structure of government. They proclaimed and enforced the policies of central government in each county, they were responsible for law and order, they collected revenue, and they administered royal estates – in particular, those parts of the royal demesne which were still under sheriffs’ control, although by this time much of the demesne had been granted away in return for secular or religious support, or farmed out. Sheriffs were often responsible for castles and forests in their counties. At the county court and on their regular tourns around the hundreds, they embodied the authority of the state throughout England. ⁴ In return for these responsibilities, their traditional reward was to help themselves to any revenue they could extract from their counties, over and above a fixed annual sum, known as the farm. The farm had remained virtually unchanged since the early years of Henry II’s reign, but, from time to time, central government would try to ensure that it received at least some of these extra revenues, by imposing a fixed annual increment, to be paid in addition to the farm. Alternatively, a sheriff might be appointed as a custodian, rather than a farmer. As custodian, the sheriff was paid a fixed sum to look after the county, and accounted at the Exchequer for all the revenues; these accounts, the particule, set out the details of all the income received in the county, from royal estates, county and hundred courts, view of frankpledge, and traditional payments such as the sheriff’s aid. The pipe roll would record the custodian sheriff’s payment into the Exchequer in two parts, as an amount matching the fixed farm, and any additional revenue, described as profit. ⁵

⁋6Some of the appointments in the spring of 1234 were just movements of familiar faces to new places: Ralph fitz Nicholas, the steward, was already sheriff of Nottinghamshire, and took over Leicestershire as well; his brother Henry fitz Nicholas moved from Somerset to Hampshire; Robert de Hay had been under-sheriff of Shropshire, and moved up to sheriff; Henry of Bath held Gloucestershire briefly, before moving to Northamptonshire; the great survivor, Engelard de Cigogné, who had been king John’s sheriff of Gloucestershire (and had been banned by the 1215 Magna Carta from holding office ever again), made the short journey from Oxfordshire to Berkshire. Some of the displaced sheriffs were too closely associated with the former regime: William de Holewell’, sheriff of Essex, so much so that he had been kidnapped and held to ransom by Richard Siward. ⁶ Many of the new ones were associated with the court, and particularly with two of the household stewards, Ralph fitz Nicholas and Godfrey of Crowcombe. Crowcombe had been sheriff of Oxfordshire before Engelard, and the county was now held by Crowcombe’s nephew, John le Brun. ⁷

⁋7The new appointments were made from the centre, except for Somerset and Dorset, where the men of those counties paid a fine of four palfreys to elect their sheriff, as provided by King John’s charter, and six palfreys to have the charter confirmed; they presented a list of three names, from whom the king chose Thomas of Cirencester, who had been sheriff before, in 1232–33.

⁋8In all but two cases, the patent rolls tell us little more than that the sheriffs were appointed to the custody of their counties, to hold office at the king’s pleasure (rather than for a fixed term, or for life). Engelard de Cigogné’s terms for holding Berkshire are recorded out of sequence, in letters patent dated May 1234 listed among the letters for the following November, suggesting that there was some reason for making a special record of them in both sets of rolls. The appointment of Aymer de St Amand (another household steward) to Herefordshire is in the patent roll for May, with his terms in a separate entry in June, but not in the fine rolls. ⁸ There is nothing about the terms on which the sheriffs were appointed in 1234 to Cambridgeshire, Devon, Gloucestershire, Somerset, Surrey and Yorkshire; for Northamptonshire and Shropshire the patent rolls merely say that the sheriff is to answer to the king for the issues of the county. That apart, it is in the fine rolls that the sheriffs’ terms are to be found.

⁋9The appointments were made in April and May 1234 (except for Kent, where an existing sheriff was retained), and the fine rolls provide the following details for the counties involved, many on somewhat later dates:

⁋10In other words, there is no consistent pattern. In some cases the sheriff acts as a straightforward farmer, paying a fixed amount each year and supporting himself from any surplus revenue; in others, the sheriff is a paid custodian of the county, receiving a fixed sum and paying over all the revenue; and then there are compromises, concerning the custody of castles, some unpaid, some paid from general revenue, and some paid from specific castle ward income. Some indication of the approach which the new sheriffs were expected to adopt can be found in a letter from Henry to all the sheriffs later in 1234. It spelled out the limits on holding the sheriff’s tourn and hundred courts too frequently, pointing out that Henry had promised this in his charter (a reference to chapter 35 of the 1225 Magna Carta). ¹⁰ This may indicate that sheriffs had previously abused these arrangements, and that the 1234 appointments were intended to change policies as well as personalities. ¹¹

⁋11Over the next two years, there were a few amendments to these arrangements. In October 1235, Bedfordshire changed from sheriff Ralph fitz Reginald being paid 40 m. a year, to William de Beauchamp offering custody at his own expense – farming the county, rather than being paid – for 1235/36. Jeremias of Caxton, sheriff of Cambridgeshire, paid a fine of one palfrey to have a new deal: he had paid a fixed increment of 50 m. for 1234/35, but switched in October 1235 to being custodian, answering for all the issues of the county (and then in October 1236, another palfrey to go back to answering at the Exchequer for 50 m. increment for 1235/36). In Essex, also in October 1235, William of Culworth changed in the other direction, from a custodian receiving 50 m. a year, to making fixed payments of £15 increment for 1234/35, and £10 a year thereafter. Bertram de Criel had been sheriff of Kent for some years, and kept the county at his own cost until Michaelmas 1234, when he changed to paying increment of £40 a year. The increment for Lincolnshire rose from £100 to £200, in addition to the traditional farm, when Robert Wolf was appointed in December 1235. Again, each county was treated differently.

⁋12The problems of extracting revenue from sheriffs were demonstrated by Richard de Gray. He was sheriff of Northumberland for the first half of 1235/36, appointed as custodian on 22 October 1235. He then failed to turn up at the Exchequer to present his accounts at the end of the financial year, and in November 1236 had to admit that he could not answer for the issues of the county, nor present particule for the time when he was sheriff, for which he should answer as custodian of the county, and placed himself on the king’s mercy. ¹²

⁋13It was only in the spring of 1236 that a new and consistent approach was adopted, as part of a radical overhaul of local government and finance. This was linked to the rise to prominence at court of William of Savoy, the bishop-elect of Valence. He came to England with his niece, queen Eleanor, and swiftly displaced the stewards who had dominated the court for the previous two years. Ralph fitz Nicholas lost his post at court, and lost the counties held by him, his brother and his supporters. Godfrey of Crowcombe’s influence was also reduced, and he lost effective control of Oxfordshire. Instead of curial sheriffs, their replacements came from the ranks of local gentry and magnates. ¹³ The change was welcomed by Matthew Paris, who thought that all the sheriffs had been replaced, because they had been corrupted and strayed from the path of virtue. ¹⁴

⁋14It was not quite that far-reaching, but in April and May 1236 there was a wave of new appointments – Worcestershire, Hampshire, Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Norfolk, Leicestershire, Devon, Northamptonshire, Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire, Essex, Northumberland and Cumberland – all on essentially the same terms. The sheriff was to have custody of the county so long as it pleased the king, answering at the Exchequer for all the revenue, while the royal manors and demesne in those counties were to be removed from the sheriff’s sources of income, and retained in the king’s hands.

⁋15This was the beginning of an experiment in centralized administration of the royal demesne, increasing both income and investment. ¹⁵ As farmers, sheriffs had had no incentive to maximize revenue to the Exchequer, or to invest for the long term. They had paid the fixed farm and the fixed profit, and pocketed any additional income from the demesne. The new system took the demesne away from sheriffs, without offering any compensation, showing how little a contribution the demesne had made to Exchequer income under the old system.

⁋16The only differences among the counties with new sheriffs in the spring of 1236 were in the treatment of castles: in most cases, the sheriff was to keep custody of the castle or castles in his county, and answer at the Exchequer for any associated revenue; in Hampshire, Geoffrey de Lisle was to receive 40 m. a year for custody; the sheriff of Berkshire lost custody of Windsor and Odiham castles; and in Oxfordshire, Robert de Amary was appointed in April, to receive the revenue from the king’s mill in return for custody of Oxford castle, but was quickly replaced by Walter of Tew, then John of Tew in May, with the mill retained in the king’s hands.

⁋17Several of these appointments – Hampshire, Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Norfolk, Leicestershire, Devon, Cumberland – were recorded in the fine roll under the same date as the record in the patent roll. This is unlike the 1234 appointments, where the entries in the fine roll are generally several months after the appointment recorded in the patent roll. Also unlike 1234, the fine roll adds little detail to the information recorded in the patent roll. ¹⁶ It is only incidentally that we learn in October 1236, when Brian fitz Ralph lost custody of Pickering castle, that he had been granted £100 for custody of Yorkshire. ¹⁷ Other sheriffs’ allowances were still being settled throughout the following year: John of Tew to receive £20 a year from the profit of Oxfordshire; Thomas of Cirencester in Somerset to receive 100 m. a year, from Easter 1235 onwards – this was not recorded until Easter term of 1237; 30 m. for custody of Leicestershire for the year from May 1236. ¹⁸

⁋18Meanwhile, counties continued to change hands, with appointments recorded on the patent roll. In two of the five counties with new sheriffs appointed in 1236/37 (Bedfordshire and Wiltshire), it is explicitly stated that the demesne is retained in the king’s hands. ¹⁹ In others, the demesne is not mentioned. Only in Herefordshire, where Aymer de St Amand was re-appointed, is there mention of a payment to the sheriff for custody of the county (80 m. a year, the same as it had been in 1234).

⁋19The office had been one which was worth paying for, attractive to court officials. Without the prospect of exploiting county revenues to enrich the farmer, rather than the Exchequer, the role was now held by local men, who received an allowance for their custody of the county and castle, leaving the demesne in the hands of professional administrators.

⁋20There had also been a change in administrative arrangements. The allowances which the sheriffs of 1236 and 1237 were to receive for their work as custodians are often left unmentioned on the patent or fine rolls. The terms for the wave of sheriffs appointed in the spring of 1236 were recorded separately, perhaps because so many were appointed at once. ²⁰ No sheriffs’ appointments are recorded in the fine roll for 1236/37. However, for the appointments of the early 1230s, the fine rolls add considerably to our knowledge of the relationship between central government and the sheriffs, and of the way in which county revenues were exploited.