General Notes

1st Lord Holand of Up holland.  He became a favorite official of Thomas, earl of Lancaster, and thus grew in importance and wealth.  He was a knight in 1307.  He had licence to crenellate his manor house of Upholland in 1308, and that of Bagworth, Leicesterchsire, in 1318.  He was justice of Chester several times between 1307 and 1320; sheriff of Flintshire, Wales, 1307; and governor of Beeston Castle, Cheshire.  He founded a college of priests in the Chapel of St. Thomas at Upholland in 1310.  It was later altered to a priory of Benedictine monks.  He was summoned to Parliament from July 29, 1314, to May 15, 1321, by writs directed Roberto de Holand, whereby he is held to have become lord Holand.  He lost his lands for insurrection with the duke of Lancaster against the King.  In 1313 he was pardoned for his complicity in the death of Piers de Gaveston.  In 1315 he assisted in suppressing the rising of Adam Banastre in Lancashire, and in 1318 was again pardoned for adherence to the earl of Lancaster.  In the earl's final rising in February and March, 1321/22, he is said to have played a ciouwardly or treacherous part.  A story says that he collected 500 men in Lancashire for the earl but brought them to the King instead.  On the earl's flight northward, before the battle of Boroughbridge, he surrendered to the King at Derby, and was sent to Dover Castle, "being hateful to all for having deceived his lord, who had loved him exceedingly and raised him from nothing to be a great man."  He appears, however, to have fought at Boroughbridge, surrendering after the battle.  He was certainly treated as a rebel, all his lands being taken into the King's hands.  At the accession of Edward III he petitioned for restoration, which was granted on December 23, 1327.  On Octgober 7, 1328, he was captured in Boreham Wood, Elstree, Hertfordshire, by some adherents of his patron, Thomas, earl of Lancaster, who, for his treachery, cut off his head.  His head was sent to Henry, earl of Lancaster, at Waltham Cross.  He was a notable benefactor to the church in which he was buried after he was beheaded.