General Notes

Joan, w. of Sir Reginald de Valletort, had at least one illegitimate child with Richard [meaning Richard de Cornwall].  [Ancestral Roots]


Jeanne de Valletort.  [Burke's Peerage]

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The following post to SGM, 10 Sep 1998, by John Carmi Parsons, has Joan as wife of Ralph de Valletort, younger brother of Reginald de Valletort (who m. Joan Basset).

From: John Carmi Parsons (jparsons@chass.utoronto.ca)
Subject: Joan de Valletort and Richard of Cornwall
Newsgroups: soc.genealogy.medieval
Date: 1998/09/10

This material is intended primarily for Todd Farmerie but will be of general interest.

On the marriages of Joan de Valletort/Vautort, mistress of Richard of Cornwall and the mother of at least one of his illegitimate children, Joan wife of Richard Champernowne of Modbury [**Note: This post, which seems to say that Richard Champernoun's wife was a daughter of Richard of Cornwall, is I think in error on that point.  Richard Champernoun's wife is said to be a half-sister of James de Okeston by this Joan.**]:

Joan's parentage is unknown.  She must not be confused with the Joan Basset of Headington who married our Joan's elder brother Reginald de Vautort (d.s.p. 1245/46).  On the Vautorts see Sanders, _English Baronies_, pp. 90-91.  It may be noted that shortly after the death of Joan's son Reginald de Vautort, his heir for the barony of Trematon, an uncle Roger (d. 1298?) sold the entire barony to Richard of Cornwall himself.

Our Joan's first husband was Ralph de Valletort/Vautort of Trematon d. 1256, younger son but ultimately heir of Roger de V. of Trematon d. 1206? by his wife Alice (parentage unknown).  By Ralph Joan had one son, Reginald, still underage 1257, d. by 1269 (Sanders says 1270).  Joan de Vautort was living 1299 by which time she had also married, before Feb. 1270, Alexander de Oxton/ Okeston and then Andrew de Trellek/Trelluk (E.B. Powley, _The House of de la Pomeray_ [Liverpool, 1944], pp. 36-37).

At the morrow of All Souls' at the end of 5 Edw I (= CE 1277), Andrew de Treslok and Joan de Vautort his wife had an action before the Exchequer touching Joan's dower lands from her marriage to Ralph de Vautort (Plea roll of the Exchequer 6 Edw I, Public Record Office E13/6 m. 6r).  So by Nov. 1277 Alexander de Okeston was dead and Joan had already married Trellek.

I am not sure, however, that Joan de Vautort/Okeston/Trellek was the mother of all Richard of Cornwall's illegitimate children.  Certainly Joan Champernowne was her daughter, and probably her son was the Richard de Cornwalle who is said to have fallen at Berwick in 1297, leaving issue by Joan [fitz Alan of Oswestry?] his wife (Reade, _The House of Cornwewall [1908]). 

Richard of Cornwall's son Philip, however, occurs as a cleric in 1248, when he was dispensed to hold an additional benefice with cure of souls.  This must mean that he was of canonical age to be a fully ordained priest, which at that time meant at least 25 years old.  So he could not have been born any later than ca 1223, which obviously means Richard of Cornwall, b. 1209, must have fathered him at a very early age indeed (which is by no means impossible).

The dates and careers of Richard of Cornwall's other natural children do not conform closely to the supposition that they were born so early in his life, and I tend to think they were sired during one of Richard's periods of widowhood, either between the death of his first wife Isabella Marshal in 1240 and his second marriage to Sancha of Provence in 1243, or after Sancha died in 1261 and before his 1269 third marriage to Beatrix von Falkenberg.

John Parsons