Manor of Bratton Fleming

The Manor of Bratton Fleming was a medieval manor estate in Bratton Fleming, Devon, England.

In the Domesday Book of 1086 the manor of "Brotone" was one of over one hundred west country manors held in chief by Robert, Count of Mortain (c. 1031 – 1090), half-brother of William the Conqueror. His tenant in the following of his manors in Devon and Cornwall was one of his knights named "Erchenbald":

Erchenbald is nowhere described in the Domesday Book as Flandrensis, le Fleming or by any other term denoting "of Flanders". Tristram Risdon (died 1640) describes him as Erchenbald Flandrensis in his paragraph concerning the descent of Croyde, which strictly is inaccurate. However, it is certain that he was Flandrensis from the evidence of the names of his descendants. "Stephen son of Erchenbald" occurs in Devon in 1139 and "Erchenbald son of Stephen" occurs as holder of several knight's fees in Devon and Cornwall in the 1166 Liber Niger ("Return of the Barons"). The lands of Robert, Count of Mortain, became the core holdings of the feudal barony of Launceston, and the Fleming family continued to hold most of their manors from that barony, as can be seen from entries in the Book of Fees.

Erchenbald (or "Archembald") le Fleming of Bratton Fleming derived his surname due to his birth in Flanders, and came to England during the reign of William I. He was succeeded by his son, Stephen (fl. 1145), whose son, Archembald, came to Ireland with Henry II in 1171 and participated in Hugh de Lacy's plantation of the Kingdom of Mide. On the west side of the hill of Slane in Ireland there are the remains of a twelfth-century motte and bailey which was the settlement, destroyed by the Irish in 1176. Succeeding Flemings were Stephen, died c. 1213 – 1214 and Baldwin, died 1260. In the Book of Fees Baldwin "le Fleming" is listed as holding lands in "Crideho" (Croyde) and also in "Bratton cum membris" (with its members), both by then fees held from the feudal barony of Launceston. He also held Alverdiscott, and held Benton and Haxton, from the feudal barons of Bradninch. Baldwin's son, Richard, is the first of whom some substantial information exists. He married Mary/Maria Martin, daughter of Sir Nicholas FitzMartin the Younger (died 1260), jure uxoris feudal baron of Barnstaple. Richard died in 1301 but it is unknown when his wife died. Their son, Baldwin (died 1335), married Matilda/Maude de Genville, daughter of Sir Simon de Genville of Trim. Baldwin was summoned to parliament at Kilkenny in 1309 and was thereby deemed to have become the 1st Baron Slane (or Baron le Fleming). They were the parents of Simon Fleming, 2nd Baron Slane, who died on 13 September 1370. On the death unmarried and without progeny of Christopher Fleming, 5th Baron Slane (son of John Fleming (who predeceased his father Sir Christopher Fleming, 4th Baron) by his wife Amy Rochfort), his two sisters became his co-heirs to his Devon estates, the Irish estates passing under tail-male to David Fleming, uncle of the half blood to the fifth and last Christopher Lord le Fleming; which David was summoned to, and sat in the parliament of King Edward the Fourth, by the title of Lord David Fleming, Baron of Slane, and thus became a peer by a new writ of creation. The title Baron Slane (or le Fleming) of the 1st creation went into abeyance between the 5th Baron's two sisters, and was still in abeyance in 1835 when a petition for the peerage was heard in the House of Lords (the "Slane Peerage case"):

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