Robert Waterton

Robert Waterton, (c. 1360 – 17 January 1425) was a trusted servant of the House of Lancaster under three monarchs, Henry IV, Henry V, and Henry VI. As Constable of Pontefract Castle, he had custody of Richard II after that king was deposed.

Robert Waterton, likely born circa 1360, was the son of John Waterton of Waterton, Lincolnshire and Joan, daughter of Peter de Mauley, 2nd Baron Mauley. He had a brother, John Waterton, and was a nephew of Sir Hugh Waterton.

Like his uncle Sir Hugh Waterton, he entered the service of Henry Bolingbroke, the future Henry IV. In 1391 he was appointed Master Forester at Pontefract Castle, and in that year accompanied Bolingbroke to the siege of Vilnius. He was with Bolingbroke when he returned to Vilnius in the following year. From 1392 he received a yearly fee from Bolingbroke of £6 13s 4d, and in 1398 Bolingbroke granted him an additional annuity of 10 marks. In 1399 he was Steward and Constable at Pontefract, as well as Constable at Tickhill Castle and Castle Donnington, positions which 'made him a dominant figure in the West Riding of Yorkshire and in north Nottinghamshire'. He remained in these posts despite Richard II's confiscation of Bolingbroke's estates after the death of John of Gaunt in 1399. In June of that year Waterton was among the first of Bolingbroke's retainers to join him at Ravenspur, where he arrived with two hundred foresters, although according to a speech by the Earl of Northumberland in Shakespeare's Richard II (Act II, scene i), Waterton was among those who sailed with Bolingbroke from the continent: