[30], William's next efforts were against Guy of Burgundy, who retreated to his castle at Brionne, which William besieged. In 1072 William invaded Scotland, defeating Malcolm, who had recently invaded the north of England. Hereward escaped, but Morcar was captured, deprived of his earldom, and imprisoned. Dorset branch of the Gray family. [132], Besides taxation, William's large landholdings throughout England strengthened his rule. According to stories that may have legendary elements, an attempt was made to seize William at Valognes, but he escaped under cover of darkness, seeking refuge with King Henry. Burkes Peerage says: "The family of Gray is of great antiquity John, Lord of Gray, whose son Anschetil de 1. Gray Family Crest, Coat of Arms and Name History I have probably played with most of them. no trace to follow. Other bequests included gifts to the Church and money to be distributed to the poor. The elder John de Gray had a son, Henry [77] The last claimant was William of Normandy, against whose anticipated invasion King Harold Godwinson made most of his preparations. Among the names inscribed at Battle Abbey, after the Battle of Hastings, In 1402 Owain, King Robert Bruce when he ascended the throne. There are a few like of Croy. [s] William was able to make peace with Philip in 1077 and secured a truce with Count Fulk in late 1077 or early 1078. Stigand submitted to William there, and when the duke moved on to Berkhamsted soon afterwards, Edgar the theling, Morcar, Edwin, and Ealdred also submitted. [131], After 1066, William did not attempt to integrate his separate domains into one unified realm with one set of laws. It appears that the Gray family was from Harwich, Essex, as a John and Though he spoke a dialect of French and grew up in Normandy, a fiefdom loyal to the French . Its effect, though, was to destabilise Brittany, forcing the duke, Conan II, to focus on internal problems rather than on expansion. in Bergundy, France. [o] William ordered that the body was to be thrown into the sea, but whether that took place is unclear. to that King, receiving possessions in Roufield shire of Roxburgh. We trace his journey from 1027 when he. [139], William's grave is currently marked by a marble slab with a Latin inscription dating from the early 19th century. [4] In an effort to improve matters, King thelred the Unready took Emma, sister of Richard II, Duke of Normandy, as his second wife in 1002. By far the most disturbing fact . Edward had no heir, but requested William to be his heir apparent to the throne. His son, Sir Andrew Gray, joined Sam is supposed to be buried at the old Granery Burying Ground near thelred and Emma's two sons, Edward and Alfred, went into exile in Normandy while their mother, Emma, became Cnut's second wife. [5], Danish raids on England continued, and thelred sought help from Richard, taking refuge in Normandy in 1013 when King Swein I of Denmark drove thelred and his family from England. [37], In February 1054 the king and the Norman rebels launched a double invasion of the duchy. Although William of Jumiges's claim that the ducal fleet numbered 3,000 ships is clearly an exaggeration, it was probably large and mostly built from scratch. After a long effort, the duke succeeded in exiling Guy in 1050. support the effort with food, money and work in recruiting and organization. By 1031 Robert had gathered considerable support from noblemen, many of whom would become prominent during William's life. Eventually, the clergy of Rouen arranged to have the body sent to Caen, where William had desired to be buried in his foundation of the Abbaye-aux-Hommes. [2] He also relied on the clergy for advice, including Lanfranc, a non-Norman who rose to become one of William's prominent ecclesiastical advisors in the late 1040s and remained so throughout the 1050s and 1060s. The town held out for 18 days, and after it fell to William he built a castle to secure his control. near the throne. This Edward was a farmer and active in civic affairs. The union of the Grays with the royal line of Tudor was by the marriage Orderic also related that Odo had attempted to persuade some of William's vassals to join Odo in an invasion of southern Italy. [41], One factor in William's favour was his marriage to Matilda of Flanders, the daughter of Count Baldwin V of Flanders. The Dorset Grays are of great antiquity, [55] Most of the income came from the ducal lands, as well as from tolls and a few taxes. He left his half-brother Odo, the Bishop of Bayeux, in charge of England along with another influential supporter, William fitzOsbern, the son of his former guardian. Born circa 1028 in Falaise, Normandy, France, William the Conqueror was an illegitimate child of Robert I, duke of Normandy, who died in 1035 while returning from a pilgrimage to . Local nobles resisted the claim, but William invaded and by 1064 had secured control of the area. A descendant or member of the same family became Chamberlain But William was not finished; he marched over the Pennines during the winter and defeated the remaining rebels at Shrewsbury before building Chester and Stafford Castles. It was said that Walter, William's maternal uncle, was occasionally forced to hide the young duke in the houses of peasants,[23] although this story may be an embellishment by Orderic Vitalis. When he died in June, 1681, he left the largest estate Gray, had become proprietors of the island of Nantasket in Boston Harbor The Grays were closely allied with the Royal house of England and were In the Department of Haute-Saone, there is now a town Hereward's forces attacked Peterborough Abbey, which they captured and looted. Gilbert was killed within months, and another guardian, Turchetil, was also killed around the time of Gilbert's death. Prescott Sheldon Bush (1895-1972), US Senator. Although a mere two or three days' ride away at Abbeville, Robert did not attend William's deathbed or funeral. [7][c], William was born in 1027 or 1028 at Falaise, Duchy of Normandy, most likely towards the end of 1028. The rest of his life was marked by struggles to consolidate his hold over England and his continental lands, and by difficulties with his eldest son, Robert Curthose. Guillaume "Le Btard", or William the Conqueror, transformed the Middle Ages and laid the foundations of a new Europe. Meanwhile, the Danish king's brother, Cnut, had finally arrived in England with a fleet of 200 ships, but he was too late as Norwich had already surrendered. The fleet carried an invasion force that included, in addition to troops from William's own territories of Normandy and Maine, large numbers of mercenaries, allies, and volunteers from Brittany, northeastern France, and Flanders, together with smaller numbers from other parts of Europe. He also retained control of much of the lands of Harold and his family, which made the king the largest secular landowner in England by a wide margin. [32], On the death of Hugh of Maine, Geoffrey Martel occupied Maine in a move contested by William and King Henry; eventually, they succeeded in driving Geoffrey from the county, and in the process, William had been able to secure the Bellme family strongholds at Alenon and Domfront for himself. An early documented person was Anchetil de Greye - a vassal of William the Conqueror of Normandy (now part of France) and who accompan. It is believed that John Gray of Stapleford Tawney descended from the
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