Sir John Fortescue Knight

  General Notes:

I started the pedigree with Sir John rather than with Sir Richard or William since there are scant records for the two. So much about these two comes from family legends.

From Devonshire Wills, pp. 456-460:
According to family legend, Sir Richard Fortescue and his son Adam came to England with William the Conqueror and took part in the Battle of Hastings. The story says that Sir Richard saved the life of William the Conqueror a couple of times, and was given the name le Fort Escu or Richard "the strong shield." As the story goes, Richard went back to France while his son Adam stayed in England. Adam was rewarded for his father's courage with "grants of Wymonderston, or Wintosn, and other lands in the County of Devon." There is no record of either at the Battle of Hastings, so it is not known if this story is more legend than truth. According to some pedigrees of the Fortescue family, "Sir Richard le Forte's" reputed son, Adam, had a son named Ralph, who supposedly granted lands to Modbury Priory by a deed dated 1135. This grant was to have been "confirmed by his son Richard Fortescue," yet there is no mention of this grant in either the Monasticon Dioc. Exou, or in Oliver's Ecclesiastical Antiquities.

Richard Fortescue, who is said to have "confirmed his father's gift to Modbury Priory in 1135," was most certainly a resident in Devonshire in 1199, when he was attached for non-appearance at an Assize de Morte d'Ancestre. This Richard, according to some pedigrees of Fortescue, left a son, William, who was the father of Sir John, Sir Richard, and Sir Nicholas Fortescue. The two latter were companions in arms of King Richard in the Holy Land, and the Knights of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem.

Sir John Fortescue, son of William, son of Richard, is supposed to have become settled upon the Manor of Wimpston in Modbury, in 1208, by virtue of a "grant" from the Crown, but which was doubtless a mere confirmation of a previous grant by the Valletorts to one of his ancestors, as his son, another Richard held the same in 1252, as "one knight's fee of the barony of Reginald Valletort, whose ancestor, Reginald de Valletort, had been sub-tenant of the same manor under Robert of Mortain,, to whom it have been given by King William." ¹⁴⁵⁹

  Noted events in his life were:

• Background Information. ¹⁴⁶²
King John, by his letters patent dated in the 10^th year of his reign, enfeoffed therewith John Fortescue, after whom it came to his son Sir Richard and after his to Adam Fortescue, who was dead in 31 Edw. I. for then it was specified he held Wymonston by one knight's-fee of the honour of Tremeton. His son and heir was another Adam, who rants to Henry Lopperigge seven shillings annual rent, which Richard, the son of Philip Gretun, used to pay him for his tenement at Wymonston ; witnesses, Sir Andrew Trelesk, Peter de Prideaux, &c. dated at Wymonston, Friday next following te feast of St. Ambrose (April 4) 1302, the 30^th of King Edward, son of Henry. To the deed is an oval seal affixed, whereon was the badge of a star, and circumscribed Sigillum Adæ Fortescu.

Collin's Peerage of England, Vol. VII, 391-395