THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB.
147
"manor house of Valence was connected by a subterranean passage
"with Barking Abbey to which it belonged, but no trace of such a passage,
"if there ever was one, has come to light as yet." He further says that
"in 1863 a portion of the house, which included several rooms supposed to
"be haunted, was taken down and the drawbridge over the moat was
"removed."
The name certainly derives from the family of Valence, earls of Pem-
broke, the earliest possessor of that name being Agnes de Valence, who
died sometime before 1309 and who was succeeded by her brother Adomar
de Valence, Earl of Pembroke. When his Inquisition Post Mortem was
taken at Barking on the 20th November, 1324, the jurors declared that he
was not seised in his demesne as of fee of lands or tenements in Dakenham,
but Margery de Moese, sometime wife of Thomas Weylond, was formerly
seised thereof for life, and leased them to Agnes de Valence for life of said
Margery; said Agnes dying before Margery, Adomar held the lands till his
death. "Said Margery is dead and the reversion belongs to John de
''Neville. Said lands are held of the Abbess of Berkyng for 17s. 4d. yearly."
This hardly agrees with the Inquisition of Agnes de Valence taken
at Dakenham 20 Jan., 1309-10, which says that she held direct from the
Abbess of Berkyng for 17s. 4d. yearly and suit of court to the said Abbess
every 3 weeks. Whether held direct from the Abbess or not the inquisi-
tion is interesting as giving a contemporary account of the extent of the
manor, for the jurors say, "And the tenants of the lands ought to ride
"with the Abbess with two horses at the costs of the said Abbess when
"rightfully forewarned, to wit (the tenants of) one messuage with a garden
"and dovecote, worth by the year 2s.; 128 acres of land, worth by the
"year 42s. 8d. at 4d. an acre; 4 acres of meadow, worth by the year 28.,
"at 6d. an acre. Also rent of assize 7s. 31/2d. from 6 free tenants there.
"Total 53s. 111/2d."
Like his father before him, Adomar de Valence met a violent death, for
he was murdered in France while in attendance upon Queen Isabella, his
father being also murdered at Bayonne in 1296.
An extract from the Barking Abbey Rental, furnished by Mr. F. J.
Brand, gives the Master of St. Anthonys as the tenant of land and
tenement called Vidaus in 1456, he paying a rent of 17s. 4d.
At the dissolution of the monasteries the manor came into the posses-
sion of the Crown and was subsequently granted to the Dean and Canons
of Windsor.
After the death of Adomar de Valence until the dissolution of the
monasteries very little is known of the manorial descent and that little is
very involved; it is not until the latter part of the 16th century that the
tale of the owners and tenants of Valence can be told with any certainty.
At that date Timothy Lucye, who married in 1584 Susanna, daughter of
Henry Fanshawe, of Jenkyns, an adjoining manor, was there. He was the
brother of Sir Thomas Lucy, of Charlecote, who prosecuted Shakespeare
for deer-stealing. He was succeeded by Sir Nicholas Coote, of Wyfields,
in Barking, who held probably from 1596-1610.
In 1616 it was in the Henshawe family, from whom it passed to the
Bonhams. Thomas Bonham died in 1676 and was buried in Dagenham
church, where an eulogistic Latin inscription testifies to his mental attain-