Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Manny, Walter de
MANNY or MAUNY, Sir WALTER de, afterwards Lord de Manny (d. 1372), military commander and founder of the Charterhouse, was a native of Hainault. His father was Jean, called Le Borgne de Mauny, lord of Mauny or Masny, near Valenciennes, and said to have been descended from the Counts of Hainault (Froissart, ed. Lettenhove, xxii. 174). Le Borgne de Mauny, according to Froissart (iv. 292-8), was slain by private enemies in the English camp, before La R6ole on the Garonne in 1324 or 1325 (Beltz, Memorials of the Order of the Garter, p. 111). Froissart makes Sir Walter discover his body when at La Reole in 1346, and bury it in the church of the Friars Minors at Valenciennes with an epitaph, a supposed copy of which, containing an impossible date, is quoted by Lettenhove (xxii. 174). Manny's mother was Jeanne de Jenlain, from whom he inherited that lordship (ib. iv. 293; Beltz, p. 113). Froissart (ii. 53, iii. 80) seems to place him fourth among five sons, three others of whom also fought in the French wars. The English authorities almost invariably spell his name Manny, not Mauny (cf. Notes and Queries, 5th ser, iii. 347, 6th ser. ix. 26, 78, 118, 335, 377).
Manny may have been in attendance upon Queen Isabella during her visit to Hainault in 1326 (Froissart, ii. 53), but probably first came to England at the end of the next year in the train of Queen Philippa, who made him one of her esquires (ib. ii. 193, xxii. 179). He was knighted in 1331, and greatly distinguished himself in the Scottish wars, accompanying Edward Balliol in July 1332, by permission of the king, in his invasion of Scotland (Murimuth, p. 296), taking a foremost part in the siege of Berwick in the next year, and, if we may credit Froissart (ii. 293, 297, 317), being left with William de Montacute to guard the frontiers. He was rewarded with grants of land, the governorship of Merioneth (1332), and the custody of Harlech Castle (1334) (Dugdale, Baronage, ii. 148-149). He was probably chiefly employed in Scotland until his appointment on 11 Aug. 1337 as admiral of the fleet north of the Thames (Fœdera, ii. 988), for there can hardly be any truth in the story that he took part in the embassy which went to Flanders in April (Lettenhove, ii. 526; Galfrid le Baker, p. 60; cf. Fœdera, ii. 747-8). Some months after his appointment he took prisoner Guy de Rickenburg, bastard brother of Count Louis of Flanders, in a sharp skirmish with the garrison of the island of Cadzand, at the mouth of the Scheldt. The English authorities describe it as an accidental conflict (Walsingham, Hist. Angl. i. 222 ; Murimuth, p. 80). Froissart (ii. 430) represents it as an organised expedition, dates the attack on the night of St. Martin, and gives the chief command to the Earl of Derby, whose life Manny saves. He may be here anticipating the earl's later association with Manny. To Sir Walter the king, after releasing Guy of Flanders on 26 Jan. 1340, granted the 8,000l. paid for his and the other prisoners' ransom (Fœdera, ii. 1107, 1 123). Two of the ambassadors accredited by Edward to Philip of France and Louis of Flanders on 3 Oct., the Bishop of Lincoln and the Earl of Suffolk, are said by some writers to have been on Manny's fleet when Cadzand was attacked (ib. pp. 811-813; Froissart, ed. Luce, i. 1348; Chronicles of Edward I and Edward II, ii. 133). On 24 Nov. 1337 Manny was sent to sea with orders to attack the king's enemies, if he thought it advisable, but to return within three weeks (Fœdera, ii. 1005). On 24 Feb. 1388 he was ordered to provide ships by a fortnight after Easter for the passage of the king to the continent, but was not able to do so in time (ib. pp. 1015, 1027). In April he had to convoy Brabant merchants to and from Ipswich and Orwell (ib. pp. 1031, 1041). The king gave him about this time the manors of Oveston in Northamptonshire and Aber in North Wales' (Abbrev. Rotul. Original. ii. l26). He probably conveyed Edward to Antwerp in July.
Before leaving England Manny, with many other knights, is said to have taken the 'Vow of the Heron,' at the instance of the fugitive Robert of Artois, undertaking to burn a town held by Godemar de Fay (Wright, Political Songs, i. 13). Froissart's version is that he bound himself to be the first to enter France and take a town or castle. Immediately after the defiance of the French king in 1339 he rode hastily, says Froissart, with only forty lances, through Brabant and Hainault, and entering France took a castle called Thun l'Evéque, in which he left a garrison under his brother, Gilles Grignart, who was slain next year before Cambray. After which he returned to Edward at Malines (Froissart, ed. Lettenhove, ii. 487-93, iii. 83). He took part in all the operations of the campaign and returned to England with the king in February 1340 (ib. iii. 8, 9, 12, 27, 53, 71). In June he is said by Froissart to have eclipsed all his companions in valour at Sluys; he was present at the siege of Tournay in August, and joined in wasting the surrounding country (ib. iii. 197, 235 ; Beltz, p. 113 n.) Manny accompanied the king when he 'stole home' to surprise his ministers on 30 Nov. (Murimuth, p. 116). He is said to have taken part in the Scottish campaign of (Froissart, iii. 428, 464).
Early in 1 342 Edward sent him to Brittany to help the heroic Countess of Montfort against Charles of Blois, empowering him to receive and keep towns and castles belonging to the Duke of Brittany (Murimuth, p. 125; Fœdera, ii. 1181, 1189). Froissart gives a glowing description of his valour and deeds of chivalrous daring, in the relief of the countess at Hennebon, in a naval victory over Louis of Spain at Quimperlé, and in the siege and defence of several Breton towns and castles (iv. 38,44-50, 54-6, 70-96, 102-9, 147-79). Murimuth says that after making a truce with Charles of Blois early in July, subject to the king's consent, he returned to England, and that Edward, not approving of the truce, sent the Earl of Northampton to Brittany (cf. Fœdera, ii. 1205). Froissart speaks of Manny as present with Edward in Brittany in the later months of the year (iv. 192-7, 447). In June 1345 he was sent to Gascony with the Earl of Derby, as one of the two marshals who had command of the vanguard, according to Froissart, who largely ascribes to Manny the success of the two brilliant campaigns in which fifty or sixty towns and castles were captured (Murimuth, pp. 189, 248 ; Avesbury, p. 356 ; Baker, p. 77 ; Froissart, iv. 214-372, v. 89-96). Froissart (v. 97-108) has a circumstantial story relating how, on hearing of the victory at Crecy, Manny obtained from the Duke of Normandy, son of King Philip, then besieging Aiguillon, a safe-conduct to go to the English king by land, but was arrested at Orleans, taken to Paris and thrown into the Chatelet, whence he was only released on the indignant remonstrance of the Duke of Normandy with his father. But the siege of Aiguillon was raised six days before Crecy, and Derby in a despatch preserved by Avesbury (p. 372) simply says that on 12 Sept. Sir Walter, in spite of a safe-conduct, was attacked near St. Jean d'Angely in Saintonge, that while his escort was captured and thrown into prison in that town, he himself escaped with difficulty. Derby, who was on his march to Poictiers, at once took St. Jean and released Manny's men. If we could credit Froissart (v. 143, 195-6), Edward entrusted the siege of Calais to him, placing the Earl of Warwick and Sir Ralph Stafford under his orders, and he induced the king to limit his vengeance, though he failed to save Eustache de St. Pierre and his companions (ib. pp. 198-210, 213-15). Avesbury (pp. 392, 396) only tells us that he was one of the five English representatives in the negotiations with the king of France during the last week of July, and that after Calais had fallen he with seven others concluded the truce of 28 Sept.
On 13 Nov. Manny was summoned to parliament as a baron, and received writs to parliament and council until January 1371 (App. to Report on Dignity of a Peer, pp. 574, 617, 622, 625, 627, 630, 647). He frequently appears as a trier of petitions, and is once mentioned as giving judgment in parliament on a traitor (Rot. Pari, it 164, 222, 268, 275, 283, 289, 294, 303, iii. 12). On 14 March 1348 Manny was once more appointed admiral of the fleet from the Thames to Berwick (Fœdera, iii. 156), and on 25 Sept. of the same year was commissioned, with the Earls of Lancaster and Suffolk and two others, to treat for peace with France (ib. p. l73). When the attempt to recover Calais by treachery on the night of 31 Dec. 1349 was frustrated, King Edward and the Black Prince, according to Froissart (v. 232-8, 248-9), honoured Manny by fighting under his banner, but of this the English authorities know nothing (Avesbury, p. 408; Bakee, p. 103; Walsingham, i. 273-4). He may have taken part in the sea-fight with the Spaniards off Winchelsea on 29 Aug. 1350 (Beltz, p. 120; Froissart, v. 258). During 1349-50 he received grants in Aquitaine, Berwick, and Oxfordshire, and is mentioned as marshal of the Marshalsey (Abbreviatio Rotul. Origin. ii. 199 ; Dugdale, Baronage, ii. 149). In the summer of 1350 he held an inquest in Hertfordshire (Gesta Abbatum St. Albani, iii. 200), and in the autumn of that year and the spring of 1351 he was chosen, as a Hainaulter, to conduct negotiations respecting the affairs of the Low Countries with Margaret of Hainault and Holland, widow of the Emperor Louis of Bavaria (Fœdera, iii. 206, 220). Manny is said to have taken part in the Breton campaign of 1352 (Dugdale, ii. 149).
Accompanying Edward to Artois in October 1355, he returned with him in order to save Berwick. After laying the king's wishes before a parliament at Westminster on 18 Nov., he was sent forward to relieve the castle of Berwick and begin the recovery of the town, whose walls he undermined with the help of men from the Forest of Dean (Avesbury, pp. 429, 450; Rot. Parl. ii. 264 ; note to Baker, p. 291). He Was staying at Westminster when the news of Poictiers reached England (Devon, Issues, p. 166). On 17 Jan. 1359 he was sent to France and negotiated an extension of the truce, which expired on 13 April (Fœdera, iii. 417). When Edward invaded France in October 1359, Manny was on his staff; he was given the Garter vacated by the death of John, lord Grey of Rotherfield, on 1 Sept., and was presented by the Black Prince with 'a grisell palfrey' (Beltz, p. 120). He accompanied Edward in his march into Burgundy in January 1860, and on their return skirmished with some new-made knights at the very gates of Paris (Froissart, vi. 209, 213, 221, 224, 266-7). His name is among the guarantors of the treaty of Bretigni in May ; he was one of the guardians of King John at Calais until the payment of John's ransom on 25 Oct. (ib. pp. 277, 295-7; Beltz, p. 120), and on 20 Sept. he was appointed with others to decide upon the claims of Charles of Blois and John of Montfort (Fœdera, iii. 508). On 7 July 1362 he was appointed a commissioner to prorogue the truce with Charles of Blois for one year (tb. p. 662). At Quesnoy on 12 May in that year he had acknowledged receipt of nineteen thousand golden florins from Margaret, countess of Hainault, to whom he had lent considerable sums, and at the same time released her from all claims against her and her son Duke Albert, but the latter was still in Manny's debt at his death (Beltz, p. 121). He attended the king of Cyprus when he visited London to solicit English aid against the Turks (ib. Froissart, vi. 884). In the autumn of 1364 he was with the king at Dover arranging with Louis of Flanders for the marriage of his daughter to Edmund of Cambridge, when the news of the victory of Auray arrived (ib. vii. 65). He was present in the council in 1366 which promised help to Pedro the Cruel (ib. p. 110). In 1368 he was ordered to Ireland (Lettenhove, xxii. 182). In August 1369 he was sent with John of Gaunt in his invasion of France as second in command, and Froissart relates an instance in which neglect of his advice robbed the army of an advantage (ib. vii. 423, 429). On 10 Nov. 1870 he was ordered, as lord of Merioneth, to fortify his castle, and on the 15th he was one of the witnesses to the letters patent issued by the king respecting the complaints of the people of Aquitaine against the government of the Black Prince (Fœdera, iii. 901; Froissart, vii. 462).
The king by letters patent of 6 Feb. 1371 licensed Manny to found a house of Carthusian monks to be called La Salutation Mere Dieu (Bearcroft, Historical Account of Thomas Sutton and of his Foundation in Charterhouse, 1737, pp. 167-73). But this foundation, known as the London Charterhouse, appears to have been created ten years before. When the black death was raging in 1349, Manny had purchased from the hospital of St. Bartholomew thirteen acres of land outside the ' bar of West Smithfield,' and had it consecrated for a burial-ground. According to Manny's own statement no fewer than fifty thousand persons were buried there during that year (ib.) He built on it a handsome chapel of the Annunciation, which gave it the name of 'Newchurchhaw,' and obtained a bull from Pope Clement VI to allow him to endow a college with a superior and twelve chaplains (ib. ; Sharpe, Calendar of Wills in Court of Husting, ii. 26, 107}. But this plan seems to have been dropped. Michael de Northburgh, bishop of London, purchased the place and the patronage of the chapel from Manny, and, dying on 9 Sept. 1361, left by his will 2,000l., with certain leases, rents, and tenements, to found a convent of the Carthusian order in 'Newchurchhaw' (Hist. MSS. Comm. 9th Rep. App. pt. i. p. 47 ; Shabpe, ii. 62). Yet in the letters patent of February 1871 and Manny's charter, dated 28 March 1371, Manny appears as the founder, and the only mention of Northburgh is that the monks are to pray for his soul and those of his successors, as well as for Manny and his family. A papal bull 'in favour of 'the new house of the Mother of God,' usually attributed to Urban V, but proved by Bearcroft (pp. 176-80) to have been granted by Urban VI in 1878, recites that Northburgh and Manny founded 'conventum duplicem ordinis Cartusiensis.' This probably points to the solution of the enigma.
Manny died in London on or about 15 Jan. 1372 (Froissart, ed. Lettenhove, viii. 482, xxii. 184 ; cf. Beltz, p. 121). He left directions that he should be buried without any pomp in the choir of the church of the Carthusian monastery which he had founded ; the king and his sons with numerous prelates and barons followed him to the grave. John of Gaunt had five hundred masses said for his ; soul (ib.) His will, dated 30 Nov. 1371, and proved at Lambeth 13 April 1372, instructed his executors to pay a penny to every poor person coming to his funeral, to pray for him and the remission of his sins (Dugdale, Baronage, ii. 150; Nicolas, Testamenta Vetusta, i. 85-6). The tomb of alabaster with his effigy, which he ordered to be made 'like unto that of Sir John Beauchamp in Paul's in London,' remained until the dissolution in the church of the Charterhouse, where also his wife and his brother, Sir William Manny, were buried (ib.; Collectanea Topographica et Heraldica, iv. 309).
Manny married Margaret, daughter and heir of Thomas 'of Brotherton,' second son of Edward I, and widow of John, lord Segrave, who died in 1352. She succeeded her father as countess-marshal and Countess of Norfolk, and many years after Manny's death was created Duchess of Norfolk. By her Manny is said to have had one son, Thomas, who was drowned in a well at Deptford during his father's lifetime. His only surviving child, Anne, who was seventeen years of age at his death, and had been married since 1368 to John Hastings, earl of Pembroke, became his heir, and outliving her husband, who called himself 'Lord de Manny,' by nineteen years, she died in 1384. The 'Escheats Roll' enumerates estates of Manny and his wife in sixteen English counties, besides his properties in Calais and Hainault. Pembroke sold the latter, including the ancestral estate of Mauny, to his wife's cousin, Henry de Mauny, youngest son of Sir Walter's brother Thierri, who married Anne, daughter of the Earl of Suffolk. Henry's granddaughter, who took the veil, was the last of the name in the direct line, and Mauny passed by inheritance to the Sires de Renesse, who still held it at the end of the eighteenth century (Lettenhove, xxii. 178). In his will Manny leaves small legacies to two illegitimate daughters, called Mailosel and Malplesant, who had taken the veil.
Manny was clearly one of the ablest and boldest of Edward III's soldiers of fortune, but his merits certainly lost nothing in the hands of his countrymen, Jean le Bel, Jean de Kleerk, and Froissart. He was a fellow-townsman and patron of Froissart, who visited Valenciennes in his company in 1364 (i. 125), and gave expression to his gratitude directly in his poems (ed. Schiller, ii. 9), and indirectly in the prominence he assigns to his benefactor in his 'Chronicles.' 'Mon livre,' he says (viii. 114) himself, 'est moult renluminé de ses prouesses.' He is represented, especially in the Breton scenes, as the mirror of the chivalrous daring of the time, as 'sagement emparlé et enlangagé' (v. 200). Yet his vengeance on Mirepoix, as related in the 'Chroniques Abregees' (Lettenhove, xvii. 169), coupled with Murimuth's reference to his 'sævitia' at Cadzand, suggests that he could on occasion be cruel.
[Many facts about Manny's career are brought together in the passage of Dugdale's Baronage referred to, and in the notes to Froissart by Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove, which should be compared, however, with those of M. Luce. Beltz's fife follows Froissart almost literally. The Fœdera are quoted in the Record edition, and Murimuth, Avesbury, and Walsingham in the Bolls Series; Galfrid le Baker of Swyubroke, ed. E. Maunde Thompson; cf. also Devon's Issues, p. 175; Brantingham's Issue Boll, pp. 317, 432; British Museum Addit. MSS. 5937 fol. 108, 6298 fol. 306; Chandos's Black Prince, p. 45; French Chronicle of London, ed. Camden Soc.,p. 78; Barnes's Edward III, p. 827; Longman's Edward III; Hutton's James and Philip van Artevelde. For the question of the Charterhouse the following works, in addition to those in the text, may be consulted: Dugdale's Monasticon, ed. Carey, Ellis, and Bandinel, vi. 6-9; Dugdale's History of St. Paul's, p. 34; Stow's Survey of London, ed. Strype, bk. iv. p. 61; Tanner's Notitia; Newcourt's Repertorium Paroch. Londin. i. 578; Samuel Herne's Domus Carthusiana, 1677; and Archdeacon Hale's paper in the Trans. of the London and Middlesex Archæol. Soc. iii. 309. Much the best guide is, however, Bearcroft (quoted in text), who prints the documents and corrects several errors.]
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.194
N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
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