Leicestershire Brabazons by Jan Barnes

In the traditional lineages the Brabazon family moved from Surrey to Leicestershire when Thomas le Brabazon of Betchworth married Amicia daughter of John de Mowsley, their marriage taking place in 1236 or before. Their son and heir Roger was knighted in 1268.

Research has revealed that a Thomas le Brabazon sold his town property in Haverberg (Market Harborough) in 1236. The town, situated close to the border with Northamptonshire, originated probably in the mid-eleventh century as a market in Great Bowden parish, and from this a market town gradually evolved.  Traders had shops fronting onto the road or the market place and used the rear of their long narrow sections for their business activity. Perhaps Thomas had a business in the town and was able to move to the country after marrying an heiress. Unfortunately, his wife was not mentioned.

About thirty years later, in 1265, Richard Chase of Little Bowden (near Market Harborough) was pardoned for the death of Thomas Brabazon. Thomas and Richard were both pardoned for killing another man. So far, the relationship of this Thomas Brabazon to the earlier Thomas, or to the Mowsley family is not known.

 Mowsley is a small village about seven miles west of Market Harborough in the southern part of Leicestershire, within the civil parish of the same name. The de Mowsley family, who were tenants of one of the manors there, took their name from the village. Court records show that John de Mowsley had a daughter and sole heir named Avice, who claimed her inheritance in court in 1199. To claim her land she had to be at least fourteen at the time, so would have been born 1185 or before. The records also show that Avice married Amfrid de Medburn before 1203. Perhaps she married Thomas Brabazon later on.

Many years later, in 1268, an inquisition found that Roger Brabazon was a landholder in Mowsley. Records also show that his mother had some land there, and was named Amice, but the lands that they held were not in the manor tenanted by the de Mowsley family. Recently it has been established that Roger’s father was named William, not Thomas. It seems that Amice has been confused with Avice de Mowsley, that heiress of an earlier generation, with a similar name.

The Brabazon family based in Mowsley are reasonably well recorded, mainly because of Sir Roger Brabazon’s high profile as a judge and also because of his landholdings, but in putting together the traditional lineages the genealogists of the time had different opinions about the relationship between Sir Roger Brabazon and Roger Brabazon ‘the younger’ and between either of them and Sir William Brabazon of Sproxton and Garthorpe. Eventually a lineage was traced through every prominent person.