The Elland Feud

13 minutes read time

Rivalry, Succession and the Breakdown of Order

The Elland Feud did not emerge suddenly with the quarrels that culminated in the beheading of Thomas Earl of Lancaster. It evolved from the collapse of authority during and after the Warenne‑Lancaster struggles (see Section 7 of the Warenne story).

By 1327, King Edward II had died in mysterious circumstances, believed murdered, at Berkeley Castle. In 1330, his son, the young King Edward III ended his mother’s tyrannical joint regency with her lover, Roger Mortimer, by defeating them in battle and taking charge of his Kingdom.

The country was battle weary, reeling from widespread famine, and torn apart by political infighting that had deposed his father, Edward II. These events had left the royal family and the nobility completely divided into warring factions, where old enmities were slow to be put aside. Crime was rampant, and faith in the royal justice system had been severely eroded.

West Riding families such as the Elands, Beaumonts, Quarmbys, and Lockwoods were bound by service to rival overlords – some to Warenne, others to Lancaster’s heirs. As great lords fought their private wars, these retainers adopted their quarrels as personal and hereditary grievances. Over the next generation the enmity between the two factions spread to a number of prominent landowners, who owed allegiance to one side or the other.

The Shadow of Lancaster and Warenne in the 1340s

What became known as the “Elland Feud” arose between families who were on either side of this great divide that Warenne and Lancaster had created (and as it happens, on either side of the present M62 road through Kirklees), the Warenne supporters north of this line and the Lancaster supporters south (see map).

The Pontefract/Earl of Lancaster Side

• Followers of Thomas (Plantagenet) 2nd Earl of Lancaster and his heirs. 
  He is my 19th Great Grand Uncle. Thomas’s wife, Alice De Lacy (1282-1348), is my 1st cousin 23 generations removed through her father, the Earl of Lincoln and the Barons of Pontefract.
• Sir Robert Beaumont (1290-1341), former Coroner for the County of York, descended from the powerful Beaumont family and the first Earls of Leicester.
  He is my 19th Great Grandfather, through the De Merfield family line.
• Hugh de Quarmby, ally and possibly the brother in law of Robert Beaumont (also my 19th GGF).
• John de Lockwood of Lockwood Hall, near Huddersfield, neighbour of Sir Robert De Beaumont.
• A man named Richard Ecklesleye (Exley), said to be a kinsman of Robert Beaumont.
• The De Lacy family of Cromwell-bottom, near Elland, into which family Lancaster was married. I’m descended from the same De Lacy family via my De Thornhill ancestors.

The Wakefield/Earl of Surrey Side

• Followers of John de Warenne (1286-1347), 7th Earl of Surrey. He is my 1st cousin 20 generations removed. Warenne’s wife Jeanne (Joan) de Bar-de-Duc, is also my 1st cousin 20 generations removed and of course they were related to each other.
• Sir John de Eland (1268-10th April 1351) was de Warrene’s Steward for the Manor of Wakefield and High Sherriff of Yorkshire. His descent is believed to be from a local Anglo-Saxon Theign. He is my 19th Great Grandfather, through the female line and via my Savile connections.
• His son, John de Eland (1310-April 1351)

Though I claim distant kinship with some of these individuals, it relies on the accuracy of compiled genealogies. But we all have more than 2 million 19th Great Grandfathers, so when you look at how many people were in Yorkshire in the 1300s, if you have Yorkshire ancestry, these people are likely to be your relations! There was so much intermarriage and mathematics proves that we are all descended from Royalty.

Blood Feud in the West Riding

By 1341, when the events of the Elland Feud unfolded, the Earldom of Lancaster had passed to the executed Earl’s nephew and the Lancastrian faction was still at Pontefract Castle. John De Warenne, Earl of Surrey, was still living and would be about 56 years old. He was now godfather to King Edward III’s son, Edmund, the Yorkist Prince of Wales and 1st Duke of York.

Sir John De Eland was one of John De Warenne’s chief allies in Yorkshire. De Eland was Sheriff of Yorkshire and was also Warenne’s Steward for the great Manor of Wakefield, which covered a vast area of 150 square miles. His neighbour, Sir Robert Beaumont of Crosland, about 8 miles away on the south side of Huddersfield, bore allegiance to the Earls of Lancaster.

A private war erupted between Beaumont and De Eland, during which Beaumont’s supporter, Richard De Ecklesleye, killed the nephew of John De Eland’s wife. De Ecklesleye came from Exley near Elland. He had begged and had received a Royal Pardon for the killing, in consideration of service he had done fighting in the King’s campaign in Scotland. He had also made compensation to the De Eland family by way of the transfer of a piece of land. The matter should have ended there, the “blood money” having discharged the debt. But it didn’t.

The Sheriff of Yorkshire, Sir John De Eland, was still looking for revenge. Richard Ecklesleye had taken refuge with the Beaumonts, at Crosland Lower Hall, a fortified manor house situated at Lower Crosland near Huddersfield. Sir Robert Beaumont refused to give him up to the Sheriff.

In a poem of 27 verses written afterwards, possibly in the 1500s, it related that, one night in May 1341, Sir John De Eland and his entourage set off to the home of Sir Robert Beaumont at Crosland Lower Hall. They stopped off at Quarmby Hall and killed Sir Hugh de Quarmby, a relative of Beaumont’s by marriage, perhaps his father-in-law or brother-in-law (Robert Beaumont’s second wife was Agnes De Quarmby).

They then murdered another Beaumont ally, John De Lockwood, at Lockwood Hall. Where the Lockwoods are placed in the feud is unclear, but usually we will find a connection by marriage. According to the Wakefield Court Rolls, John De Lockwood had evicted a free tenant unlawfully and when the greave and bailiff came to take possession of the property on behalf of the Sheriff, he attempted to kill them, but whether or not this is why he became embroiled in the killings is unclear.

Sir John De Eland and his henchmen next rode to Crosland Lower Hall, where they found the drawbridge up. Crosland Lower Hall was a medieval moated hall. The moat was stone lined and about 9 metres wide and a large part of the construction of the moat is still visible today. The moat and drawbridge would prevent John de Eland from entering by night but, early in the morning, a servant opened the drawbridge, letting Eland and his armed men into the Hall. The poem tells us that Sir Robert Beaumont was dragged from his bed, and beheaded with a sword, in front of his wife. Another account states that Robert Beaumont’s brother William was also killed, as was Ecklesleye, the fugitive.

Beaumont’s young sons were then invited to have breakfast with De Eland. Adam, aged about 22, who would probably have been the oldest of the sons still at home, bravely refused. It was said that Sir John vowed that he would “weed out the offspring of Beaumont’s blood”, though if he did say that, he was in the best position to do it then and there, so perhaps it was an empty threat. Surely those five deaths were revenge enough for the death of his wife’s nephew? The sons of Sir Robert were not culpable, whatever their father’s actions had been.

The widow of Sir Robert Beaumont, with her sons and the sons of John De Lockwood and Hugh De Quarmby, fled to Lancashire where they were taken in and supported by a branch of the De Lacy family.

However, it didn’t end there. Like all feuds, the children of the murdered men plotted their revenge, though it seems that it was some years in the plotting.

John De Warenne died in 1347 at Conisbrough Castle, without having taken any action against Sir John De Eland for the murders and De Eland was still a powerful man in the West Riding.

Elland Feud – The Revenge

Adam Beaumont, the oldest of the Beaumont boys by Agnes De Quarmby, joined with the sons of Lockwood, Quarmby and others in a conspiracy to kill Sir John De Eland.

The young men trained and planned until an opportunity arose. It is thought they attempted to kill Sir John a number of times during 1350 and during March of that year, William, son of William Quarmby and William son of Thomas Lockwood were actually being held in custody in York Castle. Somehow they either obtained their release or escaped.

Realising his life was in danger, Sir John De Eland made his will during September. Sir John was ambushed at Brookfoot, on his journey through Cromwell-bottom to the “Shire-Reeves Tourn” (Sheriff’s Court) in Brighouse. At Cromwell-bottom Wood, the group of young men attacked and Adam Beaumont seized the bridle of De Eland’s horse, causing it to rear up on its haunches. Eland dismounted and drew his sword but was cut down and killed by the four younger men. Beaumont and his fellow conspirators fled back into the Furness Fells of Lancashire.

De Eland’s will was written on Sept 8th 1350 and was proved on Nov 24th 1350, so he must have been killed between those dates.* The tourn date at Brighouse was on 26th October in 1350, so I suggest that was the date of the attack.

* Will: SIR JOHN DE ELAND, KNIGHT (Dodsworth MS. vol. 99).1350. Administration of the goods of Sir John de Eland Knight, granted to Dame Alice his wife on the feast of the Nativity of our Lady.

The catalyst for even further violence occurred when Sir John de Eland Junior petitioned the King to pursue his father’s killers. News of this must have reached the fugitives in Lancashire. Perhaps, feeling under increased threat, they decided that they must finish their vendetta, against the son, having already killed the father. On Palm Sunday 1351, April 10th, at least three men, including sons of Quarmby, Beaumont and Lockwood, ambushed Sir John De Eland Junior and his young son, at Elland Mill on their way to church. The knight was killed by an arrow shot by Lockwood and his young son was severely wounded and died later. Quarmby was also killed, possibly in Ainley Wood as he tried to escape.

On July 6th 1351 Adam Beaumont, William de Lockwood, and others were indicted of the crime. It was published in the Calendar of Patent Rolls, and required the surviving Lockwood, Beaumont and their accomplices to be arrested and brought to the Prison at York Castle:

Commission  to  William  de  Plumpton,  Brian  de  Thornhill,  William  de  Skarghill,  the  elder,  Nicholas  de  Wortelay,  Henry  de  Sothill,  John  de Calverlay,  Thomas  Flemmyng,  Robert  de  Staynton,  Adam  de  Hopton, John  Tours,  Aymer  Burdet,  William  de  Mirfeld,  John  de  Sheffeld, William  de  Lewenthorp,  William  de  Boston  and  Thomas  de  Fenton…

…reciting  that  Adam  Beaumund,  William  de  Lokwode  and  very  many other  felons  indicted  of  the  death  of  John  de  Eland,  one  of  the  king’s justices  appointed  to  hear  and  determine  trespasses  in  the  West  Riding, CO.  York,  gathering  to  themselves  a  very  great  number  of  felons  and  evil-doers have  killed John, son of  the  said  John,  because  he  was  suing  before the  king  to  punish  them  for  his  father’s  death,  and  many  others  of  the household  and  friendship  of  the  said  John  de  Eland,  and  have  committed various  assaults  on  the  king’s  justices  appointed  to  hear  and  determine such  homicides,  felonies,  trespasses  and  misdeeds,  and  killed  some  of their  men  and  servants,  and  now  strive  to  the  utmost  of  their  power  to hinder  those  who  indict  them,  the  justices,  the  sheriff  and  other  ministers of  the  king  from  executing  his  mandates  and  their  offices,  openly threatening  them,  and  so  to  hinder  if  they  can  the  king  from  ruling  and doing  justice  to  his  people ;  and  appointing  them  to  take  the  said  felons and  such  others  as  the  justices  shall  furnish  names  of  and  bring  them  to the  gaol  of  York.  Wherefore  the  king  commands them  on  pain  of  life  and limbs  and  all  that  they  can  forfeit  to  be  diligent  in  the  execution  of  the premises.

Calendar of Patent Rolls Edward III Vol 9: Page 156 – Membrane 21d 1351 July  6. 

Aftermath

William Lockwood is said to have sought refuge at Cannon Hall, where he was betrayed, captured and killed. Another account says he was killed at Emley Park near Huddersfield.

Adam Beaumont first took refuge at Crosland Lower Hall. Hunted as a criminal, he fled to Rhodes and joined the Knights Hospitallers, a Catholic military order charged with the care and defence of the Holy Land. He died fighting in Spain in 1367 (perhaps at the Battle of Nájera, which was fought on 3rd April 1367). Sir Robert Beaumont’s wives had borne him at least six more sons. The Beaumont family survived, their sons and daughters married into many of the local gentry and merchant families and there must be many thousands of their descendants around today, ordinary people like me.

John De Eland’s male line eventually died out completely and his family’s property passed to the Savile family when Isabel De Eland married Sir John Savile in 1353. In the end, what Sir John De Eland began had also destroyed his own family.

Sources (among many others)

• “Tragedies of Elland, Quarmby, Lockwood etc” by J Horsfall Turner; Bingley: 1890
• My Heritage Family History for BMD data
• The Wakefield Manor Court Rolls
• Calendar of Patent Rolls for King Edward III
• Huddersfield Exposed
• Wikipedia (dates of Kings, biographies, ownership of castles etc, etc)
• Wikimedia Commons CC and PD images
• The Yorkshire Archaeological Journal Vol XXVII

May 2026