with Edward II. by a frequent use of spiritual weapons, and took part in the proceedings against the Templars. He died at Otford on the 11th of May 1313. Miracles were said to have been worked at his tomb in Canterbury cathedral, but efforts to procure his canonization were unavailing. Although a secular priest Winchelsea was somewhat ascetic, and his private life was distinguished for sanctity and generosity. As an ecclesiastic, however, he was haughty and fond of power; and he has been not inappropriately described as “the greatest churchman of the time.”
See Chronicles of the Reigns of Edward I. and Edward II., edited with introduction by W. Stubbs (London, 1882–1883); S. Birchington, in the Anglia sacra, edited by H. Wharton (London; 1691); and W. Stubbs, Constitutional History, vol. ii. (Oxford, 1896).
WINCHELSEA, a village in the Rye parliamentary division of Sussex, England, 9 m. N.E. by E. from Hastings by the South Eastern and Chatham railways. Pop. (1901) 670. It stands on an abrupt hill-spur rising above flat lowlands which form a southward continuation of Romney marsh. This was within historic times a great inlet of the English Channel, and Winchelsea was a famous seaport until the 15th century. Two gates, the one of the time of Edward I., the other erected early in the 15th century, overlook the marshes; a third stands at a considerable distance west of the town, its position pointing the contrast between the extent of the ancient town and that of the shrunken village of to-day. The town was laid out by Edward I. with regular streets intersecting at right angles; the form is preserved, and in a picturesque open space in the centre stands the church of St Thomas à Becket. This comprises only the chancel and aisles of a building which, if entire, would rank as one of the finest parish churches in England. As it stands it is of the highest interest, showing remarkable Decorated work, with windows of beautiful and unusual design, and a magnificent series of canopied tombs. In the grounds of the residence called the Friars stands the shell of the apsidal choir of a Decorated chapel which belonged to a Franciscan house. Of a Dominican convent and other religious foundations and churches there are no remains.
The town of which the relics have been described was not the first of its name. On a site supposed to be about 3 m. S.E., and now therefore about 112 m. out in the English Channel, a seaport had grown up on a low peninsula. In 1236 and at various subsequent dates in the same century this town suffered severely from encroachments of the sea, and in 1266 it paid the penalty for its adherence to the cause of Simon de Montfort. The waves finally obliterated the site in 1288, and Edward I. thereafter planted the new town in a safe position. In the 14th and 15th centuries Winchelsea was frequently attacked by the French, and in 1350 Edward III. defeated the Spaniards in a naval action close by.
In the time of the Confessor Winchelsea (Winchenesel, Winchelese, Wynchelse) was included in Rameslie which was granted by him to the abbey of Fécamp. The town remained under the lordship of the abbey until it was resumed by Henry III. Its early importance was due to its harbour, and by 1066 it was probably already a port of some consequence. By the reign of Henry II., if not before, Winchelsea was practically added to the Cinque Ports and shared their liberties. After the destruction of Old Winchelsea, New Winchelsea, a walled town, flourished for about a hundred years and provided a large proportion of the ships furnished by the Cinque Ports to the crown; but the ravages of the French destroyed it, its walls were broken down, and the decay of the harbour, owing to the recession of the sea, prevented any later return of its prosperity. The corporation, which in 1298 included a mayor, barons and bailiffs, was dissolved by an act of 1883.
Winchelsea as a Cinque Port was summoned to parliament in 1264–1265 and returned two members from 1366 till 1832, when it was disfranchised. The abbot of Fécamp seems to have originally held a market. In 1792 a market was held on Saturdays and a fair on the 14th of May, but no market or fair now exists. Shipbuilding and fishing were carried on in the 13th and 14th centuries. In later years Winchelsea became a great resort for smugglers, and the vaults originally constructed for the Gascon wine trade were used for storing contraband goods.
WINCHESTER, EARLS AND MARQUESSES OF. The title of earl of Winchester was first borne by Saier, or Seer, de Quincy, who was endowed by King John on the 13th of March 1207, with the earldom of Winchester, or the county of Southampton. Saier de Quincy was one of the twenty-five barons named to enforce the observance of the Great Charter. He served in the Crusades at the siege of Damietta in 1219, and died soon afterwards, probably on the 3rd of November of that year. His second son Roger de Quincy (c. 1195–1264), who is said to have usurped the earldom during the absence of his elder brother Robert in the Holy Land, took part in the struggle between Henry III. and the barons. He died without male issue in April 1264, and the earldom reverted to the crown. It was revived in 1322 in favour of Hugh le Despenser, favourite of King Edward II., and was forfeited when he was put to death by the barons as a traitor in 1326. In 1472 the title, together with a pension of £200 a year from the customs of Southampton, but not the right of sitting in parliament, was given by King Edward IV. to a Burgundian, Louis de Bruges, lord of Gruthuyse and prince of Steenhuyse, as a reward for services rendered to himself while an exile on the continent. Louis de Bruges surrendered his patent to Henry VII. in 1499.
The marquessate of Winchester was created in 1551 in favour of William Paulet, or Pawlet, K.G., a successful courtier during four reigns, who died on the 10th of March 1572. It has descended in the male line of his family to the sixteenth possessor. John Paulet, 2nd marquess (c. 1517–1576), was summoned to parliament as Baron St John during the life of his father, a distinction which was shared by his three immediate successors William Paulet (c. 1535–1598), William Paulet (c. 1560–1628) and John Paulet (c. 1598–1674). Charles Paulet, son and heir of John Paulet, the eighth marquess, was created duke of Bolton, on the 9th of April 1689, and the marquessate of Winchester remained in connexion with the duchy of Bolton (q.v.) till the death of Harry Paulet, sixth duke and eleventh marquess, without male issue in December 1794. There being no male representative of the dukes of Bolton this title lapsed, but the marquessate of Winchester was inherited by George Paulet (1722–1800), great-grandson of Lord Henry Paulet (d. 1672), second son of William, the fourth marquess. On George's death on the 22nd of April 1800 he was succeeded by his son Charles Ingoldesby Burroughs-Paulet (1764–1843), who, in 1839, prefixed the name of Burroughs to his own by royal licence. Upon his death on the 29th of November 1843, the title passed to his son John Paulet (1801–1887), fourteenth marquess, who was succeeded, on the 4th of July 1887, by his son, Augustus John Henry Beaumont (1858–1899), officer in the Guards, who was killed at Magersfontein during the Boer War on the 11th of December 1899, and was followed in the peerage by his brother, Henry William Montague Paulet (b. 1862).
Three of the marquesses of Winchester were men of note. It is recorded of the founder of the family, William Paulet, that when asked how he had contrived to live through a long period of troubled times during four reigns, he replied that he came of the willow and not of the oak, ortus sum e salice non ex quercu. This saying, repeated by Sir Robert Naunton in his Fragmenta regalia, may possibly not have been due to the marquess himself, but if not it was well invented of a man who passed through many dangers and always contrived to keep, or to improve, his places. He was the son of Sir John Paulet of Basing, near Basingstoke in Hampshire, and his wife Alice or Elizabeth, daughter of Sir William Paulet of Hinton St George, Somerset. The year of his birth has been variously given as 1474 and 1485. Between 1512 and 1527 he was several times sheriff of Hampshire. He was knighted before 1525, and in that year became privy councillor. He was henceforth, continually employed in the royal household and on the council, but his only military service was in the easy suppression of the Pilgrimage of Grace in 1536. In 1525 he was named master of the wards and keeper of the king's widows and idiots, that is to say he had the lucrative charge of persons of property who were wards in chivalry. He was a member of the House of Commons which
