Draft:Baron of Cuckfield

The Baron of Cuckfield is an English title of nobility that applies to the magistrate of the manorial lordship of Cuckfield.. The Barony was founded at least by 1091; though was very likely to have existed before the Conquest of 1066. Predating the peerage founded in 1367, the barony falls under the Anglo-Saxon and subsequent Norman confirmation of English nobility based on rights and responsibilities of government over areas of land called manors (or what later academics described as the feudal system) rather than a right to sit in the House of Lords by writ or letters patent. This makes manorial lordships like the Barony the oldest category of nobility in England.

The Barony of Cuckfield has jurisdiction over the Manor of Cuckfield: which today incorporates the ancient village with neighbouring Haywards Heath. In addition, by a Royal Charter of King Charles II from 1670, the Baron has a monopoly franchise by the Royal Prerogative for the right to hold and collect a pitch penny and stall penny from businesses trading within six and a third miles from the centre of Cuckfield. Further the Baron has a right to hold a Manorial Court (which today has become an international common law arbitration service), a right to grant investitures and a responsibility to represent and support the interests of tenants (residents) of the Manor.

Escutcheon of House Pitt (as Baron of Cuckfield).

The present Baron is Lord Christian Alexander Pitt; who is a training barrister at Lincoln's Inn and member of Reform UK.

History

A Lord of the Manor, or Baron, is an English title of nobility attached to the residual common law administrative, economic and social rights and responsibilities that come with a Manor. These include sporting, fishing, mineral, judicial, chivalric and rights of escheat; as well as the obligation to defend justly the lives, property and interests of tenants (residents), resident aliens and visitors within the Manor.

A Manor is the name of the administrative unit which is governed by a Lord of the Manor. In Cuckfield's case, the Manor of Cuckfield includes the village itself and its surrounding landscape (much of which is now incorporated into Haywards Heath). Under Norman law (now incorporated into common law) the Lord of the Manor for Cuckfield is styled the Baron of Cuckfield.

Anglo Saxons

Under the Anglo Saxons, the county of Sussex was divided into Hundreds, and the Hundreds into Manors. When William the Conqueror invaded in 1066, Sussex was divided into 6 vertical strips called Rapes. Cuckfield fell into the Rape of Lewes and became one of the leading Manors in the Rape. There is no mention of the Manor in the Domesday Book.

Norman

The Manor was given to the Earl William de Warenne; who built a hunting lodge and a chapel in Cuckfield. This was then given as an endowment to the Cluniac Priory of Lewes. The Earl's son, William, confirmed this endowment in a charter of 1091. The third Earl went on the Crusades, and was never seen again after leaving Laodices. The sixth Earl was one of King John's advisers in granting Magna Carta.

Mediaeval

In 1245, Bishop Richard de la Wych, Bishop of Chichester (later St. Richard, patron of Sussex) made the parish church independent from the priory by creating a vicarage and appointing the first vicar, Fr. Walter de Warnecamp

In 1255, King Henry III issued Earl John Warenne with Cuckfield's first grant for a market. These markets were held on Tuesdays with a fair on 8 and 9 September. It is most likely that the southern boundary of the market was the churchyard, and the northern one along the line of Ockenden Lane. The Earl married King Henry III's sister. During the Barons' War, the Earl had taken the side of the King. King Edward I made him Governor of Scotland, but was defeated by William Wallace at the Battle of Stirling in 1297. His great sorrow, however, was the death of his only son; who was killed in a tournament at Croydon in 1297 (just before the birth of the latter's son, also John, who succeeded to the Earldom, and the Manor of Cuckfield, at 17 years of age. He then married Princess Joanna de Bar, daughter of King Edward I. The Earl had little training or education (save in war from his late grandfather) and proved to be a faithless husband. When he divorced, his estates were taken by the King.

Earl John Warrene left no legitimate heirs; so the Manor went to his sister's son, Richard 13th Earl of Arundel. His son, Richard 14th Earl of Arundel, after governing the Realm during the minority of King Richard II, was beheaded by the King in 1394. His son-in-law, the Duke of Norfolk, succeeded to the Manor, but was soon himself banished. The Duke's son, Thomas, returned from France to England with King Henry IV and had King Richard II handed into custody. The Duke married Princess Beatrix, daughter of the King of Portugal, and the Manor was settled on her. The Duke died childless, and the Manor was then divided amongst his four sisters by coparcenary.

Tudor

In 1573, the Earl of Derby sold his quarter of the Manor of Cuckfield to Henry Bowyer, a local iron master. Iron was a major industry in the area form as early as the 13th century right up till the 18th century. In 1574, Lord Bowyer and his wife Lady Elizabeth Bowyer dismantled the Mediæval manor hall near the church to build a new manor house, now Cuckfield Park.

Stuart

In 1670, King Charles II granted a licence to Lord Walter Hendley and five others to hold a weekly market at Cuckfield for the benefit of the inhabitants. In 1792, there was a Friday market and fairs on Whit Thursday, 25 May, 16 September and 29 November (but all these had lapsed by 1888). A weekly stock market was held on Tuesdays, but this was transferred to Haywards Heath in 1868 before it became a Sainsbury's supermarket.

Georgian

Lord Bowyer had to sell the Manor to Walter Covert of Slaugham; whose great granddaughter parted with it in 1735 to Thomas Sergison (formerly Thomas Warden). The Manor then succeeded to Thomas' brother, Michael in 1766 until his death in 1784. Lord Michael Sergison held courts there in 1770 and 1781. Francis Jefferson (who also took on the Sergison name) succeeded to the Manor in 1784 with his wife Anne. Lady Sergison continued to hold the moiety as widow until her death in 1806; after which her 3 sons held the Manor in turn: Lord Warden Sergison (died 1811), Lord Francis (died 1812), and their sister Lady Anne (wife of Fr. W. S. Pritchard, who took the name Sergison at their marriage).

Victorian

Lady Anne Sergison's son, Warden George Sergison, inherited the Manor in 1848. In 1865, he acquired the remaining half of Cuckfield Manor from William, 4th Earl of Abergavenny. The whole manor, thus reunited, descended from Lord Warden George Sergison to his son Major Warden Sergison in 1867; then, his son (Captain Charles Warden Sergison) succeeded in 1888. At his death in 1911, the Manor devolved upon his eldest daughter, Prudence; who married then Colonel Sir Bertram Sergison-Brooke dying without male heirs. Their younger daughter, Cynthia, married Sir Basil Stanlake Brooke. The title then remained dormant until 2024.

Present

In August 2024, Christian Alexander Pitt succeeded to the Manor. Lord Pitt is a practicing Greek Orthodox, a training barrister at Lincoln's Inn and a member of Reform UK.

Since succeeding to the Manor, the Baron has begun a range of initiatives that follow the historic origins of the title. These include arbitration services through the Manorial Court, investitures for a modern form of knighthood and a direct democracy Assembly for tenants within Cuckfield and Haywards Heath to open up the deliberation of local policy to the wider citizenry. Manorial tenants may join here.