# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Norwich, Walter de

​NORWICH, Sir WALTER de (d. 1329), chief baron of the exchequer, was son of Geoffrey de Norwich, and perhaps a descendant of that Geoffrey de Norwich who in 1214 fell under John's displeasure (Matt. Paris, ii. 537). A Geoffrey de Norwich ‘clericus’ represented Norwich in parliament in 1306 (Returns of Members of Parliament, i. 22). The first reference to Walter de Norwich is as holding the manor of Stoke, Norfolk, in 1297. He was in the royal service in the exchequer; on 15 March 1308 he occurs as remembrancer; on 7 Aug. he was placed on a commission of oyer and terminer in Suffolk; and on 24 Nov. as clerk of the exchequer (Cal. Close Rolls, pp. 57, 131). On 29 Aug. 1311 he was appointed a baron of the exchequer, but resigned this position on 23 Oct. in order to act as lieutenant of the treasurer; on 3 March 1312 he was reappointed a baron of the exchequer, and on 8 March was made chief baron. A week later Norwich ceased to act as lieutenant of the treasurer, but on 17 May he was again directed to act in that capacity while retaining his post as chief baron, and thus he continued till 4 Oct. (Parl. Writs). On 30 Sept., when sitting in London, Norwich refused to admit the new sheriffs, as one of them was absent (Chron. Edw. I. and Edw. II. i. 218). In December 1313 he was appointed to supervise the collection of the twentieth and fifteenth in London (Fœdera, ii. 159), and in July 1314 was a justice of oyer and terminer in Norfolk and Suffolk (Parl. Writs, ii. 79). On 26 Sept. he was appointed treasurer, and two days later resigned his office as chief baron. Norwich resigned the treasurership on 27 May 1317 through illness; but before long he resumed his post at the exchequer apparently as chief baron, for he is so styled on 9 June 1320, though on some occasions he is referred to as baron simply. On 22 Dec. 1317 he was employed to inquire into the petitions of certain cardinals (Fœdera, ii. 349). In April 1318 Norwich, as one of the barons of the exchequer, was present at the council or parliament held at Leicester to endeavour to effect a reconciliation between the king and Thomas of Lancaster. In May he was appointed to treat with Robert, count of Flanders, regarding the injury done to English merchants; and in November he was one of the justices for the trial of sheriffs and others for oppression in Norfolk and Suffolk. On 25 Feb. 1319 he sat as one of the barons of the exchequer at the Guildhall, London (Chron. Edw. I. and Edw. II. i. 285). From 6 Nov. 1319 to 18 Feb. 1320 Norwich was once more lieutenant for the treasurer; both in this year and in 1321 he appears as a justice for the counties of Essex, Suffolk, and Norfolk. In 1321 he was keeper of the treasury, and in July 1322, after the fall of Thomas of Lancaster, was one of the judges appointed for the trial of the two Roger Mortimers of Chirk and Wigmore. Norwich continued in office during the reign of Edward II; in the next reign he was reappointed chief baron on 2 Feb. 1327, in spite of his share in the condemnation of the Mortimers, the sentence on whom was cancelled on 27 March 1327. He was employed in May 1328 to inquire into the complaints of the weavers of Norwich, and in November to settle the differences between the abbot and townsmen of St. Edmund's (Pat. Rolls, Edw. III, 141, 297, 353). Norwich died in 1329, and was buried in Norwich Cathedral. Dugdale says that Norwich was summoned to parliament as a baron in 1314, but not at any other time. This is an error; for, though Norwich attended parliament in this and in other years as one of the barons of the exchequer, he was never summoned as a baron of parliament. Norwich married between 1295 and 1304 Catherine, daughter of John de Hedersett, and widow of Peter Braunche. She survived her second husband, and was living in 1349. By her Norwich had three sons: John, who is separately noticed; Roger (d. 1372); and Thomas whose daughter, Catherine de Brewse, was ​in 1375 declared heiress to her cousin John, a great-grandson of Walter de Norwich. Walter de Norwich had also a daughter Margaret, who married, first, Sir Thomas Cailey; and, secondly, Robert Ufford, earl of Suffolk; her descendants by the second marriage were her father's eventual heirs. The Norwich family had large estates in Norfolk, Suffolk, Lincolnshire, and Hertfordshire.
[Chronicles of Edward I and Edward II (Rolls Ser.); Fœdera, Record ed.; Cal. of Close Rolls Edward II, 1307–18, and Patent Rolls Edward III, 1327–30; Palgrave's Parl. Writs, iv. 1237–9; Madox Hist. of Exchequer, i. 75, ii. 49, 84; Blomefield's Hist. of Norfolk, iii. 76, iv. 39, 164, v. 126, 129, 138, 522, vi. 137, viii. 52–3, 55, ed. 1812; Dugdale's Baronage, ii. 90–1; Foss's Judges of England, iii. 469–71.]
C. L. K.