Family of Robert + BOURCHIER and Margaret + PRAYERS

Husband: Robert + BOURCHIER

Wife: Margaret + PRAYERS

Child 1: William + BOURCHIER

Note on Husband: Robert + BOURCHIER

The eastern part of the South Aisle is so called because it was appropriated by the Bourchiers as their family burial place. The first Bourchier to be connected with Halstead was John, who obtained in 1311 the estate of Stanstead and married Helen de Colchester. He was buried in 1328 and in all probability the granite effigies resting on the easternmost tomb are those of him and his wife with four bedesmen being positioned at their feet. A wooden shield painted with the Bourchier arms has been fixed above the knight, but does not necessarily belong. (There is evidence suggesting that this is a replacement dating from as early as the first half of the sixteenth century. No other such separate shield has been known to have survived.)

The remains of the tomb on which the effigies lie (three portions of two sides of a limestone tomb-chest with 'weepers' and shields) belonged to the tomb of Robert, first Lord Bourchier, son of John and Helen, and his wife Margaret, daughter of Sir Thomas Prayers. Robert was the first Lay Chancellor of England (1340); he fought with the Black Prince at Crecy and was ambassador to the French to treat for peace. He died in 1349 of the Plague. According to the research carried out by J Enoch Powell MP the effigies lying under the adjacent canopied tomb are those of Robert and Margaret.

The canopied tomb with battlemented pinnacles and damaged tomb-chest is characterised by the style prevalent in the early part of the fifteenth century. They display the Bourchier Arms supported by an angel and a dragon. One angel panel in the front appears to have a scallop (cockleshell for Coggeshall?). If so, the tomb may have been made for John, second Lord Bourchier, KG (son of Robert) and his second wife Elizabeth, daughter of Sir John de Coggeshall. He died after a long and distinguished public career in 1400. Some interesting medieval scribbling on the western canopy shaft is gradually becoming obliterated. This records the names of important people connected with the parish. These include Colet (possibly John Colet, since the great tithe belonged to the Dean and Chapter of St Paul's), and Warner, whose family held the Manor of Dynes, alias Boises, from the reign of Henry VI to that of Mary.

Another scribble close by reads 'John Worth, let be your nice legs' although the last two letters are open to question. The Worthies held the Manor of Blamsters and John Worthie was steward to Lord Bourchier at Stanstead Hall during the reign of Henry VI. Weever, in the seventeenth century, mentioned seeing in the church the much damaged tomb of George de Vere, which has entirely disappeared. George was the nephew of John, the redoubtable thirteenth Earl of Oxford who commanded the van of the Duke of Richmond's army at Bosworth Field. George was buried at Halstead in 1498.