Bedale ( ), is a market town and civil parish in North Yorkshire, England. Historically part of the North Riding of Yorkshire, it is north of Leeds, south-west of Middlesbrough and south-west of the county town of Northallerton. It was originally in Richmondshire and listed in Domesday Book as part of Catterick wapentake, which was also known as Hangshire (named after Hang Bank in Finghall); it was split again and Bedale remained in East Hang. Bedale Beck is a tributary of the River Swale, which forms one of the Yorkshire Dales, with its predominance of agriculture and its related small traditional trades, although tourism is increasingly important.
History
Before the Harrying of the North Bedale was held by Torpin (Thorfinn), a patronym retained by the infamous Dick Turpin. The parish church also dates from this time (as evidenced by its crypt), before significant remodelling. The original 9th-century church escaped destruction in the Harrying of the North and was recorded in Domesday Book. The recent discovery of the Bedale Hoard provides further evidence of high-status Anglo-Saxon and Viking Age activity in the area. The town was recorded as Bedell or Bedhal and derives from 'Beda's Halh' which means the corner or piece of land of Beda.
Under the Bretons of Richmond
After being doled out by Count Alan Le Roux to his relative Bodin of Middleham for a short time, the new market town was founded by Scollandus (in a charter later confirmed by Henry III), a Breton officer in a hereditary position at Richmond Castle. Bedale Hall marks the site of a castle built in the reign of King Edward I of England by Sir Bryan FitzAlan, Lord of the Manor of Bedale and later Baron FitzAlan. After contributing to the defeat of Llywelyn ap Gruffudd, FitzAlan succeeded the Earl of Surrey as Guardian and Keeper of Scotland for Edward I and fought at the Battle of Falkirk (1298) and the siege of Caerlaverock in July 1300. Fitz Alan was involved in a fight with William Wallace that led to the death of a comrade-in-arms and held the castles of Dundee and Forfar, as well as those in the Scottish Lowlands: Roxburgh Castle and Jedburgh. This baron also built Killerby Castle and Askham Bryan in Yorkshire.
Stapleton, Lovell and others
His co-heir jure uxoris, Sir Gilbert de Stapleton of Carleton, Knt, was a conspirator in the assassination of Piers Gaveston. Sir Miles Stapleton was a founding Knight of the Order of the Garter, who fought at the Siege of Calais and at the Battle of Crécy. The Stapletons were "Lollard knights" and were Lords of the Manor of Bedale for generations. Bedale had traditionally been a Lancastrian area, until the Kingmaker, Clarence and Gloucester obtained Richmond and Middleham Castles. Following the Battle of Bosworth Field, Francis Lovell, 1st Viscount Lovell led the charge of insurgency in the Yorkist Stafford and Lovell Rebellion against Henry VII of England, attainted Earl of Richmond. The inhabitants of the region went on several recusancy strikes, such as the Pilgrimage of Grace and made trouble for John Nevill, 3rd Baron Latymer (Catherine Parr's husband before Henry VIII) in Snape Castle. This continued in the Rising of the North, with Henry VII's follower Simon Digby of Aiskew executed and replaced by Ambrose Dudley, 3rd Earl of Warwick, whose wife sold it to the native Sir William Theakston & John Jackson, after which it was resold to Cavalier Henry Peirse, whose descendants remain in town. During the English Civil War, Philip Stapleton continued in much of the same anti-Tudor & Stuart sentiment as Guy Fawkes, whose statement, when asked by one of the Scottish lords what he had intended to do with so much gunpowder, Fawkes answered him, "To blow you Scotch beggars back to your own native mountains!" Middleham Castle was subsequently ordered to be demolished by the Parliamentarians so that the Royalists could not take it again. However there is no documentary proof that this order was ever carried out.
Lords of the Manor
Sir Alan FitzBrian, Knt, Lord of the Manor of Bedale &c., (died shortly before 17 May 1267, killed in self-defence by Payn le Keu of Brandesburton) was a descendant of Conan I of Rennes, Duke of Brittany. He had two known sons, the younger being Theobald FitzAlan of Stow and Quy (d. 21 February 1308), and was succeeded at Bedale by the elder: Sir Brian FitzAlan Knt., (d. 1 June 1306), J.P., High Sheriff of Yorkshire, &c. He was summoned to parliament from 24 June 1295 to 22 January 1305 by Writs directed to Briano filio Alani whereby he is held to have become Lord FitzAlan. Upon his death any hereditary peerage created by the Writ of 1295 is held to be in abeyance.
