Brandon

Brandon was also a manor of the medieval lordship of Brancepeth and as such was possessed by the Neville family, the Earls of Westmoreland, while Holywell, Langley, Littleburn and other such localities were the sites of large freehold gentry houses.

After the Northern Rising of 1569, Elizabeth I confiscated Brancepeth Castle and its territories. These were administered as Crown Lands until the 1620s and plundered by a series of courtiers and Royal lessees. In 1628-29 these lands were conveyed to the City of London when Charles I was forced to redeem his debts to the city. The Brancepeth lands were broken up in a series of sales to London merchants and financiers who in turn resold to local buyers at high profits. The one exception to this fate was Brandon manor, which remained in the hands of its London buyer. A silk merchant, Edward Cropley, bought the whole estate of Brandon manor for £1,700 in 1630, and his family held onto the…