An early recorded English legal case concerning the death of Richard Butler.

Matilda Butler, the wife of Richard Butler, was the daughter of Elias de Caillewey/Kaillewey of Brimpsfield, Gloucestershire, and Tuderinton/Kaylewent Wiltshire. Her father Elias would have been born about 1160-65, and was probably the Elias who married Bertha Giffard, sister of Elias Giffard, of the Baronial Giffard family. He was the forebear of John le Calewe, who was temporarily to inherit the Giffard estates of the executed John Giffard in 1327, through that marriage. Elias’s marriage would have been about 1190, perhaps earlier, and Matilda could have been born around 1190. Matilda married Richard Butler of Acton, Gloucestershire, and they had at least one child, Amice (Hawisa).

Richard Butler had been “wounded in his own house”. It was unknown by whom, however Matilda claimed it was by his former servant William Rous.

In the Presentment of the (Grand) Jury at the Agmead Hundred, she had stated she had gone for a walk in the garden at night with her maid, whilst her husband was having his feet washed by her daughter Amice. She heard a noise, and on going to the house door, saw William and another man with swords drawn near her husband. They ran after her, but she escaped, and hid herself until they went away. Her maid however was caught and bound.

The jurors disbelieved her story, denying that Richard ever had such a servant, and alleging that she and her husband were continually in strife, and that he sometimes beat her, accusing her of light behaviour. She often went off to the house of her father Elyas, or to the house of Robert Wayfer, who had married her aunt. Furthermore the said Robert and William Wayfer, and John of Fuestone, often went to the house of Richard Butler, taking her back with them, and threatening Richard.

The Agmead jurors firmly believed that William and John slew him by the counsel and wish of Matilda herself, and bribed by her thereto. The jurors of Grumboldsash Hundred concurred in that opinion.

Matilda had flatly refused to be tried by a jury of her neighbours, on the plea that many of them were probably prejudiced against her, and had judgement deferred until one month after Michaelmas, when the King’s Court sat at Westminster. Bail was exacted for Amice, possibly because she may have given false evidence for her mother.

On 27 December 1221 a mandate was given to the Sheriff of Gloucestershire to deliver his prisoner, the relict/widow Matilda, to Elyas and Osbert Giffard of Brimpsfield who, with others, had bound themselves to ensure that before the forthcoming Easter, “she would assume the habit of a black nun, or that of the Convent of Seperingham”. The others were, William Earl Marshall (son of the former Regent of England), William Earl of Salisbury (William Longsword, son of King Henry II and “Fair Rosamund”), Osbert Giffard of Norfolk, Gilbert Giffard, and her father Elyas de Cailloue/Caillewey. Apart from her father, and Giffard cousins, they included two of the principal nobles in England. Matilda presumably spent the rest of her days in the Convent, but what became of the perpetrators of the outrage we do not know. Probably they were suffered to “abjure the realm”, and perchance sought to expiate their crime by a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Considering the coarse and brutal times, the punishment could be considered lenient, no doubt because of the high family position and connections.

The case is regarded as an early example of the administration of Justice, providing an insight into the manners and customs of the English Aristocracy of the time.

Matilda’s father Elias is the earliest forebear about which we have some certainty, with direct descent to John le Calewe of Dunes Weston in Dorset, William of Sherborne, the Knights of Rockbourne, and the Pedigreed families of the Tudor period. Probably other families in Devon and elsewhere. It is probable that he was a son of the second Philip, the son of Philip and Hawisa de Chailleway, who was referred to in the Gloucester Pipe Rolls as having property in Wiltshire in 1165, and with property in Worcestershire. With earlier descent from Osbern de Cailli, who was born about 1015-1020 in Normandy.