Legend of the Crest
by Annette Hudleston Harwood


"The heir to the barony of Egremont was captured by the Saracens during the Crusades and held to ransom by the Dey of Algiers. No money was forthcoming from his brother at home who had made himself Lord of the barony. Our hero was strung up by his hair to a beam in the dungeon. The Princess Zaide, daughter of the Dey, had fallen in love with the crusader and aided by her maid, attempted to cut him down. Her hand was unsteady (with love for him?) and she missed her aim, severing the skin of his scalp, leaving it suspended and bleeding. The lovers fled and eventually arrived back in England.
Back at Egremont castle, the usurping baron was feasting in the Great hall. Suddenly, the sound of a horn at the gate was heard. It could only be rung by the rightful heir.The guilt-ridden baron realised it was his brother. However, all was forgiven, and the younger brother was given a share of the barony, which became the lordship of Millom. Some stories have the beautiful Zaide converting to Christianity and marrying her hero.
A bloody scalp raised up by two arms, form the crest of the Hudleston family, who married the heiress of the de Boyvilles, to whom this story probably refers. The horn and the "hatterel" (scalp) were apparently born by the first lords of Millom.

Notes: 1. This story appears in all the old accounts of Cumberland, tho' with variations on the place of capture and imprisonment.
2."A bugle horn stringed "was the sheep mark of Millom castle, (used to identify the owner) and was calles a "hottil" a probable corruption of "hatterel".
3. The crest of the de Boyvilles was adopted by the Hudlestons when Sir John 1st. married Lady Joan de Boyvil (the heiress) in c. 1230...but the Hudlestons kept their own coat of arms. The de Boyvill coat is quite different.
4. A long rambling account with fanciful Victorian phraseology appeared in a book " Residence in Algiers" published 1852, written 1848. It was found in the library at Algiers by an aged (now dead )relative in 1912 and the legend was typed out. I have a copy of it.


Postscript.
In 1981, archaeologists digging at St. Bee's priory in Cumberland (up the coast from Millom) on the site of a ruined chancel added c.1300, found in a vault faced with red sandstone, a lead lined coffin in which was the almost perfectly preserved body of a wax shrouded knight. A swathe of thick, black hair, not his own, was around his shoulders. A second body, of a woman, was in a coffin near to that of the knight.A coat of arms with a trellis-like bar across it was known to have been in the vault long ago.
The knight had breakfasted on grapes and some kind of gruel on the day he died, and his injuries included a broken jaw and a fractured rib, suggesting he may have been killed in battle or in jousting.
Identification of the body has not been conclusive. No dates are available and the lead has not been analysed.
It is probable he died away from St. Bees and could have been fighting in the Crusades or in battles with the Scots or Welsh. He must have been quite important to have been so carefully embalmed and wrapped in lead.
The hair was thick, black and curly.
Could this be the hair of Zaide, cut from her head and wrapped over the body of her husband as a memento?
The hair and other artefacts are now in a museum at St. Bees...I have seen them and have a photo of the hair, and the shroud.
The mystery of "St.Bees man " remains.
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Email: BJ Huddleston