Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Chaucombe, Hugh de
CHAUCOMBE, HUGH de (fl. 1200), justiciar, was probably born at Chalcombe in Northamptonshire; at least, it is certain that it was from that place that he received his surname. He is first mentioned in 1108, in the Great Roll of Henry II, as having paid 30l. for relief of six knights' fees in the diocese of Lincoln, in which Chalcombe was then included. He next appears in the same record as having in 1184 been fined one mark to be released from an oath which he had taken to the abbot of St. Albans. During the last three years of Richard I (1196-8) he was sheriff of Staffordshire, Warwickshire, and Leicestershire. On the accession of John he was employed about the king's person, and accompanied him into Normandy. In September 1200 he witnessed a charter granted by John at Argentan, and sat as one of the judges in the king's court at Caen. In the same year the barons of the exchequer received instructions that a debt which Chaucombe owed to the king should be respited so long as he continued abroad in the royal service. The next mention of Chaucombe belongs to 1203, when he appears as having been charged with the duty of making inquisition at the ports with regard to the persons who imported corn from Normandy. During the next two years he frequently accompanied the king in his journeys through England, and several charters granted at different places are witnessed by him. In 1204 he acted as justice itinerant, fines being acknowledged before him in Hampshire and Nottinghamshire, and in July of that year he sat in the king's court at Wells. In the following October he was again appointed sheriff of Warwickshire and Leicestershire, jointly with one of the king^s clerks named Hilary, and was entrusted with the care of the royal castle of Kenilworth. He was also appointed to manage the revenues of Kenilworth Priory during its vacancy. In January 1206-7 he failed to appear to a suit brought against him by R. de Aungervile relating to the wrongful possession of some cattle, and orders were issued for his arrest. In the following July he was dismissed from his office of sheriff, being succeeded by Robert de Roppesley, to whom he was commanded to deliver up the castle of Kenilworth; and subsequently he had to pay a fine of eight hundred marks to the king. In 1209 he became a monk, and entered the priory at Chalcombe. By his wife Hodiema he had one son, named Robert, and two daughters, who were married to Hamund Passalewe and Ralph de Grafton.
[Rot. Cur. Reg. ed. Palgrave, 109, 112,128, 130, 429, 430; Madox's Exchequer, i. 171, 175, 316, 459, 497; Rot. Pat. i. pt. i. 33, 74; Placit. Abbrev. 7, 55 ; Fuller's Worthies, i. 575, ii. 314; Foss's Lives of the Judges, ii. 60; Baker's Hist. of Northamptonshire, 588, 591.]