Richard Basset

Richard Basset (died between 1135 and 1144) was a royal judge and sheriff during the reign of King Henry I of England.

Basset and his wife founded a monastic house in 1125 from their lands, which before the donation were equivalent to 15 knight's fees.

He also inherited his father's English estates at Colston Basset, Kingston Winslow, and Peatling Parva.

[6] Another relative may have been the Robert Basset who witnessed nine charters of Ranulf de Gernon, Earl of Chester.

[8] In 1129–30, Basset served as sheriff of Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire, Cambridgeshire and Huntingdonshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, Norfolk and Suffolk, and Surrey together with Aubrey de Vere II.

Basset witnessed no royal documents after 1133 when King Henry left England for Normandy for the final time.

He had built a castle in Normandy at Montreuil-au-Houlme, but Basset did not have possession of it in 1136, when it was held against Stephen's opponents by William de Montpincon.

In addition, Basset held land in Leicestershire from both King David I of Scotland and from Robert de Beaumont, the Earl of Leicester.

[2] The Norman chronicler Orderic Vitalis wrote that Basset built a tower on his ancestral lands of Montreuil in Normandy purely to demonstrate his status and wealth.