His abbacy occurred at a time of tribulation for the abbey, mostly due to poor relations with the local populace.
He is described as "greatly venerable in life and always and everywhere devoted to God and the Blessed Virgin Mary"[1] and as A man of most beautiful appearance, as regards externals...and in good works also he fought a good fight for Christ, for he used a hair shirt to conquer the flesh, and by this discipline subdued it to the spirit.
[4] Abbot Walter spent much of his tenure defending the rights and prerogatives of his house (even, in 1302, securing the rights to all the dead wood on the ground within Peak Forest[5] and at the same time petitioning parliament for the payment of arrears needed to pay for the ongoing works at the Abbey).
This was disputed by a member of the local gentry, Sir Theobald Butler, who claimed the hereditary grant of the church at Kirkham (and therefore all the associated rights and rents) from the time of King Richard I. Walter also requested that the King inform the Justices of the Eyre to aid the Abbey in its enforcement of its previous royal charters and successfully proved his Abbey's rights to the Kirkham fair and market before a commission of Quo Warranto.
Abbot Walter also, for good measure, obtained from Otton de Grandson—the English Ambassador to St Peter's—Papal confirmation that the advowson of Kirkham was vale Royal's in perpetuity.