Harlaston, a clerk of the chancery who was trusted to look after both the privy seal and the Great Seal on occasion, as John of Chelmsford, the incumbent, had been deprived for supporting Lancaster's revolt: this was a decision Chelmsford later emerged from prison to contest. Holbeach also had to see that John of Kynardessey, a clerical client of Lancaster, was transferred to the prebend of Flixton, apparently making room for Robert Baldock in that of Eccleshall, although the details are complex and hazy, and were to lead to further disputes later. While at Rothwell, Northamptonshire with the king, Northburgh appointed Gilbert Ó Tigernaig, the Bishop of Annaghdown (rendered in the diocesan register as Enagdun) as suffragan bishop, to carry out ordinations and other necessary episcopal functions, and Stephen Blound as seneschal. Later, from Bosworth he recommissioned Holbeach, widening his powers, and appointed as his vicar general Geoffrey of Blaston, the experienced Archdeacon of Derby. These were troubled times and there were apparently already disturbances in the diocese. A sentence of excommunication had to be read out at Eccleshall against parishioners suspected of breaking into the bishop's deer parks, although it is unclear whether this concerned Blore, near Eccleshall, or Brewood, further south, or both, as both are mentioned. It later transpired that one of the malefactors was a cleric, Thomas de Stretton, who with his brother William, was later fined for a series of outrages: roaming with an armed gang, carrying out assaults and raiding Brewood Park to carry off game. Northburgh was at last consecrated on 27 June at Halesowen Abbey by Thomas Cobham, the Bishop of Worcester and five other bishops. He decreed a forty-day indulgence to pilgrims who visited the Abbey's most important relic, the head of St Barbara, so long as they also made a gift and said both the Lord's Prayer for the king and queen and the Hail Mary in English. He made his profession of obedience to the Archbishop of Canterbury on 31 August. Diocesan conflicts Northburgh was in almost constant conflict with his Lichfield chapter. An underlying problem was that most of the senior diocesan posts, and many of the less important, were filled by papal provision, leading to high rate of absenteeism. Nearly half, 47 out of 98, of the appointments of canons in Northburgh's episcopate were made in this way. Northburgh's treasurers, a key role in the diocese, were