Thomas (Plantagenet) of Woodstock KG (1355 - 1397)

Born 7 Jan 1355 in Woodstock Palace, Oxfordshire, England

Ancestors

Descendants

Died 8 Sep 1397 at age 42 in Pas-de-Calais, France

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Biography

Thomas (Plantagenet) of Woodstock KG is a member of the House of Plantagenet.

Name and Titles

Name: Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester ^{[1] [2]}

Twelth and youngest child of Edward III, King of England and Philippa of Hainault. ^{[3] [4]}

(Royal Ancestry)

• 1355: joint Guardian and Lieutenant of England
• 1359: Guardian and Lieutenant of England
• 1376: Constable of England
• 1378-90, 1393-95, 1397: Trier of Petitions in Parliament
• 1388-91: Chief Justice of Chester and North Wales
• 1389: Constable of Gloucester Castle
• 1389: Privy Councilor
• 1392-3: Lieutenant of Ireland

wife's right:

• 1377: hereditary Constable of England
• 1377: Earl of Buckingham
• 22 Jun 1380: Earl of Essex.[1]
• 06 Aug 1385: Duke of Gloucester.[2]
• lord of Pleshey in Essex
• lord of Huntington in Huntingdonshire
• lord of Caldicot in Monmouthshire

Marriage and Children

Married: Eleanor de Bohun, daughter of Humphrey de Bohun, Earl of Hereford, Essex and Northampton and Joan de Arundel, before 24 August 1376.^[5][6]

Children of Thomas of Woodstock and Eleanor de Bohun:

• Humphrey, 2nd Earl of Buckingham (c. 1381 - 02 Sep 1399).MedLands

• Anne of Gloucester (c. 1383 - 1438).[3]

m.1 (1390) Thomas Stafford, 3rd Earl of Stafford

m.2 (ante 28 Jun 1398) Edmund Stafford, 5th Earl of Stafford

m.3 (ante 20 Nov 1405) William Bourchier, Count of Eu.^[7]

• Joan (1384 - 16 Aug 1400).[4]

m. Gilbert Talbot, 5th Lord Talbot (1383–1419).

• Isabel (12 Mar 1385/6 - Apr 1402), nun at Minoresses Convent - Aldgate, London.[5]

• (unproven) Philippe (c. 1388 - d. young).[6]

Military

Brittany Campaign Thomas commanded a large campaign in Northern France in 1380. This was in support of John IV, Duke of Brittany, who after a period in exile in England was seeking to regain control of his dukedom. In 1381 Thomas withdrew, abandoning a siege of Nantes, after John IV reached an accord with the French king and dysentery afflicted the English army.^[8]

Rebellion

Dispute with King Richard II -- "Thomas led the Lords Appellant... to wrest power from Richard II ... culminated in rebellion in 1388, which weakened the king's power. Richard II managed to dispose of the Lords Appellant in 1397, and Thomas was imprisoned in Calais to await trial for treason.

During that time he was murdered, probably by a group of men led by Thomas de Mowbray, 1st Duke of Norfolk, and Nicholas Colfox, presumably on behalf of Richard II. This caused an outcry among the nobility of England that is considered by many to have added to Richard's unpopularity."^[8]

As he was attainted as a traitor, his dukedom of Gloucester was forfeit. The title Earl of Buckingham was inherited by his son, who died two years later in 1399. Thomas of Woodstock's eldest daughter, Anne, married into the powerful Stafford family, who were Earls of Stafford. Her son, Humphrey was created Duke of Buckingham in 1444 and also inherited part of the de Bohun estates.

The other part of these estates — including the Earldom of Hereford, which belonged to Mary de Bohun and had then become incorporated into the holdings of the House of Lancaster — became a matter of contention in the latter 15th century. The House of Lancaster ruled from 1399 to 1461. When Henry VI was deposed by Edward IV of York, Edward appropriated that half into the Crown property. Humphrey's grandson Henry Stafford, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, however, claimed those lands should have devolved to him. Unsuccessful under Edward, he was awarded these lands by Richard III, pending approval of Parliament. This was probably one of the Buckingham's motives in supporting Richard's accession.

Death

(Royal Ancestry & Royal Tombs of Medieval England) Thomas of Woodstock, duke of Gloucester in 1385, was accused of treason and arrested in the presence of Richard II at the ducal castle of Pleshy. He was taken to Calais in France in the custody of the Captain of Calais, Thomas Mowbray, Earl of Nottingham. On 21 September, a writ was issued to Nottingham to deliver the duke to Westminster to stand trial. On 24 September Nottingham replied that the duke was already dead.

Gloucester most likely died around 8 September 1397, but the circumstances of his death were not made public. In 1400 a John Hall testified before Parliament how servants of the earl of Nottingham had smothered the duke under a bed. It was confirmed by historic record that the duke was smothered by orders of the king at Calais on 8 (or 9) September 1397. On 14 October 1397 Richard II instructed Nottingham to release Gloucester's body to the royal clerk who was to deliver it to the duke's widow for burial at Westminster. Four days later the clerk was instructed to the body to the duchess. On 31 October, however, Richard II ordered the duchess to convey the body to Bermondsey Abbey (in London) and keep it there 'at her peril.' It was later claimed that Gloucester was buried in the collegiate church at Pleshy, which he founded in 1394. But at some point, the duke was buried in the chapel of St. Edmund and Thomas of Canterbury at Westminster. The burial must have taken place by 3 August 1399 when his widow instructed her own burial beside him. Shortly after his accession in 1399, Henry IV had his uncle's remains reburied in the Confessor's Chapel beside his parents, the grave marked by a memorial brass set into the chapel floor.

His Inquisitions Post Mortem state he died on 8 September 1397.^[9] His heirs were his daughters Anne, Joan, and Isabel.^[9]

Research Notes

Marriage Date: No record of the date of Thomas of Woodstock's marriage to Eleanor de Bohun seems to have been found. In considering the following, one needs to bear in mind the length of time that could be taken over detailed negotiations of the terms of a marriage as well as Eleanor's own age (though aristocratic marriages in childhood were not that uncommon in this period) and the common practice of a marriage being agreed while one or both of the parties was a fairly young child, with the marriage ceremony not taking place till some time later.

• Both Magna Carta Ancestry and the Complete Peerage state that the marriage took place before 24 August 1376.^[5][6]
• The Complete Peerage cites an entry in the Close Rolls for 8 February 1376 describing Eleanor as Thomas's wife,^[10] but appears not to regard that as firm evidence that the actual wedding ceremony had taken place by then, as it states in the main text of the entry for Thomas of Woodstock that the marriage was before 24 August that year.^[6] The Close Rolls reference to her being Thomas's wife could just mean that the couple were firmly betrothed.
• On 3 April 1374 Thomas of Woodstock was granted a number of manors in anticipation of the marriage.^[5][11] The manors had previously been held by her father, and in the grant it was stated that he "will take to wife" Eleanor de Bohun.^[11] It may nonetheless have been a while before the marriage actually took place.
• The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography entry for Thomas of Woodstock suggests hesitantly that the marriage may have been in early summer 1374, citing a record in the Register of John of Gaunt, dated 1 June 1374, of the order of a goblet and ewer to be delivered to Eleanor on her marriage day^[11][12]: clearly the marriage had not taken place by then, and it is possible that this gift was ordered some months or more before the wedding.
• T Anna Leese in her book Blood Royal does not give a marriage date.^[13]
• Alison Weir, in Britain's Royal Families, states, without giving a source, that the marriage was before 8 February 1376, and may possibly have been in 1374, and adds that there is no record of where it took place.^[14]
• Medlands also suggests that the marriage was before 8 February 1376, but again without a source.^[2]

Sources

Footnotes and citations:

1. ↑ Richardson, Royal Ancestry, Vol I, pp. 89-90 and Vol III p. 261.
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1} Cawley, Medieval Lands: Thomas of Woodstock
3. ↑ Cawley, Medieval Lands : Edward III
4. ↑ Cawley, Medieval Lands : Phillipa of Hainault
5. ↑ ^{5.0 5.1 5.2} Douglas Richardson. Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 4 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham, 2nd edition (Salt Lake City: the author, 2011), volume I pp.277-80 BOURCHIER 8.
6. ↑ ^{6.0 6.1 6.2} G E Cokayne. Complete Peerage, new edition, Vol. 5, St Catherine Press 1926, pp.727-8
7. ↑ Her son by 3rd marriage, John Bourchier, 1st Baron Berners, was grandfather of Richard Neville, 2nd Baron Latimer of Snape. Richard's granddaughter, Anne Dawney,[1] was ancestress of Zachary Taylor,[2] 12th President of the U.S.A.
8. ↑ ^{8.0 8.1} Wikipedia: Thomas of Woodstock
9. ↑ ^{9.0 9.1} J. L. Kirby, 'Inquisitions Post Mortem, Henry IV, Entries 103-152', in Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem: Volume 18, Henry IV (London, 1987), pp. 35-49. British History Online http://www.british-history.ac.uk/inquis-post-mortem/vol18/pp35-49 [accessed 15 November 2020].
10. ↑ G E Cokayne, Complete Peerage, volume 5, p. 720, footnote f
11. ↑ ^{11.0 11.1 11.2} Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: 'Thomas [Thomas of Woodstock], duke of Gloucester', 2004, revised online 2008, available online via some libraries
12. ↑ The text of the Register entry (in French) is in John Of Gaunt's Register, volume II, Camden Society, 1911, pp. 224-5, entry 1431, Internet Archive. The gifts are to be delivered to "nostre tres ame seur la dame de Wodstok le jour de son mariage."
13. ↑ T Anna Leese. Blood Royal, Issue of the Kings and Queens of Medieval England 1066-1399, Heritage Books 2007, p. 114
14. ↑ Alison Weir. Britain's Royal Families, new edition, Pimlico, 2002, reissued by Vintage Books, 2008, p. 115

Source list:

• Richardson, Douglas. Royal Ancestry: A Study In Colonial And Medieval Families, in 5 vols. (Salt Lake City, Utah, 2013). See Vol I, pp. 91, 427, 479-482.

• "Royal Ancestry" 2013 Douglas Richardson Vol. II. page 666

• Richardson, Douglas. Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 4 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham. 2nd edition. Salt Lake City: the author, 2011. See also WikiTree's source page for Magna Carta Ancestry.

• Cawley, Charles. Medieval Lands: A Prosopography of Medieval European Noble and Royal Families, Online at Foundation for Medieval Genealogy Website.

• Beltz, G. (1841). Memorials of the Order of the Garter, (pp. 269 - 274). London: Wm. Pickering. Google Books.[7] (see also Space: Memorials of the Most Noble Order of the Garter).

• Burke, B. (1864). Royal Descents and Pedigrees of Founders Kin, (pp. 64 - 72). London: Harrison. Archive.org. eBook.[8] (see also Space: Royal Descents and Pedigrees of Founders Kin).

• Cawley, C. (2006). Medieval Lands. fmg.ac.[9]

• Duffy, M. (2003). Royal Tombs of Medieval England, (pp.155-158). N.p.

• Holinshed, R. (1577). Holinshed's Chronicles, (Vol. 2, pp. 798). Google Books.[10] (see also Space: Holinshed's Chronicles).

• Weis, F.L. (1999). The Magna Charta Sureties 1215, (5th ed).

See also:

• Wikipedia: Thomas of Woodstock, 1st Duke of Gloucester
• Wikipedia: Eleanor de Bohun