Thomas de Berkeley, 5th Baron Berkeley

Primary Sources

Inquisitions Post Mortem for Thomas de Berkeley, knight. Writ 15 July 1417. He died on 13 July last [1417]. He held for life by the courtesy of England after the death of Margaret his wife of the inheritance of Elizabeth, wife of Richard earl of Warwick, their daughter: Charleton, Langdon, Downacarey, Tetcott, North Bovey and Larkbeare, the manors etc. Elizabeth his daughter and heir is aged 30 years and more.

Thomas de Berkeley, 5th Baron Berkeley

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Thomas de Berkeley, 5th Baron Berkeley the Magnificent (5 January, 1352/53 – 13 July 1417) was an English peer born in the Berkeley Castle, Berkeley, Gloucestershire, England to Maurice de Berkeley, 4th Lord Berkeley and Elizabeth le Despencer. In 1367 Lord Thomas married Margaret de Lisle, Baroness Lisle, daughter of Warin de Lisle, 2nd Lord Lisle and Margaret Pipard. Thomas and Margaret had one child, Elizabeth de Berkeley (born ca.1386 – 28 December 1422), wife of Richard de Beauchamp, 13th Earl of Warwick.

[edit]References

Richardson, Douglas, Kimball G. Everingham, and David Faris. Plantagenet Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families. Royal ancestry series. (p. 99) Baltimore, Md: Genealogical Pub. Co, 2004. googlebooks Retrieved April 20, 2008

thepeerage.com Accessed April 20, 2008

Sir Thomas de BERKELEY Lord Berkeley was born 5 Jan 1353 in Berkeley, Gloucestershire, England. He died 13 Jul 1417 in Wotton-under-Edge, Gloucestershire, England. Thomas married Margaret de LISLE Baroness Lisle on Nov 1367 in Wingrave, Buckinghamshire, England.

Margaret de LISLE Baroness Lisle was born 1362 in Kingston Lisle, Berkshire, England. She died 20 Mar 1392 in Wotton-under-Edge, Gloucestershire, England. Margaret married Sir Thomas de BERKELEY Lord Berkeley on Nov 1367 in Wingrave, Buckinghamshire, England.

They had the following children:

  F i Elizabeth BERKELEY Baroness Lisle was born 1386 and died 28 Dec 1422. 

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Thomas IV. Tenth Lord. 1368 to 1417.

Thomas de Berkeley was only 15 years of age when he succeeded to the Barony. He had been married the year previous with great pomp and ceremony to Margaret the daughter and heiress of Gerard Warren, lord de Lisle. The marriage proved a happy one to the individuals most concerned, but it brought bitter fruits to the family in a disputed succession and division of the property, with much bloodshed and litigation which lasted through many following generations. On the death of lord de Lisle in 1383, all his manors 24 in number, besides several advowsons and much other property, devolved on his daughter lady Berkeley, thereby doubling the original Berkeley estate. By this accession of property lord Berkeley greatly increased the style and magnificence of his mode of living, so that he exceeded in state and sumptuousness that of any of his ancestors. He was if possible more fond of field sports than any of his predecessors; his expenditure for the keep of hounds and greyhounds, for hunting the hare, fox, deer and badger, was very great, and at Berkeley he kept great numbers of tame pheasants. He had a barge-house at the Castle bridge-foot, and kept several barges sumptuously fitted up for use on the Severn. Like his predecessors he farmed his own demesne lands with the aid of reeves and bailiffs, maintaining great hospitality at his manor-houses with the produce, and selling the surplus.

Lord Berkeley was frequently employed in military service in the French and Scottish wars, and was also named in several Royal Commissions for arming and training men in the county, and for other purposes. In 1388, the king, Richard II., came to Berkeley Castle, and was royally entertained.

In 1393, lady Berkeley died, to the great grief of her husband, and was buried in the church of Wotton-under-Edge. "She was" says Smyth, "a very mild, devout, and benevolent lady, but without much activity or energy." To divert the sorrow occasioned by her death lord Berkeley obtained the Royal license to go abroad on a pilgrimage for a year, and he never re-married, though only 38 years of age at the time of lady Berkeley's death, and without male issue.

In 1399, the rebellion broke out which ended in the deposition of Richard II., and the elevation to the throne of the duke of Lancaster as Henry IV. The duke of York who had been left Regent of the kingdom during Richard's absence in Ireland, endeavoured for a time to stem the tide of rebellion, but finding his efforts useless, he opened negociations with the duke of Lancaster, and a meeting between them was arranged which took place at Berkeley Castle on the Sunday after St. James's day, 1399. Their combined forces took Bristol Castle, and then marched to Chester, and the unfortunate Richard returned from Ireland to find his kingdom lost. A few days after he signed a formal abdication, to which, amongst others, Thomas lord Berkeley was a witness. At Michaelmas following, the king's deposition was formally completed by a Parliament held at the Tower of London, by whom a commission, consisting of a Bishop, an Abbot, an Earl, a Baron, a Judge, and a Knight, was appointed to take, publish, and pronounce the King�s resignation, lord Berkeley being the Baron; and Lancaster was then formally recognized as king by the title of Henry IV. The unfortunate Richard was soon afterwards murdered at Pontefract Castle.

In 1405, lord Berkeley was in command of an English fleet which gained two important victories over the French, who were endeavouring to support Owen Glendower's rebellion in Wales. He was also made a Privy Counsellor, and one of the Lords of the marches of Wales. He died in 1417, at his manor house of Wotton-under-Edge, and was buried in the church there by the side of his wife the lady Margaret, under a fine altar tomb of grey marble, which bears their effigies in brass. All lady Berkeley's manors descended to their only child Elizabeth, married to the Earl of Warwick, but the Castle and Barony of Berkeley devolved upon the heir male, James, son of the late lord's brother, the lord of Raglan, who now succeeded as eleventh lord Berkeley.

The great City of London townhouse of the Berkeleys, known as "Berkeley's Inn", was at Puddle Dock by Baynard's Castle, close to the Blackfriars Monastery. Thomas FitzNicholl, one of the witnesses, was many times MP for Gloucestershire, including in 1395 when he served jointly with Gilbert Denys. Saul, N. states that such feoffees were likely to have been members of Lord Berkeley's retinue.[4] These were very significant positions of trust granted to his feoffees as Berkeley died leaving only a daughter and the succession to the vast Berkeley lands, including the castle itself, became a matter of much dispute amongst his possible heirs resulting in a series of feuds which led in 1470 to the last private battle fought on English soil at the Battle of Nibley Green, between Lord William Berkeley and Viscount Lisle, and there followed the longest dispute in English legal history, which did not end until 1609.

FindAGrave, http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=84705317

Thomas "The Magnificent" Berkeley

Birth: Jan. 5, 1353 Berkeley Gloucestershire, England Death: Jul. 13, 1417 Dursley Gloucestershire, England

Thomas Berkeley "the Magnificent", son of Maurice, Lord Berkeley and Elizabeth Despencer, at his birth in 1353 brought together the blood of the baronial families of Berkeley, Despencer, Mortimer and Clare--four of the principal dynasties central to the struggle, a generation earlier, between the barons and Edward II. His maternal great-grandmother was Joan of Acre, daughter of Edward I. In November 1367 at Wingrave, Buckinghamshire, Thomas married Margaret, Baroness of Lisle & Teyes. Their only child, Elizabeth, married Richard de Beauchamp, earl of Warwick.

Thomas' resume included an extensive military service, by sea and by land, under Richard II; this service was continued and enhanced under Henry IV. Dugdale says that he was appointed Admiral of the King's Fleet in the 5th year of Henry IV: "He was likewise retained by Indenture to serve the King with three hundred Men at Arms, upon the Sea, for one quarter of a year, himself accounted, with eleven Knights, two hundred eighty five Esquires, six hundred Archers, seven Ships, seven Barges, and seven Ballingers, double manned with Marriners," having command to sail to Bordeaux.

Thomas and Margaret's brass was commissioned in 1392 on the death of Margaret, daughter and heiress of Warin, Lord Lisle. It was conceived as a joint memorial, to the Berkeleys as a couple, although Thomas himself was to live for another 25 years. Thomas's choice of a brass for his wife is a measure of the high status enjoyed by brasses at this time. Earlier members of his family had all been commemorated by relief effigies – most of them of freestone but in one case of alabaster; and this tradition was to resume under his successors. Brasses, however, enjoyed particular favor with the aristocracy in Thomas's lifetime.

In Thomas's lifetime the estates of the Berkeley family reached their greatest extent. His wife, an heiress, whom he had married in 1367, brought him the wide Lisle estates in Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Buckinghamshire. Thomas died at Dursley Castle, Dursley, Gloucestershire, , England in 1417 without male issue, however, the Berkeley inheritance was divided between the heir male and the heir general, and the great lawsuit began which was to last for nearly two centuries.

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Family links:

Parents:

 Maurice de Berkeley (1330 - 1368)

 Elizabeth le Despenser Berkeley (1326 - 1389)

Spouse:

 Margaret de Lisle Berkeley (1360 - 1392)

Children:

 Elizabeth Berkeley Beauchamp (1386 - 1422)*

Sibling:

 Thomas Berkeley (1353 - 1417)

 James Berkeley (1354 - 1405)*

*Calculated relationship

Burial: St Mary the Virgin Churchyard Wotton-under-Edge Stroud District Gloucestershire, England Plot: Purbeck marble tomb chest in the north aisle of the church

Maintained by: Anne Shurtleff Stevens Originally Created by: Audrey DeCamp Hoffman Record added: Feb 09, 2012 Find A Grave Memorial# 84705317