Person Page - 1362

     John Talbot, 1st Viscount Lisle (1423 – 17 July 1453), English nobleman and medieval soldier, was the son of John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury, and his second wife Margaret Beauchamp.

In 1444, he was created Baron Lisle (his mother being one of the coheirs to the previous creation of the barony), and in 1451, was made Viscount Lisle. After 1449, his mother was one of three coheirs to her father, and through her he possessed a claim on Berkeley Castle.

In prosecution of the claim against the Baron Berkeley, the heir-male, he stormed Berkeley Castle in 1452 and took the Baron and his sons prisoner.

In the winter of 1452, he led troops into Guyenne to reinforce his father.

Both father and son were killed the next summer at the Battle of Castillon. Some chroniclers assert that when his wounded and unhorsed father begged him to quit the field and save himself, he refused, preferring death to dishonor; a scene memorialized by William Shakespeare in Henry VI, Part I.

He married Joan Cheddar after 1443 and had three children:

Elizabeth Talbot (d. 1487), married Edward Grey, 1st Viscount Lisle
Thomas Talbot, 2nd Viscount Lisle (d. 1470)
Margaret Talbot (d. 1475).¹

     Maurice Berkeley, 2nd Baron Berkeley (Berkeley, Gloucestershire, April 1271 - Wallingford Castle, 31 May 1326), sometimes termed The Magnanimous, was an English baron and rebel.

Born at Berkeley in the English county of Gloucestershire, he was the son of Thomas de Berkeley, 1st Baron Berkeley (d. 1321), and Joan de Ferrers (1255-1309). He was involved in the Scottish Wars from about 1295 to 1318. He acceded on 16 August 1308, was Governor of Gloucester 1312, Governor of Berwick-on-Tweed 1314, Steward of the Duchy of Aquitaine 1319 and Justiciar of South Wales 1316. With the Earl of Lancaster, he rebelled against King Edward II, for which he was imprisoned in Wallingford Castle in Berkshire (now Oxfordshire), where he died on 31 May 1326 and was eventually buried at St Augustine's Abbey in Bristol.

He married: 1. Eva la Zouche in 1289, with children:

Thomas de Berkeley, 3rd Baron Berkeley, born c. 1296
Sir Maurice Berkeley, of Uley, Gloucester
Isabel Berkeley
Milicent Berkeley
2. Isabella de Clare, daughter of Gilbert de Clare, 6th Earl of Hertford and Alice de Lusignan, about 1316.

His son, Thomas, succeeded his father as the 3rd Baron Berkeley.¹

     Thomas de Berkeley aka The Wise (1245 - 23 July 1321), 1st Baron Berkeley, was an English baron, soldier and diplomat.

Thomas was born in 1245 at Berkeley Castle in the English county of Gloucestershire, the son of Sir Maurice de Berkeley and Isabel FitzRoy. In 1267, he married Joan de Ferrers, the daughter of William de Ferrers, 5th Earl of Derby and Margaret de Quinci, and was succeeded by his son Maurice de Berkeley II.

Berkeley fought in the Battle of Evesham. He inherited the title of Baron de Berkeley [feudal baron] in 1281 and was created 1st Baron Berkeley [England by writ] on 28 June 1283. He was a commissioner to examine the claims to the crown of Scotland in June 1292.

He was on an embassy to France in January 1296 and held the office of Vice-Constable of England in 1297. He fought in the Battle of Falkirk on 22 July 1298 and fought in the siege of Caerlaverock in July 1300. He was on an embassy to Pope Clement V in July 1307. He fought in the Battle of Bannockburn on 24 June 1314, where he was taken prisoner, and paid a large sum for his ransom. He died at Berkeley on 23 July 1321.¹

     Roger de Quincy, 2nd Earl of Winchester (1195? – 25 April 1265) was a medieval nobleman who was prominent on both sides of the Anglo-Scottish border, as Earl of Winchester and Constable of Scotland.

He was the second son of Saer de Quincy, 1st Earl of Winchester, and Margaret de Beaumont.

He probably joined his father on the Fifth Crusade in 1219, where the elder de Quincy fell sick and died. His elder brother having died a few years earlier, Roger thus inherited his father's titles and properties. However, he did not take possession of his father's lands until February 1221, probably because he did not return to England from the crusade until then. He did not formally become earl until after the death of his mother in 1235.

Roger married Helen, eldest daughter and co-heiress of Alan, Lord of Galloway. Without legitimate sons to succeed him, Alan's lands and dignities were divided between the husbands of his three daughters, so Roger acquired Alan's position as Constable of Scotland, and one-third of the lordship of Galloway (although the actual title of Lord of Galloway went through Helen's half-sister Devorguilla to her husband John I de Balliol).

The Galwegians rebelled under Gille Ruadh, not wanting their land divided, but the rebellion was suppressed by Alexander II of Scotland. Roger ruled his portion of Galloway strictly, and the Galwegians revolted again in 1247, forcing Roger to take refuge in a castle. Faced with a siege and little chance of relief, Roger and a few men fought their way out and rode off to seek help from Alexander, who raised forces to again suppress the rebellion.

In the following years Roger was one of the leaders of the baronial opposition to Henry III of England, although he fought for Henry against the Welsh in the 1250s and 1260s.

Following Helen's death in 1245, Roger married Maud de Bohun, daughter of Humphrey de Bohun, 2nd Earl of Hereford, around 1250. Maud died only two years later, and Roger married his third wife, Eleanor Ferrers, daughter of William de Ferrers, 5th Earl of Derby the same year.

Roger had three daughters by his first wife, but no sons. His subsequent marriages produced no issue. After his death his estates were divided between the daughters, and the earldom of Winchester lapsed. The three daughters of Roger and Helen of Galloway were:

Helen (also known as Ela or Elena), who married Alan Baron Zouche of Ashby;
Elizabeth (also known as Isabella), who married Alexander Comyn, 2nd Earl of Buchan;
Margaret, who married William de Ferrers, 5th Earl of Derby (and was thus stepmother to her own stepmother).¹

     Sir Maurice de Berkeley "the Resolute" (1218 - 4 April 1281), 8th (feudal) Baron de Berkeley, was an English soldier and rebel, residing at Berkeley Castle in the English county of Gloucestershire.

Maurice was born in 1218 to Thomas de Berkeley and Joan de Somery. He married Isabel de Croun FitzRoy, the daughter of Richard FitzRoy, Baron of Chilham (an illegitimate son of King John of England) and Rose de Douvres, sometime before 12 July 1247.

Berkeley fought in the French Wars and was invested as a knight before 1242. He inherited the title of Baron de Berkeley in 1243 and, on 14 December 1243, he had livery of his father's lands. He fought in the war in North Wales and in 1264 he joined the Barons against King Henry III. Berkeley died on 4 April 1281 and was buried in St Augustine's Abbey in Bristol.¹

     Richard FitzRoy (c. 1190 - June 1246), was feudal Baron of Chilham, Kent, and the illegitimate son of King John of England. His mother, John's cousin, was Adela, a daughter of Hamelin de Warenne and Isabel de Warenne, 4th Countess of Surrey.

He served in his father's army as a captain during the baronial revolt. In 1216 he was made constable of Wallingford Castle. The following year he took a prominent part in a naval battle off the Kent coast.

He had scutage for Poitou in 1214. By right of his wife he became Lord of Chingford, Little Wyham and Great Wenden, all in Essex, and Lesnes, Kent, and Lutton, Northamptonshire. However in 1229 their manor of Chingford Earls was temporarily in the hands of a creditor, Robert de Winchester. In 1242 they leased the advowson of Chingford to William of York, Provost of Beverley.

Before 11 May 1214, he married Rohese de Dover, daughter and heiress of Fulbert de Dover by his spouse Isabel, daughter of William Briwere. Their children were:

Richard de Dover, feudal baron of Chilham, married Matilda, 6th Countess of Angus
Isabella, married 1247 Sir Maurice de Berkeley of Berkeley, Gloucestershire.
Lorette, married 1248 Sir William Marmion, Knt., of Tanfield, Yorkshire.
Richard FitzRoy's widow remarried, between 1250 and 1253, William de Wilton (killed at the Battle of Lewes), a prominent Justice. She died shortly before 11 February 1261, when there was a grant of her lands and heirs to Queen Eleanor of Provence.¹

     Isabel de Warenne, 4th Countess of Surrey (died 12 July 1203) was an English peeress. She was the only surviving heir of William de Warenne, 3rd Earl of Surrey and his wife, Adela, the daughter of William III of Ponthieu.

In 1148, de Warenne inherited her father's lands and the earldom of Surrey and was married to William of Blois, the younger son of King Stephen, that year. The marriage occurred at a critical moment in The Anarchy as part of the king's attempt to control the de Warenne lands. The couple did not have any children and after William's death in 1159, William X, Count of Poitou sought her hand in 1162/3, but Thomas Becket refused a dispensation from affinity on the grounds of consanguinity.

In April 1164, the countess married Hamelin Plantagenet, the half-brother of King Henry II, who became jure uxoris Earl of Surrey. They had four surviving children:

William, later 6th Earl of Surrey (1166-1240)
Adela (born c. 1170), married Robert of Naburn and William FitzWilliam and was also a mistress of King John.
Isabel (died 30 November 1234), married Robert de Lacy and Gilbert de l'Aigle, Lord of Pevensey.
Matilda, married Henry, Count of Eu and Henry de Stuteville.
Hamelin died in 1202 and the countess a year later. She was buried alongside him in the chapter house of Lewes Priory.¹