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William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke

Male 1146 - 1219  (73 years)


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  • Name William Marshal 
    Suffix 1st Earl of Pembroke 
    Nickname Greatest Knight who ever lived 
    Born 12 May 1146  Rockley, Marlborough, Wiltshire, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christened Or Normadny, France Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Gender Male 
    Christening Or Normadny, France Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christening Round Church Of The Templars, London, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christening Round Church Of The Templars, London, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christening Round Church Of The Templars, London, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christening Round Church Of The Templars, London, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christening Round Church of the Templars, London, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christening Or Normadny, France Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146  Europe Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Christening 12 May 1146 
    Died 14 May 1219  Caversham, Henley, Oxfordshire, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Buried Address:
    Round Chapel of Knights Temple, London
    Round Chapel of Knights Temple, London, Middlesex
    England 
    Notes 
    • {geni:about_me} "William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke (1146 or 1147 – 14 May 1219), also called William the Marshal (Norman French: Williame le Mareschal), was an Anglo-Norman soldier and statesman. He served five English kings – The "Young King" Henry, Henry II, Richard I, John, and Henry III.

      Knighted in 1166, he spent his younger years as a knight errant and a successful tournament fighter; Stephen Langton eulogized him as the "best knight that ever lived." In 1189, he received the title of Earl of Pembroke through marriage during the second creation of the Pembroke Earldom. In 1216, he was appointed protector for the nine-year-old Henry III, and regent of the kingdom.

      Before him, his father's family held an hereditary title of Marshal to the king, which by his father's time had become recognized as a chief or master Marshalcy, involving management over other Marshals and functionaries. William became known as 'the Marshal', although by his time much of the function was actually delegated to more specialized representatives (as happened with other functions in the King's household). Because he was an Earl, and also known as the Marshal, the term "Earl Marshal" was commonly used and this later became an established hereditary title in the English Peerage."

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      Wikipedia links:

      [http://cs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vil%C3%A9m_Mar%C3%A9chal Česky],
      [http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Marshal,_1._Earl_of_Pembroke Deutsch],
      [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Marshal,_1st_Earl_of_Pembroke English],
      [http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Marshal_%281146-1219%29 Español],
      [http://et.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Marshal Eesti],
      [http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guillaume_le_Mar%C3%A9chal Français],
      [http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%95%D7%99%D7%9C%D7%99%D7%90%D7%9D_%D7%9E%D7%A8%D7%A9%D7%9C עברית],
      [http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guglielmo_il_Maresciallo Italiano],
      [http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%A6%E3%82%A3%E3%83%AA%E3%82%A2%E3%83%A0%E3%83%BB%E3%83%9E%E3%83%BC%E3%82%B7%E3%83%A3%E3%83%AB_%28%E5%88%9D%E4%BB%A3%E3%83%9A%E3%83%B3%E3%83%96%E3%83%AB%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E4%BC%AF%29 日本語],
      [http://ms.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Marshal,_Earl_dari_Pembroke_Pertama Bahasa Melayu],
      [http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willem_de_Maarschalk Nederlands],
      [http://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Marshal,_1._jarl_av_Pembroke Norsk bokmål],
      [http://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Marshal Polski],
      [http://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guilherme_Marechal,_1.%C2%BA_Conde_de_Pembroke Português],
      [http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A3%D0%B8%D0%BB%D1%8C%D1%8F%D0%BC_%D0%9C%D0%B0%D1%80%D1%88%D0%B0%D0%BB,_1-%D0%B9_%D0%B3%D1%80%D0%B0%D1%84_%D0%9F%D0%B5%D0%BC%D0%B1%D1%80%D1%83%D0%BA Русский],
      [http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Marshal,_1:e_earl_av_Pembroke Svenska],

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      other links:

      http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=4437

      http://www.geneall.net/U/per_page.php?id=1009636

      http://www.mathematical.com/marshallwilliam1144.html

      http://www.medievalgenealogy.org.uk/families/marshal/williammarshal.shtml

      http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/printable/18126

      http://www.thepeerage.com/p64.htm#i633

      =================================================================================

      Citations / Sources:

      [S6] G.E. Cokayne; with Vicary Gibbs, H.A. Doubleday, Geoffrey H. White, Duncan Warrand and Lord Howard de Walden, editors, The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, Extant, Extinct or Dormant, new ed., 13 volumes in 14 (1910-1959; reprint in 6 volumes, Gloucester, U.K.: Alan Sutton Publishing, 2000), volume II, page 126. Hereinafter cited as The Complete Peerage.

      [S6] Cokayne, and others, The Complete Peerage, volume X, page 358.

      [S37] Charles Mosley, editor, Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage, 107th edition, 3 volumes (Wilmington, Delaware, U.S.A.: Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 2003), volume 1, page 682. Hereinafter cited as Burke's Peerage and Baronetage, 107th edition.

      [S6] Cokayne, and others, The Complete Peerage, volume X, page 364.

      [S6] Cokayne, and others, The Complete Peerage, volume I, page 22.

      [S6] Cokayne, and others, The Complete Peerage, volume II, page 127.

      [S11] Alison Weir, Britain's Royal Family: A Complete Genealogy (London, U.K.: The Bodley Head, 1999), page 53. Hereinafter cited as Britain's Royal Family.

      [S37] Charles Mosley, Burke's Peerage and Baronetage, 107th edition.

      The Golden Grove Books of Pedigrees, book 5 p. C623; book 9 p. G1050 Family History Library (FHL) : FHL microfilms 104,349-104,351

      British Genealogy, book 1 p. 49; book 5 p. E53, 69 Family History Library (FHL) : FHL microfilms 104,355 and 104,390 item 2

      A History of Monmouthshire from the Coming of the Normans into Wales down to the Present Time, vol. 1 p. 150; vol. 2 p. 256, 257, 258; vol. 3 p. 8; vol Family History Library (FHL) : FHL book 942.43 H2b

      Manuel d'Histoire, de Genealogie et de Chronologie de Tous les Etats du Globe, vol. 2 p. 271 Family History Library (FHL) , Book : FHL 929.7 St67m

      Heraldic Visitations of Wales and Part of the Marches Between the Years 1586 and 1613, vol. 2 p. 54, 55 Family History Library (FHL) : FHL book 942.9 D23d; FHL microfilm 176,668

      Welsh Pedigrees: A Genealogical Account of Several Ancient Families from which William Davies of Cringell was Descended, and which were Allied to him and his Ancestors by the Marriage of David ap Wm., his Grandfather, with Claudia the Daughter of Thomas ap, no page numbers Family History Library (FHL) , microfilm : FHL microfilm 104381 item 8

      Genealogy of Shropshire: Microfilm of original records at the Shrewsbury Public Library, vol. 4 p. 1883; vol. 6 p. 2943 Family History Library (FHL) : vol. 1-2 FHL microfilm 504,551; vol.3-4 FHL microfilm 504,552; vol. 5-6 FHL microfilm 504,678; vol. 7-8 FHL microfilm 504,679; vol. 9-10 FHL microfilm 504,680

      An official genealogical and heraldic baronage of England: an account of the ancient nobility of this Realm - Duke, Earls, Marquesses, Viscounts, Barons by Patent, Barons by Writ and Barons by Tenure, from the time of the Norman conquest till the close of , chart no. 64 Bigod, Earls of Norfolk, FHL microfilm 170063

      Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists, Who Came to America Before 1700: the Lineage of Alfred the Great, Charlemagne, Malcolm of Scotland, Robert the Strong, and Some of Their Descendants, p. 69 line 66:27 Family History Library (FHL) : FHL book 974 D2w 1992

      An historical and genealogical account of the noble family of Nevill, particularly of the house of Abergavenny, and also a history of the old land barony of Abergavenny : with some account of the illustrious family of the Beauchamps, and others, through wh, p. 104 Family History Library (FHL) : 929.242 N416r

      The complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain, and the United Kingdom, extant, extinct, or dormant, vol. 10 p. 377 Family History Library (FHL) : 942 D22cok

      Medieval, royalty, nobility family group sheets Family History Library (FHL) : FHL film 1553977-1553985

      Domesday Descendants, A Prosopography of Persons Occurring in English Documents 1066-1166, II. Pipe Rolls to Cartae Baronum, p. 235 Family History Library (FHL) : 942 D3kk

      The Wallop Family and Their Ancestry, vol. 1 p. 99, 131, vol. 2 p. 310 Family History Library (FHL) : FHL book Q 929.242 W159w; FHL microfilm 1696491 items 6-9

      Norfolk Archaeology: or, Miscellaneous Tracts Relating to the Antiquities of the County of Norfolk, vol. 6 Hastings Pedigree Family History Library (FHL) : FHL book 942.61 B2a
    • He was a loyal supporter of King John, despite the King's cruelty. He was
      chosen to be the regent to John's son when he died. He was the hero of the age. He loyally served 4 monarch's.
    • !SOURCES:
      1. Eng. A.K. Vol. 3, p. 2-7
      2. B8G4, p. 162
      3. Ireland 6, p. 47
      4. Wales A. 3 Series, vol. 6, p. 189

      !HISTORICAL NOTES:
      William Marshall was a Baron named in the Magna Charta. Also 3rd Earl of Pembroke.
    • b6839b3c-b6de-493b-9468-a345a24c2105-1 William Marshal
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=a028ae37-1ece-4802-882f-7c3ffa99017d&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • Tomb of Sir William Marshal
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=b3e94d13-bb17-47e7-9a67-a1ce253e929d&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • Signing of The Magna Carta
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=8b454e43-0538-4641-9ccd-9e0aa16b9c32&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • William Marshal
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=ac0b39d3-dd3e-4a95-818b-fafd601651db&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • Pembroke Castle
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=abc0eadb-d693-4139-9ed8-1b1fffcb60b6&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • THE WILLIAM MARSHALL STORY
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=document&guid=001f8c5c-3024-4139-98bb-7edb380d8c4e&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • !SOURCES:
      1. Eng. A.K. Vol. 3, p. 2-7
      2. B8G4, p. 162
      3. Ireland 6, p. 47
      4. Wales A. 3 Series, vol. 6, p. 189
      !HISTORICAL NOTES:
      William Marshall was a Baron named in the Magna Charta. Also 3rd Earl of Pembroke.
    • FGRA;PED OF WILLIAM FLOYD BONNER
    • William Marshall
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=dd04c833-2e0a-4406-ad3f-03e76dba4023&tid=6042454&pid=-523361527Arms of William Marshall
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=ff06b963-1e25-4a9b-8baa-9edd4d7e344a&tid=6042454&pid=-523361527William Marshall
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=9fdcacb3-36f1-4909-a6e7-b10df0cb8d2f&tid=6042454&pid=-523361527
    • _P_CCINFO 1-887
    • _P_CCINFO 1-887
    • The Marshal of England. Pembroke, Netherwent, Leinster, Orbec, Bienfaite,
      half Giffard.
    • Earl of Pembroke. [BROOKES.GED]
    • William Marshall
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=dd04c833-2e0a-4406-ad3f-03e76dba4023&tid=6042454&pid=-523361527Arms of William Marshall
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=ff06b963-1e25-4a9b-8baa-9edd4d7e344a&tid=6042454&pid=-523361527William Marshall
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=9fdcacb3-36f1-4909-a6e7-b10df0cb8d2f&tid=6042454&pid=-523361527
    • There is some confusion about whether he was the third or fourth Earl of Pembroke.
    • There is some confusion about whether he was the third or fourth Earl of Pembroke.
    • The life of William Marshal
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=document&guid=f6c451b5-5c98-4b09-b542-99148c6c3362&tid=5698773&pid=-1126866092
    • 200px-Carlow_Castle[1]
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=f44fbb67-7a8e-4650-ab8d-f2d7ca9e79ec&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • The Flower of Chivalry
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=document&guid=9bd0d588-4b04-4d22-8f7b-22a6e4476e55&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • Matthew_Paris_-_William_Marshal
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=1f0a975f-5048-4797-ac96-6f20f97716c5&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • b6839b3c-b6de-493b-9468-a345a24c2105-1 William Marshal
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=67e48975-0515-4096-b31f-9c4cad6ef4e2&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • 180px-Carlow%2C_Carlow_Castle%2C_1786[1]
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=48447a38-b6cc-4938-b441-a67a5babb9aa&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • 1st Earl of Pembroke
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=document&guid=a883f396-8725-458f-b89f-e4560cad46a3&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • Sir William Marshal, 1146 - 1219
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=document&guid=56d164c3-7c10-4be0-9fc1-b0c6ce7d8df2&tid=9115328&pid=-839726745
    • RBS : He succeeded to the title of earl of Pembroke in right of Elizabeth, his wife, daughter of Richard de Clare second earl of Pembroke in 1199.4 3rd Earl of Pembroke between 1199 and 1215.4 Lord Marshal of Ireland between 1207 and 14 May 1219.5 Lord of Leinster in Ireland, between 1207 and 14 May 1219.5 He was was present in support of King John at the signing of the Magna Carta in 1215. Regent of the Kingdom between 1216 and 1219.2 He was was appointed, on King John's death, the guardian of young King Henry. As such William Marshall, the new protector and Regent of England, recruited and reinforced the already powerful royal Anglo/Norman army, with mercenaries and friendly Anglo/Norman barons, He planned to rid England of the Dauphin and all these ambitious French undesirables. Bear in mind, they were French, not Norman as he was. Nominally a lawyer, he soon learned the military skills. Marshall ran a vigorous campaign against Prince Louis, the self-proclaimed King of England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland, and his French army who were still occupying London with our 'heroes', the traitorous Magna Carta Barons, now the vassals of the Dauphin and the King of France.
    • Pembroke Castle
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=85ea1f69-0524-4b66-a8fb-3b9e92b2d638&tid=5199921&pid=-1003682377
    • Signing of The Magna Carta
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=1142d346-f19c-44ff-9944-489da1f219cc&tid=5199921&pid=-1003682377
    • Sir William Marshal, 1146 - 1219
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=document&guid=1610c652-1533-42ab-ab8d-79a7913d15fd&tid=5199921&pid=-1003682377
    • Tomb of Sir William Marshal
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=69c0b07c-4619-4912-8d5f-af0dd35e7988&tid=5199921&pid=-1003682377
    • William Marshal jousting
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=5febf6bf-9b5a-49d6-aacf-b417ae0e3b59&tid=5199921&pid=-1003682377
    • Magna Carta Barons (1898) by Browning (Biographies of Sureties)

      William Marshall first appeared in English history as a supporter of Prince Henry the rebellous son of King Henry ll. the prince on his death bed gave his cross to William Marshall to deliver to Jerusalem , which commission he never fulfilled, as he shortly married Isabel, the great heiress, and became the Earl of Penbroke, and was left at home by Richard the Lion hearted when Richard set out on his journey to the Holy Land, as one of the assistants in the government of the realme in his absence. Upon the decease of his brother John, he became Lord Marshall to King John, and on the day of John's coronation he was invested with the sword of the Earldom of Pembroke and shortly thereafter to high sheriff in the counties of Sussex and Gloucester. At the demise of King John, the Earl of Pembroke was so powerful that he prevailed upon the Barons to appoint a day for the coronation of Henry lll to whom he constituted guardian, by the Barons who had remained firm in their allegence. Subsequntly he took up arms for the Royal cause, and after achieving a victory for the Barons at Lincoln, proceeded to London... He was the most emminent statesman and soldier of his time and was distinguished by his piety and attachment to the Church.
    • GIVN William Marshal lV
      SURN von Pembroke
      NSFX 4th Earl of Pembroke
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      DATE 9 SEP 2000
      TIME 13:15:53
    • GIVN William Marshal lV
      SURN von Pembroke
      NSFX 4th Earl of Pembroke
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      DATE 9 SEP 2000
      TIME 13:15:53
    • The office of Marshal to the king was a hereditary perquisite of a middling Wiltshire family. The duties were various, but mainly they consisted of acting as second-in-command to the constable of the royal household, maintaining order in the palace and guarding it, looking afterthe stables, keeping the rolls of those who performed their military service, and checking the accounts of various household and state departments.
      From this family came William Marshal, whose biography was written byhis squire John of Earley so providing us with one of the deepest andmost fascinating insights into the life of a great baron of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries.
      His father, John Marshal, whom the Gesta Stephani rather unkindly describes as 'a limb of hell and the root of all evil' was a man who loved warfare, and played the game of politics with great success. At first he supported Stephen but, when he began to realise the failings of the King and the potentialities of Matilda's party, he changed sides. Almost immediately he proved by a consummate act of bravery and hardihood, that he was worth having: escorting Matilda to safety in his castle at Ledgershall, John found that the party was going dangerously slowly because Matilda was riding side-saddle, so he persuaded her to ride astride, and stopped behind to delay the pursuers at Wherwell. His force was soon overpowered by the numbers of the enemy, and John took refuge with one of his knights in the Abbey. The opposing party promptly set fire to the church, and John and his knight had to take cover in the tower, John threatening to kill his knight if he made any move to surrender. As the lead of the roof began to melt and drop on the two soldiers, putting out one of John's eyes, the enemy moved off, convinced that they were dead. They escaped, in a terrible state, but triumphant, to John's castle.
      He plainly expected his children to be as tough as himself, as an incident of the year 1152, when William was about six, will show. King Stephen went to besiege Newbury Castle, which Matilda had given John to defend; the castellan, realising that provisions and the garrison wereboth too low to stand a long siege, asked for a truce to inform his master. This was normal practice, for if the castellan were not at oncerelieved, he could then surrender without being held to have let his master down. Now John had not sufficient troops to relieve the castle,so he asked Stephen to extend the truce whilst he, in turn, informed his mistress, and agreed to give William as a hostage, promising not to provision and garrison the castle during the truce. This he promptly did, and when he received word from Stephen that the child would behung if he did not at once surrender the castle, he cheerfully replied that he had hammer and anvils to forge a better child than William.
      The child was taken out for execution, but at the last moment Stephenrelented with that soft heart that was his undoing, and though his officers presented such enticing plans as catapulting William over the castle walls with a siege engine, he would not give in. Later on he grew attached to the child, and one day when William was playing an elementary form of conkers with the King, using plantains, the child saw aservant of his mother, the lady Sibile (sister of the Earl of Salisbury), peeping in to check up on his safety. William cried out a greeting and the servant had to run for his life. The child did not know what dangers he was running, but it was good and early training for his future career.
      When he was thirteen William was sent to serve in the retinue of his father's cousin, the chamberlain of Normandy. This was his apprenticeship in knighthood, and was to last eight years. As a squire he would learn by experience all the skills of a knight, and the elaborate code of honour that went with it. After he had been knighted in 1167, he began to go round the tournaments to make his name, and earn a living bythe spoils. He was eager for the fray, so eager in fact that in his earliest tournaments he concentrated too much on the fighting, and forgot to take the plunder. He had to be warned by elder and wiser knightsof the dangerous folly of such quixotic behaviour---a good war-horse captured from an unseated opponent could fetch £40. Even so, his heartwas really set upon fame, and he recalled in old age the pride he hadexperienced as a youngster when, having retired to the refuge (a hut regarded as neutral territory in a tournament) to fix his helmet, he overheard two knights outside commenting on how well he was fighting.
      He was, however, only the second son of a middling baron, and he could not live off honour; so it must have been wonderful news for him when in 1170 he heard of his appointment as captain of the guard and military tutor to King Henry II's heir, the fifteen-year-old Henry, already crowned in his father's lifetime in, as it turned out, a fruitless attempt to ensure the succession. In 1173 it fell to his lot to make the young King a knight.
      Henry seems to have had a good sense of humour, for in 1176 when the two were cantering back into town after a tournament, William managed to bag another knight, and led him reined behind, with the King following. A low-hanging water sprout swept the knight off his horse, but Henry kept what he had seen to himself, and the laugh was definitely on William when they got home to find he was leading a horse, but no knight to ransom.
      Tournaments were so frequent at that time that a real enthusiast could attend one a fortnight, and William and the King must have attaineda record number of attendances. This was the equivalent of hunting toa nineteenth century country gentleman, though much more rugged. In ten months William and a colleague captured one hundred and three knights, and risked death on each occasion: one memory William kept of those days was having to receive the prize of hero of the day kneeling with his head on an anvil whilst a smith tried to prize off his batteredhelm. Another memory he retained was arriving too early for a fight, and dancing with the ladies who had come to watch---in full armour!
      Then came trouble---William's enemies began to spread rumours that hewas the lover of Henry's wife, and seeing that the suspicion could not fail to mar their relationship, William cut out on his own. He was immediately inundated with tempting offers from great lords who wantedto engage his services---three times he was offered £500 a year or more, but he turned them down and went instead on pilgrimage to Cologne.
      He was soon recalled to service with the young King in 1183, but it was only to see him die of a fever. At the last William promised that he would carry out Henry's vow to go on crusade, and having buried hismaster, he carried out his promise.
      He came home in 1187 to take his place as an esteemed servant of the King, and to marry the second richest heiress in England who brought him the Earldom of Pembroke and extensive lands in England, Wales and Ireland. He served Henry II in his final bitter years and once, when hewas covering the king's retreat, he put the fear of God into Prince Richard who was leading the pursuit. The Lionheart cried out, 'By the legs of God, Marshal, do not kill me,' and William killed his horse instead.
      Such conduct was dangerous, but when Richard came to the throne he showed the Marshal that he respected him for it, and when he went on crusade he made William one of the four associate justiciars appointed tohelp William de Longchamp, who had the care of the kingdom. This was excellent training in administration and justice, which was to stand William in good stead later when he had to bear responsibilities far greater than those with which a simple soldier can deal.
      It also gave him lessons in how to deal with the immensely difficult Prince John, who, fearing, with some justice, that Richard intended toleave the kingdom to his nephew Arthur of Brittany, had to consolidate his position whilst his brother was away. When he heard that Richard had been captured on his way home and was being held to an incredibly stiff ransom, John's ambitions became boundless, and the Marshal had, added to his normal duties, the double problem of keeping the prince in check and raising a vast sum of money.
      Richard returned to find William a wise counsellor now as well as an incomparable soldier, and he used him well; but in 1199 he died, and William worked with skill and energy for the smooth accession of John. This King was to bring him worse problems than he had ever known.
      For the next seven years William had to watch John losing Normandy tothe Marshal's old friend Philip Augustus, knowing there was nothing to be done about it. Instead of knightly virtues, treachery was now the order of the day, and when he taxed the French King with using traitors, he had only this for reply: '. . . it is now a matter of business. They are like torches that one throws into the latrine when one is done with them.'
      Attempting to rescue something out of the chaos of the loss of Normandy, William undertook the negotiations with France to make peace, and find a formula by which the English barons might retain their lands inFrance. What he found instead was the implacable suspicion of John who, fearing that William was going over to the French side, confiscatedall his castles and official positions, and took his two eldest sons as hostages.
      So William spent the next five years in Ireland, looking after his vast estates and interests there far away from John, but unfortunately, in an area in which John took an especial interest. Every move Williammade was countered by the royal officials, and active hostilities soon commenced. However, William had the better and more faithful knights and, despite the royal offensives, he tended to win, so in 1208 a truce was made.
      Soon afterwards William received on his lands William de Briouse, whom John regarded as a bitter enemy, and so the quarrel flared up again. Finally the sixty-six-year-old knight had to come to court and offer to fight an ordeal by battle to prove his faith. No one dared to take up the challenge, though a winning contestant would have rocketed into favour with the King.
      But by the year 1212 John was in serious trouble, and was to learn where his true friends lay. William swung the baronage of Ireland into support for the crown, helped to organize the vital rapprochement with the Pope, and prepared to gather the King's friends together and put his castles in order in readiness for the inevitable struggle. A great moderating force was Stephen Langton, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who was to be associated with William throughout the struggle, persuading John to accede to those demands of the barons which he had helped to formulate.
      In 1216 William was back in the saddle as commander-in-chief of the royal forces opposing the barons and their ally the Dauphin and his French troops. All was well between the Marshal and the King who had so badly misjudged him, and now John tried to make amends. But the years of suspicion and discord still told: when he gave William the castle of Dunamase, he was upset that his justiciar failed to hand it over---he had forgotten an arrangement he had made secretly with the justiciar that William was to have nothing, whatever documents he produced, without a secret handshake (holding each other's thumbs) being given.
      Now as John lay dying in Newark Castle, with half his kingdom in enemy hands, and a nine-year old child as his successor, he realised the worth of the man he had hounded so long, and urged all present to commit the kingdom into the care of the Marshal after his death.
      William was an old man, the treasury was empty, discord reigned, and the position seemed hopeless---he wept and begged to be excused; but John of Earley, his squire, pointed out what honour there was to be won, and changed his mind for him in a flash. 'It goes straight to my heart that if all should abandon the King except me do you know what I would do? I would carry him on my shoulders, now here, now there, from isle to isle, from land to land, and I would never fail him, even if Iwere forced to beg my bread.'
      Filled with a sense of the glory of his task, the regent now raided the rich stores of jewels and clothing accumulated by the royal house 'against a rainy day' to pay the soldiers he so desperately needed. He sent out showers of letters of protection to the enemy barons, tempting them to change sides. Gradually he built up his powers for the decisive blow, at Lincoln in May 1217.
      There William led the charge, with the wily Bishop of Winchester who found a way in, and fought up and down the streets of Lincoln with many a shout of 'Ca! Dieu aide au Maréchal!' Finally they reached the open space in front of the cathedral where William personally captured the French commander and received three massive blows which left dents in his helmet. The worthy Dame Nicola, who had kept the castle for so long for the King against enormous odds, was at last relieved, and thewar was almost won.
      The Marshal sped down to Dover to intercept the convoy of reinforcements coming from France, and then set about making peace. He was generous---perhaps over-generous---to French and English alike, there was novictimisation, and little recrimination. The speediest route back to peace was chosen, for England had suffered enormous damage from the civil war.
      This was perhaps the worst time for William---the period of reconstruction. He knew well how to fight, but the sheer boredom and worry of administration of this kind must have borne heavily on the old man. Disputes and claims had to be settled so that both sides were satisfied, and no one would have a pretext for re-starting rebellion. Above all money was needed to oil the wheels and restore the losses of war, and the best way to make rebels is to overtax them. He even had to ban tournaments, which would obviously lead to dangerous positions being takenup once more. He must have wondered what he had come to---the greatest fighter in Europe, and the one who loved a fight better than anything. Instead he spent his time setting up judicial commissions and trying desperately to balance the budget.
      He continued hard at work until the end of February, 1219, when he was taken ill and confined to his bed in the Tower. Doctors came and went but could do nothing, and quickly all his family and his knights and retainers gathered round him for the end. He asked to be taken up river to his manor of Caversham near Reading to die, and there, he and his household went, in mid-March, followed by the young King Henry III, the papal legate, and the the highest officers of state.
      He urged the king 'to be a gentleman,' and told him that if he shouldfollow the example of some evil ancestor, he hoped he would die young. He worried long and hard over who should be his successor, and found no-one who could unite all under his rule, so wisely chose the papal legate. He made his will, and worried for a moment at the lack of provision for his young son Anselm, but, remembering his own career, felt that he could make his own way. 'May God give him prowess and skill.' He remembered an unmarried daughter and made provision for her 'until God takes care of her.' He had always been a religious man, founderof monasteries, crusader, and honest knight. He called for silken cloths he had thoughtfully brought back from the Holy Land thirty years before, and gave instruction that he should be covered with them at hisfuneral.
      He wanted to be buried as a Knight Templar, and when the master of the order came to clothe him, he said to his wife 'Belle amie, you are going to kiss me, but it will be for the last time.' Happy now that all the arrangements had been made, William could rest a little, and wait comfortably for death. He talked gently with his knights---one of them was worried that the clerks said no one could be saved who did notgive back everything he had taken. William set his mind at rest---he had taken 500 knights in his lifetime, and could never restore the booty, so if he were damned there was nothing he could do about it. 'The clerks are too hard on us. They shave us too closely.' When his clerk suggested that all the rich robes could be sold to win his salvation, he said 'You have not the heart of a gentleman, and I have had too much of your advice. Pentecost is at hand, and my knights ought to have their new robes. This will be the last time I can supply them. . .' Hewas a religious man---true---but he could not abide nonsense and knewhis own duty.
      In his last days he was very gentle to his family. One day he said toJohn of Earley that he had an overwhelming desire to sing, and when John urged him to do so, as it might improve his appetite, he told him it would do no such thing, people would just assume he was delirious. So they called in his daughters to sing for him, and when one sang weakly, overcome with emotion, he showed her how she should project her voice and sing with grace.
      On 14 May, William suddenly called to John of Earley to open all the doors and windows and call everyone in, for death was upon him. There was such a press that the abbots of Nutley and Reading, come to absolve the Marshal and give him plenary indulgence, were barely noticed, except by the dying man, who called them to him, made confession, prayed, and then died with his eyes fixed upon the cross.
      The cortège moved slowly up to London for the great state funeral, and there William's old friend Stephen Langton spoke his eulogy over the grave: 'Behold all that remains of the best knight that ever lived.You will all come to this. Each man dies on his day. We have here ourmirror, you and I. Let each man say his paternoster that God may receive this Christian into His Glory and place him among His faithful vassals, as he so well deserves.' [Who's Who in the Middle Ages, John Fines, Barnes & Noble Books, New York, 1995]
      ----------
      William Marshal, of the great baronial family of Marischal, marshal to the king, is first noticed as receiving from Prince Henry, the rebellious son of Henry II, upon the prince's deathbed, as his most confidential friend, his cross to convey to Jerusalem. He m. the great heiress of the Clares in 1189, and with her acquired the Earldom of Pembroke -- in which rank he bore the royal sceptre of gold, surmounted by the cross, at the coronation of King Richard I, and he was soon afterwards, on the king's purposing a journey to the Holy Land, appointed oneof the assistants to Hugh, bishop of Durham, and William, Earl of Albemarle, Chief Justice of England, in the government of the realm.
      Upon the decease of his brother, John Mareschall, marshal of the king's house, in 1199, he became lord marshal, and on the day of the coronation of King John, he was invested with the sword of the Earldom of Pembroke, being then confirmed in the possession of the said inheritance. In the first year of this monarch's reign, his lordship was appointed sheriff of Gloucestershire and likewise of Sussex, wherein he was continued for several years. In the 5th he had a grant of Goderich Castle in co. Hereford, to hold by the service of two knights' fees; and in four years afterwards he obtained, by grant from the crown, the whole province of Leinster, in Ireland, to hold by the service of one hundred knights' fees.
      Upon the breaking out of the baronial insurrection, the Earl of Pembroke was deputed by the king, with the archbishop of Canterbury, to ascertain the grievances and demands of those turbulent lords, and at thedemise of King John, he was so powerful as to prevail upon the baronsto appoint a day for the coronation of Henry III, to whom he was constituted guardian, by the rest of the nobility, who had remained firm in their allegiance. He subsequently took up arms in the royal cause and, after achieving a victory over the barons at Lincoln, proceeded directly to London, and investing that great city, both by land and water, reduced it to extremity for want of provisions. Peace, however, being soon concluded, it was relieved. His lordship, at this point, executed the office of sheriff for the cos. of Essex and Hertford.
      This eminent nobleman was no less distinguished by his wisdom in the council and valour in the field, than by his piety and his attachment to the church, of which his numerous munificent endowments bear ample testimony. His lordship had, by the heiress of Clare, five sons, who s. each other in his lands and honours, and five daus., viz., Maud, Joan, Isabel, Sybil, and Eve. The earl d. in 1219, and was s. by his eldest son, William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited, and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p. 358, Marshal, Earls of Pembroke]
      William Mareschal, now Marshall (Mareschal to the King), he became Earl of Pembroke, Lord of Leinster, and Lord Marshal of Ireland, 1207, having then a grant of the who province of Leinster. He d. 16 March, 1219, having issue, five sons and five daus. His sons, William, Richard,Gilbert, Walter, and Anselme, all succeeded to the Earldom of Pembroke and Lordship of Leinster, the last of whom dying s. p. 21 December,1245, the title of Pembroke became extinct and the Lordship of Leinster was divided amongst the five daus., viz., (1), Maud, who being m. to Hugh le Bigod, Earl of Norfolk, had issue. Roger le Bigod, Earl of Norfolk. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited, and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p. 628, Baronage of Ireland]
    • The office of Marshal to the king was a hereditary perquisite of a middling Wiltshire family. The duties were various, but mainly they consisted of acting as second-in-command to the constable of the royal household, maintaining order in the palace and guarding it, looking afterthe stables, keeping the rolls of those who performed their military service, and checking the accounts of various household and state departments.
      From this family came William Marshal, whose biography was written byhis squire John of Earley so providing us with one of the deepest andmost fascinating insights into the life of a great baron of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries.
      His father, John Marshal, whom the Gesta Stephani rather unkindly describes as 'a limb of hell and the root of all evil' was a man who loved warfare, and played the game of politics with great success. At first he supported Stephen but, when he began to realise the failings of the King and the potentialities of Matilda's party, he changed sides. Almost immediately he proved by a consummate act of bravery and hardihood, that he was worth having: escorting Matilda to safety in his castle at Ledgershall, John found that the party was going dangerously slowly because Matilda was riding side-saddle, so he persuaded her to ride astride, and stopped behind to delay the pursuers at Wherwell. His force was soon overpowered by the numbers of the enemy, and John took refuge with one of his knights in the Abbey. The opposing party promptly set fire to the church, and John and his knight had to take cover in the tower, John threatening to kill his knight if he made any move to surrender. As the lead of the roof began to melt and drop on the two soldiers, putting out one of John's eyes, the enemy moved off, convinced that they were dead. They escaped, in a terrible state, but triumphant, to John's castle.
      He plainly expected his children to be as tough as himself, as an incident of the year 1152, when William was about six, will show. King Stephen went to besiege Newbury Castle, which Matilda had given John to defend; the castellan, realising that provisions and the garrison wereboth too low to stand a long siege, asked for a truce to inform his master. This was normal practice, for if the castellan were not at oncerelieved, he could then surrender without being held to have let his master down. Now John had not sufficient troops to relieve the castle,so he asked Stephen to extend the truce whilst he, in turn, informed his mistress, and agreed to give William as a hostage, promising not to provision and garrison the castle during the truce. This he promptly did, and when he received word from Stephen that the child would behung if he did not at once surrender the castle, he cheerfully replied that he had hammer and anvils to forge a better child than William.
      The child was taken out for execution, but at the last moment Stephenrelented with that soft heart that was his undoing, and though his officers presented such enticing plans as catapulting William over the castle walls with a siege engine, he would not give in. Later on he grew attached to the child, and one day when William was playing an elementary form of conkers with the King, using plantains, the child saw aservant of his mother, the lady Sibile (sister of the Earl of Salisbury), peeping in to check up on his safety. William cried out a greeting and the servant had to run for his life. The child did not know what dangers he was running, but it was good and early training for his future career.
      When he was thirteen William was sent to serve in the retinue of his father's cousin, the chamberlain of Normandy. This was his apprenticeship in knighthood, and was to last eight years. As a squire he would learn by experience all the skills of a knight, and the elaborate code of honour that went with it. After he had been knighted in 1167, he began to go round the tournaments to make his name, and earn a living bythe spoils. He was eager for the fray, so eager in fact that in his earliest tournaments he concentrated too much on the fighting, and forgot to take the plunder. He had to be warned by elder and wiser knightsof the dangerous folly of such quixotic behaviour---a good war-horse captured from an unseated opponent could fetch £40. Even so, his heartwas really set upon fame, and he recalled in old age the pride he hadexperienced as a youngster when, having retired to the refuge (a hut regarded as neutral territory in a tournament) to fix his helmet, he overheard two knights outside commenting on how well he was fighting.
      He was, however, only the second son of a middling baron, and he could not live off honour; so it must have been wonderful news for him when in 1170 he heard of his appointment as captain of the guard and military tutor to King Henry II's heir, the fifteen-year-old Henry, already crowned in his father's lifetime in, as it turned out, a fruitless attempt to ensure the succession. In 1173 it fell to his lot to make the young King a knight.
      Henry seems to have had a good sense of humour, for in 1176 when the two were cantering back into town after a tournament, William managed to bag another knight, and led him reined behind, with the King following. A low-hanging water sprout swept the knight off his horse, but Henry kept what he had seen to himself, and the laugh was definitely on William when they got home to find he was leading a horse, but no knight to ransom.
      Tournaments were so frequent at that time that a real enthusiast could attend one a fortnight, and William and the King must have attaineda record number of attendances. This was the equivalent of hunting toa nineteenth century country gentleman, though much more rugged. In ten months William and a colleague captured one hundred and three knights, and risked death on each occasion: one memory William kept of those days was having to receive the prize of hero of the day kneeling with his head on an anvil whilst a smith tried to prize off his batteredhelm. Another memory he retained was arriving too early for a fight, and dancing with the ladies who had come to watch---in full armour!
      Then came trouble---William's enemies began to spread rumours that hewas the lover of Henry's wife, and seeing that the suspicion could not fail to mar their relationship, William cut out on his own. He was immediately inundated with tempting offers from great lords who wantedto engage his services---three times he was offered £500 a year or more, but he turned them down and went instead on pilgrimage to Cologne.
      He was soon recalled to service with the young King in 1183, but it was only to see him die of a fever. At the last William promised that he would carry out Henry's vow to go on crusade, and having buried hismaster, he carried out his promise.
      He came home in 1187 to take his place as an esteemed servant of the King, and to marry the second richest heiress in England who brought him the Earldom of Pembroke and extensive lands in England, Wales and Ireland. He served Henry II in his final bitter years and once, when hewas covering the king's retreat, he put the fear of God into Prince Richard who was leading the pursuit. The Lionheart cried out, 'By the legs of God, Marshal, do not kill me,' and William killed his horse instead.
      Such conduct was dangerous, but when Richard came to the throne he showed the Marshal that he respected him for it, and when he went on crusade he made William one of the four associate justiciars appointed tohelp William de Longchamp, who had the care of the kingdom. This was excellent training in administration and justice, which was to stand William in good stead later when he had to bear responsibilities far greater than those with which a simple soldier can deal.
      It also gave him lessons in how to deal with the immensely difficult Prince John, who, fearing, with some justice, that Richard intended toleave the kingdom to his nephew Arthur of Brittany, had to consolidate his position whilst his brother was away. When he heard that Richard had been captured on his way home and was being held to an incredibly stiff ransom, John's ambitions became boundless, and the Marshal had, added to his normal duties, the double problem of keeping the prince in check and raising a vast sum of money.
      Richard returned to find William a wise counsellor now as well as an incomparable soldier, and he used him well; but in 1199 he died, and William worked with skill and energy for the smooth accession of John. This King was to bring him worse problems than he had ever known.
      For the next seven years William had to watch John losing Normandy tothe Marshal's old friend Philip Augustus, knowing there was nothing to be done about it. Instead of knightly virtues, treachery was now the order of the day, and when he taxed the French King with using traitors, he had only this for reply: '. . . it is now a matter of business. They are like torches that one throws into the latrine when one is done with them.'
      Attempting to rescue something out of the chaos of the loss of Normandy, William undertook the negotiations with France to make peace, and find a formula by which the English barons might retain their lands inFrance. What he found instead was the implacable suspicion of John who, fearing that William was going over to the French side, confiscatedall his castles and official positions, and took his two eldest sons as hostages.
      So William spent the next five years in Ireland, looking after his vast estates and interests there far away from John, but unfortunately, in an area in which John took an especial interest. Every move Williammade was countered by the royal officials, and active hostilities soon commenced. However, William had the better and more faithful knights and, despite the royal offensives, he tended to win, so in 1208 a truce was made.
      Soon afterwards William received on his lands William de Briouse, whom John regarded as a bitter enemy, and so the quarrel flared up again. Finally the sixty-six-year-old knight had to come to court and offer to fight an ordeal by battle to prove his faith. No one dared to take up the challenge, though a winning contestant would have rocketed into favour with the King.
      But by the year 1212 John was in serious trouble, and was to learn where his true friends lay. William swung the baronage of Ireland into support for the crown, helped to organize the vital rapprochement with the Pope, and prepared to gather the King's friends together and put his castles in order in readiness for the inevitable struggle. A great moderating force was Stephen Langton, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who was to be associated with William throughout the struggle, persuading John to accede to those demands of the barons which he had helped to formulate.
      In 1216 William was back in the saddle as commander-in-chief of the royal forces opposing the barons and their ally the Dauphin and his French troops. All was well between the Marshal and the King who had so badly misjudged him, and now John tried to make amends. But the years of suspicion and discord still told: when he gave William the castle of Dunamase, he was upset that his justiciar failed to hand it over---he had forgotten an arrangement he had made secretly with the justiciar that William was to have nothing, whatever documents he produced, without a secret handshake (holding each other's thumbs) being given.
      Now as John lay dying in Newark Castle, with half his kingdom in enemy hands, and a nine-year old child as his successor, he realised the worth of the man he had hounded so long, and urged all present to commit the kingdom into the care of the Marshal after his death.
      William was an old man, the treasury was empty, discord reigned, and the position seemed hopeless---he wept and begged to be excused; but John of Earley, his squire, pointed out what honour there was to be won, and changed his mind for him in a flash. 'It goes straight to my heart that if all should abandon the King except me do you know what I would do? I would carry him on my shoulders, now here, now there, from isle to isle, from land to land, and I would never fail him, even if Iwere forced to beg my bread.'
      Filled with a sense of the glory of his task, the regent now raided the rich stores of jewels and clothing accumulated by the royal house 'against a rainy day' to pay the soldiers he so desperately needed. He sent out showers of letters of protection to the enemy barons, tempting them to change sides. Gradually he built up his powers for the decisive blow, at Lincoln in May 1217.
      There William led the charge, with the wily Bishop of Winchester who found a way in, and fought up and down the streets of Lincoln with many a shout of 'Ca! Dieu aide au Maréchal!' Finally they reached the open space in front of the cathedral where William personally captured the French commander and received three massive blows which left dents in his helmet. The worthy Dame Nicola, who had kept the castle for so long for the King against enormous odds, was at last relieved, and thewar was almost won.
      The Marshal sped down to Dover to intercept the convoy of reinforcements coming from France, and then set about making peace. He was generous---perhaps over-generous---to French and English alike, there was novictimisation, and little recrimination. The speediest route back to peace was chosen, for England had suffered enormous damage from the civil war.
      This was perhaps the worst time for William---the period of reconstruction. He knew well how to fight, but the sheer boredom and worry of administration of this kind must have borne heavily on the old man. Disputes and claims had to be settled so that both sides were satisfied, and no one would have a pretext for re-starting rebellion. Above all money was needed to oil the wheels and restore the losses of war, and the best way to make rebels is to overtax them. He even had to ban tournaments, which would obviously lead to dangerous positions being takenup once more. He must have wondered what he had come to---the greatest fighter in Europe, and the one who loved a fight better than anything. Instead he spent his time setting up judicial commissions and trying desperately to balance the budget.
      He continued hard at work until the end of February, 1219, when he was taken ill and confined to his bed in the Tower. Doctors came and went but could do nothing, and quickly all his family and his knights and retainers gathered round him for the end. He asked to be taken up river to his manor of Caversham near Reading to die, and there, he and his household went, in mid-March, followed by the young King Henry III, the papal legate, and the the highest officers of state.
      He urged the king 'to be a gentleman,' and told him that if he shouldfollow the example of some evil ancestor, he hoped he would die young. He worried long and hard over who should be his successor, and found no-one who could unite all under his rule, so wisely chose the papal legate. He made his will, and worried for a moment at the lack of provision for his young son Anselm, but, remembering his own career, felt that he could make his own way. 'May God give him prowess and skill.' He remembered an unmarried daughter and made provision for her 'until God takes care of her.' He had always been a religious man, founderof monasteries, crusader, and honest knight. He called for silken cloths he had thoughtfully brought back from the Holy Land thirty years before, and gave instruction that he should be covered with them at hisfuneral.
      He wanted to be buried as a Knight Templar, and when the master of the order came to clothe him, he said to his wife 'Belle amie, you are going to kiss me, but it will be for the last time.' Happy now that all the arrangements had been made, William could rest a little, and wait comfortably for death. He talked gently with his knights---one of them was worried that the clerks said no one could be saved who did notgive back everything he had taken. William set his mind at rest---he had taken 500 knights in his lifetime, and could never restore the booty, so if he were damned there was nothing he could do about it. 'The clerks are too hard on us. They shave us too closely.' When his clerk suggested that all the rich robes could be sold to win his salvation, he said 'You have not the heart of a gentleman, and I have had too much of your advice. Pentecost is at hand, and my knights ought to have their new robes. This will be the last time I can supply them. . .' Hewas a religious man---true---but he could not abide nonsense and knewhis own duty.
      In his last days he was very gentle to his family. One day he said toJohn of Earley that he had an overwhelming desire to sing, and when John urged him to do so, as it might improve his appetite, he told him it would do no such thing, people would just assume he was delirious. So they called in his daughters to sing for him, and when one sang weakly, overcome with emotion, he showed her how she should project her voice and sing with grace.
      On 14 May, William suddenly called to John of Earley to open all the doors and windows and call everyone in, for death was upon him. There was such a press that the abbots of Nutley and Reading, come to absolve the Marshal and give him plenary indulgence, were barely noticed, except by the dying man, who called them to him, made confession, prayed, and then died with his eyes fixed upon the cross.
      The cortège moved slowly up to London for the great state funeral, and there William's old friend Stephen Langton spoke his eulogy over the grave: 'Behold all that remains of the best knight that ever lived.You will all come to this. Each man dies on his day. We have here ourmirror, you and I. Let each man say his paternoster that God may receive this Christian into His Glory and place him among His faithful vassals, as he so well deserves.' [Who's Who in the Middle Ages, John Fines, Barnes & Noble Books, New York, 1995]
      ----------
      William Marshal, of the great baronial family of Marischal, marshal to the king, is first noticed as receiving from Prince Henry, the rebellious son of Henry II, upon the prince's deathbed, as his most confidential friend, his cross to convey to Jerusalem. He m. the great heiress of the Clares in 1189, and with her acquired the Earldom of Pembroke -- in which rank he bore the royal sceptre of gold, surmounted by the cross, at the coronation of King Richard I, and he was soon afterwards, on the king's purposing a journey to the Holy Land, appointed oneof the assistants to Hugh, bishop of Durham, and William, Earl of Albemarle, Chief Justice of England, in the government of the realm.
      Upon the decease of his brother, John Mareschall, marshal of the king's house, in 1199, he became lord marshal, and on the day of the coronation of King John, he was invested with the sword of the Earldom of Pembroke, being then confirmed in the possession of the said inheritance. In the first year of this monarch's reign, his lordship was appointed sheriff of Gloucestershire and likewise of Sussex, wherein he was continued for several years. In the 5th he had a grant of Goderich Castle in co. Hereford, to hold by the service of two knights' fees; and in four years afterwards he obtained, by grant from the crown, the whole province of Leinster, in Ireland, to hold by the service of one hundred knights' fees.
      Upon the breaking out of the baronial insurrection, the Earl of Pembroke was deputed by the king, with the archbishop of Canterbury, to ascertain the grievances and demands of those turbulent lords, and at thedemise of King John, he was so powerful as to prevail upon the baronsto appoint a day for the coronation of Henry III, to whom he was constituted guardian, by the rest of the nobility, who had remained firm in their allegiance. He subsequently took up arms in the royal cause and, after achieving a victory over the barons at Lincoln, proceeded directly to London, and investing that great city, both by land and water, reduced it to extremity for want of provisions. Peace, however, being soon concluded, it was relieved. His lordship, at this point, executed the office of sheriff for the cos. of Essex and Hertford.
      This eminent nobleman was no less distinguished by his wisdom in the council and valour in the field, than by his piety and his attachment to the church, of which his numerous munificent endowments bear ample testimony. His lordship had, by the heiress of Clare, five sons, who s. each other in his lands and honours, and five daus., viz., Maud, Joan, Isabel, Sybil, and Eve. The earl d. in 1219, and was s. by his eldest son, William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited, and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p. 358, Marshal, Earls of Pembroke]
      William Mareschal, now Marshall (Mareschal to the King), he became Earl of Pembroke, Lord of Leinster, and Lord Marshal of Ireland, 1207, having then a grant of the who province of Leinster. He d. 16 March, 1219, having issue, five sons and five daus. His sons, William, Richard,Gilbert, Walter, and Anselme, all succeeded to the Earldom of Pembroke and Lordship of Leinster, the last of whom dying s. p. 21 December,1245, the title of Pembroke became extinct and the Lordship of Leinster was divided amongst the five daus., viz., (1), Maud, who being m. to Hugh le Bigod, Earl of Norfolk, had issue. Roger le Bigod, Earl of Norfolk. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited, and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p. 628, Baronage of Ireland]
    • The office of Marshal to the king was a hereditary perquisite of a middling Wiltshire family. The duties were various, but mainly they consisted of acting as second-in-command to the constable of the royal household, maintaining order in the palace and guarding it, looking afterthe stables, keeping the rolls of those who performed their military service, and checking the accounts of various household and state departments.
      From this family came William Marshal, whose biography was written byhis squire John of Earley so providing us with one of the deepest andmost fascinating insights into the life of a great baron of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries.
      His father, John Marshal, whom the Gesta Stephani rather unkindly describes as 'a limb of hell and the root of all evil' was a man who loved warfare, and played the game of politics with great success. At first he supported Stephen but, when he began to realise the failings of the King and the potentialities of Matilda's party, he changed sides. Almost immediately he proved by a consummate act of bravery and hardihood, that he was worth having: escorting Matilda to safety in his castle at Ledgershall, John found that the party was going dangerously slowly because Matilda was riding side-saddle, so he persuaded her to ride astride, and stopped behind to delay the pursuers at Wherwell. His force was soon overpowered by the numbers of the enemy, and John took refuge with one of his knights in the Abbey. The opposing party promptly set fire to the church, and John and his knight had to take cover in the tower, John threatening to kill his knight if he made any move to surrender. As the lead of the roof began to melt and drop on the two soldiers, putting out one of John's eyes, the enemy moved off, convinced that they were dead. They escaped, in a terrible state, but triumphant, to John's castle.
      He plainly expected his children to be as tough as himself, as an incident of the year 1152, when William was about six, will show. King Stephen went to besiege Newbury Castle, which Matilda had given John to defend; the castellan, realising that provisions and the garrison wereboth too low to stand a long siege, asked for a truce to inform his master. This was normal practice, for if the castellan were not at oncerelieved, he could then surrender without being held to have let his master down. Now John had not sufficient troops to relieve the castle,so he asked Stephen to extend the truce whilst he, in turn, informed his mistress, and agreed to give William as a hostage, promising not to provision and garrison the castle during the truce. This he promptly did, and when he received word from Stephen that the child would behung if he did not at once surrender the castle, he cheerfully replied that he had hammer and anvils to forge a better child than William.
      The child was taken out for execution, but at the last moment Stephenrelented with that soft heart that was his undoing, and though his officers presented such enticing plans as catapulting William over the castle walls with a siege engine, he would not give in. Later on he grew attached to the child, and one day when William was playing an elementary form of conkers with the King, using plantains, the child saw aservant of his mother, the lady Sibile (sister of the Earl of Salisbury), peeping in to check up on his safety. William cried out a greeting and the servant had to run for his life. The child did not know what dangers he was running, but it was good and early training for his future career.
      When he was thirteen William was sent to serve in the retinue of his father's cousin, the chamberlain of Normandy. This was his apprenticeship in knighthood, and was to last eight years. As a squire he would learn by experience all the skills of a knight, and the elaborate code of honour that went with it. After he had been knighted in 1167, he began to go round the tournaments to make his name, and earn a living bythe spoils. He was eager for the fray, so eager in fact that in his earliest tournaments he concentrated too much on the fighting, and forgot to take the plunder. He had to be warned by elder and wiser knightsof the dangerous folly of such quixotic behaviour---a good war-horse captured from an unseated opponent could fetch £40. Even so, his heartwas really set upon fame, and he recalled in old age the pride he hadexperienced as a youngster when, having retired to the refuge (a hut regarded as neutral territory in a tournament) to fix his helmet, he overheard two knights outside commenting on how well he was fighting.
      He was, however, only the second son of a middling baron, and he could not live off honour; so it must have been wonderful news for him when in 1170 he heard of his appointment as captain of the guard and military tutor to King Henry II's heir, the fifteen-year-old Henry, already crowned in his father's lifetime in, as it turned out, a fruitless attempt to ensure the succession. In 1173 it fell to his lot to make the young King a knight.
      Henry seems to have had a good sense of humour, for in 1176 when the two were cantering back into town after a tournament, William managed to bag another knight, and led him reined behind, with the King following. A low-hanging water sprout swept the knight off his horse, but Henry kept what he had seen to himself, and the laugh was definitely on William when they got home to find he was leading a horse, but no knight to ransom.
      Tournaments were so frequent at that time that a real enthusiast could attend one a fortnight, and William and the King must have attaineda record number of attendances. This was the equivalent of hunting toa nineteenth century country gentleman, though much more rugged. In ten months William and a colleague captured one hundred and three knights, and risked death on each occasion: one memory William kept of those days was having to receive the prize of hero of the day kneeling with his head on an anvil whilst a smith tried to prize off his batteredhelm. Another memory he retained was arriving too early for a fight, and dancing with the ladies who had come to watch---in full armour!
      Then came trouble---William's enemies began to spread rumours that hewas the lover of Henry's wife, and seeing that the suspicion could not fail to mar their relationship, William cut out on his own. He was immediately inundated with tempting offers from great lords who wantedto engage his services---three times he was offered £500 a year or more, but he turned them down and went instead on pilgrimage to Cologne.
      He was soon recalled to service with the young King in 1183, but it was only to see him die of a fever. At the last William promised that he would carry out Henry's vow to go on crusade, and having buried hismaster, he carried out his promise.
      He came home in 1187 to take his place as an esteemed servant of the King, and to marry the second richest heiress in England who brought him the Earldom of Pembroke and extensive lands in England, Wales and Ireland. He served Henry II in his final bitter years and once, when hewas covering the king's retreat, he put the fear of God into Prince Richard who was leading the pursuit. The Lionheart cried out, 'By the legs of God, Marshal, do not kill me,' and William killed his horse instead.
      Such conduct was dangerous, but when Richard came to the throne he showed the Marshal that he respected him for it, and when he went on crusade he made William one of the four associate justiciars appointed tohelp William de Longchamp, who had the care of the kingdom. This was excellent training in administration and justice, which was to stand William in good stead later when he had to bear responsibilities far greater than those with which a simple soldier can deal.
      It also gave him lessons in how to deal with the immensely difficult Prince John, who, fearing, with some justice, that Richard intended toleave the kingdom to his nephew Arthur of Brittany, had to consolidate his position whilst his brother was away. When he heard that Richard had been captured on his way home and was being held to an incredibly stiff ransom, John's ambitions became boundless, and the Marshal had, added to his normal duties, the double problem of keeping the prince in check and raising a vast sum of money.
      Richard returned to find William a wise counsellor now as well as an incomparable soldier, and he used him well; but in 1199 he died, and William worked with skill and energy for the smooth accession of John. This King was to bring him worse problems than he had ever known.
      For the next seven years William had to watch John losing Normandy tothe Marshal's old friend Philip Augustus, knowing there was nothing to be done about it. Instead of knightly virtues, treachery was now the order of the day, and when he taxed the French King with using traitors, he had only this for reply: '. . . it is now a matter of business. They are like torches that one throws into the latrine when one is done with them.'
      Attempting to rescue something out of the chaos of the loss of Normandy, William undertook the negotiations with France to make peace, and find a formula by which the English barons might retain their lands inFrance. What he found instead was the implacable suspicion of John who, fearing that William was going over to the French side, confiscatedall his castles and official positions, and took his two eldest sons as hostages.
      So William spent the next five years in Ireland, looking after his vast estates and interests there far away from John, but unfortunately, in an area in which John took an especial interest. Every move Williammade was countered by the royal officials, and active hostilities soon commenced. However, William had the better and more faithful knights and, despite the royal offensives, he tended to win, so in 1208 a truce was made.
      Soon afterwards William received on his lands William de Briouse, whom John regarded as a bitter enemy, and so the quarrel flared up again. Finally the sixty-six-year-old knight had to come to court and offer to fight an ordeal by battle to prove his faith. No one dared to take up the challenge, though a winning contestant would have rocketed into favour with the King.
      But by the year 1212 John was in serious trouble, and was to learn where his true friends lay. William swung the baronage of Ireland into support for the crown, helped to organize the vital rapprochement with the Pope, and prepared to gather the King's friends together and put his castles in order in readiness for the inevitable struggle. A great moderating force was Stephen Langton, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who was to be associated with William throughout the struggle, persuading John to accede to those demands of the barons which he had helped to formulate.
      In 1216 William was back in the saddle as commander-in-chief of the royal forces opposing the barons and their ally the Dauphin and his French troops. All was well between the Marshal and the King who had so badly misjudged him, and now John tried to make amends. But the years of suspicion and discord still told: when he gave William the castle of Dunamase, he was upset that his justiciar failed to hand it over---he had forgotten an arrangement he had made secretly with the justiciar that William was to have nothing, whatever documents he produced, without a secret handshake (holding each other's thumbs) being given.
      Now as John lay dying in Newark Castle, with half his kingdom in enemy hands, and a nine-year old child as his successor, he realised the worth of the man he had hounded so long, and urged all present to commit the kingdom into the care of the Marshal after his death.
      William was an old man, the treasury was empty, discord reigned, and the position seemed hopeless---he wept and begged to be excused; but John of Earley, his squire, pointed out what honour there was to be won, and changed his mind for him in a flash. 'It goes straight to my heart that if all should abandon the King except me do you know what I would do? I would carry him on my shoulders, now here, now there, from isle to isle, from land to land, and I would never fail him, even if Iwere forced to beg my bread.'
      Filled with a sense of the glory of his task, the regent now raided the rich stores of jewels and clothing accumulated by the royal house 'against a rainy day' to pay the soldiers he so desperately needed. He sent out showers of letters of protection to the enemy barons, tempting them to change sides. Gradually he built up his powers for the decisive blow, at Lincoln in May 1217.
      There William led the charge, with the wily Bishop of Winchester who found a way in, and fought up and down the streets of Lincoln with many a shout of 'Ca! Dieu aide au Maréchal!' Finally they reached the open space in front of the cathedral where William personally captured the French commander and received three massive blows which left dents in his helmet. The worthy Dame Nicola, who had kept the castle for so long for the King against enormous odds, was at last relieved, and thewar was almost won.
      The Marshal sped down to Dover to intercept the convoy of reinforcements coming from France, and then set about making peace. He was generous---perhaps over-generous---to French and English alike, there was novictimisation, and little recrimination. The speediest route back to peace was chosen, for England had suffered enormous damage from the civil war.
      This was perhaps the worst time for William---the period of reconstruction. He knew well how to fight, but the sheer boredom and worry of administration of this kind must have borne heavily on the old man. Disputes and claims had to be settled so that both sides were satisfied, and no one would have a pretext for re-starting rebellion. Above all money was needed to oil the wheels and restore the losses of war, and the best way to make rebels is to overtax them. He even had to ban tournaments, which would obviously lead to dangerous positions being takenup once more. He must have wondered what he had come to---the greatest fighter in Europe, and the one who loved a fight better than anything. Instead he spent his time setting up judicial commissions and trying desperately to balance the budget.
      He continued hard at work until the end of February, 1219, when he was taken ill and confined to his bed in the Tower. Doctors came and went but could do nothing, and quickly all his family and his knights and retainers gathered round him for the end. He asked to be taken up river to his manor of Caversham near Reading to die, and there, he and his household went, in mid-March, followed by the young King Henry III, the papal legate, and the the highest officers of state.
      He urged the king 'to be a gentleman,' and told him that if he shouldfollow the example of some evil ancestor, he hoped he would die young. He worried long and hard over who should be his successor, and found no-one who could unite all under his rule, so wisely chose the papal legate. He made his will, and worried for a moment at the lack of provision for his young son Anselm, but, remembering his own career, felt that he could make his own way. 'May God give him prowess and skill.' He remembered an unmarried daughter and made provision for her 'until God takes care of her.' He had always been a religious man, founderof monasteries, crusader, and honest knight. He called for silken cloths he had thoughtfully brought back from the Holy Land thirty years before, and gave instruction that he should be covered with them at hisfuneral.
      He wanted to be buried as a Knight Templar, and when the master of the order came to clothe him, he said to his wife 'Belle amie, you are going to kiss me, but it will be for the last time.' Happy now that all the arrangements had been made, William could rest a little, and wait comfortably for death. He talked gently with his knights---one of them was worried that the clerks said no one could be saved who did notgive back everything he had taken. William set his mind at rest---he had taken 500 knights in his lifetime, and could never restore the booty, so if he were damned there was nothing he could do about it. 'The clerks are too hard on us. They shave us too closely.' When his clerk suggested that all the rich robes could be sold to win his salvation, he said 'You have not the heart of a gentleman, and I have had too much of your advice. Pentecost is at hand, and my knights ought to have their new robes. This will be the last time I can supply them. . .' Hewas a religious man---true---but he could not abide nonsense and knewhis own duty.
      In his last days he was very gentle to his family. One day he said toJohn of Earley that he had an overwhelming desire to sing, and when John urged him to do so, as it might improve his appetite, he told him it would do no such thing, people would just assume he was delirious. So they called in his daughters to sing for him, and when one sang weakly, overcome with emotion, he showed her how she should project her voice and sing with grace.
      On 14 May, William suddenly called to John of Earley to open all the doors and windows and call everyone in, for death was upon him. There was such a press that the abbots of Nutley and Reading, come to absolve the Marshal and give him plenary indulgence, were barely noticed, except by the dying man, who called them to him, made confession, prayed, and then died with his eyes fixed upon the cross.
      The cortège moved slowly up to London for the great state funeral, and there William's old friend Stephen Langton spoke his eulogy over the grave: 'Behold all that remains of the best knight that ever lived.You will all come to this. Each man dies on his day. We have here ourmirror, you and I. Let each man say his paternoster that God may receive this Christian into His Glory and place him among His faithful vassals, as he so well deserves.' [Who's Who in the Middle Ages, John Fines, Barnes & Noble Books, New York, 1995]
      ----------
      William Marshal, of the great baronial family of Marischal, marshal to the king, is first noticed as receiving from Prince Henry, the rebellious son of Henry II, upon the prince's deathbed, as his most confidential friend, his cross to convey to Jerusalem. He m. the great heiress of the Clares in 1189, and with her acquired the Earldom of Pembroke -- in which rank he bore the royal sceptre of gold, surmounted by the cross, at the coronation of King Richard I, and he was soon afterwards, on the king's purposing a journey to the Holy Land, appointed oneof the assistants to Hugh, bishop of Durham, and William, Earl of Albemarle, Chief Justice of England, in the government of the realm.
      Upon the decease of his brother, John Mareschall, marshal of the king's house, in 1199, he became lord marshal, and on the day of the coronation of King John, he was invested with the sword of the Earldom of Pembroke, being then confirmed in the possession of the said inheritance. In the first year of this monarch's reign, his lordship was appointed sheriff of Gloucestershire and likewise of Sussex, wherein he was continued for several years. In the 5th he had a grant of Goderich Castle in co. Hereford, to hold by the service of two knights' fees; and in four years afterwards he obtained, by grant from the crown, the whole province of Leinster, in Ireland, to hold by the service of one hundred knights' fees.
      Upon the breaking out of the baronial insurrection, the Earl of Pembroke was deputed by the king, with the archbishop of Canterbury, to ascertain the grievances and demands of those turbulent lords, and at thedemise of King John, he was so powerful as to prevail upon the baronsto appoint a day for the coronation of Henry III, to whom he was constituted guardian, by the rest of the nobility, who had remained firm in their allegiance. He subsequently took up arms in the royal cause and, after achieving a victory over the barons at Lincoln, proceeded directly to London, and investing that great city, both by land and water, reduced it to extremity for want of provisions. Peace, however, being soon concluded, it was relieved. His lordship, at this point, executed the office of sheriff for the cos. of Essex and Hertford.
      This eminent nobleman was no less distinguished by his wisdom in the council and valour in the field, than by his piety and his attachment to the church, of which his numerous munificent endowments bear ample testimony. His lordship had, by the heiress of Clare, five sons, who s. each other in his lands and honours, and five daus., viz., Maud, Joan, Isabel, Sybil, and Eve. The earl d. in 1219, and was s. by his eldest son, William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited, and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p. 358, Marshal, Earls of Pembroke]
      William Mareschal, now Marshall (Mareschal to the King), he became Earl of Pembroke, Lord of Leinster, and Lord Marshal of Ireland, 1207, having then a grant of the who province of Leinster. He d. 16 March, 1219, having issue, five sons and five daus. His sons, William, Richard,Gilbert, Walter, and Anselme, all succeeded to the Earldom of Pembroke and Lordship of Leinster, the last of whom dying s. p. 21 December,1245, the title of Pembroke became extinct and the Lordship of Leinster was divided amongst the five daus., viz., (1), Maud, who being m. to Hugh le Bigod, Earl of Norfolk, had issue. Roger le Bigod, Earl of Norfolk. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited, and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p. 628, Baronage of Ireland]
    • [hezboone.FTW]
      !Per "My Boone Family": Sir William Marshall was named in Magna
      Carta as Regent
      of the Kingdom, served 1216 - 1219.
    • Additions, corrections and questions invited.
    • [2753682.ged]

      !3rd Earl of Pembroke, Marshal of England, Protector of the Realm, Regent of the Kingdom, 12 16-19. [Ped. of Charlemagne, p. 163]

      MINOR, BURR, NEWLIN, WAITE LINE - 22nd ggrandfather

      !Named in the Magna Charta, 1215. A man of exemplary character. [Magna Charta Sureties]

      !Brother and heir-male of John, Baron Marshall, hereditary marshal of the king's household, w ho bore the great golden spurs of the king at the coronation of Richard I. William first appe ars in English history as a supporter of Prince Henry, the rebellious son of Henry II. Thi s prince, upon his death-bed, delivered to his most confidential friend, William Marshall, hi s cross, to convey to Jerusalem, which commission, however, he personally never fulfilled, a s he shortly afterwards married the great heiress, became Earl of Pembroke, and was left at h ome by Richard Coeur de Lion, when he set out on his journey to the Holy Land, as one of th e assistants in the government of the realm during his absence. Upon the decease of his broth er John, in 1199, he became lord marshal to King John, and on the day of John's coronation h e was invested with the sword of the earldom of Pembroke, being then confirmed in the possess ion of the said inheritance, and was shortly afterwards appointed high sheriff of the countie s of Sussex and Gloucester. In a few years he had grants from King John of Goderich Castle , in County Hereford, and of the whole province of Leinster, in Ireland. Had 5 sons by the he iress of Clare who each succeeded in his lands and honors and all died without issue, when al l his honors became extinct and his great inheritance devolved upon his 5 daughters. [Magna C harta Barons, p. 74, 106, 110, 221]

      !England, 12 Nov 1216 -- The regent, William Marshal, and the papal legate, Cardinal Guala, r eissue a slightly revised Magna Carta. [Chronicle of the Royal Family, p. 56]

      !London, Nov 1217 -- King John's dying wish is the the Earl of Pembroke, William Marshal, th e most powerful and chivalrous of his knights, should care for the boy king Henry. William w as reluctant to take on what must have appeared as a hopeless cause until he saw the helples s child. He shares the regency with Hubert de Burgh. William's career is a remarkable stor y of romance and chivalry befitting a Norman nobleman. He was trained as a squire, ransome d as a knight by Eleanor of Aquitaine and fought both for and against Henry II. [Chronicle o f the Royal Family, p. 56]

      !With Queen Eleanor when she was attacked by the Lusignan brothers. He was then a young knigh t who fought "like a wild board besieged by hounds" but had nevertheless been captured. The n 22, he was one of those landless younger sons, son of the same John Marshal whose complaint s had brought Becket to Northampton. Knighted only a few months earlier, he had already dist inguished himself in several tournaments. Eleanor arranged for his ransom and release as wel l as bestowing gifts of horses, gold, rich garments and brought him into her family as tutor , guardian, friend, and companion for Prince Henry, thus paving the way for Marshal's rise fr om knight-errant to, five decades later, regent of England. [Eleanor of Aquitaine, p. 241]

      1st Earl of Pembroke; m. Isabel de Clare; father of Eve Marshall. [Royal Descents, p. 421]

      The posterity of the great William Marshal, earl of Pembroke, was singularly unfortunate: hi s 5 sons succeeded each other in turn, all dying childless, and the estates were divided bet . the lines of his 5 daus. [Angevin England, p. 78]

      b. 1144 [Judy Martin]

      b.c. 1145, d. 14 May 1219 at Caversham, bur. in the Temple Church, London; 3rd Earl of Pembro ke, Marshal of England, Protector, Regent of the Kingdom 1216-19; son of John Marshal and Sib yl de Salisbury; m. Isabel de Clare; father of Eve/Eva Marshal. [Ancestral Roots, p. 69]

      Probably the greatest lay subject of the Middle Ages. The earliest masonry of Pembroke Castl e is certainly his work, and virtually the whole of the defences appear to have been complete d by him or by his sons, the last of whom died in 1245. With his wife's enormous inheritance , to which were later added his own family lands and the lordship of Goodrich, the Marshal wa s a very rich man indeed; and very much the largest, and possibly the most valuable part of h is property lay across the Irish Sea, in the form of the vast fief of Leinster: five modern c ounties and part of a sixth, held by the service of 100 knights. In the 30 years of the Marsh al's rule (1189-1219) there was one irruption of royal authority, between 1207 (when the earl , going to Leinster against the will of King John, was obliged to surrender to the king all h is castles in England and Wales) and 1211, when the king received the Marshal back into favou r; it is unlikely that much work was then going on at Pembroke, or elsewhere among the earl' s castles. [Pembroke Castle, pp. 7-8]

      Chepstow has been a strategic fortress for hundreds of years and it demonstrates perhaps bett er than any other site the changes in mediaeval military fortification. Chepstow is ususual a mong British Castles in that it was built largely of stone from the first, with no primary ti mber phase. The barbican was a significant addition made by the sons of William Marshall, it s tower and gateway deserving careful scrutiny. [The Gwent Collection brochure]

      Chepstow's vulnerable east face was strengthened by William Marshal, earl of Pembroke, in ab t 1200 with a curtain wall and two flanking towers equipped with arrowslits, in the new defen sive mode of the 13th century. As such it is one of the earliest examples of this new style o f fortification in the country. William Marshal's sons greatly enlarged the castle, adding th e gatehouse, through which the visitor now enters, and the ward behind it. They also heighten ed fitz Osbern's keep and built a strongly-defended barbican at the upper end of the castle . [Chepstow Castle, p. 3]

      William Marshall was one of the outstanding men of his day, a landless son of an English, kni ghtly family, who had made a name for himself in Angevin France by his formidable fighting ab ility and by his uncompromising loyalty to those he served. He stayed loyal to the old king , Henry II, when almost all others deserted him for his rebel sons. Richard Lionheart, one o f these sons, respected Marshal both for his loyalty to his father and for his skill as a sol dier (he had unhorsed Richard in a skirmish, but spared his life). When Richard became king h e married William to the heiress Isabella de Clare.
      William fitz Osbern's castle had now stood unchanged for nearly a century and a half. Will iam Marshal, however, was a notable castle builder who remodelled several strongholds in th e up to date techniques of military architecture familiar to him from his career in France. H is most impressive work is the great round keep at Pembroke, guarding the sea route between h is British and Irish lands. Marshal also built the castle at Usk, NW of Chepstow. [Chepstow C astle, p. 6]

      m. Isabel de Clare de Strigoil; father of 5 sons and 5 daus. [Charlemagne & Others, Chart 294 5]

      4th Earl of Pembroke; 4th son of John, 2nd son by #2 wife, Sibyl de Salisbury d'Evereux b. 11 46; in 1152 his father gave him as hostage to Stephen at the seige of Newbury. Later, his fat her sent him to William de Tancarville, hereditary Master Chamberlain of Normandy for 8 years . Knighted in 1167; was at the deathbed of Henry II in Chinon and escorted the body back to E ngland; m. Aug 1189 in London, Isabel, Countess of Pembroke; d. 1219 at Caversham; bur. Templ e Church, London. [Charlemagne & Others, Chart 2944]

      Earl of Pembroke; son of John the Marshall Fitzgilbert and Sibilia/Sibyl de Salisbury. [WFT V ol 6 Ped 1382]

      Son of John Fitz Gilbert and Sybill of Salisbury; m. Isabel de Clare; father of Isabell Marsh all who m. Gilbert III de Clare. [GRS 3.03, Automated Archives, CD#100]

      Arrived in Ireland in 1207. [The Oxford Illustrated History of Ireland, p. 66]

      William de Braose quarrelled with his royal master and fled to Ireland, where he was sheltere d by William Marshal and the powerful de Lacy brothers in defiance of the king's justiciar. K ing John came to Ireland a second time with an avenging army in 1210. William Marshal, lord o f Leinster, succeeded in making his peace, but the honor of Limerick, the lordship of Meath , and the earldom of Ulster were all declared forfeit to the king. [The Oxford Illustrated Hi story of Ireland, p. 66]

      1st Earl of Pembroke. Had 5 sons each of whom succeeded in turn to the Earldom and died child less; had 5 daus/co-heiresses, each of whom m. and had children, [The Plantagenet Ancestry, p . iii]

      In abt 1182 William was suspected of having an affair with Marguerite of France, wife of Henr y the Young King. This may have been a plot to discredit William, not based on any real indis cretion on his part. In any case, it led to Henry the Young King repudiating his wife and sen ding her back to her brother Philip Augustus. He also withdrew his friendship from William, w ho left young Henry's court. William went to Henry II to prove his innocence by trial in comb at, but Henry II refused to judge the quarrel. William left court again, and young Henry even tually begged him to return because of William's qualities. This must have all happened not l ong before young Henry's death. [Georges Duby, William Marshal: The Flower of Chivalry, as qu oted by Suzanne Doig
      The first stone castle at Kilkenny was built about 1190 by Strongbow's son-in-law, William Ma rshall, Earl of Pembroke. This was a square-shaped castle with towers at each corner: three o f these original four towers survive today. [Kilkenny Castle]

      Knights travelled throughout Europe to take part, and some made their living from the spoils .
      "The famous English jouster of the 12th century, William Marshall, did," confirms John Wller . "He and his colleague would hang about on the edges of the tournament waiting to see someon e get tired, then go in and knobble him. You could gang up on someone like that. It was alway s dangerous. People always got killed." ["Jousting" by Sian Ellis, BRITISH HERITAGE, Aug/Se p 2001, pp. 32-37]

      William the Marshal was the greatest soldier of his time and a man of untarnished reputation : he was given the title and responsibility of 'governor of king and kingdom'. Despite his 7 0 years, and having served under Henry II, Richard and John, few men would willingly face hi m in battle. The Marshal carried with him the goodwill of the majority of the people of Engla nd. [Lincoln Castle, p. 34]

      Goodrich Castle is mentioned in 1204 when King John gave it to William Marshal on his marriag e to the heiress of the earldom of Pembroke. Pembroke was the medieval route to Ireland, an d the earls had great estates there after the Norman Conquest in the late 12th century. Willi am had risen from humble origins because of his support for four kings: Henry II, Richard I , John and finally Henry III. [Goodrich Castle, p. 21][beaufort.ged]

      The office of Marshal to the king was a hereditary perquisite of a middli ng Wiltshire family. The duties were various, but mainly they consist ed of acting as second-in-command to the constable of the royal househol d, maintaining order in the palace and guarding it, looking after the stab les, keeping the rolls of those who performed their military service, a nd checking the accounts of various household and state departments.

      From this family came William Marshal, whose biography was written by h is squire John of Earley so providing us with one of the deepest and mo st fascinating insights into the life of a great baron of the late twelf th and early thirteenth centuries.

      His father, John Marshal, whom the Gesta Stephani rather unkindly describ es as 'a limb of hell and the root of all evil' was a man who loved warfar e, and played the game of politics with great success. At first he support ed Stephen but, when he began to realise the failings of the King and t he potentialities of Matilda's party, he changed sides. Almost immediate ly he proved by a consummate act of bravery and hardihood, that he was wor th having: escorting Matilda to safety in his castle at Ledgershall, Jo hn found that the party was going dangerously slowly because Matilda was r iding side-saddle, so he persuaded her to ride astride, and stopped behi nd to delay the pursuers at Wherwell. His force was soon overpowered by t he numbers of the enemy, and John took refuge with one of his knights in t he Abbey. The opposing party promptly set fire to the church, and John a nd his knight had to take cover in the tower, John threatening to kill h is knight if he made any move to surrender. As the lead of the roof beg an to melt and drop on the two soldiers, putting out one of John's eyes, t he enemy moved off, convinced that they were dead. They escaped, in a terr ible state, but triumphant, to John's castle.

      He plainly expected his children to be as tough as himself, as an incide nt of the year 1152, when William was about six, will show. King Stephen w ent to besiege Newbury Castle, which Matilda had given John to defend; t he castellan, realising that provisions and the garrison were both too l ow to stand a long siege, asked for a truce to inform his master. This w as normal practice, for if the castellan were not at once relieved, he cou ld then surrender without being held to have let his master down. Now Jo hn had not sufficient troops to relieve the castle, so he asked Steph en to extend the truce whilst he, in turn, informed his mistress, and agre ed to give William as a hostage, promising not to provision and garrison t he castle during the truce. This he promptly did, and when he received wo rd from Stephen that the child would be hung if he did not at once surrend er the castle, he cheerfully replied that he had hammer and anvils to for ge a better child than William.

      The child was taken out for execution, but at the last moment Stephen rele nted with that soft heart that was his undoing, and though his officers pr esented such enticing plans as catapulting William over the castle walls w ith a siege engine, he would not give in. Later on he grew attached to t he child, and one day when William was playing an elementary form of conke rs with the King, using plantains, the child saw a servant of his mothe r, the lady Sibile (sister of the Earl of Salisbury), peeping in to che ck up on his safety. William cried out a greeting and the servant had to r un for his life. The child did not know what dangers he was running, b ut it was good and early training for his future career.

      When he was thirteen William was sent to serve in the retinue of his fathe r's cousin, the chamberlain of Normandy. This was his apprenticeship in kn ighthood, and was to last eight years. As a squire he would learn by exper ience all the skills of a knight, and the elaborate code of honour that we nt with it. After he had been knighted in 1167, he began to go round the t ournaments to make his name, and earn a living by the spoils. He was eag er for the fray, so eager in fact that in his earliest tournaments he conc entrated too much on the fighting, and forgot to take the plunder. He h ad to be warned by elder and wiser knights of the dangerous folly of su ch quixotic behaviour---a good war-horse captured from an unseated oppone nt could fetch £40. Even so, his heart was really set upon fame, and he re called in old age the pride he had experienced as a youngster when, havi ng retired to the refuge (a hut regarded as neutral territory in a tournam ent) to fix his helmet, he overheard two knights outside commenting on h ow well he was fighting.

      He was, however, only the second son of a middling baron, and he could n ot live off honour; so it must have been wonderful news for him when in 11 70 he heard of his appointment as captain of the guard and military tut or to King Henry II's heir, the fifteen-year-old Henry, already crown ed in his father's lifetime in, as it turned out, a fruitless attempt to e nsure the succession. In 1173 it fell to his lot to make the young Ki ng a knight.

      Henry seems to have had a good sense of humour, for in 1176 when the two w ere cantering back into town after a tournament, William managed to bag an other knight, and led him reined behind, with the King following. A low-ha nging water sprout swept the knight off his horse, but Henry kept wh at he had seen to himself, and the laugh was definitely on William when th ey got home to find he was leading a horse, but no knight to ransom.

      Tournaments were so frequent at that time that a real enthusiast could att end one a fortnight, and William and the King must have attained a reco rd number of attendances. This was the equivalent of hunting to a nineteen th century country gentleman, though much more rugged. In ten months Willi am and a colleague captured one hundred and three knights, and risked dea th on each occasion: one memory William kept of those days was having to r eceive the prize of hero of the day kneeling with his head on an anvil whi lst a smith tried to prize off his battered helm. Another memory he retain ed was arriving too early for a fight, and dancing with the ladies who h ad come to watch---in full armour!

      Then came trouble---William's enemies began to spread rumours that he w as the lover of Henry's wife, and seeing that the suspicion could not fa il to mar their relationship, William cut out on his own. He was immediate ly inundated with tempting offers from great lords who wanted to engage h is services---three times he was offered £500 a year or more, but he turn ed them down and went instead on pilgrimage to Cologne.

      He was soon recalled to service with the young King in 1183, but it was on ly to see him die of a fever. At the last William promised that he would c arry out Henry's vow to go on crusade, and having buried his master, he ca rried out his promise.

      He came home in 1187 to take his place as an esteemed servant of the Kin g, and to marry the second richest heiress in England who brought him t he Earldom of Pembroke and extensive lands in England, Wales and Irelan d. He served Henry II in his final bitter years and once, when he was cove ring the king's retreat, he put the fear of God into Prince Richard who w as leading the pursuit. The Lionheart cried out, 'By the legs of God, Mars hal, do not kill me,' and William killed his horse instead.

      Such conduct was dangerous, but when Richard came to the throne he show ed the Marshal that he respected him for it, and when he went on crusa de he made William one of the four associate justiciars appointed to he lp William de Longchamp, who had the care of the kingdom. This was excelle nt training in administration and justice, which was to stand William in g ood stead later when he had to bear responsibilities far greater than tho se with which a simple soldier can deal.

      It also gave him lessons in how to deal with the immensely difficult Prin ce John, who, fearing, with some justice, that Richard intended to leave t he kingdom to his nephew Arthur of Brittany, had to consolidate his positi on whilst his brother was away. When he heard that Richard had been captur ed on his way home and was being held to an incredibly stiff ransom, John 's ambitions became boundless, and the Marshal had, added to his normal du ties, the double problem of keeping the prince in check and raising a va st sum of money.

      Richard returned to find William a wise counsellor now as well as an incom parable soldier, and he used him well; but in 1199 he died, and William wo rked with skill and energy for the smooth accession of John. This King w as to bring him worse problems than he had ever known.

      For the next seven years William had to watch John losing Normandy to t he Marshal's old friend Philip Augustus, knowing there was nothing to be d one about it. Instead of knightly virtues, treachery was now the ord er of the day, and when he taxed the French King with using traitors, he h ad only this for reply: '. . . it is now a matter of business. They are li ke torches that one throws into the latrine when one is done with them.'

      Attempting to rescue something out of the chaos of the loss of Normandy, W illiam undertook the negotiations with France to make peace, and find a fo rmula by which the English barons might retain their lands in France. Wh at he found instead was the implacable suspicion of John who, fearing th at William was going over to the French side, confiscated all his castl es and official positions, and took his two eldest sons as hostages.

      So William spent the next five years in Ireland, looking after his vast es tates and interests there far away from John, but unfortunately, in an ar ea in which John took an especial interest. Every move William made was co untered by the royal officials, and active hostilities soon commenced. How ever, William had the better and more faithful knights and, despite the ro yal offensives, he tended to win, so in 1208 a truce was made.

      Soon afterwards William received on his lands William de Briouse, whom Jo hn regarded as a bitter enemy, and so the quarrel flared up again. Final ly the sixty-six-year-old knight had to come to court and offer to fig ht an ordeal by battle to prove his faith. No one dared to take up the cha llenge, though a winning contestant would have rocketed into favour with t he King.

      But by the year 1212 John was in serious trouble, and was to learn where h is true friends lay. William swung the baronage of Ireland into support f or the crown, helped to organize the vital rapprochement with the Pope, a nd prepared to gather the King's friends together and put his castles in o rder in readiness for the inevitable struggle. A great moderating force w as Stephen Langton, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who was to be associat ed with William throughout the struggle, persuading John to accede to tho se demands of the barons which he had helped to formulate.

      In 1216 William was back in the saddle as commander-in-chief of the roy al forces opposing the barons and their ally the Dauphin and his French tr oops. All was well between the Marshal and the King who had so badly misju dged him, and now John tried to make amends. But the years of suspicion a nd discord still told: when he gave William the castle of Dunamase, he w as upset that his justiciar failed to hand it over---he had forgotten an a rrangement he had made secretly with the justiciar that William was to ha ve nothing, whatever documents he produced, without a secret handshake (ho lding each other's thumbs) being given.

      Now as John lay dying in Newark Castle, with half his kingdom in enemy han ds, and a nine-year old child as his successor, he realised the worth of t he man he had hounded so long, and urged all present to commit the kingd om into the care of the Marshal after his death.

      William was an old man, the treasury was empty, discord reigned, and the p osition seemed hopeless---he wept and begged to be excused; but John of Ea rley, his squire, pointed out what honour there was to be won, and chang ed his mind for him in a flash. 'It goes straight to my heart that if a ll should abandon the King except me do you know what I would do? I wou ld carry him on my shoulders, now here, now there, from isle to isle, fr om land to land, and I would never fail him, even if I were forced to b eg my bread.'

      Filled with a sense of the glory of his task, the regent now raided the ri ch stores of jewels and clothing accumulated by the royal house 'again st a rainy day' to pay the soldiers he so desperately needed. He sent o ut showers of letters of protection to the enemy barons, tempting th em to change sides. Gradually he built up his powers for the decisive blo w, at Lincoln in May 1217.

      There William led the charge, with the wily Bishop of Winchester who fou nd a way in, and fought up and down the streets of Lincoln with many a sho ut of 'Ca! Dieu aide au Maréchal!' Finally they reached the open spa ce in front of the cathedral where William personally captured the Fren ch commander and received three massive blows which left dents in his helm et. The worthy Dame Nicola, who had kept the castle for so long for the Ki ng against enormous odds, was at last relieved, and the war was almost won .

      The Marshal sped down to Dover to intercept the convoy of reinforcements c oming from France, and then set about making peace. He was generous---perh aps over-generous---to French and English alike, there was no victimisatio n, and little recrimination. The speediest route back to peace was chose n, for England had suffered enormous damage from the civil war.

      This was perhaps the worst time for William---the period of reconstructio n. He knew well how to fight, but the sheer boredom and worry of administr ation of this kind must have borne heavily on the old man. Disputes and cl aims had to be settled so that both sides were satisfied, and no one wou ld have a pretext for re-starting rebellion. Above all money was need ed to oil the wheels and restore the losses of war, and the best way to ma ke rebels is to overtax them. He even had to ban tournaments, which wou ld obviously lead to dangerous positions being taken up once more. He mu st have wondered what he had come to---the greatest fighter in Europe, a nd the one who loved a fight better than anything. Instead he spent his ti me setting up judicial commissions and trying desperately to balance the b udget.

      He continued hard at work until the end of February, 1219, when he was tak en ill and confined to his bed in the Tower. Doctors came and went but cou ld do nothing, and quickly all his family and his knights and retainers ga thered round him for the end. He asked to be taken up river to his man or of Caversham near Reading to die, and there, he and his household wen t, in mid-March, followed by the young King Henry III, the papal legate, a nd the the highest officers of state.

      He urged the king 'to be a gentleman,' and told him that if he should foll ow the example of some evil ancestor, he hoped he would die young. He worr ied long and hard over who should be his successor, and found no-one who c ould unite all under his rule, so wisely chose the papal legate. He made h is will, and worried for a moment at the lack of provision for his young s on Anselm, but, remembering his own career, felt that he could make his o wn way. 'May God give him prowess and skill.' He remembered an unmarried d aughter and made provision for her 'until God takes care of her.' He had a lways been a religious man, founder of monasteries, crusader, and honest k night. He called for silken cloths he had thoughtfully brought back from t he Holy Land thirty years before, and gave instruction that he should be c overed with them at his funeral.

      He wanted to be buried as a Knight Templar, and when the master of the ord er came to clothe him, he said to his wife 'Belle amie, you are going to k iss me, but it will be for the last time.' Happy now that all the arrangem ents had been made, William could rest a little, and wait comfortably f or death. He talked gently with his knights---one of them was worried th at the clerks said no one could be saved who did not give back everythi ng he had taken. William set his mind at rest---he had taken 500 knigh ts in his lifetime, and could never restore the booty, so if he were damn ed there was nothing he could do about it. 'The clerks are too hard on u s. They shave us too closely.' When his clerk suggested that all the ri ch robes could be sold to win his salvation, he said 'You have not the hea rt of a gentleman, and I have had too much of your advice. Penteco st is at hand, and my knights ought to have their new robes. This wi ll be the last time I can supply them. . .' He was a religious man---true- --but he could not abide nonsense and knew his own duty.

      In his last days he was very gentle to his family. One day he said to Jo hn of Earley that he had an overwhelming desire to sing, and when John urg ed him to do so, as it might improve his appetite, he told him it wou ld do no such thing, people would just assume he was delirious. So they ca lled in his daughters to sing for him, and when one sang weakly, overco me with emotion, he showed her how she should project her voice and sing w ith grace.

      On 14 May, William suddenly called to John of Earley to open all the doo rs and windows and call everyone in, for death was upon him. There was su ch a press that the abbots of Nutley and Reading, come to absolve the Mars hal and give him plenary indulgence, were barely noticed, except by the dy ing man, who called them to him, made confession, prayed, and then died wi th his eyes fixed upon the cross.

      The cortège moved slowly up to London for the great state funeral, and the re William's old friend Stephen Langton spoke his eulogy over the grave: ' Behold all that remains of the best knight that ever lived. You will all c ome to this. Each man dies on his day. We have here our mirror, you a nd I. Let each man say his paternoster that God may receive this Christi an into His Glory and place him among His faithful vassals, as he so we ll deserves.' [Who's Who in the Middle Ages, John Fines, Barnes & Noble Bo oks, New York, 1995]

      ----------

      William Marshal, of the great baronial family of Marischal, marshal to t he king, is first noticed as receiving from Prince Henry, the rebellious s on of Henry II, upon the prince's deathbed, as his most confidential frien d, his cross to convey to Jerusalem. He m. the great heiress of the Clar es in 1189, and with her acquired the Earldom of Pembroke -- in
    • William was knighted in 1167, and was travelling with his uncle Patrick, Earl of Salisbury, and Queen Eleanor near the castle Lusignan. The Lusignan brothers attacked and killed Patrick, who was unarmed. William was wounded and taken prisoner while defending the Queen's retreat into the castle, and trying to avenge his uncle's murder. He was ransomed by Queen Eleanor. William was appointed head of the military household in 1170. From then until the death of the young Prince Henry (whom William knighted in 1173) in 1183, William established his status as an undefeated knight of the tournaments. He fought in 500 matches and never lost. After Prince Henry's death, William took his cross to the Holy Land and joined the Crusades with King Guy of Jerusalem and the Templar Knights. King Richard I gave William to wife Isabel de Clare. Upon this marriage William inherited all the lands which had been held by Richard Strongbow de Clare, Isabel's father, including Pembroke and Striguil, and the Lordship of Leinster in Ireland. King John wrongly accused William of treason and began seizing his castles. William refused to fight John, as that would break his oath of fealty. When a bishop persuaded King John to expell his foreign advisors, John realised the error of his ways and restored William's lands to him. Upon John's death in 1216, William was chosen by his peers to act as Regent for young Henry III, who was nine years old. Henry was knighted and crowned under the seal of the Earl of Pembroke. William served as Marshal of the Royal Household under four kings: Henry II, Richard I "the Lionheart", John Lackland, and Henry III. It was said that William took two manors that the Bishop of Ferns could not get back. Some years after William's death the Bishop placed a curse on William's family that none of his sons would have children. Each of William's sons became Earl of Pembroke and Marshall of England, but all died without issue. In one of her essays on William Marshal, Catherine Armstrong says," William might have inherited some of the physical strength and knowledge of military strategy from his father, but as a second son, he would become in his own right and by his own abilities, skills, and sense of honor the best of chivalric knighthood, a "familiaris Regis," the Earl of Pembroke, and the Regent of England."
    • Basic Life Information

      William Marshal was the fourth son of John fitz Gilbert, hereditary marshal of--keeper of the horses-- of the Anglo-Norman kings . William was born ca. 1147, John's second son by his second wife, Sybil (whom he married in 1145), the sister of Earl Patrick of Salisbury. John was a local baron in southwestern England (Wiltshire and Berkshire), who had considerable local clout, especially during the civil war between King Stephen and his cousin the Empress Mathilda. As a younger son of a local baron, William was destined to be a serving knight. He was a household retainer of various lords (including the Angevin kings: Henry the Young King and his father Henry II) and distinguished himself for his prowess in tournaments and war and his loyalty to his masters. It was not until 1187, when he was forty years old that he received a landed endowment. Henry II gave him the lordship of Cartmel in northwestern England. He was granted the hand of Isabel de Clare, heiress of Earl Richard (Strongbow) of Striguil in 1189. From 1189-1219, William was de facto Earl of Pembroke (in southwestern Wales) and Striguil (in the Welsh 'marches,' i.e. frontier), lord of Longueville in Normandy, Earl of Leinster (southeastern Ireland) [title of 'earl' granted by King John, 1199]; regent for Henry III's minority (1216-1219).

      Here's the way it went...

      Reigh of Stephen

      1145 -John fitz Gilbert's ambitions bring him into conflict with the most powerful magnate in Wiltshire, Patrick, Earl of Salisbury. To resolve their dispute, John agrees to become Patrick's man. Together the two plunder the surrounding countryside. To cement the alliance, John puts away his wife and marries Patrick's sister, Sybile. William Marshal is their second son.

      1146/1147 -William Marshal is born. Note the uncertainty about the date. He was not then a great man, and his birth went unrecorded.

      1152 - William is given as a hostage to the forces of King Stephen, who is besieging John fitz Gilbert's castle of Newbury.

      Story: John, needing to reinforce and provision Newbury arranges a truce with Stephen, ostensibly to give John time to consult with Mathilda on possible surrender. Stephen demands a hostage, and John hands over his son William (then four or five). John promptly broke his promise, telling the King that he could do what he wanted with the child (John: I have the hammer and anvils to make more and better sons'). Stephen couldn't bring himself to kill the child.

      ca. 1159-1167- William serves as squire to John fitz Gilbert's (or, perhaps, his mother's) cousin, William of Tancarville, Chamberlain of Normandy, a powerful Norman baron.

      1165 -John fitz Gilbert and his eldest son Gilbert both die. William's elder brother John inherits the patrimony.

      Reign of Henry II

      1167 - William is knighted (in a simple affair) by William of Tancarville at Driencourt, where a number of Norman knights have assembled for the purpose of helping King Henry II in his war with King Louis VII of France. William of Tancarville, the Count of Eu, and the Earl of Essex successfully defend the town of Neufchatel against the forces of the powerful Philip Count of Flanders, an ally of Louis VII. William distinguishes himself in combat, but loses his horse.

      Story: William became the butt of a joke. During the celebration, Earl William de Mandeville asked William for a horse collar. The young knight responded that he has none. "What are you saying," the earl growled, "you had forty or sixty of them, yet you refuse me so small a thing!" The point: William had to learn that a knight fights for profit as well as glory. A lesson in the realities of war.)

      Later in the year, Earl Patrick, William's uncle, is killed by the de Lusignan brothers, knights of Louis VII, and William Marshal is injured in the same fray. He is ransomed by Eleanor of Aquitaine (wife of Henry II), whom he and the Earl were defending.

      Henry II, impressed with William Marshal's service in the recent war, appoints him tutor in chivalry to the Young King. The Marshal soon becomes young Henry's devoted retainer.

      It is during the course of this revolt that William Marshal knights the young Henry. This is the world turned upside down, since Henry is his lord.

      1177-9 -William is on the tournament circuit as partner to another bachelor in Henry's household, Roger de Gaugie; for two years they go from tourney to tourney. According to list kept by Wigain, the young king's clerk, they captured 103 knights in the course of 10 months.)

      1180 - Philip II Augustus (1180-1123) succeeds his father as king of France. Philip is to pursue a much more hostile policy towards the Angevin kings.

      1182 -William is disgraced and cast out of the Young King's household. He is accused of adultery w/ Henry's wife Margaret, d. of Louis VII of France, by members of Young King's household who were jealous of him. He demands justice before Henry II at Caen during Christmas 1182, asking for trial by combat, but is refused permission to prove innocence.

      1183 -Wm Marshal receives offers from French nobles, but refuses them. He becomes a knight-errant, travelling to a tournament at Gournai in Jan 1183, then to Cologne, and then back to France, until he is reconciled w/ Henry the Younger in Feb 1183.

      (The author of the Histoire tells a story about how William Marshal met a runaway monk and lady in the forest and took their money in order to prevent the monk from committing the sin of usury--perhaps a bit hypocritically, given that William was later to receive the gift of a Jew from King John. This incident is revealing about the nature of 12th-century chivalry.)

      The Poitevin vassals of Henry II's son Richard the Lionhearted, now duke of Aquitaine and Poitou, rebel against his harsh rule. Richard's brothers Henry and Geoffrey count of Brittany, decide to assist the rebels, which leads to Richard seeking his father's aid. The war between brothers now becomes a war of sons against their father. Henry the Younger finds himself once again at war with Henry II. Needing all the good advisors and strong warriors he could possibly obtain, he allows himself to be reconciled with William Marshal. The reconciliation between Henry and William was brought about by the advise of Geoffrey de Lusignan, William's old enemy.

      June 1183--Henry the Younger dies in the midst of the rebellion.

      He had vowed to go on crusade (the breaking of which vow led him to have his dying body taken from his bed and laid on bed with ashes, with a stone pillow, a hair shirt on his back, and noose around his neck. He kissed the ring that his father had sent him as a token of peace and died. Before dying he asked William Marshal to fulfil his vow.

      1183-86--William was on Crusade. Promised Templars that he would end his day amongst them and buried in a Templar house.

      1186 -William Marshal Enters Henry II's mesnie (i.e. household).

      1187 -William receives the grant of a FIEF, CARTMEL, a large royal estate (28,747 acres) in Lancashire, and is given custody of HELOIS of Lancaster, one of the king's female wards, heiress of the barony of Kendal in Lancashire and Westmoreland. Apparently Henry II intended to settle William in northern England. If he had married Helois, Wm would have achieved the same status as his older brother.

      1189 William is used as an emissary to Richard. The negotiations failed, but William's stock rose, and Henry rewarded him by allowing him to trade up in his marital prospects, exchanging Heloise for Isabel de Clare, daughter of earl Richard Strongbow (Norman conqueror of Ireland), and heiress to Pembroke, Striguil, and Leinster, a vast barony in Wales, the Welsh marches, and Ireland.

      4 June 1189 William almost killed an unarmed Richard in battle (killed his horse instead). 6 July 1189 Henry II died--William took charge of the burial--and Richard became king.

      Reign of Richard the Lionhearted

      William made his peace with RICHARD I, though he refused to apologize for killing his horse, and Richard gave him the heiress that Henry II had promised. William married Isabel in August 1189 and became, by right of his wife, Lord of Striguil and Pembroke. (Striguil consisted of 65.5 knights' fees, and a large demesne in south east Wales; Pembroke was an earldom in southwest Wales.) William also received his wife's claim to a great lordship in Ireland, Leinster (in theory a great prize, but in practice held firmly by Richard's brother, John), and the lands of Orbec and Longueville in Normandy. Richard allowed William to buy control of the office of sheriff of Gloucester, and to purchase half of another lordship, the lordship of Giffard.)

      William celebrated his good fortune by going on a circuit of his wife's lands, taking homage and demanding relief from his new vassals, and by founding a priory with his lands at Cartmel, which he dedicated to the souls of Henry II, and 'his lord' King Henry the Younger (note that William in 1189 still identified himself as the man of the Young King).

      1190-1194. Richard was on Crusade (until 1192), and then was a prisoner of the Emperor Henry VI (1192-4). William remained in England during this time, and served as subordinate justiciar (a royal justice) and sheriff of Lincoln. He first supported the king's brother Earl John (his overlord in Ireland) against Richard's viceregent, Bishop William de Longchamps. But William remained loyal to Richard--albeit reluctantly--when John rebelled with the aid of Philip Augustus in 1193.

      1194 -William's elder brother John Marshal died and William succeeded to his father's inheritance and to the title of royal Marshal (keeper of the king's stables). From 1195-1199 William fought for Richard on the continent against Philip Augustus and served his lord on a diplomatic mission to Flanders.

      Reign of John

      1199-1216 - Reign of King John, Richard's younger brother.

      Richard died on 20 March 1199 and John became king (despite the claims of his nephew Arthur of Brittany, son of his elder brother Geoffrey). William supported John's claim to the Crown. John rewarded him by confirming his lands and bestowing upon him the title in his own right of earl (before this he was simply the husband of a countess). John made him sheriff of Gloucestershire and of Sussex. He became one of John's court and from 1200-1203 his name appears frequently as a witness on the king's charters.

      1203-1204 Philip Augustus conquered Normandy, Maine, Anjou. This created a dilemma for William, who held land in Normandy as well as England. While serving as John's ambassador to Philip (1204), William agreed to do homage to Philip for his Norman lands if John had not recovered Normandy within a year (apparently with John's permission). The result was William saved his French holdings and lost the favor of the king, especially after William refused to go on campaign against Philip in France, pleading his homage to the French king. John accused him of cowardice and disloyalty and demanded that William give him his eldest son as a hostage. John went to Poitou in France; William was entrusted with the military defence of England. From this pount until 1212 William was out of royal favor.

      1207-1212 William Marshal, having lost the king's love, left court and sailed to Ireland to try to secure his wife's Irish inheritance, the county of Leinster. This period is marked by William's war against his Irish vassals led by Meilyr fitz Henry, John's justiciar in Ireland, who refused to acknowledge William's lordship (at one point, William was recalled to England by John, leaving Isabel in Ireland; she ended up being besieged. King John went so far as to confiscate the lands of John of Early and William's other household knights who held in chief from him). In 1208 William's relations with John took still another turn for the worse, because of William's harboring in Ireland of the fugitive baron William de Braose, not only William's friend but also his overlord for some land in England. John couldn't prove that William was guilty of treason, but he still demanded further hostage, including his squire and best friend John of Early.

      1212 John recalled William to England to fight against the Welsh. He was reconciled with John, who released the hostages. After returning to Ireland, William again was reclaled in April 1213 to aid John against his rebellious vassals. From 1213 to 1215 William was John's most trusted and loyal supporter. He advised the king, served as guardian for the king's eldest son Henry, and served John as both a castellan (warden of royal castles) and justice.

      15 June 1215 at RUNNYMEDE Marshal was one of the royal representative who witnessed the MAGNA CARTA and swore to uphold its provisions. He was sent on embassy to King Philip of France, who was about to invade, but the negotiations failed. Philip Augustus sent his eldest son Louis (later to be King Louis VIII of France) with an expeditionary force to aid the English rebels, and William's eldest son sided with Louis. William himself remained loyal to John and led his troops until John's death on 19 Oct. 1216. John's son Henry, still a boy, succeeded as King Henry III. The war with the French continued.

      Reign of Henry III

      1216-1272 - Reign of Henry III. Henry is only nine years old at his father's death. The papal legate initially serves as his regent, followed by William Marshal when the Cardinal leaves the country in 1218.

      1216-1219. On 11 Nov 1216 William Marshal was formally chosen by the king's council (the chief barons who remained loyal to John) to serve as 'regent of the king and the kingdom'. William's first action was to reissue the Magna Carta. William commanded the royalist troops, and even fought in hand to hand combat during the siege of Lincoln. The result was a royalist victory, and a favorable treaty with the French (11 Sept. 1217). 1218 witnessed some mopping up of recalcitrant English rebels.

      14 May 1219 William Marshal died at Caversham near Reading. As he lay dying he fulfilled his vow to the Templars by becoming one of their order and by his own directions was buried in the Temple Church at London. William left behind a widow, five sons and five daughters. Ironically, none of his sons left sons and the great Marshal barony lasted only a single generation.
      (http://www.medievalgenealogy.org.uk/families/marshal/williammarshal.shtml)

      Main bequests determined by law and custom of inheritance (not by will)

      i. Countess Isabel--would hold during her lifetime her own inheritance (Striguil, Pembroke, Leinster, and the honor of Giffard).

      ii. William the Younger (eldest son) received immediately the patrimony (the Marshal ancestral lands in Berks and Wilts) and was heir to the honour held by his mother.

      II. Secondary bequests by will (Lords, it would be well if I should complete my will and take care for my soul....This is the time to free myself from all earthly cares and turn my thoughst to things celestial"--Painter 280). William first made an oral testament, witnessed by his sons and household, and then had it drawn up in written form by his almoner Geoffrey the Templar. It was sealed by the Mashal, his wife, and his eldest son.

      1. The sons

      i. Richard (second son, at that time in the court of Philip Augustus in Paris)--the Norman lordship of Longueville and the Giffard lands in Bucks (held by Isabel for her lifetime) ii. Walter--estate of Sturminster (acquired from count of Meulan)

      iii. Gilbert, third son, was to be a churchman.

      iv. Walter, then a boy, an unknown amount of land.

      v. Anselm, the youngest son, first received nothing, but, through the pleas of John of Earley, was provided with Irish lands worth 140 pounds (ordinary knight's fee was worth 20 pounds).

      2. Daughters

      i. Joan, the only unmarried daughter, received lands worth 30 pounds a year and a cash sum of 133 pounds 6s.8d.

      3. Legacies to monasteries: 33 pounds to Notley abbey; 10 marks (6 pounds 13s.4d) to the cathedral of Leinster.
      http://www.medievalgenealogy.org.uk/families/marshal/williammarshal.shtml

      Other Source

      Knight Errant

      As a younger son of a minor nobleman, William had no lands or fortune to inherit, and had to make his own way in life. As a youth he was sent to Normandy to serve in the household of William de Tancarville, where he began his training to become a knight. Through William de Tancarville, he then served in the household of his mother's brother, Patrick, Earl of Salisbury. In 1168 William's uncle was killed in an ambush by Guy of Lusignan. William was injured and captured in the same battle, but was ransomed by Eleanor of Aquitaine, who was apparently impressed by tales of his bravery. He had been knighted in 1167 and soon found he could make a good living out of winning tournaments. At that time tournaments were dangerous, often deadly, staged battles, not the jousting contests that would come later, and money and valuable prizes could be won by capturing and ransoming opponents. His record is legendary: he supposedly fought in 500 such bouts in his life and never lost once.

      Flower of Chivalry

      By 1170 his stature had risen so far that he was appointed tutor in chivalry for Henry the Young King, son of Henry II of England. The Young King's relations with his father were always fractious, and William stood by Henry during the Revolt of 1173-1174, during which he knighted the Young King. However, in 1182 William Marshal was accused of undue familiarity with Marguerite of France, the Young King's wife, and was exiled from court. He went to the court of Henry II that Christmas to ask for trial by combat to prove his innocence, but was refused. A few months later the Young King died, and on his deathbed he asked William to fulfil his vow of going on a Crusade. William did so, crusading in the Holy Land from 1183 to 1186; while there he vowed to be buried as a Knight Templar.

      Royal Favor

      Upon his return William rejoined the court of King Henry II, and now served the father through the many rebellions of his remaining sons (Richard, Geoffrey, and John). In 1189, while covering the flight of Henry II from Le Mans to Chinon, William unhorsed the undutiful Richard in a skirmish. William could have killed the prince but killed his horse instead, to make that point clear. After Henry's death, he was welcomed at court by his former adversary, now King Richard I, who was not foolish enough to exclude a man whose legend, and power, just kept growing.

      In August 1189, when he was 43, King Richard arranged for him to marry the second-richest heiress in England, Isabel de Clare (1172-1240), the 17-year-old daughter of Strongbow. Her father had been Earl of Pembroke, and this title was granted to William, along with large estates in England, Wales, Normandy and Ireland. The marriage transformed the landless knight from a minor family into one of the richest men in the kingdom, a sign of his power and prestige at court. They had five sons and five daughters, and though every one of them survived into adulthood, their family line went no further (see below). William made numerous improvements to his wife's lands, including extensive additions to Pembroke Castle and Chepstow Castle.

      William was included in the council of regency which the King appointed on his departure for the Third Crusade in 1190. He took the side of Prince John when the latter expelled the justiciar, William Longchamp, from the kingdom, but he soon discovered that the interests of John were different from those of Richard. Hence in 1193 he joined with the loyalists in making war upon the prince. Richard forgave Marshal his first error of judgement, and allowed him to succeed his brother, John Marshal, in the hereditary marshalship, and on his death-bed designated him as custodian of Rouen and of the royal treasure during the interregnum.

      Magna Carta

      William supported King John when he became king in 1199, but they had a falling out when William paid homage to King Philip II of France for his Norman lands. William left for Leinster in 1207 and stayed in Ireland until 1212, during which time he had Carlow Castle erected[1]. In 1212 he was summoned to fight in the Welsh wars. Despite these differences, it was William on 15 June 1215 at Runnymede who dealt with the barons who made King John agree to the Magna Carta, and he was one of the few English noblemen to remain loyal to the royal side through the First Barons' War. It was William whom King John trusted on his deathbed to make sure John's nine-year-old son Henry would get the throne.

      On 11 November 1216, upon the death of King John, William Marshal was named by the king's council (the chief barons who had remained loyal to King John in the First Barons' War) to serve as both regent of the 9 year old King Henry III, and regent of the kingdom. In spite of his advanced age (around 70) he prosecuted the war against Prince Louis and the rebel barons with remarkable energy. In the battle of Lincoln he charged and fought at the head of the young King's army, leading them to victory. He was preparing to besiege Louis in London when the war was terminated by the naval victory of Hubert de Burgh in the straits of Dover. He was criticized for the generosity of the terms he accorded to Louis and the rebels in September 1217; but his desire for an expeditious settlement was dictated by sound statesmanship. Self-restraint and compromise were the key-notes of Marshals policy, hoping to secure peace and stability for his young liege. Both before and after the peace of 1217 he reissued Magna Carta, in which he is a signatory as one of the witnessing barons. Without his presence England might not have survived the disastrous reign of John; where the French and the rebels would not trust the English king's word, they would trust William.

      Marriage and Children

      William and Isobel had the following children:
      William Marshal, 2nd Earl of Pembroke (1190 - 6 April 1231), married (1) Alice de Betun, daughter of Earl of Albemarle; (2) 23 April 1224 Eleanor Plantagenet, daughter of King John I of England
      Richard Marshal, 3rd Earl of Pembroke (1191 - 16 April 1234), married Gervase le Dinant.
      Mahelt Marshal (1194 - 27 March 1248), married Hugh Bigod, 3rd Earl of Norfolk, William de Warenne, 6th Earl of Surrey, Walter de Dunstanville.
      Gilbert Marshal, 4th Earl of Pembroke (1197 - 27 June 1241), married (1) Marjorie of Scotland, youngest daughter of King William I of Scotland; (2) Maud de Lanvaley
      Walter Marshal, 5th Earl of Pembroke (c. 1199 - November 1245), married Margaret de Quincy, granddaughter of Hugh de Kevelioc, 3rd Earl of Chester.
      Ancel Marshal, 6th Earl of Pembroke (c. 1208 - 22 December 1245), married Maud de Bohun, daughter of Humphrey de Bohun, 2nd Earl of Hereford.
      Isabelle Marshal (9 October 1200 - 17 January 1240), married Gilbert de Clare, 5th Earl of Hertford, 9 October 1217 and Richard Plantagenet, Earl of Cornwall & King of the Romans
      Sibyl Marshal (c. 1201 - 27 April 1245), married William de Ferrers, 5th Earl of Derby
      Lady Eva Marshal (c. 1204 - 1246), married William de Braose, Lord of Abergavenny - from whom was descended Queen Jane Seymour
      Joanna Marshal (1210 - 1234), married Warin de Munchensi (d. 1255), Lord of Swanscombe

      Fate of the Marshal Family

      During the civil wars in Ireland, William had taken two manors that the Bishop of Ferns claimed but could not get back. Some years after William's death, that bishop is said to have laid a curse on the family that William's sons would have no children, and the great Marshal estates would be scattered. Each of William's sons did become earl of Pembroke and marshal of England, and each died without issue. William's vast holdings were then divided among the husbands of his seven daughters. The title of "Marshal" went to the husband of the oldest daughter, Hugh Bigod, 3rd Earl of Norfolk, and later passed to the Mowbray dukes of Norfolk and then to the Howard dukes of Norfolk, becoming "Earl Marshal" along the way. The title of "Earl of Pembroke" passed to William of Valence, the husband of Joan Marshal's daughter, Joan de Munchensi; he became the first of the de Valence line of earls of Pembroke.
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Marshal,_1st_Earl_of_Pembroke>
    • Kinship II - A collection of family, friends and U.S. Presidents
      URL: http://worldconnect.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=:2902060&id=I575187226
      ID: I575187226
      Name: William MARSHALL
      Given Name: William
      Surname: MARSHALL
      Sex: M
      Birth: 1144/1146 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Death: 14 May 1219 in Caversham Manor, , , England
      Christening: 12 May 1146
      Burial: May 1219 Round Chapel Of Knight's Temple, London, Middlesex, England
      Change Date: 30 Nov 2003 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
      Note: Ancestral File Number: 84ZX-0D

      Father: John "the Marshall" FITZGILBERT b: Abt 1105 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Mother: Sibilla (Sibyl) De SALISBURY b: Abt 1139 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales

      Marriage 1 Isabel Fitzgilbert De CLARE b: Abt 1172 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Married: 29 Aug 1189 in London, Middlesex, England 2 2
      Note: _UIDA160BA1BB487334F983A936E3DDF5E5030C8
      Children
      Isabel MARSHALL b: 1206 in Of, , Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Maud (Matilda) MARSHALL b: Abt 1192 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Eve MARSHALL b: Abt 1194 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Sibyl MARSHALL b: 1209 in Of Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Anselm MARSHALL b: Abt 1204 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Margaret MARSHALL b: Abt 1190 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Joane MARSHALL b: Abt 1202 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Walter MARSHALL b: Abt 1206 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Gilbert MARSHALL b: Abt 1196 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      Richard MARSHALL b: Abt 1200 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      William MARSHALL b: May 1198 in Of, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales

      Sources:
      Author: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      Title: Ancestral File (R)
      Publication: Copyright (c) 1987, June 1998, data as of 5 January 1998
      Repository:
      Title: janet skelton.FTW
      Note:
      Source Media Type: Other
      Repository:

      =========================================

      [BIGOD-Mel Morris,10Gen Anc.FTW]

      GIVN William Marshal lV
      SURN von Pembroke
      NSFX 4th Earl of Pembroke
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      DATE 9 SEP 2000
      TIME 13:15:53

      See Historical Document.

      GIVN William
      SURN Marshall
      NSFX Earl of Pembroke
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      DATE 25 APR 2000
      TIME 20:45:50

      GIVN William
      SURN Marshall
      NSFX Earl of Pembroke
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      DATE 25 APR 2000
      TIME 20:45:50

      GIVN William
      SURN MARSHALL
      NSFX EARL OF PEMBROKE
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      REPO @REPO32@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      _MASTER Y
      DATE 3 NOV 1999
      TIME 19:00:31

      SURN Marshall
      GIVN William
      NSFX Earl of Pembroke
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      _UID AB3C7490081C0A4CB7554FEF9FC69AF3A105
      REPO @REPO19@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      DATE 23 Dec 2000
      TIME 00:00:00

      GIVN William
      SURN MARSHALL
      NSFX [EARL OF PEMBROKE]
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
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      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      REPO @REPO82@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      REPO @REPO31@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      REPO @REPO93@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      REPO @REPO98@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      REPO @REPO92@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      REPO @REPO126@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      DATE 23 NOV 1999
      TIME 16:17:27

      GIVN William
      SURN MARSHALL
      NSFX [EARL OF PEMBROKE]
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
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      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      From Ancestral File (TM), data as of 2 January 1996.
      REPO @REPO82@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      REPO @REPO31@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      REPO @REPO93@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      REPO @REPO98@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      REPO @REPO92@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      REPO @REPO126@
      TITL Ancestral File (TM)
      AUTH The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      PUBL June 1998 (c), data as of 5 JAN 1998
      ABBR Ancestral File (TM)
      DATE 23 NOV 1999
      TIME 16:17:27

      GIVN William
      SURN MARSHALL
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      PEDI birth

      This individual has the following other parents in the Ancestral File:
      John /MARSHALL/ (AFN:FLHC-QJ) and Sybill /D'EVEREAUX/ (AFN:HPFM-L1)

      TITL lance.FTW
      REPO
      CALN
      MEDI Other
      DATA
      TEXT Date of Import: Oct 10, 1998
      TITL lance.FTW
      REPO
      CALN
      MEDI Other
      DATA
      TEXT Date of Import: Oct 10, 1998
      TITL lance.FTW
      REPO
      CALN
      MEDI Other
      DATA
      TEXT Date of Import: Oct 10, 1998
      TITL lance.FTW
      REPO
      CALN
      MEDI Other
      DATA
      TEXT Date of Import: Oct 10, 1998
      TITL lance.FTW
      REPO
      CALN
      MEDI Other
      DATA
      TEXT Date of Import: Oct 10, 1998

      SURN Marshall
      GIVN W
      NSFX Earl of Pembroke
      _UID 60737B6F75FFD411B9FE90B0FC4EB12E3660
      DATE 21 Dec 1997
      TIME 16:02:30


      NSFX 1st Earl of Pembroke & Striguil
      TYPE Book
      AUTH Faris, David
      PERI Plantagenet Ancestry of Seventeenth-Century Colonists
      EDTN 2d
      PUBL New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1999
      TEXT (279:16vii)
      TYPE Book
      AUTH Weis, Frederick Lewis
      PERI The Magna Charta Sureties, 1215
      EDTN 5th
      PUBL Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., Baltimore, MD
      DATE 1999
      TEXT Line 145-1; 146-1; 148-1; 149-1; (155-3)
      TYPE Book
      AUTH Weis, Frederick Lewis
      PERI The Magna Charta Sureties, 1215
      EDTN 5th
      PUBL Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., Baltimore, MD
      DATE 19991st Earl of Pembroke and StriguilMarshal of England, Protector of the Realm, Regent of the Kingdom (1216-1219), a man of superior ability and exemplary character.
      TYPE E-Mail Message
      AUTH Alan B. Wilson
      TITL Re: DE QUINCEY--AGAIN [sources listed]
      DATE 9 Jul 1998
      LOCA GEN-MEDIEVAL-L@rootsweb.com/PowerMac 6500>Applications>Reunion>Documents-source
      TYPE Book
      AUTH Weis, Frederick Lewis
      PERI The Magna Charta Sureties, 1215
      EDTN 5th
      PUBL Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., Baltimore, MD
      DATE 1999
      DATE 16 APR 2000

      See Historical Document.

      William MarshallBD: 1146BP: Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, EnglandDD: 14-May-1219DP: Caversham Manor, England

      16298 same as?? Named in the Magna Charta -- i don't think this is right held hostage by King Stephen... John then went ahead andcommitted the treachery, reinforcing a castle the king wasbesieging. King stephen threatened to hang young William unlessthe castle surrendered. The threat had no effect on John, whocoolly answered that he did not care if his son were hanged,since he had "the anvils and hammer with which to forge stillbetter sons."The lad was accordingly led out the next morning toward an oaktree, but his cheerful innocence won the heart of King Stephen,a man of softer nold than John Marshal. Picking the boy up, theking rode back to camp, refusing to allow him to be hanged, or -an alternative proposal from the entourage - to be catapultedover the castle wall. The king and the boy were later foundplaying "knights" with plantain weeds and laughing uproariouslywhen William knocked the head off the king's plantain. Suchtenderheartedness in a monarch was almost as little admired asJohn Marshal's brutality, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle succinctlyobserving of Stephen that "He was a mild man, soft and good, anddid no justice."Thanks sot Stephen's lack of justice, William Marshal waspermitted to grow up to become the most distinguished of all thelords of Chepstow Castle and the most renowned knight of histime. Gifted with his father's soldierly prowess but free ofhis rascally character, William first served King Stephen andafterward his Plantagenet successor, Henry II (son of thedefeated Matilda of Anjou), from whom he received Chepstow alongwith Isabel de Clare, the "pucell [damsel] of Estriguil, good,beautiful, couteous and wise," according to William'sbiographer.

      http://www.aracnet.com/~gwyddon/html/d0001/g0000110.html#I0151
    • [elen.FTW]

      [Brøderbund WFT Vol. 3, Ed. 1, Tree #4579, Date of Import: Jun 15, 2003]

      Sir William Marshal, named in the Magna Charta, 1215. He was 3rd Earl of Pembroke, Marshal of England, Protector of the Realm, Regent of the Kingdom 1216-19, a man of superior ability and exemplary character.
    • --U.S. President James Monroe is a descendant.
      --Marshal of England, Protector of the Realm, Regent of the Kingdom
      --The office of Marshal to the king was a hereditary perquisite of amiddling Wiltshire family. The duties were various, but mainly they consisted of acting as second-in-command to the constable of the royal household, maintaining order in the palace and guarding it, looking after the stables, keeping the rolls of those who performed their military service, and checking the accounts of various household and state departments.
      From this family came William Marshal, whose biography was written by his squire John of Earley so providing us with one of the deepest and most fascinating insights into the life of a great baron of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries.
      His father, John Marshal, whom the Gesta Stephani rather unkindly describes as 'a limb of helland the root of all evil' was a man who loved warfare, and played the game of politics with great success. At first he supported Stephen but, when he began to realise the failings of the King and the potentialities of Matilda's party, he changed sides. Almost immediately he proved by a consummate act of bravery and hardihood, that he was worth having: escorting Matilda to safety in his castle at Ledgershall, John found that the party was going dangerously slowly because Matilda was riding side-saddle, so he persuaded her to ride astride, and stopped behind to delay the pursuers at Wherwell. His force was soon overpowered bythe numbers of the enemy, and John took refuge with one of his knights in the Abbey. The opposing party promptly set fire to the church, and John and his knight had to take cover in the tower, John threatening to kill his knight if he made any move to surrender. As the lead of the roof began to melt and drop on the two soldiers, putting out one of John's eyes, the enemy moved off, convinced that they were dead. They escaped, in a terrible state, but triumphant, to John's castle.
      He plainly expected his children to be as tough as himself, as anincident of the year 1152, when William was about six, will show. King Stephenwent to besiege Newbury Castle, which Matilda had given John to defend; the castellan, realising that provisions and the garrison were both too low to stand a long siege, asked for a truce to inform his master. This was normal practice,for if the castellan were not at once relieved, he could then surrender without being held to have let his master down. NowJohn had not sufficient troops torelieve the castle, so he asked Stephen to extend the truce whilst he, in turn, informed his mistress, and agreed to give William as a hostage, promising notto provision and garrison the castle during the truce. This he promptly did, and when he received word from Stephen that the child would be hung if he did not at once surrender the castle, he cheerfully replied that he had hammer and anvils to forge a better child than William.
      The child was taken out for execution, but at the last moment Stephen relented with that soft heart that was hisundoing, and though his officers presented suchenticing plans as catapulting William over the castle walls with a siege engine, he would not give in. Later on he grew attached to the child, and one day when William was playing an elementary form of conkers with the King, using plantains, the child saw a servant of his mother, the lady Sibile (sister of the Earl of Salisbury), peeping in to check up on his safety. William cried out a greeting and the servant had to runfor his life. The child did not know what dangers he was running, but it was good and early training for his future career.
      When he was thirteen William was sent to serve in the retinue of his father's cousin, the chamberlain of Normandy. This was his apprenticeship in knighthood, and was to last eight years.
    • The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001.«tab»
      «tab»
      Pembroke, William Marshal, 1st earl of«tab»
      «tab»

      «tab»
      d. 1219, English nobleman. He became (1170) a guardian of Prince Henry, eldest son of Henry II, and supported him in his abortive rebellion (1173-74) against his father. After the prince's death (1183), however, he went on crusade for the king. Upon the accession (1189) of Richard I, Marshal married Isabella, heiress of Richard de Clare, 2d earl of Pembroke, and took her titles, thereby becoming 1st earl of Pembroke in the Marshal line. During Richard I's absence from England, Marshal supported the king's brother John against William of Longchamp but helped thwart John's 1193 rebellion. Once John became king, however, the earl supported him and was one of his counselors at Runnymede. Elected regent for the young Henry III by the barons in 1216, Marshal successfully waged war against the invading Prince Louis (later Louis VIII) of France and by a firm policy toward recalcitrant barons secured a relatively stable kingdom.«tab»

      «tab»
      See S. Painter, William Marshal (1933, repr. 1967).«tab»

      William Marshal took a kind of associate membership, being buried in Templar «u»silk <http://www.chronique.com/Library/Glossaries/glossary-AA/armss_s.htm>«/u»


      ----------------------------------------------------

      In a room of the Tower of London in August 1189, two people who were about to be married met for the first time. This twist of fate or act of destiny would have a far-reaching effect on English history. The young lady was Isabel de Clare, sole heiress of Richard Strongbow de Clare, Earl of Pembroke and Striguil, and Aoife, daughter of Dermot MacMurrough, King of Leinster. The man was William Marshal, the second son of John the Marshal and Sibyl, sister of Patrick, Earl of Salisbury. There are no accounts of this first meeting nor of their marriage ceremony, but this was the final step in the making of one of the greatest knights and magnates of medieval English history.
      William Marshal's life is well documented because less than a year after his death in 1219, his eldest son William II commissioned a record of his father's life. "L' Historie de Guillaume le Marechal," is a metrical history of a man and of the knightly class in the late twelfth and early thirteenth century. Little is known about the writer of "L' Historie" except that his first name was Jean, that he personally witnessed some of the events in Marshal's later life, and that he had access to Marshal's squire John D'Erley. The point of view is that of the secular knightly class and not of the ecclesiastical class. The events recorded in "L' Historie" can be verified in most instances by the official records in the Pipe Rolls, Charter Rolls, Close Rolls, Patent Rolls, Oblatis Rolls, and chronicles of the times.
      William Marshal was born c 1146, and as a younger son, becoming a knight was his natural choice of a path to success and survival. Marshal was sent to his father's cousin William of Tancarville, hereditary Chamberlain of Normandy, to be trained as a knight in c1159. He was knighted, probably by his uncle, in 1167.
      «tab»
      In 1170 William Marshal was appointed head of the mesnie (military) household of the young Prince Henry by King Henry II. From this time until young Henry's death in June of 1183, Marshal was responsible for protecting, training and running the military household of the heir. In 1173, William Marshal knighted the young Henry, and thereby became Henry's lord in chivalry. We know that Marshal led young Henry and his mesnie to many victories on the tournament fields of Normandy. It is during the years from 1170 to 1183 that William Marshal established his status as an undefeated knight in tournaments. It is here that Marshal began to establish his friendships with the powerful and influential men of his day. His reputation and his character were built through his own actions and abilities. In this age of feudalism, Marshal was a landless knight. He had no lord from whom he could gain advantages or status.
      On the death of the young Henry, Marshal obtained permission from Henry II to take the young Henry's cross to Jerusalem. Marshal spent two years in the Holy Land fighting for King Guy of Jerusalem and the Knights' Templar. There are no known records of his time in the east, but we know that some of the castle building techniques he later used at Pembroke were probably learned here.
      Henry II granted Marshal his first fief, Cartmel in Lancashire, in 1187. With this fief Marshal became a vassal of King Henry II and swore fealty to him as his lord and his king. Until Henry II's death in 1188, William Marshal served as his knight, his counselor, and his ambassador. When Richard I came to the throne, he recognized Marshal as a brother and equal in chivalry. Fulfilling the promise made by his father, Richard gave Marshal the heiress Isabel de Clare and all her lands in marriage.
      With this marriage, William Marshal became "in right of his wife" one of the greatest lords and magnates in the Plantagenet kingdom. Isabel brought to Marshal the palatine lordships of Pembroke and Striguil in Wales and the lordship of Leinster in Ireland. These were large fiefs of land where the lord held as tenant-in-chief of the Crown. A palatine lord's word was law within his lands. He had the right to appoint his own officials, courts and sheriffs, and collect and keep the proceeds of his courts and governments. Except for ecclesiastical cases, the king's writ did not run in the palatinates. King Richard also allowed Marshal to have 1/2 of the barony of Giffard for 2000 marks. This barony was split with Richard de Clare, Earl of Clare and Hertford, who held the barony in England as lord while Marshal held the land in Normandy as lord. This gave Marshal the demesne manors of Crendon in Buckinghamshire and Caversham in Oxfordshire, for 43 knights' fees, and the fief of Longueville in Normandy with the castles of Longueville and Mueller and Moulineaux, for about 40 knights' fees.

      «tab»
      Marshal considered the lands that he held to be one unit, not separate units of English, Irish, Welsh, and Norman lands. They were a compact whole to be preserved and improved for the inheritance of his children. Marshal used what he had learned fighting in Normandy and in the Holy Land to improve these fiefs. The great Tower, the Horseshoe Gatehouse, and the fighting gallery in the outer curtain wall at Pembroke were built under his guidance. At Chepstow (Striguil), he was responsible for the gate in the middle bailey, the rebuilding of the upper level of the keep, the west barbican, and the upper and lower bailey. Marshal was also responsible for the building of the castle at Kilkenny, the new castle at Emlyn, and for taking and improving Cilgerran. From a list of castles by R. A. Brown for the period from 1153 to 1214, Marshal held Chepstow , Cilgerran , Emlyn , Goodrich , Haverford , Inkberrow, Pembroke , Tenby , and Usk in England and Wales. Just these castles would have produced more than two hundred knights' fees owed by Marshal to the Crown. Without including his lands in Normandy and Ireland, as feudal lord Marshal controlled a vast amount of land, wealth, and knights/vassals in the Angevin kingdom.
      William Marshal served King Richard faithfully as knight, vassal, ambassador, itinerant justice, associate justiciar, counselor, and friend. On Richard I's untimely death in 1199, William Marshal supported John as heir to the throne rather than John's nephew, Arthur of Brittany. It was King John who belted William Marshal and created him Earl of Pembroke on the same day that John was crowned King, May 27, 1199. It is during King John's reign that the character of William Marshal is clearly revealed. John's character has been drawn by countless historians, and none have been able to erase the ineptitude that King John displayed when dealing with his English barons. Whatever his motives were, John inevitably alienated his greatest barons despite the fact that he needed their support and loyalty to rule England. William Marshal was a powerful, respected, wise and loyal knight and baron who had already served two Angevin kings. King John, however, accused Marshal of being a traitor, took all of Marshal's English and Welsh castles, took Marshal's two older sons as hostages, tried to take Marshal's lands in Leinster, and even tried to get his own household knights to challenge Marshal to trial by combat. Despite all of this, William Marshal remained loyal to his feudal lord. He did not rebel when John took his castles; he gave up his two sons as hostages; he supported John against the Papal Interdict; and he supported John in the baronial rebellion. Of all the bonds of feudalism, the greatest and the most important bond was the one of fealty, of loyalty to one's lord. To break this bond and oath was treason, and this was the greatest of crimes. William Marshal was the epitome of knighthood and chivalry. He did not simply espouse it. Marshal's entire life was governed by his oaths of fealty and by his own innate sense of honour. If Marshal had taken his lands, castles, and knights to the side of the rebellion, King John would have lost his crown and perhaps his life.
      On the death of John, October 19,1216, William Marshal was chosen by his peers in England as regent for the nine year old Henry III. Henry was knighted and then crowned under the seal of the Earl of Pembroke. William Marshal was the main force and impetus for the defeat of Philip II of France, even leading the attack to relieve Lincoln castle in May 1217 though he was seventy years old. On September 11, 1217, Marshal negotiated the Treaty of Lambeth that ended the war. By his wise treatment of those English barons who had supported Philip II against King John, Marshal ensured the restoration of peace and order in England. This undefeated knight had become a great statesman in the last years of his life. William Marshal died May 14, 1219 at Caversham and was buried as a Knight Templar in the Temple Church in London.


      +++++

      William Marshal had been born during the Civil Wars of King Stephen and Empress Mathilda. He trained and knighted one intended king; served faithfully Kings Henry II, Richard the Lionheart, and John Lackland; and knighted and served as regent for a fourth king. As "rector regis et regni," Marshal had the Great Charter reissued in 1216 and in 1217 for the welfare and future of England and the Crown. There are many explanations and definitions of Marshal, his life and his time. Some say he survived so long and so well because of his physical stamina and condition, that he was simply a man of great physical strength. This gives only a piece of the complete portrait of William Marshal. He was a brilliant strategist in terms of his world, militarily and politically. He lived and survived in Henry II's arena, earning Henry's respect and affection. No man of little intelligence would have survived very long there. William Marshal can be understood in terms of his world of feudalism, fealty, loyalty and honour. Marshal stood by King John because of Marshal's oath of fealty and homage to his "lord," who also happened to be the King. William Marshal was a man who lived his life according to his sense of honour, and his sense of honour was defined in the laws and customs of feudalism and knighthood. It is that sense of honour that made no man equal to William Marshal, knight, Earl of Pembroke and Striguil, Lord of Leinster, and Regent of England.


      «tab»
    • Earl of Pembroke
      Mareschal of England
    • [hezboone.FTW]
      !Per "My Boone Family": Sir William Marshall was named in Magna
      Carta as Regent
      of the Kingdom, served 1216 - 1219.
    • 4th Earl of Pembroke; Knight Templar; Earl of Striguil; Lord of Leinster; Marshall of England Protector, Regent of the Kingdom from 1216-1219
      Named in the Magna Charta as a noble who advised King John. He was not a surety.
      There is a tomb effigy at Temple Church in London which is believed to be of William Marshall.
      He met his wife for the first time in a room in the Tower of London August of 1189, shortly before his marriage. Less than a year after his death his son William II commissioned an author whose name is only known as Jean, to do a record of his father's life. Jean titled his work "L' Historie DeGuillaume Le Marechal."
      William was trained to be a knight by his father's cousin William of Tancarville, cira 1159. It is believed his uncle knighted him in 1167. In 1170 he was appointed head of the Mesnie Household for the young Prince Henry by King Henry II. He remained with the young prince till his death in June, 1183. He knighted the young prince and became his "Lord in Chivalry". From 1170 TO 1183 William created the status of an undefeated knight in tournaments. On Prince Henry's death, William gained permission from the king to carry the prince's cross to Jerusalem. He spent two years in the Holy Land and fought for King Guy of Jerusalem and the Knights' Templar. His first fief was Cartmel in Lancashire in 1187. When Richard came to the throne, he recognized William as a brother and equal in Chivalry and fulfilled his father's promise by giving William the Heiress Isabel De Clare to wed and all of the lands which that entailed. King John belted William Marshal and named him as Earl of Pembroke on the same day that John himself wascrowned King, May 27, 1199.
      Later King John accused William of being a traitor and took all of his English and Welsh castles. He took Marshall's two older sons hostage, tried to take his lands in Leinster and even tried to get his own house hold knights to challenge Marshall to trail by combat.
      Even through all of this William remained loyal to his king, which says a lot for his beliefs. William had swore fealty to his lord, and his word was his bond. To do anything else would have lowered his own image of himself. On the death of John, William became regent for the young King, Henry III. Henry was knighted and crowned under the seal of the Earl of Pembroke.
    • Third Earl of Pembroke 1189-1219 (first of the Marshall line), Earl of Strigoil; Marshall of England, Protector, Regent of the Kingdom 1216-1219. Named in the Magna Charta, 1215, as an advisor to King John. He held half of the barony of Long Crendon.

      He was knight of the household of the Young King (prince Henry) and following his death became a knight of the household of King Henry II 1183. He attended Henry II at his death, and escorted body to interment at Fontevraud 1189. He became Marshal of England upon death of brother in March 1193/94 and Regent of England 11 Nov 1216-1219.


      Children
      1. MAUD MARSHALL b: ABT 1192 in Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales
      2. William Marshall b: ABT 1190 in Normandy
      3. Richard Marshall b: AFT 1190
      4. Gilbert Marshall
      5. Walter Marshall b: AFT 1198
      6. ISABEL MARSHALL b: 9 OCT 1200 in Pembroke Castle, Wales
      7. Sibyl Marshall
      8. Joan Marshall
      9. EVA MARSHALL b: ABT 1206 in Pembrokeshire, Wales
      10. Anselm Marshall b: AFT 1199
      WIKIPEDIA:

      William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke (1146–1219), also called William the Marshal (Guillaume le Maréchal), was an English soldier and statesman. He has been described as the "greatest knight that ever lived" (Stephen Langton). He served five kings — Henry the Young King, Henry II, Richard the Lionheart, John and Henry III — and rose from obscurity to become one of the most powerful men in Europe. Before him, the hereditary title of "Lord Marshal" designated a sort of head of household security for the king of England; by the time he died, when people in Europe (not just England) said, "the Marshal," they meant William.

      A Remarkable Beginning
      In 1152, when William was probably about six years old, his father John Marshal switched sides in the civil war between King Stephen and Empress Matilda. When King Stephen besieged Newbury Castle, Stephen used William as a hostage to ensure that John kept a promise to surrender the castle. John broke his word, and when Stephen ordered John to surrender immediately or watch as he hanged William in front of the castle, John replied that he go ahead, for "I still have the hammer and the anvil with which to forge still more and better sons!" Fortunately for the child, Stephen could not bring himself to hang young William, and John's words were to prove very unlikely.

      William Marshal was the greatest jouster of his age. From Matthew Paris's Chronica Major, Marshal unhorses Baldwin de Guisnes.

      Knight-Errant
      As a younger son of a minor nobleman, William had no lands or fortune to inherit, and had to make his own way in life. As a young man he was sent to France to serve in the household of William de Tancarville, where he began his training to become a knight. Through William de Tancarville, he served in the household of mother's brother, Patrick, Earl of Salisbury, but in 1168 his uncle was killed in an ambush by Guy of Lusignan. William was injured and captured in the same battle, but was ransomed by Eleanor of Aquitaine, who was apparently impressed by tales of his bravery. He had been knighted in 1167, and soon found he could make a good living out of winning tournaments. At that time tournaments were dangerous, often deadly, staged battles, not the jousting contests that would come later, and money could be won by capturing and ransoming opponents. His record is legendary: he fought in 500 such bouts in his life and never lost once.

      "The Flower of Chivalry"
      By 1170 his stature had risen so far that he was appointed tutor in chivalry for Henry the Young King, son of Henry II of England. The Young King's relations with his father were always fractious, and William stood by Henry during the Revolt of 1173-1174, during which he knighted the Young King. However, in 1182 William Marshal was accused of undue familiarity with Marguerite of France, the Young King's wife, and was exiled from court. He went to the court of Henry II that Christmas to ask for trial by combat to prove his innocence, but this was refused. A few months later the Young King died, and on his deathbed he asked William to fulfil his vow of going on a Crusade. William did so, crusading in the Holy Land from 1183 to 1186; while there he vowed to be buried as a Knight Templar.

      The Right Hand of Kings
      Upon his return William rejoined the court of King Henry II, and now served the father through the many rebellions of his remaining sons (Richard, Geoffrey, and John). In 1189, while covering the flight of Henry II from Le Mans to Chinon, William unhorsed the undutiful Richard in a skirmish. William could have killed the prince but killed his horse instead, to make that point clear. After Henry's death, he was welcomed at court by his former adversary, now King Richard I, who was not foolish enough to exclude a man whose legend, and power, just kept growing.
      In August 1189, when he was 43, King Richard arranged for him to marry the second-richest heiress in England, Isabel de Clare, the 17-year-old daughter of Strongbow. Her father, had been Earl of Pembroke, and this title was granted to William, along with large estates in England, Wales, Normandy and Ireland. The marriage transformed the landless knight from a minor family into one of the richest men in the kingdom, a sign of his power and prestige at court. They had five sons and five daughters, and though every one of them survived into adulthood, they family line went no further (see below). William made numerous improvements to his wife's lands, including extensive additions to Pembroke Castle and Chepstow Castle.
      William was included in the council of regency which the King appointed on his departure for the Third Crusade in 1190. He took the side of Prince John when the latter expelled the justiciar, William Longchamp, from the kingdom, but he soon discovered that the interests of John were different from those of Richard. Hence in 1193 he joined with the loyalists in making war upon the prince. Richard forgave Marshal his first error of judgement, and allowed him to succeed his brother, John Marshal, in the hereditary marshalship, and on his death-bed designated him as custodian of Rouen and of the royal treasure during the interregnum.

      King John and the Magna Carta
      William supported King John when he became king in 1199, but they had a falling out when William did homage to King Philip II of France for his Norman lands. William left for Leinster in 1207 and stayed in Ireland until 1212, when he was summoned to fight in the Welsh wars. Despite these differences, it was William on June 15, 1215 at Runnymede who dealt with the barons who made King John agree to the Magna Carta, and he was one of the few English noblemen to remain loyal to the royal side through the Barons' War. It was William whom King John trusted on his deathbed to make sure John's nine-year-old son Henry would get the throne.
      On November 11, 1216, upon the death of King John, William Marshal was named by the king's council (the chief barons who had remained loyal to King John in the First Barons' War) to serve as both regent of the 9 year old King Henry III, and regent of the kingdom. In spite of his advanced age (around 70) he prosecuted the war against Prince Louis and the rebel barons with remarkable energy. In the battle of Lincoln he charged and fought at the head of the young Kings army, leading them to victory. He was preparing to besiege Louis in London when the war was terminated by the naval victory of Hubert de Burgh in the straits of Dover. He was criticized for the generosity of the terms he accorded to Louis and the rebels in September 1217; but his desire for an expeditious settlement was dictated by sound statesmanship. Self-restraint and compromise were the key-notes of Marshals policy, hoping to secure peace and stability for his young leige. Both before and after the peace of 1217 he reissued Magna Carta, in which he is a signatory as one of the witnessing barons. Without his presence England may not have survived the disastrous reign of John; where the French and the rebels would not trust the English king's word, they would trust William.

      Death and Legacy
      William Marshal's health finally failed him in February 1219. In March 1219 he realized that he was dying, so he summoned his eldest son, also William, and his household knights, and left the Tower of London for his estate at Caversham in Oxfordshire, near Reading, where he called a meeting of the barons, Henry III, the papal legate, the royal justiciar (Hubert de Burgh), and Peter des Roches (Bishop of Winchester and the young King's guardian). William rejected the Bishop's claim to the regency and entrusted the regency to the care of the papal legate; he apparently did not trust the Bishop or any of the other magnates that he had gathered to this meeting. Fulfilling the vow he had made while on crusade, he was invested into the order of the Knights Templar on his deathbed. He died on May 14, 1219 at Caversham, and was buried in the Temple Church in London, where his effigy may still be seen.
      After his death, his eldest son, also named William, commissioned a biography of his father to be written called L'Histoire de Guillaume le Marechal. This book, written so soon after his death, has preserved (and probably enhanced) the legend of William Marshal for posterity. While his knightly achievements may be debateable, there is no doubt of his impact on the history and politics of England, from his stalwart defence of the realm to his support of the Magna Carta.

      Children of William Marshal & Isabel de Clare
      1. William Marshal, 2nd Earl of Pembroke (~1190 - April 6, 1231), married (1) Alice de Betun, daughter of Earl of Albemarle; (2) April 23, 1224 Eleanor Plantagenet, daughter of King John I of England
      2. Richard Marshal, 3rd Earl of Pembroke (>1190 - April 16, 1234), married Gervase le Dinant.
      3. Maud (or Matilda) Marshal (1192 - March 27, 1248), married
      1. Hugh Bigod, 3rd Earl of Norfolk;
      2. ( 3. Walter de Dunstanville.
      4. Gilbert Marshal, 4th Earl of Pembroke (d. June 27, 1241), married (1) Marjorie of Scotland, youngest daughter of King William I of Scotland; (2) Maud de Lanvaley
      5. Walter Marshal, 5th Earl of Pembroke (>1198 - November 1245), married Margaret de Quincy, daughter of Hugh de Kevelioc, 3rd Earl of Chester.
      6. Anselm Marshal, 6th Earl of Pembroke (d. December 22, 1245), married Maud de Bohun, daughter of Humphrey de Bohun, 2nd Earl of Hereford.
      7. Isabella Marshal (October 9, 1200 - January 17, 1240), married
      1. Gilbert de Clare, 5th Earl of Hertford, October 9, 1217
      2. Richard Plantagenet, Earl of Cornwall & King of the Romans
      8. Sibyl (or Sybilla) Marshal, married William de Ferrers, 5th Earl of Derby
      9. Eva Marshal, married William de Braose, Lord of Abergavenny-from whom was descended Queen Jane Seymour
      10. Joan (or Joanna) Marshal, married Warin de Munchensi, Lord of Swanscombe

      The Fate of the Marshal Family
      During the civil wars in Ireland, William had taken two manors that the Bishop of Ferns claimed but could not get back. Some years after William's death, that bishop is said to have laid a curse on the family that William's sons would have no children, and the great Marshal estates would be scattered. Each of William's sons did become earl of Pembroke and marshal of England, and each died without issue. William's vast holdings were then divided among the husbands of his five daughters. The title of "Marshal" went to the husband of the oldest daughter, Hugh Bigod, 3rd Earl of Norfolk, and later passed to the Mowbray dukes of Norfolk and then to the Howard dukes of Norfolk, becoming "Earl Marshal" along the way. The title of "Earl of Pembroke" passed to William of Valence, the husband of Joan Marshal's daughter, Joan de Munchensi; he became the first of the de Valence line of earls of Pembroke.

      [edit]
      William Marshal in fiction
      • Four generations of the Marshal family, from Isabel de Clare's parents through William fitzWilliam's fictitious bastard son, are the subjects of a series of four historical romances by Mary Pershall. Dawn of the White Rose (©1985) is the one about William Marshal and Isabel de Clare.
      • William Marshal also appears as a supporting character in Thomas B. Costain's out of print novel Below the Salt, and Sharon Kay Penman's novel Time and Chance, as well as a minor appearance in Penmnan's When Christ and His Saints Slept, illustrating the story about young William's time as King Stephan's hostage and John Marshal's defiance.
      • William Marshal is the main character of the novel A Pride of Kings by Juliet Dymoke, published by the New English Library in 1978.
      • A new novel about William Marshal, The Greatest Knight by Elizabeth Chadwick, based on primary sources and the main secondary source biographies of professors Painter, Duby and Crouch was published by Time Warner Books on November 3, 2005.
      • In film, Marshal makes a minor appearance in 1968's The Lion in Winter.
      • Many events in William Marshal's life were incorporated into the 2001 film A Knight's Tale.

      References
      • This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
      • Paul Meyer, L'Histoire de Guillaume le Maréchal, (Paris: Société de l'histoire de France, 1891-1901), with partial translation of the original sources into Modern French.
      • Sidney Painter, William Marshal, Knight-Errant, Baron, and Regent of England, (Baltimore: Johns Hoplins Press, 1933; reprint Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1982).
      • Georges Duby, William Marshall, the Flower of Chivalry, (New York: Pantheon, 1985).
      • David Crouch, William Marshal: Court, Career and Chivalry in the Angevin Empire 1147-1219, (London: Longman, 1990). A healthy corrective to Duby's excessive reliance on the Histoire.
      • John Gillingham, 'War and Chivalry in the History of William the Marshal' in Thirteenth Century England II ed. P.R. Cross and S.D. Lloyd (Woodbridge, 1988) 1-13
      • Larry D. Benson, 'The Tournament in the romances of Chrétien de Troyes and L'Histoire de Guillaume le Maréchal' in Studies in Medieval Culture XIV 1980 1-24

      External links
      • Gillingham, John, War and Chivalry in the History of William the Marshall, Thirteenth Century England, 2 (1988) (PDF file)
      • Abels, Richard, William Marshal - Events in Life and Historical Context

      ---------------------------------

      THEPEERAGE.COM:

      William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke (M)
      b. 1146, d. 14 May 1219, #102525
      Father: John Marshal1

      William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke was born in 1146. He was the son of John Marshal.1 He married Isabella de Clare, Countess Strigoil, daughter of Richard FitzGilbert de Clare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke and Aoife MacMurrough, in August 1189 in London, England. He died on 14 May 1219 in Caversham, Berkshire, England. William Marshal, 4th Earl of Pembroke gained the title of 4th Earl of Pembroke.2

      Family
      Isabella de Clare, Countess Strigoil b. before 1173
      Children
      1. Eva Marshal+
      2. unknown Marshal+ 3
      3. William Marshal, 5th Earl of Pembroke b. c 1190, d. 24 Apr 1231
      4. Matilda Marshal+ b. b 1197, d. 27 Mar 12482
      5. Lady Isabella Marshal+ b. 9 Oct 1200, d. 17 Jan 1240

      Citations
      1. [S6] G.E. Cokayne; with Vicary Gibbs, H.A. Doubleday, Geoffrey H. White, Duncan Warrand and Lord Howard de Walden, editors, The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, Extant, Extinct or Dormant, new ed., 13 volumes in 14 (1910-1959; reprint in 6 volumes, Gloucester, U.K.: Alan Sutton Publishing, 2000), volume II, page 126. Hereinafter cited as The Complete Peerage.
      2. [S11] Alison Weir, Britain's Royal Family: A Complete Genealogy (London, U.K.: The Bodley Head, 1999), page 53. Hereinafter cited as Britain's Royal Family.
      3. [S37] Charles Mosley, editor, Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage, 107th edition, 3 volumes (Wilmington, Delaware, U.S.A.: Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 2003), volume 1, page 682. Hereinafter cited as Burke's Peerage and Baronetage, 107th edition.
      WIKIPEDIA: Knights Templar

      The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon (Latin: Pauperes commilitones Christi Templique Solomonici), popularly known as the Knights Templar, was one of the most famous of the Christian military orders. It existed for about two centuries in the Middle Ages, created in the aftermath of the First Crusade of 1096 to ensure the safety of the large numbers of European pilgrims who flowed toward Jerusalem after its conquest.

      The Templars were an unusual order in that they were both monks and soldiers, making them in effect some of the earliest "warrior monks" in the Western world. Members of the Order played a key part in many battles of the Crusades, and the Order's infrastructure innovated many financial techniques that could be considered the foundation of modern banking. The Order grew in membership and power throughout Europe, until it ran afoul of King Philip IV of France (Philip the Fair), who caused members in France to be tortured into confessions and burned at the stake. Under influence from King Philip, Pope Clement V then forcibly disbanded the order on Friday 13 October, 1307.

      Organization
      The High Templars were organized as a monastic order, following a rule created for them by their patron, Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, a member of the Cistercian Order. Each country had a Master of the Order for the Templars in that region, and all of them were subject to the Grand Master, appointed for life, who oversaw both the Order's military efforts in the East, and their financial holdings in the West.

      There were four divisions of brothers in the Templars:
      • the knights, equipped as heavy cavalry (wore a white habit with red cross);
      • the sergeants (serjens), equipped as light cavalry and drawn from a lower social class than the knights (wore a brown mantle);
      • the serving brothers — the rural brothers (frères casaliers), who administered the property of the Order, and the frères de métiers, who performed menial tasks and trades;
      • the chaplains, who were ordained priests and saw to the spiritual needs of the Order.

      With the high demand for knights, there were also knights who signed up to the Order for a set period of time before returning to secular life, as well as the Fratres conjugati, who were married brothers. Both of these wore a black or brown mantle with a red cross to delineate them from the celibate lifetime members, and were not considered to be of the same status as the celibate brothers. It also appears that the serving brothers (frères casaliers and frères de métiers) were not separate from the sergeants, but rather that a sergeant who was a skilled tradesman or was unable to fight due to age or infirmity would perform these other functions. The majority of the Templars, including the knights and the Grand Masters, were both uneducated and illiterate (as were most knights of the day), having come not from the upper nobility but from more obscure families.

      At any time, each knight had some ten people in support positions. Some brothers were devoted solely to banking (typically those with an education), as the Order was often trusted with the safekeeping of precious goods by participants in the Crusades; but the primary mission of the Knights Templar was warfare.

      The Templars used their wealth to construct numerous fortifications throughout the Holy Land and were probably one of the best trained and disciplined fighting units of their day. They were also famous and easily recognized, with a white surcoat with distinct red cross emblazoned above the heart or on the chest, as seen in many portrayals of crusading knights.

      Initiation into the Order was a profound commitment, and involved a secret ceremony. Few details of the rituals were known at the time, fueling the suspicions of medieval inquisitors, but initiates, at least in the early days of the Order, had to be of noble birth, of legitimate heritage, and had to be willing to sign over all of their wealth and goods to the Order. Further, joining the Order required vows of poverty, chastity, piety, and obedience. For the warriors of the Order, there was a cardinal rule of never surrendering. This fearless uncompromising nature of the Templars, along with excellent training and heavy armament, made them a feared and elite fighting force in medieval times.

      History

      Main article: History of the Knights Templar
      The order was founded around 1118 by French knights Hughes de Payens, a veteran of the First Crusade, and Geoffrey de St. Omer for the protection of pilgrims on the road from Jaffa and Jerusalem. At first, the order had only nine knights as members and relied on gifts and cast-offs. As a result, they were originally known as the Poor Knights of Christ. King Baldwin II of Jerusalem gave them a headquarters on the Temple Mount, above what was believed to be the ruins of the Temple of Solomon. It was from this location that the Order took its name of Poor Knights of Christ and the Temple of Solomon.


      The Dome of the Rock, one of the structures at the Temple Mount
      The Order grew rapidly because of support from key church leaders such as Bernard de Clairvaux, and was exempt from all authority except that of the Pope. Because of this official sanction, the order received massive donations of money, land, and noble-born sons from families across Europe, who were encouraged to donate support as their way of assisting with the fight in the Holy Land. Templar Knights also fought alongside King Louis VII of France, King Richard I of England, and in battles in Spain and Portugal.
      Though the primary mission of the Order was a military one, only a small percentage of its members were actually at the front lines, while many others were involved in developing a financial infrastructure to support the warrior branch. The Order also innovated ways of generating letters of credit for pilgrims who were journeying to the Holy Land, which involved pilgrims depositing their valuables with the Order before setting off on the journey. This may have been the first form of checking put into use. From this mixture of donations and shrewd business dealing during the 12th and 13th centuries the Order acquired large tracts of land both in Europe and the Middle East, built churches and castles, bought farms and vineyards, was involved in manufacturing, import and export, had its own fleet of ships, and for a time even owned the entire island of Cyprus.

      After Jerusalem was lost to Saladin in 1187, the Crusades gradually wound down and European support for the Order began to falter. In the early 1300s, King Philip IV of France (also known as "Philip the Fair") was in desperate need of money to continue his war with the English. He began by approaching the Templars' Grand Master, Jacques De Molay, asking him to respond to allegations of malpractice. De Molay rejected the allegations out of hand. On Friday, October 13, 1307 (a date possibly linked to the origin of the Friday the 13th legend), Philip had all French Templars simultaneously arrested, charged with numerous heresies, and tortured by French authorities nominally under the Inquisition until they allegedly confessed. This action released Philip from his obligation to repay huge loans from the Templars and justified his looting of Templar treasuries. In 1312 due to public opinion and scandal, and under pressure from King Philip (who had been responsible for maneuvering Pope Clement V into the Vatican), Clement officially disbanded the Order at the Council of Vienne. Even though all their lands were supposed to be turned over to the Hospitallers, Philip retained a great deal of the Templar assets in France. Some other European leaders followed suit in an effort to reduce the amount of Church-owned lands and property. In 1314 three Templar leaders, including Grand Master Jacques De Molay, Hugh De Perault and Godfrey De Goneville were burned alive at the stake by French authorities after publicly renouncing any guilt.

      Remaining Templars around Europe, having been arrested and tried under the Papal investigation (with virtually none convicted), were either absorbed into other military orders such as the Order of Christ and the Knights Hospitaller or contemplative Benedictine or Augustinian orders; returned to the secular life with pension; and in some cases possibly fled to other territories outside of Papal control such as England and excommunicated Scotland. But questions still remain as to what happened to the few hundreds of Templars across Europe, or to the fleet of Templar ships which, according to various works of fiction (such as Holy Blood, Holy Grail), vanished from La Rochelle on October 13, 1307. Also, the extensive archive of the Templars, with detailed records of all of their business holdings and financial transactions, was never found, though it is unknown whether it was destroyed, or moved to another location, or ever existed in the first place.

      In modern times, it is the Roman Catholic Church's position that the persecution was unjust; that there was nothing inherently wrong with the Order or its Rule; and that the Pope at the time was severely pressured into suppressing them by the magnitude of the public scandal and the dominating influence of King Philip IV. In 2002, a copy of the Chinon Parchment was discovered by Dr. Frale in the Vatican Secret Archives. The parchment gave direct documented evidence and a new perspective on the Knights Templar and overturned some of the centuries-old myths and misconceptions that have grown around the Order.

      Grand Masters
      Main article: Grand Masters of the Knights Templar
      Starting with founder Hughes de Payens in 1118, the Order's highest office was that of Grand Master, a position which was held for life, though considering the warrior nature of the Order, this could be a very short period of time. The Grand Master oversaw all of the operations of the Order, including both the military operations in the Holy Land and eastern Europe, and the financial and business dealings in the Order's infrastructure of Western Europe. Grand Masters could also be active military commanders, though this was not always a wise choice, as seen by the fate of the defeated Grand Master Gérard de Ridefort, who ended up beheaded by Saladin in 1189 at the Siege of Acre. The last Grand Master was Jacques DeMolay.

      Places associated with the Knights Templar

      Tomar Church, Portugal
      Middle East
      • Temple Mount and Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem
      • Akko (City of Acre) - contains a tunnel leading to a 13th century Templar stronghold
      • Arwad, Syria - an island fortress
      • Chastel Blanc, Syria
      • The port city and fortress of Tartous (called Tortosa by Crusaders), Syria
      France
      • Sainte-Vaubourg, 76/Seine-Maritime, Haute-Normandie, France. In 1173, King Henry II, gave the manor Sainte-Vaubourg at Val-de-la-Haye to the Knights Templar.
      • Neuilly-sous-Clermont, 60/Oise, Picardie, France
      • Mont-de-Soissons, 02/Aisne, Picardie, France - The chapel, pigeonniere and grange all date from the XIIIth century. The chapel was restored by the Knights of St. John after the dissolution of the Templars.
      • Acquebouille, 45/Loiret, France - This chapter-house was part of Commandery Saint-Marc d' Orleans.
      • La Villedieu-Les-Maurepas, 78/Yvelines, Ile de France - Thirteenth-century Gothic chapel with octagonal tower, and various buildings with a surrounding wall largely restored. Departmental cultural center.
      • Coulommiers, France
      • Avalleur, Burgundy, France
      • Chinon, Pays-de-la-Loire, France
      • Cressac-Blanzac, Charente, France
      • La Rochelle, Charente, France
      • Sergeac, Dordogne, France
      • Domme, Dordogne, France
      • Sainte-Eulalie-du-Cernon, France
      • Richerenches, France
      • La Couvertoirade, Aveyron, France
      United Kingdom
      • Rosslyn Chapel, Roslin, Midlothian, Scotland, UK
      • Temple, Midlothian, Scotland
      • Temple Church, Middle Temple and Inner Temple, London, England, UK
      • Temple Dinsley, Hertfordshire, England, UK
      • Hertford, Hertfordshire, England [1], UK
      • Royston Cave, Royston, Hertfordshire, England, UK
      • Garway Church, Herefordshire, England, UK
      • Cressing Temple, Essex, England [2], UK
      • Templecombe, Somerset, England [3], UK
      • Temple Balsall, Warwickshire, England, UK
      • Templars Park, Aberdeen, Scotland, UK
      • Temple Bruer, Lincolnshire, England, UK
      • Temple Cowton, North Yorkshire, England, UK
      • Temple Ewell, Kent, England, UK
      • Temple Newsam, West Yorkshire, England, UK
      • Temple Meads, Bristol, England, UK
      • Temple Mills, Stratford, London, England, UK
      • Temple Bellwood, Belton, North Lincolnshire, England, UK
      • Lundy Island, Devon, England, UK
      • Westerdale, North Yorkshire, England, UK
      • Great Wilbraham Preceptory, Cambridgeshire, England, UK
      • Helmsley, North Yorkshire, England, UK
      • Holy Sepulchre (Round Church), Cambridgeshire, England, UK
      • Bisham Abbey, Berkshire, England, UK
      • St. Mary's, Sompting, West Sussex, England, UK [4]
      • Tintagel Castle (Kastell Dintagell), Cornwall, England, UK
      • Tulse & Knights hills, Lambeth, London
      Portugal
      • Convento de Cristo in the Castle of Tomar [5]
      • Church of Santa Maria do Olival in Tomar
      • Castles of Almourol, Idanha, Monsanto, Pombal and Zêzere
      • Castle of Soure, near Coimbra [6]
      Spain
      • Irrigation system in Aragon, Spain [7]
      • Iglesia Veracruz in Segovia, Spain [8]
      • Ponferrada castle
      • Barbens
      • Gardeny castle, in Lérida
      Other
      • Kolossi Castle in Cyprus
      • Tempelhof in Berlin, Germany
      • Priory of St Laurence (Sv Vavrinec) in Prague, Czech Republic
      • Templstejn in Czech Republic
      • Hrad Vsetin in Czech Republic
      For a list of some of the places that have been associated with the Knights Templar, either in fiction or legend, but which have not yet been proven to have a factual association, see Rumored locations.


      Legends

      Main article: Knights Templar legends
      The Knights Templar have become surrounded by legends concerning secrets and mysteries handed down to the select from ancient times. Most of these legends are connected with the long occupation by the order of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, and speculation about what relics the Templars may have found there, such as the Holy Grail, the Ark of the Covenant. And still more stories were started by fictional embellishments upon the Templar history, such as a treasure long hidden by the Templars. This idea has been used in two recent Hollywood movies, The Da Vinci Code and National Treasure. The film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade depicted a rather more fantastic view of the history of the Templar. The idea has also been used in the graphic novel Rex Mundi (Dark Horse Comics) by Arvid Nelson, in novels by Steve Berry (The Templar Legacy), Raymond Khoury (The Last Templar), Jack Whyte (Knights of the Black and White), and even in a Donald Duck comic story by Don Rosa.

      Other legends have grown around the suspected associations of the Templars. Many organizations claim traditions from the original Order (the Freemasons, for instance, began incorporating Templar symbols and rituals in the 1700s) especially in relation to anonymous charity and good deeds. Some of these organizations which claim (spuriously) to be associated with the Templars are still active within communities across the globe supporting humanistic causes such as hospitals and medical treatment centers for the less fortunate. Additionally, while not claiming any direct descent from Templar Jacques de Molay, the Order of DeMolay, a youth fraternity associated with the Freemasons, cite de Molay's loyalty to his fellow Templars in the face of execution as a bedrock moral imperative.

      The dissolution of the Templar order is well documented, and some of its surviving members and properties after the destruction of the order in 1314 were absorbed into the Knights of the Hospital of Saint John, which continued as a minor military entity throughout the middle ages. However, the story of the Templars' persecution has proved a tempting source for many organizations to use to enhance their own dignity, history, and mystery. There are a variety of claims to descendance from around the western world, none of whom are able to produce any evidence, or plausible theory explaining their descent, except for the OCMTH-IFA SMOTJ-SKT, under Chef Mondial and Grand Prior General JJP McGrath, who now under the patriarchy of the Catholic/Melkite Bishop of Antioch, Jerusalem and Alexandria, now have autonomous priories and commandaries worldwide.
      Another legend originates around Switzerland, and associates the Knights Templar with the founding of the Swiss country.[1] For more information, see Knights Templar and popular culture.


      Sources
      • Malcolm Barber, The New Knighthood: A History of the Order of the Temple. Cambridge University Press, 1994. ISBN 0-521-42041-5
      • Peter Partner, The Knights Templar and their Myth. Destiny Books; Reissue edition (1990). ISBN 0-89281-273-7
      • ^ Frale, Barbara (2004). "The Chinon chart — Papal absolution to the last Templar, Master Jacques de Molay". Journal of Medieval History 30 (2): 109–134. DOI:10.1016/j.jmedhist.2004.03.004.
      • The History Channel, Decoding the Past: The Templar Code documentary, 2005
      • George Smart, The Knights Templar: Chronology, Authorhouse, 2005. ISBN 1-4184-9889-0
      • Sean Martin, The Knights Templar: The History & Myths of the Legendary Military Order, 2005. ISBN 1-56025-645-1
      • Dr. Karen Ralls, The Templars and the Grail, Quest Books, 2003. ISBN 0-8356-0807-7
      • Alan Butler, Stephen Dafoe, The Warriors and the Bankers: A History of the Knights Templar from 1307 to the present, Templar Books, 1998. ISBN 0-9683567-2-9
      • Malcolm Barber, "Who Were the Knights Templar?". Slate Magazine, 20 April 2006.
      • Brighton, Simon (2006-06-15). In Search of the Knights Templar: A Guide to the Sites in Britain (Hardback), London, England: Orion Publishing Group. ISBN 0-297-84433-4.
      • J M Upton-Ward, The Rule of the Templars: The French Text of the Rule of the Order of the Knights Templar. The Boydell Press, 1992. ISBN 0-85115-315-1
    • GIVN William Marshal lV
      SURN von Pembroke
      NSFX 4th Earl of Pembroke
      AFN 84ZX-0D
      DATE 9 SEP 2000
      TIME 13:15:53
    • William Marshal, 1st earl of Pembroke
      born c. 1146
      died May 14, 1219, Caversham, Berkshire, Eng.

      also called William The Marshal marshal and then regent of England who served four English monarchs as a royal adviser and agent and as a warrior of outstanding prowess.

      Marshal's father, John (FitzGilbert) the Marshal (d. 1165), fought for the empress Matilda (widow of the German emperor Henry V and daughter of Henry I of England) in her unsuccessful struggle to gain the throne of her cousin King Stephen (reigned 1135–54). After proving his bravery in warfare and in tournaments, Marshal became a guardian (1170) to Prince Henry, eldest son of King Henry II (reigned 1154–89). In 1187, four years after the prince's death, Marshal reentered Henry II's service and fought beside him in France until the king died in 1189.

      Upon the accession of Henry's third son, Richard I the Lion-Heart (reigned 1189–99), Marshal married Isabel, the heiress of Richard FitzGilbert (or de Clare), Earl of Pembroke, thereby acquiring vast estates in England, Normandy, Wales, and Ireland. Richard set forth on a crusade in 1190, leaving William Longchamp in charge of the kingdom. In the following year Pembroke joined the opposition that drove Longchamp into exile. While Richard was held captive in Germany (1192–94), Pembroke struggled to prevent the king's brother, John, from seizing power in England.

      Upon the death of Richard I in 1199, Pembroke helped John succeed peacefully to the throne; he was formally recognized as Earl of Pembroke. By 1213 he had become the king's closest adviser, and he remained loyal to John during the disputes with the barons that led to the signing of the charter of liberties known as Magna Carta (June 1215). John died during the ensuing civil war with the barons, who had invited Louis of France (later King Louis VIII) to be their king. Designated rector regis et regni (“governor of the king and of the kingdom”) for John's son, King Henry III, Pembroke defeated the English barons and French invaders and in September 1217 concluded a treaty with Louis that wisely granted amnesty to the rebellious barons.

      "Pembroke, William Marshal, 1st Earl of." Encyclopædia Britannica from Encyclopædia Britannica Premium Service. <http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9059030> [Accessed November 13, 2005].
    • !Burial place; Round Chapel Of Knight's Temple, London, Middlesex, England
    • First Earl of Pembroke. He was a Knight, Counselor and Ambassador of Henry II Plantagenet, King of England. He was also a member of the Knights Templar, which is why he's buried in the Temple Church. He was also the son-in-law of King John I and saved his throne during the Magna Carta Crisis. After the death of John I, he was Regent of England for King Henry III from 1216-19.

      findagrave.com
      http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=Marshall&GSfn=William+&GSbyrel=all&GSdyrel=all&GSob=n&GRid=4437&
    Person ID I6000000002459854209  Ancestors of Donald Ross
    Last Modified 22 Jan 2019 

    Father John FitzGilbert, I, of Rockley, le Mareschal,   b. 1105, Winterbourne Monkton Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. Bef 29 Sep 1165, Rockley Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age < 60 years) 
    Mother Sibilla FitzEdward, of Salisbury,   b. 27 Nov 1126,   d. Abt 1176  (Age 49 years) 
    Married Abt 1143  Pembroke,,Pembrokeshire,Wales Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Family ID F6000000002477143444  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Family Isabel FitzGilbert /de Clare heiress of Pembroke, heiress of Pembroke / Strigoil,   b. Abt 1172, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. 9 Mar 1220, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age ~ 48 years) 
    Married Aug 1189  London, Middlesex, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Children 
     1. Joan Marshall,   b. Abt 1210, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. Nov 1234  (Age ~ 24 years)
     2. Isabel Marshal, Countess of Cornwall,   b. 9 Oct 1200, Pembroke Castle Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. 15 Jan 1240, Berkhampstead Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 39 years)
     3. Maud Matilda Marshal, Countess of Norfolk & Surrey,   b. Sep 1192, Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. 27 Mar 1248, Tintern, Monmouthshire, Wales Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age ~ 55 years)
     4. Eva Marshal, Baroness Abergavenny,   b. 1203, Pembroke Castle, Pembrokeshire, Wales Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. Abt 1246, Llanthony Priory Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 43 years)
    Last Modified 14 Mar 2021 
    Family ID F5604688010300075360  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart