Earl Of Gloucester Gilbert DE CLARE

  General Notes:

Surety of the Magna Carta
7th Earl of Clare, 5th Earl of Hertford, 4th Earl of Gloucester

Gilbert de CLARE, born abt. 1180 had a brother Richard/Roger and a sister Matilda. Richard accompanied Henry III's brother, Richard of Cornwall, to Gascony in 1225-26 and was never heard from again. Matilda was married to William de Braose (died 1210 when he and his mother were starved to death by King John), eldest son of the great marcher baron William de Braose (died 1211), Lord of Brecknock, Abergavenny, Builth, Radnor, and Gower, who was exiled by King John. Matilda returned to her father and later (1219) sued Reginald de Braose, second son of William, for the family lands, succeeding only in recovering Gower and the Sussex baronry of Bramber.

Gilbert de CLARE, Earl of Gloucester and Hertford from 1217 to 1230, married Oct. 1214 his cousin Isabel, daughter and eventual co-heiress of William Marshal (died 1219), earl of Pembroke. Gilbert and Isabel had three sons and two daughters, with the eldest son and heir Richard, born 4 Aug 1222, thus only 8, when his father died. In 1243, Richard de CLARE came of age and assumed the estates and titles of his father until he d. 15 July 1262. His brother William, b. 1228 held lands of Earl Richard in Hampshire and Norfolk for the service of a knight's fee. In June 1258, during a baronial reform program, William was granted custody of Winchester castle. A month later he died, reportedly by poison administered by the Earl Richard's seneschal (an official in a medieval noble household in charge of domestic arrangements and the administration of servants; a steward or major- domo. Middle English, from Old French, of Germanic origin), Walter de Scoteny, in supposed collaboration with Henry III's Poitevin half-brothers, who strongly opposed the baronial program and Earl Richard's participation in it. (Why didn't they poison Richard??)

Gilbert married Countess Of Cornwall Isabel DE MARSHALL, daughter of Earl Of Pembroke William DE MARSHALL and Isabel DE CLARE, on 9 Oct 1217 in Pembroke, Pembrokeshire, Wales. (Countess Of Cornwall Isabel DE MARSHALL was born on 9 Oct 1200 in Pembrokeshire, Wales, died on 17 Jan 1239-1240 in Berkhamstead, Hertfordshire, England and was buried in Beaulieu, Southampton, England.)