Henry Somerset, 1st Marquess of Worcester

The Marquess of Worcester
Spouse(s)	Hon. Anne Russell
Issue Edward Somerset, 2nd Marquess of Worcester
Noble family	House of Beaufort
Father	Edward Somerset, 4th Earl of Worcester
Mother	Elizabeth Hastings, Countess of Worcester
Born	1577
Died	18 December 1646

Henry Somerset, 1st Marquess of Worcester (1577^[1] – 18 December 1646) was an English aristocrat, who was a prominent and financially important Royalist during the early years of the English Civil War.

Life

He was the son of Edward Somerset, 4th Earl of Worcester and Elizabeth Hastings. On 3 March 1628, he succeeded his father and became the 5th Earl of Worcester.^[2]

Brought up a Protestant, he converted to Catholicism as a young man. He was considered an outstandingly wealthy peer, with an income, by the contemporary estimate of Richard Symonds, of £24,000 per annum. By good management, as well as by inheritance and marriage, he built up major holdings in property. When war came, he claimed to have expended and lent over £900,000 to the royalist cause.^[3]

Charles I asked him to keep a low profile in public life. Some noted recusants, such as Gwilym Puw and his chaplain Thomas Bayly, gathered around him at Raglan Castle. His local support was increased by the fact that he was not identified as a courtier.^[4] For his financial support of King Charles I at the outset of the First English Civil War, he was created 1st Marquess of Worcester, on 2 November 1642.

After the battle of Naseby, King Charles sought refuge at Raglan, in the period June to September 1645.^[5] The next year, the Marquess was forced to surrender Raglan Castle to the forces of Sir Thomas Morgan, 1st Baronet, late in 1646, marking the effective end of the Civil War in Wales.^[6] He was taken into custody by the Parliamentary forces, and died in Covent Garden, on 18 December 1646.^[2]

Family

He married Hon. Anne Russell, daughter of John Russell, Baron Russell and Elizabeth Cooke on 16 June 1600. Anne's paternal grandparents were Francis Russell, 2nd Earl of Bedford and his wife Margaret St. John. Anne's maternal grandparents were Sir Anthony Cooke and his wife Anne FitzWilliam.^[7][8]

With his wife, he had nine sons and four daughters including, Edward Somerset, 2nd Marquess of Worcester, his heir and successor, and Thomas Somerset, his second son, who became a Catholic priest in Rome before joining the Oratory of St Philip Neri in Perugia before Pope Clement IX sent him to England as his internuncio. Fr Thomas died in exile in Dunkirk on 30 August 1678. Another son was Sir John Somerset, of Pauntley, Gloucestershire, who married Mary Arundell, a daughter of the 1st Baron Arundell of Wardour, co. Wiltshire by his second wife. His youngest daughter, Elizabeth, married Francis Browne, 3rd Viscount Montagu.^[9]

Ancestry

Notes

References

• Lundy, Darryl (31 January 2011). "Henry Somerset, 1st Marquess of Worcester". Thepeerage.com. p. 2465 § 24647. Retrieved October 2013. 
  • Cokayne, G.E. (2000). Vicary Gibbs, H.A. Doubleday, Geoffrey H. White, Duncan Warrand and Lord Howard de Walden, ed. The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, Extant, Extinct or Dormant. XII/2 (reprint in 6 volumes ed.). Gloucester, U.K.: Alan Sutton Publishing. p. 857. 
  • Mosley, Charles, ed. (1999). Burke's Peerage and Baronetage, 1 (106th in 2 volumes ed.). Crans, Switzerland: Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books). p. 221.