Nielsen Hayden genealogy

Edmund "Crouchback"

Male 1245 - 1296  (51 years)


Personal Information    |    Notes    |    Sources    |    All

  • Name Edmund "Crouchback"  
    Birth 16 Jan 1245  London, England Find all individuals with events at this location  [1, 2, 3, 4
    Gender Male 
    Death 5 Jun 1296  Bayonne, Aquitaine, France Find all individuals with events at this location  [1, 2, 3, 4
    Burial Westminster Abbey, Westminster, Middlesex, England Find all individuals with events at this location  [3, 4
    Siblings 2 siblings 
    Person ID I7823  Ancestry of PNH, TNH, and others | Ancestor of AP, Ancestor of DDB, Ancestor of DGH, Ancestor of DK, Ancestor of JTS, Ancestor of LD, Ancestor of LMW, Ancestor of TNH, Ancestor of TSW, Ancestor of TWK, Ancestor of UKL, Ancestor of WPF
    Last Modified 5 Dec 2023 

    Father Henry III, King of England,   b. 1 Oct 1207, Winchester Castle, Hampshire, England Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 16 Nov 1272, Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk, England Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 65 years) 
    Mother Eleanor of Provence, Queen Consort of England   d. 24 Jun 1291, Amesbury Priory, Wiltshire, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Marriage 14 Jan 1236  Canterbury Cathedral, Canterbury, Kent, England Find all individuals with events at this location  [1, 2
    Family ID F3648  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Family Blanche of Artois,   b. Abt 1248   d. 2 May 1302, Paris, France Find all individuals with events at this location (Age ~ 54 years) 
    Marriage 18 Jan 1276  Paris, France Find all individuals with events at this location  [1, 5
    Children 
     1. Thomas of Lancaster   d. 22 Mar 1322, Pontefract, Yorkshire, England Find all individuals with events at this location
    +2. Henry of Lancaster,   b. Abt 1280   d. 22 Sep 1345 (Age ~ 65 years)
    Family ID F3898  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
    Last Modified 3 Aug 2018 

  • Notes 
    • Earl of Leicester; Earl of Lancaster; Earl of Derby. Steward of England 1265; Keeper of the Isle of Lundy 1266; Warden of Sherborne Castle 1267; Lieutenant of Pothieu 1291; Lieutenant of Gascony 1296.

      Nearly King of Sicily.

      Summoned to Parliament by writ 24 Jun 1295; definitely far from the most interesting thing that ever happened to him.

      From Wikipedia (as of 5 Dec 2023):

      Edmund, 1st Earl of Lancaster (16 January 1245 – 5 June 1296), also known by his epithet Edmund Crouchback, was a member of the royal Plantagenet Dynasty and the founder of the first House of Lancaster. He was Earl of Leicester (1265–1296), Lancaster (1267–1296) and Derby (1269–1296) in England, and Count Palatine of Champagne (1276–1284) in France.

      Named after the 9th-century saint, Edmund was the second surviving son of King Henry III of England and Eleanor of Provence and the younger brother of King Edward I of England, to whom he was loyal as a diplomat and warrior. In 1254, the 9-year-old Edmund became involved in the "Sicilian business", in which his father accepted a papal offer granting the Kingdom of Sicily to Edmund, who made preparations to become king. However, Henry III could not provide funds for the operation, prompting the Papacy to withdraw the grant and give it to Edmund's uncle, Charles I of Anjou. The "Sicilian business" outraged the barons led by the Earl of Leicester and Edmund's uncle, Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester, and was cited as one of the reasons for limiting Henry's power. Deterioration of relations between the barons and the king resulted in the Second Barons' War, in which the royal government, supported by Edmund, triumphed over the baronage following the death of Montfort in the Battle of Evesham in 1265.

      Edmund received the lands and titles of Montfort and the defeated barons Nicholas Segrave, 1st Baron Segrave and Robert de Ferrers, 6th Earl of Derby, and became Earl of Lancaster, Leicester and Derby. Primarily known as the earl of the first county, he eventually became the most powerful baron of England. Later, Edmund accompanied his elder brother Edward on his crusade in the Holy Land, where his epithet "Crouchback" originated from a corruption of 'cross back', referring to him wearing a stitched cross on his garments. Following the death of his first wife, Aveline de Forz, Edmund's aunt and Dowager Queen of France Margaret of Provence arranged his second marriage to Blanche of Artois, the recently widowed Queen Dowager of Navarre and the Countess of Champagne. With his second wife Blanche, Edmund governed Champagne as count palatine in the name of his stepdaughter Joan until she came of age. Edmund was active in supporting his family members, such as assisting Edward in conquering Wales, advocating for the claims of his aunt Margaret against his uncle Charles I of Anjou in his mother and aunt's homeland of Provence and managing Ponthieu on behalf of his sister-in-law, Eleanor of Castile.

      When Edmund's stepson-in-law, King Philip IV of France, demanded Edward, who was also his vassal through Gascony, to come to Paris to answer charges of damages caused by English mariners in 1293, Edward sent Edmund to mediate the crisis to avert war. Edmund negotiated an agreement with Philip where France would occupy Gascony for 40 days, and Edward would marry Philip's half-sister, Margaret. When the 40 days were over, Philip tricked Edward and Edmund by refusing to relinquish control over Gascony, calling Edward to again answer for his charges. Edmund and Edward then renounced their homages to Philip and prepared for war against France. Edmund sailed for Gascony with his army and besieged the city of Bordeaux. Unable to pay his troops, Edmund was deserted by his army and retreated to Bayonne, where he died from illness in 1296. Edmund's body was brought back to England, where he was buried in Westminster Abbey in 1301.

  • Sources 
    1. [S142] Royal Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families by Douglas Richardson. Salt Lake City, 2013.

    2. [S145] Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America Before 1700 by Frederick Lewis Weis and Walter Lee Sheppard, Jr. 8th edition, William R. Beall & Kaleen E. Beall, eds. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 2004, 2006, 2008.

    3. [S128] The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, Extant, Extinct or Dormant ed. Vicary Gibbs, H. A. Doubleday, Duncan Warrand, Howard de Walden, Geoffrey H. White and R. S. Lea. 2nd edition. 14 volumes (1-13, but volume 12 spanned two books), London, The St. Catherine Press, 1910-1959. Volume 14, "Addenda & Corrigenda," ed. Peter W. Hammond, Gloucestershire, Sutton Publishing, 1998.

    4. [S1526] The Ancestry of Dorothea Poyntz, Wife of Reverend John Owsley, Generations 1-15, Fourth Preliminary Edition, by Ronny O. Bodine and Bro. Thomas Spalding, Jr. 2013.

    5. [S128] The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, Extant, Extinct or Dormant ed. Vicary Gibbs, H. A. Doubleday, Duncan Warrand, Howard de Walden, Geoffrey H. White and R. S. Lea. 2nd edition. 14 volumes (1-13, but volume 12 spanned two books), London, The St. Catherine Press, 1910-1959. Volume 14, "Addenda & Corrigenda," ed. Peter W. Hammond, Gloucestershire, Sutton Publishing, 1998., "apparently between 27 July and 29 Oct. 1276".