• Dates & Events.
Gilbert and his father, Richard de Clare, were made Magna Carta Sureties in 1215. ⁵²⁶

• Background Information. ¹⁴¹
Gilbert de Clare, Earl of Gloucester and Hertford, was the son and heir of Richard de Clare, Earl of Hertford, more generally known as Earl of Clare, by Amice, 2^nd daughter and coheir, and eventually sole heir, of William Fitz Robert, Earl of Gloucester. He inherited the Clare estates from his father, those of Gloucester from his mother and a moiety of the Giffard estates from his ancestor Rohese. By the death of Isabel, Countess of Gloucester, 14 Oct 1217, his mother, Amice, became sole heir of her father, William, Earl of Gloucester, and appears to have been recognized as Countess of Gloucester up to her death, abt. 1 Jan 1224/5. Gilbert was born probably circa 1180. In June 1202 he was entrusted with the lands of Harfleur and Mostrevilliers. In 1211 he held 6 1/2 knights' fees in Kent of his mother's maritigium, and she as Amice, Countess of Clare, offered 40 marks for the recovery of certain fees of which she had been disseised by Guy de Chanceaus. In Jun 1215 he was one of the 25 barons made guardians of Magan Carta. In Dec 1216 he was excommunicated by Innocent III, and at that date and in the following March had letters of protection.

Gilbert fought on the side of Louis of France at the battle of Lincoln, 19 May 1217, and was taken prisoner by William Marshal, whose daughter he married later. In the following July he was at Gloucester. In Nov 1217, shortly after the death of his aunt, Isabel, Countess of Gloucester, he appears to have been recognized as Earl of Gloucester. In the same month as Earl of Gloucester and Hertford he confirmed several benefactions. In Jan 1217/8 he was one of the King's dilecti et fiedeles, and in Oct one of the Council, approving the King's Seal. In July 1222 he was forbidden to attack the castle of Dinas Powys, in Glamorgan. From this time he frequently attests royal grants. He joined the Earl Marshal, his brother-in-law, in an expedition into Wales in 1223. In 1225 he was present at the confirmation of the Great Charter by Henry III, and in that year the sheriff of Gloucester was ordered to pay him 20 pounds "in the name of the county," as previous Earls of Gloucester had had it. He the took part of Richard, Earl of Cornwall, against the King in July 1227 with regard to the forest laws and the misgovernment of Hubert de Burgh, and in Sep was one of the nobles accredited to meet the princes of the Empire at Antwerp. He led an army against the Welsh in 1228 and captured Morgan Gam, who was released next year.

Gilbert married, 9 Oct 1217, Isabel, daughter of William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke, by Isabel, daughter and heir of Richard de Clare, known as Strongbow, formerly Earl of Pembroke. Being engaged in an expedition to Brittany, he died on his way back at Penros in that duchy, 25 Oct 1230. His body was conveyed by way of Plymouth and Cranbourn to Tewkesbury, where he was buried before the high altar, 10 Nov 1230, a monument being erected by his widow. He made his will 20 Apr and 23 Oct 1230. His widow married as her 2^nd husband, 30 Mar 1231, Richard, Earl of Cornwall, 2^nd son of King John. She died 17 Jan 1239/40, in childbed, at Berkhampstead, of jaundice, and was buried at Bealieu, Hants, her heart being sent to Tewkesbury Abbey.

~Cokayne's Complete Peerage, 2nd Edition, (Hertford), Vol. VI, pp. 694-696

• Background Information. ⁹⁰²
Gilbert de Clare, 7^th Earl of Clare, 5^th Earl of Hertford, and 6^th Earl of Gloucester, was the son of Richard, sixth earl of Clare and Hertford, by his wife Amicia, one of the three coheir of William, earl of Gloucester. On the death of his mother and the failure of issue to her two sisters, Mabel and Isabella (the divorced wife of King John, afterwards married to Godfrey de Mandevil and Hubert de Burgh), he succeeded to the vast Gloucester estates apparently in the year 1217 [Annals of Margam, p. 33]. He also inherited the estates of his 'grandmother, Maud de St. Hilary, and a moiety of the honor of Giffard from his father, who had been confirmed in this possession by Richard I as one of the coheirs of his ancestress, Rohais, daughter of Walter Giffard, earl of Buckingham' [Clark, Land of Morgan, p. 332; Marsh, Chepstow Castle, p. 78]. According to Dugdale, his father died in 1206; but this is evidently a mistake, as both 'Richard, earl of Clare, and his son Gilbert' appear in the patent rolls of 14 John [ed. Hardy, p. 192]; while the Earl of Clare and Gilbert de Clare are to be found among the twenty-five barons appointed to carry out the great charter in June 1215, and were both excommunicated by Innocent III in the beginning of 1216 [Matt. Paris, ii. 605, 643]. After the death of John, he sided with the dauphin, and is said to have been taken prisoner at the battle of Lincoln by William Marshall, the earl of Pembroke, who married him to his daughter Isabella [Walsingham, Ypod. Neust. p. 137] on St. Denis's day, 9 Oct. 1217 [Annals of Margam, p. 33].

In February 1225, he was present at the confirmation of the great charter at Westminster [Burton Annals, i. 232]. Two years later we find him taking the part of Richard earl of Cornwall, in his quarrel with the king, demanding a renewal of the forest acts and ascribing all the faults of the government to Hubert de Burgh [Matt. Paris, iii. 124; cf. Walter of Coventry, ii. 261, sub anno 1225]. About May 1230 he appears to have attended Henry III abroad in his expedition to Brittany; but died 'in ipso reditu,' at Penros in that duchy, 25 Oct. 1230 [Tewkesbury Annals, p. 76; Waverley Annals, p. 308]. He seems to have made his first will before starting on this campaign, 30 April 1230, at 'Suwik-super-Mare;' his second, just before his death, on 23 Oct. His body was conveyed to Plymouth, and thence, by way of Cranborne, to Tewkesbury, where he was buried before the great altar on the Sunday following St. Martin's day, in the presence of an innumerable concourse [Tewkes. Ann. p. 76]. To Tewkesbury Abbey he was a great benefactor in his lifetime, and bequeathed it a silver cross and the 'wood of Mutha' [ib. pp. 74, 76]. His widow Isabella set up a memorial stone 28 Sept. 1231. In the course of the same year she married Richard, earl of Cornwall [ib. pp. 38, 78]. Clare was engaged in many Welsh expeditions. He is found fortifying Builth Castle in 12 John. In 1228 he set out with a great army against the Welsh, on which occasion we read that he found silver, iron, and lead [ib. p. 70]. The same year he captured Morgan Cam and sent him prisoner to England [Marg. Ann. i. 36]; but a little later released him for hostages.

Clare had three sons by his wife Isabella: (1) Richard; (2) William; and (3) Gilbert; and three daughters: (1) Amicia (b. about 1220), who in October 1226 was betrothed to Baldwin de Redvers (Clark, p. 335); (2) Agnes; and (3) Isabel (b. 2 Nov. 1226), who married Robert de Bruce of Annandale [ib.] His widow, Isabel, died 17 Jan. 1239-40, and was buried at Beaulieu. Her heart, however, was brought to Tewkesbury by the prior in a silver-gilt casket (cuppa) and interred before the great altar [Tewkes. Ann., pp. 113-14].


[Sources cited by the author:The Land of Morgan, by G. T. Clark, in Archæological Journal (1878), xxxv. 332-8; Marsh's Annals of Chepstow Castle; Annals of Margam, Tewkesbury, Burton, and Waverley in vols. i. and ii. of Annales Monastici, ed. Luard (Rolls Series); Walsingham's Ypodigma Neustriæ, ed. Riley (Rolls Series); Dugdale's Baronage, vol. i.; Patent Rolls (John), ed. Hardy (1835); Close Rolls, ed. Hardy (1833), i. 606; Walter of Coventry, ed. Stubbs (Rolls Series).]

~ Thomas Andrew Archer, The Dictionary of National Biography, Vol. IV, p. 378

Gilbert married Lady Isabella Marshall, daughter of Sir Willam Marshall Knight, Third Earl of Pembroke and Isabella de Clare Countess of Pembroke, on 9 Oct 1217 in Pembroke Castle, Pembrokeshire, Wales ^141,160.^,902 (Lady Isabella Marshall was born on 9 Oct 1200 in Pembroke Castle, Pembrokeshire, Wales, died on 17 Jan 1240 in Berkhamsted Castle, Hertfordshire, England ¹⁶⁰ and was buried in Beaulieu Abbey, Hampshire.)