Oswald Barron

“ He was constable and porter of Abergavenny Castle, and his son William, “a mad fighting fellow” in his youth, married a sister of Catherine Parr and thus in 1543 became nearly allied to the king, who made him one of the executors of his will. The earldom of Pembroke was revived for him in 1551. It is worthy of note that all traces of illegitimacy have long since been removed from the arms of the noble descendants of Richard Herbert. ”

“ The second earl while still a minor exchanged at the king’s desire in 1479 his earldom of Pembroke for that of Huntingdon. In 1484 this son of one whom Hall not unjustly describes as born “a mean gentleman” contracted to marry Katharine the daughter of King Richard III., but her death annulled the contract and the earl married Mary, daughter of the Earl Rivers, by whom he had a daughter Elizabeth, whose descendants, the Somersets, lived in the Herbert’s castle of Raglan until the cannon of the parliament broke it in ruins. ”

“ Thomas’s fifth son, William or Gwilim ap Thomas, who died in 1446, was the first man of the family to make any figure in history. This Gwilim ap Thomas was steward of the lordships of Usk and Caerleon under Richard, duke of York. Legend makes him a knight on the field of Agincourt, but his knighthood belongs to the year 1426. ”