♂Humphrey de Bohun

Humphrey de Bohun^W (living in 1144) was an Anglo-Norman baron and steward to King Henry I of England, who married Margaret of Gloucester, the eldest daughter of Miles of Gloucester, Earl of Hereford. He was the twenty-fourth great-grandfather of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006), through his son Humphrey de Bohun and, probably, Humphrey’s descendant John Washburn (died 1547).

The king’s steward

The family took its name from Bohon in Normandy. As the king’s steward (dapifer), Humphrey witnessed Henry I’s charter to Bec Abbey^W in 1131, and five years later, in the same office, he witnessed King Stephen’s Charter of Liberties of 1136, the new king’s promises to the church and the barons at the start of his reign. When the crown was fought over in the years that followed, Humphrey took the side of the Empress Matilda^W, and between 1144 and 1146 she gave him a charter confirming all the lands he had held at Henry I’s death, together with his stewardship in England and Normandy.

Marriage

Humphrey married Margaret of Gloucester, the eldest daughter of Miles of Gloucester^W, Earl of Hereford and Constable of England, and of Sibyl de Neufmarché. Miles’s five sons all died without children, and when the last of them, Mahel, died, the inheritance was divided among his three daughters and their husbands. Margaret is said to have brought the county of Hereford and the constableship of England as her share, although the title of earl came to the Bohuns only with her grandson Henry de Bohun in 1200. Their son, Humphrey de Bohun, was recognized as hereditary Constable of England.

No date is known for Humphrey’s death. Margaret died on 6 April 1187 and was buried at Llanthony Secunda Priory^W, outside Gloucester.

Notes

Sources

Humphrey’s office as steward, the charters of 1131 and 1136, the Empress’s confirmation, his marriage and his son are given in the Complete Peerage (2nd ed., vol. 6, 1926, pp. 456–458 and notes, under Hereford), which cites Round’s Calendar of Documents Preserved in France (no. 373), Stubbs’s Select Charters (p. 121) and the Duchy of Lancaster royal charters (no. 19). The division of Miles of Gloucester’s inheritance and the Llanthony chronicle’s account of Margaret’s share are in the same notes, from Dugdale’s Monasticon (vol. 6, p. 134); the chronicle names her Margery. Her death and burial are from p. 457, note.

Earl or constable

The Complete Peerage remarks that the chronicle’s “county of Hereford” for Margaret “appears to be anticipating events, so far as concerns a titular earldom”: the earldom came to the family only when Humphrey’s grandson Henry was created Earl of Hereford on 28 April 1200.

The descent through John Washburn

That the John whom the pedigrees give as a son of Joyce Botetourt’s great-granddaughter Joan Mitton was John Washburn of Bengeworth, who died in 1547, is the identification of the Washbournes’ historian, James Davenport, not a record’s, so the descent through him is given here as probable.