♀Isabel de Warenne

Isabel de Warenne (died 13 July 1199) was the heiress of the Warenne earls of Surrey, and each of her two husbands, a son of King Stephen and then a half-brother of King Henry II, was recognized as Earl Warenne through her. She was the twenty-fourth great-grandmother of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006), through her daughter Maud de Warenne.

Heiress of Warenne

Isabel was the daughter and sole heir of William de Warenne^W, Earl of Surrey, and his wife Ela Talvas, a daughter of William Talvas, Count of Alençon and Ponthieu. Her father went on crusade under Louis VII of France^W and was killed by the Turks in the passes near Laodicea on 19 January 1147/8, leaving no son.

In or before 1153 she was married to William de Blois, the youngest son of King Stephen^W, who was recognized as Earl Warenne by right of her. He became Count of Boulogne on his elder brother’s death and Count of Mortain on his father’s in 1154. He died in October 1159, at about twenty-five, leaving no children.

Countess with Hamelin

In 1164 Isabel de Warenne, the childless widow of William de Blois, married Hamelin of Warenne, an illegitimate son of Geoffrey of Anjou and half-brother of King Henry II. He too was recognized as Earl Warenne through her, and he took her family’s name, so that the king’s brother is remembered as Hamelin de Warenne rather than Hamelin Plantagenet.

Their daughter Maud de Warenne married Henry, Count of Eu. Isabel died on 13 July 1199 and was buried at Lewes Priory^W. Hamelin died in April 1202.

Notes

Sources

Isabel’s parentage, both marriages, her first husband’s career and death, her second husband’s recognition as Earl Warenne, and her death and burial are given in the first edition of the Complete Peerage (vol. 7, 1896, under Surrey, p. 326), which calls her “da. and sole heir” of Earl William and Ela. The same entry notes that on her father’s death the earldom may be considered to have passed to her, or, as it thought more probable, to have reverted to the Crown. The marriage of her daughter Maud to Henry, Count of Eu, is in the second edition of the Complete Peerage (vol. 5, 1926, under Eu, p. 159).

The descent through John Washburn

The line from Isabel to Nancy Jane Blanchard runs through her daughter Maud and her descendants to John Washburn of Bengeworth, who died in 1547. That the John Washburn of the pedigrees was this man is the identification of the Washbournes’ historian, James Davenport, not a record’s, so the descent through him is probable.