FAUCONBERG, THOMAS, The Bastard of, sometimes called Thomas the Bastard (d. 1471), was the natural son of Sir William Nevill, baron Fauconberg in 1429 and earl of Kent in 1462, who took an active part in 1461 in setting Edward IV on the throne in the place of Henry VI. In 1471 the Bastard was in the service of the Earl of Warwick, and zealously supported the earl's attempt to reinstate Henry VI. He was appointed the captain of ‘Warwick's navy,’ and was directed to cruise about St. George's Channel between Dover and Calais to intercept assistance coming to Edward. About the date of the battle of Tewkesbury (4 May), where Edward gained a complete victory, the Bastard received orders to raise the county of Kent in behalf of Warwick and Henry VI. He marched through Kent and Essex, and collected a large number of men. Nicholas Faunt, the mayor of Canterbury, actively assisted him. On 14 May the Bastard appeared at Aldgate and demanded admission to the city of London. This was refused, and the Bastard set fire to the eastern suburbs. The citizens met the attack vigorously, and pursued the Bastard and his army as far as Stratford and Blackwall, but the damage his followers wrought on the banks of the Thames was long remembered (cf. Wright, Political Songs, ii. 277). The Bastard afterwards made his way westward to Kingston-upon-Thames in pursuit of Edward IV. Lord Scales, who held London for Edward, recognised the king's danger, for the Bastard's army was estimated at twenty thousand men, and recruits were stated to be still coming in. Scales sent word to the Bastard that Edward IV was quitting England, and thus induced the Bastard to return to Blackheath. Thence the Bastard journeyed with six hundred horsemen to Rochester and Sandwich. He soon learned there that Warwick's cause was lost. Edward marched on Sandwich and captured thirteen ships with most of the Bastard's immediate followers. The Bastard himself escaped to Southampton, where the Duke of York took him prisoner. He was taken thence to the castle of Middleham, Yorkshire, and there was beheaded on 22 Sept. 1471. His head was set on London Bridge, ‘looking into Kentward’ (Paston Letters, ed. Gairdner, iii. 17). A brother is stated to have been a prisoner at the same time, but took sanctuary at Beverley (ib.)
[Warkworth's Chronicle (Camd. Soc.), pp. 19, 20, 65; Stow's Chronicle (1632), pp. 424–5; Hasted's Kent, iv. 260, 433; Hardyng's Chronicle, ed. Grafton and Ellis, pp. 459–60; Polydore Vergil's History (Camd. Soc.), pp. 153, 154.]
FAUCONBERG, Lord. [See Nevill, Sir William, d. 1463.]
FAUCONBERG, Earl (1627–1700). [See Belasyse, Thomas.]
FAUCONBRIDGE, EUSTACE de (d. 1228), bishop of London, is described, on no definite evidence, as a native of Yorkshire, and as a member of the noble house of that name (Fuller, Worthies, ii. 250, ed. Nichols; Foss, Judges of England, ii. 324). He first appears in 1199 as a royal justice, and during the whole of John's reign and the early years of Henry III he is constantly mentioned in records as taking part in various judicial proceedings. In 1204 he served on an embassy to Flanders and France (Rot. Claus. i. 16, 32). In 1217 he was appointed treasurer, the first reference to his acting in that office being dated 4 Nov. (ib. i. 340). Of ecclesiastical preferment he had obtained the prebend of Holborn in St. Paul's Cathedral (Le Neve, Fasti Eccl. Angl. ii. 391, ed. Hardy). In January 1221 the resignation by Bishop William of S. Mère l'Eglise of the see of London led to long disputes in the chapter as to the choice of his successor, which finally terminated in the unanimous election of Fauconbridge on 25 Feb. (Ann. Londonienses in Stubbs, Chron. Ed. I and Ed. II, i. 23; Coggeshall, p. 188; Matt. Paris, Hist. Major, iii. 66; Walter of Coventry, ii. 249; Ann. Worcester, p. 414). The election was confirmed by the legate Pandulf, and on 25 April Fauconbridge was consecrated bishop in the chapel of St. Catharine at Westminster by the Bishop of Rochester, the Canterbury monks' objections to his consecration away from their city having been disposed of.
