Eighteenth Generation

229634. Sir Knight Richard CROFT¹⁸⁸ was born in 1429/30 in Croft Castle, Hereford, England. He died in 1509.
1296-1727: The Crofts were also represented in Parliament, mainly for the Shire of Hereford or the Borough of Leominster.

1462: the Battle of Mortimer’s Cross was held nearby on land belonging to the Croft family. This battle was decisive in putting the Yorkist King Edward IV (a Mortimer) on the throne. Sir Richard Croft, who fought at the battle, was a Knight for the Shire and Sheriff of the County of Hereford.

1471: Richard Croft captured Prince Edward at the battle of Tewkesbury and was made a Knight Banneret upon the field of Stoke by Henry VI. Under Henry VII Richard was made Receiver-General of the Earldom of March and Knight Banneret at the Battle of Stoke (1487). He was also Steward to the young Prince Arthur and Treasurer to the King’s Household. Edward IV and Richard III appointed Thomas Croft as ranger of Woodstock Park; he was deprived of this honour in 1491 because he had committed a ‘ detestable murder’ in the Marches of Wales.
Sir Knight Richard CROFT and Elinor BARE (BARRE) were married about 1458 in Croft Castle, Hereford, England.

229635. Elinor BARE (BARRE)¹⁸⁸ was born about 1430 in Croft Castle, Hereford, England. She died in 1520 in Croft Castle, Hereford, England. Sir Hugh Mortimer's widow, Eleanor, married Sir Richard Croft, of Croft Castle near Leominster. In 1461 he had played a major role in the Yorkist victory at Mortimer's Cross, two miles away. By Sir Richard, Dame Eleanor had eight children. They, as did Sir Hugh's daughter Elizabeth, married so well that on her father's heart-tomb is written, "Dame Eleanor had such increase of children that seventeen score and odd people were descended from her body before she died". Two of her direct descendants were Sir Philip Sidney, the Elizabethan poet, and Robert, Earl of Leicester, the Queen's favourite.

Sir Richard Croft held a number of high offices including that of Governor or Ludlow Castle where Dame Eleanor became the "Lady Governess" to the two little Princes, Edward (later Edward V) and Richard, Duke of York, who were to be murdered in The Tower of London. Dame Eleanor outlived both her children by Sir Hugh Mortimer. She died aged nearly 90 in 1520. She is buried in the church alongside Croft Castle in a double effigy with her second husband, who died in 1509.
Children were:

60545

i.

Anne CROFT.