Edmund Mortimer

The name Edmund Mortimer was held by several members of the powerful Marcher family of Mortimer.

Edmund Mortimer (1351—1381), 3rd earl of March, was son of Roger Mortimer, 2nd earl of March, by his wife Philippa, daughter of William Montacute, 1st earl of Salisbury. Being an infant at the death of his father, Edmund, as a ward of the crown, was placed by Edward III of England under the care of William of Wykeham and Richard Fitzalan, earl of Arundel. The position of the young earl, powerful on account of his possessions and hereditary influence in the Welsh marches, was rendered still more important by his marriage in 1368 to Philippa, only daughter of Lionel of Antwerp, duke of Clarence, third son of Edward III. Lionel’s wife was Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of William de Burgh, 6th Lord of Connaught and 3rd earl of Ulster, and Lionel had himself been created earl of Ulster before his marriage. The earl of March, therefore, not only became the representative of one of the chief Anglo-Norman lordships in Ireland in right of his wife Philippa, but the latter, on the death of her father shortly after her marriage, stood next in succession to the crown after the Black Prince and his sickly son Richard, afterwards king Richard II. This marriage had, therefore, far-reaching consequences in the history of England, giving rise to the claim of the house of York to the crown of England, contested in the War of the Roses; Edward IV being descended from the third son of Edward III as great-great-grandson of Philippa, countess of March, and in the male line from Edmund, duke of York, fifth son of Edward III.

Mortimer, now styled earl of March and Ulster, became marshal of England in 1369, and was employed in various diplomatic missions during the next following years. He was a member of the committee appointed by the Peers to confer with the Commons in 1373—the first instance of such a joint conference since the institution of representative parliaments—on the question of granting supplies for John of Gaunt’s war in France; and in the opposition to Edward III and the court party, which grew in strength towards the end of the reign, March took the popular side, being prominent in the Good Parliament of 1376 among the lords who, encouraged by the Prince of Wales, concerted an attack upon the court party led by John of Gaunt. The Speaker of the Commons in this parliament was March’s steward, Peter de la Mare; he firmly withstood John of Gaunt in stating the grievances of the Commons, in supporting the impeachment of several high court officials, and in procuring the banishment of the king’s mistress, Alice Perrers. March was a member of the administrative council appointed by the same parliament after the death of the Black Prince to attend the king and advise him in all public affairs. On the accession of Richard II, a minor, in 1377, the earl became a member of the standing council of government; though as father of the heir-presumptive to the crown he wisely abstained from claiming any actually administrative office. The most powerful person in the realm was, however, John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster, whose jealousy of March led to the acceptance by the latter of the lieutenancy of Ireland in 1379. March succeeded in asserting his authority in eastern Ulster, but failed to subdue the O’Neills farther west. Proceeding to Munster to put down the turbulency of the chieftains of the south, March died at Cork on the 27th of December 1381. He was buried in Wigmore Abbey, of which he had been a benefactor, and where his wife Philippa who died about the same time was also interred. The earl had two sons and two daughters, the eIder of whom, Elizabeth, married Henry Percy (Hotspur), son of the earl of Northumberland. His eldest son Roger succeeded him as 4th earl of March and Ulster. His second son Edmund (1376—1409) played an important part in conjunction with his brother-in-law Hotspur against Owen Glendower; but afterwards joined the latter, whose daughter he married about 1402.

Edmund Mortimer (November 9, 1376 - 1409?), second son of the above, is the best-known of the various Edmumd Mortimers. A grandson of Lionel of Antwerp and thus descended from King Edward III of England, he was born at Ludlow Castle in Shropshire. Despite having a good claim to the throne (better than that of Henry Bolingbroke, he supported Bolingbroke and fought for him until captured by the Welsh rebel, Owain Glyndwr in battle. When Henry proved slow to ransom Mortimer, Glyndwr won him over and married him off to his daughter, Katherine, in 1402. They are believed to have had at least four children.

Glyndwr and Mortimer plotted with Henry Percy to depose Henry IV and divide the kingdom of England and Wales in three. However, at some time during the siege of Owen's stronghold of Harlech by the future King Henry V, Mortimer died, possibly of plague.

Edmund de Mortimer, (1391—1425), 5th earl of March and Ulster, son of the 4th earl, succeeded to his father’s claim to the crown as well as to his title and estates on the death of the latter in Ireland in 1398. In the following year Richard II of England was deposed and the crown seized by Henry of Lancaster. The young earl of March and his brother Roger were then kept in custody by Henry IV, who, however, treated them honourably, until March 1405, when they were carried off from Windsor Castle by the opponents of the Lancastrian dynasty, of whom their uncle Sir Edmund Mortimer and his brother-in-law Henry Percy (Hotspur) were leaders in league with Owen Glendower. The boys were recaptured, and in 1409 were committed to the care of the prince of Wales. On the accession of the latter as Henry V, in 1413, the earl of March was set at liberty and restored to his estates, his brother Roger having died some years previously; and he continued to enjoy the favour of the king in spite of a conspiracy in 1415 to place him on the throne, in which his brother-in-law, Richard, Earl of Cambridge, played the leading part. March accompanied Henry V throughout his wars in France, and on the king’s death in 1422 became a member of the council of regency. He died in Ireland in 1425, and as he left no issue the earldom of March in the house of Mortimer became extinct, the estates passing to the last earl’s nephew Richard, who in 1435 was officially styled duke of York, earl of March and Ulster, and baron of Wigmore. Richard’s son Edward having ascended the throne in 1461 as Edward IV, the earldom of March became merged in the crown.