{104} Ruvigny Addition: Henry IV & Essex Descents for Maj-Gen. Desmond A.B. Clarke (1912-1986)

Maj-Gen. Desmond Alexander Bruce Clarke,
C.B., C.B.E. (1912-1986)
[Image courtesy of Desmond Clarke]

Having examined the maternal Petre ancestry of guest blogger Desmond Clarke, it's time to turn to his paternal ancestry. His father, Desmond Alexander Bruce Clarke, "had a distinguished war record, having been Mentioned in Dispatches four times, awarded the Belgium Croix de Guerre with palm and appointed an OBE and a Chevalier of the Order of the Crown of Belgium." He was appointed to the Royal Horse Artillery in 1937, joining C Battery RHA at Trimulgherry in India. C Battery moved in May 1939 to Helmieh, Egypt to form, with two other batteries, 4th Regiment RHA. Young Capt. Clarke was a member of the polo team that won the Cairo Christmas Cup in 1939. 4th Regiment fired the first guns in anger at the start of the Western Desert Campaign in June 1940, and Capt. Clarke received his first Mention in Dispatches. "He served throughout the campaign both at regimental duty and on the staff and was briefly captured at the Fall of Tobruk in June 1942 before managing in the subsequent chaos to escape.  He then served in India, briefly taking part in the Burma campaign, before returning to England early in 1943 and joining the planning staff for the Normandy landings.  In August 1943, as a young lieutenant colonel, he was appointed Adjutant and Quartermaster General of the 59th (Staffordshire) Division and later, in the same role, with the 43rd (Wessex) Division.  He fought with these divisions from Normandy to the Baltic and the surrender of Germany in May 1945." After the War, Capt. Clarke held a number of key staff appointments and commanded two regiments: in 1956, he was sent briefly to Australia to join Sir William Penny, who headed Britain’s nuclear programme, and witnessed at close quarters an atomic bomb explosion, which experience he was then asked to discuss in a tour of the British Army of the Rhine. After attending the Imperial Defence College in 1959, Clarke was "appointed Brigadier in charge of administration and briefly, during the first Iraqi dispute with Kuwait, acting chief of staff of Southern Command which included the Army’s strategic reserve." He was "promoted Major-General in 1962 and for four years, first at the War Office and from 1964 at the new Ministry of Defence, he was the Army’s director responsible for an eclectic mix of personnel functions: discipline, military law and legal matters; the provost services; conditions of service; the welfare of single and married soldiers and their families; pay and allowances and ceremonial, including Army bands."

State Funeral of Sir Winston Churchill, January 30, 1965

Maj-Gen. Clarke was responsible for organizing in 1965 both the state funeral for Sir Winston Churchill and the 150th anniversary celebrations for the Battle of Waterloo. The major-general was well-known for going into battle on behalf of the Army and the ordinary soldier. "On one occasion, he famously refused to leave the Treasury until they agreed to provide the required funding!" He was appointed Commander of the British Empire in 1961 and a Companion of the Bath in 1965. "His favourite additional appointments during his service were as a Commissioner of the Royal Hospital Chelsea 1962–66 and as a member of the executive committee of the National Army Museum for ten years until 1972." He retired from the Army in November 1966, and died twenty years later. [Primary source, and all quoted material: Desmond Clarke, Footnotes: A Personal History, private manuscript, pp. 2-6.]

Denzil Robert Noble Clarke
(1908-1985)

Maj-Gen. Clarke's elder brother, Denzil Robert Noble Clarke, had his own distinguished career, becoming Chairman of British American Tobacco from 1966 to 1970. "Mr. Clarke is a chairman who reached the top after a long hard slog up through the ranks...he followed an English education at Stonyhurst by going to a firm of chartered accountants. He joined BAT in the very year of his qualification, 1932. His work on the accounting side gave him ample opportunity to travel in the US, the Far East, and Europe." During the War, Denzil Clarke worked for Intelligence, in South East Asia Command, becoming a Lieutenant Colonel, and was for many years a member of the Special Forces Club. After his wartime service, he "rejoined BAT and worked on up from Assistant Finance director, to a seat on the board, and the Deputy chairmanship. Then in 1966...took over the reins as chairman" ['Future of the tobacco industry', Illustrated London News, August 17, 1968, p. 33; Clarke, Footnotes, pp. 8-9].

Robert and Gladys (née Whyte) Clarke in the Punjab c.1912
[Image courtesy of Desmond Clarke]

The Clarke brothers, along with their sister Beryl Rumboll, were very close throughout their lives, and the three siblings died within sixteen months of each other. The Clarkes were a reasonably prosperous farming family in County Donegal, Ireland, though being strict Presbyterians, thought to have originated in Scotland. Robert Thomas Clarke (1871-1953) "attended the Royal School at Raphoe, a James I foundation.  He went up to Trinity College, Dublin, taking his first degree in classics and winning the Classics Medal.  He later obtained a doctorate of law in jurisprudence and passed the Indian Civil Service exam in 1894, arriving in India on 14 December 1895.  He served as an assistant commissioner in the Punjab before being employed under the Kashmir Durbar as the settlement officer in Baltistan from July 1898 to December 1901.  He was then transferred to the North West Frontier before returning to the Punjab for the next twenty years.  The India Office List records that he was Deputy Commissioner 1st Grade in the Punjab Commission having been DC in Ambala and then Ferozepore" [Clarke, Footprints]. While at a weekend party with the Guinness family in 1907, Robert Clarke met the beautiful, vivacious Gladys Whyte of Dublin, descended from a Catholic gentry family seated at Loughbrickland House in County Down. The couple decided to let love triumph over  their family's religious differences, and travelled to Wales to marry, in order to get around the restrictions on 'mixed' marriages in Ireland. Unfortunately, Robert Clarke's marriage caused a rupture with his parents which was never healed: his mother always refused to receive her Catholic daughter-in-law. Robert Clarke retired from the Indian Civil Service in November 1923, and spent his final years at St Kilda's, his house in Weybridge, Surrey, "a quiet, thoughtful man with a gentle sense of humour," as his grandson Desmond Clarke recalls.

Gladys (née Whyte) Clarke
(1880-1966)

ROBERT THOMAS CLARKE of St Kilda's, Weybridge, Surrey, Indian Civil Service 1894-1923, b. 12 Aug. 1871 Manorcunningham, co. Donegal, Ireland; d. 23 Mar. 1953 St Peter Hospital, Chertsey, Surrey, bur. Weybridge Cemetery, son of Thomas Alexander Clarke of Manorcunningham, farmer (c.1835-1915) and Elizabeth Clarke; m. 25 Sept. 1907 Anglesey, Wales, (MARGARET MARY) GLADYS WHYTE, b. 18 Oct. 1880 Dublin; bap. 25 Oct. 1880 St Andrew Church, Westland Row, Dublin; d. 4 Dec. 1966 Surrey, bur. Weybridge Cemetery, 2nd dau. of Maj. Edward Whyte of Dublin (1839-1904, descended from Henry IV - see Generation A15 below) and his 2nd wife Catherine Mary Codd (1857-1909), and had issue, two sons and one daughter.

Issue of Robert Thomas and Gladys (Whyte) Clarke:

1) DENZIL ROBERT NOBLE CLARKE of Puffins, Wokingham, Berkshire, Chairman British American Tobacco 1966-70, b. 9 July 1908 Bengal, bap. 5 Aug. 1908 St Michael Cathedral, Shimla, Bengal; d. 30 July 1985 Puffins; m. 24 Jan. 1942, ISMAY ELIZABETH PRESTON, b. 14 June 1912 Westminster, London; d. 20 Dec. 2001 Puffins, est dau. of Lt-Col. Hon. Richard Martin Peter Preston (1884-1965, descended from Charles II) and his 1st wife Belle Hamblin (d. 1936), and had issue, one son and two daughters (with eight grandchildren).

2) BERYL ELIZABETH KATHLEEN MARY CLARKE, b. 19 June 1910 Rathdown, co. Dublin; d. 23 June 1986 Surrey, bur. Weybridge Cemetery; m. by 1938, CHARLES RICHARD RUMBOLL of Buenos Aires, Argentina, accountant, b. 24 Oct. 1908 Buenos Aires, bap. 30 Dec. 1908 St John Anglican Church, Buenos Aires; d. 13 Sept. 1984 Surrey, son of Ernest Large Rumboll of Buenos Aires (1872-1953) and Kathleen Isabel Wellesley Shaw (1884-1970), and had issue, two sons (with six grandchildren).

Madeleine (née Petre) Clarke
(1913-2005)

3) Maj-Gen. DESMOND ALEXANDER BRUCE CLARKE, C.B., C.B.E., of Caldbeck, Cumberland, b. 15 July 1912 Kasauil, the Punjab, India; d. 22 Nov. 1986 Cumberland; m. 19 Jan. 1944 Surrey, MADELEINE MARIE ETHEL PETRE, VAD Nurse WWII 1939-44, family history author, b. 16 June 1913 Portsmouth, Hampshire; d. 4 Jan. 2005 Chichester, Sussex, 2nd dau. of RAdm. Walter Reginald Glynn Petre of Pinecroft, Weybridge, Surrey (1873-1942, descended from Charles II) and Agnes Marie Cadic (1880-1963), and had issue, three sons and two daughters (with thirteen grandchildren and (to date) eleven great-grandchildren).

It is through the Catholic Whytes of Loughbrickland that the Clarke siblings derive their descents from the Plantagenet monarchs. In fact, the Clarke siblings and their mother should have been included in Ruvigny's 1908 Essex volume, and Line B below is their descent from Isabel (née Plantagenet), countess of Essex. Line A is the 17-generation descent from Henry IV through his illegitimate granddaughter Antigone, countess of Tancarville, for Maj-Gen. Desmond Clarke.

1st Duke of Gloucester -
see Generation A1

Henry IV had a yst son:
A1) Humphrey of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Gloucester (1390-1447) m. 2) Eleanor Cobham (c.1400-1452, possible mother), and had
A2) Antigone of Lancaster, illegit. (b. c.1420) m. 1) Henry Gray, 2nd Count of Tancarville (1420-1450, descended from Edward I), and had
A3) Elizabeth Gray (c.1439-aft.1495) m. Sir Roger Kynaston of Hordley (d. 1495), and had
A4) Ermine Kynaston m. John Eyston of Ruabon, and had
A5) Elizabeth Eyton m. John Trevor of Plas Einion, and had
A6) Edward Trevor of Brynkinalt Hall m. Jane Lloyd, and had
A7) John Trevor of Brynkinalt Hall m. Margaret fetch Richard, and had
A8) Sir Edward Trevor of Brynkinalt Hall (c.1585-1649) m. 2) Rose Ussher (c.1590-1623), and had

Rose (née Trevor) Purcell
- see Generation A10

A9) Marcus Trevor, 1st Viscount Dungannon (1618-1670) m. 1) Frances Whitechurch (c.1618-1656), and had
A10) Hon. Rose Trevor (c.1650-1684) m. Nicholas Purcell, 13th Baron of Loughmoe (1651-1722, descended from Edward III), and had
A11) MARY PURCELL, b. c.1684; d. unknown; m. 1704, Col. JOHN WHYTE of Leixlip Castle, co. Kildare, b. c.1690; d. 1741, son of Col. Charles Whyte of Leixlip Castle and his 2nd wife Mary Newcomen (descended from Edward I), and had
A12) CHARLES WHYTE of Leixlip Castle, b. 1714; d. 29 Nov. 1784; m. 24 Dec. 1751, ANASTASIA DUNNE, b. c.1732; d. unknown, dau. of Edward Dunne of Brittas (c.1695-1765) and Margaret Wyse, and had
A13) JOHN WHYTE of Loughbrickland House, co. Down, b. 1752; d. 4 Jan. 1814 London, England, bur. 10 Jan. 1814 St Giles in the Fields, London; m. 15 Feb. 1776, LETITIA DE BURGH (see B16 below), and had

Capt. Nicholas Whyte -
see Generation A14

A14) Capt. NICHOLAS CHARLES WHYTE of Loughbrickland House, b. 18 Jan. 1783; d. 28 Feb. 1844; m. MARY LOUISA SEGRAVE, b. c.1800; d. 29 June 1877, est dau. of Thomas Segrave of Dublin (d. 1817, descended from Edward III) and Anne Grehan, and had
A15) Maj. EDWARD WHYTE of East Monkstown, co. Dublin, Major Royal Canadian Rifles Regiment 1868-70, military correspondent Irish Times, b. 1839; d. 10 Dec. 1904 East Monkstown; m. 2nd 1878 Rathdown, co. Dublin, CATHERINE MARY CODD, b. 30 Mar. 1862 Strickland House, Dublin; d. 21 Sept. 1909 Kingstown, co. Dublin, dau. of Francis Codd of Dublin (1808-1867) and Margaret Anne Ryan (d. 1882), and had
A16) (MARGARET MARY) GLADYS WHYTE (1880-1966-see details above) m. Robert Thomas Clarke of Weybridge (1871-1953), and had
A17) Maj-Gen. DESMOND ALEXANDER BRUCE CLARKE (1912-1986-see details above)

Edward III had a second surviving son,

Isabel (née Plantagenet), Countess
of Essex - see Generation B5

B1) Lionel of Antwerp, 1st Duke of Clarence (1338-1368) m. 1) Lady Elizabeth de Burgh (1332-1363, descended from Edward I), and had
B2) Lady Philippa Plantagenet of Clarence (1355-1377) m. Edmund Mortimer, 3rd Earl of March (1352-1381), and had
B3) Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl of March (1374-1398) m. Lady Alianore Holland (1370-1405, descended from Edward I), and had
B4) Lady Anne Mortimer (1388-1411) m. Richard of York, 3rd Earl of Cambridge (1385-1415, descended from Edward III), and had
B5) Lady Isabel Plantagenet (1409-1484) m. 2) Henry Bourchier, 1st Earl of Essex (1404-1483, descended from Edward III), and had
B6) William, Lord Bourchier (c.1428-1477) m. 2) Lady Anne Woodville (c.1448-1489), and had
B7) Cecily Bourchier (c.1473-1493) m. John Devereux, 2nd Lord Ferrers of Chartley (1464-1501, descended from Edward I), and had

2nd Earl of Essex -
see Generation B11

B8) Walter Devereux, 1st Viscount Hereford (c.1491-1558) m. 1) Lady Mary Grey (c.1492-1538, descended from Edward III), and had
B9) Sir Richard Devereux of Lamphey (by 1513-1547) m. Lady Dorothy Hastings (c.1520-1566, descended from Edward III), and had
B10) Walter Devereux, 1st Earl of Essex (1539-1576) m. Lettice Knollys (1543-1634, descended from Edward III), and had
B11) Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex (1565-1601) m. Frances Walsingham (1567-1632, descended from Edward I), and had
B12) Lady DOROTHY DEVEREUX, b. 20 Dec. 1600 Walsingham House, London; d. 30 Mar. 1636 Blatherwyck Hall, Northamptonshire, bur. 5 Apr. 1636 Holy Trinity Church, Blatherwyck; m. 1st 18 May 1615 St Lawrence Pountney, London, Sir HENRY SHIRLEY, 2nd Baronet of Staunton Harold, b. 4 Jan. 1589 Somerton, Oxfordshire; d. 8 Feb. 1633 Staunton Harold Hall, Leicestershire, bur. 9 Feb. 1633 St Mary & St Hartulph Church, Breedon on the Hill, Leicestershire, son of Sir George Shirley, 1st Baronet of Staunton Harold (1559-1622) and his 1st wife Frances Berkeley (1564-1595, descended from Edward III), and had

Letitia (née de Burgh) Whyte
- see Generation B16

B13) LETTICE SHIRLEY, b. c.1618; bur. 25 Sept. 1655 St Mary & St Hartulph Church, Breedon on the Hill; m. c.1640, as his 1st wife, WILLIAM BURGH, 7th Earl of Clanricarde, b. c.1610; d. 4 Oct. 1687, son of Sir William Burgh (c.1580-1626, descended from Edward I) and Joan O'Shaughnessy (descended from Edward I), and had

B14) JOHN BURGH, 9th Earl of Clanricarde, b. 1642; d. 17 Oct. 1722; m. Oct. 1684, MARY TALBOT, b. c.1661; d. 27 June 1711, bur. 28 June 1711 Meelick Friary, co. Galway, dau. of James Talbot of Mount Talbot House (d. 1691, descended from Edward I) and Bridget Bermingham (d. 1699, descended from Edward I), and had
B15) Hon. THOMAS BURGH of Lackan House, co. Roscommon, b. c.1695; d. 14 July 1763 Cloghan, co. Offaly (per Gentleman's Magazine); m. 1747, MARY EUSTACE, b. c.1725; d. 17 Dec. 1762, dau. of Alexander Eustace, and had[*1]
B16) LETITIA DE BURGH, b. c.1753; d. by 1813; m. 15 Feb. 1776, JOHN WHYTE of Loughbrickland House (see A13 above)

Ruvigny's account of Hon. Thomas Burgh on p. 80 of his 1908 Essex volume

[*1] Ruvigny wasn't aware of any descendants of Hon. Thomas Burgh, as indicated on p. 80 of his 1908 Essex volume. Though the Clanricarde article in Burke's Peerage merely states that Thomas died without male issue, Lodge's Peerage of Ireland (1789) provides the list of his three daughters and coheirs: 1) Mary de Burgh, b. c.1748; d. unknown; m. 12 Sept. 1770 St Mary Pro-Cathedral, Dublin, as his 3rd wife, Michael Aylmer of Lyons House, co. Kildare, b. c.1728; d. 6 Aug. 1808 Brussels, Belgium, yr son of Gerald Aylmer of Lyons House (d. 1729, descended from Edward I) and Mary Moore, and had issue; 2) Helen de Burgh, b. c.1750; d. unm.(?); 3) Letitia de Burgh (see Generation B16 above).

The next blogpost, the final one in the series on the ancestry of guest blogger Desmond Clarke, will cover the remaining Edward III descents for Maj-Gen. Desmond Clarke.

Cheers,                         ----Brad