HOWARD, Thomas (1619-1706), of Charlton, Wilts.

The great difficulty in reconstructing this period in the life of this MP is the endless confusion with his cousin Thomas†, son of the 2nd earl of Suffolk (Theophilus Howard†). Both men were of a similar age, may have seen active service as royalist army officers during the civil war and spent time in exile. But what is certain is that it was this man, a younger son of the earl of Berkshire, who briefly sat for Wallingford in the Long Parliament.

Howard owed his election as the Wallingford MP to his father’s office as the town’s high steward and the fact that the original election result had been overturned. Once elected, he proved to be an inactive Member. It was not until early 1642 that he began to make any noticeable impact at Westminster and then it was his alleged actions outside the House that attracted attention. In the second week of January 1642 the mood in Parliament was particularly jittery. The king had failed in his abortive attempt to arrest the Five Members and had now withdrawn from the capital. The fear was that his supporters might follow his example of precipitate action. It was against this background that on 12 January the Commons received information that Sir Thomas Lunsford had been gathering a force at Kingston-upon-Thames and that he had been joined by Howard. Orders were issued demanding that the two of them come to Westminster to explain themselves.8CJ ii. 372a, 373a; PJ i. 40, 44, 46. Two days later Howard appeared before the House to deny the story. His claim that he had not been present at Kingston was accepted, with John Moore* recording that he thought Howard had ‘cleared himself very well’.9PJ i. 66, 70, 74. Even so, Howard’s sympathies were clearly with the king. He probably ceased attending altogether and he was absent when the House was called the following June.10CJ ii. 626n; PJ iii. 481. As armed conflict became imminent, he was named by the king as one of the commissioners of array for Berkshire.11Northants. RO, FH133, unfol.

Which of the two cousins served as a colonel during the civil war is still unclear; both Thomas Howards have been identified as such and it may be that their careers have been conflated.12Newman, Royalist Officers, 201; HP Commons 1660-1690, ‘Thomas Howard’. One of them applied for and obtained a pass from the Lords in early 1643 to permit travel to France.13LJ v. 606a, 695b, vi. 49a That the other Thomas Howard was allowed to visit his sister, Lady d’Aubigny, in prison in August 1643 might perhaps suggest that it was the MP who wanted the pass.14CJ iii. 191a. Equally, the fact that this visit was permitted could suggest that it was the MP who was the ‘Colonel Howard’ who had been fighting for the king the previous month in Gloucestershire, reportedly with a force of 50 Walloons and Dutchmen.15HMC Portland, iii. 112.

In January our Thomas Howard took his seat in the Oxford Parliament and so became one of those MPs expelled by the Commons at Westminster on 22 January 1644.16CJ iii. 374a. Five days later he was among those MPs at Oxford who signed the letter to the parliamentarian commander, Robert Devereux, 3rd earl of Essex.17Rushworth, Hist. Collns. v. 573. The Committee for Advance of Money fined him £1,200, but, in his absence, did not proceed against him.18CCAM 436. It seems more likely that he was the Colonel Thomas Howard whose regiment of horse, along with that of Henry Percy*, 1st Baron Percy, was operating in Berkshire in the spring of that year.19CSP Dom. 1644, p. 54; Luke Letter Bks. 652. That, in turn, makes it more likely that it was the former MP who commanded one of the cavalry regiments that fought on the losing side at Naseby on 14 June 1645.20Symonds, Diary, 182; Mems. of Prince Rupert, iii. 104.

Following the collapse of the king’s cause, Howard went into exile in Holland. On 21 November 1646 the Lords granted him permission to make a temporary return visit, and then extended this for a further six weeks on 26 February 1647.21LJ viii. 573b, ix. 38b. (It is known that his cousin was on the continent at that point.22CSP Dom. 1645-7, p. 525.) While in England he quarrelled with his elder brother, Viscount Andover (Charles Howard*), with the result one of them challenged the other to a duel. The Speaker of the Lords, the 2nd earl of Manchester (Edward Montagu†), ordered them to remain in their chambers and on 30 March the Lords appointed a committee to mediate between them. Two days later Manchester reported that their differences had been resolved and the day after that the Lords issued a pass to allow Howard to travel to Holland, effectively telling him to leave the country.23LJ ix. 110b, 117a, 119a. But within a year he was back and again at odds with his relatives. This time his quarrel was with Andover’s nephew, Thomas, Viscount Savage, son and heir of John, 2nd earl Rivers. Also involved was a distant cousin, John Mordaunt, the future 1st Viscount Mordaunt. The Lords appointed another committee in February 1648 to try to settle the dispute.24LJ x. 46b, 78a, 89b. Four months later Howard was one of the ex-royalists whose arrest was ordered by the Derby House Committee on the grounds they had violated the ordinance banning delinquents from London.25CSP Dom. 1648-9, p. 148. His immediate reaction was obtain a pass from the Lords permitting him to travel to Holland.26LJ x. 407a. On 28 September, however, he was given permission to stay for another three months and at about this time he paid bail as an assurance that he would not take up arms against Parliament.27LJ x. 515b; CSP Dom. 1648-9, p. 328. He was evidently still in England 16 months later when the council of state ordered Edward Dendy* to arrest him on suspicion of distributing seditious pamphlets and plotting with other royalists.28CSP Dom. 1649-50, p. 569. A similar order was issued in December 1651. The council agreed to release him on 2 January 1652 on condition that he give two sureties for his good behaviour of £500 each and then go into exile in Holland.29CSP Dom. 1651-2, pp. 65, 83, 90, 548.

His cousin was also there, serving the princess royal as her master of the horse, and most of the mentions of a Thomas Howard in royalist circles during the 1650s do appear to refer to him. The ex-MP may, however, have been the one who discussed plans to seize Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Tynemouth with Sir Edward Nicholas† in the autumn of 1652 and who offered to raise troops for Charles Stuart in July 1653.30CCSP ii. 149, 227. In the summer of 1659 he was keen to travel to Ireland to organise an uprising to parallel that being planned by Sir George Boothe*. The king refused to let him go, however.31CCSP iv. 229, 245. Howard instead returned to England to assist the rebels there. In early September he was reported to have been busy plotting in Nottinghamshire before returning south.32CCSP iv. 365. The following month he took part in Mordaunt’s unsuccessful uprising in Surrey.33CCSP iv. 328-9. Back on the continent once all the plots had unravelled, he assisted Sir Henry Lunsford, the brother of his alleged co-conspirator in January 1642, in his efforts to seek military assistance from the vicomte de Turenne in the event of another royalist uprising in England.34Mordaunt Letter-Bk. 37, 80; T. Carte, A Collection of Original Letters and Pprs. (1739), ii. 230.

Only in 1660 was Howard able to return for good. He showed no interest in seeking re-election to the Commons and it was not until he succeeded his brother as 3rd earl of Berkshire in 1679 that he sat in another Parliament. During the latter decades of his life he was a tory, although he was never active in the Lords.35HP Lords 1660-1715.