TRENCHARD, Thomas (1616-58), of Wolveton House, Charminster, Dorset.

The career of Thomas Trenchard must be read in conjunction with that of his father, the influential county figure Sir Thomas Trenchard*, whom he outlived by only six years. Thomas Trenchard’s disparate kinship group included such important local figures as his uncle John Trenchard*, cousins by marriage, John Bingham* and William Sydenham*, and uncles by marriage, Sir John Strangways*, Nicholas Strangways*, Sir John Rodney and John Browne I*. Trenchard also dealt financially with men such as the future royalist James Gould*, a former mayor of Dorchester, who bought lands in the town from Trenchard and his father in May 1639.10C54/3235. Trenchard was returned as MP for Bridport on March 1640, although his family had no obvious connection with the borough.11C219/42/89; Dorset RO, DC/BTB/EF3. There is no record of Trenchard having taken an active part in the Short Parliament, and he did not acquire another seat in the following November. During the first civil war, though nominally a supporter of Parliament, Trenchard seems to have shared the neutralist tendencies of his father, and Dorset royalists expected him to cooperate with the king’s forces when they overran the county in the summer of 1643. In a letter urging Poole to surrender to the king in July 1643, the turncoat William Constantine* claimed that, ‘Mr Thomas Trenchard and divers others have submitted and are received’, adding that ‘such as he have good reason for it, or they had not done it’.12Bodl. Tanner 62, f. 170v. Although Constantine was soon proved wrong, there are other indications that Trenchard’s allegiances were compromised. Even if, as seems likely, the Thomas Trenchard who was among those appointed to carry the Dorset clubmen’s petition to the king in June 1645 was not the MP, there is no doubt that in the early months of 1646 he was making strenuous attempts to preserve the estate of his royalist relative, Susanna Strangways (wife of Giles Strangways*).13Bayly, Dorset, 264; Dorset RO, D/FSI/233(ii), unfol.

Trenchard’s father had become reconciled with the parliamentarians long before his election as a recruiter MP in November 1645, and Thomas clearly benefited from this change of position. Despite his earlier ambivalence towards the cause, Trenchard was now able to arrange marriages for various of his children with influential parliamentarians. His son and heir, also Thomas, married Anne, daughter of Thomas Erle* of Charborough, and his daughter, Anne, married Walter Erle, another member of the same family.14Hutchins, Dorset iii. 326-7. In the spring of 1646 Trenchard was appointed keeper of a walk in Cranborne Chase by the 2nd earl of Salisbury (William Cecil*), in a deal brokered by his cousin, John Fitzjames*.15Alnwick, Northumberland MS 547, ff. 28-9, 80v. Trenchard and Fitzjames continued to work together in a variety of concerns, including the management of Cranborne Chase, the sale of dean and chapter lands, and the settlement of local disputes, over the next few years.16Alnwick, Northumberland MS 547, f. 80v; 548, ff. 26, 86, 87v; 551, ff. 30, 42v, 48. After the death of his father in 1652, Thomas Trenchard took over the role of leader of the family interest, and was appointed JP on the Dorset commission in July of that year.17C231/6, p. 241. He signed the election indenture for Dorset in July 1654 and was appointed to the gaol delivery commission for Poole in February 1655.18C219/44, unfol.; C181/6, p. 95.. In August 1656 Trenchard joined Fitzjames, Sir Walter Erle* and Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper* in an attempt to manage the return of Dorset MPs to the second protectorate Parliament, but, despite being fielded as a possible candidate, he himself was not elected.19Alnwick, Northumberland MS 551, ff. 89v, 94v.

Trenchard died in 1658 and was buried at Charminster.20Charminster par. reg. His will, drafted the previous year, shows his concern to provide for his extensive family, including his three brothers, and for his sister’s family. The largest bequests were a £2,000 portion for his daughter, Anne, and £1,500 for each of his children to reach majority or to marry, while the bulk of the estate went to his eldest son, Thomas. Trenchard’s widow received a life-interest in the family’s mansion at Lytchett Matravers, near Poole.21PROB 11/276/696. Trenchard was the father of three Restoration MPs for the borough of Poole: Thomas Trenchard I, John Trenchard and Henry Trenchard.