The last time we saw Thomas of Woodstock he was one of the Lords Appellant, working to curtail the administration of his nephew, Edward the Black prince's son King Richard II. In this he was opposing his older brothers, John of Gaunt Duke of Lancaster and Edmund Langley Duke of York.
Thomas was the youngest child of Edward III and Philippa of Hainault. He was born 7 January 1355 at Woodstock Palace (hence his surname). He was the second Thomas: there had been a son named Thomas earlier who did not survive long after childbirth. At 19 in 1374 he was married to Eleanor de Bohun, 11 years younger than he and the daughter of the 7th Earl of Hereford. Eleanor and her younger sister, Mary, were co-heiresses of their father.
The sisters' father had died in 1373, and Thomas and Eleanor were given the responsibility to raise Mary, who at that point was only perhaps four years old. Thomas decided that Mary's upbringing should be dominated by religious instruction, pressuring her to become a nun. He kept her at his castle in Essex, Pleshey, which had come to him via marriage (Pleshey had been in the Bohun family since 1227). The plan was for her to enter a convent, leaving the inheritance wholly to Eleanor and Thomas.
Thomas' older brother, John of Gaunt, also had his eye on the Hereford estates, and decided Mary would be a match for his son, Henry. (Henry was very literate, his father was a patron of poets (like Geoffrey Chaucer), and the Bohun family had an extensive library and was one of the foremost creators of books in England at the time. I'm not saying that was the reason for the match, but it certainly was an enhancement to her status.) John of Gaunt and Mary's aunt managed to sneak Mary out of Pleshey and out of Essex, where she could marry Henry Bolingbroke (in 1381).
Thomas had plenty of titles without becoming Earl of Hereford. He was Duke of Aumale, Duke of Gloucester, Earl of Buckingham, and Earl of Essex. We may come back to him some day, but for now let's return to Henry Bolingbroke and his bride.
