Thomas Arnold (abt. 1468 - 1545)

Born about 1 Jan 1468 in Llanthony, Monmouthshire, Wales

Ancestors

Husband of Agnes (Warnsted) Warnestead — married 1494 in Bagbere,Milton Abbas,Dorset, England

Descendants

Died 15 Sep 1545 at about age 77 in Churcham, Gloucestershire, England

This person is part of a false pedigree of William Arnold, the immigrant to New England, created by Horatio G. Somerby in 1870. Individual parts of the pedigree may be correct, but many of the parts are incorrect and false. See below.

Original Biography on this Profile

The Coat of Arms Blazoned: Per pale Azure and Sable, three fleurs-de-lis Or (for Ynyr). Gules a chevron ermine between three pheons Or (for Arnold) Crested: A demi-lion rampant gules, holding between its paws a lozenge. Motto: Mihi gloria cessum

Sir Thomas ARNOLD, Esq., born Jan 01 1468 in Llanthony, Monmouthshire (Sir Fynwy), Wales, buried in Westbury, Gloucestershire, England, died 15 Sep 1545 in Churcham, Gloucestershire, England (He was the 18th generation from the original founders of England.) He married Lady Agnes Warnestead, daughter of Sir Richard Warnestead. • Thomas was NOT the father of William (the first of the line in the American Colonies) • The Thomas Arnold who settled in Rhode Island was NOT William's half-brother.

Children: a) Richard ARNOLD, Lord of Bagbere born 1494 b) Eleanor ARNOLD born in 1496 in Bagber, Dorset, England. She died in 1497. c) John ARNOLD, of Hinghan and Over; died Sept.15, 1545.

Sources

An excellent source of information about the first five generations of this line of the Arnolds in America is the Arnold Memorial, by Elisha Stephen Arnold. Published in 1935, it corrects many of the errors made by earlier researchers about the first William Arnold, his parents, and his half-brother, Thomas--who remained in England. References to William Arnold and his son, William Arnold can be found in the History of Warren, Rhode Island in the War of the Revolution, by Virginia Baker. Note that Warren, Rhode Island was previously a part of Swansea, Massachusetts, which accounts for L.H. Evert's statement, in his History of Bradford County, Pennsylvania, that William Arnold came from "Swansea" to Warren Township, Bradford County, Pennsylvania in 1797.

Arnold, Elisha Stephen, “The Arnold memorial: William Arnold of Providence and Pawtuxet, 1587-1675, and a genealogy of his descendants”, Rutland, VT, Tuttle Publishing Company, 1935.

The Somerby Biography

Thomas Arnold, Esq., succeeded to Llanthony and other estates in Monmouthshire. He married Agnes, daughter of Sir Richard Warnestead, Knight.^[1][2]

Children:

1. John, of Hinghan and Over; died Sept. 15, 1545.^[1][2]
2. Richard, ^[1][2]

Rejection of the Somerby Biography

From Wikipedia:
In 1870, genealogist Horatio G. Somerby compiled a pedigree^[3] of the Arnold family. This pedigree, showed William Arnold as son of a Thomas Arnold and a descendant of a 12th-century King of Gwentland (in modern day Wales) whose name was Ynir. In 1915, Edson S. Jones on checking Somerby's information with his sources, discovered discrepancies in dates and places, mixed up generations and unrelated people. "This fabricated research was not an isolated incident; Mr. Somerby had also been implicated in other fraudulent research and was out to please his clients regardless of the veracity of his work"^[4]

From Anderson's Great Migration:
In 1915 Edson Salisbury Jones published a brief account^[5] of his research into the ancestry of immigrant William Arnold (NEHGR 69:64-69), which showed the problems of the supposed pedigree done by Somerby, which did not have the correct father or location of William Arnold the immigrant. Anderson states unequivocally, "The pedigree prepared by Somerby is completely erroneous, and William Arnold came from Ilchester, Somerset"^[6]

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2} "Arnold" hosted by rootsweb
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2} Drowne, Henry T. (communicator). "Mr. Somerby's Genealogy of the Arnold Family" New England Hist. and Gen. Register. 33:432. 1879.
3. ↑ ”Mr. Somerby’s Genealogy of the Arnold Family. New England Historical and Genealogical Register 33:432 Link at Google Books
4. ↑ 'The false pedigree of the Arnold family' in the Wikipedia article "William Arnold (settler)"
5. ↑ Jones, Edson Salisbury. "The Parentage of William Arnold and Thomas Arnold of Providence, R. I." New England Historical and Genealogical Register 69:64 Link at Archive.org
6. ↑ Great Migration 1634-1635, A-B. (Online database. AmericanAncestors.org. New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2008.) Originally published as: The Great Migration, Immigrants to New England, 1634-1635, Volume 1, A-B, by Robert Charles Anderson, George F. Sanborn, Jr., and Melinde Lutz Sanborn. Boston: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1999. William Arnold article p. 84; comments p.89 American Ancestors (pay site)

• Visitation of Gloucestershire Page 4: Arnold