Thomas Gorges

Sir Thomas Gorges was an English courtier and landowner whose career placed him close to Elizabeth I’s household. Born in 1536 into the Gorges family of the West Country, he became a Groom of the Privy Chamber and undertook a range of court and administrative duties. His position brought him into contact with senior royal servants and with the queen’s female household, including the Swedish-born Helena Snakenborg, widow of William Parr, Marquess of Northampton, whom Gorges married in 1576.

Gorges’s royal service included politically sensitive assignments. In 1586 Francis Walsingham sent him to Chartley during the final proceedings against Mary, Queen of Scots, and he assisted with the transfer of Mary and the arrest of her secretaries. He also sat in Parliament and developed the estate at Longford in Wiltshire, where he and Helena built the distinctive Longford Castle. Under James I the couple received offices connected with Richmond Palace and its park. Gorges died in 1610 after more than three decades of court service.

In Sandra Byrd’s Roses Have Thorns, Her marriage to William Parr gives her rank at court, but widowhood and a later attachment to Thomas Gorges must be negotiated under a queen who closely controls the marriages and loyalties of her attendants.