Nicholas Knowles, 3rd Earl of Banbury

rdf:langString Nicholas Knowles, 3rd Earl of Banbury

rdf:langString Earldom of Banbury

rdf:langString Baron Knollys

rdf:langString Viscount Wallingford

rdf:langString Azure, crusilly of 12 cross-crossletts, a cross moline, voided or.

rdf:langString In utrumque paratus

rdf:langString Nicholas Knowles, Knollis or Knollys, 3rd Earl of Banbury, (3 January 1631 - 14 March 1674) was an English nobleman who sat in the House of Lords but was excluded from the Long Parliament, thus precipitating the famous “Banbury Case” which remains partly unresolved to this day. The Banbury case was notorious both for its long duration and for the fact that it involved the bastardisation of children without an accompanying Parliamentary divorce. William Knollys, 1st Earl of Banbury, had died apparently childless, aged 85, in 1632. His widow, the Catholic Lady Elizabeth Howard, over thirty years his junior, had quickly married Edward Vaux, 4th Baron Vaux of Harrowden, also a Catholic, and soon after produced two young children who had undoubtedly been born during her first husband’s lifetime and who, she claimed, were William’s lawful issue. The case fell into abeyance during the English Civil War and the Commonwealth of England, but when Lady Elizabeth’s son Nicholas attempted to take his seat in the Convention Parliament (1660) leading up to The Restoration, his legitimacy was successfully challenged by his peers. There followed the presentation and scrutiny of at least eight petitions by Nicholas and his descendants, before their claim of his legitimacy was finally defeated in 1813, although the Committee merely reported that the petitioner had not discharged the burden of proof that lay upon him and so left the way open for a future claim.

rdf:langString Boughton Hall, Harrowden Hall.

rdf:langString William Knollys, titular 8th Earl of Banbury

rdf:langString Heirs male of the first earl's body lawfully begotten