#5621, Thomas William COKE 1st Earl of Leicester

Thomas William was the 1st Earl of Leicester of the 2nd creation. His father was Wenman Roberts (1717-11/4/1776) who assumed the name of Coke in 1750 on the death of his uncle. Thomas William's mother was Elizabeth Chamberlayne-Denton who died in 1810.

Thomas William Coke and his wife Lady Anne Amelia Keppel had five sons and a daughter.

The earldom of Leicester was first
created in 1107, but whenever an
earl dies without a son to inherit the
title it lapses and can then be granted
to an entirely unrelated family. Over
the centuries this happened three times
before Thomas was created earl in
1744. Previous Earls of Leicester had
included Simon de Montfort, champion
of the barons against the crown in the
13th century, and Queen Elizabeth I’s
favourite, Robert Dudley.
The Coke family has no connection with
any of these earlier Earls of Leicester.
Thomas Coke’s only son died before
him so the peerage once again fell
into abeyance when he died in 1759. The
hall and estate passed to his great-nephew,
a commoner, who was always known as
‘Coke of Norfolk’. In 1837, when he was
83, the title was re-created for him. In the
meantime, however, it had been granted
to a rival local family, the Townshends of
Raynham, an estate only a few miles away.
T. W. Coke’s official title was therefore
‘Earl of Leicester of Holkham’ and until the
Townshend line died out in 1855, there
were two Earls of Leicester living near to each other.
In each creation, the numbering of the
earls started afresh. In Holkham history,
Thomas Coke is known as the 1st Earl,
T. W. Coke became the 1st Earl
of the 2nd creation and his
descendants are the 2nd to 7th
Earls. This numbering is helpful
as five of the earls were named
Thomas William Coke.