ALBEMARLE, TITLE OF.
(Vol. ii., p. 442.).
In reply to the question of J., I send you some particulars about Aumerle or Albemarle.
The first Earl of this place, which is the name of a small town or territory in Normandy, was Otho, descended from the Earls of Champagne, and nearly related to William the Conqueror, to whom he fled for protection, having killed a great person in that country, and obtained this earldom and the Isle of Holderness, in Yorkshire, for his maintenance. The title remained in the heirs of Otho till the death of William, eighth Earl of Albemarle, 44th Henry III., when it reverted to the Crown, with the lordship of Holderness, and in the 9th of Richard II. he granted them to Thomas of Woodstock, summoned to parliament as "Thomas, Duke of Albemarle, the king's loving uncle."
Without enumerating the different persons upon whom our kings subsequently conferred this title as often as it became extinct or vacant, it will be sufficient for our purpose to show, that at the Restoration the dukedom of Albemarle was given to General Monk, who, according to Banks (D. and E. Peerage, vol. iii. p. 37.), had a certain degree of hereditary pretension to the name
by which he was ennobled, inasmuch as he was descended from Margaret, eldest daughter and co-heir of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick and Albemarle; but this is not satisfactorily made out in Banks' table. At all events, the dukedom became again extinct on the death of Christopher Monk, the second Duke of Albemarle, in 1688, S.P.; but the name was once more revived in 1695-6, by William III., in favour of Arnold Joort Van Keppel, Lord of Voorst, who had attended the king in several campaigns, and was his Master of the Robes, and on the 10th of February in that year created "Earl of Albemarle in Normandy;" the title having been doubtless selected as one so frequently enjoyed by persons of the highest consideration, and not in any way resting upon an hereditary claim.
Braybrooke.
Audley End.