1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Constable, Sir Marmaduke

CONSTABLE, SIR MARMADUKE (c. 1455–1518), English soldier, was descended from a certain Robert (d. 1216), lord of Flamborough, who was related to the Lacys, hereditary constables of Chester, hence the surname of the family. A son of Sir Robert Constable (d. 1488), Marmaduke was in France with Edward IV. in 1475 and with Henry VII. in 1492. He was sheriff of Staffordshire and Yorkshire, was in high favour with Henry VII. and Henry VIII., and led his kinsmen and retainers to the battle of Flodden in 1513. He was twice married, and left several sons when he died on the 20th of November 1518. In Flamborough church one may still read a rhyming epitaph describing Constable’s life and prowess.

Sir Marmaduke’s eldest son, Sir Robert Constable (c. 1478–1537), helped Henry VII. to defeat the Cornish rebels at Blackheath in 1497. In 1536, when the rising known as the Pilgrimage of Grace broke out in the north of England, Constable was one of the insurgent leaders, but towards the close of the year he submitted at Doncaster and was pardoned. He did not share in the renewal of the rising which took place in January 1537; but he refused the king’s invitation to proceed to London, and was arrested. Tried for treason, he was hanged at Hull in the following June.

Sir Marmaduke’s second son, Sir Marmaduke Constable (c. 1480–1545), was knighted after the battle of Flodden, and was at the Field of the Cloth of Gold in 1520. He was a knight of the shire for Yorkshire and then for Warwickshire, and was a member of the Council of the North from 1537 until his death. Another noteworthy member of this family was the regicide, Sir William Constable (d. 1655), who was created a baronet in 1611. A member of the Long Parliament, he fought with distinction among the parliamentarians at Edgehill; in 1644 his military enterprises in north Yorkshire were very successful, and later he guarded the king at Carisbrooke, and was governor of Gloucester. He was one of the king’s judges, was a member of the council of state under Cromwell, and died in London on the 15th of June 1655.