1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Milo of Gloucester

MILO OF GLOUCESTER, lord of Brecknock and earl of Hereford (d. 1143), was the son of Walter of Gloucester, who appears as sheriff of that county between 1104 and 1121. Milo succeeded his father about the latter year. He was high in the service of Henry I. between 1130 and 1135, and combined the office of sheriff with that of local justiciar for Gloucestershire. After the death of Henry I. he declared for Stephen, at Whose court he appears as constable in 1136. But in 1139, when the empress Matilda appeared in England, he declared for her, and placed the city of Gloucester at her disposal; he was further distinguished by sacking the royalist city of Worcester and reducing the county of Hereford. In 1141, at Matilda’s Coronation, he was rewarded with the earldom of Hereford. He remained loyal to the empress after her defeat at Winchester. John of Salisbury classes him with Geoffrey de Mandeville and others who were non tam comites regni quam hostes publici. The charge is justified by his public policy; but the materials for appraising his personal character do not exist.

See the Continuation of Florence of Worcester (ed. B. Thorpe, 1848–1849); the Cartulary of Gloucester Abbey (Rolls series); and J. H. Round’s Geoffrey de Mandeville (1892).