p. 93). At the beginning of 1412 the Beauforts were displaced, and Thomas seems to have supplanted his elder brother in the direction of the government. Under his influence a treaty of alliance was concluded with the Duke of Orleans in May. He was made Duke of Clarence on 9 July, and given the command of the intended expedition. In August he proceeded to France at the head of a force of eight thousand men to assist the Orleanists. He landed at Hogue St. Vast in the Cotentin, and, after capturing various towns from the Burgundians, joined Orleans at Bourges. Eventually the French court arranged that Orleans should buy the English off, and, under an agreement concluded on 14 Nov., Clarence withdrew with his army to Guienne. He was intending to interfere in the affairs of Arragon had not his father's death (20 March 1413) compelled him to return to England (Goodwin, History of Henry V, p. 9).
Though Clarence was removed from his Irish command, and though in the royal council he continued to support an alliance with the Orleanists against the Burgundians, he was personally on good terms with his brother. He was confirmed as Duke of Clarence in the parliament of 1414, and was present in the council which considered the preparations for the war on 16–18 April 1415 (Nicolas, Proc. Privy Council, ii. 156). He was ordered to hold the muster of the king's retinue at Southampton on 20 July (Fœdera, ix. 287). When the Cambridge plot was discovered, Clarence was appointed to preside over the court of peers summoned to consider the process against Richard of Cambridge and Lord Scrope. He sailed with the king from Portsmouth on 11 Aug., landing before Harfleur two days later. In the siege he held the command on the eastern side of the town. Like many others, he suffered much from illness, and after the fall of Harfleur was appointed to command the portion of the host which returned direct to England. In May 1416 Clarence received the Emperor Sigismund at Dartford. Monstrelet incorrectly ascribes to Clarence the command of the fleet which relieved Harfleur in August 1416 (Chron. p. 393). Clarence took part in the great expedition of 1417 which landed in Normandy on 1 Aug. He was appointed constable of the army, and, in command of the van, captured Touque on 9 Aug., and led the advance on Caen. This town was carried by assault on 4 Sept., the troops under Clarence's command scaling a suburb on the north side. After the fall of Caen he was sent to besiege Alençon in October, and in December rejoined the king before Falaise. In the spring of 1418 he was employed in the reduction of central Normandy, capturing Courtonne, Harcourt, and Chambrais. In the summer he joined in the advance on Rouen, was present at the siege of Louviers in June and of Pont de l'Arche in July, and in August took up his post before Rouen at the Porte Cauchoise. Immediately after the fall of Rouen in January 1419 Clarence was sent to push on the English advance, and in February took Vernon and Gaillon. The capture of Mantes and Beaumont followed, and after the failure of negotiations with the French court and the capture of Pontoise, Clarence commanded a reconnaissance to the gates of Paris at the beginning of August. In May 1420 he accompanied his brother to Troyes, and, after Henry's marriage, took part in the sieges of Montereau and Melun. He accompanied the king at his triumphal entry into Paris on 1 Dec. After Christmas Clarence went with Henry to Rouen, and on his brother's departure for England at the end of January 1421 was appointed captain of Normandy and lieutenant of France in the king's absence. Shortly afterwards Clarence started on a raid through Maine and Anjou, and advanced as far as Beaufort-en-Vallée, near the Loire. Meantime the dauphin had collected his forces, and, being joined by a strong force of Scottish knights, reached Beaugé in the English rear on 21 March. Clarence, on hearing the news next day, at once set out with his cavalry, not waiting for the main body of his army. He drove in the Scottish outposts, but was in his turn overwhelmed, and, together with many of the knights who accompanied him, was slain. His defeat was due to his own impatience and his anxiety to win a victory which might compare with Agincourt. After his death the archers, under the Earl of Salisbury, came up and recovered the bodies of the slain (Cotton. MS. Claud. A. viii, f. 10 a). Clarence's body was carried back to England and buried at Canterbury. The English mourned him as a brave and valiant soldier who had no equal in military prowess (Gesta Henrici Quinti, p. 149).
Clarence had no children by his duchess Margaret, daughter of Thomas Holland, duke of Surrey and earl of Kent [q. v.], and widow of his uncle, John Beaufort, earl of Somerset. He had, however, a bastard son, Sir John Clarence, who was old enough to be with his father at Beaugé, and who afterwards took part in the French wars in the reign of Henry VI.
[Annales Henrici Quarti ap. Trokelowe, Blaneforde, &c.; Royal and Historical Letters of Henry IV; Walsingham's Historia Anglicana
