of Arms in Ordinary in December 1540, and was advanced to the office of Richmond Herald of Arms in Ordinary later in that same month. At the death of William Fellow, Norroy King of Arms, in December 1546, Dethick was nominated to succeed him, but it was not until the reign of Edward VI, on 16 August 1547, that his appointment was confirmed by letters patent. At the death of Sir Christopher Barker, Dethick was promoted to Garter Principal King of Arms on 20 April 1550. On 14 April 1549 Dethick was granted a knighthood. Dethick served his monarch in many capacities. It is presumed that he was an excellent linguist. He was sent on several missions to the Danish court to reclaim ships and was also sent to the Duke Cleves to negotiate the marriage of his daughter, Ann, with Henry VIII. He was also sent to represent Henry at the Diet of Ratisbon. He was rewarded by Henry VIII with a mansion and acre of land at Poplar, in the parish of Stepney, where his descendants resided for almost two centuries. In 1547 Sir Gilbert accompanied Lord Protector Somerset in his expedition against the Scots, and in 1549 he delivered a summons to surrender to rebels in Kent, Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk. He and William Flower, Chester Herald of Arms in Ordinary, accompanied William Parr, 1st Marquess of Northampton, in his 1551 mission to Paris, to invest Henry II of France with the Order of the Garter. Both officers of arms received ten shillings per day for food and lodging. During the reigns of both Mary and Elizabeth, Dethick was sent abroad on diplomatic missions, and at home it became his duty to proclaim declarations of war and treaties of peace. As the public voice of the monarch, he may have held an exalted view of his own dignity. Sir Gilbert Dethick was "unmanageable when a herald, very unsociable, insolent and tempestuous," according to Mark Noble's History of the College of Arms, p. 186, 201. Sir Gilbert died in London 3 October 1584, and some records infer he was buried in the Church of St Benet Paul's Wharf. However, he is listed in St Paul's Cathedral on a monument in the crypt, as one of the important graves lost in the Great Fire of London in 1666. Arms See also Pursuivant Herald King of Arms References Citations Bibliography