Theodore Paleologus (Junior)

Theodore Junior was eldest surviving son of Theodore Paleologus and his wife Mary Balls, baptized on 30 April 1609.[3] In his youth, Theodore Junior lived with his father and his siblings at Tattershall in Lincolnshire, England, since his father served the hated and feared Earl Henry Clinton as Master of the Horse. When Clinton died in 1616 and their father left Lincolnshire, possibly being evicted by the new Earl (Thomas Clinton), the whereabouts of the children are unknown. What likely transpired was that the children were placed in the service of some household of higher class, a common practice in regards to adolescents at the time. It is also possible that the family lived with Mary's relatives, the Balls family.[4]

In 1619, Theodore the elder is known to have lived in Plymouth with Mary and documents confidently place Theodore Junior in the city as well, at least as early as 1623.[5] By 1628, Theodore Junior, aged nineteen, was again away from his family, making his own life elsewhere.[6] He is next attested in 1631, the same year his mother died, as a witness in a lawsuit against Richard Grenville. Theodore was apparently a friend of Grenville, described in court papers as "Theodore Palaeologus of Tavistock, gent, aged twentyone, who gave evidence that he had been present on 1 April the previous year when Sir Richard paid over money to redeem some jewels pawned by his wife Dame Mary". According to Theodore himself, he had known Grenville since 1623 and as he had been fourteen in 1623, the Grenvilles were likely the family he had served in his adolescence.[7]

Grenville was imprisoned, but fled to Germany, where he would earn the nickname "Skellum", derived from the German "scheim", meaning "scoundrel". Grenville returned to England years later, in order to join the 1640 army raised by King Charles I against the Scots during the Bishops' Wars. Serving in this army, he would have met Theodore (now at the age of 31) again, as they are both listed as lietuenants of the army led by Algernon Percy, the Earl of Northumberland. Like his father before him, Theodore Junior now served as a professional soldier. The campaign against the Scots ended in defeat and Theodore is then listed, in the same year, as present in the regiment of Jacob Astley at Yorkshire.[8]

Soon thereafter, The English Civil War (1642–1651) erupted, forcing nobles across the country to choose either to fight for the royalists (Cavaliers) or the parliamentarists (Roundheads).[8] Even though both Grenville and Theodore's brothers, John Theodore and Ferdinand, were Cavaliers, Theodore sided with the rebels. By June 1942, his name was on the Reformado List, the parliament's list of officers who were entitled to be payed half their wage even when not employed. Soon after, a "Theo Paholigus" (a misspelling of Theodore's name) is listed as a captain lieutenant in a foot regiment raised in Oxford by Oliver, Lord of St John of Bletso.[9]

Theodore did not survive the war, dying in 1644, aged 35, by then having the rank of lieutenant colonel. Although his cause, time and place of death is unknown, by tracking the movements of his company, it can be assumed that he died of camp fever, a miserable way to die, during the early stages of the long Siege of Oxford.[10] He was buried in the St. Michael's Chapel[11] of the Westminster Abbey, a distinguished burial site, on 3 May 1644.[1][10] Theodore's body was spared the fate of many of the burials conducted in the abbey by the parliamentarists. Many graves were exhumed on the orders of Charles II after the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, with the corpses suffering symbolic executions and their heads being impaled on spikes.[12] Theodore's grave was one of only seven parliamentarist graves spared this fate, but whether it was because he was a simple soldier or because his grave was unmarked at the time is unknown.[13] The present marker for his grave, which reads "THEODORUS PALÆOLOGUS 1644", was laid down by Arthur Penrhyn Stanley in the 19th century.[11]