Thomas Blood

Colonel Thomas Blood (1618 – 24 August 1680) was an Anglo-Irish officer and self-styled colonel best known for his attempt to steal the Crown Jewels of England from the Tower of London in 1671. Described in an American source as a "noted bravo and desperado," he was known for his attempt to kidnap and, later, to kill, his enemy, the Duke of Ormonde. He had switched allegiances from Royalist to Roundhead during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, and despite his subsequent notoriety received a Royal free pardon and found favour at the court of King Charles II.

Sources suggest that Blood was born in County Clare, in the Kingdom of Ireland, the son of a successful land-owning blacksmith of English descent, and was partly raised at Sarney, near Dunboyne, in the County Meath. He was apparently a Protestant Presbyterian. His family was respectable and prosperous (by the standards of the time); his father held lands in the Counties Clare, Meath and Wicklow. His grandfather was a member of the Irish Parliament, and had lived at Kilnaboy Castle (also in County Clare). He received his education in Lancashire, England. At the age of 20, he married Maria Holcroft, the daughter of John Holcroft, a gentleman from Golborne, Lancashire, and returned to Ireland.

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