Thomas Fitz-Christopher Plunket

Sir Thomas Fitz-Christopher Plunket (c.1407-1471) was a leading Irish lawyer and judge of the fifteenth century who held office as Lord Chief Justice of Ireland. He was an ancestor of the Duke of Wellington in the female line.

He was born in County Meath, the third of seven sons of Sir Christopher Plunket, who married in 1403 Janet Cusack, the heiress of Killeen Castle, Dunsany. Christopher was created 1st Baron Killeen about 1426, and founded a prominent Anglo-Irish dynasty. It was said that Thomas was "bred to the law": he and his younger brother Robert were the first two of numerous lawyers and judges in the Plunket family.

Thomas became Serjeant-at-law (Ireland), who at that time was the senior legal adviser to the Crown, in 1434. He was entrusted with levying subsidies in 1447, and with surveying the royal mines in 1450. He was made a justice of assize in County Meath, and was entrusted with the defence of the county in 1456. There is some evidence that he was admitted to Lincoln's Inn in 1452-3, although the name is spelt "Blonket" in the records.

During the Wars of the Roses Thomas, like most of the Anglo-Irish gentry of the Pale, was a supporter of Richard of York; he accompanied him to England in 1460 and was knighted. After the triumph of York's son, King Edward IV in 1461, Plunket was appointed Lord Chief Justice, but was forced to contest the position with his predecessor, Sir Nicholas Barnewall. He was reappointed in 1463 and confirmed in office in 1468 jointly with John Chevir.

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