Thomas Blood

Thomas Blood, soldier and conspirator and possible Government double agent, was born in about 1617 in Co.Meath in Ireland but we know nothing about his family. He fought in the civil wars in England and Ireland but his claim to be a Colonel is dubious. He died in his house in the Bowling Alley (now Tufton Street) in Westminster on 24th August 1680 and was buried on 27th in the New Chapel burial ground. This area was an overflow churchyard for St Margaret's Church Westminster and burials there were recorded in their registers. It was also called the Broadway chapel and is now a garden on the corner of Broadway and Victoria Street. (It is strange that in the burial register a note in a later hand against the entry of burial for Mr Robert Blood in 1674, also buried in the New Chapel,  says "he that stole the crown" so the clerk was confused between the two).

He married Mary, daughter of Colonel Holcroft, in Lancashire and they had six children  - Thomas (who became a highwayman and pre-deceased his father), Holcroft (who fought with the Duke of Marlborough and married Elizabeth Fowler, having an illegitimate son called Holcroft), William, Charles, Mary and Elizabeth. The family was in Ireland from about 1651 until around 1660. He was involved in the Dublin Plot to seize Dublin castle and the Lord Lieutenant. While rescuing his friend and fellow conspirator Captain John Mason on his way to trial in 1667 he was wounded. In 1671 after his unsuccessful attack on the Duke of Ormond he attempted to steal the Crown Jewels from the Tower of London. He took the alias Dr Ayliffe and befriended Mr Edwards the assistant keeper of the jewels and even arranged to marry his daughter. But on the wedding day he and son Thomas with two others overpowered Edwards when he was showing them the jewel house. Secreting the jewels in their clothing they made for their horses, held by a fifth thief outside. But the alarm was given and he was captured. Surprisingly Charles II pardoned him. Later he was mixed up in the Popish Plot and was finally imprisoned in the Gatehouse Prison near the Abbey where he caught a fever and was moved to his house.

Further reading for Thomas and Holcroft

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

His pocket book, taken when he was captured, is in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.