General Notes

Gilbert de Gant, son of Baldwin, Earl of Flanders, by Maud, sister of William the Conqueror, accompanied his uncle into England and, participating in the triumph of Hastings, obtained a grant of the lands of a Danish proprietor named Tour, with numerous other lordships. This Gilbert happened to be at York, anno 1069, and had a narrow escape when the Danes in great force, on behalf of Edgar Etheling, entered the mouth of the Humber and, marching upon that city, committed lamentable destruction by fire and sword, there being more than 3,000 Normans slain. Like most of the great lords of his time, Gilbert de Gant disgorged to the church a part of the spoil which he had seized, and amongst other acts of piety restored Bardney Abbey, co. Lincoln, which had been utterly destroyed many years before by the Pagan Danes, Inquar and Hubba. He m, Alice, dau. of Hugh de Montfort, and had issue, Hugh, who assumed the name Montfort; Walter, his successor; Robert, Lord Chancellor of England, anno 1153; and Emma, m. to Alan, Lord Percy. This great feudal chief d. in the reign of William Rufus. [Sir Bernard Burke, Dormant, Abeyant, Forfeited, and Extinct Peerages, Burke's Peerage, Ltd., London, 1883, p. 227, Gant, Earls of Lincoln]NOTE: Both Burke and Brian Tompsett agree that Baldwin, [6th] Count of Flanders, was Gilbert's father. However, I cannot find any reference to William the Conqueror having a sister named Maud - the only documented sister I find is Adelaide. Brian Tompsett shows Baldwin VI "the Peaceable," Count of Flanders and Artois, and Richilda, Countess of Hainault and Namur, as the parents of Gilbert, and that's what I'm sticking with.