William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk

William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk was an English military commander and statesman who from 1443 to 1450 dominated the government of the weak king Henry VI (ruled 1422–61 and 1470–71).

He was born as a younger son and thus destined to inherit smaller part of his father’s estates. However, both his father and brother died at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, and William succeeded to the earldom of Suffolk. From 1417 he served in all the French campaigns of King Henry V and became one of the most trusted generals of Henry VI. In 1428 Suffolk was made commander in chief of the English army in France, and was recalled to England in 1431. For the next two decades he dominated the government.

In 1449 Suffolk was blamed as responsible for English military losses in France and was banished from the realm for five years. He left England on May 1, 1450, but he was intercepted in the English Channel by some of his enemies and beheaded. Suffolk left a fortune estimated at £50,000, the equivalent of 1.5 % of net national income of £3.3m at the time. In 2010 that would be £16.7 billion.