The Woodvilles: The Wars of the Roses and England's Most Infamous Family (2 page)

In July 1534, the Duke and Duchess of Bedford sailed back to France.
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The duke’s health steadily declined, and on 14 September 1435 he died.
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Neither of his two marriages had resulted in children, although the duke had two illegitimate children, Mary and Richard,
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and Jacquetta would later prove to be more than adequate at childbearing.

Bedford had made a will in 1429 naming his wife Anne of Burgundy one of his executors; in his final will, made a few days before his death, he did not entrust Jacquetta with this task. This, as Jenny Stratford suggests, was likely because of her youth; certainly the administration of Bedford’s estate would prove to be a lengthy and complicated task.
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Bedford did treat Jacquetta favourably in his will. She received at least 12,000
livres
in goods, including, perhaps, a tablet of gold and beryl, made in the manner of a reliquary, garnished with small pearls, and wrought with images of the Trinity, that the duchess later gave to Henry VI.
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More importantly, Bedford tried to leave his widow a life interest in most of his lands in England, France, and Normandy. For various reasons, including the quirks of English inheritance law and the claims of Bedford’s brother, Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, this proved unworkable, but Jacquetta was by no means left impoverished. Pursuant to her dower rights (a one-third share of Bedford’s lands), she was allowed by the king to enter her lands in England and Calais on 6 February 1436 – on the condition that she not marry without royal permission.
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Michael Hicks has estimated that Bedford’s income in England was over £4,000, giving Jacquetta an income of £1,333.
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Despite her youth – she was still under 20 – Jacquetta proved tenacious in fighting for her rights. Bedford had left her Harcourt, together with the lordships of La Rivière Thibouville and Le Neubourg, but the council overrode the duke’s wishes and granted Harcourt instead to Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset. By the time the grant to Beaufort took effect on 23 December 1435, however, Jacquetta was actively administering her lands at Harcourt. As ‘Duchess of Harcourt’, she ordered a sale of woods, while at La Rivière Thibouville, she ordered that repairs be made to mills. Beaufort ultimately gained possession of Harcourt in 1537, but Jacquetta continued to press her claim in the courts. She had better fortune with La Rivière Thibouville and Le Neubourg, which she retained until their loss to the French in 1444.
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During this time, Jacquetta’s lands were not her only preoccupation. By 23 March 1437, she had remarried.
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She had not sought the king’s permission, and her husband was not whom one would have expected.

Richard Woodville, Esquire – we shall call him Squire Richard when necessary to distinguish him from his son by the same name – was the second son of John Woodville, who served as Sheriff of Northampton on several occasions in the late fourteenth century as well as in Parliament. He was the offspring of John Woodville’s second marriage to Isabel, widow of Robert Passelaw.
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According to Richard Neville, who ‘rated’ Squire Richard’s son for his low birth years later, Squire Richard was brought up with Henry V.
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He served in France and in 1423 became the Duke of Bedford’s chamberlain. Following Bedford’s death, he was appointed Lieutenant of Calais. The following year, he was made constable of Rochester Castle.

Squire Richard was married to Joan Bittlesgate. The couple had two children, named, naturally and confusingly, Richard and Joan. On 18 July 1429, Squire Richard entered into a marriage settlement with William Haute of Kent for William to marry Richard’s daughter Joan. Squire Richard gave his daughter a marriage portion of 400 marks and agreed to pay the costs of the wedding, which was to take place at Calais. Joan was also to bring a ‘chamber’, meaning her personal effects and goods suitable for a gentlewoman of her estate. William, in turn, was to settle a jointure of 100 marks and dower of £40 on his bride.
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As for Squire Richard’s son, he would make his own marriage arrangements.

The first we hear of the younger Richard Woodville is on 19 May 1426. On that day at Leicester, the Duke of Bedford knighted the 4-year-old king, who in turn had knighted a number of other men and boys, including Richard Woodville (whom we may now call Sir Richard). Ironically, one of the other young men knighted on that date was Richard, Duke of York, whose son would marry Sir Richard’s daughter.
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Although it is sometimes uncertain which Richard Woodville is being referred to, it seems to be Sir Richard who in 1429 served as the captain of 100 men at arms and 300 archers in France, and who on 9 March 1429 received a payment of 100 marks for bringing a payment of wages to Philip, Duke of Burgundy.
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He was a knight bachelor in the Duke of Bedford’s retinue in 1435.
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That same year, he is said to have been taken prisoner by the French when the English besieged Gerberoy, but he was free by May 1436, when he was serving in the retinue of William de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk.
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It was probably in the latter half of 1436 that Sir Richard’s thoughts turned from war to love. As Richard was associated with Bedford’s retinue, he would have had ample opportunity to make the acquaintance of his new duchess, Jacquetta, but when this happened, or when the couple began their romance, is unknown. All we know is that by March 1437, Jacquetta, breaking the condition that she not remarry without royal permission, had secretly married Sir Richard, the son of Bedford’s chamberlain. Monstrelet reported that Jacquetta’s uncle Louis and her other friends were indignant at the match, given that Richard, though ‘beautiful and well-formed in his person’, was much below the social status of Jacquetta and her first husband, but there was nothing they could do about the matter.
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The last comment is curious; perhaps Jacqueline’s marriage had come to light due to a visible pregnancy.

The reaction across the Channel was far more muted, although it is hard to imagine that Squire Richard was less than delighted at the news that his son had landed a duchess as a wife. In the petition the couple brought before Parliament, they claimed that they had ‘suffered very great hardship both personally and as regards their property’ for their actions, but this language may have been formulaic.
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In the event, on 23 March 1437, Parliament fined the couple £1,000, but as Lucia Diaz Pascual points out, this was standard practice for noblewomen who married without royal licence. Katherine Neville, Duchess of Norfolk (whom we shall encounter later) would be given the same fine in 1442, as had Margaret, Lady Roos, in 1423.
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Once the business of the fine was out of the way, Richard Woodville’s career continued uninterrupted. He was made chief rider of Salsey Forest in Northampton on 11 July 1437.
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In 1439, he was among those troops coming to the relief of Meaux.
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He was back in France in July 1441, this time coming to the relief of Pontoise.
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Richard was active not only on the battlefield but on the tournament field – an avocation which he was to pass to at least three of his five sons. In 1439, he and Thomas Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk, jousted at the Tower of London at Shrovetide.
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His jousting took on an international flavour at Smithfield in November 1440, where Richard’s opponent was Peter de Vasques of Spain. The king, a spectator, cried ‘hoo’ – thereby bringing the combat to a halt – when the men had finished fighting with their poleaxes.
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A medieval wife’s primary role was to produce children, and Jacquetta excelled at this task. She and Richard would see twelve of their children live to adulthood; a couple of others died in early childhood. The following handwritten note by Robert Glover, Somerset Herald, to a late fifteenth-century visitation may indicate the birth order of the Woodville children:

    Richard Earl Ryvers and Jaquett Duchess of Bedford hath issue Anthony Earl Ryvers, Richard, Elizabeth first wedded to Sir John Grey, after to King Edward the fourth, Lowys, Richard Erie of Riueres, Sir John Wodeuille Knight, Iaquette lady Straunge of Knokyn, Anne first married to the Lord Bourchier son and heir to the Earl of Essex, after to the Earl of Kent, Mary wife to William Earl of Huntingdon, John Woodville, Lyonell Bishop of Sarum, Margaret Lady Maltravers, Jane Lady Grey of Ruthin, Sir Edward Woodville, Katherine Duchess of Buckingham
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No birth dates were recorded for any of Richard and Jacquetta’s children, so it is unclear when the babies started arriving. Elizabeth, Edward IV’s future queen, is said to have been born in 1437, making her the couple’s first child, but the 1437 date is highly questionable. It is based solely upon a portrait, labelled ‘Elizabeth Woodville 1463’, which states that Elizabeth was aged 26. Elizabeth’s circumstances in 1463, as we shall see later, were not conducive to having her portrait painted, however, so it is likely that the label was based on a mistaken recollection of when Elizabeth became queen. It is quite possible, then, that Anthony Woodville, not Elizabeth, was Richard and Jacquetta’s first child. Anthony, the first child named in Glover’s list, was listed in his mother’s 1472 post-mortem inquisition as being ‘of the age of thirty years and more’, which would put his birth date at around 1442, but the ‘more’ allows plenty of hedge room and leaves open the possibility that he was born earlier.
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With other children we are on more sure ground. John Woodville was described in 1465 as being 20 years old, placing his birth year at around 1445.
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Lionel was described as being in his 29th year in 1482, so he was probably born around 1453.
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The youngest child was probably Katherine, who is named in her brother Richard’s 1492 post-mortem inquisition as being ‘34 or more’, placing her birth year at about 1458.
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Edward’s career is consistent with his being one of the younger Woodville children, as is his name; he was likely named for Henry VI’s son, born in October 1453. Although an inquisition post-mortem identifies Richard Woodville as being 35 or more in 1486, which would place his birth date around 1451, his career makes it likely that he fell well into the ‘or more’ category; he was old enough to require a pardon in 1462.
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On 10 June 1440, Jacquetta and Richard acquired a place to house their growing family – the manor of Grafton in Northampton.
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Squire Richard’s brother Thomas had left Squire Richard the hundred of Cleley and land in Grafton, but not the manor itself, which was in the hands of the de la Pole family. Thomas may have been leasing the manor.
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Squire Richard himself seems to have been primarily associated with the Mote in Maidstone, Kent. It was in Maidstone that he was buried, although his tomb no longer exists.
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The Mote came into the hands of Sir Richard and Jacquetta sometime after 29 November 1441, when Squire Richard, having made his will on that date, died.
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In 1444, Henry VI, now in his twenties, chose a bride: Margaret of Anjou, the daughter of René, Duke of Anjou, and Isabelle, daughter of Charles II, Duke of Lorraine. Margaret was a niece by marriage to the French king, Charles VII, and her marriage was brokered in exchange for a truce. A Frenchwoman like Margaret, Jacquetta had family ties to the new queen: her sister was married to Margaret’s uncle, Charles of Anjou. Jacquetta and her husband were among the large party sent in November 1444 to escort Margaret to her new home in England: Alice de la Pole, Marchioness of Suffolk, whose husband William headed the escort, ordered that a boat, the
Swallow
, be reserved for Jacquetta and her retainers. Sir Richard managed with a smaller boat.
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