A WHO’S WHO OF TUDOR WOMEN: U-Z

compiled by

Kathy Lynn Emerson

to update and correct

her very out-of-date

WIVES AND DAUGHTERS, THE WOMEN OF SIXTEENTH-CENTURY ENGLAND (1984)

NOTE: this document exists only in electronic format

and is ©2008-10 Kathy Lynn Emerson (all rights reserved)

ANNE UNTON

see ANNE SEYMOUR

DOROTHY UNTON
see DOROTHY WROUGHTON

DINGHEN VAN DEN PLASSE (d.1565+) (maiden name unknown)
Dinghen, Dingen, or Dingham Van Den Plasse, Van Den Passe, or Vanderplasse was born in Taenen in Flanders (some sources say Brabant), where her father was a knight, but his name has not been preserved. In 1564 or 1565, Dinghen and her husband, William Van Den Plasse, fled to England to escape religious persecution. To support her family, Dinghen set up as a starcher and soon set a new court fashion for starched ruffs. Her handiwork was first seen at the wedding of Ann Russell to Ambrose Dudley in November 1565. Starch soon replaced wire supports and was so popular that Dinghen could charge £5 to teach others the art of starching. For 20s more she would show them how to manufacture the starch.

VANE

see FANE

ANNE VAUGHAN (c.1535-c.1595)

Anne Vaughan was the daughter of Stephen Vaughan (d. December 25,1549) and his first wife, Margery Gwynneth or Guinet (d.October 1544). Vaughan’s second wife (d.1557) was also named Margery. She was the widow of Henry Brinklow (d. c. January 20,1545/6), a London mercer who was also famous as an evangelist and as a pamphleteer. Both Margery Vaughans were royal silkwomen. Anne stepmother is generally credited with providing Anne’s education and influencing her religious beliefs. Anne married Henry Locke (Lock; Lok) (d.1571), another London mercer. They had three sons and a daughter, including Henry (1553-1608), Michael, and Anne. By 1552, both were followers of John Knox. When Mary Tudor became queen, Knox was concerned about their safety and urged them to leave England. Locke remained in England but sent his wife and two youngest children to Geneva. They arrived there in May 1557 and remained there until after Mary Tudor’s death. Some accounts say that her daughter died during their exile. Others indicate Anne Locke grew up and married, so perhaps it was the unnamed son who died. Thirteen letters from Knox to Anne Locke, written between 1556 and 1562 are extant. Later, when she provided printer John Field with Knoxiana, rumormongers claimed that Knox had lured her away from her husband. In 1560, Anne Locke translated John Calvin’s Sermons upon the Song that Ezechias made after he had been sick and afflicted by the Hand of God. After she was widowed, Anne Locke married a second time in 1572, taking as her husband Edward Dering (1540-June 26,1576), a preacher with Puritan leanings. In late 1573, Dering described his wife as “rich in grace and knowledge.” Dering died of tuberculosis at Thoby in Essex at the height of his fame. His widow had married a third time by 1583, this time to an Exeter merchant named Richard Prouze or Prowse (d.1607), by whom she had at least two sons. In 1590, Anne Prouze’s translation of John Taffin’s Of the Marks of the Children of God was published. Biography: There is more information on the Locke family in Mary Prior, ed., Women in English Society 1500-1800; Oxford DNB entry under "Locke [née Vaughan; other married names Dering, Prowse], Anne."

ANNE VAUGHAN

see ANNE PICKERING

ELIZABETH VAUGHAN

see ELIZABETH ROYDON

JANE VAUGHAN (d.1610)

Jane Vaughan was probably the daughter of Cuthbert Vaughan (c.1519-July 23,1563) and Elizabeth Roydon (1523-August 19, 1595), even though they were noted puritans and she was a recusant. Jane married Thomas Wiseman of Braddocks, Essex (1528-December 7,1585), by whom she had eight children: William, Jane (c.1570-July 8,1633), John (1571-1592), Thomas (1572-1596), Robert, Anne (d.1650), Barbara (d.1649), and Bridget (1582-1627). In January 1593, she was indicted for hearing mass at Braddocks in September 1592. She had had lived there with her son William (sometimes called Walter) and his wife for a time after her husband’s death. In December 1593, her own house at Bullocks was searched for evidence that she’d been harboring priests, and although none were found, it is likely that it is at this point that she was imprisoned. By July 1594, the authorities had learned that all four of her daughters had been sent to the Continent to become nuns. Anne and Barbara joined the Bridgettines and both became abbesses. Jane and Bridget entered St. Ursula’s in Louvain and Jane later became the first prioress of that convent’s English offshoot, St. Monica’s. Since the Jesuit John Gerard was the Wiseman family chaplain in 1591, there was no question of Mrs. Wiseman’s guilt. While in prison, she associated with the priests also being held there and in December 1595 gave first aid to one of them. Charged with “helping and maintaining” priests, she was sentenced to death on July 3, 1598. Reportedly, she was eager to become a martyr, but the sentence was commuted to life in prison and when James I took the throne she was pardoned. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under “Wiseman [née Vaughan], Jane.”

MARGARET VAUGHAN (c.1540-1619)

Margaret Vaughan was the daughter of Charles Vaughan of Hergist, Kington, Hertfordshire and Elizabeth Baskerville of Eardisley. She was said to have been one of the women of Queen Elizabeth’s bedchamber but what position she held is not clear. Sometime after his first wife’s death in 1591, she married Sir John Hawkins (1532-November 12,1595). In March 1595, she sent for Simon Forman the astrologer. This was just before the voyage on which her husband perished. One wonders what the horoscope he drew up for her might have said. At the time Sir John died, his son, Richard Hawkins, had been a prisoner in Spain for some two years. His ransom had been set at £12,000 and Sir John left £3000 in his will to contribute toward that amount. Richard, still a prisoner in June 1602, accused his stepmother of interfering with the payment of this money. He returned to England in January of 1603. Lady Hawkins seems to have maintained her contacts with the court. In 1601, when Mary Fitton was about to give birth to an illegitimate child, she was sent to Lady Hawkins for keeping. The child’s father was sent to the Fleet. Lady Hawkins lived primarily in London, in Mincing Lane, although she had properties elsewhere. She made a detailed will on April 23,1619. It was proved on January 4,1620, indicating that she died between those two dates. She endowed a school, left money and jewelry to a considerable number of relatives and friends, including the countess of Leicester and Lady Mary Wroth, and asked to be buried in St. Dunstans in the East in London “near the monument there erected for my late beloved husband.”

JACQUINETTA, JACQUELINE or JAKLIN VAUTROLLIER (d. 1611) (maiden name unknown)

Jacquinetta Vautrollier was the wife of Thomas Vautrollier (d. July 1587), a Huguenot refugee from Troyes, in the French province of Champagne. He had set up as a printer in London by 1558. He received letters of denization on March 9, 1562 and was admitted to the Stationer’s Company in 1564. He lived and worked in the Blackfriars section of London and records there list the births of Simon, Thomas (d.1608), Daniel, and Manassie (Manassas) Vautrollier between 1570 and 1587. They also had a son named James. In 1580 and 1586, while Vautrollier was in Edinburgh, his wife ran the business in London. After he died, it would not have been unusual for her to take over as printer. Many wives of printers did just that. She was allowed to finish an impression he had begun and print one book, but then an order was issued, dated March 4,1588, by the Court of Assistants. It reads, with spelling modernized, “Mrs. Vautrollier, late wife of Thomas Vautrollier, deceased, shall not hereafter print any manner of book or books whatsoever, as well by reason that her husband was no printer at the time of his decease, as also by the decrees set down in the Star Chamber she is debarred from the same.” Alice Clark, in her Working Life of Women in the Seventeenth Century, suggests that this was because the business had already been transferred to a daughter, also named Jacquinetta. This may explain why records show Jacquinetta Vautrollier printing several more books in 1588, although these may also have been projects left unfinished at Vautrollier’s death. Richard Field (November 1561-November 1624), admitted to the Stationer’s Company on February 6, 1587, married “Jaklin Vautrollier” on January 12, 1589. She was probably Vautrollier’s widow, although some sources call her his daughter. Some also say Field was Vautrollier’s apprentice. Technically, he was apprenticed to George Bishop, but he served the first six of seven years of his apprenticeship in Vautrollier’s printing shop. A son, Richard Field, was born in 1590. In about 1600, Field moved from Blackfriars to the parish of St. Michael in Wood Street at the sign of the Splayed Eagle. He was a prominent member of the Stationer’s Company. Jacquinetta was probably the "Field's wife" who was buried in Blackfriars on March 9, 1611. After Field's death his widow, Jane, by whom he had three sons and two daughters, was permitted to continue printing books but after a short time sold out to one of Field’s apprentices.

ANNE VAUX (July 1562-c.1637)
Anne Vaux was the daughter of William Vaux, 3^rd baron Vaux of Harrowden (August 14, 1542-August 20, 1595) and Elizabeth Beaumont (d. August 1562). From 1571, she and her siblings lived at Grace Dieu, Leicestershire with their maternal grandmother, Elizabeth Beaumont (née Hastings; d. 1588). By a deed dated in February of that year, their father agreed to pay £10 a year for the upkeep of each of his daughters for a period of ten years. A dedicated recusant, Anne used the alias “Mrs. Perkins” to hire houses for use as meeting places for missionary priests. She also occasionally impersonated her sister Eleanor Brooksby, to confront the authorities, as Eleanor was exceedingly timid. Anne was arrested when the Gunpowder Plot was uncovered but released soon after. At one point it was thought that she was the one who sent a letter to Lord Monteagle, warning him of the plot, but this is unlikely. She was arrested again the following March and this time confined in the Tower of London. She was released in August 1606. She and her sister, Eleanor (see below) lived quietly at Shoby, Leicestershire for some years but were arrested for recusancy in 1625. After her sister’s death, Anne moved to Stanley Grange, Derbyshire, which became a center of Jesuit activities in England and the site of a school for the sons of the Catholic gentry. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under “Vaux, Anne.”

ELEANOR VAUX (c.1560-1625)
Eleanor Vaux was the daughter of William Vaux, 3^rd baron Vaux of Harrowden (August 14, 1542-August 20, 1595) and Elizabeth Beaumont (d. August 1562). From 1571, she and her siblings lived at Grace Dieu, Leicestershire with their maternal grandmother, Elizabeth Beaumont (née Hastings; d. 1588). By a deed dated in February of that year, their father agreed to pay £10 a year for the upkeep of each of his daughters for a period of ten years. In about 1577, Eleanor married Edward Brooksby of Shoby, Leicestershire (d.1581). They had two children, William (d. June 1606) and Mary (c.1579-1628) and Eleanor adopted a cousin, Frances Burroughs (b.1576) shortly after her husband’s death. At that point she was living in the manor house of Great Ashby, part of her jointure. Her sister, Anne, lived with her. The third sister, Elizabeth, was smuggled out of England in 1582 and became a Poor Clare at Rouen. From 1586, Jesuit Henry Garnet was a regular member of Eleanor’s household, which by that time was situated in Warwickshire. After his arrest, Eleanor was in hiding. In 1625, Eleanor was convicted of recusancy at Leicester and fined £240, but she never paid the fine. She died later that same year. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under “Brooksby [née Vaux], Eleanor.”

ELIZABETH VAUX
see ELIZABETH CHENEY; ELIZABETH ROPER

JOAN or JANE VAUX (c.1463-September 4, 1538)
Joan Vaux, better known as “Mother Guildford,” was the daughter of Sir William Vaux (d.May 4,1471) and Katherine Penyson (1440-1509+). She was a protégée of Margaret Beaufort, countess of Richmond (Henry VII’s mother) and in 1489 married Sir Richard Guildford (1455-September 6,1506) as his second wife. Both the king and queen attended the wedding. She was in the household of Elizabeth of York and by 1499 had become “lady governess” to Margaret and Mary Tudor. She met the great scholar and philosopher Erasmus when he visited the royal children and apparently impressed him during the two conversations she had with him. In 1519, he referred to Joan in a letter to her son, Henry Guildford, as “the noble lady your Mother” and wished her happiness and prosperity. Joan was called upon to wait upon the queen for the arrival of Princess Catherine of Aragon and many years later, when Henry VIII was attempting to divorce Catherine, gave a deposition concerning whether or not Catherine’s first marriage, to Prince Arthur, had been consummated. She reported that they had spent their wedding night together in the same bed, from her personal knowledge, and that she had heard from Queen Elizabeth herself that Arthur and Catherine “lay together in bed as man and wife all alone five or six nights after the said marriage.” Joan's husband, in a move most unusual at that time, made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. When he died there, he was deeply in debt. The previous year he had lost his post as controller of the king’s household due to poor management of money and had spent six months in the Fleet before being released by the king’s order. He was pardoned just before he left England. As his widow, Joan was again one of Margaret Beaufort’s ladies in 1509. By 1510 she had retired and was living on a small pension in a house in Blackfriars. That same year she inherited a life interest in second house, this one in Southwark, along with lands in Norfolk and Suffolk, from Sir Thomas Brandon. She had to pay Brandon’s nephew, Sir William Sidney, twenty marks a year in rent. She leased the Southwark house back to Brandon’s principal heir, Charles Brandon. Lady Guildford was called out of retirement to travel to France with Mary Tudor in 1514. Her dismissal by King Louis, along with most of Mary’s English attendants, on the day after the French wedding ceremony, caused a furor. In particular, Mary objected to sending her “Mother Guildford” away. On October 12, in a letter to Cardinal Wolsey, Mary wrote “I have not yet seen in France any lady or gentleman so necessary for me as she is.” Upon Lady Guildford's return to England, she resumed her retirement. In 1515, she was granted two pensions by the king totaling £60 per annum. In 1519, she was granted for life an annual gift of a tun of duty-free Gascon wine. She also received several New Year’s gifts from the king, including a garter with a gold buckle and pendant in 1531/2, and may have remained at court as a lady-in-waiting to Queen Catherine. She had also remarried, taking as her second husband Anthony Poyntz (1480-1533). After her second husband’s death, Joan retired to the Hospital of St. Mark in Bristol, a house of prayer. A proposed injunction forbidding women to come within the precincts of St. Mark led to a letter to Lord Cromwell in September 1535. This was where she had “a lodging most meetest I have chosen for a poor window to serve God now in my old days.” Under the new rules, she and her woman would be evicted. The reply is missing but in 1536 the hospital was suppressed. Joan returned to her old lodgings in Blackfriars, where she spent the remainder of her life. She was one of the last people to be buried in the convent of the Blackfriars on September 9, 1538. Joan’s only child was Sir Henry Guildford (1489-1532) but in her will, dated August 30, she also left bequests to, among others, a cousin, Sir William Penison, a niece, Bridget Walsh, her nephew, the Lord Vaux (she left him her book of French and her “hanging of tapestry that has his arms”), and Maud, her fool.

KATHERINE VAUX

see KATHERINE PENYSON

ANN VAVASOUR (c.1560-c.1650)

Ann Vavasour was the daughter of Henry Vavasour of Tadcaster, Copmanthorpe, Yorkshire and Margaret Knyvett (b.c.1537). She came to court as a maid of honor, probably sometime in 1580, and on March 23, 1581 scandalized everyone by giving birth to an illegitimate child fathered by Edward de Vere, 17th earl of Oxford (April 12,1550-June 24,1604). Together with the child, named Edward Vere after his father, Ann was imprisoned in the Tower. The date of her release is not known, but by 1588 she was free and had resumed her affair with Oxford. By 1590 she had married a sea captain named John Finch, about whom little is known, and had taken a second aristocratic lover, becoming the mistress of Sir Henry Lee (1533-February 12,1611). She had a second illegitimate child, Thomas Vavasour, alias Freeman, by Lee. In 1605, Lee pensioned off John Finch, granting him an annuity of £20. By all accounts, Lee looked on Ann as his wife, leaving her in his will an income of £700 a year, the use of a house, and money to pay for her burial with him at Quarrendon, Buckinghamshire. The tomb he erected there was for both of them. The church stepped in, however, to object to this plan. By 1618, Ann married John Richardson, but because John Finch was still alive, Ann was charged with bigamy and brought before the High Commission on August 8, 1618. This case dragged on until February 1,1622, when Ann was ordered to pay a fine of £2000. She should have been obliged to perform public penance as well, but was granted a dispensation. Ann is said to have been over ninety years old when she died. She did not marry Sir Richard Warburton (d.1610). He was the husband of another, younger Anne Vavasour, who was brought up in the household of Lucy Harington, countess of Bedford and then was a maid of honor from 1601-3. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Vavasour [married names Finch: Richardson], Anne." Portrait: attributed to John de Critz, c.1605.

FRANCES VAVASOUR (1568-c.1606)
Frances Vavasour was the daughter of Henry Vavasour of Tadcaster, Copmansthorpe,Yorkshire, and Margaret Knyvett (b.c.1537) and the younger sister of Ann Vavasour. Frances came to court as a maid of honor around 1590 and in 1591 secretly married Sir Thomas Sherley or Shirley (1565-1633). At about the same time she had an affair with Sir Robert Dudley and her husband, without mentioning that he already had a wife, was courting Frances Brooke, the widowed Lady Stourton, as if he was free to marry her. In September 1591, the secret marriage was revealed and Sherley was imprisoned until the spring of 1592 as punishment for his deceitful behavior. In 1606, after Frances’s death, Dudley claimed he had married her around 1591 and thus had never been legally married to Alice Leigh. Dudley was trying to free himself from an unwanted marriage in order to wed his mistress, Elizabeth Southwell, with whom he had eloped to the Continent. A. L. Rowse, in Sex and Society in Shakespeare’s Age records a visit by Frances, in July 1600, to inquire who she will marry. This seems unlikely, since by then she had been Lady Sherley for some time. She had three sons and four daughters with her husband, including Cheyney (d.yng.), Henry (d.1627), and Thomas (b. June 30, 1597).

ELIZABETH VENABLES (c.1525-1580+)

Elizabeth Venables was the daughter of Sir William Venables of Kinderton (1480-1541) and Catherine Grosvenor (d.1558). She was married to James Marbery (Marberye/Marbry/Marberry/Marbury) (d. July 25,1558) and both were members of Elizabeth Tudor’s household at Woodstock in 1554. When Elizabeth Sandes was sent away in June of that year, Marbery suggested that his wife be promoted to replace her instead of bringing in a new lady-in-waiting for the imprisoned princess. Elizabeth Marbery was granted a pension of £20 per annum for life at the beginning of Elizabeth's reign and received material for a livery gown (satin guarded with velvet) every Christmas. In 1574, she resigned her pension in exchange for the lease on the manors of Warden and Southill, Bedfordshire, which she received with Thomas Marbery (d.1620), her son. She also had a son named George. Elizabeth was listed as one of the queen’s chamberers in 1570 and as a gentlewoman of the bedchamber in 1580. One genealogy has her remarried, to Christopher Davenport of Swettenham, Cheshire, by 1566, but others make him the second husband of another, later Elizabeth Venables.

INEZ DE VENEGAS (AGNES DE VANEGAS) (1475-1514)
Inez de Venegas was one of Catherine of Aragon’s Spanish ladies. She married William Blount, Lord Mountjoy (1479-November 8, 1534), as his second of four wives, on July 30, 1509 and at that time King Henry VIII wrote on her behalf to Ferdinand of Aragon to claim a legacy from his late wife, Isabella of Castile. Inez still had kin in Spain, but their names are elusive and it is not known if she ever received her legacy. She had no surviving children from her brief marriage.

ANN de VERE

see ANN CECIL

BRIDGET de VERE (April 6, 1584-c.1630)
Bridget de Vere was the daughter of Edward de Vere, 17^th earl of Oxford (April 12,1550-June 24,1604) and Ann Cecil (December 5,1556-June 5,1588). She was brought up by her grandfather, Lord Burghley, who intended, in 1597, that she marry William Herbert, heir to the earl of Pembroke. He refused the match and in April 1599, Bridget married Francis Norris of Rycote, Oxfordshire (July 6,1579-January 29,1622) instead. They had one child, Elizabeth (c.1603-November 1645) and had separated by 1606. In 1621, Norris was created earl of Berkshire. He was contemplating divorce when he committed the crime of elbowing Lord Scrope in the presence of royalty and was sent to the Fleet. Upon his release, he went home to Rycote and killed himself using a crossbow. His estate was then forfeit to the Crown. Bridget died between December 1630 and March 1631.

ELIZABETH de VERE
see ELIZABETH TRENTHAM

ELIZABETH de VERE (July 2, 1575-March 10,1627)
Elizabeth de Vere was the daughter of Edward de Vere, 17^th earl of Oxford (April 12,1550-June 24,1604) and Ann Cecil (December 5,1556-June 5,1588). She was brought up by her grandfather, Lord Burghley, who wanted her to marry Henry Wriothesley, 3^rd earl of Southampton, whose wardship he held. When Wriothesley refused to wed her in 1591, he was fined £5000. After a period as a maid of honor, she married William Stanley, 6^th earl of Derby (1561-September 29, 1642) on June 26,1594 at Greenwich in the presence of Queen Elizabeth. They had waited to be sure his sister-in-law’s posthumous child would be a girl, making his title secure, before they wed. This wedding is sometimes said to have been the occasion for the first performance of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, although there are other contenders. In late 1596 and again in late 1597, Elizabeth was rumored to be having an affair with the earl of Essex. These rumors were probably unfounded. She was the mother of James, 7^th earl of Derby (January 31,1607-October 15,1651), Elizabeth (d. yng.), Robert (d.1632), Anne (d. February 15,1657), and another Elizabeth, who also died young. Portrait: unknown artist.

FRANCES de VERE (1517-June 30, 1577)
Frances de Vere was the daughter of John de Vere, 15^th earl of Oxford (1490-March 21,1540) and Elizabeth Trussell (1496-1559). In the summer of 1532 she married Henry Howard, earl of Surrey (1517-x.January 19,1547), but they lived apart until 1535 because of their youth. According to one of her grandson’s biographers, Frances was also a poet. Her children were clever and well educated, although Frances did not have charge of their education. They were Jane (1537-1593), Thomas (March 10, 1538-June 2,1572), Catherine (1539-April 7,1596), Henry (February 1540-1614), and Margaret (January 1543-March 17,1592). Frances miscarried in 1547, the year her husband was executed for treason. She was ill for some time afterward. By 1553, she had married Thomas Steyning of Woodbridge, Suffolk (d. October 20, 1575+), where she owned the manor of Earl Soham. She was granted nine manors in all by the duke of Norfolk, her father-in-law, after his restoration in 1553. In July, 1554, Frances represented Queen Mary at the christening of the French ambassador’s son and in December 1557 she was chief mourner at the funeral of her sister-in-law, Mary Howard. She was also chief mourner for her daughter-in-law, Margaret Audley, in 1563. Frances had a daughter, Mary, by her second husband, and possibly a son. She died at East Soham. Portrait: sketch by Hans Holbein, 1535.

KATHERINE de VERE (c.1541-January 17, 1600)
Katherine de Vere was the daughter of John de Vere, 16^th earl of Oxford (1512-August 3, 1562) and his first wife, Dorothy Neville (1515-c. January 1548). On February 1, 1548, while still a child, she was promised in marriage to the duke of Somerset's son, Henry Seymour, age seven. This marriage contract was cancelled after Somerset's execution. Katherine instead married Edward, 3^rd baron Windsor (1532-January 24, 1575) and was the mother of Frederick, 4^th baron (February 2, 1559-December 24, 1585), Henry, 5^th baron (August 10, 1562-April 6, 1605), Andrew, Edward, William (b.1566), Catherine (c.1567-December 15, 1640), Elizabeth, and Margaret. On her father’s death, Katherine brought suit against her half brother, claiming that his mother’s marriage to her father had not been valid because there had been a precontract between her father and Katherine’s lady-in-waiting, Dorothy Fosser. Portraits: alone, 1567; with her family, 1568; both by the Master of the Countess of Warwick.

MARGERY de VERE

see MARGERY GOLDING

MARY de VERE (1554-June 24, 1624)
Mary de Vere was the daughter of John de Vere, 16^th earl of Oxford (1512-August 3, 1562) and his second wife, Margery Golding (1525-December 2, 1568). She was sworn in as one of the Privy Chamber in 1576/7. She was soon after reported to be headed for marriage with a "Lord Garrat," possibly a member of the Fitzgerald family, but by July 1577, she was being courted by Peregrine Bertie (October 12, 1555-June 25, 1601). Both families objected to the match, but by December Bertie's mother, Catherine Willoughby, duchess of Suffolk, had been won over. The couple married early in 1578, as evidenced by a letter written by the duchess in March. There were some initial difficulties, but after Bertie succeeded his mother and became 11^th baron Willoughby d’Eresby in 1580, they seem to have worked them out. They lived at first in the Barbican in London, but in 1582 Bertie went to Denmark as ambassador. Mary stayed behind in England. They had daughter who died young and sons Peregrine, Henry, Vere, and Robert (December 16,1582-October 23, 1642). Their second daughter, born in 1586, was to be named Sophia after the queen of Denmark but there was some confusion over gaining permission for the name from Queen Elizabeth and the child ended up being given the name Sophia by one godmother and Katherine by the other. A number of letters from and about Mary are extant and several are reprinted in Cecily Goff's biography of Catherine Willoughby, A Woman of the Tudor Age.

MARY de VERE
see MARY TRACY

SUSAN de VERE (May 24, 1587-January 1629)
Susan de Vere was the daughter of Edward de Vere, 17^th earl of Oxford (April 12,1550-June 24,1604) and Ann Cecil (December 5,1556-June 5,1588). She was brought up by her grandfather, Lord Burghley. At fifteen, she was the subject of a poem by Nathaniel Baxter that lamented her lack of a dowry. She married Philip Herbert (October 16,1584-January 23,1650) at Whitehall on December 27, 1604. It was said to be a love match. The nuptials were celebrated with a masque at court and the king gave the newlyweds land worth £10,000 at Shurland, Kent. Herbert was one of the king’s favorites and the honors and gifts continued to roll in. In 1605, he was created, earl of Montgomery. Susan was at court that year to dance in The Masque of Blackness and both Susan and Philip danced in Hymenaei the following January. They had seven sons and three daughters, three of whom died young. Among the others were Anna Sophia (c.1610-1695), Charles (1619-1636), Philip (1621-1669), James (1623-1579), William, and John. Susan’s niece, Elizabeth Norris, her sister Bridget’s daughter, was living in the earl of Montgomery’s house in 1622, giving rise to rumors that she was his mistress, but Elizabeth’s elopement with Edward Wray early that year tends to cast doubt on that allegation. Like her husband, Susan was a patron of the arts.

ELEANOR VERNEY

see ELEANOR POLE

MARY VERNEY

see MARY BLAKENEY

DOROTHY VERNON (1545-1584)

The name Dorothy Vernon is known to many people otherwise uninterested in Tudor women. They have only to visit Haddon Hall in Derbyshire to hear the story of her elopement and see “Dorothy Vernon’s Bridge” in the garden. Dorothy was the younger daughter of Sir George Vernon (1508-1565), known as “King of the Peak,” and his first wife, Margaret Talboys. There are various accounts of Dorothy’s elopement, and opinions differ as to exactly when it took place, but all agree that Sir George Vernon took a dislike to the man Dorothy wanted to marry. He was Sir John Manners (d.1611), second son of the earl of Rutland. The story goes that the young man disguised himself as a minstrel during a gathering at Haddon Hall. It was either the wedding of Dorothy’s older sister, Margaret (b.1540) to Thomas Stanley (d.1576), second son of the earl of Derby, or a banquet at the end of a hunt, and took place either in 1558 or in 1563. The cruel stepmother of some versions of Dorothy’s elopement is also questionable. In fact, Maud Longford (d.June 14, 1596) was only a few years older than her stepdaughter. Sir George Vernon was more than twice Maud's age. According to her epitaph, Maud made a second match after Sir George’s death “by her own choice/Pleasing herself, who others pleased before.” She married Sir Francis Hastings (d.1610), a younger son of the 2nd earl of Huntingdon, in 1567, giving up her life interest in Haddon Hall to her stepdaughter, Dorothy. Dorothy's children were Sir George (1573-1623), Grace, John (1576-1590), and Sir Roger (d. 1632). Portraits: Dorothy Vernon’s likeness is preserved in the effigy on her tomb in Bakewell, Derbyshire.

ELIZABETH VERNON (1573-1655+)

Elizabeth Vernon was the daughter of John Vernon of Hodnet (1546-1592) and Elizabeth Devereux (c.1541-c.1583). She came to court as a maid of honor, became pregnant, and secretly married Henry Wriothesley, earl of Southampton (October 6, 1573-November 10,1624) at Leez Priory in Essex before August 30,1598. The queen was not pleased. Their children were Penelope (November 1598-July 16,1667), James (1605-1624), Thomas (March 10,1608-May 16,1667), Elizabeth (b.1609), and Mary (1611-1645). Southampton was involved in the earl of Essex’s treason in 1601 but escaped execution. He spent two years as a prisoner in the Tower of London. After his release, both he and his wife were high in favor at the court of James I. In 1647, King Charles took refuge with Lady Southampton at Titchfield in Hampshire after escaping from Carisbrook Castle. Portraits: There are five, including the most famous one, which shows her combing her hair, c.1595-1600. A full length portrait is dated c.1610. Another was painted by Paul van Somer c.1620.

MARGARET VERNON

see MARGARET BASSETT; MARGARET DYMOKE

MARGARET VERNON (c.1475-1538+)
Margaret Vernon the daughter of Sir Henry Vernon of Haddon Hall, Derbyshire (1441-April 13, 1515) and Anne Talbot (c.1445-May 17, 1494). The Victoria County History (1905), online as British History Online, characterizes Margaret as "a scheming and worldly woman with a keen eye for her own advancement and no real love for the little priory over which she ruled." A number of her letters to Thomas Cromwell have been preserved, several of them concerning Cromwell's son, Gregory, who was under Margaret Vernon's supervision at some point, although the letters to his father that mention him are not dated. Gregory had a schoolfellow, Nicholas Sadler, and their tutor, Mr. Copland, with him, and there was also a "little gentlewoman" with Master Sadler. Margaret asked permission to educate her. Gregory Cromwell is usually said to have been born around 1514, Usually young boys did not stay in nunneries past the age of ten, which would place this correspondence before 1524. Margaret was elected prioress of Little Marlow in Buckinghamshire in 1528. In 1529, she wrote to Cromwell to offer a bribe in return for the post of prioress at St. Helen's, Bishopsgate. She did not get the job. Another letter to Cromwell asks when he will be in the neighborhood, as she would like his counsel on several matters. In 1530, there were only six nuns at Little Marlow, including Margaret. In 1535, three of them were dismissed for being under twenty-four years of age (the minimum age at which one could take final vows). One of the nuns dismissed was Katherine Picard, who had complained to Bishop Longland in 1530 that Little Marlow had no sub-prioress. Margaret was left with only two men servants, two women servants, and two nuns, both of whom told commissioners that they wished to enter other houses of religion. After the surrender of Little Marlow on September 23, 1536, Margaret became abbess of Malling. She surrendered Malling on October 28, 1538. Her pension, had she been merely prioress of Little Marlow, would have been £4 or £5. As Abbess of Malling, she received an annuity of £50.

MARY VILLIERS

see MARY BEAUMONT

HELENA VON SNAKENBORG (1548-April 10,1635)

Helena von Snakenborg (Elin Ulfsdotter of Fyllingarum) was the daughter of Ulf or Wulfgang Henriksson Snakenborg of Ostargotland (d.c.1565) and Agneta Knuttson (d.1568+). She came to England as a maid of honor to Princess Cecilia of Sweden on a state visit in the autumn of 1565 and stayed on when Cecilia left in May 1566. She was being courted by William Parr, marquis of Northampton (August 14,1513-October 28, 1571), who had asked her to marry him, even though he was not legally free to remarry. He promised her a house of her own. At that point, Queen Elizabeth stepped in, taking Helena into her keeping at court, possibly as a maid of honor. Later she was a gentlewoman of the privy chamber, although without pay. Helena and Parr finally married in May 1571, after the death of his first wife, from whom he had been separated for decades. He died soon after, leaving Helena a wealthy widow and, as marchioness of Northampton, senior to every other lady at court save the queen and the queen’s cousin, Margaret Douglas. Around 1577 she remarried, taking as her second husband Thomas (later Sir Thomas) Gorges (1536-March 30,1610). Helena was a patron of the arts, rebuilt Langford House in Wiltshire, and was chief mourner at the funeral of Elizabeth Tudor. Her children, all by her second husband, were Elizabeth (June 1578-1659), Francis (c.1579-c.1599), Frances (1580-1649), Edward (c.1582-c.1652), Theobald (1583-1648), Bridget (1584-c.1634), Robert (1588-1648), and Thomas (1589-1624+). Biography: Gunnar Sjögren, “Helena, Marchioness of Northampton,” History Today, September 1978; there is also an older full-length biography, C. A. Bradford's Helena, Marchioness of Northampton (1936), but I have not been able to find a copy; Oxford DNB entry under "Gorges [née Snakenborg], Helena." Portraits: c.1569 by the Master of the Countess of Warwick (identity unproven); c.1603 by Robert Peake.

DOROTHY WADHAM

see DOROTHY PETRE

FLORENCE WADHAM (c.1530-c.1596)

Florence Wadham was the daughter of Sir John Wadham of Branscombe, Devon (c.1515-March 8, 1578) and Joan Tregarthen (d.1581). In 1556, she married John Wyndham (c.1506-August 25, 1572). In 1557, she fell ill and died. Or at least that’s what everyone thought. She was duly buried in the Wyndham family vault in St. Decuman’s Church in Watchet, Somerset. That night, so the story goes, a sexton bent on stealing her jewelry, opened her coffin and tried to remove her rings. This brought her back to consciousness and sent the sexton screaming from the crypt. Her family, however, welcomed her back and the following year she gave birth to a son, John (1558-1645). Florence remarried after Wyndham’s death, taking as her second husband John Faringdon

JANE WADHAM (1517+- 1544+)

Jane Wadman was the daughter of Sir Nicholas Wadham, of Maryfield, Governor of the Isle of Wight (c.1474-1541) and his second of four wives, Margaret Seymour (b.c.1479), making her the niece of Queen Jane Seymour. She was a nun at Romsey Abbey in Hampshire, under Abbess Elizabeth Ryprose, at the time it was dissolved on July 11, 1538, as was her half sister, Katherine (b.1511), who was subprioress. Jane was sexton, but she had no real vocation. Because ex-religious were required to remain chaste, a ruling retained until 1549 and revived from 1553-1558, Jane had to obtain a “capacity” to return to the world. According to some accounts, she claimed that prior to becoming a nun she had gone through a private form of marriage with John Foster or Forster (d.1557+), but then was forced to take her vows, and that John Foster had been forced to become a priest. Foster's father was steward at Romsey and John is variously called steward and chaplain there. He received a number of properties after the dissolution. Geoffrey Baskerville's English Monks and the Suppression of the Monasteries states that Jane married Foster after the surrender of Romsey in 1539. In any case, from 1538 Jane and John lived together as man and wife and they had three children, Edward, Andrew, and Jane. By June 1541, however, concerns about the validity of their marriage had caused Foster to separate from Jane. At that time, she asked for a ruling on the subject and a special commission of two bishops was formed. Records are scarce, but Jane was again asking that commissioners look into the validity of her marriage in April 1544. Foster, meanwhile was the incumbent at Baddesley by 1543. One account has Jane living there with him, presumably after the validity of their marriage had been established to everyone’s satisfaction. Baskerville cites a reference to Jane Foster, gentlewoman, in May 1558, in the belief that this was Jane Wadham.

FRANCES WALDEGRAVE
see FRANCES NEVILLE

JOAN WALDEGRAVE

see JOAN BULMER

ELIZABETH WALLOP

see ELIZABETH HARLESTONE

ELIZABETH WALSHE

see ELIZABETH STONOR

ANNE WALSINGHAM

see ANNE JERNINGHAM

FRANCES WALSINGHAM (October 1567-February 17,1633)

Frances Walsingham was the daughter of Sir Francis Walsingham (1530-April 6,1590) and Ursula St. Barbe (c.1550-June 1,1602). Her father was English ambassador to France in 1572, and had his family with him, when the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre of Huguenots took place. Frances met her future husband, Sir Philip Sidney (November 30,1554-October 17,1586) when he took shelter with the Walsinghams in Paris. In 1581, one John Wickerson was said to have a contract of matrimony with “Mrs. Frances,” but he spent the next two years in the Marshalsea and on Friday, September 21, 1583, she married Sidney. They lived with her parents at Barn Elms, Surrey, six miles from London, where their daughter, Elizabeth (November 1585-1614) was born. Frances arrived in Flushing in the latter part of June 1586, to join her husband. She was pregnant when Sidney died of a gunshot wound sustained in the Battle of Zuthpen on September 22,1586. By the end of December, Frances was very ill. She either miscarried or her second daughter, Frances, was born prematurely and died young. Sidney had entrusted his wife’s care to his friend Robert Devereux, earl of Essex (November 19,1566-February 25, 1601). Essex married her in the spring of 1590, shortly after her father’s death. Their children were Robert (1591-September 14,1646), Walter and Henry, who died young, Frances (1599-1674), and Dorothy (1600-1636). Frances was born just after Essex was imprisoned for his unauthorized return from Ireland. As soon as she was able to rise from childbed, Lady Essex went to court, dressed in widow’s weeds, and attempted to see the queen. She had already been forbidden to come to the court for marrying Essex and was denied access to the queen. Later, however, she was permitted to nurse Essex when he fell ill at York House. During this period, Lady Essex had other troubles, as well. She was being blackmailed over some letters that a servant had stolen. Shortly before Essex had been taken into custody, Frances had given her maidservant, Jane Rehora, recently married to another Essex servant, John Daniels, a casket of letters to hide for her. Daniels found the casket under his bed and had copies made of some of the letters. In January, 1600, when the countess reclaimed them, she realized that some were missing. Confronted, Daniels denied all knowledge of them and berated both Frances and Jane for endangering him by hiding them in his house. Daniels then suggested that his wife’s maidservant, who had recently been dismissed, might have stolen them, and offered to try to get them back. In March, he told the countess he could restore her letters . . . for £3000. The countess sold her jewels to raise part of that sum and turned the money over to Daniels, but she did not get all of her letters back. In June, after Daniels attempted to sell the letters to the government, he was arrested and charged with extortion. He was condemned to life in prison and fined £3000. The money does not seem to have been returned to Frances, for after Essex was released, the family was deeply in debt. The queen’s refusal to renew certain leases, his main source of income, drove him to desperate measures. Frances was at Essex House during his abortive rebellion in February of 1601 but it was her sister-in-law, Penelope, Lady Rich, who was egging Essex on. After the earl was executed, Frances lived with her mother until that lady’s death. Early in the reign of James I, she married a third time, taking as her husband Richard Burke, 4th earl of Clanrickard (d.1635). They had one son, Ulick (1604-1657) and a daughter, Honora. Portraits: The only verified portrait of Frances was painted c. 1590 and is attributed to William Seger, but Sir Roy Strong belives Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger's woman in Persian dress (c.1600) may be Frances.

URSULA WALSINGHAM

see URSULA ST.BARBE

MARY WARD (January 23,1585-January 20, 1645)

Mary Ward was the daughter of Marmaduke Ward of Mulwith Manor, Yorkshire (c.1552-1601+) and Ursula Wright. Although she attracted many suitors, Mary chose the religious life and became a nun at St. Omer. In 1609, with a vision for a new religious community, she was living in a house on the Strand in London and, with other like-minded English ladies, and ministering to persecuted Catholic women. What became the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary made Mary Ward a controversial figure at the time and she continued to be so until the twentieth century. Her order was devoted to the education of women. Biography: Margaret Mary Littlehales, Mary Ward: Pilgrim and Mystic (2002); Oxford DNB entry under “Ward, Mary.” Portraits: numerous, including the one below, 1621, by an unknown artist.

ELIZABETH WARNER

see ELIZABETH BROOKE

AGNES WATERHOUSE (x.1566) (maiden name unknown)

Agnes Waterhouse of Hatfield Peverell, Essex, was accused of witchcraft in 1566, along with her daughter, Joan, and Elizabeth Francis. She was said to have bewitched one William Fynne, who had died on November 1, 1565. In a confession, she claimed she had been a witch for fifteen years and admitted to killing livestock, bewitching her husband, and trying to kill another man. She said she had tried to use Mrs. Francis’s familiar, a cat named Sathan, to help her, but that Sathan had turned himself into a toad. She denied she had ever succeeded in killing anyone by witchcraft, but she was found guilty of Fynne’s death at the Chelmsford Assizes and hanged. Portrait: a drawing of “Mother Waterhouse” is included in a chapbook describing the trial.

MARY WATERS or ATWATER (1527-May 11, 1620)
Mary Waters was the daughter of Robert Waters of Lenham, Kent (c.1500-1565) and Katherine Bright of Royton. She married Robert Honywood or Honeywood of Charing, Kent in February 1543. They had sixteen children—Robert, Katherine, Priscilla, Anthony, Thomas, Mary, Anne, Grace, Arthur, Walter, Elizabeth, Susan, Bennett, Dorothy, Isaack, and Joyce. During the reign of Queen Mary, she visited prisons to give comfort to the heretics held there. She attended at least one execution by burning. From the age of forty, Mary supposedly suffered from consumption but since she lived to be ninety-three, this seems to have been an inaccurate diagnosis. In 1591, having believed herself to be possessed by a devil for more than a dozen years, she was exorcised by one William Hacket, later revealed to be a charlatan. In 1605 her son Robert bought Marks Hall, where Mary spent the rest of her life. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under “Honeywood [née Waters], Mary.” Portraits: 1597; 1605; line engraving.

SUSAN WEEKS (d. 1592)

Susan Weeks was the second wife of Sir Henry Cromwell of Hinchinbrooke, Huntingdonshire (1537-January 7, 1603/4), marrying him at some point after October 12, 1584. In March, 1590, Lady Cromwell paid a visit to Warboys, where the young daughters of Robert Throckmorton were alleging that Alice Samuel, an old woman who lived nearby, was the cause of their fits. Lady Cromwell took Mrs. Samuel aside and berated her for what she had done. The quarrel escalated until Lady Cromwell plucked up a pair of scissors, cut off a lock of Mrs. Samuel’s hair, and gave it to Mrs. Throckmorton to burn—a folk remedy believed to weaken a witch’s power. Mrs. Samuel protested that she had never done Lady Cromwell any harm . . . “as yet.” That night, Lady Cromwell had nightmares and fell ill. She did not die, however, until July of 1592, and it was December of that year before Alice Samuel, persuaded to it by a local parson, confessed to being a witch. She confessed again before the bishop of Lincoln and was subsequently imprisoned, along with her husband, John, and her daughter, Agnes. They were tried on April 5, 1593 for the murder, by witchcraft, of Lady Cromwell, convicted, and hanged. Sir Henry Cromwell confiscated the Samuels’ property and used it to pay for an annual sermon against witchcraft to be preached in Huntingdon in perpetuity. It was discontinued in 1812.

MARY WELD
see MARY SLANEY

CECILY WELLES
see CECILY PLANTAGENET

AGATHA WELLESBOURNE (c.1505-June 13,1595)

Agatha Wellesborne was the daughter of Humphrey Wellesborne of Bustlesham Montague, Berkshire. She married William Barlow (c.1500-August 13,1568), who at that time was probably already Bishop of St. David’s in Wales. Later he was Bishop of Bath and Wells. The story that Agatha was a nun before the Dissolution of the Monasteries, or even a "runaway abbess of Norfolk," have no basis in fact. At that time, however, it was illegal for clergy to marry. In 1554, Barlow fled to the Continent and Agatha followed him into exile for the duration of the reign of Mary Tudor. They were in Embden, then Wesel, and in 1556 Barlow was serving as chaplain to Catherine Willoughby, duchess of Suffolk, in exile at Weinheim Castle. Under Elizabeth Tudor, Barlow was made Bishop of Chichester. Their son, William (c.1549-May 25,1625) became Archdeacon of Salisbury and their five daughters all married bishops. Margaret Barlow (c.1533-1601) married William Overton (1525-1609), Bishop of Coventry. Anne Barlow (d.1597) married first Augustin Bradbridge (d.1567), prebendary of Salisbury, and after his death wed Herbert Westphaling, Bishop of Herford (1532-1602). Elizabeth Barlow (1538-1575) married William Day, Bishop of Winchester (1520-September 20, 1596) in 1562. Frances Barlow (c.1551-May 8, 1629) married first Matthew Parker (1551-1574), son of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and then Tobie Mathew, Bishop of York (1546-1628). Anthonine Barlow (c.1552-1598) married William Wickham, Bishop of Lincoln and later Bishop of Winchester (1539-1595). There were also sons John (d.1634) and Arthur, Hugh, Marmaduke, Thomas, and Thomas, all of whom died young. Agatha lived the last part of her life with her eldest son at Easton, Hampshire, where she is buried. Her daughter Frances erected a monument to her there.

KATHERINE WELLS (d.1524+)
Katherine Wells was prioress at Littlemore in Oxfordshire by 1507. It was a small priory with only five nuns in 1517. Around 1509, she gave birth to an illegitimate daughter. The father was Richard Hewes, chaplain of Littlemore. He was a priest in Kent who visited the convent two or three times a year. Katherine kept her daughter with her and sold priory property to provide a dowry for the child. She also gave priory plate to Hewes. A visitation to the priory on June 17, 1517 resulted in charges that she had a child of seven or eight and that she would not give Hewes up because she loved him. Hewes was due to return in his role as chaplain around the first of August. Another complaint against her was that she was excessive in her punishments, putting nuns in the stocks if they criticized her. One of her nuns, Julian Wynter, apparently took her prioress as a role model. She had engaged in a love affair with a married man, John Wikisley of Oxford, and had given birth c. 1516 to his illegitimate child. When Katherine was examined by the bishop, she at first she denied the charges against her. Then she confessed to having given birth to a daughter but said the child had died four years earlier. Remarkably, although Katherine was deposed as prioress, she was allowed to continue to perform the functions of the office. One of the first things she did was put one of the nuns, Anne Willye, in the stocks for a month. And she continued her affair with Hewes. When the bishop visited on September 2, 1518, he found matters at Littlemore worse than before. When Elizabeth Wynter offended Katherine by playing games with some boys in the cloister, Katherine beat her and put her in the stocks. The other nuns rescued her, burnt the stocks, and broke a window to escape the priory and go stay at the house of one Inglyshe for two or three weeks. In 1524, Cardinal Wolsey recommended that the priory be dissolved and this was done in February 1525. As prioress, Katherine Wells received a pension of £6 13s.4d.

AGNES WENMAN

see AGNES FERMOR

ANNE WENTWORTH

see ANNE HOPTON

ANNE or JANE WENTWORTH (c.1503-c.1572)

Anne Wentworth was the daughter of Sir Roger Wentworth of Gosfield, Essex. Around 1515, when she was twelve, she fell ill and began to have visions, much in the manner of Elizabeth Barton (the Nun of Kent) but in her case the visions were believed to be the work of Satan. Then one of her visions convinced her that she must go on a pilgrimage to the Virgin at Our Lady of Ipswich. She did so, and went through various torments there, but these torments supposedly drove out the devils that had possessed her and she was left with the gift of prophesy. Although her father objected, she wished to become a nun and entered the Franciscan convent of Bruisyard in Suffolk. After the dissolution of the monasteries, she lived in Framlingham. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Wentworth, Jane."

DOROTHY WENTWORTH (1543-January 3, 1601)

Dorothy Wentworth was the daughter of Thomas, 1^st baron Wentworth (1501-March 3,1551) and Margaret Fortescue (c.1502-c.1548). She married three times. Her first husband was Paul Withypole (Wythypole; Wythipool) of Ipswich and Rendlesham, Suffolk. In April 1591 (Oxford DNB says 1590), in Whitwood, Yorkshire, she married Sir Martin Frobisher (c.1535-November 1594) as his second wife. Later she married Sir John Savile of Methley (1545-February 2, 1607) as his third of four wives. By her first husband, she had children Paul, Edmond, Elizabeth, and Mary.

MARGERY WENTWORTH (c.1478-October 18, 1550)

Margery Wentworth was the daughter of Sir Henry Wentworth of Nettlestead, Suffolk (d.1499) and Anne Say or Saye (d.c.1494). Margery was sent to join the household of her mother’s half sister, Elizabeth Tylney, countess of Surrey, at Sheriff Hutton Castle, Yorkshire, and was there at the time poet John Skelton was writing his poem the Garland of Laurel in praise of the countess and her ladies. The work included a shorter piece titled “To Mistress Margery Wentworth.” One of the lines is “Benign, courteous, and meek, With words well devised; In you, who list to seek, Be virtues well comprised.” On October 22, 1494 Margery married Sir John Seymour of Wulfhall, Wiltshire (1474-December 21,1536). Their children were: John (d. 1510), Edward (1502-x.January 22,1552), Henry (d.1578), Thomas (1507-x.March 10,1549), Jane (c.1508-October 24,1537), Elizabeth (1511-June 1563), Dorothy, Margery (d.c.1528), and Anthony (d.c.1528). Although Lady Seymour may have been at court from time to time when Catherine of Aragon was queen, she did not spend time there when her daughter Jane was Queen of England or when her son Edward was duke of Somerset and Lord Protector for her grandson, King Edward VI. She made her home at Wulfhall, even after it passed into the possession of her eldest surviving son on the death of Sir John. It was a small establishment, the usual staff consisting of forty-four menservants and seven servant women, two of the latter nurses for Edward Seymour’s children. When King Henry VIII visited Wulfhall for four days in August 1539, Margery and her grandchildren moved into nearby Tottenham Lodge to make room for the royal party. The king arrived with a retinue of 200 and on the Sunday of the visit the Seymours had to feed some 400 persons. In September 1548, when her daughter-in-law, Katherine Parr, died in childbirth, some sources report that Margery temporarily joined the household of her son Thomas at Sudeley Castle to care for the newborn Mary Seymour. Others accounts have Thomas bringing the child to his brother’s house in London. In letters written at this time to Lady Jane Grey’s parents, in the hope of having Lady Jane returned to his guardianship, Thomas Seymour assured them that he would keep his late wife’s household intact and that his mother take charge of it and treat young Lady Jane as if she were her own daughter. Lady Jane thereafter went to live at Seymour Place, Thomas Seymour’s London house, and one must suppose that Lady Seymour was there also. Only six months later, however, Thomas was executed for treason and his baby daughter was sent to live with Catherine Willoughby, duchess of Suffolk. It is difficult to imagine Margery Seymour’s feelings at that time, especially when it was her older son, Edward, who had sent Thomas to his death. Margery did not live long enough to see Edward executed in his turn, but by the time she died, she must have known that he had many enemies. When he attempted to give her a state funeral, claiming it was her right as the king’s grandmother, the Privy Council refused permission, some say simply to spite the much despised Lord Protector.

ANNE WEST
see ANNE CRESACRE

FRANCES WEST
see FRANCES FITZLEWIS

ANNE WESTON

see ANNE PICKERING

ELIZABETH WESTON

see ELIZABETH LOVETT

ELIZABETH JANE WESTON (November 2,1582-November 23,1612)

Elizabeth Jane Weston was the daughter of Joanna or Jane Cooper of Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire (1563-1602) and John Weston (d. May 1582). By April 1583, Joanna was married to Edward Kelley, who worked as an assistant to Dr. John Dee. It has been said that he was paid to marry her to legitimize her children by an aristocratic lover, Elizabeth Jane and her brother John Francis (1580-1600), but there is no proof of this. Kelley and his new wife went abroad with Dee, his wife, and their children. Joanna's children at first remained with their grandmother but later joined their mother and stepfather in Prague. When the Dees returned to England, the Kelleys remained behind. Kelley was, for a time, high in the favor of Emperor Rudolph II, but he was imprisoned in 1591 for killing a man and is believed to have died around 1597. From that point onward, especially after the death of her brother three years later, Elizabeth Jane and her mother were in dire financial straits. She wrote letters appealing to members of the court for aid and also began to write poems in Latin. Poemata was published in 1602. She had been well educated and spoke German, Greek, Latin, Italian, and all the Czech languages and was welcomed into literary circles as the "new Sappho." In April 1603, she married Johannes Leo, a lawyer and courtier. They had four sons, all of whom died young, and three daughters. Known professionally as “Westonia” and famous as “an English maiden,” she described herself in 1610 as “Elizabeth Jane, wife of Johannes Leo, Agent in the Imperial Court and Englishwoman of the Weston family.” She died in childbirth (the Oxford DNB says of consumption) and was buried in the Church of St. Thomas in Prague. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Weston, Elizabeth Jane." Portraits: J. Balzer engraving from an edition of her poems (1677); drawing in Hessisches Landesmuseum, Darmstadt, Germany.

ANNE WHARTON

see ANNE TALBOT

FRANCES WHITE (c.1524-c.1584)

Frances White was the daughter of Sir Thomas White of Swanborne, Hampshire (d. November 2, 1566), Master of Requests to Queen Mary, and Agnes White (daughter of Robert White). She married Thomas Yate or Yates (c.1514-November 28, 1565) of Lyford Grange, Berkshire around 1540. When the nunnery of Syon was dissolved in 1539, Frances’s sister-in-law, Elizabeth, who had been one of the nuns there, moved in with her father at Buckland, bringing several other nuns with her, but by 1556, Elizabeth and six other former nuns were living at Lyford Grange with Thomas and Frances and their two sons, Francis and Edward. After Queen Mary’s death and Queen Elizabeth’s restoration of the “New Religion,” Lyford Grange became a gathering place for recusants. The refounded Syon Abbey in Mechlin sent several young Brigittine sisters to Lyford Grange and in 1580, Frances’s son Francis (1548-1588) was arrested for recusancy and imprisoned in Reading. He was still there on July 16, 1581 when a raid on Lyford Grange by priest-catchers resulted in the arrests of two nuns (Catherine Kingsmill and Juliana Harmon), and several other people. Lyford Grange was riddled with priest holes and although others were found and taken away that day, the Jesuit priest, Father Edmund Campion, was not discovered. That night, he came out of hiding, but rather than flee, he joined Frances and others in her chamber to pray. When they were almost caught, Campion hid again, but his hiding place was discovered the next day. Frances herself may have been arrested, but some accounts state that while the men, both priests and laymen, were arrested and taken to London for trial, the women, including eight nuns, were left alone.

MARY or MARIA WHITE (c.1500-c.1587)
Mary White was the daughter of William White of Reading, Berkshire (c.1460-1523), a clothier, and Mary Kibblewhite of Fawley, Berkshire (d.1523). Her brother, Thomas (1492-1567), was Lord Mayor of London in 1553 and founder of St. John’s College, Oxford. Mary wed twice, first to John Bridgman or Bridgeman (c.1465-c.1557), by whom she had two daughters, Katherine (b.c.1530) and Anne (b.c.1531), and then to William Matthew or Mathew (d.1565), a mercer who moved from Abingdon to Oxford in 1558, apparently at about the time he married Mrs. Bridgman. He was mayor of Oxford when he died. As his widow, Mary Mercer took over her late husband’s business. She set a record among women who took apprentices by having twelve of them during her widowhood. Portrait: painted while she was still Mrs. Bridgman.

SUSAN WHITE (before 1510-1566)

Susan White was the daughter of Richard White of Hutton Hall, Essex and Maud Tyrell. She married Thomas Tonge, Clarencieux King-at-arms (d.March 1536) and is better known to history as Susan or Susanna Clarence, Clarencius, or Clarencieux. As early as 1525, Susan was in the service of Mary Tudor and went with her to Ludlow Castle when she took up her duties as Princess of Wales. She remained with Mary until she was dismissed in late 1533 and returned in 1536 when Mary’s household was reorganized. She was one of the three women Mary asked for by name. In 1544, Susan received an annuity of £13 and the grant of Chevenhall. When Mary became queen, Susan was named Mistress of Robes, a new position that combined the duties of Yeoman of the Wardrobe and Groom of the Stole. In 1554, she was granted Chingford Earls and Chingford St. Pauls. In 1555, she was the only one present when the recently imprisoned Elizabeth Tudor met with her half sister the queen. A story told in Linda Porter's First Queen of England paints Susan as somewhat conniving and greedy. She persuaded the Venetian ambassador, Michieli, to make a gift to Queen Mary of his coach and horses, after which Mary turned around and presented them to Susan. She received many gifts from Queen Mary, both grants of land in Essex and wardships. Susan was also with Mary when the queen died on November 17, 1558 and the dying Mary gave her further gifts to insure her future. Susan transferred her English properties to her brother, Richard, before leaving the country in August 1559 in the household of Jane Dormer, countess of Feria, where she remained until her death. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Tonge [née White], Susan."

ISABEL WHITEHEAD (before 1515-March 18, 1588)

Isabel Whitehead was a Cluniac nun at Arthington Priory, Yorkshire at the time of the Dissolution of the Monasteries. The prioress, Elizabeth Hall, age 45, surrendered the priory on November 26, 1540. She received a pension of £35 but the eight nuns in her charge received considerably less. They ranged in age from 25 to 72. Dame Isabel is likely to have been one of the younger nuns, since she lived another forty-eight years. Isabel lived for a time with Lady Middleton of Stockeld, probably the third wife and widow of William Middleton (d.1552). After Lady Middleton’s death, Isabel “wandered up and down doing charitable work” until she went to live with Katherine Ingleby (1530?-1600+), wife (or more probably widow) of Sir William Ardington. By this time Dame Isabel was quite elderly (even seventy-two would have been considered ancient in the sixteenth century) and in poor health. At Michaelmas 1587, the Ardington house was searched for Catholics. Mrs. Ardington and her daughter, Jane (or Anne) (1556-1606), the wife of Sir Ralph Grey, were taken into custody and the searchers badgered Dame Isabel, who lay sick in her bed, threatening her with swords and saying that they would kill her if she did not tell them were David Ingleby (Mrs. Ardington’s brother) and a Mr. Winsour were. The latter may be a misprint for Wintour (Wynter/Winter), as two of Mrs. Ardington’s sisters married men with that last name. The searchers finally arrested Dame Isabel and took her off to prison in York Castle. She died there the following March and was buried “under the castle walls.” As for Mrs. Ardington, she was at large and entertaining another houseguest during the years 1597-1600, when she was living at Harwell Hall. This was her kinswoman Mary Ward, granddaughter of one Ursula Wright (born Ursula Rudson) (d.1594). Ursula had spent fourteen years imprisoned for her religious beliefs, at least part of that time in company with Katherine Ardington.

JOAN WHITELOCKE
see JOAN COLTE

BLANCHE WHITNEY

see BLANCHE MILBORNE

ELINOR WHITNEY (c.1550-March 1596)
Elinor Whitney was the daughter of James Whitney of Clifford (c.1500-1564) and his first wife, Sybil Parry. She married Richard Bull on October 14, 1571 at St. Mary-le-Bow, London. Bull was sub-bailiff at Sayes Court, the manor house of Deptford, Kent, a village less than a mile from Greenwich Palace, and owned his own house with a garden. In 1589, Elinor inherited £100 from her “cousin” Blanche Parry, the queen’s lady in waiting. [NOTE: Blanche’s biographer says Elinor was the granddaughter of James and Sybil, not the daughter, but does not say who her parents were.] Richard Bull died in April of 1590, whereupon his widow seems to have begun to take in lodgers. Contrary to some reports, she did not run a tavern on Deptford Strand. It was at her house that, on May 30, 1593, Christopher Marlowe met three other men and was killed in a quarrel over a reckoning. One of the four men, probably Ingram Frizer, was Elinor’s lodger. Elinor was mentioned in trial records, but not involved in the crime. She had no children. She was buried at St. Nicholas, Deptford, with her husband.

ISABELLA WHITNEY (c.1540-1580+)

Isabella Whitney was the daughter of Geoffrey Whitney of Coole Pilate, Cheshire (c.1520-1587). Her brother, a second Geoffrey (c.1548-c.1601), was an emblem book writer. Isabella's original poetic works were “The Copie of a letter, lately written in Meeter by a yonge gentilwoman to her inconstant louer by Is. W.” (1567) and “A Sweet Nosgay, or pleasant Posye containing a hundred and ten Phylosophicall Flowers” (1573). According to some genealogies, she married a man named Eldershae and had two children.Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Whitney, Isabella."

ANNE WHORWOOD (d. June 1, 1552) (maiden name unknown)
Anne Whorwood was the first wife of Lord Ambrose Dudley. Very little is known about her, but her unexpected death at Otford, Kent was described in considerable detail in a letter from her father-in-law, John Dudley, duke of Northumberland, to Sir William Cecil. Some sources, especially older ones, say this death and description were of Northumberland’s own daughter, Temperance, who died at age seven, but that is not the case. Anne had been ill, seemed to be recovering, and suddenly took a turn for the worse. She left behind a daughter, Margaret, by her first husband, whose surname was Whorwood. The child became Northumberland’s ward.

ELIZABETH WIDDRINGTON
see ELIZABETH TREVANION

WINEFRID WIGMORE (1585-1657)

Winefrid Wigmore was the daughter of Sir William Wigmore of Lucton, Herefordshire, and Anne Throckmorton. She was one of five women who joined Mary Ward in founding what was to become the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary, an order dedicated to the education of women. When the institute spread into Flanders and Italy, Winefrid was appointed superior in Naples in 1624. After Mary Ward’s death in 1645, Winefrid and Mary Poyntz wrote her first biography and chose the subjects for a series of fifty oil paintings to depict her life. Biography: M. Philip, Companions of Mary Ward (1939); Oxford DNB entry under “Wigmore, Winefrid.” Portraits: one from the early 1600s.

ELIZABETH WILFORD
see ELIZABETH GALE

ALICE WILKES (1547-October 26,1613)

Alice Wilkes was the daughter of Thomas Wilkes, an Islington innkeeper, and his first wife. She married three times. Her first husband, to whom she was married in 1570, was Henry Robinson (1543-1585), a brewer, by whom she had six sons (John, William, Henry, John, Thomas, and Henry) and five daughters (Margaret, Susan, Anne, Anne, and Alice). She was pregnant with her eleventh child, Henry, when her husband died. She quickly married William Elkin (d.1593), a mercer, by whom she had a daughter, Ursula (c.1587-1622+). During this marriage, Alice’s eldest daughter, Margaret, then twelve years old, was abducted by one John Skinner, who hoped to marry her. Legal action followed but before anything was resolved, Skinner vanished. Margaret was promptly married off to someone else. Alice’s third husband was Thomas Owen (d. December 21,1598), a judge. They were married c. 1595 and his son Roger (1573-May 29,1617) was married to her daughter Ursula. Dame Alice Owen’s fame, however, is due to her actions during her third widowhood. On June 5, 1608, she purchased eleven acres in Islington, including the spot where she had nearly been killed by an arrow as a child, and there erected a school for thirty boys, a hospital for ten widows, a free chapel, and almshouses. She also left bequests to Christ’s Hospital and to Oxford and Cambridge Universities. She was buried at St. Mary, Islington. Portraits: a small figure from the almshouses; 1840 copy of a 1610 portrait (original destroyed in World War II); 1897 statue based on fragments from Alice’s tomb (original effigy lost when the church was rebuilt in 1751). Biographies: Clive Rose’s Alice Owen: The Life, Marriages and Times of A Tudor Lady.

JOAN WILKINSON
see JOAN NORTH

FRANCES WILLIAMS (d.1594+)

Frances Williams was the sister of Sarah (below) and possibly the “Fid” employed in Sir George Peckham's household. While she was a prisoner in the Marshalsea for recusancy, she married a fellow prisoner, William Harrington (x. February 1594). When she became pregnant, their priest, Father Blackman, told her to say that the father had gone overseas. At that point, Frances went to the Privy Council and testified concerning her knowledge of a spy named Stoughton and gave information as to the whereabouts of another Williams sister, Alice. Frances and her husband were then released and went to live with Frances’s father, but soon after that William Harrington was rearrested, this time on the charge of being a priest himself. While in prison awaiting trial, Harrington denied that he and Frances had ever been married. After his execution, Frances married Ralph Dallidown. She had received threats from several priests—Sherwood, Gerard, Blackman and Greene—and then the servant of a Master Roper, who was living at Southampton House, threatened to shoot her for betraying her sister’s whereabouts. When Dallidown killed his man, the death was ruled manslaughter rather than murder.

JOAN WILLIAMS
see JOAN CROMWELL

MARJORIE WILLIAMS (1521-December 1599)

Marjorie Williams was the daughter of John Williams, 1^st baron Williams of Thame (1500-October 14,1559) and Elizabeth Bledlow (c.1490-October 25, 1556). She married Henry Norris or Norreys of Rycote (1525-June 27,1601) before 1545 and had William (d.1579), John (1547-1597), Edward (d.1603), Henry (1554-1599), Thomas (1556-1599), Katherine (d. 1601/2), and Maximilian (d. 1593). She's said to have first met the future Queen Elizabeth when Elizabeth was lodged at Thame on her way to Woodstock during the reign of Mary Tudor. The two women became close friends and Elizabeth called Marjorie her “crow.” Henry Norris was knighted in 1566 and sent to France as ambassador. His wife stayed at Rycote. Norris remained in France until 1571 and was created Baron Norris on his return. All of the Norris sons were soldiers and five of them died before their mother. Portraits: life-sized effigy in St. Andrew’s Chapel, Westminster Abbey.

SARAH WILLIAMS (1570-1594+)

Sarah Williams was the daughter of protestant parents. At age fifteen, she went to work in the household of Sir George Peckham of Denham, Buckinghamshire, a secret Catholic. A priest in that household, Robert Dibdale (x. October 8, 1586) decided that Sarah was possessed and must be exorcised. Subsequently, she was forced to drink “holy” potions and inhale brimstone fumes to induce “visions.” Together with other girls in the household, including Sarah’s sister “Fid,” Sarah was abused and exploited, first by Dibdale and then by other priests. She later said that Dibdale had promised to send her abroad so that she could become a nun. Instead she was prevented from returning to her parents for four years. After the residents of Denham scattered to avoid arrest, Sarah was taken for recusancy in Oxford and sent to prison for five months for her failure to attend church for four years. Eventually, she denounced those who had exploited her and went on to marry and have five children.. Her ordeal was described in Samuel Harsnet’s A Declaration of Egregious Popish Impostures (1603). Biography: Kathleen R. Sands’s Demon Possession in Elizabethan England, Chapter Seven (“Sarah Williams”).

ANNE WILLOUGHBY

see ANNE GREY

CATHERINE WILLOUGHBY (March 22, 1520-September 19,1580)

Catherine Willoughby was the daughter of William Willoughby, 10^th baron Willoughby d’Eresby (d.1526) and Maria de Salinas (c.1490-October 19,1539). After her father’s death she became the ward of Charles Brandon, duke of Suffolk (1485-August 22,1545) and was raised with his children. She was to have married his son, Henry, earl of Lincoln (March 11,1516-1534), but after the death of Brandon’s wife in 1533, he married Catherine himself, on September 7, 1534. She was 14. He was 49. She had two sons by Brandon, Henry (September 18,1535-July 14,1551) and Charles (March 10,1538-July 15,1551) and during the last part of the reign of Henry VIII was much at court. She was inclined toward religious views that would later be called Puritan and tended to be outspoken. In spite of that, there were rumors in 1546 that King Henry was tired of his sixth wife and meant to divorce her and marry the widowed duchess of Suffolk. In 1548, when the Queen Dowager died after giving birth to a baby girl, the child was placed in Catherine’s care. Catherine lost both of her sons to an epidemic of “the sweat” in 1551, when they died within hours of each other. In 1553, Catherine took as her second husband the man who had been her first husband’s steward (some sources say gentleman usher). Richard Bertie (December 25,1517-April 9,1582) shared Catherine’s religious views. In 1554, their daughter Susan (d.1596+) was born. By that time Mary Tudor was queen and had restored Catholicism to England. Richard Bertie went into exile first and on New Year’s Day 1555, Catherine and Susan followed him. A son named Peregrine (October 12,1555-June 25,1601) was born during their travels abroad. They ended up in Poland, where King Sigismund offered them the governorship of Lithuania. They remained there until after Mary Tudor’s death, returning to England in the late spring of 1559. Under Elizabeth Tudor, the Berties were not significant figures at court, but Catherine was entrusted with the keeping of Lady Mary Grey for a time after that young lady’s elopement. Mary was in her step-grandmother's household from August 7, 1567 until June 1569. Catherine spent most of her time after her return to England at Grimsthorpe in Lincolnshire but she also had a house in the Minories in London. Biographies: Lady Cecilie Goff’s A Woman of the Tudor Age, Evelyn Read’s My Lady Suffolk, and Melissa Franklin Harkrider's Women, Reform and Community in Early Modern England: Katherine Willoughby, duchess of Suffolk, and Lincolnshire's Godly Aristocracy 1519-1580; Oxford DNB entry under "Bertie [née Willoughby; other married name Brandon], Katherine." Portraits: a sketch by Holbein; a miniature after Holbein; a full length portrait c.1548; tomb in Spilsby Church.

ELIZABETH WILLOUGHBY

see ELIZABETH LITTLETON

MARGARET WILLOUGHBY (1544-1578+)

Margaret Willoughby was the daughter of Henry Willoughby of Wollaton, near Nottingham (1510-August 27, 1549), and Anne Grey (1514-January 1548). Upon the death of her father, Margaret and her younger brother Francis (1546-1596) were sent to live in the household of her mother’s half brother, George Medley, at Tilty in Essex and in the Minories, London. After Wyatt’s Rebellion in 1554, the house in the Minories was searched and Medley was briefly in prison. Margaret’s uncle, Henry Grey, duke of Suffolk, and her cousin, Lady Jane Grey, were executed at that time. Margaret seems to have joined the household of the widowed duchess of Suffolk (Frances Brandon) and been with her at the court of Queen Mary, although she was only eleven at the time. The duchess was at court from July 1554 until May 1555. At Christmas 1555, still a very young girl to be a maid of honor, Margaret joined the household of Elizabeth Tudor at Hatfield. It was while she was there that John Harington wrote his poem in praise of six of Elizabeth's gentlewomen. He calls Margaret "worthye willobe" and comments upon her "pearcing eye." It is not clear if she stayed on after Elizabeth's household was reorganized by order of Queen Mary in June 1556. At fifteen or sixteen, in 1559 or 1560, Margaret married Matthew Arundell of Wardour (c.1535-December 24, 1598). Their children were Thomas (1560-November 7, 1639), Catherine, and William (d. February 16,1592). On July 16,1565, Margaret supped with her cousin, the Lady Mary Grey, and two other gentlewomen. At nine that evening, Mary married Thomas Keyes without the queen’s permission. Margaret knew about the wedding but remained outside the chamber where it was performed so that she could say she had not actually witnessed the exchange of vows. She resumed her friendship with her cousin after the Lady Mary was released from captivity and was mentioned in Mary’s will in 1578.

MARY WILLOUGHBY

see MARIA de SALINAS

BRIDGET WILTSHIRE (d. by 1536)

Bridget Wiltshire was the daughter of Sir John Wiltshire of Stone Castle, Kent (c.1434-December 1526), comptroller of Calais under Henry VII, and Isabella Clothall. The date of her birth is listed in some accounts as 1477, but this seems too early in light of some of the birthdates of her children, which go as late as 1532. She married first Sir Richard Wingfield of Kimbolton, Huntingdonshire (1469-July 22,1525) as his second wife. He was Lord Deputy of Calais and later ambassador to Spain and died in Toledo. Their children were: Cecily (d.1525), Elizabeth (d.1522), Sir Charles (1513-May 24, 1540), Sir Thomas, James (c.1519-1587+), Lawrence, Jane (b.c.1525), Mary, Margaret, and Catherine. As Lady Wingfield, she was at the Field of Cloth of Gold in 1520 and was invited to court by Anne Boleyn in 1530 when Anne was still only Lady Anne Rochford. The text of a letter Anne wrote to her at this time is still extant. Although some accounts say Lady Wingfield was at court in 1532 and that she served as Mother of Maids while Anne Boleyn was queen, this does not seem likely. By 1532, she had remarried and been widowed a second time. Her second husband was Sir Nicholas Hervey of Ickworth (c.1490-August 5, 1532), gentleman of the Privy Chamber and ambassador to Ghent. She may, however, have continued to call herself Lady Wingfield. By Hervey, Bridget had five children, Henry (b.1526), George (1527-1599), another George (1532-1605), Mabel, and another daughter. She inherited Backenhoe from Hervey in 1532 and in 1534 passed it on to her third husband, Sir Robert Tyrwhitt of Kettleby (d. November 16, 1581). She was his first wife and they had no children. In 1536, her name came up (as Lady Wingfield) when Anne Boleyn was charged with adultery. It was said that Bridget had made a deathbed confession concerning the queen’s misconduct. This was apparently common gossip at the time. Exactly what she’s supposed to have confessed is unknown, as is the date of her death. She was still alive in January 1534.

ELIZABETH WINDSOR
see ELIZABETH COWDRAY

KATHERINE WINDSOR
see KATHERINE de VERE

MARGARET WINDSOR (c.1478-1543+)
Margaret Windsor was the daughter of Thomas Windsor and Elizabeth Andrews and the goddaughter of Margaret Beaufort, countess of Richmond and Derby. She was living at Syon Abbey by 1505 and by March 1507 had become a Bridgettine. She was prioress at Syon from 1513 until 1539. When the abbey was dissolved, Margaret received a pension of 150 marks (the abbess, Agnes Jordan, received £200) and some of the nuns afterward lived with her. In his July 31, 1543 will, her brother Lord Windsor left Margaret an annuity of £3 6s. 8d.

ANNE WINGFIELD
see ANNE HARLING

BRIDGET WINGFIELD

see BRIDGET WILTSHIRE

ELIZABETH WINGFIELD

see ELIZABETH LECHE

KATHERINE WINGFIELD
see KATHERINE WOODVILLE

SUSAN WINGFIELD

see SUSAN BERTIE

JANE WISEMAN

see JANE VAUGHAN

DOROTHY WITHYPOLE

see DOROTHY WENTWORTH

MARGARET WODEHOUSE

see MARGARET SHELTON

ALICE WOLFE

see ALICE TANKERFELDE

MARY WOLLACOMBE

see MARY BASSETT

MARY WOLVERSTON (1540-before 1617)

The daughter of Philip Wolverston of Wolverston Hall, Suffolk (b.1514), a "gentleman pirate," she married first Thomas Knyvett (d.c.1553), by whom she had a son, Henry, and then Sir John Killigrew of Arwennack, Cornwall (d. March 5, 1584). Her children by Killigrew were John (c.1554-August 12,1605), Thomas (b.c.1556), Simon (b.c.1558), Mary (b.c.1560), and Katherine (c.1562-c.1623?). Lady Killigrew was said to keep open house for the more respectable pirates at Arwennack House and in 1582 was accused of leading a boarding party onto a Hanseatic ship at Falmouth and murdering a factor. In fact, there were two Lady Killigrews at the time (see the entry for Elizabeth Trewinard) and neither actively engaged in piracy or boarding ships, although both did receive stolen goods. Mary’s husband died £10,000 in debt because of their lavish lifestyle and her oldest son, John, died in prison. Mary’s grandson, yet another John Killigrew, erected a monument to Sir John Killigrew and his wife (although records I've seen of this give her name as Elizabeth) in 1617.

ELIZABETH WOOD (d.1536+)
Elizabeth Wood was the daughter of John Wood of East Marsham, Norfolk. In about 1518, she married Sir James Boleyn of Blickling Hall, Norfolk (1493-December 5, 1561). They had no children. She may have been the Lady Boleyn who attended Queen Anne Boleyn in the Tower in 1536.

ELIZABETH WOOD (x. July 26, 1537) (maiden name unknown)
Elizabeth Wood was the wife of Robert Wood of Aylsham, Norfolk. In May 1537, she was overheard to say, among other things, that "we had never good world since this king reigned." One of her listeners, John Dix, reported her to the constables, who referred the matter to the magistrates (Sir James Boleyn and Sir John Heydon) and within two weeks the "lewd and ungracious" Elizabeth Wood was in prison. She was convicted in the King's Bench on July 26 and immediately executed.

ELIZABETH WOODFORD (d. October 25,1570)

Elizabeth Woodford was the daughter of Robert Woodford of Ashby Folvile, Leicestershire and Brightwell, Buckinghamshire and Alice Gate. She should not be confused with the Elizabeth Woodford (d. March 1523), who was a nun at Syon. That Elizabeth was a senior member of the order there in 1518. This Elizabeth did not become a nun until 1519, when she entered Burnham Abbey. She was turned out when the abbey was dissolved and subsequently joined the household of Dr. John Clement, where she was put in charge of the education of the Clement daughters. She accompanied the family to Flanders when they went into exile in 1549 and once in Louvain she entered St. Ursula’s Augustinian cloister in Louvain. The Clement girls continued their education at St. Ursula’s and the youngest, Margaret Clement, was elected prioress there in 1569. She is said to have credited Elizabeth Woodford with being her inspiration for entering the religious life.

AGNES WOODHULL (1542-March 20, 1576)
Agnes Woodhull was the daughter of Anthony Woodhull (1518-February 4,1542) and Anne Smith (b.1522) and the niece of Mary Woodhull (below). She was born at Warkworth, Northumberland. Her wardship, with a yearly rent of £20 for her expenses, was purchased by Sir Anthony Browne. He sold it to Charles Brandon, duke of Suffolk, in 1544. He left it in his will (1545) to his son, Charles Brandon. Upon the younger Brandon’s death in 1551, Agnes’s custody passed to his mother, Catherine Willoughby, who in turn made a gift of it to her sons’ former governess, Margaret Blackborne. It is not known if Agnes went into exile during the reign of Mary Tudor, but Catherine Willoughby, her second husband, their children, and Margaret Blackborne did, so it seems probable. Around 1559, Agnes married Richard Chetwode of Worleston, Cheshire (1528-January 20, 1561), who had been a gentleman of the privy chamber to King Edward VI. They had a son, Richard, (c.1560-May 21, 1635). Around 1566, Agnes remarried, taking as her second husband Sir George Calverley or Claveley (c.1540-August 5,1585). Agnes died at Hodiffe, Bedfordshire.

MARY WOODHULL (c.1528-1550+)
Mary Woodhull (often written Odell) was the daughter of Nicholas Woodhull, Woodall, Wodill,Wodil, Woodhall, or Wodhull of Woodhull, Bedfordshire and Thenford Manor, Northamptonshire (c.1495-May 1531) and Elizabeth (or Alice) Parr (c.1499-before 1531). Her grandfather was Lord Parr of Horton, making her a cousin to Queen Katherine Parr, Horton’s niece. She came to court as a chamberer in 1543 when she was about fifteen and had been promoted to gentlewoman of the queen’s chamber at a salary of five shillings by 1547. Although Susan James (Catherine Parr) states that Mary Woodhull had previously served Katherine’s mother, Maud Parr, this is not possible given the date of Maud’s death (1529) and Mary’s probable date of birth. Mary remained with the queen dowager, sometimes sharing her bed for warmth, until Katherine’s death in 1548. Mary married David Seymour, a distant relation of Lord Protector Edward Seymour, duke of Somerset, who had also been in Queen Katherine’s household. They had three children, William, Edward, and Anne.

KATHERINE WOODVILLE (1457/8-May 18, 1497)
Katherine Woodville was the daughter of Sir Richard Woodville (x. August 12, 1469) and Jacquetta de St. Pol (1415-May 20, 1472) and the sister of Edward IV’s queen, Elizabeth Woodville. Although it was once commonly believed that she was born in 1442, making her nearly twenty-four in 1465, when Edward IV married her to ten-year-old Henry Stafford, 2nd duke of Buckingham (1455-1483), more recent research indicates that she was a child of around eight at that time. They had five children: Edward (February 3, 1478-May 17, 1521), Henry (1479-March 6, 1523), Elizabeth (d. May 1532), Anne (c.1483-1544+), and Humphrey (d.yng.). Buckingham initially allied himself with Richard III after Edward IV’s death, but switched allegiance to Henry Tudor, duke of Richmond in 1483 and was executed by Richard for treason. In October of that year, he had taken the precaution of sending his wife and sons to Weobley, Hertfordshire, home of Walter Devereux, Lord Ferrers. Their daughters were left behind at Brecon Castle. Katherine and her younger son remained at Weobley after Buckingham’s death, but her oldest son, Edward (1478-1521), was spirited away for safety when King Richard put a price of £1000 on his head. £500 was offered for the capture of young Henry. Searching for her sons, the king’s men found Katherine and Henry at Weobley and took them to London as prisoners. In December, she was allowed to bring her daughters and servants from in Wales to London. A few months later, she was granted an annuity of 200 marks. During the first months of Henry VII’s reign, before November 7, 1485, she married the king’s uncle, Jasper Tudor, duke of Bedford (c.1431-December 21, 1495). On her marriage, she received her dower and a jointure of 1000 marks, giving her annual revenue of about £2500. In early 1496, she took a third husband, Sir Richard Wingfield of Kimbolton Castle (c.1469-July 22, 1525). As she married without a license from the king, she was fined £2000, but the payment was demanded from her son rather than from her new husband. She had no children by Tudor or Wingfield. Biography: included in her husband’s Oxford DNB entry.

JOAN WOODWARD (1571-June 28,1623)
Joan Woodward was the daughter of Henry Woodward (d. December 1578), a dyer, and his wife Agnes (d. April 1617). On February 14, 1579, Agnes married one of her husband’s apprentices, Philip Henslowe (d. January 6,1616), a man some twenty years her junior. Henslowe used his profits as a dyer to purchase the Little Rose in St. Saviour’s parish, Southwark, and opened it as the Rose Playhouse in 1587. On October 22, 1592, Joan married Edward Alleyn (September 1,1566-November 25,1626), a player. In 1593, she was carted through Southwark as a bawd, accused of living on the proceeds of prostitution. According to some sources, both Henslowe and Allyn were brothel-keepers as well as theatrical entrepreneurs. Henslowe kept a diary and other details about the Rose are also available. Joan had no children that we know of. Letters between Joan and her husband are extant, although Joan had to have someone, often her stepfather, write hers for her. One of the letters from Allyn addresses her as "my good sweetheart and loving mouse." Portrait: date unknown.

MARGARET WOTTON (1487-1541)

Margaret Wotton was the daughter of Sir Robert Wotton of Boughton Malherbe, Kent (1465-1524) and Anne Belknap. She married first, in 1505, William Medley (1481-February 1509), by whom she had a son, George of Tilty, Essex (d. 1562), and second, in 1509, Thomas Grey, 2nd marquis of Dorset (June 22,1477-October 10,1530), by whom she had Elizabeth (b.1510), Katherine (1512-May 1,1532), Anne (1514-January 1548), Henry, 3rd marquis (January 12,1517-x.February 23,1554), John (1523-November 19,1569), Thomas (1526-x.1554), and a son and daughter who died young. She accompanied Mary Tudor to France in 1514 and was one of Elizabeth Tudor’s godmothers. She did not get on well with her eldest son. Portraits: a sketch by Holbein at Windsor; portrait by Holbein; miniature.

MARY WOTTON (1499-1543+)

Mary Wotton was the daughter of Sir Robert Wotton of Boughton Malherbe, Kent (1465-1524) and Anne Belknap. She married first, as his second wife, Sir Henry Guildford (1489-1532) and was his executrix. She received a release from all her obligations to the king on March 25, 1533 but was still deeply in debt in 1535 when she wrote to Lord Cromwell on the subject. Her second husband was Sir Gavin or Gawen Carew (d.1583), as the second of his three wives. She was at court in 1543 as one of Queen Kathryn Parr's ladies. Portraits: a sketch by Holbein in Basle; portrait by Holbein (1527) in the St. Louis Art Museum; Holbein's sketch of two women at the Tudor court, c.1527, now in the British Museum, may be another preliminary study for this portrait.

MARY WOTTON or WOOTON

see MARY NEVILLE

ELIZABETH WRAY
see ELIZABETH NORRIS

ISABEL WRAY (January 27, 1560-February 12, 1622/3)
Isabel Wray was the daughter of Sir Christopher Wray (1524-May 7,1592) and Anne Girlington (d. 1593). Isabel, her sister Frances (d. c. 1634), and their brother William (c.1555-August 13,1617), were all supporters of radical protestants. Isabel and Frances financed the education of puritan minister Richard Bernard (1568-1641), sending him to Christ’s College. Isabel’s first husband was Godfrey Foljambe of Aldwarke, Yorkshire (November 21, 1558-June 14, 1595). During their marriage she had a suspected demoniac named Katherine Wright brought to their house at Walton, near Chesterfield, while various ministers attempted to cure her of possession. John Darrell, later shown to be a charlatan, was given credit for accomplishing this. By 1599, Isabel married Sir William Bowes of Streatlam and Barnard Castle, Durham (d. October 30, 1611). Bowes yielded to Isabel in matters of religion, although most men looked down on a woman’s ability to understand theology. In 1606, she hosted a conference of leading puritans at her house in Coventnry. She supported many ministers who lost their livings for non-conformity. On May 7, 1617, at Walton, Derbyshire, Isabel married a third time, becoming the second of the four wives of John Darcy, baron Darcy of Aston (1579-July 5, 1635). She aquired three stepchildren but does not seem to have had any children of her own. Isabel’s sister Frances, who outlived her, married first Sir George St. Paul of Sharford, Lincolnshire (d. October 28, 1613) and then, on December 21, 1616, Robert Rich, earl of Warwick (1559-1619). Biography: Oxford DNB entry under “Darcy [née Wray; other married names Foljambe, Bowes], Isabel.”

ELIZABETH WRIOTHESLEY

see ELIZABETH VERNON

JANE WRIOTHESLEY
see JANE CHENEY

MARY WRIOTHESLEY

see MARY BROWNE

MARY WRIOTHESLEY (1572-June 1607)
Mary Wriothesley was the daughter of Henry Wriothesley, 2^nd earl of Southampton (April 1545-October 4,1581) and Mary Browne (July 22,1553-November 4,1607). Her father specified that she was to be brought up by his sister, Katherine Cornwallis of East Horsley, Surrey, or by her great aunt, Mistress Lawrence. Immediately after Southampton’s death, however, Mary’s mother wrote to Robert Dudley, earl of Leicester, for assistance in reclaiming her daughter. Mary was returned to her mother on November 28, 1581, two days before her father was buried. Mary was raised as a Catholic and married Thomas Arundell of Wardour (c.1586-November 7,1639), from another recusant family, in 1585. Their children were Anne, Catherine, Thomas (c.1586-May 14,1643), William (d.1653), and (possibly) Elizabeth. Arundell fought in Emperor Rudolph’s war with the Turks and returned to England in February 1596 to face Queen Elizabeth’s wrath because he’d accepted a foreign title. He was not permitted to live with his wife, even though she was ailing.

MARY WROTH

see MARY SIDNEY

DOROTHY WROUGHTON (1576-July 1634)
Dorothy Wroughton was the daughter of Sir Thomas Wroughton of Broad Hinton, Wiltshire (1547-1597) and Anne Barwick. She married Sir Henry Unton or Umpton of Faringdon, Berkshire (1557-March 23, 1595/6) in 1580. The Untons had no children but were apparently devoted. After Sir Henry’s death, Dorothy went into deep mourning. She commissioned a memorial portrait of his life, which includes scenes of the masque celebrating their wedding, a banquet table over which she presides, and his tomb with her kneeling figure above his effigy. She also raised a tomb at Faringdon to Sir Henry and herself. She inherited Faringdon and Wadley, Berkshire and made Wadley her principal residence, although initially she retired to her family's home at Broad Hinton to mourn. The estate was encumbered by debts said to equal £23,000. Since there was no will, Unton's sisters fought over their inheritance in court and the matter was not settled until the next year. In March 1598, before Dorothy would agree to marry her second husband, Sir George Shirley of Staunton Harold, Lincolnshire (1559-April 27, 1622), she had a number of demands, including reserving a living to herself, without his control; a jointure of £1000 a year; £500 in land to go to her son if there should be one; £500 a year out of his living should they fall out to live apart from him; and, most remarkably, should she find fault with her husband’s “unsufficiency,” the right to choose another bedfellow! They were married at the end of 1598 and separated after only two years. Dorothy lived primarily at Faringdon and Astwell and she entertained King James at Wadley in September 1603. After Shirley’s death it was rumored that she might marry diplomat Sir Thomas Edmondes (1563-Septembe 20,1639), who had been secretary to her first husband during his embassy to France in 1591-2, but Edmondes married someone else in 1626. Dorothy was also rumored to be his mistress. This seems unlikely, although he was a beneficiary in Dorothy's will. After his wife's death in 1629, Edmondes lived primarily in Essex. Portrait: memorial portrait; effigy at Faringdon.

ELIZABETH WYATT

see ELIZABETH BROOKE

MARGARET WYATT (c.1506-1561)

Margaret Wyatt was the daughter of Sir Henry Wyatt of Allington, Kent (1460-November 10,1537) and Anne Skinner. Before 1530, she married Sir Anthony Lee of Burston and Quarendon, Buckinghamshire (c.1509-1550). Their children were Sir Henry (1530-February 12,1611), Cromwell (d. 1601), Robert (c.1538-June 1598), and Katherine. Margaret was one of Anne Boleyn’s ladies and said to be her close friend. She accompanied Queen Anne to the scaffold and helped bury her. One source gives Margaret's life dates as c.1490-March 10, 1537 and has her married first to Thomas (or John) Rogers in 1505 and giving birth to Rogers's children John, William, Edward, Eleanor, and Joan. I believe this marriage belongs to Margaret's sister Mary (sometimes called Anne). Alternate birth dates given for Margaret range as late as 1514. Portrait: by Hans Holbein, 1540, in the Metropolitan Museum, New York; effigy on her tomb at Quarendon.

FLORENCE WYNDHAM

see FLORENCE WADHAM

KATHERINE WYNN

see KATHERINE TUDOR

ANNE WYSE
see ANNE CALTHORPE

FRANCES YATE

see FRANCES WHITE

ANNE ZOUCHE

see ANNE GAINSFORD

ELIZABETH ZOUCHE (c.1480-1540+)

Elizabeth Zouche was the daughter of John Zouche of Codnor (c.1440-1513+) and Eleanor St. John (b.c.1455). Elizabeth became a nun and in 1529 was elected abbess of Shaftesbury in Dorset. During 1536-38 she worked hard to preserve her house and its fifty-six nuns from the Dissolution, offering bribes to the king and to Thomas Cromwell, but the inevitable could be put off only so long. Shaftesbury was the last abbey to surrender, on March 23, 1539/40. Elizabeth did, however, come away with one of the largest pensions, a yearly stipend of £133 6s. 8d. The prioress received £20, the subprioress £7, and the sisters varying amounts between 56s. 8d. and £6 13s. 4d.

MARGARET ZOUCHE

see MARGARET BOURCHIER

MARY ZOUCHE (c.1512-1537+)

Mary Zouche was the daughter of John Zouche, 8th baron Zouche of Harringworth (c.1486-August 10, 1550) and his first wife, Dorothy Capell. In about 1527, she wrote to her cousin, Sir John Arundell, asking to be taken into royal service because her new stepmother (Susan Welby) was cruel to her. She was at court as a maid of honor, possibly first to Catherine of Aragon, but certainly to Anne Boleyn and Jane Seymour. She is the "Mrs. Souche" who was given jewelled borders by Queen Jane and attended Jane's funeral in 1537. In 1537, she was granted an annuity of £10 for her services to the late queen that was to continue until she married. A number of accounts say Mary never wed, but some genealogies give her a husband named Richard Burbagge. Portrait: Although the "M" in "M. Souch" could be an abbreviation for "Mistress" rather than "Mary," or indicate that the likeness is of Margaret Cheney, second wife of Richard, 9th baron Zouche, it is far more likely that Mary Zouche is the subject of the Holbein sketch at Windsor.

SARAH ZOUCHE
see SARAH HARINGTON

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