A WHO’S WHO OF TUDOR WOMEN: D

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her very out-of-date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 ©2008-11 Kathy Lynn Emerson (all rights reserved)

 

CECILY DABRIDGECOURT (1506-1558)
Cecily Dabridgecourt was the daughter of John Dabridgecourt or Daubridgecourt of Langdon Hall and Solihull, Warwickshire (1483-July 16, 1543) and his first wife Maria Mynors (1485-1512). She was one of Princess Mary's attendants in Wales in 1525, before her marriage to Sir Rhys/Rice Mansell of Oxwich, Glamorganshire (January 25, 1487-April 10, 1559). She was his third wife and they married on June 19, 1527. Their children were Edward (c.1527-August 5, 1595), Philip (1531-before 1559), Anthony (1535-1601+), Mary (1536-1564), Katherine, Elizabeth (d.1549+), and three sons who died young. In a letter to Lord Cromwell, Princess Mary refers to Cecily as "one of my gentlewomen, whom, for her long and acceptable service to me done, I much esteem and favor." On August 3, 1535, Cecily herself wrote to Cromwell, begging him to intercede with the king so that her husband, who was serving in Ireland, might return to England where, she writes, "Most of his living is encumbered with jointures and other charges, so that if God should take him, I, with my poor children, were clearly undone; for in these parts I am a stranger." She was writing from Beaupré and signed herself "Cecil Maunsell." In 1540, Margam Abbey became the family seat. They also had a town house in Clerkenwell. When Mary became queen, Cecily was a Lady of the Privy Chamber as "Lady Manxwell" and her daughter Mary was a maid of honor. Cecily was buried in St. Bartholomew-the-Great, Smithfield. Portraits: effigy in Margam Abbey, Glamorganshire.

CHRISTIAN DABRIDGECOURT (d.1562+)
Christian or Christiana Dabridgecourt was the daughter of John Dabridgecourt of Langdon Hall, Warwickshire (1483-July 16, 1543) and his second wife Elizabeth Wigston (d.1543+). She married Anthony Forster of Newark-upon-Trent, Nottinghamshire (d. March 1559) as his second wife. His will, dated February 23, 1558, left her lands in Nottinghamshire, £200, and specified valuables, as well as the lease of St. Leonard's hospital, Newark, for as long as she chose to live there. He also made provision that his two daughters by his first wife and his daughter with Christian be raised by her and married at eighteen or earlier, and gave instructions for a tomb to be erected to himself and his first wife in the church of Mary Magdalene, Newark. By 1562, Christian married Sir Robert Constable (c.1522-November 12, 1591), a soldier. Their son Henry (1562-October 9, 1613) was a poet and religious exile.

ANNE DACRE
see ANNE BOURCHIER

ANNE DACRE (c.1500-1547/48)
Anne Dacre was the daughter of Thomas Dacre, 2nd baron Dacre of the North (November 25, 1467-October 24, 1525) and Elizabeth Greystoke (July 10, 1471-August 14, 1516). On September 28, 1515, she married Christopher Conyers, 2nd baron Conyers of Hornby (c.1491-June 14, 1538). On February 2, 1539, her brother, William, 3rd baron Dacre, wrote to Lord Cromwell to ask him to befriend Anne, who needed his aid for herself and her young children. Lady Conyers herself then wrote to Lord Cromwell from Skelton Castle on July 10, 1539. Her eldest son John (1524-June 30, 1557) was still a minor and so had become a ward of the Crown, but he was already betrothed to Maud Clifford, daughter of the earl of Cumberland. Although her husband had tried to make arrangements for the rest of his family before his death, he had left behind enormous debts and she was faced with raising Elizabeth, Jane (c.1522-December 4, 1558), and Leonard (c.1529-1577) and arranging marriages for them without any income. She asked Cromwell for her dower rights and begged to be allowed to stay where she was and "be your farmer of my said son's lands." In a second letter, written on October 17, 1539, she restates her case, telling Lord Cromwell that since her husband died she has had "nothing to live upon, but as we have borrowed amongst our poor friends, and daily sundry of the creditors of my said lord my husband calls upon me for such debts as he was indebted unto them; the which I shall never be able to pay, unless I may be therein relieved and holpen by the profits of such of my said husband’s lands as he devised and assigned to that purpose, and for the preferment of his children." She asks again for her "dower and living" but when or if she received them is not recorded. Anne wrote her will on December 16, 1547 and it was proved on April 1, 1548. She asked to be buried with her husband in the Church of All Saints in Skelton and, among other bequests, left her daughter Jane all her clothes except one gown of tawny velvet with one kirtle of tawny damask, which she left to her other daughter.

ANNE DACRE (March 1,1557-April 13,1630)

Anne Dacre was the oldest daughter of Thomas, 4th baron Dacre (c.1526-July 25,1566) and Elizabeth Leyburne (d.September 4,1567). Her mother remarried on January 29, 1567. After the death of her only brother, George, 5th baron, at Thetford, Norfolk on May 17, 1569 in a fall from a wooden vaulting horse, she and her sisters became considerable heiresses. They were brought up by their stepfather, Thomas, 4th duke of Norfolk and by their grandmother, Helen Preston, dowager Lady Mounteagle. In September 1571, when Anne was fourteen, she was married to her stepbrother, Philip Howard (June 28, 1557-November 19,1595). He should have succeeded his father to the dukedom, but Thomas Howard was executed for treason in 1572 and the title was forfeit. Norfolk requested that “Meggy and Nan”—his daughter, Margaret Howard, and Anne—be given into the care of the Frances Sidney, countess of Sussex. Philip Howard was taken into the household of William Cecil, Lord Burghley, then attended St. John’s College, Cambridge, and then went to court. While he lived at Howard House in Charterhouse Square, Anne lived with his maternal grandfather, the earl of Arundel. She was chief mourner at the funeral of his daughter, Lady Lumley, in 1578, and depicted as such, styled countess of Surrey, in a contemporary manuscript. In 1581, Philip succeeded to his maternal grandfather’s title as earl of Arundel and shortly thereafter he and Anne began to live together, part of the time at Arundel Castle. When Anne openly converted to Catholicism, which was against the law, the queen committed her to the custody of Sir Thomas Sherley at Wiston House. There she gave birth to her first child, Elizabeth (1583-1598). She was successful in convincing her husband to convert to Catholicism as well, a step he took on September 30, 1584. As a result, he was made a prisoner in his own house by order of the queen. He was released in April 1584 and Anne was allowed to leave Wiston in September. In April 1585, however, Philip made secret plans to flee the country. Contrary winds delayed his escape and when he finally set sail, his ship was boarded and he was returned to shore. He was confined in the Beauchamp Tower, charged with trying to escape the realm. His brother William and sister Margaret and his uncle, Henry Howard, were also arrested. Shortly after he was imprisoned, Anne gave birth to their son and heir, Thomas (1586-1646). Anne and her two children were reduced to living in one wing of Arundel House on a pension of £8 a week. Anne managed, however, to scrape together £30 to bribe Cecily Hopton, one of the daughters of the Lord Lieutenant, to provide her husband with access to a priest, William Bennett, who was also imprisoned in the Tower of London. Bennett secretly said mass in Philip’s cell until, in the autumn of 1588, they were discovered and Bennett was transferred to another prison. Philip was soon after charged with treason because the mass was for the success of the Armada, and as a result spent the rest of his life in the Tower. Anne remained free and continued to practice her faith. From 1589 until 1595, Robert Southwell secretly lived in Anne’s household as her priest. Under James I, Anne regained possession of some of her properties, including Shifnal Manor, Shropshire, where she died. She spent her last years writing a memoir with the help of a live-in biographer. He finished it five years after her death. The Life of the Right Honorable Lady Anne Countesse of Arundell and Surrey was edited by the Duke of Norfolk in 1837. She also wrote at least one poem, in 1595, on the death of her husband. Written on the cover of a letter, it begins: "In sad and ashy weeds I sigh,/I groan, I pine, I mourn;/My oaten yellow reeds/I all to jet and ebon turn./My wat'ry eyes, like winter's skies,/My furrowed cheeks o'erflow./ All heavens know why men mourn as I,/And who can blame my woe." Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Howard [née Dacre], Anne." Portraits: a stained glass window in Arundel Cathedral, West Sussex; drawing by Lucas Vorsterman, 1626, in the British Museum; engraving by Wenceslaus Hollar, 1627; portrait sent to Philip II of Spain (no longer extant). She was described in life as being "taller of stature than the common sort" and "somewhat corpulant" in her last years.

ELIZABETH DACRE (1565-1639)
Elizabeth Dacre was one of the three daughters of Thomas, 4th baron Dacre (d. July 25, 1566) and Elizabeth Leyburne (d. September 4, 1567). Upon her mother’s remarriage to the 4th duke of Norfolk, she was betrothed to the duke’s younger son, Lord William Howard (1563-1640). They married in 1577. They lived primarily at Naworth Castle and had little to do with the court. Their children were Philip (b.1581), William, Charles, Thomas, Mary, Elizabeth (March 1, 1587-1637), Francis (1588-1660), John, Robert, Anne, and Margaret (December 19, 1593-March 3, 1620/21). Portrait: a portrait called “Lady Elizabeth Dacre, 1577” was at Gilling Castle in 1878 and was said to resemble one at Naworth called Queen Elizabeth, except that it showed the sitter with a candle and crucifix.

ELIZABETH DACRE
see ELIZABETH GREYSTOKE; ELIZABETH LEYBURNE; ELIZABETH TALBOT

JANE DACRE
see JANE CARLISLE

MABEL DACRE
see MABEL PARR

MABEL DACRE (c.1490-c.1533)
Mabel, sometimes called Margaret, Dacre was the daughter of Thomas, 2nd baron Dacre of Gillesland (November 25, 1467-October 24, 1525) and Elizabeth Greystoke (July 10, 1471-August 14, 1516). In about 1520, she married Henry, 7th baron Scrope of Bolton (c.1480-December 1532). Their children were John, 8th baron (c.1510-June 22, 1549), Anne, Joan, Elizabeth, and Anne. Mabel was at court as one of Catherine of Aragon’s ladies at the beginning of the reign of Henry VIII. Neville Williams, in Henry VIII and His Court, calls her the “sickly Lady Scrope.”

MAGDALEN DACRE (1539-April 8, 1608)

Magdalen Dacre was the daughter of William Dacre, 3^rd baron Dacre of Gilsland (April 29,1500-November 18,1563) and Elizabeth Talbot (d.1559). At thirteen, she was a gentlewoman to Anne Sapcote, countess of Bedford and at sixteen joined Queen Mary’s household. She was one of Mary’s bridesmaids when she married Philip II of Spain. Magdalen was reportedly very religious, spending much of her time in prayer and wearing a coarse linen smock under her court clothes. According to a story repeated in E. S. Turner’s The Court of St. James and elsewhere, she was a blonde, a head taller than any other maid of honor, and very attractive, and she caught the attention of Queen Mary’s husband, Philip of Spain. The story goes that Philip opened a window to a room where Magdalen was washing her face (or in some versions, brushing her hair) and, supposedly in jest, caught hold of her. Magdalen beat him off with a nearby staff and neither she nor her mistress found the incident amusing. On July 15, 1558, Magdalen was married at St. James’s palace to Anthony Browne, Viscount Montagu (November 29, 1528-October 19,1592). Magdalen raised two stepchildren and had ten children of her own: Philip (b.1559), Henry (c.1562-1628), George, Anthony, Jane, Mary, Elizabeth, Mabel, Thomas, and William. Magdalen and her husband were recusants during the reign of Elizabeth and her husband was questioned when Magdalen’s brother, Leonard, took part in the Northern Rebellion of 1569, but in general they were left alone by the government, even though they had resident chaplains who celebrated mass for as many as 120 people on special occasions. Magdalen was only once accused of recusancy, her house was searched only twice, and only once was one of her priests taken and imprisoned. She was willing to allow a printing press on her premises, but would not aid treasonous plots, not even those of another brother, Francis. Her chaplain at Cowdray was Thomas More, grandson of the martyr. When Queen Elizabeth visited Cowdray for a week in 1591, the priests were hidden and George Browne was knighted. Magdalen lived at Battle Abbey after her husband's death. In 1597, when a messenger brought a letter there to be passed on to the earl of Essex, Magdalen turned the messenger over to the magistrate and also reported the incident to Lord Buckhurst, a privy councilor, sending her niece along as a witness. At the same time, a house at the edge of Battle manor contained a subterranean passage by which priests were smuggled into England. Magdalen was buried in Midhurst Church. Biography: written in Latin by Richard Smith, Bishop of Chalcedon (1627); A.C. Southern, ed. An Elizabethan Recusant House: the Life of the Lady Magdalen, Viscountess Montague; Roger B. Manning, Religion and Society in Elizabethan Sussex; Oxford DNB entry under "Browne [née Dacre], Magdalen." Portrait: alabaster tomb in Eastbourne Church with figures of Sir Anthony Browne and both of his wives.

MARY DACRE (July 4, 1563-April 7, 1578)
Mary Dacre was the daughter of Thomas Dacre, 4th baron Dacre of Gillisland (c.1526-July 25, 1566) and Elizabeth Leyburne (d. September 4, 1567). During her mother's short remarriage to the duke of Norfolk, Mary was betrothed to one of the duke's sons, Thomas Howard, later earl of Suffolk (1561-1626), and married him by May 9, 1577. Charlotte Merton, in The Women who served Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth, advances the theory that Mary Dacre was the "Ladie M. Howarde" Sir John Harington referred to, in 1606, when he related the following story in a letter to Robert Markham. A lady at court appeared in "a rich border powdered wyth golde and pearle, and a velvet suite belonging thereto." The queen, annoyed that "it exeeded her own" clothing, got hold of the outfit and put it on. The "kirtle and border was far too shorte for her Majesties height; and she askede every one, How they likede her new-fancied suit? At lengthe she asked the owner herself, If it was not made too short and ill-becoming? Which the poor Ladie did presentlie consente to. Why then if it became not me, as being too short, I am minded it shall never become thee, as being too fine; so it fitteth neither well. This sharp rebuke abashed the Ladie, and she never adorned her herewith any more. I believe the vestment was laid up till after the Queenes death." Attempts to identify M. Howarde, usually connect the story to one of the Mary Howards who were maids of honor to Elizabeth during her long reign (see MARY HOWARD), but Merton argues that since Harington says he was "a boye" at the time of the incident, it could logically have taken place in about 1577, when Mary Dacre, Lady Thomas Howard, might have been expected to appear at court for the first time. Merton suggests inexperience as the reason Mary might have dressed in clothing both above her station and likely to infuriate the queen. Although Mary had been raised in the household of the duke of Norfolk from about age three until about age nine, he was executed for treason in 1572, after which it might not have been considered essential to educate her in the ways of the royal court. Mary died at Saffron Walden before her fifteenth birthday. She had no children.

MARGARET DAKINS (February 1571-September 1633)

Margaret Dakins was the daughter of Arthur Dakins of Linton, Yorkshire (c.1517-July 13, 1592) and Thomasine Gye (d. November 13, 1613), but she was brought up in the Puritan household of the earl of Huntingdon at Ashby-de-la-Zouch, Leicestershire. Her first husband was another of Huntingdon’s charges, Walter Devereux (1569-September 8, 1591), but he was killed in battle in France early in their marriage. By November 1591, even before Walter’s body had been returned to England for burial, she was being courted by two men. She married one, Thomas Sidney (1569-July 26,1595) on December 22, 1591 and, after his death, reluctantly agreed to wed the other, Thomas Posthumous Hoby (1566-December 30, 1640). She married Hoby at his mother’s house in Blackfriars on August 9,1596. They lived at Hackness, Yorkshire, which Hoby’s powerful relations, the Cecils, had secured for her. It had been purchased at the time of her first marriage as a home for the young couple, but there were difficulties over the financing and the new earl of Huntingdon was claiming the property belonged to him. Margaret kept a diary of her religious observances and recorded some of the cures she used to treat her retainers. The diary covers the period from August 9, 1599 to July 21, 1605. Margaret’s piety was highly respected, but the same characteristics in her husband provoked an incident on August 27,1600 which ended in the courts. A band of hunters, dissatisfied with the way the Hobys kept open house, vandalized Hackness. The case was finally decided in Hoby’s favor by the Privy Council in 1602, but his refusal to unlock his wine cellar was regarded as just as rude as breaking four quarrels of glass and roistering while the Hobys were at prayers. Margaret was buried at Hackness on September 6,1633. Her husband erected an alabaster monument to her there. The value of her estate has been estimated at £1500. Biography: Dorothy M. Meads, ed., The Diary of Lady Margaret Hoby, 1599-1605 (1930); Joanna Moody, ed., The Private Life of an Elizabethan Lady: The Diary of Lady Margaret Hoby, 1599-1605 (1998); Oxford DNB entry under "Hoby [née Dakins], Margaret."

DOROTHY DALE (1560-1618)
Dorothy Dale was the daughter and heir of Valentine Dale (c.1520-November 17, 1589) and Elizabeth Sherer (d. October 1590), who was the widow of one Forth when she married Dale. In around 1580, Dorothy married Sir John North (1551-June 5, 1597). Their children were Dudley, 3rd Baron North (1582-1666), Elizabeth (c.1583-c.1616), Roger (1588-1652/3), Sir John, Gilbert, and Mary. She erected a monument to her husband in St. Gregory by Paul's, London. Portrait: c.1605, attributed to John de Critz.

MARY DALE (d. November 1601)
Mary Dale was the daughter of William Dale, a Bristol merchant. She married three times, but the name of her first husband is unknown. Her second husband was Thomas Avery (d. 1576), to whom she was married by 1554. In 1578, she wed Sir Thomas Ramsey (1510/11-1590), who was lord mayor of London that year and one of the richest men in London. His house in Lombard Street was one of the finest in the city. By the time of her death, Mary owned her own coach. Since there were no children from Ramsay’s first marriage and Mary had no children from any of hers, she was very active in charitable works. She left £1000 to her native city, Bristol, and the total value of charities established by both husband and wife from 1583 until Mary’s death is reckoned at £14,318. After Mary’s death, she was twice honored in print. The first was Nicholas Bourne’s 1602 An Epitaph upon the Decease of the Worshipful Lady Ramsay and in 1606 she was presented as what the Oxford DNB calls “the model of virtuous civic womanhood” in Thomas Heywood’s play If You Know Not Me You Know Nobody, Part II. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under “Ramsey [née Dale; other married name Avery], Mary.” Portraits: oil painting at Christ’s Hospital; line engraving.

ELIZABETH DALKELD
see ELIZABETH PENNINGTON

KATHERINE DALLAM (1516-1563)
Katherine Dallam was the daughter of Thomas Dallam (d.1497+), a skinner. Her first husband was Richard Collyer or Collier (d.1533), a wealthy adventurer and mercer born in Horsham, Sussex. They had two children, George and Dorothy, and lived in The Key, a property located on the south side of Cheapside, almost opposite Mercers' Hall in the parish of St. Pancras, Soper Lane. Collyer purchased this property in 1520 for £100. By 1532, he also owned another house in Cheapside and property in Kent, Surrey, and Sussex. After his death and before November 1535, Katherine married Robert Packington or Pakington (1496-November 13, 1536), another mercer. Packington was an evangelical and during the 1530s was secretly smuggling English-language Bibles into England. This may have led to his death. At 4 AM on Monday, November 13, 1536, Packington, who was probably living at The Key, was on his way to mass at the Mercer's Chapel of St. Thomas of Acre Church. Near the end of Soper Lane, about to cross Cheapside, he was shot dead by an assailant who was never identified. Both the fact that he’d been shot by a hand gun, when guns were still somewhat rare, and the failure of authorities to make any arrest led to all manner of speculation. The best guess is that he was killed because of his smuggling activities. The Oxford DNB gives Packington two sons and a daughter by his first wife. Anne F. Sutton, in The Mercery of London confuses Katherine with this first wife, Agnes Baldwin. Another source says Packington and Katherine's children were Thomas (d. June 2, 1571), John, Elizabeth, Anne, and Margaret, but some of those may belong to Agnes. What is clear is that, on August 21, 1539, Katherine married for a third time. Her new husband was Michael Dormer (d.1545), yet another mercer. He is said to have been wealthier than either of her previous husbands. They appear to have remained at The Key, but by 1540, both George and Dorothy Collyer had died. Under the terms of Collyer's will, the property was supposed to be sold to provide an endowment to establish a school at Horsham. An agreement was worked out whereby Katherine and her husband stayed on at The Key as company tenants and, in August 1540, Dormer paid £8 6s 8d for a house and garden near Horsham for the school, which opened in 1541 and remained in operation until 1893. Michael Dormer was Lord Mayor of London in 1541-2. Katherine does not seem to have had any children by this third marriage. Dormer, however, had five sons and a daughter by his first wife. Upon his death, Katherine inherited his dwellings in St. Laurence Jewry and at Kimble, Buckinghamshire for life. According to his will, proved October 2, 1545, she was "to take her pastime therein, to make merry with my friends and hers." Dormer also left several sets of instructions for her. She was to pay 53s 4d to the Mercers to support a morrow mass priest during the lifetime of Ambrose Barker, grocer. After his death, the reversion of certain lands were to pass to the Mercers to support the same priest. She was also to give the Mercers £6 13s 4d each year for a dinner "to be kept at their pleasure."

CATHERINE DAMMARTIN (d. February 15, 1553)
Catherine Dammartin was a former nun from Metz when she married Pietre Martiri Vermigli of Florence (September 8, 1499-November 12, 1562) in Strasbourg in 1545. Known as Peter Martyr, her husband was a radical religious reformer. They traveled to England where, in January 1551, he was appointed first canon of Christ Church, Oxford. Catherine thus became the first woman resident in an Oxford college. The Oxford DNB entry for Richard Cox, later bishop of Ely, gives this distinction to Cox's first wife, who resided at Christ Church and was "joined by Mrs. Vermigli." When the windows of their rooms were repeatedly smashed by protestors, the Vermiglis moved their lodgings into the cloisters. A contemporary, George Abbot, described Catherine as "reasonably corpulent, but of most matronlike modesty" and skilled at cutting "plumstones into curious faces." When Catherine died, she became the first clerical wife buried in an English cathedral. She was interred in Christ Church Cathedral near the former shrine to St. Frideswide. Only a few months later, however, Mary Tudor became queen and Peter Martyr fled from England with other Marian exiles. It is difficult to separate the truth of what happened next from later Protestant propaganda, but it appears that sometime in 1557, Catherine was tried posthumously for heresy. The case could not be made, partly because she does not appear to have spoken English and those who had met her could not understand German. The intention, had she been convicted, was to burn her remains. This was not done, but her bones were exhumed, some say on orders from Cardinal Pole himself, and Richard Martial/Marshall, dean of Christ Church, was ordered to dispose of them. The story goes that the bones were flung on a dungheap in the stable. In 1558, when Elizabeth Tudor became queen, these bones were somehow identified and at some point were reinterred in the cathedral. The story reported in a 1562 publication and repeated by John Foxe in his Book of Martyrs was that her bones were deliberately mixed with those of St. Frideswide so that neither would ever be dishonored again.

MARGARET DANE
see MARGARET KEMPE

ELIZABETH DANET, DANNET, DANNATT or DANNETT
see ELIZABETH LENTON

ELIZABETH DANET, DANNET, DANNATT or DANNETT (c.1500-1564)

Elizabeth Danet was the daughter of Gerard or Gerald Danet of Danet's Hall, Bruntingthorpe, Leicestershire (c.1455-May 4, 1520) and his second wife, Mary Belknap (1472-c.1558). I question the date of birth given in "Early Dannett Pedigree" online, as August 10, 1507 would make her only ten when she participated in revels at court in 1517. She was one of Queen Catherine of Aragon's "women" by March 1521, when she received a "reward" from the king of £20. Elizabeths younger sister, Mary Danet, was also at court. Elizabeth Danet's marriage contract with Sir John Arundell of Lanherne (c.1500-November 7, 1557) bears the date July 10, 1525. She was his second wife. They had twelve children, including John (c.1530-November 17, 1590), Cecill (Cecilia or Cecily), Thomas, Marie, George, Elizabeth, and Edward (d.1586). Arundell was in prison from 1549 until June 1552. After his death, his widow was granted the administration of his possessions, including his library. Elizabeth was buried in St. Mawgan's church, where there is a memorial brass. She left a ring worth 20s. to her sister, Mary Medley, which calls into questions the date of death given for Mary (below).

MARY DANET, DANNET, DANNATT or DANNETT
see MARY BELKNAP

MARY DANET, DANNET, DANNATT or DANNETT (d. before 1562?)
Mary Dannett was the daughter of Gerard or Gerald Danet of Danet's Hall, Bruntingthorpe, Leicestershire (c.1455-May 4, 1520) and his second wife, Mary Belknap (1472-c.1558). She is recorded as being in the household of Mary Tudor (later Queen Mary) in 1526. Mary Danet married George Medley (d.1562), half brother of Lady Jane Grey's father. They lived at Tilty, Essex and had three sons and two daughters. Portrait: brass in St. Mary the Virgin, Tilty, Essex

THOMASIN DANIELL
see THOMASIN BARDFIELD

JANE DANIELS

see JANE REHORA

ANNE DANVERS
see ANNE PURY; ANNE STRADLING

ANNE DANVERS (d.1558)
Anne Danvers was the daughter of William Danvers of Culworth, Northamptonshire, Calthorpe, Oxfordshire, and Chamberhouse at Crookham, Berkshire (c.1432-April 1504) and Anne Pury (d.1530). She married Richard Verney of Compton Verney, Warwickshire (c.1464-September 28, 1527) and was the mother of Anne (d.1523), Thomas, John, and George (c.1506-before 1540). Portraits: Anne is featured in two memorials in stained glass, formerly in the church in Compton Verney, the first in memory of her husband and executed c.1527 and the second commemorating her own death in 1558.

ELIZABETH DANVERS (1506-1522+)
Elizabeth Danvers was the daughter of John Danvers of Chamberhouse (c.1478-October 30, 1508) and Margaret Hampden. In 1518, William Boughton was granted the wardships of Elizabeth and her sisters Mary and Dorothy. Another sister, Anne, was already married. By February 1522, Elizabeth was married to Thomas Cave of Stanford, Northamptonshire (d. September 4, 1558). Their children were John, Richard (c.1527-1566), Ambrose (d.yng), Roger (c.1536-July 26, 1586), Edward, Anthony, Amy, Mary, Margaret, Elizabeth (c.1532-1562+), Margery, Barbara (d.yng), Alice, and Susan. Portrait: tomb effigy in St. Nicholas Church, Stanford-on-Avon.

ELIZABETH DANVERS
see ELIZABETH NEVILLE

LUCY DANVERS (d.1621)
Lucy Danvers was the daughter of Sir John Danvers of Dauntsey (1540-December 19, 1543) and Elizabeth Neville (d.1630). She inherited property through her grandfather, making her a good catch for Sir Henry Baynton of Bromham, Wiltshire (1571-1616). They married c. 1599 and lived primarily at Bromham and at Bromhill House and had two children, Edward and Elizabeth (1606-1638). In her will, Lucy left money for a minister to say the service in Foxham Chapel in Bromhill parish and items of clothing such as an ash color velvet gown and a satin waistcoat. She was buried in Westminster Abbey on June 14, 1621.

MAGDALEN DANVERS

see MAGDALEN NEWPORT

SYBIL DANVERS
see SYBIL FOWLER

CAMILLA DARCY
see CAMILLA GUICCIARDINI

CATHERINE DARCY
see CATHERINE LEIGH; CATHERINE PAKINGTON

CATHERINE DARCY (d.1592+)
Catherine Darcy was the daughter of Sir Henry Darcy of Brimham, Yorkshire (d.1592) and his second wife, Catherine Fermor. In June 1591, she married Gervase Clifton of Leighton Bromswold (c.1570-1618). In that same year, John Dowland wrote four musical pieces for her. The Cliftons had a son, who died young, and a daughter, Catherine (c.1592-1637).

DOROTHY DARCY
see DOROTHY MELTON

DOUSABELLA DARCY
see DOUSABELLA TEMPEST

EDITH DARCY
see EDITH SANDYS

ELIZABETH DARCY
see ELIZABETH de VERE; ELIZABETH WENTWORTH

ELIZABETH DARCY (1501-1536+)
Elizabeth Darcy was the daughter of Thomas, baron Darcy of Templehurst (1467-x. June 30, 1537) and Edith Sandys (1475-August 22, 1529). By April 1521, possibly on April 26, 1514, she married, as his first wife, Sir Marmaduke Constable of Nuneaton, Warwickshire (d. April 21, 1560). They had two sons and eight daughters, including the heir, Robert (1530-1591), Marmaduke, Jane, Catherine, Margery, Dorothy, Isabel, Margaret, and Frances. Elizabeth and her husband were estranged by 1534 and in 1536, when both his father and hers were involved in the Pilgrimage of Grace, she wrote a letter to Thomas Cromwell complaining of her ill-treatment by her husband. At that time, Constable was facing the probable forfeiture of his father's lands and consequent loss of his own inheritance. She died before 1539.

ELIZABETH DARCY (c.1584-March 9, 1650/1)
Elizabeth Darcy was the daughter of Thomas Darcy, 3^rd baron Darcy of Cliche (July 5, 1565-February 1640) and Mary Kytson (1566-June 28, 1644). On May 14, 1602 she married Thomas Savage (c.1586-November 20, 1635) of Melford Hall, Suffolk. He was created Viscount Savage in 1626. Following his death and that of her father, Elizabeth was created Countess Rivers for life in her own right on April 21, 1641. She was a lady of the bedchamber to Queen Henrietta Maria and because she was a Catholic, became a target when Parliament called for action against all recusants. Her homes at St. Osyth and Long Melford were destroyed by mobs, for a loss estimated at £100,000. Although Parliament ordered restitution, her troubles continued and in May 1643 she requested permission to leave England for France, but does not appear to have gone. By her death, she was said to be bankrupt. Elizabeth and Thomas Savage had eleven sons and eight daughters, including Anne, John (c.1602-1654), Jane (1607-1633), Thomas (1611-1682), Dorothy (c.1611-1691), Charles, Elizabeth, Catherine, Henrietta Maria, Francis, William, James, and Richard. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under “Savage [née Darcy], Elizabeth.” Portrait: c.1640 by P. Leley.

ISABEL DARCY
see ISABEL WRAY

KATHERINE DARCY
see KATHERINE NEVILLE

MARY DARCY (d. by September 1561)
Mary Darcy was the daughter of Thomas Darcy of Danbury, Essex, but exactly who he was is uncertain. Mary was not the daughter of Thomas, 1st baron Darcy of Cliche (1506-June 28, 1558) and Elizabeth de Vere. By 1531, Mary was married Robert Leche (Leeche/Leech), an alderman of Norwich (d.1544+) but during that marriage was the mistress of Richard Southwell of Wood Rising, Norfolk (d. January 11, 1565), who was married to Thomasine Darcy, sister of the 1st baron of Cliche. Mary had four children by Southwell before Thomasine died and Southwell was able to marry her—Richard (by 1531-1600), Dorothy, Mary, and Thomas. Accounts that identify Mary's husband as Robert Leche of Colchester, Essex, who made his will in 1559, are incorrect, as is the claim that when Thomasine died, Southwell accused him of making a bigamous marriage with Mary, since his (Leche's) first wife still lived. In 1544, Thomas Lewyn, clerk, acting for Southwell, had license to alienate Widford Manor in Hertfordshire to the use of Mary Leech, wife of Robert Leech. In 1558, she is listed as Mary Darcy alias Leech of Horsham St. Faith, Norfolk. After their marriage, which took place no earlier than 1559, they had one additional child, Catherine.

MARY DARCY
see MARY KYTSON

ELIZABETH DARRELL (d.c.1556)

Elizabeth Darrell was probably the daughter of Sir Edward Darrell of Littlecote, Wiltshire (1466-March 9, 1530) and either his first wife, Jane Croft (d. before 1493), or his third, Alice Flyte, to whom he was married on April 3, 1512. He left his unmarried daughter Elizabeth 300 marks in his will. His other two daughters received 100 marks each. It makes more sense that Elizabeth was the youngest, born c. 1513. She was one of Catherine of Aragon's gentlewomen and among the mourners at her funeral. She asked to join the household of Queen Jane Seymour but is next found in the household of Gertrude Blount, marchioness of Exeter, in November 1538, when the marchioness and others were arrested on suspicion of treason. She was forced to give evidence against the marchioness. In her interrogation on November 6, she confessed that she had heard that the king had sent Peter Mewtas into France to kill Cardinal Pole with a handgun. Elizabeth was the mistress of Thomas Wyatt (1503-1542) the poet and diplomat, said to be the Phyllis of his poem If waker care, if sudden pale colour. Exactly when they met and how long they were involved in a romantic relationship is unclear. Some suggest that the affair began as early as June 1532. Wyatt was out of the country a good deal as an ambassador. They could not marry because Wyatt already had a wife, Elizabeth Brooke, from whom he had long been separated. In 1537 an attempt was made by the Brooke family to force a reconciliation between husband and wife, but Wyatt refused to take her back. Elizabeth Darrell was openly living with Wyatt, as his mistress, at Allington Castle in Kent, in January of 1541, when Wyatt was arrested. Because she was pregnant at the time, she was allowed to remain in one of Wyatt’s confiscated houses. There was another attempt made at that time to force him to take back his wife, but following his release from the Tower, he returned to his mistress. Wyatt made provision in his will for Elizabeth and the son born in 1541, leaving her properties in Dorset with the right of reversion to her son, Francis, and Montacute and Tintinhull in Somerset, to revert to his son Sir Thomas on Elizabeth's death. She gave birth posthumously to a second son, Henry, who died young. Wyatt was reputed to have another illegitimate child, a daughter named Frances who married Thomas Lee (Leigh) of St. Bees and Calder Abbey, Cumberland by 1553. She does not appear to be Elizabeth's daughter. Elizabeth apparently got along well with Wyatt’s legitimate son, Thomas Wyatt the younger, which is probably what gave rise to the identification of her as his mistress rather than his father’s. There is also a story that credits her with a third son, Edward (c.1540-1590), who was involved with the rebels led by Sir Thomas the Younger in 1554 and sentenced to be executed, even though he was only thirteen or fourteen at the time. This Edward is variously identified as a natural son of Sir Thomas the Younger and as the son of Sir Thomas the Elder. If he was thirteen or fourteen, however, he would have been born before Sir Thomas the Elder died and one would have expected him to be named in Sir Thomas’s will. It seems more likely he was the natural son the younger Thomas. He was pardoned on April 29, 1554. Elizabeth's son Francis went by the name Francis Darrell. Sir Thomas the Younger transferred Tarrant, Kent to him in 1542 (or, according to other sources, to Elizabeth in 1544). With the attainder of Sir Thomas the Younger in 1554, those properties held by Elizabeth that would have gone to him on her death, went to the Crown instead. She was in possession of Tintinhull in 1547 but it was occupied by the Crown's tenant, Sir William Petre, in 1556, and papers relating to the lease suggest that Elizabeth was by then deceased. The parsonage at Stoke, Somerset was leased to Elizabeth in 1548 and around 1554, at about the same time Queen Mary seems to have paid Elizabeth a legacy left to her by Queen Catherine of Aragon, Elizabeth married Robert Strode or Strowde. In 1560, he was living in the provost's house at Stoke.

MARY DARRELL
see MARY RADCLIFFE

MARY DARRELL (c.1545-1594+)
Mary Darrell was the daughter of Thomas Darrell of Scotney, Kent and Mary Roydon (c.1525-1591+). In 1563, the Darrells approached John Lennard of Chevening, near Tunbridge Wells, about making a match between Mary and his son, Sampson (1545-September 20, 1615). Mary seemed agreeable and Lennard approved of her and a pre-contract was arranged. By Bartholomewtide, however, Lennard had heard rumors that Mary was to wed someone else. When he questioned the Darrells about this, they denied it. They admitted that she had another suitor, one Barnabe Googe of Gooche (June 11, 1540-February 7, 1593/4), who had been writing poems to her, but insisted that there was no “secret enticement.” The case was submitted to arbitration by Archbishop Parker of Canterbury. He removed Mary from her parents’ house and made her a ward of the court while the matter was decided. To the dismay of both the Darrells and the Lennards, the archbishop decided in favor of Master Googe, to whom Mary was wed on February 5, 1564. They had eight children: Matthew (c.1566-c.1624), Thomas (b.c.1568), Barnabe, William, Henry, Robert, Mary, and Francis. Additional details on Mary and the Lennards are given in Germaine Greer’s Shakespeare’s Wife.

ANNE DASTON (1580-1605)
Anne Daston was the eldest daughter of Richard Daston of Dumbleton. She married John Savage of Nobury, Worcestershire. She died giving birth to his son. Portrait: brass in St. Katherine’s Church, Wormlington, Gloucestershire.

CATHERINE DASTON (1590-1674)
Catherine Daston was the daughter of Richard Daston and Anne Savage. She married her first cousin, Sir Giles Savage of Elmley Castle, Worcestershire on April 22, 1623 in Worminton, Gloucestershire. They had five children, four sons, who appear on the Savage monument in St. Mary's Church, Elmley, and a posthumous daughter who died as an infant and who is shown on the monument in her mother's arms. Also on the monument is Sir Giles's father, William Savage, who died in 1616. Although represented on this c.1631 structure, Catherine herself lived to be eighty-four and was buried in Malvern Priory.

ELIZABETH DAUBENEY
see ELIZABETH ARUNDELL

KATHERINE DAUBENEY
see KATHERINE HOWARD

ELIZABETH DAUNCEY

see ELIZABETH MORE

JANE DAVENANT
see JANE SHEPPARD

ELIZABETH DAVIES
see ELIZABETH TOUCHET

CATHERINE DAVISON
see CATHERINE SPELMAN

ALICE DAVY (d.1519+)
Alice Davy was a nurse to Margaret Tudor. Later she was a gentlewoman to Queen Catherine of Aragon. In 1519, she was granted an annuity of £10.

FAITH DAVYS
see FAITH FULFORD

MARGARET DAWES
see MARGARET FINCH

ISABEL DAWTREY
see ISABEL SHIRLEY

PRUDENTIA DEACON (c.1580-December 21, 1645)
Prudentia Deacon was the daughter of John Deacon of Middlesex. She was in the household of Penelope Devereux, Lady Rich in England but on July 11, 1606 she was in Brussels, where she was received into the Abbey of the Glorious Assumption of Our Lady along with four other Englishwomen. One of the others was a Mrs. Morgan, who had previously been in the service of the countess of Sussex. Prudentia was professed as a nun on April 29, 1608, when she was said to be thirty-two, but if the age given at her death is correct, she was only twenty-seven or twenty-eight. In 1623 she was sent to a new convent at Cambrai. She served as prioress at Cambrai and worked on translations there. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Deacon, Prudentia."

_____ DE BRUXIA (d. 1533+) (maiden name unknown)
This is one of my mystery ladies, and yet what is known about her is intriguing. She was the wife of an Italian musician at the court of Henry VIII and herself served in the household of Princess Mary from at least 1525-33. She is listed only as the wife of Peter de Bruxia (d.1536+), without a first name. Was she Italian like her husband? Probably not, although there was probably a Spaniard, Mary Vittorio, in the same royal household. More likely, since de Bruxia was in England before 1512, she was an English girl. What makes matters more difficult is the huge number of names/spellings used in referring to her husband. He signed himself Giovanni Pietro de Bustis but surviving records call him John Peter, John Piero, and Zuan Piero de Brescia, de Bruxia, de Brecia, de Briscia, and de Brisia. In 1512, King Henry granted him an annuity of £40 for life. At that time he was the premier court lutenist and he remained in royal service until 1536, but by 1517 he had been eclipsed by a younger lute player, probably Philip van Wilder. In 1525 and 1533, Mrs. Peter de Bruxia is listed among the ladies and gentlewomen in the household of Princess Mary and her husband is also to be found there, although as one of the gentlemen waiters rather than as a musician. He likely served in both capacities.

JANE DEE
see JANE FROMOND

ÉTIENNETTE DE LA BAUME (d. 1521)
Étiennette de la Baume was the daughter of Marc de la Baume, seigneur of Châteauvillain and Count of Montrevel. A Flemish woman who was a maid of honor at the court of Margaret of Austria, Archduchess of Savoy and Regent of the Netherlands, she enjoyed the attentions of King Henry VIII during his visit to Lille in 1513. In August 1514, when she was about to marry Ferdinand de Neufchatel, seigneur de Marnay and Montaigu (1452-1522), as his third wife, she wrote to the king, sending him "a bird and some roots of great value" and reminding him that he had promised to give her ten thousand crowns as a wedding present. It is unclear whether or not Henry sent her the gift. Neither is it clear whether she was briefly his mistress or simply someone he flirted with during his time in Lille. Alison Weir (Mary Boleyn) suggests that this letter from Étiennette indicates that King Henry installed her in a house in Marnay and that she was still living there a year later. The wedding took place on October 18, 1514. She had no children.

ELIZABETH DE LA BERE
see ELIZABETH MORS

JANE DELAHAYE
see JANE ASHLEY

ELIZABETH DE LA POLE
see ELIZABETH PLANTAGENET

MARGARET DE LA POLE
see MARGARET SCROPE

CECILY DELVES (c.1470-1517+)
Cecily Delves was the daughter of Sir Henry Delves of Doddington, Cheshire (one source says Shropshire) (c.1454-c.1484) and Elen (Eleanor/Helena/Elena/Hellina) Swinnerton or Swynnerton (c.1453-1489?). Her mother rapidly remarried, to Humphrey Peshall of Horsley (d. June 3, 1489), by whom she had three sons (John, Richard and William) and a daughter, Isabella. Cecily married William Mytton of Shrewsbury (1465-July 16, 1513). They had two children, Helen or Eleanor (1498-1517+) and Richard (1500/1-November 28, 1591). William owned 200 houses at the time of his death, in Habberley, Shrewsbury, and elsewhere. The family seat was at Halston, near Olwestry. The heir, Richard, became the ward of the 10th earl of Arundel, but Mytton had purchased the right to arrange his marriage and Cecily was the one who negotiated the marriage settlement for her son on September 29, 1517. He was to marry Anne, daughter of Sir Edward Grey of Enville, Staffordshire. As part of the arrangement, Cecily received a payment of £200.

ELIZABETH DENKARING (d.c.1539/40)
Elizabeth Denkaring was the daughter and heir of Philip Denkaring and Elizabeth Finch. Her first husband was Thomas Tamworth of Essex and Lincolnshire (d. January 1533), by whom she had a son, John Tamworth (c.1524-April 19, 1569). Her second husband (as his second wife) was Sir William Musgrave of Hartley, Westmorland and Edenhall, Cumberland (d.1544). They had no children. In January 1537, after Musgrave took a stand against the rebels, they were living in St. Botolph's without Aldersgate, London. When Musgrave returned home from court, looking "pensive," Elizabeth feared he had "fallen in displeasure" with the king. He had not, but her prediction that he would never be able to live in Westmorland again proved true. She appears to have remained in London until her death.

HONORA DENNY

see HONORA GREY

JOAN DENNY

see JOAN CHAMPERNOWNE

JOYCE DENNY (July 24, 1506-January 1560/1)
Joyce Denny was the daughter of Sir Edmund Denny of Cheshunt, Hertfordshire (c.1461-December 22, 1520) and, going by dates, Mary Troutbeck (c.1461-June 29, 1507), his second wife. Many sources say her mother was Mary Coke, Denny’s third wife, but the birthdates given for Joyce (July 29, 1495 is sometimes given in place of 1506) are both before Mary Troutbeck’s date of death. Joyce married first Sir William Walsingham (d. March 1534), a London lawyer, by whom she had Elizabeth (d. July 21, 1596), Barbara, Eleanor, Christiana, Mary (c.1527-March 16, 1576), Sir Francis (c.1532-April 6, 1590), and possibly another son named Thomas who died young. In c. 1536, she married Sir John Carey of Plashy, Hertfordshire and Thremhall Priory, Essex (1495-September 9, 1552). Her son Francis’s biographer, Robert Hutchinson, speculates that this marriage, for which he gives a date of 1538, was arranged by her family, since they owned property in Hertfordshire. Her Carey children were Wymond (March 6, 1538-August 3, 1612), Sir Edward (c.1540-July 18, 1618), and possibly a third son named Adolphus, who probably died young. Joyce died at Thremhall Priory. One genealogy says she died between November 10, 1560 and January 30, 1560/1. Other accounts give her date of death as April 6, 1559/60/61, but this was the date of her funeral, described in the diary of Henry Machyn. She was buried next to her first husband in St. Mary Aldermanbury Church in London.

MARGARET DENNY

see MARGARET EDGECUMBE

MARTHA DENNY (1505-January 9,1571/2)

Martha Denny was the daughter of Sir Edmund Denny of Cheshunt, Hertfordshire (c.1461-Decembe 22, 1520) and Mary Troutbeck (c.1461-June 29,1509). She married Sir Wymond Carew of Antony, Cornwall and St. Giles in the Fields, Middlesex (c.1493-August 22,1549) by July 1519 and they had nineteen children, including Thomas (1527-February 12,1564/5), Roger, George John, Matthew (1531-1618), Anthony, Harvey, Prudence (d.1586+), and Temperance (c.1537-October 9,1577). During her husband’s lifetime, the Carews lived in grand style at Bletchingley, Surrey, where he held the position of Anne of Cleves’s receiver, and had their own houses at Pyshoo, Hertfordshire and Hackney, Middlesex. When he died, Martha was left owing almost £8000 and in 1554 lost Hackney and other lands to the Crown. She petitioned the exchequer for relief, more than once, but Hackney was not returned to her and the debts were not fully discharged until 1611. Martha ended up living in London where, on September 8, 1562, she was arrested for attending mass. She was tried and convicted a month later and when she did not pay a fine of 100 marks, she was put in prison for six months. She was arrested a second time on the same charge on April 4, 1568. This time she received a pardon from Queen Elizabeth. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under “Carew [née Denny], Martha.”

ALICE DENT
see ALICE GRANT

ANNE DENTON
see ANNE WILLISTON

ELIZABETH DENTON

see ELIZABETH JERNINGHAM

MAGDALEN DENTON
see MAGDALEN BROME

MARGARET DENTON
see MARGARET MORDAUNT

MARGERY DENTON (d.1593+) (maiden name unknown)
Margery, whose surname is unknown, married first William Denton of Southwark, Surrey and Stedham, Sussex (by 1523-July 28, 1565), steward to Sir Anthony Browne and to Anthony Browne, viscount Montagu. They had three sons and two daughters. Denton left a will that mentioned the viscount and viscountess Montagu as well as members of his own family. Her second husband was Thomas Martin of Winterbourne Martin, Dorset, Steeple Morden, Cambridgeshire, and London (1520/21-1592/3), as his second wife. They had one daughter. In his will, made July 8, 1590 and proved August 7, 1593, Thomas left Margery a portrait of Queen Mary. He left most of his property, plus portraits of himself and his first wife, Mary Roys, to his son Thomas, who later brought action in Chancery against Margery and her daughter over the administration of the personal estate of the elder Thomas.

MARY DENTON

see MARY MARTYN

ELIZABETH DENYS
see ELIZABETH STATHAM

MARY DENYS or DENNYS
see MARY ROOS

MARY DENYS (1517-1593)
Mary Denys was the daughter of Sir William Denys of Dyrham, Gloucestershire (1470-June 22, 1533) and Anne Berkeley (1474-1519). She was a nun at Lacock Abbey, Wiltshire, a small house of Augustinian canonesses with fifteen professed nuns and three novices. In late 1535, this "a faire yong woman of Laycok" was appointed prioress of Kingston St. Michael, a Benedictine house, also in Wilsthire. In August 1535, there had been only three nuns at the priory. Two were guilty of incontinence and one, who was under twenty-four years of age, did not want to remain a nun. The latter was discharged. The next year, under Mary Denys, the report was better: there were four "religious of honest conversation, all desirous of remaining in religion," together with a clerk, four women servants, one waiting servant, and four farm laborers. When the priory was dissolved, Mary Denys received a pension of £5 a year. She was living in Bristol at the time of her death.

CATHERINE DEPDEN
see CATHERINE TRENTHAM

THOMASIN DERHAM (c.1525-1596)
Thomasin Derham or Dearham was the daughter of Thomas Derham of Crimplesham, Norfolk and Ellen Touchet. Her first husband, married in 1546, was John Throckmorton (c.1516-c.1554). Several online genealogies identify John and Thomasin as the parents of George (c.1547-1513), Hugh, Thomas, and Raphael, but according to her will, she had only one son by her first husband and that was Robert Throckmorton (d.1596). Some sources say John was of Wardington, Buckinghamshire while others give Werrington, Northamptonshire. Thomasin married second John Rippes of West Walton, Norfolk, by whom she had a son, John, and a daughter, Thomazin. Her third husband was John Heath of Kepyer, Durham (d.1590). She was his second wife and had no children by him, although she refers to several members of the Heath family as her sons and daughters in her will, which was written on October 14, 1596. She calls herself "Thomazin Heathe of Acklife, widow," and leaves, among other bequests, "a gold ring with a death's head, for a remembrance of my good will" to her sister, Jane Baker, and her workday wearing apparel to whatever two maidservants were in her service at the time of her death.

ANNE DERING

see ANNE VAUGHAN

OLD COUNTESS OF DESMOND
see KATHERINE FITZGERALD

ANNE DEVEREUX (d.1554+)
Anne Devereux was the daughter of John Devereux, 2nd baron Ferrers of Chartley (d.1501) and Cecilia Bourchier (d.c.1493). She was in Mary Tudor’s entourage when Mary went to France in 1514 to marry King Louis. On October 1, 1514, Sir Walter Devereux, her brother, received £25 for a "gown of tynsel for Mistress Anne Devereux, sent over with the French Queen." Anne should not be confused with the Anne Devereux who married Henry Clifford. That Anne was the daughter of Sir Richard Devereux. This Anne Devereux married David/Davy Owen of Midhurst and Cowdray, Sussex (1459-1535), as his third wife, sometime before 1525. They had three children, Elizabeth (d.1551), Harry (d. before 1535), and John (c.1525-1559). Owen was buried in Easebourne Priory, Sussex on or about September 27, 1535, although his will was not proved until 1542, causing some to date his death in that year. In December 1535, however, Anne Owen, widow of David Owen, petitioned the king for custody of their ten year old son, John, and for £4,800, jewels, and plate, and other items. In the petition she states that her dowry was £1000 in angelettes and royals, plus clothing, and that she had spent £113 19s. 8d. on clothes for her son Harry, now deceased, while he was in royal service. She was his heir. She further asks for all the timber, iron, lead, and glass from the house of Cowtherey, which her husband gave to her for her lifetime, so that she could build a new house at Bodyngton, and for a casket Owen had until his death. It is unclear how her petition fared, but by 1538 she had remarried, taking as her second husband Nicholas Gaynesford of Ditchling, Sussex (d.c.1548). They had no children. Anne took a third husband soon after Gaynesford died, choosing John Harman of Naunton Hall, Rendlesham, Suffolk (d.1558+), a gentleman usher and member of parliament. She was his third wife. They had no children.

DOROTHY DEVEREUX (1564-August 3, 1619)

Dorothy Devereux was the daughter of Walter Devereux, earl of Essex (September 16, 1539-September 22, 1576) and Laetitia Knollys (1543-December 25, 1634). After her father died, she became the ward of the earl of Huntingdon. He hoped to marry her to his wife's nephew, Philip Sidney, even offering to provide an additional dowry if the match were made, but Dorothy's stepfather, Robert Dudley, earl of Leicester, (Lady Huntingdon's brother and therefore also Sidney's uncle), proposed a match with the king of Scotland instead. In March 1583, the Spanish ambassador, Inigo de Mendoza, reported that Leicester had assured James VI that the English crown would be his after Elizabeth Tudor's death if he married Dorothy Devereux and promised to remain a protestant. When the queen heard of the proposed match, however, she forbade it. Leicester then claimed he'd planned to marry Dorothy to a private gentleman. In July, Dorothy took matters into her own hands by eloping with Sir Thomas Perrott (September 1553-February 1594). The groom was imprisoned in the Fleet for a month and Dorothy's dowry of £2000 was not paid. In 1587, when she was at North Hall, country seat of the earl of Warwick, during a royal visit, she was ordered to keep to her room. This decree so angered Dorothy's brother, Robert Devereux, earl of Essex, that he quarreled with the queen, then sent his servants to pack Dorothy's things and rode off with her. They were ordered to return by a royal messenger. After Perrott's death, Dorothy married Henry Percy, earl of Northumberland (April 1564-November 5, 1632). They were often at odds and separated in October 1599, when Dorothy wrote to her brother that "It was his lordship's pleasure upon no cause given by me to have me keep house by myself." She did so in a house in Putney, leaving two young daughters behind. Several months later, the girls were sent to her, but with no increase in the allowance Northumberland was giving his wife. In December 1601, after her brother's failed rebellion, Dorothy and her husband again began living together, primarily at Syon. She had inherited the lease on it from her first husband and, in 1604, King James granted it to Northumberland. In London, they stayed at Essex House, which belonged to Dorothy’s mother, Lettice. Dorothy had six children, Penelope (b.1588) and Robert (1592-d.yng.) Perrott and Dorothy (1598-1659), Lucy (1599-November 5, 1660), Algernon (September 29,1602-October 18, 1668), and Henry (1604-March 11, 1705) Percy. Lita-Rose Betcherman's biography of Dorothy’s two younger daughters, Court Lady and Country Wife, contains many details of their mother's life, especially after their father's arrest in 1606 for complicity in the Gunpowder Plot. According to Betcherman, Dorothy suffered from depression even before Northumberland's imprisonment. On July 16, 1606, she waylaid King James on his way to chapel to plead for her husband's release from the Tower of London. She was not successful in freeing him, but she continued to be welcome at court herself, since Queen Anne was fond of her. In the summer of 1607, the queen visited Dorothy at Syon. Dorothy saw her husband regularly during the first ten years of his imprisonment, stopping her visits only after she learned of his infatuation with the newly incarcerated Countess of Somerset, Frances Howard. She did not, however, pay much attention to his wishes. She resumed marriage negotiations for his eldest daughter after Northumberland had rejected the match. The wedding, in early 1616, was kept secret from the earl until the following year. Dorothy also supported their younger daughter's betrothal to a man Northumberland refused to consider as a son-in-law. He went so far as to force the girl to stay with him in the Tower when she came for a visit. He sent her away again, infuriated to discover that she'd been meeting her future husband in the Tower through the connivance of the Countess of Somerset. Intimidated by her husband's reaction, Dorothy refused to take young Lucy in at Essex House and the girl had to go to her sister instead. That summer (of 1617), mother and daughter were reconciled and stayed at Syon together. In late August, Lucy's sister joined them and gave birth to her first child there in September. On November 6, 1617, Lucy Percy married her choice, Sir James Hay. Dorothy, out of deference to her imprisoned husband, did not attend the wedding. In August 1619, while staying at Syon with Lucy for company, Dorothy died quite suddenly of a fever. In spite of their many differences, Northumberland was deeply upset by the news of his wife's death. He remembered only that she'd never given up her efforts to win his freedom and had to be reminded by friends of how bitterly they had always quarreled. He insisted upon giving her an elaborate funeral. Her body was carried by barge from Syon to Petworth House in Sussex, where she was buried in the family crypt. Portraits: a double portrait of Dorothy and Penelope Devereux painted in 1581 is at Longleat; portrait mislabeled "Lettice Knollys" at Alnwick Castle, Northumberland.

FRANCES DEVEREUX

see FRANCES HOWARD; FRANCES WALSINGHAM

LETTICE DEVEREUX

see LETTICE KNOLLYS

MARGARET DEVEREUX

see MARGARET DAKINS; MARGARET GARNEYS

MARY DEVEREUX
see MARY GREY

PENELOPE DEVEREUX (1562-1607)

Penelope Devereux was the daughter of Walter Devereux, earl of Essex (September 19,1539-September 22,1576) and Laetitia Knollys (1543-December 25,1634). Like her younger sister, she became a ward of the earl of Huntingdon after her father’s death, but in Penelope’s case, Lady Huntingdon (née Katherine Dudley) took her to court in 1581 to find her a husband. Sir Philip Sidney was suggested, but he had no prospects. Instead she was married to Robert, 2nd baron Rich (December1559-March 24,1619) on November 1, 1581. Sidney’s infatuation with Penelope, the “Stella” of his sonnets, developed after her marriage and their composition probably took place during the summer of 1582 when he was away from court. On his deathbed, Sidney is said to have called Penelope “a vanity wherein I had taken delight,” but it is unknown if the two had an affair. As Lady Rich, Penelope was a lady of the privy chamber to Queen Elizabeth. As early as 1589 she began a secret correspondence with the king of Scotland. When her brother, Robert Devereux, earl of Essex, fell out of royal favor, Penelope aggravated matters with a saucy letter to the queen. Penelope’s marriage was an unhappy one. It was not until she had borne her husband several children, however, that she began an affair with Charles Blount, 8th baron Mountjoy (1563-April 3, 1606). She then had a number of children by Mountjoy. There is considerable confusion about the paternity of many of them. Rich was probably the father of Lettice (d.1619+), Essex, Robert (March 18, 1587-April 19,1658), a daughter, possibly named Elizabeth, born November 26, 1588 who died young, and Henry (May 19, 1590-1649). Charles Blount, Lord Mountjoy was probably the father of Penelope (March 1592-October 26, 1613), Mountjoy (1597-1666), Scipio (b.December 1597), St. John, Charles (d.1645), and Isabel. In 1595 Penelope worked out a settlement with Rich and in 1601 they were formally divorced. However, under the Anglican church, remarriage was forbidden while a former spouse still lived. 1601 was also a significant year in Penelope’s life for another reason. Her brother the earl of Essex attempted to take over the government and was executed for treason. Even though Penelope had twice been put under restraint in the past for defending her brother and even though Essex blamed her for inciting him to rebellion, she was not severely punished. Penelope maintained that she had been more like a slave than a sister to Essex and had done what he told her to out of love for him. She was released into Lord Rich’s care. When James became king in 1603, Penelope was appointed a lady of the bedchamber to Queen Anne and given precedence at court over all other baronesses and over the daughters of all but four of the earls (Oxford, Arundel, Northumberland, and Shrewsbury). She forfeited her place, however, by marrying her long-time lover on December 26, 1605. He died the following spring. Seven books were dedicated to Lady Rich between 1594 and 1606. Penelope converted to Roman Catholicism late in life. Her former husband, Lord Rich, was at her side when she died. Biographies: Sylvia Freedman, Poor Penelope; Sally Varlow, The Lady Penelope; Oxford DNB entry under "Rich [née Devereux], Penelope." Portraits: double portrait with her sister Dorothy, 1581; portait said to be Penelope at Lambeth Palace; miniature.

ABIGAIL DIGBY
see ABIGAIL HEVENINGHAM

ANNE DIGBY (d.1539+)
Anne Digby was the daughter of Sir John Digby of Kettleby (d.1533) and Katherine Giffin. She married Sir William Skeffington (1460-December 21, 1535), Lord Deputy of Ireland from 1529-1535, as his second wife and was the mother of John, Thomas, Catherine, Isabel, and Anne. The Oxford DNB also identifies Leonard Skeffington, later Lord Lieutenant of the Tower of London, as Anne’s son, but most genealogies indicate he was the son of the first Lady Skeffington, Margaret Digby, daughter of Sir Everard Digby of Tilton, Leicestershire. Lady Skeffington wrote two letters to announce the death of her husband, both still extant, from Dublin on January 26, 1536, one to Secretary Thomas Cromwell and the other to Queen Anne Boleyn. In the letter to Cromwell, she attached a list of requests. They included, among other things, the fees and stipends due her late husband, license to convey back to England her husband’s horses and other moveable goods, and travel expenses. The letter to the queen asked her to persuade the king to support her petition to Cromwell. In another letter to Cromwell, dated Dublin, February 18, 1536, she complains of Lord Leonard Grey, who had replaced her husband as Lord Deputy, claiming that he would not let her take her own belongings out of the castle at Maynooth and had prevented the ship due to take her home from leaving Ireland. A third letter, dated August 1, 1536, still from Dublin, informs Cromwell that Lord Leonard has released her belongings, but complains that she still cannot afford the journey home unless the wages due her late husband are paid to her. She eventually returned to England. On April 27, 1539, she again wrote to Lord Cromwell, this time from Colliweston, to say that "I have been so straitly ordered with my husband's children, that I have no house of my late husband's to put my head in; neither have I any house of any other man but only from year to year." She also had to write to Cromwell to ask that the sentence of outlawry be lifted from her and others who had been sureties to the king for her late husband. In that letter, she complains not only of being improverished, but also of age and sickness.

ELEANOR DIGBY
see ELEANOR ROPER

KATHERINE DIGBY (d. before 1570)
Katherine Digby was the daughter of Sir Thomas Digby and Dorothy Oxenbridge. Her father was knighted by Henry VII at Bosworth Field. Her mother remarried after his death, taking as her second husband Eustace Braham. Katherine married Simon Wheeler of Kenilworth, Warwickshire. After his death, she wed John Fisher of Olney, Buckinghamshire (d. March 8, 1570/1), bringing him the manor of Packington, Warwickshire from the estate of her first husband. At the dissolution of the monasteries, Fisher bought Great Packington church for £626. He was a gentleman pensioner to King Henry VIII, King Edward VI, Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth. John and Katherine were the parents of Sir Clement Fisher (d. October 23, 1619). Portrait: effigy in Great Packington church, transferred to a newer building in 1789.

LETTICE DIGBY
see LETTICE FITZGERALD

ANNE DIGHTON
see ANNE HARDY

ELIZABETH DIGNELEY (1502-before 1558)
Elizabeth Digneley was the daughter of Thomas Digneley or Dingley of Stanford Dingley, Berkshire and Middle Aston, Oxfordshire (d.1502) and Philippa Harpsfield. Her father died when she was two months old. By 1518, she had married George Barrett of Belhus in Aveley, Essex and been widowed. They had five children, including, Edward (d.1558+). At some point before that, but after she was a widow, she brought suit in Chancery against her great uncle, Francis Digneley (c.1465-1538/9) for possession of the deeds to her inheritance, lands in Hampshire and several adjoining counties. By 1530, she married a close friend of her first husband, John Baker of London and Sissinghurst, Kent (c.1489-December 23, 1558), attorney general from 1536-1540 and chancellor of the Exchequier from 1540 until his death, by whom she had six children, including Richard (c.1530-1594), John (c.1531-c.1605), and three daughters. One daughter, Cecily (d.1615), married Thomas Sackville, later earl of Dorset. Elizabeth was buried in the church at Cranbrook, Kent, at some point before Baker made his will on October 16, 1558.

MARY DIXWELL (d. by 1595?)
Mary Dixwell was one of three daughters of Humphrey Dixwell of Churchover, Warwickshire (d.1572+) and Ellen or Eleanor Low or Lowe (given as Anna Loe on one site). She married Robert Price of Washingley (d.1595), who erected a tomb in Holy Trinity Church in Churchover to himself and his wife and her parents. Portrait: tomb effigy, Churchover.

JOANNA DOBSON
see JOANNA DYNGLEY

DOROTHY DODDRIDGE or DODDERIDGE

see DOROTHY BAMPFIELD

ANNE DONNE (c.1471-c.1507)
Anne Donne was the elder daughter of Sir John Donne of Kidwilly, Carmarthenshire (d. January 1503) and Elizabeth Hastings (c.1450-1508). She was painted as a child in the Donne Triptych, with her mother. She married Sir William Rede of Boarstall, Buckinghamshire (1467-c.1527) and had by him three children, Leonard (d. before 1552), Elizabeth (d.1508+) and Mary (d.1508+). It was Rede’s second wife, Anne Warham, who was a member of Mary Tudor’s household (both as princess and queen) and Anne Warham, not Anne Donne, who was the mother of the Anne Rede who married Giles Greville, Sir Adrian Fortescue, and Thomas Parry.

ANNE DONNE
see ANNE MORE

ELIZABETH DONNE
see ELIZABETH HASTINGS

MARGARET DONNINGTON (1510-January 20,1562)
Margaret Donnington was the only daughter of John Donnington of Stoke Newington, Middlesex (d.1544) and Elizabeth Pye. She married three times, each time improving her lot. Her first husband was Sir Thomas Kytson of London and Hengrave, Suffolk (1485-September 11, 1540), a widower with one daughter (Elizabeth), who built Hengrave Hall between 1525 and 1538. King Henry VIII often visited them there. Kytson also had houses in Milk Street, London, Stoke Newington, Westley, and Risby, Suffolk, and Torbrian, Devonshire. Kytson and Margaret were the parents of Frances (c.1527-c.1586), Katherine (d. before November 8, 1586), Dorothy (1531-May 2, 1577), Anne, and Thomas (October 9, 1540-January 28, 1603), the latter born posthumously. By a marriage settlement dated November 10, 1541, Margaret took a second husband, Sir Richard Long of Shengay, Cambridgeshire (c.1494-September 30, 1546), a courtier. She had four children by him, Jane (c.1541-c.1562), Mary (b.c.1543), Henry (March 31,1543/4-April 15,1573), and Catherine (c.1546-c.1568). Margaret was sole executrix of Long's will, made September 27, 1546. At that point, Henry was only two years nine months old and became a royal ward. He was still a minor when Queen Elizabeth visited his inheritance, Filliot's Hall, Essex, in 1561. Margaret's third husband was John Bourchier, earl of Bath (1489-February 10, 1561), as his third wife. They were married on December 11, 1548 and together they had two more daughters, Susanna and Bridget. Margaret married her eldest daughter, Frances Kytson, to her stepson, John Bourchier, Lord Fitzwarine. Margaret's monument in Hengrave Church is to herself and all three husbands. I have encountered a bit of a mystery in reading The English Noble Household 1450-1600 by Kate Mertes. She lists three manuscripts as the day books of Lady Margaret Long of Hengrave Hall, one for 1541-2, one for 1563-4, and one for 1571-2, the latter including what she calls the accounts of Thomas Kytson, Margaret's ward. The Lady Margaret Long of 1541-2 is obviously Margaret Donnington, but Thomas Kytson was her son, not her ward, but in 1563-4 and 1571-2, Margaret was already deceased. One fact Mertes gleans is probably still valid: that Margaret and her daughters employed about five maids during the period 1541-64. The Elizabeth Kytson who oversaw the later accounts, however, is not the daughter by a previous marriage that Mertes suggests, but rather Elizabeth Cornwallis, who married Thomas Kytson in 1561.

AGNES DORMER
see AGNES WOODVILLE

ANNE DORMER (1525-1603)

Anne Dormer was the daughter of William Dormer of Eythrope, Buckinghamshire (1503-May 17,1575) and Mary Sidney (d.1542). In May 1558 she married Sir Walter Hungerford of Farleigh (c.1526-1596). They had four children, Lucy (b.1560), Edmund (b.1562), Susan (b.1564), and Jane (b.1566) but in 1570, Hungerford sued Anne for divorce, claiming that she had committed adultery with William "Wild" Darrell of Littlecote (1540-1589) between 1560 and 1568 and had had a child by him. Sir Walter also accused her of trying to poison him in 1564. Surviving letters from Anne to her "good Will" give some foundation to the charges but Anne was acquitted and awarded costs (£250) in the law suit. Hungerford refused to pay or to support his wife while they were separated (he did agree to take her back) and spent three years in Fleet Prison as a result. In a letter written in 1570 to "Doll" (Dorothy) Essex, her sister Jane's lady in waiting, Anne complained that she had not seen her children in over a year. She also wrote to her sister at this time. In 1571, Anne received a license to travel to Louvain to visit her dying grandmother (Jane Newdigate, Lady Dormer, who died on July 7). In August of that year Anne's sister (Jane Dormer, duchess of Feria), asked that the license be extended from six months to two years. Anne took over her grandmother's household in Louvain after Lady Dormer's death and remained there. In 1573, she was granted a pension of 1,100 livres a year by the king of Spain and in 1583 he granted her a further pension of fifty escudos a month. Anne became friends with Margaret of Parma as well as with the other English exiles living in Flanders. After her only son died (the date of his death varies, depending on the source, from 1583 to 1587), Anne claimed that Hungerford was attempting to defraud their daughters of their portion. In his 1595 will, Hungerford left two farms to Margery Bright, his mistress for some years and the mother of four children by him, the last born after Hungerford's death. Upon hearing a rumor that Anne was dead, Hungerford married Margery shortly before he died with the result that both Anne and Margery sued to establish the right to inherit as Hungerford's widow. There was never any question but that the victory would go to Anne. During that same period, Anne involved herself in politics in Flanders, urging her sister, the widowed duchess of Feria, to leave Spain and travel to Brussels. She wrote a number of letters on the subject and seems to have been convinced that the duchess's journey would alarm Queen Elizabeth and turn the tide in King Philip's favor in the ongoing war in the Netherlands. Anne's nephew, Don Lorenzo, 2^nd duke of Feria, took steps to thwart this intrigue and Anne seems to have given up the plan around 1599. As far as is known, Anne never returned to England. She died in Louvain.

DOROTHY DORMER

see DOROTHY CATESBY

JANE DORMER

see JANE NEWDIGATE

JANE DORMER (January 6,1538-January 13, 1612)

Jane Dormer was the daughter of William Dormer of Eythrope, Buckinghamshire (1503-May 17,1575) and Mary Sidney (d.1542). She was a favorite maid of honor to Queen Mary, having entered the queen’s service before the death of Mary's brother, King Edward VI. Jane’s hand in marriage was sought by the earl of Devon, the duke of Norfolk, and Charles Howard, later earl of Nottingham, but she accepted the proposal of Don Gomez de Figueroa, count of Feria (d. September 7, 1571). They were waiting for the return to England of Philip II to marry when Queen Mary died. Jane herself had been ill in October of 1558 but she returned to her dying mistress’s bedside in November and was entrusted with the errand of journeying to Hatfield to deliver Mary’s jewels to her sister and heir, Elizabeth Tudor. After Mary’s death, Jane lived with her grandmother, Jane Newdigate, Lady Dormer (d.July 7,1571) at the Savoy Palace. She had some questions to answer about jewels missing from Queen Mary's coffers. Queen Elizabeth appointed Catherine Carey Knollys, Marjorie Williams Norris, and Blanche Parry to question her. Her explanations appear to have satisfied them. Jane Dormer married the count of Feria on December 29 and left England in July 1559. Her party included her grandmother and six gentlewomen. Jane’s son Lorenzo (September 28, 1559-1607) was born at Mechlin, at the court of Margaret of Parma. At Amboise, France the following spring, Jane began a friendship with Mary Stewart, Queen of Scots, that lasted until the queen’s execution. Upon reaching Spain, Feria and Jane settled at Zafra in Estremadura and Feria was created duke of Feria in 1567. Jane proved so adept at running his estates after Feria’s death that Philip II considered naming her Regent of the Netherlands. Instead, she devoted her time to helping other English Catholics, although she also obtained the release of Protestant Englishmen imprisoned at Seville. In 1603, an Englishman named Henry Clifford entered her service and wrote her biography, possibly from her dictation, but it was not published until 1887. After 1609, Jane was in poor health and spent the last year of her life bedridden. She died in Madrid. She was buried in the habit of a Franciscan tertiary. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Suarez de Figueroa [née Dormer], Jane;" Chapter Four of Albert J. Loomie's The Spanish Elizabethans. Portraits: c.1563 by Sanches-Coello; one painted c. 1560-9 by Antonio Mor may be Jane. It may also be an unknown Englishwoman, a Netherlandish aristocrat, or one of the duke of Alva’s concubines. Margaret of Parma, once identified as the sitter, has been ruled out as the subject.

KATHERINE DORMER
see KATHERINE DALLAM

MARGARET DORMER (1553-April 26, 1637)
Margaret Dormer was the daughter of William Dormer of Eythrope, Buckinghamshire (1503-May 17, 1575) and his second wife, Dorothy Catesby (c.1527-September 30, 1613). In a marriage settlement dated October 20, 1578, she married Sir Henry Constable of Burton Constable, Holderness, Yorkshire (c.1551-December 15,1607) and as Lady Constable was a notable recusant who spent time in prison in 1592, 1593, 1595, and 1607. She raised her children—Catherine (c.1579-1626), Dorothy (1580-March 26, 1632), Henry (c.1582-1645), Margaret (c.1582-February 27, 1662/3), John (b.c. 1589), and Mary (c.1586-April 17, 1669+)—as pious Roman Catholics.

ELIZABETH DOUGLAS
see ELIZABETH TOUCHET

MARGARET DOUGLAS (October 8, 1515-March 7, 1578)

Margaret Douglas was the daughter of Margaret Tudor (1489-1541) by her second husband, Archibald Douglas, 6th earl of Angus (1489-1557). She was thus half sister of James V of Scotland and granddaughter of Henry VII of England. Her mother was fleeing from Scotland, seeking shelter with her brother, Henry VIII, when Margaret was born at Harbottle, on the English side of the border. At barely fifteen, she was appointed chief lady in waiting to her cousin, Princess Mary. Three years later, she was at court as one of Anne Boleyn's ladies. Margaret was in and out of trouble all her life. She formed two unacceptable romantic alliances with English suitors and was confined for a time after each incident. She may actually have married Thomas Howard (1512-October 29, 1537), one of the duke of Norfolk's half-brothers. Thomas died in the Tower of London, where he had been imprisoned for his liaison with Margaret. Margaret remained close to Thomas Howard's niece, Mary Howard, duchess of Richmond, who had been married to Henry FitzRoy. Their "circle" had a literary bent and they all wrote poetry, although only the sonnets of Mary's brother, the earl of Surrey, achieved renown. During Catherine Howard's time as queen, Margaret was romantically involved with the queen's brother, Charles Howard. On July 6, 1544, Margaret married Matthew Stuart, earl of Lennox (1516-1571). They had four sons and four daughters but only two sons survived to adulthood, Henry, Lord Darnley (1545-1567) and Charles, earl of Lennox (1556-1577). Shortly before Henry VIII’s death, Margaret quarreled with him over a matter of religion (she remained a devout Catholic all her life) and was disinherited. She was high in favor under Queen Mary, but under Queen Elizabeth she was under arrest on three separate occasions, once on suspicion of witchcraft and treason, once because her son, Lord Darnley, had married the queen of Scots, and once because she conspired to marry her other son, Charles, to Elizabeth Cavendish. Biography: Kimberley Schutte, A Biography of Margaret Douglas; Oxford DNB entry under "Douglas, Lady Margaret." Portraits: tomb effigy; included in the Darnley Centograph of 1567/8 by Livinus de Vogelaare; two portraits, one full length and painted in 1572 are not authenticated. Alison Weir suggests that the alleged Holbein portrait of Mary Boleyn may actually be Margaret Douglas.

MAGDALEN DOWNES (d.1552+)
Magdalen Downes was a novice in the Benedictine priory of Ankerwick in Buckinghamshire by 1519. In that year, Bishop Atwater found two cases of apostasy in the priory. Two nuns had left the monastery. One had married, but since marriage was forbidden to professed nuns, she was declared to be living in sin in the house of a relative. Magdalen went on to become the last prioress of Ankerwick, succeeding Alice Worcester when Alice resigned in 1526. After Ankerwick was dissolved, Magdalen achieved notoriety by becoming the only former nun in Buckinghamshire to marry. According to a footnote to the article on Ankerwick Priory in British History Online, there were only a few nuns in all of England who married after the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Several came from Elstow in Bedfordshire and fourteen from Lincolnshire (eight of them Gilbertine nuns).

MARGARET DOWNES

see MARGARET NEVILLE

ANNE DOWRICHE

see ANNE EDGECUMBE

ELIZABETH D’OYLEY (1592-1612+)
Elizabeth D’Oyley (sometimes written Doyle) was the daughter of Edmund D’Oyley of Shottisham, Norfolk (d.1612+) and Catherine Neville (b.1570). In 1607 or 1608, she married Robert Buxton of Tibbenham, Norfolk (d. January 17, 1610/11). His surname is given incorrectly as Barston in the Visitation of Essex. They had one child, a son, John (c.1609-1660). His wardship was granted to Elizabeth and her father. She married second William Perte or Pert of Arnolds, Mountnessing, Essex (d.1637?). By his first wife, Isabel Conyers, he had a daughter, Margaret (c.1610-1686). He had no children by Elizabeth D’Oyley. The inscription (added later) on the portrait by Robert Peake c.1608, is misleading. It seems to identify the sitter as a Conyers co-heiress and the mother of Margaret Buxton. In fact, it was Margaret Perte, Elizabeth's stepdaughter, who was the co-heiress. Margaret Perte became Margaret Buxton by her marriage to Elizabeth’s son, John.

FRANCES D’OYLY

see FRANCES EDMONDS

ELIZABETH DRAKE
see ELIZABETH SYDENHAM

ANNE DRAPER (August 1560-March 29, 1641)
Anne Draper was the daughter of John Draper (d. 1576), a wealthy London brewer, and Margery Wilkes (d.1600/01). After her father’s death, his clerk, Thomas Hobson, wanted to marry her, but Anne’s mother refused and dismissed him. He took her to court. She claimed he’d “shamefully, wickedly, and horribly” tried to marry Anne. Exactly what this entailed is not spelled out, but it was obviously more than Margery Draper was willing to allow. On June 4, 1579, Anne married Eustace Bedingfield (d. May 19, 1599). They had several children, including two named Anne, one who died in 1581 and one who survived her mother. Anne Draper’s inheritance from her father included a piece of property in Clerkenwell. By 1605, she had leased this to Aaron Holland, who built the Red Bull theater on the property. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under “Bedingfield [née Draper], Anne.” Portrait: memorial brass 1641, All Saints, Darsham, Suffolk.

ELIZABETH DRAPER (d. April 27, 1605)
Elizabeth Draper was the daughter of Robert Draper of Camberwell and Elizabeth Fyfield. She married first, on June 17, 1550, John Bowyer of Shepton Beauchamp, Somerset and Lincoln's Inn (d. October 10, 1570), as his second wife. Bowyer's commonplace book describes Elizabeth's wedding ring in detail and also records the apparel purchased for the occasion. The entries include four ells of tawney taffeta at 11s. 6d. an ell for a Venice gown, seven yards of crimson silk camlet at 7s. 6d. a yard for a kirtle, and eight yards of black russet at 4s. 6d. a yard for a Dutch gown. Smaller amounts of fabric purchased included tawny velvet, crimson satin, tawny satin, black velvet, tawny damask, and scarlet for a petticoat. The couple had eight sons and three daughters, including Edmond (May 12, 1552-c.1626), Elizabeth (June 10, 1553-1590+), John, Matthew, Luke (1563-5), Benjamin, and Gregory. On September 9, 1572, Elizabeth remarried, taking as her husband William Forster (d. before 1605), by whom she had a son and a daughter. As a widow for the second time she lived beside the Free School. Portrait: memorial brass in Camberwell.

ELIZABETH DRAPER

see ELIZABETH GARTON

ELIZABETH DRAYCOTT
see ELIZABETH FITZHERBERT

ANN DRURY or DREWRIE (x. May 13,1573) (maiden name unknown)
According to John Bellamy, in Strange, Inhuman Deaths: Murder in Tudor England, Ann Drury was a "sinister widow . . . notorious for her palmistry and 'surgery.'" With her friend, Ann Saunders, Ann Drury plotted the murder of Ann's husband, George Saunders. Bellamy gives a full account of the case in Chapter 6 of his book, based on contemporary pamphlet written about the crime and later accounts in the chronicles of Stow and Holinshed. From evidence in her speech from the gallows, it would seem that Ann Drury was once in the service of Henry Stanley, Lord Strange, who had succeeded his father as earl of Derby the previous year and was present at her execution. She asked his forgiveness and insisted that she was not responsible for his separation from his wife (see MARGARET CLIFFORD). Bellamy interprets this statement as indicating one of two things. Either Ann had been sexually involved with the earl or she had practiced palmistry while a member of his household. Ann also denied from the scaffold that she had ever used witchcraft or sorcery, poisoned her own husband, or accused any merchants' wives of unchaste living. She had confessed, however, to having instructed George Browne how to kill George Saunders in March 1573, and to paying him when he reported to her that he’d done the deed. Browne, when apprehended, claimed that Ann Drury had also promised him that she would arrange his marriage to the newly made widow. Browne pled guilty to murder and was executed. Mrs. Drury, when questioned, also confessed and was imprisoned, along with her servant, Roger Clement. It was Clement who implicated Mrs. Saunders. The two women were tried in May at the Guildhall, charged with being accessories both before and after the murder. On May 6, both were convicted and sentenced to be hanged at Smithfield a week later. While in Newgate awaiting execution, a defrocked clergyman named Mell offered to provide a dowry for Ann Drury's daughter if Ann would exonerate Mrs. Saunders, with whom Mell had fallen in love after seeing her at her trial. He hoped to obtain a pardon for Ann Saunders and then marry her. This plan failed and both women were hanged. The play, A Warning to Fair Women (1599), was based on this case. Exactly who Ann Drury was is not clear. Her husband's name is not given, nor is her daughter's, but if she was part of the household of Lord and Lady Strange at some point, then she may have been of gentle birth.

ANNE DRURY

see ANNE BACON; ANNE JERNINGHAM

ANNE DRURY (d. September 5, 1561)
Anne Drury was the eldest of six daughters of Sir William Drury of Hawstead, Suffolk (d. January 11, 1557/8) and his second wife, Elizabeth Soothill (d. May 19, 1575). By 1540, she married Sir Christopher Heydon or Hayden of Baconsthorpe, Norfolk (1518/19-December 10, 1579). They had three sons and five daughters, including William (d.1592), Henry, and Christopher. Portrait: memorial brass in Baconsthorpe Church.

CATHERINE DRURY
see CATHERINE FINCH

ELIZABETH DRURY

see ELIZABETH CALTHORPE; ELIZABETH SOTEHILL; ELIZABETH STAFFORD

ELIZABETH DRURY (January 4, 1577/8-February 26, 1653/4)
Elizabeth Drury was the daughter of William Drury of Hawstead, Suffolk (May 20, 1550-January 8, 1589/90) and Elizabeth Stafford (c.1546-February 6, 1598/9). She married William Cecil, 2nd earl of Exeter (1566-1640) and was the mother of Elizabeth (1595-1672, Richard (d.yng), Diana (1596-April 27, 1654), and Anne (b.1596; twin). Her will was proved April 20, 1654. She was buried in St. James, Clerkenwell. Portrait: unknown date.

FRANCES DRURY (June 13, 1576-1642)
Frances Drury was the daughter of Sir William Drury of Hawstead (May 30, 1550-January 18, 1590) and Elizabeth Stafford (c.1546-February 6, 1598/9). She married first, in 1596, Sir Nicholas Clifford of Bobbing, Kent (1572-1599) and second, in 1600, Sir William Wray of Glentworth, Lincolnshire (1557-August 13, 1617). Her children were Frances Clifford (d. 1658) and Christopher (1601-February 8, 1646), George, Charles, and Frances Wray. Her will was written on May 27, 1637 and proved in 1642. She was buried in Ashby Church, Lincolnshire. Portrait: c.1590 miniature by Nicholas Hilliard may be Frances Drury; effigy on Wray tomb.

MARGARET DRURY
see MARGARET WENTWORTH

SUSANNA DRURY (1584-September 29, 1606)
Susanna Drury was the daughter of Sir William Drury of Hawstead (May 30, 1550-January 18, 1590) and Elizabeth Stafford (c.1546-February 6, 1598/9). Suffolk Manorial Families by Joseph James Muskett includes a transcript of a memorandum stating the terms of her will, made on September 20, 1606. In this document, she is identified as being "of Glentworth" in Lincolnshire and as "being sicke in bodye but of sound and perfect memorye." She directed her words to her sister, Frances, wife of Sir William Wray and made Wray and Lord Burghley, husband of her sister Elizabeth, her executors. She made bequests of money and clothing to various relatives and servants. The will was proved at London on November 14, 1606. Muskett then adds the story, quoted from an 1831 issue of Gentleman's Magazine, of how Susanna Drury died. She was visiting Lady Wray at Glentworth and went riding but, not being a proficient horsewoman, was "fastened to her saddle with straps that she might not be dismounted." Unfortunately, the horse ran away with her and she dashed her head against the branches of a tree, sustaining injuries that proved fatal. She was buried in Ashby Church and an effigy was erected there in her memory. She is shown with two greyhounds. The Latin inscription reads "Unhappy only in her death, she burst the portals on the feast day of St. Michael, 1606, and joined the choirs of the blessed, having numbered but two and twenty years." Portrait: effigy in Ashby, Lincolnshire.

URSULA DRURY (1492-1522/3)
Ursula Drury was the daughter of Sir Robert Drury of Hawstead, Suffolk (d. February 8,1535) and Anne Calthorpe. On July 5, 1515, she married Sir Giles Alington of Horseheath, Cambridgeshire (June 1499-August 22, 1586). She had a son, Robert (1520-May 22, 1552) and a daughter, Margaret. Zillah Dovey, in An Elizabethan Progress, gives her date of death as 1552, but since Alington remarried in 1524, this is obviously incorrect. Portrait: memorial brass in Hawstead Church.

JANE DUCKETT
see JANE PACKINGTON

ALICE DUDLEY
see ALICE LEIGH

AMYE DUDLEY

see AMYE ROBSART

ANNE DUDLEY

see ANNE RUSSELL; ANNE SEYMOUR; ANNE WHORWOOD

CECILY DUDLEY
see CECILY GREY

ELIZABETH DUDLEY
see ELIZABETH GARDINER; ELIZABETH GREY; ELIZABETH SOUTHWELL; ELIZABETH STUCLEY; ELIZABETH TALBOYS

ELIZABETH DUDLEY (1488-1560)
Elizabeth Dudley was the daughter of Edmund Dudley (1462-x.1510) and Anne Windsor. She was betrothed to Peter Stourton, one of the sons of Edward, 6th baron Stourton, but when he died, she married his younger brother, William, 7th baron Stourton (1484-September 16, 1548), who succeeded to the title in 1535. They were married in about 1516. Their children were Ursula (1518-September 4, 1551), Charles, 8th baron (c.1521-x.March 6, 1556/7), Francis, Dorothy, Andrew, Arthur (c.1524-1558), William (c.1526-November 22, 1581), George, Giles, John, and another Francis. In spite of their numerous children, the marriage was not a happy one and the couple separated. Stourton lived with his mistress, Agnes Rhys, while Elizabeth, at least part of the time, lived in the home of William Hartgill, her husband's steward, at Kilmington, on the border of Wiltshire and Somerset and two miles from Stourton House. It was there, shortly after her husband's death, that her son Charles confronted her with the demand that she vow never to remarry. What he really wanted was to gain control of her widow's third of the estate. He wanted her to accept an annuity of 100 marks and live with him in lieu of the jointure she was entitled to, or live at Stourton Caundle manor with an annuity of 200 marks. Either way, she would lose her annuity if she remarried. Elizabeth objected. Hartgill supported her rights. But Charles removed her from Kilmington against her will and took her to Stourton House. This was not the only bone of contention between Lord Stourton and the Hartgills and the feud between them raged on until January 1557, when Stourton and his men murdered William Hartgill and his son John. For this crime, Charles was executed. By the mid-1550s, however, Elizabeth had escaped his control and married Edward Ludlow of Maiden Bradley, Wiltshire. Elizabeth was the half sister of John Dudley, duke of Northumberland, and therefore aunt of Robert Dudley, Queen Elizabeth's favorite. For this reason, even though she was seventy years old by then, was probably the Lady Stourton at court in 1558/9. The alternative is her Catholic daughter-in-law, Anne Stanley (d.1602), Charles's widow.

JANE DUDLEY

see JANE GUILDFORD

KATHERINE DUDLEY (November 1545-August 4, 1620)

Katherine Dudley was the daughter of John Dudley, duke of Northumberland (1504-x.August 22, 1553) and Jane Guildford (1509-January 15, 1555). Although the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography gives her birthdate as c.1538, there is a record of a christening on November 30, 1545 that several authorities believe was Katherine's. The godparents were Francis van der Delft, Imperial Ambassador to England, Princess Mary, and Catherine Willoughby, duchess of Suffolk, who hosted a reception at Suffolk Place, Southwark. Assuming this birthdate to be correct, Katherine was seven when she was married to eighteen-year-old Henry Hastings (1535-December 14, 1594) on May 24, 1553 at Durham House in the Strand. Three months later, her father was arrested and executed for treason. It would have been easy for her father-in-law, the earl of Huntingdon, to have her marriage annulled. Instead he took her to Ashby-de-la-Zouche to be raised with his own family. She first came to court in 1562 or 1563 and because her brother, Robert Dudley, was the queen’s favorite, she was made a lady of the privy chamber. In 1564, however, when a book on the succession urged acceptance of her husband’s claim to the throne, Katherine was given “a privy nippe” by the queen. His assurance that the book was “foolishly written” did not mend the rift and for a time Katherine left the court. In 1576 she and her husband became legal guardians of the earl of Essex’s children. She was already fostering and training several young gentlewomen but had no children of her own. After her husband’s death, she returned to court and was considered one of the queen’s closest friends during the last years of her reign. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Hastings [née Dudley], Katherine." Portrait: In 1599, Frances Powlett, an Essex gentlewoman, widowed and a recusant, owned a portrait of Katherine Dudley.

LETTICE DUDLEY

see LETTICE KNOLLYS

MARGARET DUDLEY

see MARGARET AUDLEY

MARY or MARGARET DUDLEY
see MARY or MARGARET CAVENDISH

MARY DUDLEY (1531-August 9, 1586)

Mary Dudley was the daughter of John Dudley, duke of Northumberland (1504-x.August 22,1553) and Jane Guildford (1509-January 15, 1555). She was educated with her brothers, having among her tutors Roger Ascham and John Dee. She wrote poetry as a young woman. On March 29, 1551, she was married to Sir Henry Sidney (June 20, 1529-May 5, 1586). When her father attempted to put Lady Jane Grey on the throne instead of Mary Tudor, Mary Sidney was sent to fetch Lady Jane to Syon House where she was told of her great good fortune. Mary remained with Queen Jane throughout her brief reign. After the failure of the coup, Mary was allowed to return to her husband, who was pardoned for his role in the attempt on July 21. Sir Henry’s father obtained for them the confiscated Dudley property of Penshurst and there the couple made their home. Mary’s son, Philip Sidney, was born November 30, 1554. His godfather was King Philip II. Mary’s other children were Margaret (1556-1558), Elizabeth (October 1560-February 1567), Mary (1561-1621), Robert (November 19,1563-1626), Ambrosia (1565-1575), and Thomas (March 25,1569-July 26,1595). Under Elizabeth I, Mary Sidney was at court as one of her ladies and nursed the queen through her bout of smallpox in October 1562. Mary subsequently caught the disease herself and was left horribly scarred by it. Thereafter, it is said, she always wore a mask in public. When her husband was Lord Deputy of Ireland, Mary was with him briefly, but soon returned to England. She had rooms at court but spent most of her time at her house near Paul’s Wharf in London or at Ludlow Castle. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Sidney [née Dudley], Mary." Portraits: Two portraits identified as Mary Dudley Sidney exist, one by Hans Eworth at Wilton House and the other by Willaim Scots at Petworth.

THEODOSIA DUDLEY
see THEODOSIA HARINGTON

AGNES DUFFORD or DUFFIELD (1479-1549)
Agnes Dufford or Duffield was the daughter of William Duffield. She married first William Pykerell and second, in 1513, Peter Cheke (1477-January 30, 1529/30). Both were bedells at Cambridge University. Agnes was a vintner in St. Mary’s Parish, Cambridge, in her own right, and she continued to run her wine shop in her second widowhood. She had one son, John Pykerell (1498/9-1539) by her first marriage and one son and five daughters by Cheke, including Anne (1512-1557), John (June 16, 1514-September 13, 1557), and Mary (c.1520-February 22, 1543/4). John became a royal tutor. Mary married William Cecil, later Lord Burghley, and Agnes’s grandson, Thomas Cecil, inherited that title in 1598.

MARY DUNCH
see MARY CROMWELL

BENEDICTA DUNHAM
see BENEDICTA FOLJAMBE

ELEANOR DUTTON (c.1484-June 1522+)
Eleanor Dutton was the daughter of Peter or Piers Dutton of Hatton, Cheshire (c.1465-before 1502) and Elizabeth Fouleshurst. She married Randall Brereton of Malpas, Cheshire (1467-June 1530) c.1502. Their children were Randall (d.1533), Richard (d.c.1556), John (c.1542), Thomas (d.1511), Peter, Roger, William (c.1507-x. May 17, 1536), Robert (d.1566+), Urian (c.1510-March 19, 1578), Eleanor, Jane, Anne, and Elizabeth (c.1505-November 30, 1545+). Portrait: effigy at Malpas.

JANE DUTTON
see JANE ASTON

JACQUINETTA DUTWITE (c.1550-1611)
Jacquinetta, Jacqueline, or Jaklin Dutwite was the daughter of James Dutwite (d.1591), resident in the immigrant enclave of St. Martin le Grand at the time of his death. She was probably born in France. She married 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. The Vautrolliers 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. According to her, this explains 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. Although some sources call her Vautrollier's daughter, she was more likely to have been his widow. Some sources 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 to Jacquinetta 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.

JOAN DUWES (d.1538) (maiden name unknown)
Although she is listed as a member of Mary Tudor's household in 1533, little is known about Joan Duwes other than that she was the wife of Giles Duwes or Dewes (d. April 12, 1535) a lute player, French tutor, and author of An Introduction for to Lerne to Rede, to Pronounce, and to Speke French Trewly (c.1533), and other works. Duwes was employed from the 1490s to teach the children of Henry VII. He also tutored Henry VIII's daughter, Mary Tudor, and Henry Courtenay, who was later marquess of Exeter. Duwes and his wife had four children, three of them named after the royal children: Henry, Arthur, Gwylliam, and Margaret. From April 1506, Duwes was also the royal librarian. Young Arthur Duwes entered the royal household as a lute player in 1515 and later taught the king's illegitimate son, Henry Fitzroy, how to play that instrument. Duwes frequently appears in records as "Master Giles Luter." In 1533, Joan Duwes was appointed as one of Princess Mary's gentlewomen, although it must be noted that, at that time, Anne Boleyn was queen and Mary was out of favor and considered illegitimate. Duwes made his will on December 20, 1534, mentioning his wife "Jhone," but leaving his musical instruments to his sons Arthur and Gwylliam. Princess Mary's Privy Purse expenses for January 1538 include the gift of a frontlet to "Mistress Colson sometime Mistress Giles," which seems to indicate that Joan remarried.

FRANCES DYER (d. before 1603)
Frances Dyer was the daughter of Thomas Dyer of Weston, Somerset (d. June 14, 1565) and Frances Darcy. She married, as his second wife, Sir John Stawell of Cothelstone, Somerset (d. 1603), who had divorced his first wife after a long court battle and a large bribe not to contest his new marriage (see MARY PORTMAN). Their pre-nuptial settlement is dated April 10, 1572. They had one son, a second Sir John Stawell (d.1603/4). Portrait: effigy on tomb at Cothelstone.

MARGARET DYER

see MARGARET à BARROW

JANE DYLLYCOTES (d.1605)
Jane Dyllycotes's parentage is unknown. She is recorded in most places simply as a French woman or a Huguenot. A manuscript cited by Alexander Balloch Grosart in Occasional Issues of Unique or Very Rare Books calls her Jane Jerrard (Gerard?) and says she was born in Anjou, but gives no source for this information. What we do know is that on March 20, 1582, she married Richard Barnes, bishop of Durham (d. August 24, 1587) at Durham Castle. She was his second wife. On September 30, 1597, she took as her second husband cleric Leonard Pilkington (1527-August 1599), whose brother had been Barnes's predecessor as bishop of Durham. She had no children by either husband. She was buried June 20, 1605 in Durham, near the burial place of Bishop Barnes.

MARGARET DYMOKE (c.1490-1550)

Margaret Dymoke was the daughter of Sir Robert Dymoke of Scrivelsby, Lincolnshire (c.1461-April 15,1545) and Jane (or Anne) Sparrow. She married Sir Richard Vernon of Haddon, Derbyshire (1477-1517) in about 1507 and was the mother of a son, George (1508-1567) and a daughter, Elizabeth. When she was left a wealthy widow, Cardinal Wolsey advocated a match with Sir William Tyrwhitt, but Margaret accepted Sir William Coffyn of Porthledge, Devon (c.1492-December 8, 1538). Margaret attended Catherine of Aragon at the Field of Cloth of Gold in 1520 and was at court with her second husband, who was master of horse to both Anne Boleyn and Jane Seymour. Margaret was one of the gentlewomen sent to wait (and spy) upon Anne Boleyn in the Tower. Some accounts give the name as “Mistress Cosyns” but this is a mistake for Coffyn. In Jane Seymour’s household, Margaret was a lady of the bedchamber. She wrote to Lord Cromwell from Standon, Hertfordshire to announce her second husband had died, "full of God’s marks over all his body." She was his sole executor and inherited all his leases and goods. In 1539, she married Sir Richard Manners of Garendon, Leicestershire (1490-February 9, 1551), by whom she may have had a son, John. During this marriage she lived primarily at Haddon Hall. Biography: Oxford DNB entry under "Coffin, Sir William." NOTE: the DNB gives her mother's name as Anne Sparrow. Portrait: effigy at Tong, Staffordshire.

MARGARET DYMOKE
see MARGARET WOGON

MARY DYMOKE or DYMOCK

see MARY HUSSEY

JOANNA DYNGLEY (d.1547+)
Nothing is known about Joanna Dyngley's parents, although a John Dyngley received an annuity of ten marks on May 29, 1516, "in token of the king's regard." It is extremely tempting to wonder if Joan has been mistread as John, but the date seems much too early. Joan or Joanna Dyngley is said to have been a royal laundress. Her natural or "base" daughter, Ethelreda or Audrey Malte (d.c.1556), was raised as the child of John Malte, Henry VIII’s tailor, but was rumored to be Henry’s bastard. Joanna was married to a Mr. Dobson by the time Malte made his will on September 10, 1546. It refers to her as "Joane Dingley, now wife of one Dobson" and as "Joane Dyngley, otherwise Joane Dobson." He left her £20. Joanna does not seem to have played any part in her daughter's life and the identity of Mr. Dobson remains elusive. The notoriously speculative The Other Tudors: Henry VIII’s Mistresses and Bastards by Philippa Jones, offers an interesting if unsupportable theory about Joanna's identity, complete with a solution to another minor mystery—the identity of the mistress who so infuriated Anne Boleyn that she tried to send her away from court. Jones's candidate is Jane or Joan Moore (d.1558+), daughter of Sir John Moore of Douklin, Douklen, Dunclent, or Dunkelyn, Worcestershire (d.1535) and Eleanor Milbourne. This Jane Moore was married three times. Her first husband was Michael Ashfield of Northlatche Manor, Gloucestershire. Her second was a man named James Dingley. Jones suggests that Dingley had recently died when his widow began an affair with the king c.1534 and suggests that Jane was the unnamed mistress the king refused to send away from court in that year, a woman sympathetic to Princess Mary. Jones then gives Eltheleda's birth date as June 23, 1535 and goes on to say that, by 1546, Jane Moore had married Thomas Parker of Notgrove, Gloucestershire (d.1558). They had three sons, Edmund, Thomas, and Michael, and a daughter. Where did the name Dobson come from in Malte’s will? Jones explains this away as a mistake by the person who copied the will, misreading "alias Dobson" as a reference to a husband when it was, in fact, a reference to the Moore family's lands.

EDITH DYNHAM or DINHAM (c.1448-1514)
Edith Dynham or Dinham was the daughter of John Dynham of Hartland, Devonshire (d.1458) and Joan Arches or Archer (c.1410-1497). She was the third wife of Thomas Fowler of Foxley, Buckinghamshire (c.1435-c.1510), who was an esquire of the body to King Edward IV and supported Richard III. He was pardoned in 1485. In spite of her husband's Yorkist sympathies, Edith later served as a waiting gentlewoman to Margaret Beaufort, countess of Richmond and Derby, the mother of Henry VII. She was one of those given "manteletts and kercheffes" for Henry’s funeral in 1509. The countess died soon afterward, on June 29, 1509. Edith and her husband were buried in Christ Church, Cambridge. Portrait: brass armorial effigy.

ELIZABETH DYNHAM (1449-October 19, 1516)
Elizabeth Dynham was the daughter of John Dynham or Dinham of Devon and Cornwall (1405/6-January 25, 1458) and Joan Arches (d.1497) and one of the co-heirs of her brother, John, 1st Lord Dynham (d.1501). She was married three times, first to Fulke Bourchier, 2nd baron Fitzwarine (October 25, 1445-September 18, 1479), by whom she had four children, John, 1st earl of Bath (July 20, 1470-April 30, 1539), Joan, Elizabeth (1474-1557), and William. Her second husband was Sir John Sapcote of Elton, Huntingdonshire (d. January 5, 1501), by whom she had one son, Richard (1483-July 9, 1542). Her third husband was Sir Thomas Brandon (1470-January 27, 1510). She was probably not married to Brandon long, as he mentions her in his will only in connection with a bequest to the Augustinian Friars in London for a "perpetual memory to be had of the Lord Marquess Berkley and the Lady Marquess, late my wife [his first wife, Anne Fiennes, who died in 1497], my Lady my wife [Elizabeth Dynham], [and] my brother Sir Robert Brandon." The will was written January 11, 1509/10 and proved May 11, 1510. There are no other bequests to Elizabeth, although he leaves gowns to two sisters and two nieces and a house in Southwark and land in Norfolk and Suffolk to the widowed "Lady Jane Gylford” (Joan Vaux). His nephew, Charles Brandon, was his principal heir. The logical conclusion is that Elizabeth was already well provided for in their marriage contract, having no doubt inherited considerable estates from her two previous husbands. She was, through Fulke Bourchier, the grandmother of Anne Stanhope, duchess of Somerset and, through Sir John Sapcote, the great-great grandmother of Anne Sapcote, countess of Bedford. Elizabeth was buried in the Greyfriars, London

ELIZABETH DYNHAM
see ELIZABETH WILLOUGHBY

JANE DYNHAM
see JANE or JOAN ORMOND

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