The Talbot Sisters

(Note, this is an article I wrote some time ago - it has not been updated to reflect information contained in recent publications. It is offered as it may still be of some interest.)

When considering John Talbot (1384-1453) first Earl of Shrewsbury, and his second wife, Margaret Beauchamp (1404-1468) it is difficult to decide which of the pair was the more formidable. John Talbot was a sort of fifteenth-century Field-Marshal Montgomery, a famous soldier who spent much of his adult life fighting first against Owain Glyndwr’s Welsh supporters, and later in numerous campaigns against the French. (There was a brief intermediate period when he served as an extremely unpopular Lieutenant of Ireland. He started a feud with the Earl of Ormonde which went on for decades.) An English hero in his time (though largely forgotten now) he was hated and feared by his enemies in roughly equal measure. When dealing with rivals in England he was every bit as ruthless as he was in war, and not at all reluctant to make use of outright violence.

As for the Countess Margaret, whom he married in 1425, she had inherited a feud of her own with her Berkeley cousins. Her mother had been the only child of Thomas, 5^th Lord Berkeley – the cousins were Berkeley’s heirs-male. The resulting dispute over the family lands ran on for decades, and like her husband, Margaret was none too nice in her dealings. After Lord Berkeley had attacked Margaret’s manor at Wotton-under-Edge (in 1452), she had her son respond by seizing Berkeley Castle itself and taking Lord Berkeley prisoner. She also arranged for Lady Berkeley to be thrown into prison, where the lady died next year. (The feud was patched for a time by a marriage between Lord Berkeley and Margaret’s step-daughter – but that was by no means the end of it.)

This delightful couple had three sons and two daughters. The eldest son, Viscount Lisle, died with his father at the Battle of Castillon. The second, Sir Lewis Talbot, died in 1458 – possibly of violence, although the facts are sketchy. The youngest son, Sir Humphrey, lived a quieter life, initially as a retainer of his brother-in-law, the Duke of Norfolk, and died in 1492 while on pilgrimage to the Holy Land.

The two Talbot sisters are the main subject of this article. One may have been the rightful Queen of England. The other became a duchess, and mother-in-law of one of the Princes of the Tower. Both have a place in the ongoing saga of Richard III.

Eleanor was married to Thomas Butler, heir to Ralph, Lord Sudeley, a Lancastrian, when she was approx. 14 years old. This was in some ways an unambitious match, as the Butlers of Sudeley were not of magnate rank. They would have been regarded as having only local importance but for the family’s long tradition of personal service to the Lancastrian kings, which gave them influence at court. Having said this, it is important to recognise that Shrewsbury himself was a ‘new man’ a first earl, promoted through the peerage because of his exceptional military service.

Thomas Butler died around 1461, during the lifetime of his father. His stepmother was Alice Deincourt, Lady Lovel. This Alice, who was Francis Lovel’s' grandmother, was governess to Edward (Lancastrian) Prince of Wales. She petitioned to be released from the job in 1460 because a) he was old enough to be ruled by men and b) her own infirmities.

Elizabeth Talbot, while young had married the Mowbray heir and become Countess of Warenne. This was a much greater marriage than Eleanor’s and lined her up to be one of the greatest ladies in England, Duchess of Norfolk after her father-in-law died in 1462. After Thomas Butler’s death she seems to have gradually assumed the role of protectress of her sister, who eventually spent most of her time living within the Mowbray sphere of influence in East Anglia.

Eleanor quite possibly caught Edward's eye when she petitioned him about her dower rights. (Edward was in Norwich in May and October of 1461), though the Butler family were acquainted already with him since Lord Sudeley's sister, Elizabeth Butler, Lady Say, was his godmother. Some difficulty had been caused by the transfer of lands to Eleanor without royal licence. This issue was resolved, but Eleanor’s property remained small, to say the least – the consequence of her husband dying during his father’s lifetime.

If Richard III’s accession statute, Titulus Regius is to be believed, at some point before Edward IV’s purported marriage to Elizabeth Woodville in 1464, King Edward went through an irregular marriage with Eleanor and the relationship was consummated. An irregular marriage was one conducted without the full rites of the church and in private without publication of banns. Even the participation of a priest was not required to make it binding. Such marriages could be ‘regularised’ by obtaining a dispensation. Edward’s own grandparents had been through exactly the same process and sought a dispensation. Edward did not bother, either in Eleanor’s case or after his equally irregular marriage to Elizabeth Woodville. Why he did not in the case of Elizabeth is something of a mystery. One possibility is that he was idle and ill-advised. Another is that (if he had committed bigamy) he did not want to tell lies to the Pope.

It is sometimes asked why, if Eleanor was married to Edward, she did not come forward and protest after his marriage to Elizabeth Woodville was announced. This overlooks the difficulties and real dangers that a woman of small resources had in going head-to-head with the absolute sovereign of England. It would have been utterly impractical for Eleanor to do so, to say nothing of being highly embarrassing. There were no children involved, and as Eleanor seems to have had a strong religious bent she may have preferred to keep quiet and live in peace.

Eleanor Talbot died in 1468 at Whitefriars Priory in Norwich where she was a benefactress and 'conversa' [lay member]. Her younger sister Elizabeth was out of the country at the time, attending on Margaret of York at her wedding.

You may think that if Edward had the sense to ‘renew’ his marriage vows with Elizabeth Woodville, then Edward V could very well have been legitimate, as could his younger brother and his sisters Katherine and Bridget.

Professor R.M. Helmholz deals with this very point in Richard III Loyalty Lordship and Law (ed. P.W. Hammond) page 93-94. I quote: ‘Under medieval canon law, adultery, when coupled with a present contract of marriage, was an impediment to the subsequent marriage of the adulterous partners. It was not simply a matter of having entered into an invalid contract. The parties to it rendered themselves incapable of marrying at any time in the future, because under canon law one was forbidden to marry a person he (sic) had "polluted" by adultery where the adultery was coupled with either a present contract of marriage or "machination" in the death of the first spouse. Thus...if Sempronius being validly married to Bertha, purported to marry Titia and consummated this second, purported marriage, Sempronius and Titia would not only have entered into an invalid union and committed adultery, they would also have incurred a perpetual impediment to marrying after Bertha's death. This is precisely the situation (it was alleged) of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville.’

Helmholz goes on to point out that if Elizabeth Woodville was unaware of the marriage to Eleanor Butler then a marriage contracted after Eleanor's death would been valid.

So - on the point of Lady Eleanor - it seems that if Elizabeth Woodville knew about Eleanor, then any remarriage after 1468 would have been automatically invalid. Unfortunately we cannot possibly establish what Elizabeth Woodville did or did not know. Moreover, since Edward and Elizabeth had already been through a form of marriage, a dispensation would have been needed to repeat the sacrament, and Edward certainly did not obtain one.

A further issue is that neither the original Edward-Elizabeth Woodville marriage nor any subsequent marriage that may have taken place between the was celebrated in facie ecclesie . Such marriages were contrary to the rules of the Church and thus raised a presumption of bad faith. According to Helmholz, in the case of of Edward and Elizabeth, who went out of their way not to have banns read and so on, this would ‘in most circumstances render the children of the union illegitimate’ even though (as I understand it) the marriage itself might be regarded as valid. It must be acknowledged that the same conditions applied to the Edward-Eleanor marriage, but in their case there were no children to be illegitimated.

Elizabeth, Duchess of Norfolk was Executrix of Eleanor's will. (The will, unfortunately has not survived, but would probably have contained provision for her soul and bequests of personal items.). As well as the Norwich Whitefriars, Corpus Christi College, Cambridge also benefited from Eleanor's patronage. She gave money for the building of 10 of 16 buttresses inside the Old Court and was closely associated with the College for over 30 years. Some 28 years after Eleanor's death, Thomas Cosin, the College’s Master, set up a benefaction as a memorial at Elizabeth's request to her 'famous and devout' sister and Thomas Butler. The benefaction was a Fellowship, an institution that still continues today. John Ashdown-Hill has demonstrated that Eleanor possessed certain lands which were not dower lands (which would have gone back to her father-in-law) cannot have been inherited from the Talbots (because such lands would have gone to male heirs) and which Eleanor did not have the means to purchase. The implication is that this property was given to her by Edward IV. These lands Eleanor had already transferred to Elizabeth before her death, possibly because she knew she was dying.

On Duchess Elizabeth's return from Burgundy that summer, her retainers John Poynings and Richard Alford, were arrested. They were apparently suspected of involvement in a conspiracy with the exiled Duke of Somerset, their lady’s first cousin. Whatever the truth of the matter, the two men were found guilty and executed in November 1468. It is even possible that Elizabeth herself was imprisoned, because these sort of temporary immurements were done on the authority of a privy seal writ, the records of which (to the great convenience of fiction writers if not historians) are nearly all long since destroyed.

“However, Duke Charles would always keep a soft spot in his heart for the self-styled Duke of Somerset and he continued, secretly, to pay him a pension, while overtly supporting the Yorkist cause. Despite his exclusion from the general festivities, Somerset was able to make good use of his benefactor's wedding celebrations, through clandestine contact with Lancastrian sympathisers among the many English hangers-on attending. By this means, messages were exchanged with persons highly placed in England, who still looked for the restoration of Henry VI to the throne of his fathers, when fate smiled once more on Lancaster's cause.” (Quote from Geoffrey Richardson)

Elizabeth received a pardon before 7 December 1468, and another one subsequently in connection with a land-grab. Interestingly, Edward IV refused at that time to resolve the long-running Berkeley Inheritance dispute in which Elizabeth was involved. Colin Richmond in The Paston Family in the Fifteenth Century mentions that Elizabeth’s social circle in the 1470s included Margaret Beaufort, Morton, and Lady Anne Paston, the sister of the exiled (and later executed) Somerset. Since her half-nephew Shrewsbury was lining up with Clarence and Warwick in 1468-1469, it’s perhaps not that surprising Edward was suspicious of her. It may be that it was as well for this particular Talbot sister that her husband was so vital (and faithful) to the Yorkist cause.

Anne Crawford's article The Mowbray Inheritance in Richard III Crown and People states that in May 1476 William Berkeley agreed to make over his reversionary rights to the Mowbray estates (rights that would of course only arise in the event of Anne Mowbray's death without children) to Richard of York and his heirs male. In return Edward IV agreed to pay off Berkeley's debts "to the Talbots" in the sum of £34000. Let’s say that again. Thirty four thousand pounds. That’s getting on for fourteen million sterling in modern values.

Now who exactly among "the Talbots" got this money is not clear, but presumably the money could have spread itself around the family.

From the same article:

"Edward also persuaded [sic] Anne's mother, the widowed Duchess of Norfolk, to forgo her own dower and jointure in order to augment her daughter's dower. In return she received a much smaller [my emphasis] grant of manors, all of which were to revert on her death to Richard of York for his lifetime."

The subsequent marriage of Elizabeth Talbot's daughter to young Richard of York, with all its onerous conditions as far as the Mowbrays were concerned, may be seen in this light as a combination of threat and bribe. "You keep quiet and your daughter gets to be Duchess of York, perhaps even Queen. Step out of line and you're as much the loser as we are. More so; we've already forced you to give up some of your dower. We can have the rest any time it
suits."

As it happened, Elizabeth’s daughter, Anne Mowbray died in 1481, long before there was any possibility of her marriage being consummated. Under the unjust legislation Edward IV put through Parliament for his own family’s benefit, the Mowbray lands went to Richard, Duke of York, and the rightful heirs, Lord Howard and Lord Berkeley were denied their inheritance. (Though as mentioned above, Berkeley had agreed to be robbed, Howard certainly hadn’t.)

It has been suggested that after Edward IV’s death Eleanor’s family may have approached Richard about the pre-contract and that Richard got Stillington in to confirm their information. Indeed, Buck suggests Eleanor told her mother and Elizabeth of the pre-contract as she was upset at Edward’s treatment of her. However, he also suggests her father tried to do something about it, but this cannot be true as Shrewsbury was long dead.

Elizabeth Talbot certainly had no great cause to love Edward IV, and maybe she did indeed provide evidence about sister Eleanor once Edward was safely dead. It would have been an excellent way to extract the Mowbray lands from Richard of York and get herself and John Howard a fair deal.

John Ashdown-Hill in his December 1997 article in the Ricardian points out that, according to Commynes, Stillington claims to have witnessed the pre-contract, though a witness wasn't necessary - just a promise of marriage followed by sexual intercourse, and that it was up to Eleanor herself, as the 'wronged party', to put the case to a Church court, so Stillington had no obligation to speak out against the pre-contract if she hadn't done so. Stillington spoke up only when the first 'wrong' looked like it was going to be compounded by the enthronement of a bastard.

Richard III treated Elizabeth Talbot kindly when King. She was in attendance at his Coronation and given her rightful precedence as a duchess. Richard referred to her as his 'kinswoman' (she was Anne's full cousin), and he granted her land and property which she was 'to hold by the service of a red rose at midsummer'. This additional land (Chelsea) she was subsequently ‘persuaded’ (after Richard’s death) by Margaret Beaufort to grant to Margaret’s henchman, Reginald Bray.

After 1485 Elizabeth decided to take up the lease of a great house within the precincts of the Minories, London. Here she could live a religious life without actually becoming a nun, and, despite her Lancastrian family connections, she surrounded herself with a group of what might reasonably be called ‘Yorkist’ ladies – for example the daughters of Sir Robert Brackenbury, King Richard’s faithful supporter, who had been killed at Bosworth.

Elizabeth died in May 1507, and was buried in the Minories. She did not spend all her time within its precincts – for example, she was one of the ladies who were sent to greet Catherine of Aragon on her arrival in England. If they had only shared a common language, Elizabeth could have told Catherine a few interesting tales about her new country.

For anyone who would like to know more about Eleanor Talbot, I highly recommend Eleanor The Secret Queen by John Ashdown-Hill. Elizabeth Talbot appears in the same source, but for more about her, see Colin Richmond’s three books about the Paston family, or indeed, the Paston Letters themselves, in which she appears as one of the more charming and tolerant characters.

A mystery from 1468

(reblogged from Murrey and Blue)

Lady Eleanor Butler (born Talbot) probably knew that she was dying. In the early months of 1468, she transferred the lands that were hers to transfer to her sister, Elizabeth, Duchess of Norfolk. Where these lands came from is something of a mystery. John Ashdown-Hill has demonstrated that they were not dower lands, could not have been inherited, and were almost certainly not bought by Lady Eleanor, as she lacked the resources. The most probable origin of this mysterious land is that it was a gift from Edward IV. As King Edward was not in the habit of gifting land to random females this is suggestive of a connection between them. Of course, some people have pointed out that the land was not particularly valuable. Oh, well that makes it OK then! The point is that land -  even small amounts of it - was not just handed out for no reason. No one has satisfactorily explained where the land came from if it did not come from the King.

Anyway, no sooner was this sorted than King Edward appointed Duchess Elizabeth to go to Burgundy with his sister, Margaret of York, on the occasion of the latter's wedding. This involved the Duchess being in charge of the whole female side of things - no mean responsibility when around one hundred women and girls were attached to Margaret's train. The reason for Elizabeth's selection was probably that she was the most senior English lady who was not either a member of the royal house or a Woodville, or both. It may also have been intended as a mark of favour to her husband, John Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk, who, although apparently not the sharpest knife in the drawer by a long way, was at least a loyal Yorkist.

So off they popped to sunny Burgundy, to the celebration and pageantry that John Paston felt there were no words to describe. Elizabeth's brother, Sir Humphrey Talbot, went with her. The unfortunate Eleanor was left behind in Norfolk to die without any of her birth family around her, although one would like to think that Norfolk himself visited with the occasional bunch of flowers. She was buried in the house of the White Carmelites at Norwich.

Elizabeth had scarcely set foot back in England (round about July 1468) when two of her servants John Poynings and Richard Alford, were charged with having treasonable dealings with the agents of the Lancastrians in Kouer-La-Petite. Brought to trial, they were found guilty and were hanged, drawn and quartered.

Now, as I mentioned above, Elizabeth's husband, Norfolk, was a loyal Yorkist. So why should his servants have been suspected of intrigue with the Lancastrians? It makes no obvious sense. Elizabeth herself - though one of the most charming individuals to appear in the Paston Letters - was in no position to do anything of significance for the Lancastrian cause even if she was that way inclined. She did not control her husband's retainers, or his castles, or anything helpful.

One of the Lancastrian exiles present in Flanders was, however, Somerset, Elizabeth's first cousin, and brother to her good friend Lady Anne Paston. It is possible that she sought to pass on family news to him - but if this is the explanation, the treatment of her servants was extremely severe.

So was this a shot across the bows, to warn Elizabeth to keep her mouth shut about - certain matters? Who knows. 

What can be said is that on 8 December 1468 the Duchess took out a pardon for all offences before 7 December. It is quite unusual for a married woman to take out a pardon without the inclusion of her husband. In civil matters she had no separate legal standing, she was under coverture. It may simply have been an insurance for any errors or omissions committed while serving in the office of Margaret's Principal Lady-in-Waiting. There was, after all, potentially a lot to go wrong, jewels to go missing, whatever. But it could also indicate something more sinister.

On 28 January 1469, the Duchess' brother, Sir Humphrey Talbot also received a general pardon.

It looks to me as if in the autumn/early winter of 1468, Elizabeth and Humphrey were under royal suspicion for something. The question is, was it something they did, or something they knew?

Just to add - it was no light thing for the King to execute the followers of a nobleman. It cast doubts on the noble's loyalty, and suggested he was not able to protect his own. Compare Clarence's reaction to Edward's attack on his followers. But Norfolk was a loyal Yorkist. There is no suggestion that he at any time was conspiring against Edward.

Henry Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, part 4.

In the early summer of 1463, Sir Ralph Percy reverted to his former Lancastrian loyalties and surrendered Bamburgh and Dunstanburgh to the Scottish/Lancastrian allies. In its way, trusting Ralph Percy with this responsibility had been as big a gamble as trusting Somerset, but it may have been the case that he was the only practical option in this neck of the woods, where the Percy name was still important.

Perhaps more surprising was the decision of Sir Ralph Grey to hand over Alnwick to the enemy. Grey had been regarded as a committed 'Yorkist' and was indeed grandson to the Grey executed with Cambridge at Southampton in 1415.

Warwick and Montagu were immediately instructed to mobilise their forces in the north - Warwick had been in London for the Parliament and had to make a long journey. Edward meanwhile concluded the Parliament without any undue haste and moved to Northampton, where he planned a muster.

Somerset was very much in his company - but the men of Northampton remembered the damage to their town caused by the Lancastrian armies a few years before, and rioted against the duke, even though he was in King Edward's proximity and surrounded by the King's guards. Edward had to break up the 'scuffle' with his own hands, rescue Somerset and threaten the rioters with a swift hanging if they did not disperse. The angry citizens retreated to their homes, and Somerset was saved.

However, Edward decided that he could no longer be kept about his person while emotions were so high against him. He sent Somerset (with a suitable guard) off to North Wales. Accounts differ as to whether it was to Chirk or Holt. I suspect the latter as the Duke of Norfolk was established there, with the difficult task of keeping order among some fairly restless local punters. This Norfolk was not the one who fought at Towton, but his young son, an individual who was always to prove a loyal Yorkist, albeit not a particularly capable one. He was probably employed at Holt as he was the only magnate available for the task with lands in the strategic area, not because of his great ability. But his wife, Elizabeth Talbot, was first cousin of Somerset and of course, sister to the legendary Lady Eleanor Talbot! I believe Somerset was sent to stay 'with family'. Given that the area was riven with Lancastrian dissent, it was not an obvious place to send someone Edward suspected might choose to defect. This leads me to think that Edward still had faith in Somerset.

The Nevilles meanwhile relieved Norham Castle and Newcastle, but were not in a position to recapture the lost castles. In August Margaret of Anjou and a small party set off for France again, hoping to secure more aid from King Louis. Whatever faults Queen Margaret had, no one could accuse her of being a pessimist.