The story of Lady Margaret Beaufort is full of sadness and intrigue. Her year of birth is not known for certain but assumed to be between 1441 and 1444. The variance makes it difficult to know how old she was when certain events took place. Born into the royal family as the daughter of the Duke of Somerset, her first marriage to John de la Pole (at no more than nine years old and possibly when she was just one year old!) was annulled and she was married again at the behest of King Henry VI to Edmund Tudor, his half-brother when she was (probably) twelve, on 1st November 1455. Sadly, Edmund died of the plague a year later (3rd November 1456) during a period of captivity in Carmarthen (the Wars of the Roses had just broken out and Yorkist forces took him prisoner). Margaret was pregnant. She became a single mum at just 13 years old. It was, by all accounts, a difficult birth, and her son, Henry, was to be her only child.
She was married again at 14, and widowed again at 28 – her husband, Lord Stafford, fighting for the Yorkists, died of wounds inflicted at the Battle of Barnet in 1471. With Edward IV’s accession to the throne, her son, Henry, fled to France with other Lancastrians. Margaret would not see him again for fourteen years.
In 1472, she married for a fourth time (she only regarded it as her third marriage, the first having been annulled). This time it was to one Thomas Stanley, a powerful figure from the north west and older brother of Sir William Stanley. Thomas managed to stay on good terms with both warring sides of the family. He promised Richard III that he would restrain his wife from her schemes to promote her son and, when he sought to leave court and return north, he agreed to leave his own son at court in his place – a token of security.
He never committed his own forces in battle (unlike his younger brother), and even at the decisive Battle of Bosworth in his support of his stepson, Henry Tudor, he didn’t fully engage –his own son’s safety may have played a part in his hesitance. However, by the timely and determined intervention of his brother William’s forces, Richard III was defeated and Thomas’ wife’s only son became King. Henry made him 1st Earl of Derby as a mark of gratitude in 1485.[1]
As for Margaret, she remained an influential figure at court, and especially in the life of the King. In 1499, with her husband’s permission, she took a vow of chastity and lived separately from him. In 1503, Hunsdon was added to her property portfolio, and it remained hers until her death in 1509.[2]
[1] All information about Thomas Stanley sourced from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Stanley,_1st_Earl_of_Derby accessed on 22nd August 2024
[2] All information about Margaret Beaufort sourced from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Margaret_Beaufort accessed on 22nd August 2024