Eleanor de la Clare, Lady of Glamorgan

Notes:

Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eleanor_de_Clare

She was a powerful English noblewoman who married Hugh le Despenser, 1st Baron Despenser and was the granddaughter of Edward I of England. With her sisters, Elizabeth de Clare and Margaret de Clare, she inherited her father's estates after the death of her brother, Gilbert de Clare, 8th Earl of Gloucester, 7th Earl of Hereford at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314. She was born in 1292 at Caerphilly Castle in Glamorgan, Wales and was the eldest daughter Gilbert de Clare, 6th Earl of Hertford, 7th Earl of Gloucester, 5th Lord of Glamorgan and HRH Princess Joan of Acre.

As a co-heiress with her sisters Elizabeth de Clare (wife of Roger Damory), and Margaret de Clare (wife of Hugh Audley), in 1314 she inherited the de Clare estates including the huge feudal barony of Gloucester, following the death of her brother, Gilbert de Clare, 4th Earl of Gloucester at the Battle of Bannockburn. The partition was not fully settled until 1317.

During this period the family seat of Caerphilly Castle was held by the king under the stewardship of Payn de Turberville of Coity Castle. In protest against Turberville's mistreatment, the Welsh nobleman Llywelyn Bren and his supporters launched a surprise attack on 28 January 1316, and besieged Caerphilly Castle, which successfully held out under the command of "The lady of Clare" (almost certainly Eleanor) and a small garrison until relieved by Sir William Montacute on 12 March 1316. [Another ancestor]

In May 1306 at Westminster, Eleanor married Hugh le Despenser the Younger, the son of Hugh le Despenser, Earl of Winchester by his wife Isabella de Beauchamp, daughter of William de Beauchamp, 9th Earl of Warwick. Despenser thereby became Lord of Glamorgan. Her grandfather, King Edward I, granted Eleanor a dowry of 2,000 pounds sterling.

Eleanor's husband rose to prominence as the new favourite of her uncle, King Edward II of England. The king strongly favored Hugh and Eleanor, visiting them often and granting them many gifts. One foreign chronicler even alleged that Edward was involved in a ménage à trois with his niece and her husband. Eleanor's fortunes changed drastically after the invasion of Isabella of France and Roger Mortimer, following which her husband Hugh le Despenser was executed.

Eleanor and Hugh had nine children to survive infancy:

1. Hugh le Despencer, 2nd Baron le Despencer (1308-1349), 2nd Baron Le Despencer, who was restored to his grandfather's title of Baron le Despencer in 1338. He had no surviving children.

2. Gilbert le Despencer

3. Edward le Despenser, (1310-1342), soldier, killed at the siege of Vannes; father of Edward II le Despenser, Knight of the Garter, who became Baron Le Despencer in a new creation of 1357.

4. Isabel le Despenser, Countess of Arundel (1312-1356), married Richard Fitzalan, 10th Earl of Arundel.

5. John le Despenser, (1311-June 1366).

6.Eleanor le Despenser, (c. 1315-1351), nun at Sempringham Priory

7. Joan le Despenser, (c. 1317-1384), nun at Shaftesbury Abbey

8.Margaret le Despenser, (c. 1319-1337), nun at Whatton Priory

Elizabeth le Despenser, born 1325, died 13 July 1389, married Maurice de Berkeley, 4th Baron Berkeley.

In November 1326, Eleanor was confined to the Tower of London. The Despenser family's fortunes also suffered with the executions of Eleanor's husband and father-in-law. Eleanor and Hugh's eldest son Hugh le Despencer, 2nd Baron le Despencer (1308-1349), who held Caerphilly Castle against the queen's forces until the spring of 1327, was spared his life when he surrendered the castle, but he remained a prisoner until July 1331, after which he was eventually restored to royal favor. Three of Eleanor's daughters were forcibly veiled as nuns. Only the eldest daughter, Isabel, and the youngest daughter, Elizabeth, escaped the nunnery, Isabel because she was already married and Elizabeth on account of her infancy. In February 1328 Eleanor was freed from imprisonment. In April 1328, she was restored to possession of her own lands, for which she did homage.

In January 1329 Eleanor was abducted from Hanley Castle by William la Zouche, 1st Baron Zouche of Mortimer, who had been one of her first husband's captors and who had led the siege of Caerphilly Castle. The abduction may in fact have been an elopement; in any case, Eleanor's lands were seized by King Edward III, and the couple's arrest was ordered.

At the same time, Eleanor was accused of stealing jewels from the Tower of London. Sometime after February 1329, she was imprisoned a second time in the Tower, and was later moved to Devizes Castle. In January 1330 she was released and pardoned after agreeing to sign away the most valuable part of her share of the lucrative Clare inheritance to the crown. She could recover her lands only on payment of the enormous sum of 50,000 pounds in a single day.

Within the year, however, the young future King Edward III (Eleanor's first cousin) overthrew Queen Isabella's paramour, Roger Mortimer, 1st Earl of March, and had him executed. Eleanor was among those who benefited from the fall of Mortimer and Isabella.

She petitioned Edward III for the restoration of her lands, claiming that she had signed them away after being threatened by Roger Mortimer that she would never be freed if she did not. In 1331 Edward III granted her petition "to ease the king's conscience" and allowed her to recover the lands on the condition that she should pay a fine of 10,000 pounds, later reduced to 5,000 pounds, in installments. Eleanor made part-payments of the fine, but the bulk of it was outstanding at her death.

Eleanor's troubles were by no means over, however. After Eleanor's marriage to Zouche, John de Grey, 1st Baron Grey de Rotherfield claimed that he had married her first. In 1333 Grey was still attempting to claim marriage to Eleanor; the case was appealed to the Pope several times. Ultimately, Zouche won the dispute and Eleanor remained with him until his death in February 1337, only a few months before Eleanor's own death. By Zouche Eleanor had progeny as follows:

William de la Zouche, born 1330, died after 1360, a monk at Glastonbury Abbey and Joyce Zouche, born 1331, died after 4 May 1372, married John de Botetourt, 2nd Lord Botetourt.

Hugh le Despenser the younger and Eleanor are generally credited with having begun the renovations to Tewkesbury Abbey, a foundation of her ancestors, which transformed it into one of the finest example of the decorated style of architecture surviving today.

The famous fourteenth-century stained-glass windows in the choir, which include the armor-clad figures of Eleanor's ancestors, brother and two husbands, were most likely Eleanor's own contribution, although she probably did not live to see them put in place. The naked kneeling woman watching the Last Judgment in the choir's east window may represent Eleanor.



Buried:
Grave location, biography, and stained glass window portrait:
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=16441442

Eleanor married Hugh le Despenser, The Younger. Hugh (son of Hugh le Despenser, 1st Earl of Winchester and Isabella de Beauchamp, Baroness Despenser) was born 1286, Gloucestershire, England; died 24 Nov 1326, Hereford Herefordshire, England; was buried , Tewkesbury Abbey, Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire, England. [Group Sheet]

Notes:

Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabel_le_Despenser,_Countess_of_Arundel

She was the eldest daughter of Hugh Despenser the Younger and Eleanor de Clare. She was descended from Edward I of England through her mother, while her father is famous for being the favorite of Edward II of England.

Though he had stood against Edward II in the past, Edmund FitzAlan, 9th Earl of Arundel had loyally supported him since the 1320s. Thus it must have seemed to be politically prudent to Edmund to marry his heir Richard to the eldest daughter of the King's closest friend and adviser Hugh le Despenser. For Hugh's part, a large incentive for him must have been that he could expect his daughter Isabel would one day become Countess of Arundel.

On 9 February 1321 at the royal manor Havering-atte-Bower, Isabel was duly married to Richard FitzAlan, the heir to the earldom of Arundel. Isabel was only eight at the time, while Richard was fifteen (not seven as has been claimed). Their respective ages would come up later when Richard would try to seek an annulment.

Richard and Isabel had one son, Edmund Fitzalan, born in 1327, and in 1331 Isabel's husband became earl of Arundel. However, in December 1344 Richard Fitzalan had their marriage annulled on the grounds that he had never freely consented to marry Isabel and that they both had renounced their vows at puberty but had been "forced by blows to cohabit, so that a son was born". Isabel retired to several manors in Essex that were given to her by her ex-husband. After receiving a papal dispensation, Richard married Isabel's first cousin Eleanor of Lancaster, with whom he had apparently been having an affair.

Richard and Isabel's only child, Edmund Fitzalan, was rendered illegitimate by this annulment and so was unable to inherit his father's earldom. When his father died in 1376 Edmund quarreled with his half-siblings, the children of his father's second marriage, over inheritance rights. Edmund was imprisoned in the Tower of London until he was released in 1377 by request of his brothers-in-law.

After their father was executed for treason in 1326, Isabel and her youngest sister Elizabeth were the only daughters of Hugh the Younger to escape being confined in nunneries, Isabel because she was already married and Elizabeth because of her youth.

Buried:
Grave location, portrait and abbey photo:
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=62397103

There is an inscription on the chapel where she rests. It runs along the outside and inside walls as follows:
"Mementote dne Isabelle le Despenser Comitisse de Warrewick Que hanc capellam fundavit in honore bte Marie Magdalene Et obiit Londiniis apud Minres A° Dni MCCCCXXXIX Die Scti Jhis Evngste Et sepulta e i choro i dextra patris sui cuj. Ame parcet Deus. Amen."

Translation:
"Remember the Lady Isabelle le Despencer, Countess of Warwick, who founded this chapel to the honour of the blessed Mary Magdalene, and died in London in the Minories AD 1439 on the day of Saint John the Evangelist [27th December], and was buried in the Choir on the right hand of her father, on whose soul may God have pity. Amen."

Isabel married Richard (Cropped Hat) Fitz Alan, 10th Earl of Arundel and 8th Earl of Surrey 09 Feb 1321, Havering-atte-Bower, London Borough of Havering, England. Richard (son of Edmund FITZALAN, Lord of Arundel and Alice DE WARREN) was born 1306, Arundel, Sussex, England; died 24 Jan 1376, Sussex, England; was buried , Chichester Cathedral, Chichester, West Sussex, England. [Group Sheet]

Notes:

Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_FitzAlan,_10th_Earl_of_Arundel

Richard FitzAlan, 10th Earl of Arundel and 8th Earl of Surrey married twice:

Firstly, on 9 February 1321 at Havering-atte-Bower, to Isabel le Despenser (born 1312, living 1356, and may have died circa 1376-7). At that time, the future earl was either eight or fifteen, and his bride nine years old. Later he repudiated this bride, and was granted an annulment by Pope Clement VI in December 1344 on the grounds that he had been underage and unwilling. By this marriage, Richard and Isabel had one son (when Richard was either fourteen or twenty-one, and Isabel fifteen), who was bastardized by the annulment:

Sir Edmund de Arundel, knt (b ca 1327; d 1376-1382), bastardized by the annulment. Edmund was nevertheless knighted, married at the age of twenty, in the summer of 1347 Sybil de Montacute, a younger daughter of William Montacute, 1st Earl of Salisbury and Catherine Grandison, whose elder sister Elizabeth was married to his maternal uncle, of whom it was said he arranged.

Edmund protested his bastardization bitterly in 1347, but was apparently ignored. After his father's death in 1376, Edmund disputed his half-brother Richard's inheritance of the earldom and associated lands and titles in 1376 and apparently tried to claim the six manors allotted to his deceased mother.

He was imprisoned in the Tower of London in 1377, and finally freed through the intervention of two of his brothers-in-law (his wife's brother John de Montacute and the second husband of Elizabeth de Montacute, Lady Le Despencer). They had three daughters who were his co-heiresses and who brought a failed suit in 1382 against their half-uncle the Earl:

1. Elizabeth (or Alice) de Arundel, who married Sir Leonard Carew (1343-1369) of Mohuns Ottery in Devon, feudal lord of Carew Castle in Pembrokeshire and lord of the manor of Moulsford in Berkshire. From Alice are descended all the members of the prominent and widespread Carew family, except Carew of Beddington in Surrey, descended from one of Sir Leonard's great-uncles.

2. Philippa de Arundel (died 18 May 1452), who married (as his 2nd wife) Sir Richard Sergeaux, Knt, of Colquite, Cornwall. A Victorian historical novel ascribes the following five children to her: a) Richard, born 21 December 1376, and died childless, 24 June 1396; b) Elizabeth, born 1379, wife of Sir William Marny; c) Philippa, born 1381, wife of Robert Passele; d) Alice, born at Kilquyt, 1 September 1384, wife of Guy de Saint Albino; e) Joan, born 1393, died 21 February 1400. "Philippa became a widow, 30 September 1393, and died 13 September 1399."

3. Alice Sergeaux, later Countess of Oxford (c. 1386-18 May 1452), who married 1stly Guy de St Aubyn of St. Erme, Cornwall, and 2ndly about 1406-7 (as his 2nd wife) the 11th Earl of Oxford and widower of Alice de Holand (dsp. 1406, niece of Henry IV), and was the mother of two sons by him
a)John de Vere, 12th Earl of Oxford b)Robert de Vere, whose grandson, John, became the 15th Earl of Oxford.

4. Katherine de Arundel, who married Robert Deincourt.


Birth:
Source:
Aileen Lewers Langston and J. Orton Buck, Jr., Pedigrees of Some of the Emperor Charlemagne's Descendants, Vol. II (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1974), 170, 334.

Died:
Source:
Frederick Lewis Weis, The Magna Charta Sureties, 1215, 5th ed. (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1999).

Edmund married Sybill de Montagu. Sybill (daughter of William de Montagu and Catherine de Grandison) was born ca 1330. [Group Sheet]

Notes:

Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_FitzAlan,_10th_Earl_of_Arundel#Marriages_and_children

Richard FitzAlan, 10th Earl of Arundel and 8th Earl of Surrey married twice:

Firstly, on 9 February 1321 at Havering-atte-Bower, to Isabel le Despenser (born 1312, living 1356, and may have died circa 1376-7). At that time, the future earl was either eight or fifteen, and his bride nine years old. Later he repudiated this bride, and was granted an annulment by Pope Clement VI in December 1344 on the grounds that he had been underage and unwilling. By this marriage, Richard and Isabel had one son (when Richard was either fourteen or twenty-one, and Isabel fifteen), who was bastardized by the annulment:

Sir Edmund de Arundel, knt (b ca 1327; d 1376-1382), bastardized by the annulment. Edmund was nevertheless knighted, married at the age of twenty, in the summer of 1347 Sybil de Montacute, a younger daughter of William Montacute, 1st Earl of Salisbury and Catherine Grandison, whose elder sister Elizabeth was married to his maternal uncle, of whom it was said he arranged.

Edmund protested his bastardization bitterly in 1347, but was apparently ignored. After his father's death in 1376, Edmund disputed his half-brother Richard's inheritance of the earldom and associated lands and titles in 1376 and apparently tried to claim the six manors allotted to his deceased mother. He was imprisoned in the Tower of London in 1377, and finally freed through the intervention of two of his brothers-in-law (his wife's brother John de Montacute and the second husband of Elizabeth de Montacute, Lady Le Despencer). They had three daughters who were his co-heiresses and who brought a failed suit in 1382 against their half-uncle the Earl:

1.Elizabeth (or Alice) de Arundel, who married Sir Leonard Carew (1343-1369)of Mohuns Ottery in Devon, feudal lord of Carew Castle in Pembrokeshire and lord of the manor of Moulsford in Berkshire. From Alice are descended all the members of the prominent and widespread Carew family, except Carew of Beddington in Surrey, descended from one of Sir Leonard's great-uncles.

2. Philippa de Arundel (died 18 May 1452), who married (as his 2nd wife) Sir Richard Sergeaux, Knt, of Colquite, Cornwall. A Victorian historical novel ascribes the following five children to her:

Richard, born 21 December 1376, and died childless, 24 June 1396;

Elizabeth, born 1379, wife of Sir William Marny;
Philippa, born 1381, wife of Robert Passele;
Alice, born at Kilquyt, 1 September 1384, wife of Guy de Saint Albino;

Joan, born 1393, died 21 February 1400.

"Philippa became a widow, 30 September 1393, and died 13 September 1399."

3. Alice Sergeaux, later Countess of Oxford (c. 1386-18 May 1452), who married 1stly Guy de St Aubyn of St. Erme, Cornwall, and 2ndly about 1406-7 (as his 2nd wife) the 11th Earl of Oxford and widower of Alice de Holand (dsp. 1406, niece of Henry IV), and was the mother of two sons by him:

John de Vere, 12th Earl of Oxford

Robert de Vere, whose grandson, John, became the 15th Earl of Oxford.


Birth:
Source:
Douglas Richardson, Plantagenet Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2004), 334.

Buried:
Grave location:
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=152343727

Died:
Sources:
Inquisitiones Post Mortem, 17 Ric. II., 53; 21 Ric. II., 50; 1 H. IV., 14, 23, 24.

Philippa married Sir Richard Sergeaux. Richard was born , Erwan, Cornwall, England; died 30 Sept. 1393, Cornwall, England; was buried , Saint Mary Chapel of Colquite, St Mabyn, Cornwall, England . [Group Sheet]