#historian: ralph a. griffiths

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From the autumn of 1427 onwards, additional constraints were placed on Queen Katherine's freedom of action. During the following three years (and possibly longer) she and her familia were accommodated within the king's own household, where she would be under more vigilant control by councillors and household servants alike. Her receiver-general paid £7 a day to the treasurer of Henry's household to meet the additional expense involved. She may also have travelled with King Henry to France in April 1430, for it was later recorded that while she was at Rouen the Queen gave her son a precious jewel, which he later, in December 1434, presented to the Duchess of York. Mother and son cannot have been together in the Norman capital at any other time.

Ralph A. Griffiths, “Queen Katherine of Valois and a Missing Statue of the Realm”, King and Country: England and Wales in the Fifteenth Century (The Hambleton Press 1991)

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Margaret of Anjou had the most intimate interest in the wedding in 1456 of her kinswoman, Marie, daughter of Charles, count of Maine, to Thomas Courtenay, the son and heir of the earl of Devon. That this was a court-contracted marriage is suggested by the fact that Marie's wedding gown was supplied by the king's Great Wardrobe [...] The second notable marriage of 1457 to be arranged at court was that between the king's cousin, Margaret Beaufort, countess of Richmond, and her third husband, Henry Stafford, second son of the duke of Buckingham. This additional bond among the king's blood relatives buttressed the Lancastrian regime and the royal family at a time when the survival of the dynasty rested on the young shoulders of Prince Edward, the only son and heir of King Henry VI and Queen Margaret.

— Ralph A. Griffiths, "The King's Court during the Wars of the Roses" | King and Country: England and Wales in the Fifteenth Century

It is, indeed, a striking fact that no aristocratic marriages of comparable significance took place outside the court circle in these crucial years before the onset of civil war. Most — if not all — of those that did take place were probably discussed at court among magnates — Staffords, Courtenays, Beauforts, Talbots, Berkeleys, Butlers, Greys and Percies — who were loyal to the house of Lancaster and prominent at King Henry's court.

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The Hotel Historian Is at Your Service

For David Pupo, learning about Blantyre, in Lenox, Mass., was about reclaiming his own past. Mr. Pupo grew up about a half mile away from the luxury hotel, which was built in 1902.

As a teenager, Mr. Pupo, who doubles as Blantyre’s director of membership and concierge services, spent his summers swimming in the grand pool behind the main house, back when it was a swim club for locals. Mr. Pupo wanted to know more about the 110-acre estate that played such a prominent role in his youth.

So he read everything that had been written on the place. He now leads daily history tours in the mansion, which was once briefly owned by the filmmaker D.W. Griffith. “We show how the house was used in the Gilded Age period, and compare and contrast it to how it is being used today as a five-star hotel,” he said.

For David Pupo, learning about the Blantyre was about reclaiming his own past. CreditLauren Lancaster for The New York Times

Others are utilizing the property’s history to help inform the present.

When the real estate developer Anthony Champalimaud took over Troutbeck, a country estate-turned-guesthouse in Amenia, N.Y., in 2016, he and his wife, Charlie, spent two years exhaustively researching the history. (Mr. Champalimaud is the former managing director of Champalimaud, a design firm that has overseen renovations and redesigns at many hotels and guest properties, including Singapore Raffles.)

Troutbeck was built in 1765 by Myron Benton, a farmer, poet and writer whose pals included Ralph Waldo Emerson, Mark Twain and Henry David Thoreau, all of whom visited regularly.

In 1902, the property was purchased by Colonel Joel Spingarn and his wife, Amy. Mr. Spingarn, who founded the publishing house Harcourt Brace & Company, entertained the likes of Ernest Hemingway, Sinclair Lewis and Theodore Roosevelt (The president favored room 8). Later visitors included Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, W.E.B. Du Bois, and Langston Hughes.

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The Movies, Mr. Griffith and Me By Lillian Gish & Ann Pinchot (Englewood Cliffs, NJ Prentice-Hall, 1969)

D. W. Griffith (1875–1948) was a popular and innovative Hollywood film director who made silent films in the early 20th century. His most famous film was Birth of a Nation, which appeared in 1915 and drew criticism from many African Americans for its depiction of blacks and its advocacy of white supremacy. The NAACP organized protests and boycotts of the film nationwide. In this selection from her autobiography, the actress Lillian Gish describes Griffith’s conception of the film.

One afternoon during the spring of 1914, while we were still working in California, Mr. Griffith took me aside on the set and said in an undertone, “After the others leave tonight, would you please stay.” Later, as some of the company drifted out, I realized that a similar message had been given to a few others. This procedure was typical of Mr. Griffith when he was planning a new film. He observed us with a smile, amused perhaps by our curiosity over the mystery that he had created. I suspected what the meeting was about. A few days before, we had been having lunch at The White Kitchen, and I had noticed that his pockets were crammed with papers and pamphlets. My curiosity was aroused, but it would have been presumptuous of me to ask about them. With Mr. Griffith one did not ask; one only answered. Besides, I had learned that if I waited long enough he would tell me. “I’ve bought a book by Thomas Dixon, called The Clansman. I’m going to use it to tell the truth about the War between the States. It hasn’t been told accurately in history books. Only the winning side in a war ever gets to tell its story.” He paused, watching the cluster of actors: Henry Walthall, Spottiswoode Aiken, Bobby Harron, Mae Marsh, Miriam Cooper, Elmer Clifton, George Siegmann, Walter Long, and me.

“The story concerns two families—the Stonemans from the North and the Camerons from the South.” He added significantly, “I know I can trust you.” He swore us to secrecy, and to us his caution was understandable. Should his competitors learn of his new project, they would have films on the same subject completed before his work was released. He discussed his story plots freely only over lunch or dinner, often testing them out on me because I was close-mouthed and never repeated what anyone told me.…

Mr. Griffith didn’t need the Dixon book. His intention was to tell his version of the War between the States. But he evidently lacked the confidence to start production on a twelve-reel film without an established book as a basis for his story. After the film was completed and he had shown it to the so-called author, Dixon said: “This isn’t my book at all.” But Mr. Griffith was glad to use Dixon’s name on the film as author, for, as he told me, “The public hates you if it thinks you wrote, directed, and produced the entire film yourself. It’s the quickest way to make enemies.” After the first rehearsal, the pace increased. Mr. Griffith worked, as usual, without a script. But this time his pockets bulged with books, maps, and pamphlets, which he read during meals and the rare breaks in his hectic schedule.… At first I didn’t pay much attention to Mr. Griffith’s concept of the film. His claim that history books falsified actual happenings struck me as most peculiar. At that time I was too naïve to think that history books would attempt to falsify anything. I’ve lived long enough now to know that the whole truth is never told in history texts. Only the people who lived through an era, who are the real participants in the drama as it occurs, know the truth. The people of each generation, it seems to me, are the most accurate historians of their time. Soon sets were going up; costumes arrived; and mysterious crates, evidently filled with military equipment, were delivered.…

When the final casting was announced, we learned that Ralph Lewis was to play the Honorable Austin Stoneman, the “uncrowned king of Capitol Hill.” The character of Stoneman, a fiery political fanatic from the North, was patterned after the real-life Thaddeus Stevens, one of the legislators whose harsh policy toward the South wrecked President Lincoln’s postwar plans. Bobby Harron and Elmer Clifton were to play Stoneman’s sons, and I was given the role of his daughter Elsie. Mary Alden was to be Stoneman’s mulatto mistress Lydia Brown, whom Dixon described as “a woman of extraordinary animal beauty and the fiery temper of a leopardess.” George Siegmann was awarded the part of Silas Lynch, who, according to Dixon, was “a Negro of perhaps forty years, a man of charming features.…” Walter Long was to be the renegade Negro Gus, and Elmo Lincoln, a magnificent strong man who would later swing through the trees as Tarzan, played the Negro who attacks Wallace Reid, the stalwart blacksmith. There were practically no Negro actors in California then and, as far as we knew, only a few in the East. Even in minstrel shows, the parts were usually played by whites in blackface. The only scene in which actual Negroes appear in The Birth is the one in which the Stoneman boys, visiting the southern Camerons, are taken out to the plantation to see Negroes working in the cotton fields.

When this scene was filmed in Death Valley, where the Negroes worked, they danced andplayed their banjos for the visiting actors. But one young Negro woman did play in the film—Madame Sul-Te-Wan. (We never did discover the origin of her name.) She was first employed to help us keep our dressing rooms clean at the studio. She was devoted to Mr. Griffith, and he in turn loved her. Later, when Madame was having financial difficulties, he sent her money to help herself and her small sons. She was one of the few friends near him when he died years later in Hollywood.… For President Lincoln, Mr. Griffith chose Joseph Henabery, a tall, thin man who could be made up to resemble Lincoln. The search for an appropriate Mary Todd Lincoln ended when he found a woman with an uncanny similarity to the First Lady working in wardrobe. Raoul Walsh was picked for the role of John Wilkes Booth. Members of Mr. Lincoln’s Cabinet were chosen on the basis of facial resemblance to the historical characters. The other historical characters were recreated by Donald Crisp as General Grant, Howard Gaye as General Lee, and Sam de Grasse as Senator Sumner.…

Although fact and legend were familiar to him, he did meticulous research for The Birth. The first half of The Birth, about the war itself, reflects his own point of view. I know that he also relied greatly on Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War, Matthew Brady’s Civil War Photographs: Confederate and Union Veterans— Eyewitnesses on Location; the Nicolay and Hay Abraham Lincoln: A History; and The Soldier in Our Civil War: A Pictorial History of the Conflict 1861–1865. For the second half, about Reconstruction, he consulted Thomas Dixon, and A History of the American People by Woodrow Wilson. President Wilson had taught history before going into politics, and Mr. Griffith had great respect for his erudition. For Klan material, he drew on a book called Ku Klux Klan—Its Origin, Growth and Disbandment by John C. Lester and D.L. Wilson. But he did not use the uniform that is worn by Klan members today. Instead he used the costumes that, according to Thomas Dixon, were worn by the earlier Klans—white and scarlet flowing robes with hood and mask to hide the features of rider and horse. Brady’s photographs were constantly consulted, and Mr. Griffith restaged many moments of history with complete fidelity to them. The photographs were used as guides for such scenes as Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, and Sherman’s march to the sea. He telegraphed a newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, for photographs of the interior of the state capital, which held a majority of Negro representatives after the war, and constructed the legislative chamber according to the photographs.

The largest interior was Ford’s Theater, the setting of the assassination scene, which was done in one day on the lot. So great was Mr. Griffith’s obsession with authenticity that he unearthed a copy of Our American Cousin, which had been performed at Ford’s Theater on the night of the assassination, and restaged parts of it. In the actual filming, as Raoul Walsh, gun ready, steals into the Presidential box, the lines being spoken on the replica of the stage are precisely those spoken at the fateful moment on the night of April 14, 1865. This fidelity to facts was an innovation in films. Mr. Griffith knew the terrain of the battle fields, and he hired several Civil War veterans to scout locations similar to the original ones. After exploring the southern California country, they chose what later became the Universal lot for the countryside around Petersburg, Virginia, site of the last prolonged siege and final battle of the war. He had studied maps of the major battles of the Civil War and, with the help of the veterans, laid out the battle fields. Trenches, breastworks, roads, brooks, and buildings were constructed to duplicate those of the actual battle fields. Troop movements were planned with the advice of the veterans and two men from West Point Military Academy. Civil War artillery was obtained from West Point and the Smithsonian Institution, for use when the camera was close. Mr. Griffith also sent to the Smithsonian for historical records and then went over the documents with his advisers. But in the end he came to his own conclusions about historical facts. He would never take the opinion of only one man as final.

Source: From The Movies, Mr. Griffith, and Me by Lillian Gish with Ann Pinchot. Copyright © 1969 by Lillian Gish and Ann Pinchot. Copyright renewed © 1997 by James Frasher and Ann Pinchot. Reprinted by arrangement with James Frasher, Susan Pinchot, and the Barbara Hogenson Agency.

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Colorful, lively, and moving memoir of a giant of the early screen, actress Lillian Gish. Her story is inseparable with the history of the movies, from the early days, when the pioneers of the industry worked long hours through hardship and cold, public criticism through the horrors of war, and the proverty of the Depression. She knew them all: Mary Pickford, Greta Garbo, Rudolh Valentino, Noel Coward, Erich Von Stroheim, and many more. She talks about the director of many of her films, D.W. Griffith (David Wark Griffith), whose consuming passion creating new ways to tell stories on celluloid. A long-time member of his company, she separates the man from the legend. She exposes the very personal, human side of this early Hollywood legend, warts and all.

True to her own philosophy, Lillian Gish in this book tells the story of her own era and of the personalities who built the movie industry to its present greatness. With candour and wisdom, humour and pathos, Miss Gish relates her own experiences and fascinating memories of the growth and development of motion pictures. This is the story of a great industry, from birth to maturity. It is also the story of the people who struggled, dreamed, and strove unceasingly to make the film industry the giant that it is today.

The subtlety and passionate conviction of her work with Griffith revolutionized the art of screen acting. In 1920, she became one of the first women to direct a feature film, REMODELING HER HUSBAND. Soon after that, she assumed artistic control of the films in which she appeared; her contract with MGM in the late silent era gave her a power few other women have achieved in Hollywood. With such productions as LA BOHÈME, THE SCARLET LETTER and THE WIND, she brought the silent film to the summit of its art.

Peter Warrack: Lillian Gish signing her book, The Movies, Mr. Griffith and Me

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The Movies, Mr. Griffith and Me – 1969 The Movies, Mr. Griffith and Me By Lillian Gish & Ann Pinchot (Englewood Cliffs, NJ Prentice-Hall, 1969)

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Soma

Soma (Sanskrit: सोम) connotes the Moon as well as a deity in post-Vedic Hindu mythology. In Puranic mythology, Soma is the moon deity, but sometimes also used to refer to Vishnu, Shiva (as Somanatha), Yama and Kubera. In some Indian texts, Soma is a name of an Apsara, alternatively it is the name of any medicinal concoction, or rice-water gruel, or heaven and sky, as well as the name of certain places of pilgrimage.

Soma is synonymous with Chandra, Indu (bright drop), Atrisuta (son of Atri), Sachin (marked by hare), Taradhipa (lord of stars) and Nishakara (the night maker).

Soma (Sanskrit: soma) or haoma (Avestan) was a Vedic ritual drink of importance among the early Indians. It is mentioned in the Rigveda, particularly in the Soma Mandala. In the Avestan literature, haoma has the entire Yasht 20 and Yasna 9–11 dedicated to it.

It is described as being prepared by extracting the juice from a plant, the identity of which is now unknown and debated among scholars. In both Hinduism and Zoroastrianism, the name of the drink and the plant are the same.

In the Vedas, the same word (soma) is used for the drink, the plant, and its deity. Drinking soma produces immortality (Amrita, Rigveda 8.48.3). Indra and Agni are portrayed as consuming soma in copious quantities. The consumption of soma by human beings is well attested in Vedic ritual.

The Rigveda (8.48.3) says:

ápāma sómam amŕtā abhūmâganma jyótir ávidāma devân

kíṃ nūnám asmân kṛṇavad árātiḥ kím u dhūrtír amṛta mártyasya

Ralph T.H. Griffith translates this as:

We have drunk soma and become immortal; we have attained the light, the Gods discovered. Now what may foeman's malice do to harm us? What, O Immortal, mortal man's deception?

The references to immortality and light are characteristics of an entheogenic experience. Also, consider Rigveda (8.79.2-6) regarding the power of Soma: "...He covers the naked and heals all who are sick. The blind man sees; the lame man steps forth....Let those who seek find what they seek: let them receive the treasure....Let him find what was lost before; let him push forward the man of truth...." Such is indicative of an experience with an entheogen of some source.

The identity of the ancient plant known as Soma is one of the greatest unsolved mysteries in the field of religious history. Common in the religious lore of both ancient India and Persia, the sacred Soma plant was considered a God. When Soma was pressed and made into a drink, the ancient worshipper who imbibed it gained the powerful attributes of this God. 

In a spirit similar to that of the Catholic Eucharists, Soma was prepared in a sacred ritual, and then bestowed upon the pious to give them spiritual inspiration, wisdom, courage, health, and other benefits.

In the 1921 Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, the effects of consuming Soma are described as follows:

“In such a state, the devotee becomes as powerful as an independent monarch, and is able to withstand many dangers coming from ill-disposed persons. Heaven, health, long life, power to contend against evils, victory against enemies, and fore-warnings against coming dangers from thieves, murderers, and plunderers are the six gifts bestowed by Haoma when adequately praised and prepared. Haoma is specially sought for by young maidens in search of good husbands, by married women desirous of being mothers, and by students striving after knowledge.”

Over the millennia, the original identity of Soma/Haoma has been lost. Although modern descendants of these ancient cults still perform the rituals of their ancestors, placebo sacraments are now used in place of the long lost Soma.

The plant which was the original source of Soma is a mystery that has been debated by scholars and theologians for centuries.

The mountain top location for the ancient Soma has been identified as the Hindu-Kush Mountains, an area also renowned for the quality ganja it has produced for millennia.

Also, the beautiful fragrance of Soma is referred to a number of times, hardly something that would be applicable to a mushroom.

References to the blissful state Soma produced and the quantity and extent to which it was used also limits the number of potential candidates. Some botanical suggestions produce effects which could be considered far from blissful. In many cases, if ingested in the quantities in which Soma was consumed, suggested candidates would be toxic. Safety at high dosages and blissful states are both attributes of cannabis.

Taking all this into account, it is not surprising to find that many researchers have disputed the theory that amanita muscaria is Soma, and instead suggest cannabis as the prime candidate.

Soma and bhang

Cannabis was originally rejected outright by western historians researching the identity of Soma. It was not until 1921 and the publication of Braja Lal Mukherjee’s article “The Soma Plant” in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society that “bhang” was put forth as a serious candidate.

Mukherjee based his assertion on references in the Satapatha Brahmana that mention a plant, “usana,” from which Soma is made. The “u” in “usana” was a prefix carry over from the Kiratas, with whom Soma originated. When the “u” is dropped you return to one of the original Sanskrit names for cannabis: “sana.”

As well, Mukherjee notes the use of terms similar to Soma in cannabis names in the languages of the Tibetans (somarasta) and the Tanguts (dschoma). Mukherjee also noted the long Hindu history regarding the sanctity of bhang, and its use in the worship of Shiva and his counterpart, Durga.

Finally, like other researchers, Mukherjee noted the obvious parallels between ancient descriptions of the preparation of the Soma and the traditional preparation of bhang.

Also in favor of the theory that Soma was originally cannabis are ancient writings which indicate that the stalks of the Soma were woven together and worn around the neck as an amulet for protection. This is similar to the modern wearing of hempen jewelry amongst the counter-culture.

Soma is also described as having the multi-faceted fibrous and healing properties we now recognize in cannabis. “The restless Soma - you try to grab him but he breaks away and overpowers everything,” reads one Vedic passage. “He is a sage and seer inspired by poetry. He covers the naked and heals all who are sick. The blind man sees; the lame man steps forth.”

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Those who formulated the statute relating to the marriage of dowager-queens were clear about the problems such marriages posed. These included the implications that might flow from a new husband whose social status was inferior to that of his wife. Its terms, therefore, expressed fears for the disparagement of the Queen, whose honour (as well as that of the Crown itself) needed to be safeguarded. Secondly, although it was provided that he who married a dowager queen without the King's permission should suffer forfeiture of his lands and other possessions during his lifetime, this relatively mild punishment reflected an awareness that there might be children of an illicit marriage who would in some sense be members of the royal family and merit treatment as such—as, indeed, Jasper and Edmund Tudor, the sons of Katherine and Owen, were accorded by Henry VI later on. Certainly, there was no question of regarding such a union as treasonable or rendering it null and void. Behind the statute's provisions lay a further apprehension that a new husband might endeavour to play a part in English politics. Consequently, it was declared that permission to marry should be given by the King only when he had reached years of discretion (esteantz dez anz de discretion). If duly observed, this clause would effectively delay Queen Katherine's remarriage for some years yet, for in 1427 Henry VI was barely six years old; and for the time being, there would be no step-father available to influence the impressionable boy-king. This provision was presumably the principal reason for Katherine's marrying Owen in secrecy and the justification for the Welshman's arrest after the Queen's demise in 1437.

Ralph A. Griffiths, “Queen Katherine of Valois and a Missing Statue of the Realm”, King and Country: England and Wales in the Fifteenth Century (The Hambleton Press 1991)

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Historians have failed to discover the date of Owen's and Katherine's marriage, and for this they can hardly be blamed, for it was evidently contracted in secret and did not become common knowledge until after the Queen's death in 1437. It is generally assumed that they married about 1428-29, and the fact that they had four children—three sons and a daughter—would certainly indicate a date prior to 1433. If the queen was ill for some considerable time before she died, an even earlier date is likely.

Ralph A. Griffiths, “Queen Katherine of Valois and a Missing Statue of the Realm”, King and Country: England and Wales in the Fifteenth Century (The Hambleton Press 1991)

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Edward IV's most urgent need in 1461 was not for experiment which might antagonise his aristocratic allies but for a strong regime that would re-establish order and loyalty in a traditional setting. This was provided by William Herbert, the son of Sir William ap Thomas, 'the Blue Knight of Gwent', and Gwladys Ddu, daughter of the famous Welsh commander, Dafydd Gam, who was killed in Henry V's service at Agincourt. With such an upbringing, it is hardly surprising that Herbert came to inspire devotion from Welsh propagandists, while around him were grouped both family and friends who were enlisted in Edward IV's service as a core of loyal officers. In nine months between May 1461 and February 1462 Herbert gathered into his and his relatives' hands the southern counties of the principality and practically all the southern marcher lordships apart from Glamorgan, Abergavenny and the earldom of March. By 1468 there were few areas in Wales as a whole (Glamorgan is again the principal exception) of which he was not either lord, custodian or principal official. One Welsh poet fittingly described him as 'King Edward's master-lock'.

— Ralph A. Griffiths, "Wales and the Marches in the 15th century" | King and Country: England and Wales in the Fifteenth Century

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The reason for the statute's later disappearance from view and its omission from the Chancery's statute roll is uncertain. It may be that as soon as Katherine's marriage to Owen became known to the Council (and such an event, still less her pregnancies, could hardly be kept secret), the need for the statute evaporated. This had, perhaps, happened by the time that Parliament met on May 12, 1432, when (or soon afterwards) Owen publicly and formally received letters of denizenship to protect him from the consequences of Henry IV's legislation against Welshmen. If the statute roll and the parliament roll relating to the assembly of 1427-28 were compiled some little time after the Parliament itself had ended, then its exclusion may be explained in this way. Alternatively, when the king came to play an active part in government in 1436-37, it might be expected that he would resent the presence on the statute or parliament roll of an act that was implicitly directed at his mother. Suggestions that it was removed even later from the statute roll, whose numbering was thereupon altered—perhaps by the Tudors, who would be equally sensitive about their forebear's marriage—have been dismissed after careful scrutiny of the statute roll itself; no such alterations have been detected. Nevertheless, the statute was publicised at the time and circulated in the realm, including at Leicester, where it was evidently regarded as sufficiently relevant to the municipality for it to be included in about 1430-31 in its collection of statutes. (Leicester's inhabitants, of course, were less likely to be acquainted with Katherine's remarriage and probably shared the ignorance displayed by the chroniclers of the day.) Whatever the reason for the fate of this statute, it is one of the very few cases—probably the only one at present known to historians —of a fifteenth-century statute that does not appear on the official statute roll.

Ralph A. Griffiths, “Queen Katherine of Valois and a Missing Statue of the Realm”, King and Country: England and Wales in the Fifteenth Century (The Hambleton Press 1991)

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Chronicles that were written after her trial and a ballad, "The Lament of the Duchess of Gloucester," have elements of the truth about her case, but their portrayal of this social and perhaps political rebel tells us about the mores of the period. The true story of Eleanor and her trial is not easy to establish. No trial transcript remains, and the chronicle accounts are biased and appeared long after the trial. There are few references to her in the Patent Rolls, Close Rolls, and the Privy Council. Eleanor seems to have been a convenient target in the struggle between Duke Humphrey and Cardinal Beaufort for control over Henry VI. Humphrey was a popular figure, but his power was not as great as that of the Cardinal. Eleanor, along with members of his household, was accused of necromancy, witchcraft, sorcery, and treason. Eleanor's high-handed manner and obvious enjoyment of her elevated status brought condemnation from Londoners.

Barbara A. Hanawalt, “Portraits of Outlaws, Felons, and Rebels in Late Medieval England”, British Outlaws of Literature and History (McFarland 2011)

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Mystery also surrounds Owen Tudor's marriage, but there is no question as to its validity or the legitimacy of his offspring. Richard III's proclamations described Tudor as a bastard; his marriage, however, was not disputed.

Ralph Griffiths, "Tudor, Owen [Owain ap Maredudd ap Tudur] (c. 1400–1461)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004, updated 2008)

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Indeed, there are indications that [Eleanor Cobham's] degradation was contrived by the Court, and members of the Household were given exclusive charge of her as she was chivvied from castle to castle in the following years. Eventually, she was placed in the custody of Sir Thomas Stanley on the Isle of Man, of which Stanley was lord. In March 1449 it was decided to transfer her to Beaumaris, where the king's carver, Sir William Beauchamp, was constable of the castle under the overall authority of Stanley and the duke of Suffolk as joint-justiciars of north Wales. The reason for what proved to be the final move in the sorry saga of Eleanor's progress from prison to prison in north-west England is not obviously apparent. It may be that the Household's grip which had closed on north Wales and Cheshire made Beaumaris a more secure place than Man, for although Stanley was lord of the Isle, he is not known ever to have visited it. By contrast, he and his servants would find Beaumaris rather more accessible and easier to police, while at the same time Eleanor would remain reasonably beyond the resources of those who (as in 1447) were thought to be plotting her release. Equally, the Isle of Man was more exposed to naval attacks by the Scots, the Irish and even by the French. Shortly before 1450, hostile Scots, Bretons and others had even landed on the island of Anglesey itself and caused serious damage, and in 1448-49 the Scots were said to be committing depredations there daily. But it is likely that the Isle of Man suffered such attacks even more severely. As it was, Anglesey and Beaumaris castle were urgently reinforced in 1449 against both foreign invaders and Welsh dissidents. These reinforcements (of eight soldiers, and then twelve and one priest) were needed that much more speedily once it was decided to transfer Eleanor Cobham to the island. On 10 March 1449 at Man castle, she was handed over by John Glegge, Sir Thomas Stanley's representative and janitor of Flint castle (where Stanley was constable), to William Bulkeley, the Cheshire esquire who was serjeant-at-arms in north Wales and lived at Beaumaris. Bulkeley was acting on behalf of Sir William Beauchamp, the constable of Beaumaris castle, whence she was taken forthwith with a great company.

Ralph A. Griffiths, "Richard of York and the Royal Household in Wales, 1449-1450", King and Country: England and Wales in the Fifteenth Century (The Hambleton Press 1991)

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By 1435, the dynastic prospects of the house of Lancaster had deteriorated alarmingly: Bedford was dead and had left no legitimate heirs; Henry VI at the age of fourteen was unmarried and childless; and even Gloucester, by then aged forty-four, had little chance of fathering the legitimate heir that had hitherto eluded him and his two wives—something which contemporaries realized when, from 1440 onwards, steps were taken to formally dispose of his property in the event of his death. The personality and political attitudes of Duke Humphrey and his second wife, Eleanor Cobham, intensified contemporaries' concern for the succession even while he lived. It was apparent after 1435 that should anything happen to Henry VI, Gloucester would succeed to the throne and Eleanor would become queen (for no previous English king had not made his wife queen). But beyond the Gloucesters there was no further Lancastrian heir in existence and no likelihood of one in the direct line until Henry VI married. Then, too, Duke Humphrey had acquired a long list of enemies over the past twenty years. For these reasons, the possibility of his succeeding King Henry probably played a part in the scandal that enveloped his wife in 1441. Her trial highlighted the fragile dynastic hold which the Lancastrians had on the English (let alone the French) throne, even aside from whether Gloucester himself was personally acceptable or not in some influential quarters.

Ralph A. Griffiths, The Reign of King Henry VI: The Exercise of Royal Authority, 1422-1461 (Fonthill, 3rd edition, 2020).

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After Catherine died, Gloucester summoned Tudor before the council under a safe conduct; he sought sanctuary at Westminster. He maintained his innocence of any charge and was released, but on his way to Wales was arrested. His goods, worth £137 10s. 4d., were seized and he was consigned to Newgate prison, whence he escaped in January or early February 1438. After his recapture by John, Lord Beaumont (d. 1460), he returned to Newgate, and was then transferred to Windsor Castle (14 July) in the charge, soon afterwards, of Edmund Beaufort. Released in July 1439 on a £2000 recognizance, he was pardoned all offences on 12 November. Thereafter he was a member of the king's household; his two sons were in the care (1437–42) of the earl of Suffolk's sister, Katherine de la Pole, abbess of Barking, at the king's expense.

Ralph Griffiths, "Tudor, Owen [Owain ap Maredudd ap Tudur] (c. 1400–1461)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004, updated 2008)

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In most years between 1440 and 1447 Duke Humphrey spent time in south Wales, where he was not only lord of Pembroke and other lordships in the region but also (since February 1440) justiciar of the royal counties of Carmarthen and Cardigan; he had a contingent interest in stabilising Gower and in controlling the local tenantry involved in Margaret Malefaunt’s abduction, including the Mansel family and the Turbervilles, who had connived in Lewys Leyshon’s plans. This is the likely context of a mutilated and fragmentary receiver’s account of expenses incurred in Swansea in the autumn of 1440. This account relates to arrangements made for a visit to Swansea castle by the lord and lady of Gower and the duke of Gloucester in September and October 1440. Norfolk was accompanied by Sir Henry Inglose and other of his councillors, including John Andrew, his steward. Repairs by local craftsmen were made to doors, windows and rooms in the castle and to the castle stables; furniture was constructed and stores of food acquired from the lord’s tenants and coal for heating; clothing was bought for his henxmen and household servants and for the lady and her servants; new equipment and parchment were bought for the exchequer and chancery chamber in the castle, while purchases of pewter plates were ordered from Bristol. In short, measures were taken to refurbish and strengthen Swansea castle as a military and administrative headquarters and as a temporary residence not only for the duke and duchess of Norfolk but also for the king’s uncle on his way to or from his Pembrokeshire lordships and Carmarthen and Cardigan, where he held meetings of the great sessions in each year between 1440 and 1444.

Ralph A. Griffiths, "Lordship and the Social Elite in the Lordship of Gower during the Wars of the Roses", The Fifteenth Century XVIII (The Boydell Press 2020)

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Eleanor died at Beaumaris on 7 July 1452 and was buried there perhaps in the early-fourteenth-century parish church of St. Mary and St. Nicholas) at great cost to Sir William Beauchamp.* She was certainly alive and in residence in the castle when the duke of York sailed into the harbour, not a stone's throw away, in September 1450. It is hardly surprising that Henry VI and his Household servants should feel great anxiety for the former duchess's safe keeping at a time when disturbing rumours of Duke Richard's intentions were reaching the ears of the king. * Beauchamp received 100 marks to defray the burial costs.

Ralph A. Griffiths, "Richard of York and the Royal Household in Wales, 1449-1450", King and Country: England and Wales in the Fifteenth Century (The Hambleton Press 1991)