A RED ROSE FOR CHELSEA

After he became King, Richard III leased the Manor of Chelsea to the Dowager Duchess of Norfolk for a red rose given each Midsummer. The Dowager Duchess was Elizabeth Talbot, the sister of Eleanor Talbot, Edward IV‘s secret wife. Elizabeth (and Eleanor) were also full 1st cousins to Richard’s wife, Anne Neville. Elizabeth, who had not been treated particularly well by Edward with his ‘land grab’ with some of her dower lands and the whole Mowbray inheritance going to his younger son, Richard of Shrewsbury, should young Richard’s wife, Elizabeth’s only child, Anne Mowbray, die even if the marriage was never consummated. Which of course is exactly what happened to poor little Anne, who was only eight when she died.

Why was Richard generous to Elizabeth? She also attended his Coronation, so obviously she was not appalled or insulted that her deceased sister’s name was brought up as Edward’s possible secret bride. She had been close to her sister Eleanor and continued to patronise Corpus Christi College in Cambridge, endowing the college with scholarships in her sister’s name. Did she perhaps give evidence of her sister’s secret marriage? All of what proofs were given has been lost but what we do know is, some proofs must have been given. Unlike fanciful traditionalist accounts, no one is going to just hand over a crown in the blink of an eye on someone’s say-so. Rumours about Edward’s marriage to Elizabeth Woodville being somehow ‘irregular’ had been about long before 1483.

As it happened, Elizabeth Talbot didn’t hold Chelsea for very long. After Richard was killed at Bosworth and Henry Tudor became King, she was persuaded by Margaret Beaufort to give up Chelsea to her famous (or infamous) henchman, Sir Reginald Bray. Today the old manor house is long gone but the church near it still remains. Inside are are tombs to Bray’s brother John and to his heir, his nephew Edmund. Reginald Bray himself is buried at St George’s Chapel, Windsor.

A year or two after giving up Chelsea, Elizabeth retired to the convent of the Minoresses, where she had a friend, Anne Montgomerie, and where a number of ‘Yorkist’ ladies now lived. She died and was buried there in 1506/07, and her grave is now lost.

Below:stained glass of Elizabeth Talbot

and the Ruins of the Abbey of the Minoresses of St Clare, London