Margaret Woodville, Daughter of Anthony Woodville
Of Elizabeth Woodville’s five brothers who lived to adulthood,
none left legitimate children. Indeed, only one brother is known to have left an
out-of-wedlock child—and that brother was Anthony Woodville, usually thought of
as the most straitlaced member of the family. He left a daughter, named
Margaret.
Margaret’s mother has been identified as Gwenllian, daughter of William
Stradling. Nothing more is known about Gwenllian or her relationship with
Anthony, but Margaret’s name suggests that the child might have been born before
the battle of Towton, after which Anthony changed his allegiance from the
Lancastrian cause to the Yorkist one. Of course, Margaret need not have been
named after Margaret of Anjou; she might have been named for one of her mother’s
relatives, for a saint, for her godmother, or after Anthony’s sister Margaret.
Nonetheless, on New Year’s Day of 1465, John Howard, who was at Edward IV’s
Christmas court at Eltham with Anthony and his wife, gave “to my lord Scales
child 12d.” Anthony was married to Elizabeth Scales at the time, so the entry
could possibly refer to a legitimate child who died young, but it seems more
likely that the child is Margaret, since Anthony’s will makes no mention of
deceased children.
Nothing else is heard of Margaret until her marriage to Robert Poyntz of Iron
Acton in Gloucestershire. According to E. L. Barnwell, who doesn’t cite a
source, on September 12, 1479 (19 Edward IV), Anthony settled 800 marks on
Margaret, with 200 to be paid on the sealing of the deed; he also settled on her
lands worth 100 marks a year. Poyntz was probably born in the late 1440’s and
thus was probably about thirty or so. Their first son, Anthony, was born around
1480. Like her paternal grandmother Jacquetta, Margaret was fertile: she gave
Robert five sons and four daughters.
Anthony Woodville was executed by order of the future Richard III on June 25,
1483. He made his will on June 23, 1483. Lynda Pidgeon makes much of his failure
to name Margaret in his will, of which she writes, “It showed awareness of some
of the wrongs he had committed but it displayed no affection. Perhaps he simply
did not have feelings for anyone else.” This is hardly a fair judgment:
Anthony’s feelings, or lack thereof, cannot be determined by a single document,
especially one written when he was under the extreme emotional stress of his
impending execution for a crime he most likely had not committed. Much of his
will is taken up with directions to pay his debts (for which all of his goods
were to “goo to the paying”), to right any wrongs he had done, and to arrange
for the welfare of his soul and those of his deceased family members. Knowing
that his property would be seized by the crown, he might have thought it futile
to leave any bequests to his daughter; he also might have believed that as his
daughter had been married suitably, there was no need to make special mention of
her in his will. Notably, Anthony named Margaret’s husband one of his executors.
Lacking more complete records of Anthony’s, we have no way of knowing whether he
was generous to his daughter in other ways or whether he held her in his
affection. Notably, Margaret and Robert named their first son Anthony.
During Edward IV’s reign, Robert Poyntz had been made constable of Carisbroke
Castle and of St. Briavel’s (holding the latter office along with his
father-in-law) and sheriff of Hampshire. Soon after Anthony’s arrest, the future
Richard III stripped Poyntz of these offices. Later, he was replaced as steward
of Sodbury. Not surprisingly, Poyntz was among those who rebelled against
Richard III in the fall of 1483. He ended up in sanctuary at Beaulieu, where
Anthony’s younger brother Lionel, Bishop of Salisbury, had also taken shelter.
Poyntz was later pardoned, but in 1485 he fought for Henry Tudor at Bosworth
Field. Following the battle, he was knighted on the field. It was the beginning
of a long career in Tudor service for Poyntz, who was present at the Field of
Cloth of Gold in 1520, where he appeared as a member of Katharine of Aragon’s
household. King Francis gave him a gift of plate.
Margaret predeceased Robert, who died on November 5, 1520. In his will, made in
October 1520, he asked that a black gown of Margaret’s be made into vestments
for the Chapel of Jesus at the “church of the Gaunts beside Bristol,” where he
asked to be buried. The vestments were to contain Robert’s arms and those of his
wife. Barker, writing in 1892, described the chapel thusly:
The Chapel is entered by a panelled doorway, the sides of which are splayed. The fan-traceried roof is arranged in two main divisions, and in the centre of each is a boss in the form of a carved shield of arms. That to the East contains the arms of Henry VIII. and Catharine of Arragon, and that to the West, those of Sir Robert Poyntz and his wife Margaret Woodville, daughter of Anthony, Earl Rivers.
The “church of the Gaunts” is now known as St. Mark’s or the Lord Mayor’s
Chapel. Evidently Robert's and Margaret’s arms can still be seen there in the
Poyntz Chapel today. The remains of the couple’s home in
Iron Acton—mainly a
wing built by their grandson to impress the visiting Henry VIII and Anne
Boleyn—are open to tourists (leave your high heels at home). On the premises is
a sundial designed for Robert in 1520 by Nicholas Kratzer.
Sources:
William Robert Barker, St. Mark’s, or the
Mayor’s Chapel, Bristol (Formerly Called the Church of the Gaunts)
(available on Google Books).
E. L. Barnwell, “Notes on the Perrot Family.”
Archaeologia Cambrensis (January 1865), p. 32 (available on Google
Books).
Anne Crawford, ed., Howard Household Books.
Gloucestershire: Alan Sutton, 1992.
Frederick Arthur Crisp, Abstracts of Somerset
Wills, 1890 (available on Google Books).
Louise Gill, Richard III and Buckingham’s
Rebellion. Gloucestershire: Sutton, 2000 (paperback edition).
Alasdair Hawkyard, ‘Poyntz, Sir Robert (b. late 1440s, d. 1520)’, Oxford
Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004; online edn,
Jan 2008 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/70796, accessed 20 July 2009]
Rosemary Horrox, Richard III: A Study in
Service. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991 (paperback edition).
John Maclean, ed., The Visitation of the
County of Gloucester, Taken in the Year 1623 (available on Google Books).
Luke MacMahon, ‘Poyntz, Sir Anthony (c.1480–1532/3)’, Oxford Dictionary of
National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004; online edn, May 2006
[http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/22689, accessed 20 July 2009]
Lynda Pidgeon, “Antony Wydevile, Lord Scales and Earl Rivers: Family, Friends
and Affinity. Part 2,” The Ricardian,
2006.
Copyright © 2009 Susan Higginbotham