Today in 1511 William Courtenay, 1st Earl of Devon, died at Greenwich. He died of pleurisy and was buried at Blackfriars, London, with the honours due to him an earl, even though he hadn’t been officially invested as an earl.
William Courtenay was Henry VIII’s uncle, having married Katherine, daughter of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville. William was a supporter of King Henry VII (1485–1509), the first of the Tudors, who made him a Knight Bachelor on 25 November 1487, at the coronation of Queen Elizabeth. He was a Captain in the royal army and assisted his father in the defeat of the pretender Perkin Warbeck at the siege of Exeter in 1497, which secured finally the Tudor succession.
However, William fell out of favour. King Henry VII discovered that he had joined in the conspiracy to crown Edmund de la Pole, 3rd Duke of Suffolk (d.1513), the last Yorkist claimant. For his complicity, he was attainted and imprisoned in the Tower of London in February 1504, and so made incapable of inheritance.
Released from prison by Henry VIII (1509–1547), Courtenay was pardoned and restored to his rights and privileges, as a sword-bearer at the coronation on 24 June 1509. It is a matter of debate as to whether he lived long enough to have been formally restored in his honours. Certain sources however maintain that he assumed the full titles and lands of the earldom on 10 May 1511, after jousting in a tournament with the king and his cousin Sir Thomas Knyvett and Sir William Nevill.
That’s your Tudor Minute for today. Remember you can dive deeper into life in 16th century England through the Renaissance English History Podcast at englandcast.com.
Suggested link:
Episode 124: Perkin Warbeck
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Heather Teysko is the creator, writer, and producer of The Renaissance English History Podcast, one of the longest running indie history podcasts, going since 2009. She's been writing about history online for over 25 years, since her first site on Colonial American history became number one in history on Yahoo in 1998. She writes books, created the original Tudor Planner (a yearly diary filled with Tudor history) and in 2019 created the world's first Tudorcon (you can "attend" online this year!). She has been passionate about Tudor England since she first read Alison Weir's The Six Wives of Henry VIII 20 years ago, and subsequently moved to London after college to spend her time immersed in Tudor history.