Today in 1580 Katherine Willoughby died. We talked about her yesterday with her sons and the sweating sickness, but something else you may not have known about her is that she was the daughter of Maria de Salinas, one of Catherine of Aragon’s most loyal ladies in waiting, who came with her from Spain. Maria de Salinas married an Englishman, William Willoughby, and when he died, their daughter Katherine became the ward of Charles Brandon. They had two sons, who died of the sweat, of course.
After Brandon died, she did something many women dreamt of. After the death of her sons, both students at Cambridge, within half an hour of each other, she tried to rebuild a new life. She married for love, to her gentleman usher and master of the horse, Richard Bertie. Both Katherine and her husband were staunch reformers, and Katherine herself was a part of the group of reforming women surrounding Katherine Parr when she was Henry VIII’s wife. Willoughby actually helped fund Katherine Parr’s book Lamentations of a Sinner. Katherine Willoughby had been a Marian exile during the reign of Mary I as she was such a staunch reformer, and she successfully avoided persecution for her beliefs by fleeing to the Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth.
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 links:
Episode 132: Tony Riches on Katherine Willoughby
Spring 2019 Tudor Summit: Tony Riches on Charles Brandon, Mary Tudor, and Katherine Willoughby
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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.