Henry Stafford was the second son of Humphrey Stafford, First Duke of Buckingham. I’ve posted about him before. The post can be found here. Henry was Margaret’s second husband (discounting John de la Pole). Their marriage began when she was fourteen and covered the period of Henry Tudor’s minority – initially in the care of Jasper Tudor and then, after Towton, Sir William Herbert.
On the 14th April 1471, Sir Henry took part in the Battle of Barnet against the Earl of Warwick’s forces. Warwick having turned his coat and reached an agreement with Henry VI’s queen Margaret of Anjou. The official record does not record how Margaret Beaufort felt about her husband taking up arms on York’s behalf. Clearly Edmund Beaufort’s visit to the couple at Woking in March did not go as planned! Nor for that matter do we fully know why Stafford chose to support the Yorkist king rather than the Lancastrian one on this particular occasion.
Sir Henry was wounded and returned to Woking (which he and Margaret had acquired through royal warrant in 1466 – it had formerly been in Beaufort hands) where he was cared for by Margaret. He died on the 4th October 1471.
He had written his will on the 13th April 1471 – a hasty realisation of what might follow. It was witnessed by the parish priest of Woking, a man named Walter Baker. He also gave 10 shillings to the church for tithes – noting that he may have forgotten to pay them or even withheld them previously. Another 20 shillings were given for building work in the church.
The bequests that the will contains are few. He left Henry Tudor new velvet trappings for four horses, Reginald Bray – his man of business- a “grizzled horse” and £160 for masses to be said for his soul. The copy of the will held by St John’s College, Cambridge includes the gift of another horse to his brother John – who Edward IV had created Earl of Wiltshire. He left everything else to his “entirely beloved wife Margaret, Countess of Richmond, she thereof to dispose her own free will for ever more.” Another, downloadable, copy of the will can be found in the National Archives at Kew.
Halsted, Caroline (1845) Life of Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond and Derby, mother of King Henry the Seventh. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=PF9iAAAAcAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false
Jones, Michael and Underwood, Malcom. (1992) The King’s Mother. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Licence, Amy. 2016 Red Roses. Stroud: The History Press