Everything about William De La Pole 1st Duke Of Suffolk totally explained
William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk, 1st Marquess of Suffolk, 4th Earl of Suffolk (
16 October 1396 at
Cotton, Suffolk, –
2 May,
1450), was an important English soldier and commander in the
Hundred Years' War, and later
Lord Chamberlain of England. He also appears prominently in
William Shakespeare's
Henry VI, part 1 and
Henry VI, part 2. His murder is the subject of the traditional English folk ballad
Six Dukes Went a-Fishing (
Roud # 78).
William was the second son of
Michael de la Pole, 2nd Earl of Suffolk and Katharine de Stafford, daughter of
Hugh, 2nd Earl of Stafford, K.G.
Almost continually engaged in the wars in
France, he was seriously wounded during the siege of
Harfleur (
1415), where his father was killed. Later that year his older brother
Michael de la Pole, 3rd Earl of Suffolk was killed at the
Battle of Agincourt, and William succeeded as 4th Earl. He became co-commander of the English forces at the siege of
Orléans (
1429), after the death of
Thomas Montacute, 4th Earl of Salisbury. When that city was relieved by
Joan of Arc in 1429, he managed a retreat to
Jargeau where he was forced to surrender on 12 June. He remained a prisoner of
Charles VII of France for three years, and was ransomed in
1431.
After his return to the
Kingdom of England, he became a courtier and close ally of
Henry Cardinal Beaufort. His most notable accomplishment in this period was negotiating the marriage of
King Henry VI with
Margaret of Anjou (
1444). This earned him elevation to
Marquess of Suffolk that year but a secret clause was put in the agreement which gave Normandy back to France which was partly to cause his downfall. His own marriage took place on 11 November
1430, (date of licence), to (as her third husband) Alice (1404 - 1475), daughter of
Thomas Chaucer of
Ewelme,
Kidlington,
Oxfordshire, and granddaughter of the notable poet
Geoffrey Chaucer and his wife
Philippa (de) Roet. In 1434 the Earl became Constable of
Wallingford Castle.
With the deaths in
1447 of
Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester and Cardinal Beaufort, Suffolk became the principal
power behind the throne of the weak and compliant Henry VI. In short order he was appointed Chamberlain, Admiral of England, and to several other important offices. He was created Earl of Pembroke in 1447 and
Duke of Suffolk in
1448.
The following three years saw the near-complete loss of the English possessions in northern
France, and Suffolk couldn't avoid taking the blame for these failures, partly because of the loss of Normandy through his marriage negotiations regarding Henry VI. On
28 January,
1450 he was arrested and imprisoned in the
Tower of London. He was banished for five years, but on his journey to France his ship was intercepted, and he was executed. It was suspected that his archenemy the
Duke of York was responsible for his beheading on the gunwales of a boat and his body was thrown overboard. He was later found on the seashore near Dover and the body was brought to a Church in Suffolk, possibly
Wingfield, for burial, seemingly at the wishes of his wife Alice.
His only known legitimate son, John, became
2nd Duke of Suffolk in
1463.
William de la Pole was also father, by a nun, Malyne de Cay, to Jane, an illegitimate daughter. "The nighte before that he was yolden (yielded himself up in surrender to the Franco-Scottish forces of
Joan of Arc on
12 June 1429) he laye in bed with a
Nonne whom he toke oute of holy profession and defouled, whose name was Malyne de Cay, by whom he gate a daughter, nowe married to Stonard of Oxonfordshire". (Historic MSS Commission, 3rd Report, pps.279-280).
Jane de la Pole (d. 28 February
1494) was married before 1450 to Thomas Stonor (1423 - 1474), of
Stonor,
Oxfordshire. Their son Sir
William Stonor, K.B., was married to Anne Neville, daughter of
John Neville, 1st Marquess of Montagu.
The body of Sir William de la Pole, K.G., 1st Duke of Suffolk, was returned to the Collegiate Church at
Wingfield, Suffolk, where it was buried beneath a purfled arch.
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