Hello and welcome to the Renaissance English History podcast.

I'm your host, Heather Tesco.

Last time we met, I talked about Margaret Beaufort, a woman who worked tirelessly to bring her son Henry Tudor to power as Henry the 7th.

Today I'm going to talk about another formidable mother, Elizabeth Woodville, who had just as important of a role in the Wars of the Roses,

and, though she was a symbol for the Yorkists, ultimately worked with Margaret Beaufort to bring

about the compromise that made the reign of the Tudors possible. Elizabeth Woodville was born

around 1437, and at the time of her birth, no one had any idea the turmoil that England would go

through in later years. She was born into middle nobility.

Her own parents' marriage had caused quite a stir when her mother, Jaketta of Luxembourg,

who had been married to the Duke of Bedford, married a mere night when the Duke died,

without waiting for a marriage to be arranged for her, which was quite the scandal. But eventually,

all is forgiven, and Jeketa and her husband, Richard, were welcomed back at court after a period of

exile, and Henry VI promoted Richard into the nobility. Elizabeth was their oldest child, and she was 15 when she was married off to

John Gray from another noble family. His family was firmly Lancasterian, and in fact he had

fought with Elizabeth's father during one of the early rebellions against Henry VI. We don't

know much about her early life until she

married King Edward because she wouldn't have been part of the historical record yet, but we can

guess some things about her that she was taught to read and do some needlepoint and manage an estate

and enjoy the comforts of being brought up in a noble family. She lived a fairly

uneventful life with her first husband, having two sons, and then he died in the second

Battle of St. Albans, again fighting for the Lancasterian side, which left Elizabeth a young

widow. She was entitled to lands and rents from her husband's family now that he had died,

...