Henry Holland, 3rd Duke of Exeter

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Henry Holland
Born(1430-06-27)27 June 1430
Anne of York
ChildrenAnne Holland
Parents (father)
  • Anne Stafford (mother)
  • France

    Henry Holland, 3rd Duke of Exeter, 3rd Earl of Huntington (27 June 1430 – September 1475) was a Lancastrian leader during the English Wars of the Roses. He was the only son of John Holland, 2nd Duke of Exeter, and his first wife, Anne Stafford. His maternal grandparents were Edmund Stafford, 5th Earl of Stafford, and Anne of Gloucester.

    Career

    He inherited the

    Earl of Huntington when his father died in 1447. However, he was cruel, savagely temperamental and unpredictable, and so had little support. P.M. Kendall describes him as "dangerous", and was seen as "cruel and fierce" by contemporary Italian observers.[1]

    Constable of the Tower

    Exeter was for a time

    Constable of the Tower of London, and afterwards the rack there came to be called "the Duke of Exeter's daughter".[2]

    Wars of the Roses

    In 1447 he married

    attainted
    in 1461, and his estates were given to his wife, who separated from him in 1464. During the brief period of Henry VI's restoration he was able to regain many of his estates and posts.

    At the Battle of Barnet, Exeter commanded the Lancastrian left flank. He was badly wounded and left for dead, but survived. Afterwards he was imprisoned, and Anne divorced him in 1472. He "volunteered" to serve on Edward IV's 1475 expedition to France. On the return voyage he fell overboard and drowned, his body being found in the sea between Dover and Calais, Fabyan saying "but how he drowned, the certainty is not known".[3] However, Giovanni Panicharolla, the Milanese envoy to the Burgundian court, was told by Duke Charles that the King of England had given specific orders for the sailors to throw his former brother-in-law overboard.[4][5]

    Family

    On January 30, 1446 in the chapel of the Bishop of Ely,

    Cecily Neville.[7] She was an older sister of Edward IV and Richard III
    .

    He had one legitimate child:[7]

    Since Henry had no legitimate male issue the disposition of his estates became a complex matter for his widow, the dowager

    Duchess of Exeter
    .

    See also

    Ancestry

    References

    1. ^ Kendall, P.M. Warwick the Kingmaker. p. 305.
    2. ^ However, Stubbs says it was named after the 2nd duke, who was also constable of the Tower, in his The Constitutional History of England in Its Origin and Development, vol. 3, p. 302
    3. ^ Robert Fabyan. The new chronicles of England and France, in two parts, p. 663. [1]
    4. ^ Desmond Seward. The Wars of the Roses and the Lives of Five Men and Women in the Fifteenth Century, Constable & Robinson, 2002. p. 240.
    5. ^ Calendar of State Papers and Manuscripts in the Archives and Collections of Milan 1385-1618, p. 220 [2]
    6. ^ Pidgeon, Lynda (2023). "Anne of York and her Loyal Yorkist: Sir Thomas St Leger (ex. 1483)". The Ricardian. XXXIII: 107.
    7. ^ a b Douglas Richardson. Plantagenet Ancestry: A Study in Colonial And Medieval Families, Genealogical Publishing, 2005. pp. 299–301. Google eBook
    8. ^ Oxford, Bodleian Library MS Digby 57, fol. 2*r

    External links

    Political offices
    Preceded by
    The Duke of Suffolk
    Lord High Admiral

    1450–1461
    Succeeded by
    Peerage of England
    Preceded by Duke of Exeter
    1447–1461
    Forfeit