Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury

Thus when Henry VII succeeded to the throne, his only rivals in title were John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, the son of Richard III's sister Elizabeth, who had been declared by Richard heir to the throne.

His brother, the Earl of Suffolk, Edward Plantagenet, Earl of Warwick, the son of the Duke of Clarence, put to death by Edward IV, his sister Margaret, afterwards Countess of Salisbury, and Elizabeth, the daughter of Edward IV.

Margaret Beaufort, Henry's mother, successively Countess of Richmond and of Derby, was, as will be shown in a subsequent chapter, one of the most remarkable women in English history.

Her father was John Beaufort, the first Duke of Somerset.

This property included the islands of Guernsey, Jersey, and Sark, the city of Worcester, the town and castle of Warwick, and a vast number of manors and lordships in nineteen counties of England.

Only a moderate pension and one manor in Warwickshire was left to her who, when young, had been the greatest lady in England.

Nothing was reserved for her granddaughter Margaret, who afterwards married Sir Richard Pole and is well known as the Countess of Salisbury, executed by Henry VIII in 1541.

On September 28th, Henry made his entry into London in a close chariot, says Lord Bacon, in order to strike reverence into the people.

But on his way through the Netherlands he received orders from the Emperor to go no further without his permission.

There were many in England who wished Mary to marry Poole, for Reginald Poole's mother, the Countess of Salisbury, was a daughter of the Duke of Clarence, Edward IV's brother, and through her Poole could claim a royal descent.

During Henry VIII's reign Poole had gone into exile rather than recognize the royal supremacy.

He incurred Henry's anger by writing a most violent book against his divorce.

... being attacked in the late 1530s.

One of them is Margaret Pole, who has been, she's a countess in her own right, and she has been arrested.

She's been put in the tower, and suddenly in 1541 it's decided that she will be executed.

And, and there really is very little justification for her death.

For sure, yeah.

We have two episodes on Margaret Pole, I think.

So if y'all are interested in her, go check those out, 'cause her life was really interesting.

But yeah, her and Mary were very bonded.

Sh- so she's not a princess.

Henry at this point disbands her house.

Margaret Pole is removed from her service, so now Mary doesn't have literally any of her mother figures in her life.

Yeah.

Thus when Henry VII succeeded to the throne, his only rivals in title were John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, the son of Richard III's sister Elizabeth, who had been declared by Richard heir to the throne.

His brother, the Earl of Suffolk, Edward Plantagenet, Earl of Warwick, the son of the Duke of Clarence, put to death by Edward IV, his sister Margaret, afterwards Countess of Salisbury, and Elizabeth, the daughter of Edward IV.

Margaret Beaufort, Henry's mother, successively Countess of Richmond and of Derby, was as will be shown in a subsequent chapter one of the most remarkable women in English history.

Her father was John Beaufort, the first Duke of Somerset.

This property included the islands of Guernsey, Jersey and Sark, the city of Worcester, the town and castle of Warwick, and a vast number of manors and lordships in nineteen counties of England.

Only a moderate pension and one manor in Warwickshire was left to her, who when young had been the greatest lady in England.

Nothing was reserved for her granddaughter Margaret, who afterwards married Sir Richard Pole and is well known as the Countess of Salisbury executed by Henry VIII in 1541.

On September 28th, Henry made his entry into London in a close chariot, says Lord Bacon, in order to strike reverence into the people.

More recently, ghost tour operators incorporate her story into nightly walks, positioning her as the Tower's silent queen, an image largely derived from nineteenth century Victorian romanticism rather than contemporaneous documentation.

Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury, is another high-profile figure whose death at the Tower on 9 November 1541 remains a key narrative in ghost folklore.

She was executed for treason under Henry V's reign.

But unlike Anne Boleyn or Lady Jane Grey, contemporary chronicles record that she pleaded for mercy before being strangled within the Tower's inner precincts.

From an archeological perspective, the Tower's layered history offers tangible clues.

For instance, the discovery of bloodstains in the chapel of Saint Peter ad Vincula, dating to the 1530s, corroborates the violent execution scene of Anne Boleyn.

Similarly, the iron collar fragments found in 1869 near the south gate have been associated by historians with the brutal restraints used on Margaret Pole during her imprisonment.

These physical remnants ground the narrative in reality and illustrate that many ghost stories stem from a concrete backdrop of violence.

So today we're looking at perhaps one of the most extraordinary Yorkist survivors of the Tudor Age.

Reginald Pole, son of Margaret Pole, cousin of Henry VIII.

Henry VIII paid for Reginald's education and helped create one of Europe's most respected scholars.

But when Pole turned against the royal supremacy, Henry branded him a traitor and tried to bring him home.

Yes.

So at this point, Henry VIII is going, OK, my cousin's going to be a problem.

I'm sure he starts putting some pressure on Margaret Pole, who Margaret and one of Reginald's brothers then beg him, beg him to submit because they feared that Henry would punish the entire family, which now we know with hindsight he does.

And then not long after this, in December 1536, the Pope made him a cardinal.

[regal music] Welcome to the Proper British History Podcast.

Today, we unravel how Margaret Pole, a Plantagenet heiress, fell into Tudor politics and was executed without trial.

Margaret Pole was born on the fourteenth of August, fourteen seventy-three to George Plantagenet, the Duke of Clarence, who had been twice a kingmaker and twice condemned for treason.

Its mother, Isabel Neville, connected Margaret directly with the powerful House of York through her grandmother, Anne Beauchamp.

At nineteen, she became the eighth Countess of Salisbury suo jure, one of only two women in early modern England to sit in the House of Lords without a husband.

Other scholars emphasize her role as a devoted mother and lady-in-waiting, arguing that the severity of her punishment was driven largely by Henry's paranoia rather than any concrete plot.

Contemporary accounts describe the event with grim detail, but they are colored by royal propaganda that sought to legitimize the king's brutal measures against perceived enemies.

In eighteen eighty-six, Pope Leo XIII beatified Margaret Pole, recognizing her suffering as martyrdom in a Catholic context far removed from Henry's reign.