3rd November 1456
Edmund and his brother Jasper had arrived at the court of their half-brother Henry VI in 1446, four years earlier, following the death of their mother, Catherine of Valois, the two boys had been placed under the care of Abbess of Barking Katherine de la Pole, the abbey was paid an allowance of £52 12s for their care. It was Katherine who introduced and encouraged the relationship with Henry VI, this was more to do with lack of money for her to continue their support, rather than noticing that they were a couple of likely candidates for the ‘Wales Got Talent’ contest. Henry accepted them into his court, it may have been for dynastic reasons or personal reasons, no one really knows, although it must have been of some comfort to a quiet and retiring king to have brothers on whom he thought he could rely.
The boy's father Owain ap Marededd ap Tudur’s origins are somewhat vague, he is said to have arrived at the court of Henry V in 1415, but at some point, he was under the command of the Welsh warrior Dafydd Gam, the maternal grandfather of the Vaughan's of Tretower and a staunch opponent of Owain Glyndwr. Tudor’s affair with Catherine of Valois had been conducted away from court and resulted in a number of other children. The twenty or so years that covered their adolescence under the control of the aforementioned Katherine de la Pole appear to have been unremarkable and prior to them being formally recognised as Henry VI’s legitimate uterine brothers in 1452, and their ennoblement as Earls of Richmond and Pembroke, their ‘Welshness’ can be called into question, Edmund, it seems, had no connection with the Welsh until after his marriage to the teenage Margaret Beaufort in 1452, and neither did Jasper until he moved into Pembroke Castle and took up Lancaster's cause.
The boy's father Owain ap Marededd ap Tudur’s origins are somewhat vague, he is said to have arrived at the court of Henry V in 1415, but at some point, he was under the command of the Welsh warrior Dafydd Gam, the maternal grandfather of the Vaughan's of Tretower and a staunch opponent of Owain Glyndwr. Tudor’s affair with Catherine of Valois had been conducted away from court and resulted in a number of other children. The twenty or so years that covered their adolescence under the control of the aforementioned Katherine de la Pole appear to have been unremarkable and prior to them being formally recognised as Henry VI’s legitimate uterine brothers in 1452, and their ennoblement as Earls of Richmond and Pembroke, their ‘Welshness’ can be called into question, Edmund, it seems, had no connection with the Welsh until after his marriage to the teenage Margaret Beaufort in 1452, and neither did Jasper until he moved into Pembroke Castle and took up Lancaster's cause.
In 1455 as mentioned he had married the twelve years old Margaret Beaufort and wasted little time getting her pregnant, the poor child gave birth to the future Henry VII a year later. However, Tudor was not destined to see his only child, he was dead of the plague by the end of this day in 1456.
Tudor's tomb at the Cathedral Church of St Davids, Wales Image Credit: A Bit about Britain
Tudor was buried at Greyfriars in Carmarthen where his tomb lay undisturbed until the Reformation when it was removed to the choir of St David's Cathedral, where it can still be found today.
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