#OTD in Tudor history – 26 November

On this day in Tudor history, 26th November, Henry VIII's 14-year-old illegitimate son, Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond and Somerset, married Lady Mary Howard, daughter of the Duke of Norfolk (1533); and the first men to be executed under the new treason laws against Jesuits in Elizabeth I's reign were hanged at York (1585)...

• 1533 - Henry Fitzroy, the Duke of Richmond and Somerset, married Lady Mary Howard at Hampton Court Palace. Fitzroy was the illegitimate son of Henry VIII by his mistress Elizabeth (Bessie Blount) and Mary was the daughter of Thomas Howard, the 3rd Duke of Norfolk, and the cousin of Anne Boleyn. See video below or you can click here to read more about Fitzroy and here to view a Claire Chats video on him. You can also click here to read about his wife, Mary Howard.
• 1542 (26th or 27th November) – Death of Robert Radcliffe, 1st Earl of Sussex, courtier, soldier and Lord Great Chamberlain of England. He was buried at St Laurence Pountney Church in London, but then moved to Boreham in Essex. Radcliffe was made Lord Great Chamberlain of England for life on 3rd May 1540 for his loyal service to Henry VIII.
• 1546 – Baptism of Sir Giles Fletcher the Elder, diplomat, member of Parliament and author, in Watford, Hertfordshire. Fletcher was the son of Richard Fletcher, Church of England clergyman, and his wife, Joan. Fletcher is known for his poetical work, “Licia” (1593), but his other works included the Latin pastorals Poemata varii argumenti, the poem De literis antiquae Britanniae and the account of his travels as diplomat, “Of the Russe Common Wealth. Or, Maner of gouernement of the Russe emperour, (commonly called the Emperour of Moskouia) with the manners, and fashions of the people of that countrey”. He was the father of the poet Sir Giles Fletcher the Younger.
• 1585 – Executions of Hugh Taylor, Catholic priest, and his friend Marmaduke Bowes at York. They were both hanged, and were the first men executed under the 1585 statute which made it treason to be a Jesuit or seminary priest in England, or to harbour such a priest. Both men were beatified in 1987. See video below.
• 1612 – Death of Sir Thomas Walmsley, Judge and Justice of the Common Pleas, at his home at Dunkenhalgh in Lancashire. He was buried at Blackburn.