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- http://www.tudorwomen.com
HONOR GRENVILLE (c. 1494-April 1566)
Honor Grenville was the daughter of Sir Thomas Grenville of Stow (d.1514) and Isabella Gilbert (d.c.1502). In 1515 she married Sir John Bassett of Umberleigh (1462-January 31, 1528) and had John (1518-1541), George (c.1525-1580), James (1527-1558), Philippa (c.1516-1582), Catherine (c.1517-1558+), Anne (c.1521-before June 7, 1557), and Mary (c.1522-May 1598). After his death she married Arthur Plantagenet, viscount Lisle (c.1464-1542), an illegitimate son of Edward IV. He was a widower with three daughters, Frances, Elizabeth, and Bridget. The eldest, Frances, married Honor’s son John in 1538. In 1532, Honor Lisle was one of the “six beautiful ladies” who accompanied Anne Boleyn to Calais to meet King Francis I and in June 1533 the entire family settled there when Lisle was appointed Lord Deputy. The correspondence between Calais and England, much of it Lady Lisle’s, has been preserved and edited in six volumes by M. St. Clare Byrne as The Lisle Letters. In 1540, Lisle was arrested and charged with treason. Honor and her daughters Philippa and Mary were held under house arrest, in part because Mary had been hiding a secret betrothal to a Frenchman, something for which she needed the king’s permission. Lisle’s complicity in the schemes of his chaplain, Gregory Botolph, could not be proven and in March 1542, he was told he would be set free. Unfortunately, the shock of this news was too much for him and he died that same night. Honor returned to England and lived in obscurity in the West Country until her death. Some accounts had her running mad with grief, but in 1547, she is recorded as selling property at Frithelstoke, an indication that she was managing her own affairs. She was buried in Illogan Church on April 30, 1566. Biographies: M. St. Clare Byrne’s The Lisle Letters; A. L. Rowse’s “Honor Grenville, Lady Lisle, and her Circle,” in Court and Country: Studies in Tudor Social History. Portrait: Monumental brass of Sir John Bassett and his two wives, Church of St. Mary, Atherington, Devonshire.
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Bassett Family Association Database
- 1566