John Neville, 3rd Baron Latimer

John Neville, 3rd Baron Latimer (17 November 1493 – 2 March 1543) was an English peer. His third wife was Catherine Parr, later Queen consort of King Henry VIII.

Family

John Neville, born 17 November 1493, was the eldest son of Richard Neville, 2nd Baron Latimer, by Anne Stafford, daughter of Sir Humphrey Stafford of Grafton, Worcestershire, and Katherine Fray (12 May 1482), the daughter of Sir John Fray, Chief Baron of the Exchequer, by Agnes Danvers (d. June 1478), the daughter of Sir John Danvers (died c. 1448). He had five brothers and six sisters:

• William Neville (15 July 1497 – c.1545), author of The Castell of Pleasure, who married, before 1 April 1529, Elizabeth Greville, the daughter of Sir Giles Greville, by whom he had a son, Richard Neville of Penwyn and Wyke Sapie, Worcestershire, and two daughters, Mary and Susan. After the death without male issue of John Neville, 4th Baron Latimer, William's son, Richard Neville (d. 27 May 1590), wrongfully assumed the title of Baron Latimer.
• Sir Thomas Neville of Piggotts Hall in Ardleigh, Essex, who married Mary Teye, the daughter and coheir of Sir Thomas Teye, by whom he had a son, Thomas.
• Marmaduke Neville of Marks Tey, who married Elizabeth Teye, the daughter and coheir of Sir Thomas Teye, by whom he had a son, Christopher, who died young, and a daughter, Alianore, who married Thomas Teye, esquire, of Layer de la Haye, Essex.
• George Neville, Archdeacon of Carlisle, (born 29 July 1509, buried 6 September 1567 at Well, North Yorkshire).
• Christopher Neville.
• Margaret Neville (born 9 March 1495), who married, by papal dispensation dated 22 November 1505, Edward Willoughby (d. November 1517) of Alcester, Warwickshire, son of Robert Willoughby, 2nd Baron Willoughby de Broke (d. 10 or 11 November 1521), by his first wife, Elizabeth Beauchamp, by whom she had three daughters, Elizabeth (buried 15 November 1562), who married Sir Fulke Greville (d. 10 November 1559), Anne (d. 1528) and Blanche (d. before 1543), who married Francis Dawtrey. Elizabeth Willoughby and Sir Fulke Greville (d. 10 November 1559) were the grandparents of the courtier and author, Fulke Greville, 1st Baron Brooke.
• Dorothy Neville (1496–1532), who married Sir John Dawney, High Sheriff of Yorkshire, 1543.
• Elizabeth Neville (born 28 April 1500), who married, before 1531, Sir Christopher Danby (c.1505 – 14 June 1571), of Farnley, North Yorkshire, only son of Sir Christopher Danby (d. 17 March 1518) and Margaret Scrope, daughter of Thomas Scrope, 5th Baron Scrope of Masham (d.1475). They had six sons, Sir Thomas Danby, Christopher Danby, John Danby, James Danby, Marmaduke Danby and William Danby, and eight daughters, Dorothy, who married Sir John Neville; Mary; Joan, who married Roger Meynell, esquire; Margaret, who married Christopher Hopton, esquire; Anne, who married Sir Walter Calverley; Elizabeth, who married Thomas Wentworth, esquire; Magdalen, who married Marmaduke Wyvill; and Margery, who married Christopher Mallory, esquire. Anne Danby and Sir Walter Calverley were the grandparents of Walter Calverley (d.1605), whose murder of his children is dramatized in A Yorkshire Tragedy, attributed on the title page to William Shakespeare. It seems likely that Anne's brother, William Danby, was the William Danby who served as coroner at the inquest into the death of Christopher Marlowe in 1593.
• Katherine Neville.
• Susan Neville (1501 – c.1560), who married the rebel Richard Norton (d. 9 April 1585), esquire, the eldest son of John Norton (d. 1557) by Anne Radcliffe (d. before 1557).
• Joan Neville.

After the death of Anne Stafford, Neville's father, by licence dated 5 July 1502, married secondly, Margaret (d. 16 December 1521), the widow of Sir James Strangways.

Career

The Neville family was one of the oldest and most powerful in the North, with a long-standing tradition of military service and a reputation for seeking power at the cost of the loyalty to the crown.

Neville came to court as one of the King's gentlemen-pensioners. In 1513 he served in King Henry VIII's French campaign, and was knighted after the capture of Tournai. He took part about 1517 in the investigation of the case of the Holy Maid of Leominster. He was knight of the shire (MP) for Yorkshire in 1529, his fellow knight of the shire being his cousin, Sir Marmaduke Constable, the son of his mother's sister, Joyce Stafford, and Sir Marmaduke Constable.

Neville's father died before the end of 1530. Neville was appointed to the Council of the North in that year, and signed the letter petitioning Pope Clement VII to grant Henry VIII a divorce from Catherine of Aragon. He had livery of his lands on 17 March 1531. He lived chiefly at Snape Castle, Yorkshire, but sometimes at Wyke in Worcestershire.

In 1536 he was implicated in the Pilgrimage of Grace, in an ambivalent role. It was rumoured that he was captured by the rebels, and he afterwards said of the part he had played: "My being among them was a very painful and dangerous time to me". He represented the insurgents, however, in November 1536 at the conferences with the royal leaders, and helped to secure the amnesty.

He then returned home and took no part in the Bigod rising of the following year. He did have to give up his town house in the churchyard of the Charterhouse to a friend of Lord Russell. He died 2 March 1543 in London, and was buried in St. Paul's Cathedral.

Marriages and issue

Neville married firstly, by 1520, Dorothy (d. 7 February 1527), daughter of Sir George de Vere by Margaret Stafford, and sister of John de Vere, 14th Earl of Oxford, by whom he had a son and a daughter:

• John Neville, 4th Baron Latimer (1520-1577), married Lucy, daughter of Henry Somerset, 2nd Earl of Worcester by whom he left four daughters and co-heiresses, of whom Dorothy married Thomas Cecil, 1st Earl of Exeter. At his death the barony of Latimer fell into abeyance among his four daughters, and so remained until 1913, when Francis Burdett Thomas Coutts-Nevill was summoned to Parliament by writ, dated 11 February 1913. Latimer was buried next to Snape Castle in St. Michael's Church, Wells, within Nevilles' Chapel.
• Margaret Neville (1525-1546), was betrothed to Ralph Bigod. She died at age twenty-one with no children.

Neville married secondly, by licence dated 20 June 1528, Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Edward Musgrave of Hartley, Westmorland, and Edenhall, Cumberland, by whom he had no issue.

Neville married thirdly, in 1534, Catherine (1512–1548), daughter of Sir Thomas Parr of Kendal, Westmorland, and widow of Sir Edward Borough (d. 1533), son of Thomas Burgh, 1st Baron Burgh. She afterwards became the sixth wife of King Henry VIII.

Footnotes

Ancestry