Tomb brass of Eleanor Cobham (nee Culpepper) in Lingfield, Surrey, England, United Kingdom
Eleanor Culpepper was married to Reginald Cobham, 3rd Baron Cobham of Sterborough, probably around 1400. Their children included Eleanor Cobham, who later married Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester. Eleanor died 5 November 1420.
The inscription around her tomb reads:
here lies Lady Eleanora | once wife of Reginald Cobham, daughter of Thomas Culpepper | who died the fifth day of November | in the year 1420, whose soul may god save.
The father of Eleanor Cobham was Reginald (or Reynold) Cobham, 3rd Baron Cobham of Sterborough, who died in 1446 and buried at Lingfield in Sussex, where his tomb monument - shared with his second wife, Anne Bardolf - is located.
In Death, Art, and Memory in Medieval England: The Cobham Family and Their Monuments, 1300-1500, Nigel Saul makes this comment on Reginald:
Could he have been the Reginald Cobham who, at the end of Richard Il's reign, was accused of bigamy? In a petition to Bishop Stafford, the chancellor, one Margaret Grimsby of 'Straesburgh' in Germany complained that Reginald Cobham had married her, affirming that he was 'Lord Cobham's son' and heir to a great inheritance, but later abandoned her saying that he was already married—though not before making off with her goods (PRO, C1/3/49). Which member of the Cobham clan was this? The Christian name and the reference to Lord Cobham's son' are suggestive of Reginald III, of Sterborough. But it is not clear whether or not Reginald III was married by this time or how, indeed, he could have come into contact with the obscure Margaret Grimsby! The Christian name 'Reginald' is also found in the Randall and Chafford branches of the family at this time. Unfortunately, no light is shed on the case by other sources
I've collected some records relating to the case:
From the Select Cases in the Chancery, A.D. 1364 to 1371, ed. William Pailey Baildon (Selden Society, 1896):
63. A tres reuerent Piere en Dieu et tres noble seignur, l'Euesque d'Excestre, Chuunceller d'Engleterre
Supplie tres humblement Margarete Grymmesby de Straesburgh en Duchelond qe come Reignold Cobham, esquier, le xiiij iour d'Octobre darrein passe, prist a femme la dite Margarete affirmaunt q'il n'auoit autre femme ; lui quel Reignold soi auaunta q'il estoit le fitz de Seignur de Cobeham et coment il auoit tres graund enheritaunce en Engleterre, et issint par ses fraudes paroles il auoit la dite Margarete et ses biens al value de ce liures ouesque lui hors du dite ville de Straesburgh tanque al ville de Tilleburi en le Countee d'Essex, et illoesqes demurreit ouesque la dite Margarete tanque al xx inur de Nouembre darrein passe, a quel iour le dit Reignold toutz les ditz biens du dite Margarete al value de ce liures illoesqes troues prist et ouesque lui apporta, disaunt q'il auoit autre femme allostielle:* Plese a vostre tres noble seignurie graunter comission a vn sergeaunt d'armes pur prendre et amesner le corps de dit Reignold deuaunt vous a respoundre a iceste cas, en oeuere de charite.
* Al hostiel.
63. To the most reverend Father in God and most noble Lord, the Bishop of Exeter, Chancellor of England
Beseecheth most humbly Margaret Grimsby, of Strasburg in Germany, that whereas Reginald Cobham, esquire, on October 14th last past took to wife the said Margaret, affirming that he had no other wife; which Reginald boasted himself to be the son of the Lord of Cobham and how he had very great inheritance in England,* and so by his fraudulent words he got the said Margaret and her goods to the value of £200 with him out of the said town of Strasburg unto the town of Tilbury in the County of Essex, and there he dwelt with the said Margaret until the 20th day of November last past, on which day the said Reginald took all the said goods of the said Margaret there found to the value of £200, and carried them away with him, saying that he had another wife at home : May it please your most noble Lordship to grant a commission to a Serjeant at arms to take and bring the body of the said Reginald before you to answer in this case ; In way of charity.**
* Lord Cobham of Sterborough at this period had a son Reginald.
** No reason appears why the plaintiff should apply to the Clmiicellor, unless the fact that the plaintiff is an alien supplies one.
From Calendar of Patent Rolls, Vol. VI: Richard II: A.D. 1396-1399 (1909):
1397. Nov. 26. Westminster.
Commission to John Brook, escheator in Surrey and Sussex, Robert Saperton, the king's serjeant-at-arms, Ralph Amotsam, Thomas Grene and John Merlawe to arrest and bring before the king and council Reginald Cobeham, esquire, and also to arrest and safely keep until further order all the goods and chattels of the said Reginald and those of Margaret Grymesby of Strauseburgh, removed by him.
Reginald was a common name in the Cobham family and as Saul says, it's not clear which Reginald Cobham deceived Margaret Grimsby into marrying him. It seems unlikely the the perpetrator gave "Reginald Cobham" as a false name to Margaret Grimbsy, since the orders for his arrest refer to him by that name. However, it seems possible that the story he told Margaret - the claim he was the son of the "Lord of Cobham" and had a "very great inheritance" - was false, designed to deceive and entice Margaret into marrying him. The fact he stole Margaret's goods might suggest that he had little wealth of his own and that his claim of a great inheritance was a lie. However, it is likely that his claim to be already married was true since presumably Margaret would have had recourse to the ecclesiastical courts should it be untrue.
On the face of it, it seems Reginald Cobham, 3rd Baron Cobham of Sterborough is the obvious fit. His father died in 1403 which means in the final years of Richard II's reign, Reginald was "the son of the Lord of the Cobham" and would expect to inherit his father's titles and lands, as the Reginald Cobham in the Grimsby case claimed. Reginald likely did hold the rank of esquire in 1397 (he was not knighted until 1426) and Sterborough was near the eastern border of Surrey so if he was the Reginald in the Grimsby case, the escheator in Surrey and Sussex would have likely been the appropriate person to arrest him.
Though, as I said above, the Reginald in the Grimbsy case may have lied about being the son and heir of Lord Cobham in which case these similarities may mean nothing. For all we know, this Reginald may have even posed as the future third Baron Cobham of Sterborough to deliberately deceive Margaret. We know little about the Grimsby case and little about Reginald, 3rd Baron Cobham of Sterborough's life.
A case in point in his marriage to his first wife, Eleanor Culpepper. It isn't known when they married or when their children were born or in what order. Their daughter, Eleanor Cobham, is given a birthdate of c. 1400 in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Assuming Eleanor was the eldest child and born shortly after her parents' wedding, this would suggest they were married in the late 1390s or early 1400s. However, this is relies on a lot of supposition and it's possible that Eleanor was not the eldest, that her parents had married some time before children were born from it. There is more I could say about Reginald's children and their dates of birth but this isn't the space for it.
In relation to the Grimsby case, it is possible Reginald was married before the case was being heard but since we lack a more specific date for Reginald's marriage as well as information about when Margaret married Reginald Cobham, it's impossible to know whether this tells anything about who the Reginald at the centre of the case really was.
The final point Saul raises is how exactly Reginald Cobham (whoever he was) came in contact with Margaret Grimsby. As far as I've found, there's no evidence the third Baron Cobham of Sterborough left England prior to the Agincourt campaign (1415) and as the records relating to the Grimsby case make clear, Margaret had met and married Reginald in Strasbourg and then moved to England with him. It has to be said that there is little information about the 3rd Baron Cobham of Sterborough's life, particularly before his father's death, and it's possible that he may have gone overseas as a young man in the 1390s for whatever reason.
In short, it's impossible to know whether Reginald, 3rd Baron Cobham of Sterborough was the same Reginald Cobham in the Grimsby case. The information we have about both him and the case is so limited that it's impossible to match up all the details perfectly. As the son and heir of the second Baron Cobham of Sterborough, he seems the best match for "the son of the Lord of Cobham" who had a "very great inheritance in England". But this requires us to take the claims of the Reginald in the Grimsby case at face value and we know he deliberately deceived Margaret on his life. It is not impossible that he similarly lied about his identity. It may also be that where petition to the chancellor spoke of Reginald's "fraudulent words", it meant not only his claim to be unmarried but also his claims to his identity.
I haven't found out what became of Margaret Grimsby. The entry in the Calendar of Patent Rolls suggests that action was being taken on her behalf. I didn't find any further reference to her - perhaps her goods were restored and she returned to Strasbourg?
In his discussion of the tomb monuments of the Cobham family, Nigel Saul talks about how the last generation of the Cobhams of Sterborough had to be content with their status as country gentry but their tomb monuments were splendid and hearkening back to the time where the family fortunes were on the rise in the reign of Edward III rather than reflecting the family's current circumstances.
Saul points to the enormous, "grandiose" joint monument of Reginald Cobham, 3rd Baron Cobham of Sterborough and Anne Bardolf and the tomb brass of Reginald's first wife, Eleanor Culpepper, which unusually features a banner alluding to the 1st Baron Cobham of Sterborough's rank as a knight banneret, as evidence for the family's attempt to clinging to the appearance of their former status. Reginald and Anne's effigy, Saul says, "more appropriate to someone of comital or baronial rank than a country knight".
But - Reginald wasn't "just" a country knight. His daughter, Eleanor, was married to Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, making him father-in-law to one of the foremost men in England. What if these monuments are not gestures of a frantic groping back to the past glories but an attempt to emphasise the nobility of the family in view of Eleanor Cobham marrying "son, brother and uncle of kings", Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester? Saul also points to Reginald's founding of a college in Lingfield Church as part of his move to affirm his family's status. This occurred in 1431, the year when Eleanor seems to have gained significant public recognition as the Duchess of Gloucester.
On the other hand, Eleanor Culpepper died in November 1420 so, unless her brass wasn't commissioned for several years, it's unlikely the unusual design had much to do with her daughter's marriage to the Duke of Gloucester. Reginald's 1445 will left instructions for his monument and it seems likely it was built after his death in 1446, several years since Eleanor Cobham's downfall and her divorce from Gloucester. Regardless, it may have been an attempt to the assert the status he had held during her marriage - and there may have been hope that Eleanor's marriage to Gloucester would be restored.
Tomb of Reginald Cobham, 3rd Baron Cobham of Sterborough and his second wife, Anne Bardolf, in Lingfield, Surrey, England.
Reginald Cobham married first Eleanor Culpepper, who it is generally accepted bore him four children: Reginald (who appears to have predeceased his father), Thomas, Eleanor (who married Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester) and Elizabeth. Following Eleanor Culpepper's death, he married Anne, the daughter of Sir Thomas Bardolf and Amice Cromwell and widow of Sir William Clifford. They appear to have had no children. Reginald died 21 August 1446; Anne died 6 November 1453.
When the war with France resumed and both Suffolk and John Cornwall readied armies for another invasion in May of 1436, custody of Charles [Duke of Orléans] became the responsibility of Reynald Cobham of Sterborough Castle, Lingfield, Surrey, fourteen years his senior and the father-in-law of Humphrey, duke of Gloucester. Gloucester, as I have mentioned, seems to have disliked Charles and may, in any event, have been too busy to look after the duke of Orléans himself. The move to Surrey brought Charles closer to London (Cobham escorted him there in the spring of 1437 and 1438) and it also provided him with the opportunity to meet with his brother, kept at Speldhurst, Kent, by a soldier too old to return to France, Richard Waller.
Reynold Cobham (1381–1446) was himself no soldier at all and had never been called to Parliament. He may have been a person of some refinement, as the founding of Lingfield College in 1431 by himself and his second wife, Anne Clifford, would suggest. The couple donated a substantial library to Lingfield College and Cobham’s celebrated daughter, Eleanor, Gloucester’s wife, possessed a copy of the Ancrene Riwle which she perhaps acquired after she, like the mother of Charles of Orléans, was accused of witchcraft and began her own turn in prison. One of Reynold Cobham’s tenants was Stephen Scrope, the translator of Christine de Pisan’s The Epistle of Othea, a French version of Cicero’s De senectute, Guillaume de Tigonville’s Dit moraulx des philosophes, and The boke of noblesse. Though Charles was no longer in England when Scrope began these translations in the 1440s, both and he brother were familiar with these works and had copies of several of them in their possession while they were in Surrey and Kent.
William Askins, "The Brothers Orléans and their Keepers", Charles d’Orléans In England (1415–1440) (D. S. Brewer 2000)
Some notes: Reynold (or Reginald) Cobham was a soldier: he had fought at Agincourt and campaigned in France in the retinue of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester. It is generally assumed that it was his service with Gloucester that resulted in Eleanor securing a position in Jacqueline of Hainault's household. He may have also served in Gloucester's ill-fated Hainault campaign.
Eleanor acquired her copy of the Ancrene Riwle prior to her imprisonment; the ex libris records she was given it by Joan Holland (nee Stafford), Countess of Kent at Pleasance (later Greenwich Palace). This must have occurred prior to her downfall, as she never returned to Pleasance throughout the scandal.
The Will of Reginald Cobham, 3rd Baron Cobham of Sterborough
Reginald Cobham, August 12, 1445, 24th Henry VI [1]. My body to be buried in the Collegiate Church of Lingfield, before the high altar. I will that a tomb of alabaster be placed there for my monument; and that XI.l. be allowed for the expences of my funeral, for my trental, and alms to poor people at that solemnity. To Anne, my wife [2], all my household goods in my Castle at Sterborough, at the time of my decease; and I will that during her life she shall have the use of all the furniture of my Chapel in that Castle; and after her death the said furniture to remain to the Master of the Collegiate Church of St. Peter at Lingefeld, by me lately founded, to the priests therein, and their successors for ever. And I constitute Sir Thomas Cobham, Knight, my son, one of my executors.
[1] August 12th, 1445, is the 23d of Henry VI.
[2] His second wife; she was the daughter and coheir of Thomas Lord Bardolf, and widow of Sir William Clifford, Knight.
Source: Testamenta Vetusta, vol. 1, ed. Nicholas Harris Nicolas (1826)
(Testamenta Vetusta often heavily abridges the wills and so this is probably not Reginald's complete will but an abridged version of the original document.)
BY THE KINGE.
Right dere and welbeloved, we grete you well. And late you wytt that we have understand by the repute of our welbeloved servant Stevyn, Knight of our Chamber, whom we late sende unto you with oure lettres, how ye have not fully executed our desyre conteyned in the same lettres ; wherof we marvaill gretly, consideryng our said wrytyng, and that we have often writen unto you, in semblable caas, fore this tyme. For which cause, and that ye shulde closely understande, that our said writyng was of our singler desyre; we write eftsones unto you, desyryng and hertely prayynge you that, withoute firther delay, ye put our said desyre in effectuell execution; latyng you witte that, for the hasty expedicion therof, the brynger of thies shall delyver unto you letters of protection, in suche cas accustumed to be made and, in thaccomplisseing of this our entent, ye shall deserve of us right good thank, and have us the rather enclined to shew unto yow the favor of or good grace, in tyme to come. Yeven, etc.
To the Lady Strange.
Source: Letters of Queen Margaret of Anjou and Bishop Beckington and Others. Written In The Reigns of Henry V. and Henry VI. From a MS. found at Emral in Flintshire. ed. Cecil Monro, Esq. (The Camden Society, 1863)
Monro prefaces this letter with:
I conceive that the lady, to whom this letter was addressed, may have been Elizabeth, relict [widow] of Richard Baron le Strange or Strange of Knockyn or Cnokyn, in Shropshire. Baron le Strange married, as his second wife, Elizabeth daughter of Reginald Lord Cobham of Sterborough, and died 9th August, 1449 (27 Hen. VI.), leaving his widow and an infant son. Supposing this to have been the lady, I have no means of ascertaining the circumstances under which the letter was written .
What Monro doesn't say, however, that this Elizabeth, Lady Strange and daughter of Reginald Cobham of Sterborough, was the sister of Eleanor Cobham, Duchess of Gloucester. While Monro seems to place the letter in the context of Elizabeth's widowhood, I wonder if it's possible there was some connection between this letter and Eleanor's downfall. None of the preceding correspondence Henry mentions in his letter appear to have survived so we don't know what Elizabeth had done to earn his displeasure. Regardless, I can't imagine it was comfortable for her to receive this letter.
