Tudor, Mary, Duchess of Suffolk (1496 -1533)

Mary Tudor was the fifth daughter of King Henry VII, and younger sister of Henry VIII of England. In December 1507 Mary was betrothed to Charles of Castile, later Holy Roman Emperor, but the wedding did not take place. Instead, Cardinal Wolsey negotiated a peace treaty with France, and on 9 October 1514, at the age of 18, Mary married its 52-year-old King Louis XII, thus becoming Queen Consort of France. Following Louis’ death, which had occurred less than two months after her coronation, she became the third wife of Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk. The wedding was carried out in secret, without the king’s permission. This amounted to treason and the Privy Council urged that Brandon should be imprisoned or executed. Instead they were heavily fined. Relations between Henry VIII and Mary were strained in the late 1520s when she opposed the King's attempt to obtain an annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, whom Mary had known for many years. She had developed a strong dislike for the future Queen, Anne Boleyn, whom she had first encountered in France. Mary’s marriage, to Charles Brandon, which took place on 13 May 1515 at Greenwich Palace, produced four children. Through her eldest daughter, Frances, Mary was the maternal grandmother of Lady Jane Grey, who became the de facto monarch of England for a little over a week in July 1553.