Richard Pole’s death came while Margaret Pole was confined for childbirth, leaving his wife to face bereavement, the management of their household, and the future of their children at once. The physician attributed the death to a fever but could not identify it more precisely. Richard’s death also ended the income and royal service on which the family had relied, making the loss both personal and financial.

Illness during Margaret’s confinement

Richard was ill at Stourton while Margaret was confined in her chamber. In a note, he said that he had a fever, was resting in bed, and had ordered the children not to visit him. He also tried to reassure her. For Margaret, however, his illness arrived at a difficult moment: she was unable to leave her chamber, and his absence from the estate threatened the oversight of its seasonal business.

The timing mattered because Michaelmas was a key point in the management of their lands. Margaret expected the steward to check rents and collect apprenticeship fees from young people beginning work that quarter. The household’s stored hay also had to be rationed through winter, and she feared that without either her or Richard supervising the accounts, debts might be forgiven or rents allowed to remain unpaid. She trusted the steward’s honesty, but still worried that the estate would be managed less carefully in their absence. Her frustration at being confined alongside a sick husband reveals the practical responsibilities that accompanied her position as lady of Stourton.

Two nights after the first note, Richard reported that he was much worse and that a doctor had been summoned, while saying that the children remained well. His illness was unusual: he had served the Tudors on campaigns across kingdoms and a principality, riding in varied conditions. Margaret wrote to ask how ill he was and what the doctor had said, but no reply came. She sent her lady-in-waiting, Jane Mallett, to ask Richard’s groom of the bedchamber for news. Mallett’s shocked expression prepared Margaret for a grave answer before she spoke.

Death and uncertain cause

Mallett told Margaret that Richard had died during the night. Margaret was still in confinement, pregnant and unable to meet the news outside her chamber. A priest offered consolation from beyond the door, while the physician explained that a fever had overcome Richard’s strength. He was forty-six and had been powerful and active, but the doctor could not give Margaret a definite name for the illness. Instead, he listed several diseases it was not, including the Sweat, pox, measles, ague, and St. Anthony’s fire. The exclusions did not resolve the cause; Richard’s death remained a fever of uncertain origin.

Margaret’s own physical confinement shaped what she could do next. Unable to take charge in person, she gave instructions through the door and ordered the steward to arrange the funeral. Richard was to be laid in his coffin on the chancel steps of the church at Stourton, with a proper watch kept over him. The bell was to be tolled, tenants given money, and mourners supplied with black cloth. She insisted on a burial that preserved his dignity while keeping the expense as low as possible. The care of these arrangements shows her moving immediately from private grief to the responsibilities of managing a household and commemorating its head.

Widowhood and the family’s future

Margaret wrote to Henry VII and his mother, Margaret Beaufort, describing Richard as their honorable servant, dead in their service. She did not spell out that his death left her nearly penniless, with four children of royal blood and another child yet to be born. She believed the royal family understood the obligation created by her kinship and Richard’s service: she expected an immediate grant of money, followed by land that could support her and the children. His death had removed the fees he had earned through work in Wales and other posts, so continued provision was essential to maintaining the family’s livelihood and dignity.

She also had to tell the children. Margaret left the task of explaining their father’s death to Ursula and Reginald to the governess, but summoned her two eldest sons, Henry and Arthur, herself. Henry was twelve and Arthur ten. She told them that their father was dead and that, from then on, they would have to help one another. That appeal to mutual support gives the bereavement a lasting consequence: Richard’s death altered the children’s place in the family as well as Margaret’s, making their solidarity part of the household’s response to his absence.

Significance

The event turns on the collision between a sudden private loss and responsibilities that cannot be suspended. Margaret is unable to leave confinement, yet she must direct funeral arrangements, address the king and his mother, consider the household’s lost income, and prepare her children for life without their father. Richard’s death is therefore presented not only as the end of a marriage, but as a change in the family’s material and emotional circumstances. His service to the Tudors gives Margaret grounds to seek support, while her own rank and obligations require her to preserve the household even as she mourns.