Daughter of the Duke of Clarence, himself the brother Edward III, Countess Margaret was
the last survivor of the Plantagenet line and,
as such, Henry VIII saw in her person a
claim to the throne by descent which he removed by incarcerating her in the Tower of
London and having her executed.
The sad fate which befell Countess Margaret was the culmination of a series of tragedies
in the Pole family. Her grandfather, 'Warwick, the King-Maker', had fallen at the
Battle of Wakefield in that long
and bloody saga which history would later call 'The Wars of the Roses'. Her father
was murdered by his brother, then the Duke of Gloucester but later to reign as
Richard III. Her brother and son were executed on charges of high treason.
Another of Countess Maragaret's sons, Cardinal Pole, became Dean of
Wimborne aged only
seventeen. In his later years he was both Cardinal and Archbishop of Canterbury. The
strife between Church and monarch when Henry decided to take on a new wife caused the
Cardinal/Archbishop to publish an attack upon the King on the continent. The furious
Henry wrought vengeance on the family; some he had brought to trial and executed, others
he had attainted without trial and, into this latter group, fell the Countess.
Over seventy years of age, the old lady steadfastly refused to place her head on the
executioner's block in 1451 and it was hacked from her erect body. The monarch was
equally as steadfast in his rage, refusing to allow Countess Margaret's remains to be
buried in the Salisbury Chantry built for her by
Torregiano within
Christchurch Priory in Dorset (where the
manor
belonged to the Earls of Warwick) but condemned them instead to the traitor's corner
which is St Peter's Chapel within the precincts of the Tower where she died.
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Macauley wrote a passge of St Peter's Chapel, the closing lines of which remind us of the
Countess;-
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Here and there among the thick graves of unquiet and aspiring statesmen lie more delicate
sufferers; Margaret of Salisbury, the last of the proud race of Plantagenets, and those
two fair queens who perished by the lealous rage of Henry.
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