Jasper Tudor - 1st Duke of Bedford

The Good Duke

Jasper Tudor, Earl of Pembroke and Duke of Bedford, was a Welsh Nobleman and the uncle of King Henry VII. He protected Henry Tudor through years of exile and helped place him on the throne.

Jasper Tudor was born around 1431 in Hatfield, Hertfordshire. He was the younger son of Owen Tudor and Catherine of Valois, the widow of Henry V, and the half-brother of King Henry VI. After their mother died in 1437 and their father was imprisoned, Jasper and his brother Edmund Tudor were raised by Katherine de la Pole, and later in the care of priests. Henry VI ennobled both brothers, making Jasper the Earl of Pembroke in 1452.

Jasper was a loyal supporter of the Lancastrians during the Wars of the Roses. In the mid-1450s, he held Carmarthen and Aberystwyth Castles in Wales for the Lancastrian cause, although opponents such as William Herbert later took them from him. When Edmund died in 1456, Jasper took his 13-year-old pregnant sister-in-law, Margaret Beaufort, into his household at Pembroke Castle. On January 28th, 1457, she gave birth there to Henry Tudor, and Jasper became the boy's protector.

The Lancastrians lost badly in 1461. Jasper fought at the Battle of Mortimer's Cross in February, where the Yorkists defeated him, and he fled. The Yorkist William Herbert took Pembroke Castle and was given Jasper's earldom and the wardship of young Henry, who was taken to Raglan Castle. In 1468, Jasper returned from exile in France with Welsh support and laid siege to Denbigh Castle, the great fortress built by Edward I in North Wales, where he had been appointed constable for life around 1460. He captured it from the Yorkists, but he failed to relieve Harlech Castle, which fell in August.

When Henry VI briefly regained his throne in 1470, Jasper returned to Wales, found Henry Tudor, and brought the boy to the king in London. The restoration collapsed the following year. After the Lancastrian defeat at the Battle of Tewkesbury and the death of Henry VI, Jasper and the 14-year-old Henry escaped from Tenby in Wales and sailed to Brittany, where Duke Francis II sheltered them for the next fourteen years.

In August 1485, Jasper sailed with Henry from France and landed at Milford Haven, near Pembroke. He fought beside his nephew at the Battle of Bosworth on August 22nd, where Richard III was killed and Henry became King Henry VII.

Henry rewarded his uncle generously. Jasper regained the earldom of Pembroke and was created Duke of Bedford in October 1485. He was also given lordship of Caerphilly Castle and, in 1486, Sudeley Castle. Henry also granted him the Lordship of Glamorgan and Cardiff Castle, which Jasper took possession of around 1488. He also married Katherine Woodville, the sister of Dowager Queen Elizabeth Woodville and aunt of Henry's queen, Elizabeth of York. They had no children, although he had at least one illegitimate daughter, Helen.

Jasper helped defeat the pretender Lambert Simnel at the Battle of Stoke in 1487. He died on December 21st, 1495, and was buried at Keynsham Abbey in Somerset.