Ursula St Barbe

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Portrait said to be of Ursula St Barbe, by an unknown artist, 1583 Ursula barbe.jpg
Portrait said to be of Ursula St Barbe, by an unknown artist, 1583

Ursula St Barbe (died 18 June 1602), also known as Ursula, Lady Worsley and Ursula, Lady Walsingham, was an English lady at the court of Queen Elizabeth I of England in the late 1500s.

Contents

Biography

St Barbe was the daughter of Henry St Barbe (1504–1567), of Ashington, Somerset, by his wife, Eleanor St Barbe ( née  Lewknor, 1513–1590). [3] Her uncle Sir William St Barbe (1499–1562), was a gentleman of the Privy Chamber. [4]

St Barbe firstly married Sir Richard Worsley, who was the captain of the Isle of Wight. [5] [6] After his death, she married Sir Francis Walsingham in 1566. Walsingham was principal secretary to Queen Elizabeth I of England. [7]

The following year, St Barbe's two sons by Worsley, John and George, were killed along with others in an accidental gunpowder explosion at the Worsley estate on the Isle of Wight, Appuldurcombe. Gunpowder had been laid out to dry in the gatehouse, where the boys had lessons, when a stray spark ignited it. [8]

With Walsingham, Ursula had two daughters: Frances, who was born in about October 1567 and was married three times, and Mary, who was born in early January 1573 and died in 1580. [9]

Walsingham was appointed as ambassador to France and St Barbe and her daughter Frances moved with him to Paris. [10] During Walsingham's time as ambassador, the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre of Huguenots took place in August 1572. The Walsingham house in Paris acted as a refuge for French Protestants during the terror. [11] As soon as it was deemed safe, Ursula, who was pregnant at the time, [10] and her daughter Frances fled to England. [12] Two of her guards were beaten at the city gate as she left Paris. [10] St Barbe was reunited with her husband in April 1573. [13]

Her husband was acquainted with the mathematician and astrologer John Dee, and her daughter Frances stood godmother to Dee's daughter Madima. [14] Ursula's sister, Edith, was the wife of Robert Beale, clerk of the Privy Council, [15] [16] although the date of their marriage is unknown. [17] He wrote the official record of the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, to which he was an eyewitness. [18]

St. Barbe was widowed in 1590. [7] [10] At his death he was in debt and was buried privately with no heralds at his funeral. [19]

After the execution of her daughter Frances' second husband Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex on 25 February 1601, Frances lived with St. Barbe until she died. [20] Lady Walsingham died at her home in Barn Elms on 18 June 1602, and was buried the following night in Old St Paul's Cathedral, London. [10] [21]

Following her mothers death, Frances married for a third time to Richard Burke, 4th Earl of Clanricarde. [22]

Issue

With Sir Richard Worsley:

With Sir Francis Walsingham:

References

  1. ↑ Unknown woman, formerly known as Ursula, Lady Walsingham, National Portrait Gallery, London, accessed 28 April 2012
  2. ↑ Strong, Roy; Britain), National Portrait Gallery (Great (1969). Tudor & Jacobean Portraits. H.M. Stationery Office. p. 322. ISBN   978-0-11-290056-6.
  3. ↑ Burke's Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry, Vol. 2 1847. H. Colburn. p. 1173
  4. ↑ Haynes, Alan (1 October 2007). Walsingham: Elizabethan Spymaster and Statesman. The History Press. ISBN   978-0-7524-9622-1.
  5. ↑ Hutchinson, Robert (2007) Elizabeth's Spy Master: Francis Walsingham and the Secret War that Saved England. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. ISBN   978-0-297-84613-0, p. 297.
  6. ↑ Brisland, Martin (15 April 2025). A-Z of Romsey: Places-People-History. Amberley Publishing Limited. ISBN   978-1-3981-2053-2.
  7. 1 2 Adams, Simon; Bryson, Alan; Leimon, Mitchell (21 May 2009) [23 September 2004]. "Walsingham, Sir Francis (c. 1532–1590), principal secretary" . Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/28624 . Retrieved 18 April 2025.(Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  8. 1 2 3 Hutchinson, p. 31
  9. 1 2 Hutchinson, p 33
  10. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Levin, Carole; Bertolet, Anna Riehl; Carney, Jo Eldridge (3 November 2016). "Ursula St. Barbe Worsley Walsingham (died 1602)". A Biographical Encyclopedia of Early Modern Englishwomen: Exemplary Lives and Memorable Acts, 1500-1650. Taylor & Francis. p. 187. ISBN   978-1-315-44071-2.
  11. ↑ Hutchinson, pp. 49–50
  12. ↑ Hutchinson, p. 51
  13. ↑ Hutchinson, p. 53
  14. ↑ Diary of John Dee. North Atlantic Books. 2003. p. 61.
  15. ↑ Mears, Natalie (8 December 2005). Queenship and Political Discourse in the Elizabethan Realms. Cambridge University Press. p. 63. ISBN   978-0-521-81922-0.
  16. ↑ Hutchinson, p. 32
  17. ↑ Gehring, David Scott (24 June 2024). A European Elizabethan: The Life of Robert Beale, Esquire. Oxford University Press. p. 70. ISBN   978-0-19-890293-5.
  18. ↑ Bell, Gary M. (23 September 2004). "Beale, Robert (1541–1601), administrator and diplomat". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Retrieved 18 April 2025.
  19. ↑ Crisp, Frederick Arthur (1889). Abstracts of Somersetshire Wills, Etc: Copied from the Manuscript Collections of the Late Rev. Frederick Brown. Priv. print. for F. A. Crisp. p. 49.
  20. ↑ Emerson, Kathy Lynn (1984). Wives and Daughters: The Women of Sixteenth Century England. Whitston Publishing Company. p. 238. ISBN   978-0-87875-246-1.
  21. ↑ Hutchinson, p. 266
  22. 1 2 Tsakiropoulou, Ioanna (9 May 2019). "Devereux, Frances [née Walsingham; other married names Sidney and Burke], countess of Essex and of Clanricarde (c.1568–1632), noblewoman". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. doi:10.1093/odnb/9780198614128.013.112779. ISBN   978-0-19-861412-8 . Retrieved 18 April 2025.
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