Penelope Blount, Countess of Devonshire

This unusual double portrait of the teenage sisters Dorothy (left) and Penelope Devereux (right) hangs at Longleat House, home of Lord Bath. Dorothy was to become Countess of Northumberland upon her marriage, and Penelope was to become Lady Penelope Rich on marrying Lord Robert Rich. For more information on this portrait and Penelope Rich, refer to Chapter Fifteen and the Author's Postscript to Shakespeare's Dark Lady.

Penelope Rich, Lady Rich, later styled Penelope Blount (née Devereux; January 1563[1] – 7 July 1607) was an English court office holder. She served as lady-in-waiting to the English queen Anne of Denmark. She was the sister of Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, and is traditionally thought to be the inspiration for "Stella" of Sir Philip Sidney's Astrophel and Stella sonnet sequence (published posthumously in 1591).[2][3] She was married to Robert Rich, 3rd Baron Rich (later 1st Earl of Warwick) and had a public liaison with Charles Blount, Baron Mountjoy, whom she married in an unlicensed ceremony following her divorce from Rich. She died in 1607.

She had a strict Puritan upbringing and quite a simple life until she was presented at Court in early 1581. In January, she arrived at court accompanied by her guardian's wife, Catherine, Countess of Huntingdon, who was Leicester's sister and Sidney's aunt.[4] In March 1581 Huntingdon as her guardian secured the queen's assent through Lord Burghley, Master of the Court of Wards, for her marriage with Robert Rich, 3rd Baron Rich (later 1st Earl of Warwick). Penelope is said to have protested in vain against the alliance with Rich.[3][8] The marriage was unhappy from the start.

Penelope Rich was considered one of the beauties of Elizabeth's court. She was golden-haired with dark eyes, a gifted singer and dancer, fluent in French, Italian, and Spanish.[3][10]

Whether Sidney fell passionately in love with Penelope in the years between her arrival at court in 1581 and his own marriage in 1583, or whether the "Stella" sonnets were courtly amusements reflecting fashionable poetic conceits may never be known. In her essay "Sidney, Stella, and Lady Rich", Katherine Duncan-Jones writes:

No one since 1935 has seriously doubted that Sidney intended the first readers of Astropil and Stella, whoever they may have been, to link "Stella" with Lady Rich. The exact nature of Sidney's relationship with the famous beauty is another and much more ticklish matter ..."[12]

Penelope's arranged marriage to Rich had been unhappy, and by 1595 she began a secret affair with Charles Blount, Baron Mountjoy. Lord Rich took no action during the lifetime of Penelope's brother, the powerful Earl of Essex, who became the ageing Queen's favourite in the years after the death of Leicester in 1588.[18]

However Penelope became tainted by association with her brother's plotting. Essex shocked many people, after the failure of his rebellion, by denouncing her as a traitor, and after his execution for treason in 1601, Lord Rich had Penelope and her children by Mountjoy cast out. Mountjoy, like Penelope, had been implicated in the Essex rebellion, but the Queen, who wished to show as much clemency as possible to the rebels, took no action against either of them. Lady Rich moved in with her lover, and the couple began a very public relationship. Mountjoy was created Earl of Devonshire on the accession of James I, and Lady Rich was in high favour at court.[3]

Children

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penelope_Blount,_Countess_of_Devonshire

Penelope's children by Robert Rich were:

1. Lettice Rich (d. 1619), named after her maternal grandmother Lettice Knollys and known as Lucy. Married firstly Sir George Carey and secondly Sir Arthur Lake[9]
2. Essex Rich, married Sir Thomas Cheek and had three sons and five daughters
3. Robert Rich (1587–1658), later 2nd Earl of Warwick
4. Henry Rich (1590–1649), later 1st Earl of Holland

Penelope's illegitimate children acknowledged by Charles Blount were:[22][23]

1. Penelope Rich, who, despite her surname, was a daughter of Penelope by Blount
2. Mountjoy Blount (c.1597–1666),[24] later 1st Earl of Newport
3. Charles Blount
4. St. John Blount
5. Isabella Blount
6. another child died in infancy

22. Sylvia Freedman Poor Penelope: Lady Penelope Rich, An Elizabethan Woman (London, Kensal Press, 1983), 188.

23. Frederick M. Jones, Mountjoy, 1563–1606: The Last Elizabeth Deputy (Dublin, Clonmore & Reynolds, 1958), 226.

Family

Children listed in the biography for Blount, Charles, eighth Baron Mountjoy and earl of Devonshire. < ODNB >

1. Mountjoy Blount, received a substantial inheritance. His other children,
2. St John,
3. Charles,
4. Penelope, and
5. Isabella also received an annual sum out of his vast estate.

   ---

Notes

https://www.geni.com/discussions/101249?msg=1436252

From Sally Varlow, The Lady Penelope: Passion and Intrigue at the Heart of the Elizabethan Court (Andre Deutch: London, England, 2014)

page 238: "Once the peace was signed [Treaty of London, 1604] Devonshire was at last able to get away to Wanstead for a summer interlude. Here in the calm and quiet of Wanstead he could relax with Penelope and his children. Their eldest child, Penelope, was now twelve years old; Isabella had turned nine in January; and though none of their three sons, Mountjoy, St. John and Charles, had yet reached eight, they were fine boys who would one day join him in riding, hunting and hawking in the parks."

page 259: "The deed of trust and Devonshire's will, signed the day before he died, meant his properties should pass straight to his beneficiaries . . . . In the will, Penelope and their five children were carefully identified . . . . To make it watertight only their Christian names were used: Mountjoy St. John, Charles, Penelope and Isabella, and 'such issue as the said lady now goeth withall'."

page 312. The endnotes cite Devonshire's will thusly: "PROB 11/108, re-examined 11/109/322; the inquistionem post mortem: PRO C 142/306/146 to establish his estate; and the Star Chamber court case is STAC 8/108/10."

On 7 February 1600, Elizabeth sent Charles Blount, then 8th Baron Mountjoy, to Ireland to replace Essex. A year later (during the time Essex was committed to the Tower) he petitioned Elizabeth to return to London, but she refused. He returned from Ireland in June of 1603 after her death. (His success in quashing the Irish rebellion earned him the title 1st Earl of Devonshire from James I.)

Comments

a result of one of the merges showed the possible birth date of 07/07/1562 but given the fact that it's also the exact death date and the fact I couldn't find any source for this, I've removed it from the birth date field. if anyone knows something about this please let us know.

References

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penelope_Rich,_Lady_Rich
   1. Duncan-Jones, Katherine. "Sidney, Stella, and Lady Rich." In Sir Philip Sidney: 1586 and the Creation of a Legend, edited by J. A. van Dorsten, Dominic Baker-Smith, and Arthur F. Kinney. Brill Archive, 1986, ISBN 90-04-07923-8, < GoogleBooks >
   2. Hammer, P.E.J. The Polarisation of Elizabethan Politics: The Political Career of Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, 1585–1597 Cambridge UP, 1999. ISBN 0-521-01941-9
   3. A Historical Dictionary of British Women, Taylor & Francis Group, Routledge, 2nd revised edition 2003, ISBN 1-85743-228-2
   4. "Rich, Penelope" . Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.
   5. Wilson, Mona, Sir Philip Sidney, London: Duckworth, 1931
2. http://www.thepeerage.com/p6785.htm#i67849
3. http://our-royal-titled-noble-and-commoner-ancestors.com/p1922.htm#...
4. http://www.tudorplace.com.ar/Bios/PenelopeDevereux.htm
5. http://www.luminarium.org/encyclopedia/peneloperich.htm
6. http://www.tudorplace.com.ar/DEVEREUX.htm#Penelope%20DEVEREUX%20%28...
7. http://histfam.familysearch.org/getperson.php?personID=I31475&tree=...
8. http://www.grangermusgrave.co.uk/getperson.php?personID=I8159&tree=G
9. http://www.palmspringsbum.org/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I750...
10. http://www.stepneyrobarts.co.uk/9204.htm
11. http://www.ourfamilyhistories.org/getperson.php?personID=I132788&tr...
12. http://papayne.rootsweb.ancestry.com/dna-project/pedigrees/d0000/g0...
13. Champernowne v Blount. Plaintiffs: Sir Richard Champernowne. Defendants:... < link >
14. “ Blount, Charles, eighth Baron Mountjoy and earl of Devonshire” at < ODNB >
15. https://www.genealogics.org/getperson.php?personID=I00062027&tree=LEO cites
    1. [S00119] Paget, Gerald, The Lineage and Ancestry of H.R.H. Prince Charles, Prince of Wales, Edinburgh, 1977. M 7418
    2. [S00058] Doubleday, H.A. & Lord Howard de Walden, The Complete Peerage, 1936 . 9:346
    3. [S01353] ~Burke's Peerage and Baronetage 1967 . 1287
    4. [S04610] Shirley, Evelyn Philip, Stemmata Shirleiana. Westminster, 1873 . 105
16. https://www.flickr.com/photos/60861613@N00/3380214231

This unusual double portrait of the teenage sisters Dorothy (left) and Penelope Devereux (right) hangs at Longleat House, home of Lord Bath. Dorothy was to become Countess of Northumberland upon her marriage, and Penelope was to become Lady Penelope Rich on marrying Lord Robert Rich. For more information on this portrait and Penelope Rich, refer to Chapter Fifteen and the Author's Postscript to Shakespeare's Dark Lady.

a result of one of the merges showed the possible birth date of 07/07/1562 but given the fact that it's also the exact death date and the fact I couldn't find any source for this, I've removed it from the birth date field.

if anyone knows something about this please let us know

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• Penelope Rich, Lady Rich, later styled Penelope Blount, Countess of Devonshire (née Penelope Devereux, January 1563[1] – 7 July 1607) was an English noblewoman. She was the sister of Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex and is traditionally thought to be the inspiration for "Stella" of Sir Philip Sidney's Astrophel and Stella sonnet sequence (published posthumously in 1591).[2][3] She married Robert Rich, 3rd Baron Rich (later 1st Earl of Warwick) and had a public liaison with Charles Blount, Baron Mountjoy, (later first Earl of Devonshire), whom she married in an unlicensed ceremony following her divorce from Rich. She died in 1607.
• Born Penelope Devereux at Chartley Castle in Staffordshire, she was the elder daughter of Walter Devereux, 2nd Viscount Hereford, later 1st Earl of Essex and Lettice Knollys, daughter of Sir Francis Knollys and Catherine Carey, and sister of William Knollys, later 1st Earl of Banbury. Catherine Carey was the daughter of Lady Mary Boleyn by either her husband Sir William Carey, Gentleman of the Privy Chamber, or her lover King Henry VIII.
• Her father was created Earl of Essex in 1572. Penelope was a child of fourteen when Sir Philip Sidney accompanied her distant cousin Queen Elizabeth on a visit to Lady Essex in 1575, on her way from Kenilworth, and must have been frequently thrown into the society of Sidney, in consequence of the many ties between the two families. Essex died at Dublin in September 1576. He had sent a message to Philip Sidney from his death-bed expressing his desire that he should marry his daughter, and later his secretary wrote to the young man's father, Sir Henry Sidney, in words which seem to point to the existence of a very definite understanding.[3]
• Penelope's brother, Robert, Viscount Hereford, inherited the Earldom of Essex on their father's death in 1576, and Penelope, her sister Dorothy, and younger brother Walter were entrusted to the guardianship of their kinsman Henry Hastings, 3rd Earl of Huntingdon.[4][5] In 1578[6] their widowed mother married the Queen's favourite, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. Perhaps the marriage of Lady Essex with the earl of Leicester, which destroyed Philip Sidney's prospects as his uncle Leicester's heir,[7] had something to do with the breaking off of the proposed match with Penelope.[3] In January 1581 Penelope arrived at court accompanied by her guardian's wife Catherine, Countess of Huntingdon, who was Leicester's sister and Sidney's aunt.[4] In March 1581 Huntingdon as her guardian secured the queen's assent through Lord Burghley, Master of the Court of Wards, for her marriage with Robert Rich, 3rd Baron Rich (later 1st Earl of Warwick). Penelope is said to have protested in vain against the alliance with Rich.[3][8]
• Penelope's children by Robert Rich were:
  • Robert Rich (1587–1658), later 2nd Earl of Warwick
  • Henry Rich (1590–1649), later 1st Earl of Holland
  • Sir Charles Rich (d. 1627), died unmarried and without issue
  • Lettice Rich (d. 1619), named after her maternal grandmother Lettice Knollys. Married firstly Sir George Carey and secondly Sir Arthur Lake
  • Penelope Rich, married Sir Gervase Clifton
  • Essex Rich, married Sir Thomas Cheek and had three sons and five daughters
  • Isabella Rich, married Sir John Smythe, son of Sir Thomas Smythe, first governor of the East India Company
• Penelope's marriage to Rich was unhappy and by 1595, she had begun a secret affair with Charles Blount, Baron Mountjoy. Lord Rich took no action during the lifetime of Penelope's brother, the powerful Earl of Essex, who had become the aging Queen's favourite in the years after the death of Leicester in 1588.
• But Penelope was tainted by association with her brother's plotting, and after Essex's execution for treason in 1601, Lord Rich had Penelope and her children by Mountjoy cast out. Lady Rich moved in with her lover, and the couple began a very public relationship. Mountjoy was created Earl of Devonshire on the accession of James I, and Lady Rich was in high favour at court,.[3] She was among the ladies who escorted Anne of Denmark on her entry to London in 1603 and served Anne as a Lady of the Bedchamber.[8][9] She danced as the nymph Ocyte in Ben Jonson's Masque of Blackness on Twelfth Night 1605.[8][15]
• In 1605, Rich sued for a divorce, and Penelope wanted to marry Blount and legitimise their children. In the divorce proceedings, she publicly admitted to adultery. The divorce was granted, but the requests to remarry and legitimise her children were refused. She married Blount in a private ceremony conducted by his chaplain, William Laud, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, on 26 December 1605 at Wanstead House in London. This proceeding, carried out in defiance of canon law, was followed by the disgrace of both parties, who were banished from court by King James. The couple continued to live together as husband and wife with their children until his death a few months later. Blount died on 3 April 1606[3] and Penelope on 7 July 1607.
• Penelope's illegitimate children acknowledged by Charles Blount were:
  • Mountjoy Blount (1597–1663), later 1st Earl of Newport
  • Elizabeth Blount
  • John Blount
• From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penelope_Rich,_Lady_Rich __________________

Links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penelope_Rich,_Lady_Rich

http://www.thepeerage.com/p6785.htm#i67849

http://our-royal-titled-noble-and-commoner-ancestors.com/p1922.htm#...

http://www.tudorplace.com.ar/Bios/PenelopeDevereux.htm

http://www.luminarium.org/encyclopedia/peneloperich.htm

http://www.tudorplace.com.ar/DEVEREUX.htm#Penelope%20DEVEREUX%20%28...

http://histfam.familysearch.org/getperson.php?personID=I31475&tree=...

http://www.grangermusgrave.co.uk/getperson.php?personID=I8159&tree=G

http://www.palmspringsbum.org/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I750...

http://www.stepneyrobarts.co.uk/9204.htm

http://www.ourfamilyhistories.org/getperson.php?personID=I132788&tr...

http://papayne.rootsweb.ancestry.com/dna-project/pedigrees/d0000/g0...

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