Blanche Parry
Lyra
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Dictionary of Welsh Biography
Cymraeg The National Library of Wales
PARRY (AP HARRY, APARRY, APPAREY, and other forms), BLANCHE
(1508?-1590),
gentlewoman to queen Elizabeth; b. in 1508 or 1507 at Newcourt,
Bacton, in the Dore valley, Ewias, Herefs., daughter of Henry Parry
and his wife Alice.
The pedigree of this wide-branching family is given by Theophilus
Jones in Hist. Brecknock (3rd ed.), iv, 2-3.
Guto'r Glyn (q.v.) sang (200-4 and 216-20 of the University of Wales
edition of his poems) to ‘Harri Ddu o Euas,’ Blanche's great-
grandfather;
her grandfather, Miles ap Harri,
was m. to Joan, a daughter of Sir Harry Stradling of S. Donat's
(Glam.)
— see the article on that family —
and as Joan's mother was sister to William Herbert, earl of Pembroke
(q.v.), the Herberts too come into the complex.
Besides all this, there was kinship between the Parrys and the Cecils
(qq.v.) of Allt-yr-ynys (which is not far from Bacton); the William
Cecil who continued to live at Allt-yr-ynys was in his youth a friend
of Blanche Parry's, and was m. to Olive Parry of Poston (cf. the
article Parry, James Rhys), who was descended from Harri Ddu's younger
brother.
The relationship of the Parrys and the Cecils was recognised even by
the great William Cecil lord Burghley — Blanche Parry calls him
‘kinsman’ (not, more vaguely, ‘cousin’); he drew up her will, and was
her chief executor.
Again, the Vaughans and Morgans of Gwent and Ewias and Ystradyw
intermarried with the Parrys.
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On the other hand, there seems little ground for thinking that the
conspirator William Parry (q.v.), who was executed in 1585, was of
this family. Nor, again, are the arms of bishop Richard Parry (q.v.)
of S. Asaph satisfactory proof of his kinship with the family — to the
contrary, see J. E. Griffith, Pedigrees, 387.
And there is not the slightest ground for calling Thomas Parry the
‘queen's cofferer’ (d. 1560) (q.v.), Blanche's ‘father’ (at other
times he is called her ‘husband’) — in fact, his real surname was
Vaughan (of Tretower — see the article on that family)
— though he may well have been distantly akin.
Again, some have made overmuch of her alleged kinship with John Dee
(q.v.), but in fact Dee refers to her only three times — it is true
that she acted (by deputy) as godmother of one of his children, and
that on that occasion he calls her his ‘cousin,’ but the relationship
has not been established. Still less has any basis been discovered for
the belief that such a relationship was the means whereby Blanche
Parry attained the queen's favour. Indeed, her influence over the
queen has probably been exaggerated.
Her career has been elucidated in detail by C. A. Bradford (see
below), who has also dispelled many legends about her. It is fairly
certain that it was her kinswoman ‘lady Herbert of Troy’ who first
brought her to Court. She herself asserts that she saw Elizabeth ‘in
her cradle,’ but the princess was three years old (1536) before
Blanche became officially her ‘gentlewoman.’
In 1558 she became ‘second gentlewoman,’ and in 1565 ‘first,’ but she
never held a ‘noble’ post at Court. Yet, her office was very
profitable, what with her salary, maintenance, gifts, grants of
privileges and indeed of estates, and grateful legacies from persons
aided by her.
Her name recurs very frequently in official records, and there are
references to her in contemporary literature. Toward the end of her
life she became blind. She d., unmarried, 12 Feb. 1589/90.
She had at one time erected a tomb for herself at Bacton, but
afterwards changed her mind, and was actually buried in S. Margaret's,
Westminster, where her grave can now be seen — but there is a confused
story that her entrails (or perhaps her heart) were interred in the
Bacton tomb which still survives.
In 1811, Mrs. Burton, wife of the then vicar of Atcham, near
Shrewsbury, and a descendant of the Newcourt family, had the stained-
glass window commemorating Miles ap Harri removed from Bacton to
Atcham, and at the same time put up there a window to Blanche Parry.
Blanche left liberal legacies and charitable bequests [her will was
privately printed (1845) by Sir Thomas Phillipps]. It is known that
her religious opinions were conservative — indeed, she is thought to
have been a Roman Catholic.
Blanche Parry touches Welsh historiography at one point.
Sir Edward Stradling (q.v. in the article on his family), on William
Cecil's suggestion, had written a tractate on the Norman conquest of
Glamorgan, and had sent it to Cecil. It is clear that Cecil passed it
on to Blanche Parry — perhaps for the queen, for Blanche kept the
queen's books.
But when David Powel (q.v.) was in London, probably to see about
printing his Historie, Blanche Parry handed Stradling's work over to
him — Powel describes ‘the right worshipfull Mistres Blanch Parry,’ as
‘a singular well willer and furtherer of the weale publike’ of Wales.
Powel printed the tractate in full in his Historie — on this matter,
see G. J. Williams, Traddodiad Llenyddol Morgannwg, 197-9.
Bibliography:
* C. A. Bradford, Blanche Parry, Queen Elizabeth's Gentlewoman,
1935;
* other references given above;
* [Cardiff Catalogue].
Author:
Emeritus Professor Robert Thomas Jenkins, C.B.E., D.Litt., Ll.D.,
F.S.A., (1881-1969), Bangor.