Mary de Bohun

She and her sister Eleanor were heirs to their father’s vast estates and possessions which in turn would transfer to their husbands. Eleanor was married to Thomas of Woodstock, 1st Duke of Gloucester, who wanted to keep the entire inheritance for himself and he hoped to convince Mary to become a nun. 

 

Her aunt and John of Gaunt formed a plot and took her to Arundel Castle where Mary was married in 1380 at around the age of twelve to Henry Bolingbroke, future King Henry IV. 

 

Their marriage was to produce seven children including the future Henry V, however Mary herself was never to become Queen of England as she died before her husband came to the throne. 

 

She died on 4 July 1394, in childbirth with her daughter Philippa of England at Peterborough Castle. 

 

She is buried in the collegiate Church of the Annunciation of the Lady of the Newarke, Leicester