Mary de Bohun (c. 1369/70 – 4 June 1394) was the first wife of Henry Bolingbroke, Earl of Northampton and Hereford and the mother of King Henry V. Mary was never queen, as she died before her husband came to the throne as Henry IV.

Early life

Mary was a daughter of Humphrey de Bohun, 7th Earl of Hereford (1341–1373) by his wife Joan Fitzalan (1347/8–1419), a daughter of Richard FitzAlan, 10th Earl of Arundel, and Eleanor of Lancaster. Mary and her elder sister, Eleanor de Bohun, were the heiresses of their father's substantial possessions. Eleanor became the wife of Thomas of Woodstock, 1st Duke of Gloucester, the youngest child of Edward III. In an effort to keep the entire inheritance for himself and his wife, Thomas of Woodstock pressured the child Mary into becoming a nun. In a plot with John of Gaunt, Mary's aunt took her from Thomas' castle at Pleshey back to Arundel whereupon she was married to Henry Bolingbroke, the future Henry IV.

Marriage and children

Mary married Henry—then known as Bolingbroke—on 5 February 1381, at Arundel Castle. It was at Monmouth Castle, one of her husband's possessions, that Mary gave birth to her first child, the future Henry V, on 16 September 1386. Her second child, Thomas, was born probably at London shortly before 25 November 1387. Her children were:

Death

Mary de Bohun died at Peterborough Castle, giving birth to her daughter Philippa. She was buried in the collegiate Church of the Annunciation of Our Lady of the Newarke, Leicester, on 6 July 1394.

Ancestry

Sources