Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grim
Speaker 1: and Mild from Aaron Mankie. Listener discretion advised. The year
Speaker 1: was fourteen forty one and Eleanor Cobbham was one of
Speaker 1: the wealthiest and most powerful women in England. Her scent
Speaker 1: had been astonishingly quick. Eleanor had been born the daughter
Speaker 1: of a Surrey knight, and now she was a duchess
Speaker 1: married to Humphrey the Duke of Gloucester. And Gloucester wasn't
Speaker 1: just any duke. He was the brother of the late
Speaker 1: King Henry the fifth, and the uncle and counselor for
Speaker 1: the young King Henry the sixth. And because Henry the
Speaker 1: sixth was still young and unmarried, obviously with no children
Speaker 1: of his own, there was something else incredibly important about
Speaker 1: the Duke of Gloucester in fourteen forty one. His only
Speaker 1: other surviving older brother had died a few years earlier,
Speaker 1: which meant that if anything should happen to his nephew,
Speaker 1: Henry the sixth, he Gloucester was next in line to
Speaker 1: be King. Eleanor Cobbham, daughter of a knight, was a
Speaker 1: heartbeat away from being Queen of England. It was a
Speaker 1: medieval Cinderella story. Perhaps Eleanor was reflecting on how far
Speaker 1: she had come that summer the afternoon of June twenty ninth,
Speaker 1: fourteen forty one. Sure she wasn't necessarily popular among the
Speaker 1: other nobles. Those who rise quickly seldom are, and certainly
Speaker 1: her husband's position of favor seemed to be temporarily ebbing,
Speaker 1: as jealous rivals sought to undermine his influence. But it
Speaker 1: was hard to worry about that when Gloucester was quite
Speaker 1: literally next in line for the throne. When Eli had
Speaker 1: been made a duchess, she had buckets of royal honors
Speaker 1: bestowed upon her. Young King Henry the sixth gave her
Speaker 1: personal gifts. Her position had already brought her family more
Speaker 1: wealth and prominence than they had ever seen before she
Speaker 1: was a duchess, and even better, her astrologers had informed
Speaker 1: her secretly that King Henry would become deathly ill in
Speaker 1: a matter of months. If they were right, she was
Speaker 1: practically queen. That afternoon, Eleanor was dining in cheapside, enjoying
Speaker 1: a meal outdoors, when a messenger crested the horizon with
Speaker 1: a dazed and nervous look in his eye. He told
Speaker 1: Eleanor that her astrologers, Thomas Southall and Roger Bolingbrooke, had
Speaker 1: been arrested. The charge treasonable necromancy. Consulting with dark spirits
Speaker 1: and the dead in order to predict the future is
Speaker 1: one thing heresy, but to do it in order to
Speaker 1: predict the death of a king will that was a
Speaker 1: charge that meant certain and violent execution. Eleanor ran. She
Speaker 1: knew that officials would be coming for her next and
Speaker 1: so in order to protect herself, she fled to the
Speaker 1: legal sanctuary of Westminster. The consequences of Eleanor's ambition were
Speaker 1: now just outside the doors of the chapel, and there
Speaker 1: was only so long she could keep herself safe. This Halloween,
Speaker 1: it's time to tell a story of necromancy, of treason
Speaker 1: and magic, because, like so many ambitious women, Eleanor Cobbham,
Speaker 1: Duchess of Gloucester, was accused of being a witch. I'm
Speaker 1: Danish shorts and this is noble blood. Eleanor Cobbham was
Speaker 1: actually the Duke of Gloucester's second wife, and to understand
Speaker 1: the full picture of Eleanor's story, we actually need to
Speaker 1: zoom back a little bit and talk about his first
Speaker 1: wife for just a moment. Her name was Jacqueline, Countess
Speaker 1: of Hainault, and she was an incredibly important heiress in France.
Speaker 1: Her father died without any sons, and she was legally
Speaker 1: allowed to inherit one of his territories, Hanault, an area
Speaker 1: which today covers the border between Belgium and France, but
Speaker 1: her father's other lands, Holland and Zealand, went instead to
Speaker 1: the next living male relative. In this case, Jacqueline's uncle, Gloucester,
Speaker 1: was in her first spouse ei there. First, Jacqueline had
Speaker 1: married a man named John the fourth, the Duke of Brabant,
Speaker 1: and they, to he Gathers, a couple had tried to
Speaker 1: fight Jacqueline's uncle for control of those territories, but Jacquelin's
Speaker 1: husband was a terrible leader and a weasley guy in general,
Speaker 1: and he basically sold the rights to those contested territories
Speaker 1: to Jacqueline's uncle behind her back, And then when John's
Speaker 1: financial situation got really bad, he also gave Jacqueline's uncle Hanault.
Speaker 1: That was the final straw for Jacqueline, who made the
Speaker 1: perfectly reasonable decision to try to get a formal separation
Speaker 1: from her terrible husband Jacqueline's uncle conquered her last loyal city,
Speaker 1: she was defeated, and so she fled to England. The
Speaker 1: king at this time was Henry the fifth, and he
Speaker 1: gave Jacqueline a glittering reception at English court, and when
Speaker 1: Henry's son, the future King Henry the sixth, was born,
Speaker 1: Jacqueline was actually made godmother. In the mean time, she
Speaker 1: got a sort of legally gray zone divorce from her
Speaker 1: weasley husband that was kind of only legal in England.
Speaker 1: Jacqueline tried to get that marriage officially annulled, adorably appealing
Speaker 1: to both Pope Martin the fifth in Rome and the
Speaker 1: anti Pope Benedict the thirteenth in Avignon, but before she
Speaker 1: was able to do that officially, in a move that
Speaker 1: shocked the world, in fourteen twenty three, Jacqueline remarried into
Speaker 1: an incredibly controversial alliance. She married Humphrey, the Duke of Gloucester. Gloucester,
Speaker 1: of course, was brother to King Henry the Fifth, and
Speaker 1: once Henry died, Gloucester was the uncle and lord protector
Speaker 1: to the baby King Henry the sixth. At this point,
Speaker 1: Gloucester was one of the most powerful princes in Europe,
Speaker 1: and the alliance between him and Jacqueline did not make
Speaker 1: France very happy at all, because Jacqueline and her new
Speaker 1: incredibly powerful husband were going to try to fight for
Speaker 1: her lands back. Ultimately, this is going to have some
Speaker 1: real ramifications for the One Hundred Years War, because at
Speaker 1: this point the Duke of Burgundy is the regent of
Speaker 1: those lands, and England and Burgundy had an alliance, but
Speaker 1: that is not relevant to our story. What is relevant
Speaker 1: to our story is that when Jacqueline and Gloucester land
Speaker 1: in Calais, high on new love and the potential for
Speaker 1: lands to be reconquered. In Jacqueline's retinue, she had a
Speaker 1: young lady in waiting named Eleanor Cobham. Gloucester was gallant
Speaker 1: in his attempt to try to get Hannault back for
Speaker 1: his wife, and he did get some of it back,
Speaker 1: but then the Duke of Burgundy advanced and the locals
Speaker 1: turned against the strange English interloper and sided with Burgundy.
Speaker 1: To make a long story short, Gloucester's invasion was ultimately
Speaker 1: a failure, and he returned to England in April fourteen
Speaker 1: twenty five without his wife, but conveniently enough, with her
Speaker 1: lady in waiting, Eleanor Cobbham. Eleanor was described by a
Speaker 1: contemporary French chronicler as quote beautiful and marvelously pleasant. She
Speaker 1: was attractive, smart and charming. So it wasn't really any
Speaker 1: surprise that while Gloucester's wife was back in France waiting
Speaker 1: to hear if the Pope would grant an annulment from
Speaker 1: her first marriage, Gloucester began to have an affair with
Speaker 1: Eleanor Cobbham. Three years later, in fourteen twenty eight, Pope
Speaker 1: Martin the Fifth made his determination and ruled that Jacqueline's
Speaker 1: marriage to Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester was entirely invalid because
Speaker 1: she was still legally married to her first, weaslely husband, John.
Speaker 1: The convenient thing for Jacqueline was that her terrible first
Speaker 1: husband died the year before, so in theory, Gloucester could
Speaker 1: have just swept back to France and remarried Jacqueline legally.
Speaker 1: The English public certainly wanted him to do that, at
Speaker 1: least the women. You see, when Gloucester retreated back to England,
Speaker 1: the Duke of Burgundy had swept in and conquered every
Speaker 1: territory that Jacqueline had ever held. The Duke forced her
Speaker 1: to concede her administrative rights, and he put her under
Speaker 1: an incredibly confining legal situation. Jacqueline became something of a
Speaker 1: pre modern Princess Diana figure, a scorned aristocratic wife disposed
Speaker 1: of by her husband in favor of his mistress. Early
Speaker 1: in fourteen twenty eight, a well dressed and well to
Speaker 1: do group of London women came to Parliament to send
Speaker 1: letters quote containing matter of rebuke and sharp reprehension of
Speaker 1: the Duke of Gloucester because he would not deliver his
Speaker 1: wife Jacqueline out of her grievous imprisonment, being then held
Speaker 1: prisoner by the Duke of Burgundy, suffering her to remain
Speaker 1: so unkindly, and for his public keeping by him another adulteress,
Speaker 1: contrary to the law of God and the honorable estate
Speaker 1: of matrimony end quote. But whatever the will to do
Speaker 1: women of England thought, Gloucester did not care. He did
Speaker 1: not go back to France, and he did not remarry Jacqueline. Instead,
Speaker 1: he married that adulteress, Eleanor Cobbham. Imagine the scandal. Gloucester's
Speaker 1: marriage to Jacqueline had come at tremendous diploce mad cost.
Speaker 1: It had sent shockwaves throughout Europe, and now just a
Speaker 1: few years later, Gloucester had cast her off a duchess
Speaker 1: in favor of a lowly lady in waiting. But it
Speaker 1: was easy for the new Duke and Duchess of Gloucester
Speaker 1: to tune out the malicious gossip. The two of them
Speaker 1: moved into a gorgeous renovated manner called the Palace of Placentia,
Speaker 1: a veritable castle with stone towers on the Thames, surrounded
Speaker 1: by hundreds of acres and a pleasure garden. The residents
Speaker 1: would later become known as Greenwich Palace, and it was
Speaker 1: there that Eleanor and her husband invited their glamorous friends
Speaker 1: to pass the time dining and drinking with the most
Speaker 1: brilliant scholars and most dazzling musicians and poets of the day.
Speaker 1: Regardless of what the public thought about Eleanor, she was
Speaker 1: enjoying a meteoric world in the world of nobility. She
Speaker 1: was admitted to the Fraternity of the Monastery of Saint
Speaker 1: Albans and the Order of the Garter, and young King
Speaker 1: Henry the sixth gifted her incredibly luxurious New Year's gifts
Speaker 1: a garter of gold with diamonds and pearls, and rubies,
Speaker 1: more exotic gems and jewelry. When Queen Joan of Navarre
Speaker 1: died in fourteen thirty nine, who was the dowager second
Speaker 1: wife of the late King Henry the fourth, Eleanor was
Speaker 1: made a prominent mourner. But the more important royal death
Speaker 1: in Eleanor and her husband's life had been a few
Speaker 1: years earlier, in fourteen thirty five, when Gloucester's older brother died,
Speaker 1: which made him Humphrey, the Duke of Gloucester, next in
Speaker 1: line for the throne. Because the King Henry the sixth
Speaker 1: was fourteen years old with no children, it was an
Speaker 1: incredibly powerful position for the Duke and duchess, and Eleanor
Speaker 1: wasn't modest about her new status. According to one chronicle,
Speaker 1: she rode through the streets of London, glitteringly dressed and
Speaker 1: suitably escorted by men of noble birth. Her star had
Speaker 1: risen astronomically high, but Eleanor Cobbham was soaring on wings
Speaker 1: held together with meltable wax. A few years after Eleanor
Speaker 1: in Gloucester got married, the Duke created a jointure for
Speaker 1: his wife from his estate, which basically meant that Eleanor
Speaker 1: would get full rights to his properties for life. It
Speaker 1: would be almost impossible to undo and take that wealth
Speaker 1: from her. Of course, one of the only circumstances where
Speaker 1: it could be removed from her was if she was
Speaker 1: charged with treason, as Eleanor's rise to prominence had been
Speaker 1: her husband. Gloucester was also having a great decade in
Speaker 1: addition to becoming next in line for the throne. In
Speaker 1: fourteen thirty six, he returned from a battle in Calais
Speaker 1: as a hero, given a vote of thanks from the Commons.
Speaker 1: Even better, his main rival in the King's Council, Cardinal Beaufort,
Speaker 1: was conveniently abroad at a peace conference on the Continent,
Speaker 1: which meant that he Gloucester had full control over the
Speaker 1: King's ear but status at court, like any sort of
Speaker 1: fame or popularity, ebbs and flows. By fourteen forty one,
Speaker 1: Gloucester's star was beginning to fade. Cardinal Beaufort had returned
Speaker 1: to England and with his small cadre of supporters, began
Speaker 1: elbowing Gloucester out of the King's Council. Politically too, Gloucester
Speaker 1: was losing influence. As the One Hundred Years War continued
Speaker 1: to rage on, Gloucester's position of no surrender was becoming
Speaker 1: less and less popular. His rivals on the council and
Speaker 1: among the nobility were looking for a way to take
Speaker 1: him down, and, as it so happened, that way would
Speaker 1: be his wife, Eleanor. On June twenty ninth, fourteen forty one,
Speaker 1: Eleanor was dining at the King's head in Cheapside when
Speaker 1: she heard about the arrest of three men. The first
Speaker 1: was Roger Bolingbrooke, who was an Oxford priest and Eleanor's
Speaker 1: personal clerk. The second man was Thomas Southwell, a cannon
Speaker 1: and rector. The third was John Holme, Eleanor's chaplain and secretary.
Speaker 1: The charge was conspiring to bring about the king's death,
Speaker 1: and it was an incredibly serious accusation. Bolingbrooke and Southwell
Speaker 1: were indicted for sorcery and treason, with Bolingbrooke accused of necromancy,
Speaker 1: or communicating with the dead or spirit world in order
Speaker 1: to predict the future. The future they were trying to
Speaker 1: predict in this case was allegedly if and when King
Speaker 1: Henry the sixth would die, making the Duke and Duchess
Speaker 1: of Gloucester the new King and Queen, and according to Bolingbrooke,
Speaker 1: it was Eleanor who had commissioned them to do it.
Speaker 1: Eleanor fled to the sanctuary of Westminster Saint Stephen's Chapel,
Speaker 1: and though she was told to await her hearings at
Speaker 1: Leeds Castle, she was, as you can probably imagine, reluctant
Speaker 1: to leave religious sanctuary. Eleanor even pretended to be ill
Speaker 1: to try to escape in August, but in the end
Speaker 1: members of the king's household captured her and escorted her
Speaker 1: to Leeds, where she stayed for two months before facing
Speaker 1: a tribunal. As it happened, Eleanor would appear before an
Speaker 1: ecclesiastical council and not the secular authorities, which had the
Speaker 1: benefit for her of not using the death penalty. One
Speaker 1: peculiarity about Eleanor's trial was that she was a peeress
Speaker 1: of the realm, and there was a blind spot in
Speaker 1: the law about what would happen if a peeress was
Speaker 1: charged for felony and treason. That oversight would be corrected,
Speaker 1: but fortunately for Eleanor only after her trial. In the end,
Speaker 1: she was charged on five counts, and she confessed to one.
Speaker 1: She denied the necromancy and the plotting about bringing about
Speaker 1: the king's death, but she did admit to witchcraft, or
Speaker 1: at least to using witchcraft. Eleanor confessed to soliciting the
Speaker 1: services of a woman named Marjorie Jordemain, also known as
Speaker 1: the Witch of the Eye. That nickname is only slightly
Speaker 1: less cool than it sounds, because the Eye was a
Speaker 1: name for a geographical area in Westminster. But Marjorie was
Speaker 1: a known witch who had actually been imprisoned for it
Speaker 1: already and released on good behavior. She was particularly well
Speaker 1: known among a certain group of women looking for love potions.
Speaker 1: Eleanor confessed that she had used Marjorie's services back before
Speaker 1: she and Gloucester had gotten married to get him to
Speaker 1: love her, and that she had also used Marjorie's witchcraft
Speaker 1: to try to get pregnant. The two still did not
Speaker 1: have a child together. As for the charge that she
Speaker 1: had instructed Bolingbrooke and Southwell to try to predict King
Speaker 1: Henry the sixth death, well, she denied it, but I
Speaker 1: will say it's not entirely unreasonable. There are actually no
Speaker 1: contemporary sources that speculate that the trial was a complete
Speaker 1: fabrication in order to politically undermine Gloucester. It's plausible that Eleanor,
Speaker 1: with a few men closest to her, let the possibility
Speaker 1: of power go to her head a little bit and
Speaker 1: tried to engage in a little secret prognostication, with the
Speaker 1: assumption that no one would ever find out. There had
Speaker 1: actually been another incredibly powerful woman who had also been
Speaker 1: accused of treasonable witchcraft in living memory while Eleanor's trial
Speaker 1: was going on. Do you remember that dowager Queen Joan
Speaker 1: of Navarre, whom Eleanor had been a prominent mourner for
Speaker 1: Will Back in fourteen nineteen when Joan's stepson Henry the
Speaker 1: fifth was king. She Joan was accused of witchcraft, but
Speaker 1: never actually tried. She was imprisoned, but comfortably and temporarily,
Speaker 1: and her massive dowry was significantly reduced, which was very
Speaker 1: convenient for Henry the fifth as he was waging the
Speaker 1: expensive one hundred Years War. But now twenty two years later,
Speaker 1: another noble woman was being accused of witchcraft, and whether
Speaker 1: or not she was guilty, there was no denying that
Speaker 1: it was all very convenient for her husband's political rivals.
Speaker 1: Marjorie Jordemayne was burned at the stake. Bolingbrooke was hanged,
Speaker 1: drawn and quarters Southwilt died in the Tower of London,
Speaker 1: allegedly quote of sorrow, but more likely of poison because
Speaker 1: he knew it would be more pleasant than the alternative.
Speaker 1: The third man involved Home was actually only indicted for
Speaker 1: being aware of the treason his activities and not doing
Speaker 1: anything about them, and he was pardoned. Eleanor Cobbham was
Speaker 1: found guilty, and though she wouldn't be executed, she would
Speaker 1: be punished. On November sixth, fourteen forty one, a commission
Speaker 1: of bishops ordered that Eleanor of Gloucester would be forcibly
Speaker 1: divorced from her husband. Had her husband tried to free her,
Speaker 1: or had he just been so shocked and outraged by
Speaker 1: the charges leveled against his wife that he cast her
Speaker 1: out of his heart entirely, we don't know. After their
Speaker 1: divorce the two would never see each other again, and
Speaker 1: then Eleanor's penance began. On November fourteenth. She was forced
Speaker 1: to walk through London from Westminster to the Temple landing stage,
Speaker 1: dressed in black, with no cap covering her hair, holding
Speaker 1: a taper in her hand that she would offer at
Speaker 1: the high altar at Saint Paul's Cathedral. Two days after that,
Speaker 1: she had to do another walk of public shame, holding
Speaker 1: another taper and walking from Swanpierre on Thame Street to
Speaker 1: christ Church. Two days after that, from Queen helped to
Speaker 1: Saint Michael's. Eleanor, who had once ridden through the streets
Speaker 1: glittering and magnificent as one of the most powerful women
Speaker 1: in England, was now on foot, with hordes of citizens
Speaker 1: lining the streets on both sides to witness her shame
Speaker 1: and humiliation. In January, with her three walks complete, Eleanor
Speaker 1: was sent to Cheshire, with the King making a special
Speaker 1: note that even if she were sick, she was not
Speaker 1: to be delayed. Perhaps he speculated that she might be faking.
Speaker 1: She was transferred from there to Kenilworth and then to
Speaker 1: Peel Castle on the Isle of Man. Eventually she was
Speaker 1: sent to Beaumrie in Wales, where she died July seventh,
Speaker 1: fourteen fifty two. Eleanor Cobbham was all but forgotten by history.
Speaker 1: At this point, no chroniclers wrote about her. We only
Speaker 1: rediscovered the date and place of her death in the
Speaker 1: twentieth century. In nineteen seventy seven, Shakespeare's Lady Macbeth is
Speaker 1: one of the most famous and enduring female characters in
Speaker 1: all of English literature. If it's been a while since
Speaker 1: you are ap English class, or since you dove into Shakespeare,
Speaker 1: let me quickly refresh your memory. In the play Macbeth,
Speaker 1: the titular Scottish general is given a prophecy from three
Speaker 1: witches telling him that he will become a King of Scotland.
Speaker 1: When his wife hears about the prophecy, she becomes consumed
Speaker 1: with ambition and go to her husband into murdering the
Speaker 1: current King of Scotland so that he can take his place.
Speaker 1: I'll avoid spoiling a play about four hundred and fifteen
Speaker 1: years old and merely say that it doesn't end well
Speaker 1: for either Macbeth or for Lady Macbeth. Even though Shakespeare
Speaker 1: was loosely inspired by a real eleventh century Scottish monarch,
Speaker 1: his play is pretty much all fiction. In fact, given
Speaker 1: that just a few years before it was performed, King
Speaker 1: James the first and sixth became King of England, it
Speaker 1: could be argued that the play itself is one of
Speaker 1: the best historical examples of sucking up, given that it's
Speaker 1: set in King James's home country of Scotland, and that
Speaker 1: it features a scene in which King James's real life
Speaker 1: ancestor Banquo, is told how his descendants will nobly rule
Speaker 1: for generations. But two hundred years before Shakespeare wrote his tragedy,
Speaker 1: a real life woman was cast in that metaphorical Lady
Speaker 1: Macbeth role. She was decried by contemporaries for her ambition,
Speaker 1: and in the end it would be her faith in
Speaker 1: witchcraft that caused the downfall of both her and her
Speaker 1: noble husband. But is eleanor Cobbham the seductive and powerful
Speaker 1: vixen that we so often imagine Lady Macbeth to be,
Speaker 1: or was she an unfortunate victim in a man's war
Speaker 1: of shifting alliances and opportunism. If there's ambition to be
Speaker 1: criticized here, I would say from a moral standpoint, they're
Speaker 1: certainly more blame to be had in the actions of
Speaker 1: Gloucester's ambitious enemies who began this whole well witch hunt
Speaker 1: in the first place. In their efforts to undermine Gloucester
Speaker 1: to bolster their own positions, they led to the deaths
Speaker 1: of three people and the lifelong imprisonment of another. Sure
Speaker 1: Using love potions and quote necromancy to try to predict
Speaker 1: the future is bad, but it's also not real. Even
Speaker 1: if Eleanor and her advice were secretly speculating on the
Speaker 1: death of the king, yes treason, yes bad, but they
Speaker 1: didn't actually hurt anyone. Shakespeare actually wrote about Eleanor Cobbham.
Speaker 1: She's a character in his play Henry the Sixth Part two.
Speaker 1: In the play, Eleanor pushes her husband into asserting his
Speaker 1: claim to the throne, and she is manipulated by one
Speaker 1: of her husband's rivals into performing the necromancy that ultimately
Speaker 1: leads to her and her good husband's downfall. Gloucester is
Speaker 1: the good and noble man who tried his best to
Speaker 1: resist his wife, but who ultimately was out maneuvered by
Speaker 1: political opponents. Eleanor is just a piece in Gloucester's tragedy.
Speaker 1: The real Eleanor Cobbham, whoever she may have been, spent
Speaker 1: a decade in prison alone and in the cold and dark.
Speaker 1: She was a woman who had done everything she physically
Speaker 1: could do in the fifteenth century to secure her own position,
Speaker 1: to reach a state of comfort and power, but in
Speaker 1: the end she was a woman. She would spend the
Speaker 1: rest of her life in prison, with no agency or freedom,
Speaker 1: her destiny entirely controlled by the ambitions of the men
Speaker 1: around her, like her husband's enemies had predicted, and Leonor's
Speaker 1: scandal ruined Gloucester's political career. He retired from public life,
Speaker 1: and he himself was actually arrested a few years later
Speaker 1: in fourteen forty seven, on his way to a meeting
Speaker 1: of Parliament on charges of treason, possibly for trying to
Speaker 1: free his former wife, Eleanor Cobbham. He died just a
Speaker 1: few days later. One detail about this entire tragic ordeal
Speaker 1: that I find a little charming in spite of myself,
Speaker 1: is that back after Eleanor was arrested, when the details
Speaker 1: of her alleged necromancy were coming to light, it was
Speaker 1: told that her astronomers had predicted that King Henry the
Speaker 1: sixth would die later that very summer August fourteen forty one. Four.
Speaker 1: Young Henry the sixth, probably very nervous hearing that, hired
Speaker 1: his own astronomers, who were able to correct that prediction
Speaker 1: and tell the king that he would actually live a
Speaker 1: very long life if those astronomers saw that Henry would
Speaker 1: die before he turned fifty in a prison cell after
Speaker 1: losing his wits as a prisoner to the Yorks. They
Speaker 1: very smartly didn't mention anything. That's the story of Eleanor
Speaker 1: Cobbham and her dalliance with witchcraft. But keep listening after
Speaker 1: a brief sponsor break for a spooky little Halloween haunting.
Speaker 1: Over Eleanor Cobham's decade long imprisonment, she was moved between
Speaker 1: several castles. In the summer of fourteen forty six, she
Speaker 1: was moved to the Isle of Man, where she was
Speaker 1: kept on a small islet on the west coast of
Speaker 1: the main Isle, in a place called Peel Castle. By
Speaker 1: this point, years into her captivity, the former Duchess was
Speaker 1: reportedly stormy and anxious. Eleanor was irritable and angry, constantly
Speaker 1: under the watchful eyes of guards preventing her from both
Speaker 1: escaping and taking her own life. It's in those dark,
Speaker 1: cold halls in the castle on the Irish Sea that
Speaker 1: Eleanor's spirit, alleged still roams. They say, if you listen closely,
Speaker 1: and if you're very very quiet, the sound of the
Speaker 1: sea can transform into the sound of lonely footsteps walking
Speaker 1: up the stairs leading up from the dungeon. The ghost
Speaker 1: of a woman who became a casualty in the political
Speaker 1: aspirations of a man. A woman who dared, for a moment,
Speaker 1: to dream that she might control her own life. Noble
Speaker 1: Blood is a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild
Speaker 1: from Aaron Mankie. Noble Blood is created and hosted by
Speaker 1: me Dana Shworth, with additional writing and researching by Hannah Johnston,
Speaker 1: hannah's Wick, Mira Hayward, Courtney Sender, and Lori Goodman. The
Speaker 1: show is edited and produced by Noemi Griffin and rima
Speaker 1: Il Kahali, with supervising producer Josh Thain and executive producers
Speaker 1: Aaron Manke, Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts
Speaker 1: from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.