Edward Howard

Sir Edward Howard (1476/1477 – 25 April 1513) was an English naval officer. He was the first of the Howards to win fame as an admiral, participating in his first naval battle while in his teens. He was in command during the Battle of Saint-Mathieu, which may have been the first sea battle fought by ships with cannons deployed through ports. He was killed shortly afterwards, leading an assault on galleys in the French fleet near Brest.

Early life The son of Thomas Howard (later 2nd Duke of Norfolk) and his first wife, Elizabeth Tilney, and a younger brother of Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, Howard's date of birth can be determined only approximately, and nothing is known of his early upbringing or education. He began his military career in August 1492 at the age of fifteen under Sir Edward Poynings at the siege of Sluys. In 1497 his father, then Earl of Surrey, was given a command in Scotland and took his sons Thomas and Edward with him. Surrey knighted both Thomas and Edward on 30 September 1497 at Ayton Castle after the signing of a treaty concluding an invasion by James IV of Scotland. In 1503 Howard was among those who escorted Margaret Tudor to Scotland for her marriage to King James IV.

King Henry VII died on 21 April 1509. Howard played a prominent role in the tournament held to celebrate the coronation of the new King, Henry VIII, and was appointed the King's standard-bearer on 20 May 1509. Howard seized vessels of various nationalities on the pretext that they were carrying French cargoes. At the beginning of June, he escorted to Brittany the army which Henry was sending to France under the Marquess of Dorset with the hope of recovering Guyenne. Howard then raided Le Conquet and Crozon on the Breton coast. During June and July 1512 Howard effectively controlled the Channel and is said to have captured more than 60 vessels. By August, a French fleet had assembled at Brest. Howard attacked, and in the ensuing Battle of Saint-Mathieu the two largest ships on either side, the Regent and the Marie de la Cordelière, were destroyed when the latter's magazine exploded. Although undefeated, the French retreated. On 10 October the King showed his appreciation by awarding Howard an annuity of 100 marks and the reversion of the office of Lord High Admiral held by the Earl of Oxford. Both his body and his silver whistle, the Lord Admiral's badge of office, were found three days later, and delivered to Bidoux at Le Conquet, who sent the armour as a trophy to Princess Claude, the French King's daughter, and the whistle to Queen Anne. Before January 1506, he married Alice (d. 1518), the daughter and heir of William Lovel, Lord Morley, and Eleanor, Baroness Morley, and widow of Sir William Parker. She was 10 or 12 years Howard's senior, and held the barony of Morley in her own right. There were no children of the marriage.

When Howard wrote his will in January 1513 he left bequests to two unnamed bastard sons, commending one to the care of the King, and the other to the care of his friend Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk. As a younger son, he held only the manor of Morley in Norfolk, which he willed in reversion to his stepson, Henry Parker, after the termination of his widow's life interest.

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