Sir John Donne - Family and Early Career

Family and Early Career

The Donnes of Kidwelly, Carmarthenshire were a distinguished family ("Dwnn" in Welsh). His father Griffith (Gruffydd) reputedly fought at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415 and certainly in many other French campaigns; he was Lieutenant of Cherbourg in 1424. His mother was Joan Scudamore, a grandchild of Owain Glyndŵr, the last independent Prince of Wales, who disappeared into hiding in 1412. John Donne was born in France, "in parts of Picardy", probably in the 1420s.

Donne was their third son who entered, probably in his late teens, the service of the Duke of York, father of Edward IV. He may have done so through the patronage of the leading Yorkist in South Wales, William ap Thomas, also an Agincourt veteran and father of Donne's contemporary William Herbert, 1st Earl of Pembroke (1423-1469). Donne is recorded as having fought in France for the Duke, which must have been before 1447. It is from this and his apparent age in the Memling that his birth in the 1420s is estimated. He also fought for the Duke in England, and in the late 1440s in Ireland.

Donne married before 1465 Elizabeth Hastings, sister of William, Lord Hastings, the favourite of Edward IV, who was executed by Edward's brother King Richard III of England in 1483. Hastings had also been in the service of the Duke of York for all his adult life, so he and Donne must have known each other very well. The Donnes' surviving children were first two daughters, Anne and Margaret, then two sons Edward and Griffith (both later knighted). Elizabeth Donne died in 1507–8.

On Edward's accession in 1461 he was made an Usher of the Chamber and started to become wealthy. From 1465–9 he was an Esquire of the Body and he was knighted on the field after the huge Yorkist victory of the Battle of Tewkesbury in 1471 (along with many others). His wife was a damicellae or Lady-in-waiting, of the Queen. In the portrait he and his wife wear lavish Yorkist gold collar chains of suns and roses with the personal livery of Edward in pendants of his emblem, a lion, both in white ronde bosse enamel with gold highlights, clutching a ruby in their raised paws. These chains would presumably have been presents from Edward to his close followers.