Introduction
Elizabeth Howard (1564—1646), English aristocrat and courtier.
She was a daughter of Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Nottingham and Catherine Carey.
She was a maid of honour and lady in waiting to Queen Elizabeth, as was her sister Frances Howard, Countess of Kildare.
She married Sir Robert Southwell (1563—12 October 1598) of Woodrising, Norfolk, on 17 April 1583. He was the son of Sir Thomas Southwell and his second wife Mary Mansell.
Sir Thomas Southwell had a daughter with his third wife Nazareth Newton (d. 1583), another Elizabeth Southwell, who was a Maid of Honour to Queen Elizabeth. She was a mistress of Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex and mother of Walter Devereux, who married Sir Barentine Moleyns or Molyns of Clapcot.
After Robert Southwell's death in November 1598 Elizabeth Howard was left "a rich widow", and there was a rumour she would marry Sir William Woodhouse of Waxham, a cousin of her fellow courtier Lady Walsingham.
She became a lady of the Privy Chamber to Anne of Denmark in 1603, and her daughter, Elizabeth Southwell, was later a maid of honour. After 1608 her daughters Frances and Katherine were gentlewomen of the Privy Chamber.
In October 1604 she married Sir John Stewart, Master of Orkney, a son of Robert Stewart, 1st Earl of Orkney, at Chelsea. He became Lord Kinclaven in 1607, and Earl of Carrick in 1628.
She died in 1646 and was buried at Greenwich.
Christopher Sutton, rector of Woodrising dedicated his Disce Mori (1600) and Disce Vivere (?1604) to Lady Southwell, and his Godly Meditations on the Most Holy Sacrament (1613) to her daughters Frances and Katherine.
Portraits of Elizabeth Howard, her mother Catherine Carey, and her daughter Elizabeth Southwell were included in a sale at Cowdray Park in 2011.
Family
Her children included;
- Charles Southwell (2 February 1588 - 23 April 1588), buried at Reigate where the Howard family lived at Reigate Priory.
- Thomas Southwell (d. 1648), married Margaret Fuller.
- Elizabeth Southwell (1584-1631), maid of honour to Queen Elizabeth in 1599. She danced in the masque at the marriage of Henry Somerset, 1st Marquess of Worcester in June 1600. She was also maid of honour to Anne of Denmark, and third wife of Robert Dudley. She wrote an account of the death of Queen Elizabeth. She was buried in San Pancrazio, Florence where there was formerly a Latin inscription including her age, 37 years. Her portrait is drawn in an Italian armorial.
- Frances Southwell, gentlewoman of the privy chamber to Anne of Denmark, married Sir Edward Rodney of Rodney Stoke, Somerset, at Denmark House in 1614. The Earl of Rutland gave a wedding present of a gilt bowl and cover worth £21.
- Katherine Southwell, gentlewoman of the Privy Chamber to Anne of Denmark, who married Greville Verney, 7th Baron Willoughby de Broke in 1618.
- Robert Southwell.
- Margaret Stewart, married Sir Matthew Mennes of Sandwich.