Elizabeth Holland (died 1547/8), commonly known as Bess Holland, was the mistress of Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk and maid-of-honour to his niece, Anne Boleyn, the second wife of Henry VIII of England.
Life
The daughter or sister of the Duke's secretary, it is often said that Bess had worked for eight years as a laundress in the household of Norfolk's wife, Elizabeth Stafford, Duchess of Norfolk. This is from one of the Duchess of Norfolk's letters in which she describes Bess as a "churl’s daughter who was but a washer in my nursery for eight years". Kate Emerson points out that since she was a gentlewoman, she was probably not a laundress in the household, or the children’s nurse, but may have been the children's governess. Bess was certainly on good terms with Mary Howard, Norfolk’s daughter.
When Anne Boleyn was created Marquess of Pembroke, Bess Holland was one of her maids of honour, and she was still at court in 1537, when she rode in the funeral cortege of Queen Jane.
Paternity
According to Kate Emerson's A Who's Who of Tudor Women Elizabeth Holland was the daughter (some sources say the sister) of John Holland of Wartwell Hall in RedenHall, Norfolk and a kinswoman, probably a niece, of John Hussey 1st baron Hussey of Sleaford.
The Visitations of Norfolk, however, identifies Bess as "Elizabeth Holland da. to Thomas Holland of Swynested", as does The Gawdy Papers.
It is known that Holland had a brother, George, who signed for her jewellery “for and in the name of my said sister” when it was returned to her in February 1547. After the Duke of Norfolk's fall the commissioners had seized rings, brooches, strings of pearls, silver spoons, ivory tables, and other treasures from her lodgings at Kenninghall. Bess had at her disposal an outer chamber, a bedchamber, and an adjoining garret. Bess herself was taken to London for questioning but was eventually released. At the time her jewellery was returned to her, Bess was identified as living in Mendham, Suffolk. Mary, Duchess of Richmond, Norfolk's daughter, granted her an annuity of £20. It is also known that her eldest brother was called Thomas, because he was involved in a dispute with her husband over her inheritance after her death.
John Holland, of Wortwell Hall, in Redenhall, trustee to the Duke of Norfolk, died 10 February 1542. However, Bernard Henry Holland in The Lancashire Hollands also separates this family of Hollands from that of Elizabeth and her brother George:Another Holland, George, was secretary to the same Duke, when he was arrested for treason in 1547, and the officials found in the house Elizabeth Holland, a mistress of the Duke. But George Holland was certainly one of the Hollands of Estovening, Lincolnshire, and so, probably, was Miss Elizabeth, descendants from Sir Thomas Holland, who mostly lived in the Holy Land, and his wife, Elizabeth, the "devilish dame." In the seventeenth century the Hollands of Quidenham were for two generations trustees of the Howard estates in Norfolk.This other Holland family does have an apparent abundance of Elizabeths and an eldest son named Thomas, but lacks a George, while Thomas Holland of Swinsted did have both a son named George and an eldest son named Thomas.
On 3 July 1551 Thomas Holland of Swynested, Lincolnshire, wrote to Simon Lowe, Citizen and Merchant Scissor-dealer of London, regarding a statute staple for 40 pounds payable to Lowe next Bartholomew-tide. The Gawdy Papers here describes him as "son and heir apparent of Thos. Holland, Esq., sen." This again fits with the father of Thomas and George.
Kate Emerson writes:Jeffrey Miles or Myles of Stoke Nayland, Suffolk, is identified as her husband by Gerard Brenan and Edward Phillips Stratham in The House of Howard (1908), but a hundred years later, the Oxford DNB states that her husband was Henry Reppes of Mendham (1509-February 10, 1558), that she married him in 1547, and that she died in childbirth in 1547/8.This confusion is again due to the mix-up of the two families. This other Holland family did have a daughter called Elizabeth Holland who married Jeffrey Miles of Stoke Nayland, Suffolk, but the Duke of Norfolk's Bess married Henry Reppes.