This is a Cenotaph for Richard Neville. His actual burial is in Bisham Priory
Richard Neville, 5th Earl of Salisbury, was a Yorkist leader during the early parts of the Wars of the Roses.
He was the 3rd son (and tenth child) of Ralph Neville, 1st Earl of Westmorland, Richard was the first child to be born to Ralph's second wife, Joan Beaufort, Countess of Westmoreland. The Neville lands were primarily in Durham and Yorkshire, but both Richard II and Henry IV found the family useful to counterbalance the strength of the Percys on the Scottish Borders. Ralph's marriage to Joan Beaufort, at a time when the distinction between royalty and nobility was becoming more important can be seen as another reward, for as a granddaughter of Edward III she was a member of the royal family.
The children of Earl Ralph's first wife had made good marriages to local nobility, but his Beaufort children married into much greater families. Three of Richard's sisters married dukes (the youngest Cecily, marrying Richard, Duke of York), and Richard himself married Alice Montacute, daughter and heiress of Thomas Montacute, the Earl of Salisbury.
The date of Richard and Alice's marriage is not known, but believed to be before February 1421, when as a married couple they appeared at the coronation of Queen Catherine of Valois. When Earl Thomas Montacute died in 1428, Richard Neville and Alice were confirmed as the Earl and Countess of Salisbury.
From now on, Richard Neville will be referred to as Salisbury.
Salisbury came into possession of greater estates than, as a younger son, he could reasonably have expected. Strangely, his elder half-brother John apparently agreed to many of the rights to the Neville inheritance being transferred to Joan Beaufort — Salisbury would inherit these on her death in 1440. He also gained possession of the lands and grants made jointly to Ralph and Joan. Ralph's heir (his grandson, also called Ralph) disputed the loss of his inheritance, and although the younger Ralph agreed to a settlement in 1443, it was on unequal terms — Salisbury kept the great Neville possessions of Middleham and Sheriff Hutton, as well as the more recent grant of Penrith. Only Raby returned to the senior branch. The Neville-Neville dispute was later to become absorbed into the destructive Percy-Neville feud.
When King Henry tried to assert his independence and dismiss Richard as Protector, Salisbury joined him in fighting at the First Battle of St Albans. After the Battle of Blore Heath, Salisbury escaped to Calais, having been specifically excluded from a royal pardon. He was beheaded the day after the Battle of Wakefield.
His alabaster effigy is in Burghfield Church in Berkshire. He was buried first at Pontefract, but his son transferred his body to the family mausoleum at Bisham Priory and erected this effigy. It was brought to Burghfield after the Dissolution of the Monasteries.
With Alice Montague he fathered ten children:
Cecily Neville, 1424 - 1450, who married Henry de Beauchamp, 1st Duke of Warwick
Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick 1428 - 1471
John Neville, 1st Marquess of Montagu 1431 - 1471
George Neville 1432 - 1476, who became Archbishop of York and Chancellor of England
Joan Neville, 1434 - 1462, who married William FitzAlan, 16th Earl of Arundel
Katherine Neville, 1442 - 1503, who married first William Bonville, 6th Baron Harington and second William Hastings, 1st Baron Hastings
Thomas Neville, 1443 - 1460, who was knighted in 1449 and died at the Battle of Wakefield
Eleanor Neville, 1447 - 1482, who married Thomas Stanley, 1st Earl of Derby
Alice Neville, c. 1450 - 1503, who married Henry FitzHugh, 6th Lord FitzHugh. They were parents of Elizabeth Fitzhugh, grandparents of Sir Thomas Parr of Kendal and great-grandparents of Katherine Parr. Katherine was the sixth Queen consort of Henry VIII of England.
Margaret Neville, c 1450 - 1506, who married John de Vere, 13th Earl of Oxford