Aldgate, and by the end of 1577, she had been rehabilitated to the extent that she was appointed one of the Queen's Maids of Honour. Death In April 1578, while plague was raging in London, Mary became ill and drew up her will. She left her mother's jewels to her step-grandmother, the Duchess of Suffolk, gifts of plate to Lady Arundell and to Adrian Stokes's wife, and money to her godchild, Mary Merrick, a granddaughter of her late husband, Thomas Keyes. She died three days later on 20 April 1578, aged 33. The Queen granted her an imposing funeral in Westminster Abbey, with the Duchess of Suffolk's daughter Susan Bertie, now Countess of Kent, as chief mourner. She was buried in her mother's tomb in the Abbey, where her grave is still unmarked. In spite of the intrigues involving her sisters, it does not appear that Mary Grey ever made a serious claim to the throne. After her death, according to the terms of Henry VIII's will, the chief claimant became Margaret Stanley, Countess of Derby, the only surviving child of Eleanor Brandon, second daughter of Henry VIII's younger sister, Mary Tudor. Ancestry Cultural depictions Mary is the main character of Philippa Gregory's The Last Tudor (2016), the final instalment in The Plantagenet and Tudor Novels. Leanda de Lisle's biography The Sisters Who Would Be Queen: Mary, Katherine, and Lady Jane Grey; A Tudor Tragedy was published in 2009 and was a NY Times bestseller. De Lisle recounted the stories and fates of Lady Jane (the "Nine Days Queen"), Katherine, and Mary, and shed new light on Elizabeth I's reign as well. Notes References Profile of Mary Grey, britannia.com; accessed 27 March 2014. Thomas Keyes (1524-1571) profile, History of Parliament website; accessed 27 March 2014. 1540s births 1578 deaths 16th-century deaths from plague (disease) 16th-century English nobility 16th-century English women Daughters of English dukes English royalty Mary Grey Brandon family Burials at Westminster Abbey Date of birth unknown