Henry Howard's biographer, Jessie Childs, suggests that Surrey's purpose in writing the sonnet was to improve her opportunities of making a good marriage by praising not only her noble ancestry, but also her beauty and virtues.

She was sent to the household of Princess Mary Tudor at Hunsdon following the execution of her half-brother, "Silken Thomas", and her five uncles for treason.

In Donegal, Gerald along with his aunt Lady Eleanor, the new wife of Manus O'Donnell, along with other powerful Irish clans who were related to the FitzGeralds by marriage, formed the Geraldine League.

[citation needed] In 1543, at the age of sixteen, Lady Elizabeth married 60 year old Sir Anthony Browne KG, following the death of his first wife, Alice Gage.

When the plot fails, Lady Elizabeth and her husband manage to regain the trust of Princess Mary, who subsequently becomes queen.

[8] Elizabeth was one of those who, in 1561, had tried to warn Lady Katherine Grey to confess her clandestine marriage to Edward Seymour to the Queen before the latter discovered the truth from other people.

[10] Tudor historian David Starkey concludes that Archbishop Parker considered Lady Elizabeth to have been a "strumpet".

Several years later, in 1569, Lady Elizabeth exercised her husband's rights as Lord High Admiral to seize a ship which had been illegally taken by Martin Frobisher.

It is currently on display at Agecroft Hall, in Richmond, VA. Another portrait, which can be viewed in the National Gallery of Ireland, was painted in about 1575 by an unknown artist.

She is a minor character in Anya Seton's historical romance Green Darkness, which was partially set in mid-16th century England.