Shortly before 1 June 1470, she married Sir Richard Hastings, a committed supporter of the House of York.
A month later, on 25 April 1470, the King seized Sir Robert Welles' lands, but on 1 June 1470, granted them to Joan and her now husband, Sir Richard Hastings, giving them licence to enter all the lands 'which on the death of her father and brother, both tenants-in-chief, should descend to her'.
The exact date of her death is not known; however she likely died shortly before her father and brother were attainted, five years after their executions, by the Parliament of January–March 1475.
[5][4][6] According to some historians, the attainders were passed by Parliament in order to enable Edward IV to grant Joan Welles' lands after her death to her husband, 'the trusted Yorkist Sir Richard Hastings',[7] and accordingly, on 23 January 1475, the King granted Hastings a life interest in the greater part of the Welles and Willoughby estates.
In compensation, however, it was enacted in the same year that Hastings should be entitled, for life, to all the lands which had belonged to Joan Welles' father.