Brooke, Thomas Wyatt: J. A. Wagner, The Devon Gentleman, p. 164. 125
strangers and papists: Ellis, Letters Illustrative, Vol. II, pp. 187, 188.
above personal ambition: Knighton (ed.), CSPD Mary, p. 42.
XIII: A FATAL REVOLT
of the Mass: Reestablished by royal proclamation on 15 December.
the Catholic faith: Original Letters Relative to the English Reformation, Vol. I, p. 365.
unto Christ’s war: Foxe quoted at www.hri.shef.ac.uk.
and release Jane: Lord Thomas Grey was later accused of carrying messages to Elizabeth shortly before the revolt, and John Harington, the servant who had helped Sudeley arrange Jane’s wardship, also did so on Suffolk’s behalf, although nothing found incriminated Elizabeth. It is possible that Jane, being out of contact with the rebels, believed, when she learned of the revolt, that her father wished to put her back on the throne. This was what the Marian regime was saying, and before her death she told her sister that if their father had been successful, she (that is, Katherine) would have inherited their father’s lands. Jane as Queen would have had royal lands instead. But it is as likely that she said this because she thought that regardless of whether her father won or lost, she would die. If this was the case, she may have believed he was being reckless. Her last letter to her father is ambiguous on this point. It observed that God had decided to hasten her death at the hands of one “by whom my life should rather have been lengthened” (Strickland, Tudor Princesses, p. 176).
Jane’s wardship: D. M. Loades, Two Tudor Conspiracies, p. 26.
him to court: Knighton (ed.), CSPD Mary, p. 42.
“fast and go”: Nichols, Chronicle of Queen Jane, p. 25.
his way north: CSPD, Vol. I, p. 28.
“Dudley her husband”: Ibid., p. 44.
in Suffolk’s support: This was a former close associate of Parr of Northampton, called Robert Palmer.
his own servants: Loades, Two Tudor Conspiracies, pp. 28, 29.
Suffolk’s secretaries: Thomas Rampton.
“destroyed this night”: Merton, “The Women Who Served,” p. 85.
letters for Suffolk: Nichols (ed.), Machyn, p. 54.
“show me favour”: H. W. Chapman, Lady Jane Grey, p. 190. According to Michel Angelo Florio, Jane wrote three aphorisms in Latin, Greek, and English. They were: “If justice is done with my body, my soul will find mercy with God.” “Death will give pain to my body for its sins, but the soul will be justified before God.” “If my faults deserve punishment, my youth at least, and my imprudence were worthy of excuse; God and posterity will show me favour.”
“daughter, Jane Dudley”: Strickland, Tudor Princesses, p. 179.
army in person: Nichols, Chronicle of Queen Jane, p. 42.
“wonderful to hear”: Ibid., p. 49.
“may stand fast”: www.hrionline.shef.ac.uk/foxe. I have modernized the English to make it easier to read.
recorded for posterity: Recorded by the polemicist John Bale.
“of your heart”: Foxe, Acts and Monuments, Vol. VI, pp. 415, 416, 417. Also www.hrionline.shef.ac.uk/foxe.
“like the devil”: Ponet in Hudson, Ponet, p. 134.
“sharp and cruel execution”: Nichols, Chronicle of Queen Jane, p. 54. Ponet in Hudson, Ponet, p. 134.
Jane concluded: Strickland, Tudor Princesses, p. 177.
“sister, Jane Dudley”: Ibid., pp. 187–89. The letter echoed the language of the letter she had once received enclosing the gift of a book of Basil the Great, and of letters she had sent, notably that to Harding, as well as the lessons of her youth.
sent to Jane: It may or may not have actually occurred, but the story is certainly in keeping with what we know of Jane and Guildford.
“by indissoluble ties”: Malfatti, Marriage of Mary Tudor, pp. 48, 49.
off his head: Nichols, Chronicle of Queen Jane, pp. 54, 55.
“of in heaven!”: In my description of this scene, with Jane addressing Guildford’s body, I have drawn from Michel Angelo Florio, but he was writing some time after the event and at second hand. I wonder if it isn’t more likely that she spoke these words in her rooms to her ladies after she heard the drums roll and the shouts of the crowd as Guildford’s head fell. As a Protestant she would have believed that he was going straight to heaven (or hell), and so might not have addressed his spirit many minutes later. Eyewitness reports do not mention her speaking as she sees Guildford being carried into the chapel. If it took place in private, her words could have been relayed to, for example, James Haddon, the family chaplain and friend of Florio’s. While it is also possible, of course, that the entire speech is invented, in its favor is the fact that it echoes Jane’s sentiments about Guildford as expressed in her letter to her father: that is, that he, like her, was a martyr.
“friend, Jane Dudley”: Nichols, Chronicle of Queen Jane, pp. 56, 57; www.bl.co.uk/onlinegallery; Harris, Literary Remains, pp. 58, 59. The prayer on this page, which can be seen in the endpapers of this book, is the Te Deum, which in legend was composed by St. Ambrose for St. Augustine’s baptism.
“she ended”: Ibid., pp. 58, 59.
PART THREE
HEIRS TO ELIZABETH
XIV: AFTERMATH
that of Guildford: Ponet in Hudson, Ponet, p. 61.
members of the guard: Ibid., p. 62; Nichols (ed.), Machyn, p. 55.
unsettling the crown: J. H. Baker, Reports from the Lost Notebooks of Sir James Dyer, Vol. I, p. 10.
country from strangers: Loades, Two Tudor Conspiracies, p. 103.
behind his actions: Ibid., p. 30.
“heavy and pensive”: Nichols, Chronicle of Queen Jane, p. 60.
“to move him”: Robinson, Original Letters, Vol. I, p. 305.
Suffolk’s religious beliefs: Such sermons were commonplace at the executions of heretics and religious dissidents in Henry VIII’s time. This scene does not appear in the earlier Nichols, Chronicle of Queen Jane, however, and what follows concerning the scuffle is drawn from Foxe.
with one stroke: www.hrionline.ac.uk/foxe/single/book10/101570_1637 and Nichols, Chronicle of Queen Jane, pp. 63, 64.
rebellion and heresy: CSPS, Vol. XII, p. 94.
“[to lose] his head”: Loades, Two Tudor Conspiracies, p. 104.
for their lives: David Starkey, Elizabeth, pp. 145, 146, 147.
Bullinger in Zurich: Robinson, Original Letters, Vol. 1, pp. 304, 365. Translations by John Banks.
called John Day: John Day claimed he had the originals in the printed introduction to the letters.
by John Knox: For a fuller account of this story see Elizabeth Evendon, “The Michael Wood Mystery,” pp. 383–94; see also www.hrionline.shef.ac.uk/foxe.
reign of Queen Mary: David Loades (ed.), John Foxe and the English Reformation, p. 18.
“now safe enough?”: Evelyn Read, Catherine, Duchess of Suffolk, pp. 99–100.
and wild beast: CPR, 1553–54, p. 106.
Queen, Mary Brandon: Herrick MSS, Leicester, DG9/79, Misc. 4th series, 1980, Vol. 2, p. 215.
the bossy Margaret: Her bossiness is well described in Richard Smith’s biography of her younger brother, Sir Francis Willoughby.
oranges and olives: Merton, “Women Who Served,” pp. 19, 80, 81.
rich mulberry reds: A. Carter, “Mary Tudor’s Wardrobe,” p. 15; Merton, “Women Who Served,” p. 67.
perfectly proportioned: Nichols, Chronicle of Queen Jane, p. 166.
25 July 1554: The descriptions of Katherine’s attendance in Richard Davey’s The Sisters of Lady Jane Grey are inaccurate—he may have confused sources with those concerning Elizabeth’s coronation.
fluted gold: Nichols, Chronicle of Queen Jane, p. 166.
them to Philip’s: Ibid., p. 169.
at one another: Malfatti, Marriage of Mary Tudor, pp. 85–88. CSPS, Vol. XII, p. 297. For Underhill’s description, see, for example, Tytler, Edward VI and Mary, ii p. 416.
“of evil conversation”: CSPS, Vol. XIII, p. 33.
&nbs
p; and cupids: David Loades, Intrigue and Treason, The Tudor Court 1547–1558, p. 189.
in the stonework: It is possible it was the name of Jane, Duchess of Northumberland, but I incline to Jane Grey, who they knew was to die, and whom they had served loyally as Queen.
Dudley brothers performed: The elder brother, John, died shortly after his release.
himself to danger: C. C. Stopes, Shakespeare’s Environment, p. 254; Alan Young, Tudor and Jacobean Tournaments, p. 31.
released in April: CSPS, Vol. XIII, p. 166.
at the time: Devon Record Office, Petre 123M/TP22, TP24, and TP25–26. Leicester’s Commonwealth, p. 75 (www.oxford-shakespeare.com/new_files_dec_21/Leicesters_Commonwealth.pdf).
“perfect” daughter Jane: The Spanish comment on Frances’s possible marriage to Courtney was written on 22 April 1555. As Renard was very close to Mary the quality of imperial gossip was high and it may well be that Frances was married to Stokes after this date and not in March at all. There is no contemporary manuscript that mentions March 1555 that I have seen, although plenty of secondary sources quote a March date (though they differ on the precise day).
highly educated Protestant: Stokes was born on 4 March 1519, and Frances on 16 July 1517. Stokes had served as Marshal of Newhaven in 1546, alongside Lord John Grey, and the following year was plaintiff in a court case for trespass in the Great Park of Brigstock. He made distinguished friends such as the antiquary and Anglo-Saxonist Laurence Nowell, and later gained a reputation for being among the hotter sorts of Protestant (Notes and Queries, March 2000, p. 28; Notes and Queries, 11th series, Vol. V, p. 26).
found with Stokes: The alleged comments about Frances were, in fact, made about Elizabeth by Catherine de Medici in 1560, when it looked as if Elizabeth might marry Robert Dudley, her Master of the Horse. Elizabeth’s only reported comment on Frances’s marriage was made in the spring of 1561. “What,” Elizabeth asked the Spanish ambassador, would King Philip “think if she married one of her servitors as the Duchesses of Suffolk [Frances and Katherine] and the Duchess of Somerset had done?” (CSPS, Vol. I, 1558–67, p. 182). Snobbish comments were made about the Stokes marriage in Leicester’s Commonwealth, but this was a Catholic polemic and its authors weren’t likely to have anything good to say about Frances. Frances’s marriage to Stokes at this time suggests that she may have played a role in 1553 in the rumor that Jane had been betrothed to a lowly member of Gardiner’s household.
XV: GROWING UP
gossip and play: Add MSS 33749, f. 84.
was not pregnant: Carter, “Mary Tudor’s Wardrobe,” p. 18.
“of admirable beauty”: Sir John Hayward, Annals of the First Four Years, p. 7.
the Queen’s heir: CSPV, Vol. VI, p. 107.
on his friends: The mastermind was Northumberland’s kinsman Henry Dudley, who was actually more closely related to the Greys—he was Suffolk’s first cousin.
to Edward Courtney: www.tudorplace.co.ar/documents/Dudley_conspiracy.
put to death: Wyatt, Italian Encounter, pp. 122, 123.
household at Hatfield: HMC Salisbury, Vol. I, p. 139n, at Christmas 1555.
Parr of Northampton: In March 1555.
of Mary Grey’s: Thomas Stafford’s sister, Dorothy, then in exile, is mentioned in Mary Grey’s will.
France in June: The exposure of plots encouraged by agents provocateurs was to be used highly successfully against Catholics later in the century. Perhaps the Protestants had learned from their enemies.
with their mother: CSPV, Vol. 6, Part II, p. 1077.
tens of thousands: Up to eighteen percent of the population succumbed to sickness or hunger in 1557 and 1558, the highest death rate recorded in England between 1540 and 1740 (R. A. Houlbrooke, Death, Religion and Family in England 1480–1750, p. 6).
she to die: Stephen Alford, Burghley: William Cecil at the Court of Elizabeth I, p. 80.
“touching marriage”: Add MSS 33749, ff. 47, 66.
“express commandment”: Ibid., f. 47.
sweet music playing: Clifford, Jane Dormer, p. 70.
in its hands: Such images were used even in the funeral of the nobility and of bishops: Stephen Gardiner had one at his funeral.
to the ground: Strype, Memorials, Vol. II, Part II, pp. 141–42.
“a young lass”: Winthrop S. Hudson, The Cambridge Connection, p. 18.
XVI: THE SPANISH PLOT
in shirtsleeves: Wyatt, Italian Encounter, p. 123. CSPV, Vol. VII, p. 12.
gentry had access: We know only that Frances and Mary were not listed for livery.
“clear the air”: Hoak, “Coronations,” p. 131.
“their coat armour”: J. R. Planche, Regal Records, p. 35.
“their own conditions”: The advice of Bess Hardwick’s descendant the Duke of Newcastle to the restored King Charles II (Andy Wood, Riot, Rebellion and Popular Politics, p. 27).
“in scarlet damask”: CSPV, Vol. VII, p. 12.
“chains of gold”: Planche, Regal Records, p. 35.
lush, green mount: CSPV, Vol. VII, p. 14.
Cecil that year: Margaret J. Beckett, “The Political Works of John Leslie Bishop of Ross,” p. 147.
“court of parliament”: Aylmer’s Faithful and trew subjects was published in April by John Day, the man who had published Jane’s writings from his secret press on Cecil’s estate in 1554.
“of her people”: Hoak, “Coronations,” pp. 139, 140, 141.
Elizabeth’s likely replacement: It is notable also that the Greys were close relations or friends of the leaders of both the invasion attempts during Queen Mary’s reign.
of the crown: Jennifer Loach, “The Function of Ceremonial in the Reign of Henry VIII,” p. 44.
“to an end”: CSPV, Vol. VII, p. 17.
of his counsel: It is believed to have been the same or similar to that revised for Edward VI (Stephen Alford, “The Political Creed of William Cecil,” p. 9).
“a thousand greetings”: Ibid.
“offended at this”: CSPS, Vol. I, p. 45.
“of the Queen”: CSPF, Vol. II, p. 2.
without his consent: CSPS, Vol. I, p. 45; CSPF, Vol. II, p. 2.
affection for Katherine: HMC Bath, Vol. IV, p. 131.
called for the countess: Clifford, Jane Dormer, pp. 108, 109.
and loving talk: CSPF, Vol. II, p. 422.
“would come thereof”: Add MSS 37749, f. 83.
passionately and deeply: Ibid., f. 56.
“music, till midnight”: John Nichols, The Progresses and Public Processions of Queen Elizabeth, Vol. I, p. 74.
courage and piety: Foxe had been living with their friend Norfolk, who was married to Katherine’s first cousin Margaret Audley.
“the Lady Katherine”: Add MSS 37749, f. 57. Stokes recalled it as being in October; it was certainly not March, as suggested by Agnes Strickland, Richard Davey, and followers (Add MSS 37749, ff. 57, 75).
XVII: BETROTHAL
“stopping of the spleen”: CSPD, Vol. I, p. 254.
“follow the same”: Add MSS 37749, f. 75.
“the more quietly”: Add MSS 37749, f. 74.
to marry Hertford: Add MSS 37749, f. 57.
made her executor: Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica, 4th Series, Vol. 2, pp. 215, 216 (1908). Her will was proved on 28 November.
“consanguinity unto us”: Harris, Literary Remains, p. cxvii (note).
in the elements: Roger Bower, “The Chapel Royal,” p. 342; the use of the cross was also allowed.
by an usher: Arundel 35, ff. 5–9: “the chief mourner, the Lady Katherine, daughter to the said Duchess, defunct.” It was unusual to have an immediate member of the family playing such a role, but the other royals, Margaret Lennox and Margaret Strange, were both Catholic.
of the choir: Nichols, The Progresses and Public Processions of Queen Elizabeth, Vol. I, pp. 80, 81.
“bred my woe”: HMC Bath, Vol. IV, p. 178.
your enemies closer: CSPS, Vol. I, 1558–67, p. 122.
Mary of Guise: The civil war was fueled, in large part, by the desire of the rebel lairds to keep their feudal powers and private armies against the wishes of a centralizing monarchy. But Protestantism, which offered a useful tag for some rebels, was a genuine ideological commitment to others.
gospel of Christ: Alford, “Political Creed,” p. 13.
of Plantagenet descent: CSPS, Vol. I, p. 122; HMC Salisbury, Vol. I, p. 197.
“come to pass”: CSPF, Vol. III, p. 312.
with Hertford’s sister: M. Le Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove, Relations Politiques des Pays-Bas et de L’Angleterre, Vol. II, p. 608n.
Lord Robert dead: CSPS, Vol. I, p. 175.
Earl of Arundel: Thomas Hoby, A Booke of the Travaile and Lief of Me, Vol. X, p. 128.
de Quadra reported: CSPS, Vol. I, 1558–67, p. 176.
of her claim: Ibid. Cecil tried to lure the Spanish back toward Katherine by suggesting what an excellent idea it would be for them to find her a groom since she “would succeed by virtue of the will of King Henry.” But de Quadra called his bluff by enquiring if Elizabeth would name Katherine her heir and end all dispute on the matter. “Certainly not,” Cecil was forced to admit, “because, as the saying is, the English run after the heir to the crown, more than after the present wearer of it.” This is before Elizabeth’s famous 1561 speech on the succession in which she reiterated this saying.
Frances Mewtas: The daughter of Sir Peter Mewtas, who had been a keen supporter of Jane’s accession in 1553.
“next to London”: Add MSS 37749, ff. 58, 49.
“their hands together”: Add MSS 37749, f. 49.
“pointed diamond ring”: Harley 611, f. 1A. Exactly such a ring was listed among the jewels Jane Grey had as Queen in the Tower, and these had included many jewels worn previously by the Duchess of Somerset. The particular “ring of gold with a pointed diamond” may have been returned to her and then passed to her son, Hertford.
XVIII: A KNOT OF SECRET MIGHT
business they had: Intriguingly, Fortescue was a former servant of Cardinal Pole.
The Sisters Who Would Be Queen Page 38