The Six Wives & Many Mistresses of Henry VIII

by Amy Licence

  Catherine may have even thought it was all her fault. Certain sexual practices were stigmatised by canon law, such as intercourse during menstruation, on Sundays, the vigils of saints’ feasts, fast days or processional days, before taking the Eucharist, when performing penance and on the days before Ascension. It has been calculated by Debra Hassig that, taking all these prohibited dates into account, couples were only left with forty-four days in the year when sex was considered acceptable, or just under once a week.9

  Catherine and Henry had transgressed a boundary by sleeping together while she was still technically in confinement, in April or May 1510. Having experienced her first miscarriage before entering the lying-in chamber in anticipation of delivering that infant’s twin, she had not been purified by the churching process but had entertained her husband within the all-female sanctuary of the birth chamber. Perhaps it was an act borne out of desperation, or desire for mutual comfort, as the days passed and she had realised she was not about to give birth. To Catherine’s Catholic mind, though, and also perhaps Henry’s, this loss may well have been an indictment of the act of conception. If so, this would have a terrible burden. According to protocol, neither parent was present when their young son was brought to Westminster and buried in the abbey.

  15

  Regent, 1511–13

  The greatest honour that can be.1

  In 1511, perhaps to distract themselves from their loss, Henry and Catherine turned their focus towards Europe. With the model of her warlike parents in mind, the queen would have relished the chance to become part of a military partnership, demonstrating the continuing greatness of the English Crown in a way that also supported her father’s policies. Caroz and Fray Diego were instructed to persuade Catherine to convince Henry to declare war on France. Ferdinand’s next tactic was to appeal directly to his sense of chivalry, pointing out that this was an opportunity to engage in a real battle instead of the mock tournaments and combats he staged for courtly entertainment. It was a challenge issued directly to his manhood. The twenty-year-old king could not resist.

  That November, Henry joined Ferdinand, Emperor Maximilian and the Pope in the Holy League, which had been established as part of the Italian Wars raging between France, Venice and the Pope since 1508. This established a further family connection for Catherine, as Maximilian was the father of Philip the Handsome, her former brother-in-law. Henry and Ferdinand followed this by signing the Treaty of Westminster, to pledge their support against the ‘infidel’ of France. In exchange for invading and defeating the ambitious Louis XII, Pope Julius offered to reward Henry with the French crown. Henry was keen to begin, to gain this illustrious prize as well as the Pope’s good will. In spring 1512, he chose Sir Edward Howard to lead a successful fleet against the French at the Battle of Saint-Mathieu and rewarded him with the position of Lord Admiral. It was a good start, with England’s forces in a safe pair of hands. However, Howard died in March 1513 during a failed attack on a French fleet.

  The campaign on land had not fared any better. In 1512, the first invasion only served to cast shame upon England thanks to a disastrous expedition to Guienne led by the Marquess of Dorset, at which Ferdinand’s promised support did not appear and the unpaid, unfed English soldiers rebelled. This was the point when Catherine stepped in. Acting as the intermediary between the Spanish envoy, Martin de Muxica, and Henry, Catherine upheld her father’s complaint that the English force had been unreliable, rather than blaming him for his abandonment. She stated that Henry was aware ‘how shamefully the English had behaved and was very angry with them’.2 There is no doubt, though, that she was fully supportive of her husband’s authority, stating that it was not proper for her to meet the envoys before their formal reception with the king. Catherine was at Henry’s side when the ambassadors were received a week later, after which the Spaniards witnessed an interrogation of the captains in a sort of mock trial. Liaising with her father, the queen advised Henry and his commons to finance another French invasion and championed the view of the injured Spanish. That month she also made enquiries of the Venetian ambassador about the cost of hiring ships, although she ultimately decided the price they demanded was too high.

  Catherine’s role in this was a significant one. It was a fine line to walk, trying to support her husband’s ambition and reputation but also defend Ferdinand despite his betrayal in signing a treaty with the French. She embraced the role of negotiator, comfortable at the heart of politics on an international scale, mediating with ambassadors, influencing decisions and shaping interpretations of events. No doubt her nationality and her comparative maturity also played a part beside the inexperienced twenty-year-old king. Henry took her advice and overlooked Ferdinand’s failure to support him; that autumn, it was agreed in Parliament that he would lead the expedition in person, ‘with fire and sword’. Just how far was Catherine aware of her father’s real intentions? He had used Henry’s involvement for his own ends, to engage the French while he gained Navarre, and cited English unreliability for his own French alliance. His daughter may have believed his protestations, making her and Henry his dupes and marking a significant act of betrayal and manipulation on his part. If she did suspect, she persisted with her martial policy anyway, perhaps hoping that it would bring England a comparable glory with that which her mother had achieved in Spain.

  That Christmas at Greenwich, the king was keen to remember his Plantagenet roots and how they associated him with the warlike Henry V and Edward IV, who had been successful against the French in both battle and diplomacy. He sat atop a pageant made in the shape of a mountain decorated with broom flowers made from green silk and gold, which was wheeled into the hall and presented to Catherine to celebrate Epiphany. As one of six Lords of the Mount, dressed in crimson velvet set with gold spangles, he descended and danced before taking his place at Catherine’s side for the banquet. They were partners in every sense – on the throne, in the royal bed and, hopefully, on the international stage. And Catherine was soon to be in charge of the country.

  On11 June, Henry appointed his wife ‘Regent and Governess of England, Wales and Ireland during the king’s absence in his expedition against France, for the preservation of the Catholic religion and recovery of his rights’. She was given ‘power to issue commissions of muster’, to give assent to Church elections, to ‘appoint sheriffs, to issue warrants under her sign manual’. John Heron, Treasurer of the Chamber, was instructed to pay ‘any sums of money ordered by the queen … to whatever persons she may appoint, for defence of the kingdom’.3

  Catherine left Greenwich with Henry four days later, at the head of 600 guards dressed in new costumes of green and white, with silver spangles and embroidery. They made a leisurely progress through Kent, arriving at Canterbury on 20 June, where they went to the cathedral to pray and make offerings to St Thomas. The minutes of the Chamber of Canterbury recorded that they stayed in the tent, or pavilion, at Blean, the royal forest overlooking the city, which was the final stopping point on the pilgrims’ route. It was Catherine’s first visit and she was presented with a cup of silver and gilt, weighing over thirty-one ounces and engraved with the city’s arms. A local man, John Alcocke, was paid for the cup, at 4s 10d per ounce. Coins to the value of £13 6s 8d filled the cup, as an additional gift. The king’s trumpeters, herald at arms, henchmen and footmen each received 6s 8d and Catherine’s footmen were rewarded with 5s each. Additionally, 10d was given ‘to a person going to Ashford, to provide two great oxen to be presented to the king’.4 On 28 June, Henry and Catherine arrived at Dover Castle, where Henry tarried ‘only for a wind to cross’ to Calais. They spent the night there before Henry set sail, arriving at 7 p.m. the same day. Catherine was now in charge of England. She was also pregnant again.

  Despite her condition, it was Henry’s health and welfare that concerned Catherine. Without an heir, his loss would be catastrophic for the country and she wrote to her sister-in-law Margaret of Savoy, on 1 August, asking her to send a physicia
n to her husband, to be with him in case of need. She also wrote to Henry’s trusted almoner and Privy Councillor, Thomas Wolsey, hoping he would put her mind ‘at rest’, by relaying news of the king’s welfare. Wolsey did write to Catherine ‘so often’, for which ‘payne’ she thanked him in her replies. In the meantime she continued to run the country to the best of her ability, with the assistance of Archbishop Warham. News soon came of an initial victory at the Battle of the Spurs, which Catherine described as the greatest victory: ‘none such hath been seen before’.5 She was also ‘very glad to hear [of] the meeting’ between Henry and the Emperor on 11 August, which took place in a tent of cloth of gold, with Henry dressed in gold, with golden bells hanging from his horse, in contrast with the Emperor’s mourning attire.6 Soon after this, Henry achieved another success by taking Therouanne, then moved on to lay siege to Tournai.

  Henry had been in France for a month or so when rumours reached Catherine that the Scots were planning to take advantage of his absence and invade England. King James IV was Catherine’s brother-in-law; she had been a young widow when he had been married by proxy to Henry’s sister Margaret, at Richmond in January 1503. Now James was compromised by Henry’s entry into the Holy League, being bound by treaties to both England and France. In the end, James drew up his will naming Margaret as regent for their infant son and marched south to invade. His first troops crossed the border on 13 August. Catherine ordered that the property of all Scotsmen in England was to be seized. Then she summoned Sir Thomas Lovell and the Earl of Surrey, with his sons Edmund and Thomas Howard, to muster armies and ordered the standard to be raised on 3 September. As regent and queen, her role was one that required her to adopt a traditional female role, being ‘horribly busy making standards, banners and badges’ while at the same time taking on Henry’s job as king, locked away in talks with the royal council, preparing to defend the country. She was certainly determined to look the part, as the royal goldsmith, Robert Amadas, was paid for ‘garnishing a headpiece with a gold crown’.7

  Catherine headed north, perhaps with the intention of speaking to her men herself, as the Venetian ambassador recorded, but she did not get that far. Heavily pregnant, it seems unlikely that she would have risked her unborn child by riding onto the field of battle when she had the competent Surrey and his sons to rely on. If she did make a ‘splendid oration to the captains … in imitation of her mother’, as her old tutor, Peter Martyr, related, she must have done it in London before they departed, not anywhere near the location in Northumberland, where the armies were about to clash. When the Battle of Flodden Field took place, on 9 September, at Branxton, she was three hundred miles away at Woburn Abbey, waiting to hear the outcome. Eventually news came and Catherine forwarded Surrey’s letter to Tournai. As Henry later described to the Duke of Milan, ‘the fight was long and sharply contested on both sides, but at length the Almighty, avenging the broken treaty, gave victory to the English’.8 Among the dead was James IV, his body ‘having been found and recognised and taken to the nearest church. He thus paid a heavier penalty for his perfidy than we [Henry and Catherine] could have wished.’9

  For Catherine, though, it was a triumph, and she described it to ‘my Henry’, as ‘the most happy that can be remembered’.10 She had wanted to send Henry the battered body of the dead king as a trophy of war, but, recognising that this was offensive to English sensibilities, she opted instead to dispatch his bloodstained coat, to be put to use as a banner. The cross which James had been wearing, enclosing a fragment of the true cross, was kept in the royal treasury. In turn, ‘as a present’11 Henry sent his wife a French prisoner, the Duc de Longueville, Charles d’Orleans, cousin to Louis XII. He was lodged in the Tower during her absence, with an entourage of six, at a cost of £13 6s and 8d.12 From Woburn Abbey, she set out to Walsingham on 16 September to give thanks for the victory and her pregnancy.

  16

  Etiennette de la Baume, 1513

  From Dover to Calais, with willing mind

  Lo! How desire is both sprung and spent

  And he may see, that whilom was so blind.1

  Across the Channel, Henry was amusing himself with more than just martial feats. On 10 September, he arrived in Lille, at the court of Margaret of Savoy, riding in pomp and triumphantly displaying the fleur-de-lys badge of France. In spite of the pressing campaign, he managed to stay overnight in the city, lodged in ‘the palace of the Prince’, which is likely to have been the Palais Rihour. This palace had been completed in 1477 by the Emperor’s father-in-law, Charles the Bold, and was a huge quadrangle of a building, of which only a section remains. The part that still stands, though, is an impressive fifteenth-century staircase, giving a flavour of the palace stairs where Margaret of Savoy is recorded as meeting Henry, making ‘deep reverence’.

  The English king was lodged in four rooms hung with Margaret’s tapestries, all worked with gold, and slept on a bed of gold, decorated with the arms of Spain. It is not impossible that he had some company between those golden sheets. At dinner, both host and guest began eating in their separate chambers, but Margaret rose ‘from the banquet in her quarter, took her plate with her and went to sup with the king, accompanied by some of her principal damsels, notably Madame the Bastard. Madame clearly captivated Henry as he danced with her from the time the banquet finished until nearly day, in his shirt and without shoes.’2 That night, he presented ‘them’, which suggests the ladies collectively, with a ‘beautiful diamond in a setting of great value’.3

  Who was this mysterious Madame the Bastard, who kept Henry dancing, half-undressed, until almost dawn? The chances are that she was descended from one of Margaret’s two great-uncles, making her of dubious but royal blood. The illegitimate Anthony and Corneille, known as the Bastards of Burgundy, both fathered children, with Corneille’s son Jean siring two daughters before his death in 1479. These were probably too old to qualify for the Madame who captured Henry’s attention, but they may have borne children of their own. However, some research has suggested that Margaret’s great-grandfather, Philip III, fathered at least eighteen children outside marriage and had over twenty mistresses. The lady who kept Henry up all night may well have been one of their line. The siege of Tournai began the next day and, after enjoying archery, jousting and more music making, Henry eventually visited the town on 13 September. It fell to the English ten days later.

  The good news delighted Queen Catherine. She had reached Walsingham on 23 September, from where she made her way back to London to await the return of her husband and the arrival of her child. Exactly what happened in the following weeks is unclear, but on 8 October the Imperial agent James Bannisius reported that ‘the Queen of England had given birth to a son’.4 According to this version of events and that of Venetian ambassador, de Favri, the child was born alive but died soon afterwards. Some accounts date his arrival earlier, to 17 September, but this is unlikely given Catherine’s pilgrimage to Walsingham a week later – she would still have been in the traditional period of confinement and recovery, even if the child was lost. If she had experienced a miscarriage, her doctors would have advised her against travelling again so soon. Given her movements, it would appear that the child was premature, as she had not yet entered confinement, and that he was born and died early in October, probably on the same day. Catherine must have felt this third loss keenly. A veil of silence descended at court. The lack of reports of her loss has led some to speculate that she was not even pregnant at all. Indeed, the last seven or eight months must have seemed strangely unreal for her as, once again, she had no healthy baby to show for her efforts.

  Henry was still in Tournai on 12 October, with Margaret of Savoy, Charles of Castile and ‘divers’ other nobles as his guests, when he wrote to the Pope stating that he ‘must return to England’ and had summoned a parliament for 1 November.5 The following day, the beleaguered town received notice of his departure. They were probably pleased to see him go but Henry had a final parting gift. Before he dep
arted, he passed an order forbidding the defeated people to ‘make, sing or utter libels in the form of songs, ballads or otherwise against kings or princes’. With that, he left the battlefield again in pursuit of pleasure. The party had reached Lille again by 16 October, where Wolsey settled payments to stewards, cooks, clerks and others including £20 to ‘the gentlewomen called watchers of my lady’s chamber’ and £40 to Sir Thomas Boleyn, the king’s future father-in-law. That summer, Margaret had acquired a new maid of honour who may have been present in her retinue when she met Henry. The maid was a dark-haired English girl of twelve years named Anne Boleyn. If she was there, Anne would have seen the tone of the festivities turn flirtatious, with Henry’s close friend Charles Brandon conducting an ardent game to woo the widowed Margaret and stealing a ring from her finger under the pretence of an engagement. Unsurprisingly, his proposal came to nothing, but the English court had victories to celebrate and the lavish parties would have provided them with plenty of young and attractive women with whom to play the games of courtly love.

  On Sunday 16 October, Henry heard divine service with Margaret of Savoy and his teenaged nephew Charles, the Prince of Castile, who was betrothed to his sister Mary.6 Two days later, he took part in the jousts for which the knights were dressed in purple velvet and a tent of cloth of gold was erected; there were ‘many speres broken and many a good buffet given’, after which the jousters unmasked and rode about the tilt yard ‘and did great reverence to the ladies’.7 The following day, Henry hosted a ‘sumptuous’ banquet of a hundred dishes for Charles and Margaret after which the ladies danced with men masked in ‘bonnets’ of gold and ‘passed the time at their pleasure’. Perhaps Henry danced again with Madame the Bastard, or it may be that this was the moment that another woman caught his eye.8