Tudor Queen, Tudor Crown

by Jennifer Peter Woods

  Beloved, for her obliging nature, for her accommodation of the king’s whims and for freeing him from the shackles of their vows, Anne was now ‘Most Beloved’ indeed. And in changing her title from ‘wife’ to ‘sister’ Anne of Cleves had managed to gain the love and ever lasting esteem of Henry the king.

  ‘God send me well to keep,’ ran the lady’s motto and she had done well, living according to her principals. The lady was to be soundly congratulated. Mary applauded her. Anne of Cleves had known when to stand her ground and when to give way. The king would forever remember her and think upon her fondly as the woman who gave him leave to pursue his happiness.

  Happiness and lust, Mary wanted to sneer. Her father had fallen and fallen deep into the abyss.

  He was the Head of the Church of England, but Henry was still a mortal. One day he would have to answer to a power greater than his own and when the time came, Mary feared her father would find little favor in God’s eyes.

  The populace of this realm was suffering and they were suffering because of him. The people had been turned away from the One True Faith and Mary’s heart bled for them. How could good Englishman and women find salvation when their king is leading them astray?

  Her mind turned and turned upon these matters, and though she kept quiet, what she saw had served to strengthen her convictions. With Cromwell and Cranmer by her father’s side, the reforms to the Church were gaining greater and greater momentum. Each law and act passed through Parliament served to entrench the new church as well as her father’s powers even further. Though the Duke of Norfolk and Bishops Gardiner and Bonner fought to rein in the changes in Parliament, they were powerless against her father’s matchless powers.

  But we have had a victory, let us rejoice in that at least, she reminded herself.

  Sweeping her eyes coldly over her father’s fifteen-year old bride, Mary wondered if the girl knew. Thomas Cromwell, the Earl of Essex had been executed on Katherine Howard’s wedding day.

  Cromwell’s death had been a victory for Norfolk, his friends as well as the Catholic cause. For far too long, Cromwell had been her father’s man.

  He had helped her father rid himself of Katherine of Aragon. He had paved the way for the creation of Henry’s Church, drawing up the edicts and laws, helping to institute every change. The son of a wool merchant, Cromwell’s way to his earldom had been paved with blood. From the king’s queens to the brutal suppression of every opposition toward the king’s new church, Cromwell had shown himself to be as wily as he was ruthless.

  His last great gamble however had proved to be his undoing.

  He was the one who found the king Anne of Cleves. He had played the queen-maker but the king hadn’t liked the wife the Earl of Essex had procured for him. Seizing their chance, those waiting to pounce on his mistakes closed in.

  If Cromwell thought his services to the crown and his loyalty to the king would save him from the scaffold, he was wrong.

  He died by the order of the king on the twenty-eighth day of July. While her father donned his bridal garb, Cromwell met his end on the Tower Green. He had outlived his usefulness to the king and so his head was made to roll.

  Some had praised him as a champion of the Protestant cause, saying that he would be well received in heaven, but Mary doubted the man instrumental to closing some eight hundred houses of God on earth would be met with a resounding welcome in heaven. True, her father’s royal coffers had been swelled by the transferring of the tithes from the Papal Seat to his privy purse, but they had little good to show for it. The poor now had no place to go to for charity, shelter or guidance.

  The lands and estates of the Church were now her father’s to tithe and bestow upon his friends. The monies from the monasteries were being used to procure his new queen costly jewels and sumptuous gowns.

  Great wrongs are being done in this land. Many had uttered the words over and over, and in her heart Mary knew it to be true. She gritted her teeth. For Cromwell was not the only one to die. I have suffered a loss too, a painful defeat.

  Her Lady Salisbury had been executed. Dead and gone, lamented Mary, yet another who I have loved, taken from me by my father’s hand.

  Mary had been stunned. Her father bore the Lady and her children no love, but she never imagined that he would force upon the woman such a senseless death.

  Lady Salisbury had been one of the last of the Plantagenets. She was the daughter of the Duke of Clarence, the brother of Edward IV. The lady had been cousin to the king’s own mother, Elizabeth of York.

  All her life, Lady Salisbury had lived by the strictest of virtues. She was venerated and respected. She had served Henry’s first queen, then his daughter, before retiring to the country to live a quiet life.

  A proud lady, faithful and true, Mary remembered her. She stood for everything honest and righteous, only to be decried as a heretic snake.

  Lady Salisbury had been arrested some two and a half years before. With no crime to her name she was kept in the Tower until it pleased the king to dispatch her.

  Mary had thought Lady Salisbury safe. One day soon, she was certain, Margaret de la Pole would be released. But no such pardon ever came. When it had finally pleased her father, he, under the pretext of heresy had ordered Margaret de la Pole to be put to death.

  Old and frail, Margaret at almost seventy years of age was advised of her execution an hour before they made her laid her head down on the block.

  It was a farce. Mary recalled the words, writ upon the letter sent to her as she stared hard at her father.

  The Lady Salisbury was led from her cell. She had stumbled, confused. When she saw the block and the executioner, she cried out, decrying the injustice being done unto her.

  The Lady had refused to kneel, protesting her innocence. But the king’s order was final. The lady had to die. Dragged by many hands then held down so that she bent her head over the block, she was forced to submit to the will of the king…

  Lady Salisbury was innocent. Mary believed it, knew it and felt it in the very depths of her bones. The woman who loved her, who treated her with such care, who taught her how to form her letters and say her prayers was guilty of nothing. But the sorry tale did not end there. Nay, the bumbling executioner had been too green to know what he was about. He made a mess of Lady Salisbury, hacking away at her neck and her shoulders a multitude of times before he used the edge of the axe to saw through her neck… Vividly, Mary’s mind summoned forth the words describing the death of Lady Salisbury.

  Her eyes on her father, she watched his smiling face, his smile chilling her to the bone. Beside him, the Howard girl laughed, giggling gaily at his words.

  Belatedly, Mary stood to attention.

  You must be a good mother to my children, he told the girl.

  I will your majesty, the young girl dutifully replied, her eyes dancing nervously.

  The king clicked his fingers, urging his children to embrace Katherine Howard. Edward, guided by Lady Bryan was the first to come forward.

  Katherine bent down, opening her arms to the child. Edward gave her the requisite hug but her many jewels abraded his cheek and the boy cried out, sticking his thumb in his mouth, turning away from his new mother to seek the consoling arms of Lady Bryan. Next, Elizabeth stepped forward. Her embrace with Katherine Howard was stiff and brief though they were cousins, sharing the same Howard blood.

  Mary was determined not to suffer such an outrage. She stood stock still, refusing to go to the new queen. She turned to her father and spoke-

  I am afraid I do not have the disposition for such intimacy, Mary proclaimed in an attempt to escape the task, I would however, she bit, humbly offer my hand to the queen.

  How now Mary, her father’s eyes met hers, eyes so like her own. You would do well to improve your disposition.

  She sank low into a curtsey and for a brief instant she thought she saw her father’s eyes soften. She bowed her head. A long pause ensued before her father declared, very well, Lady M
ary, We shall indulge you, he allowed, surprising her.

  Mary straightened.

  Katherine Howard was still standing and with a bright smile on her face she waited for Mary to walk toward her. Mary moved forward, taking the required steps until she was face to face with the girl.

  As the taller of the two, Mary stared down her slim nose at the flighty creature. Katherine Howard is a beauty, she determined, fresh, bright and spritely, with a body to tempt men to sin.

  They were toe to toe now and while Mary continued to stare down at her, Katherine looked up, her clear blue eyes large and dewy, filled with question. Then, as if remembering herself, Katherine extended a hand for Mary to shake. But Mary did not take it. Instead, she held out two of her own fingers to the girl.

  Mary’s eyes bore into the young queen’s. The command in Mary’s gaze was clear. She stared the girl down and there before the court, Katherine Howard, the king’s fifth Queen eventually succumbed, reaching out to shake the proffered fingers of the daughter of Katherine of Aragon.

  1543

  ELIZABETH AGED TEN

  Her cousin was dead. The awful scandal she caused had managed to fill even Elizabeth’s young ears. They said Katherine Howard was nothing but a harlot. She committed sin upon sin upon sin, and for that, she was put to death.

  Put to death.

  Her mother had been put to death. Elizabeth peered at her reflection in the looking glass. My mother had died on the Tower green too.

  She remembered nothing of the woman. The tale of Anne Boleyn was meant to be a great secret. No one was allowed to speak of the matter, especially to her daughter. But at the grand age of seven, Elizabeth made her discovery. Her mother was Anne Boleyn.

  The name was foreign, she had never heard of it until the day she asked her sister Mary after their mother. Her sister Mary had answered her query thus: Anne Boleyn was your mother, Elizabeth, as Katherine of Aragon was mine.

  Who is Anne Boleyn? Elizabeth asked her tiny hand entangled in Mary’s rich skirts, who is Katherine of Aragon?

  Her sister took her hand in hers as they stood, watching the merriment of their father’s court.

  They were our mothers, she answered succinctly. The two of them looked on as their father led Katherine Howard out to dance. The court applauded and everyone seemed to be very merry.

  As studious as she was the mystery pertaining to her mother failed to elude Elizabeth for long. She was careful with her inquiries, and now she knew. Her mother had been put to death on her father’s orders. She was a traitor’s and that was why she was not to be spoken of.

  Elizabeth frowned.

  Her father had a great many queens for a king. Katherine of Aragon was his first, her mother Anne Boleyn his second, Jane Seymour his third, Anne of Cleves his fourth and Katherine Howard his fifth.

  A great many queens and a great many deaths, Elizabeth thought, swallowing hard at the thought of all those dead women.

  And now Katherine Howard has joined them too, following my mother in my father’s headless parade. Of all her father’s queens, Anne of Cleves, now the king’s honored sister, was the only one still living.

  Katherine Howard was Elizabeth’s cousin. The same Howard blood flowed through their veins.

  She was my mother’s cousin too. We are all of us cousins, all round. Elizabeth remembered Katherine well. She was pretty, dazzling, a wondrous beauty. She was young too, only several years Elizabeth’s senior.

  Beautiful, captivating, a veritable dove my father called her. She was his Rose without a Thorn. And now she was headless, quite headless and very, very dead.

  Her lovers had died too, paying for their horrid sins with their deaths. But this is not the first time this has happened, the whispers in the corridors ran, rampant and wild, tripping one over the other as the trial of Katherine Howard set the realm alight.

  Just like my mother they say. Katherine Howard was just like Anne Boleyn. They were both condemned to die alongside their lovers. They had shamed my father and done unspeakable things, making them deserving of their deaths.

  But it is not the same, surmised Elizabeth. She had collected the facts and studied them, applying her mind to the matter most studiously. There were many similarities, yea, but her mother was no Katherine Howard.

  Last time, my father had been sweet on Jane Seymour. He had been most eager to win the hand of his One True Queen and my mother had stood in his way. He needed her to disappear. He needed her gone. Dead. He wanted to be rid of Anne Boleyn so he could wed Jane Seymour.

  Not so with Katherine Howard.

  It was different this time. He had no other woman waiting in the wings. He was happy with the Howard Girl. He had not wanted to be rid of her.

  After weighing the facts, Elizabeth decided that the execution of her mother had more to do with her father being tired of her charms than the sins she supposedly committed against the king. Everything that he loved about Anne Boleyn had soured by the time he decided to be rid of her and he had done so with brutal efficiency, pointing one wife to the block while beckoning another forward to take her place.

  The evidence against my mother was slim, hardly anything of substance at all. Every man brought to court in the case against her had protested her innocence, decrying the injustice being done.

  Not so for Katherine Howard.

  Indeed, those that came forward to accuse her multiplied from one day to the next, their words flourishing, raising their ugly heads like the dreaded Hydra…

  One witness came then another and another, springing forth to denounce the young queen.

  But the trouble this time was that her father didn’t want to be rid of this wife, at least not yet. And that was what made his rage so terrible.

  My mother, Elizabeth concluded, my mother Anne Boleyn was no Katherine Howard.

  Where the king had sent his man Cromwell after Anne Boleyn, making them commit her to the charges he decided to lay at her feet, the charges against Katherine had been brought to the king, whispered into his ears, shocking and stunning him. This time, the charges had not been commanded nor commissioned by the king’s desire. This time, the king’s marriage had not been brought to an end by design. It had been, instead, a most ugly surprise.

  The king was ashamed and enraged. The young queen he doted on, spoiled and lavished his love on had made a mockery of him. The humiliation was too much for him to stomach.

  …They said Katherine Howard tried to make one last dash.

  Knowing that the men at arms were coming for her, she fled the confines of her royal apartments in the hopes of seeing her husband. She had been certain that should he but see her in her pitiful state, he would be convinced of her innocence.

  But no such meeting ever took place.

  She was caught. She screamed for her husband the king, begging for mercy. She had screamed and screamed and screamed as they took her away…

  So much for the love of a king, frowned Elizabeth, so much for the love of my father. A king will always love his pride more. The sight of her would not have been enough to save her from the block. Katherine Howard was a fool. Her father’s wrath was too terrible. Indeed, there was no placating him. His anger refused to be quelled. He had been shamed before the world. Nothing was worse for a man than this. His manhood and his virility were being questioned and the tongues of Christendom were wagging, laughing and pointing at the privates of Henry VIII, the King of England.

  My father’s shame is great, for they call him the king who cannot satiate his wife. My father has had to endure not one but two inconstant wives, mused his daughter. My father is now twice the cuckold. He had made my mother cuckold him in name and now his young queen has made him a cuckold in deed. Turn and turn about the story goes.

  Katherine Howard had been queen for two short years.

  Her time was brief but she had managed to change her husband, the king, during her reign by his side, Elizabeth had seen it with her own two eyes. The wound on his leg had healed. He had
started to ride again, trying hard to regain his vigor. He danced, he rode and he even tried to joust.

  He fought so very hard to recapture his youth, to be young again to please his nubile bride. With her, he had been a man rejuvenated, a man revived. The youth of his wife invigorated him and Henry the king had been pleased with the change, most pleased.

  But despite all his efforts, his young wife, they said, found him wanting and turned to the embrace of another; the embrace of Thomas Culpepper.

  Elizabeth remembered Culpepper, he was a handsome fellow and he was always with her father. As the king’s attendant, he would often be found sleeping at the foot of her father’s bed or outside the doors to the king’s privy chamber, ready for the king’s orders, be it night or day. They said it was this proximity to the king that gave Culpepper the chance to eye the king’s bed and his wife.

  They had said the same of my mother, of her and her musician, her many male attendants and her own brother no less. They had called my mother a harlot and dubbed her the Great Whore. They said that she had been in love with her Smeaton, Wyatt, Weston and Norris, committing every sin with them and her brother George Boleyn too whenever it was to be contrived. They had called her mother the Great Witch and an agent of Satan.

  Not so Katherine Howard. Not in the beginning. They did not dub her thusly. For this new queen, they pronounced, had been in love. Indeed, as the evidence goes, Katherine had loved her husband not. Not one jot. Instead, she had loved the roguish Culpepper.

  Eros then, that be-winged creature was supposedly the one at fault, but when they dug deeper and deeper into her past the pit of Katherine Howard’s disgrace proved to be endless…

  The mounting evidence against the queen eventually hinted at something far more sinister.

  Every account said Katherine Howard was a dirty creature, well steeped in sin. Many came forward to denounce her, materializing from the households of her uncle Howard. They said she loved above all to copulate, that she was forever occupied with the desire to indulge her whore’s senses, and that she had been so since she was of a young age.