Thomas Cromwell: Servant to Henry VIII

by Loades, David

  Then in July 1529 he wrote his will, or rather he completed a will upon which he had been working for some months.38 Why he should have done this when he was forty-four years old and apparently in the best of health is something of a mystery, but it was probably connected with the death of his wife, Elizabeth, which seems to have occurred towards the end of 1528. His young daughters Anne and Grace also died while the will was in preparation, and these domestic tragedies may well have turned his thoughts towards his own mortality. It is an interesting document in many ways, starting as it does with the bequest of his soul to ‘the great God of heaven, my maker and redeemer’, and with a petition to the Virgin Mary and the whole company of heaven to be intercessors for him.39 Nothing could have been more correct and orthodox, because such a formula betrays no hint of the Lutheran sympathies of which he was subsequently accused. Later on in the substance of his will he continues, ‘Item I will that mine executors shall conduct and hire a priest being an honest person of continent and good living to sing for my soul by the space of seven years next after my death, and to give him for the same forty six pounds thirteen shillings and four pence, that is to say vi li xiiis iiiid yearly for his stipend.’ Such a provision would have been unthinkable had he been the crypto-Protestant he is sometimes represented as being.40 The piety of this will is strictly conventional, and, although consistent with the biblical humanism which we know from other sources that he professed, could not cause offence even to the most conservative of minds. Stephen Vaughn and Ralph Sadler, his servants, and John Williamson, his brother-in-law, are named as executors, but it is just possible that he intended it to be seen by Wolsey. That might account for its rather self-conscious orthodoxy, but there is no tangible reason to suppose that he was thinking along these lines. The substance of his bequests are the setting up of a use for his son Gregory, until he shall come to the age of twenty-two whereby the revenues of his lands will be secured, and the distribution of his moveable property among his kindred and servants. Typical of these provisions is that for his niece Alice Wellyfed, who is left ‘to her marriage xx li. And if it happen her to die before marriage, then I will the said xx li shall remain to her brother Christopher’, and for his mother-in-law Mercy Prior, who is left some silver plate and the exhortation to his executors ‘to be good unto her during her life’.41 It is altogether a generous document, making several bequests to the poor and to the marriage of poor maidens, and it enables us to get closer to the human side of Cromwell than any number of business letters. Unfortunately we do not know how the death of his wife affected him. Between 1520 and 1528 numerous friends asked to be commended to her, and the fifteen years or so that they spent together appear to have been happy, but we can form no impression of her as a person. After 1525 Thomas spent much time travelling, but her letters to him (if she wrote any) do not survive. There is a single reference to her in his will as ‘my late wife’ and his request that ‘poor indigent folk’ should pray for all Christian souls does not include any specific reference to her. But then neither does it include any reference to his daughters Anne and Grace, to whom we know he was close. In spite of this last will and testimony, Cromwell’s nearest and dearest remain shadowy background figures, belonging to that private life about which he was so reticent.

  By 1529 Wolsey had been the king’s right-hand man for rather more than fifteen years. They had had their ups and downs, but his influence still remained unsurpassed. In 1525 the cardinal had taken the blame for the failure of the Amicable Grant, which he was bound to do, although the fault had been mainly Henry’s. This had temporarily weakened the king’s trust in his minister’s judgement, because Henry was genuinely unable to see the truth of the matter, and confidence had not been restored until the end of the year.42 Then in 1527 Henry had been less than frank about his feelings for Anne Boleyn, and, having confessed his doubts about the viability of his marriage, had allowed Wolsey to undertake a diplomatic mission to France for the purpose of finding him another bride. In fact, unbeknown to the cardinal, he had already proposed to Anne, and been accepted, so the mission was a wild goose chase, and offered evidence of a lack of trust between them. Wolsey was chagrined by this, as well he might have been, but more to the point identified Mistress Boleyn as a potential rival for the king’s ear, and this had placed him in a considerable dilemma.43 If he should do his duty, and promote the annulment of the king’s marriage in Rome, he would create a formidable power at court and run the risk of losing his unique relationship with Henry. If, on the other hand, he should fail in Rome, not only would he risk Anne’s wrath and indignation, but he would inevitably forfeit Henry’s favour completely. The Boleyns realised this and, as Anne’s influence over the king became greater, regarded the cardinal with steadily increasing suspicion.44 They read the situation correctly, but for the time being held their fire as he appeared to be the only man capable of resolving the king’s problem. He had, after all, a foot in both camps, and consistently overemphasised his influence in the Curia. Then in 1528 he appeared to have succeeded, and Anne became positively polite to him, exchanging gifts in friendly fashion. He had extracted a commission from Clement to enable the king’s ‘Great Matter’ to be heard in England before himself and Lorenzo Campeggio, the Cardinal Protector of England. What he did not know was that Campeggio was under orders to delay proceedings as far as possible, and in no way to find in the King of England’s favour.45 So the Legatine Court which assembled in May 1529 was a sham, and Wolsey was the dupe. At the end of July Campeggio adjourned the court on the pretext of keeping the Roman terms, without reaching any decision, and the fraudulent nature of the proceedings became clear. The king’s fury knew no bounds, and Anne was equally enraged. This gave the cardinal’s many enemies at court their opportunity, and a series of articles was drawn up against him. Henry, however, bided his time. He may have realised the truth about Campeggio’s mission, but the Roman cardinal was beyond his reach, and was allowed to depart in peace, leaving him free to deal with Wolsey in his own way. It was obvious by the middle of August that the latter had lost his master’s favour, but it was not clear how far the king’s indignation would go, or what the consequences would be.46 The tension was racked up further by the fact that Henry accorded a private audience to him at the beginning of October, and it began to be speculated that he would survive the crisis. However, on 4 October he was charged with offences under the statute of praemunire, and on the 18th deprived of the Great Seal. As a prince of the Church he could of course have defied the king, although not over the chancellorship, which was in Henry’s gift, but he chose not to do so. Instead he pleaded guilty to the absurd charge of praemunire, and all his properties and promotions were declared forfeit.47 His servants, including Thomas Cromwell, were left in limbo, because without resources he could not pay them or reward them in any way, and Cromwell ran the risk of being exposed to the popular fury over his role in the monastic dissolutions.

  It is against this background that Cavendish’s famous story of his encounter with Thomas must be set. Cavendish was Wolsey’s gentleman usher, and was writing many years after the event, but his account nevertheless has a ring of truth about it.

  It chanced me upon All Hallows day (1 November) to come into the Great Chamber at Esher in the morning to give mine attendance, where I found Mr Cromwell leaning in the great window with a primer in his hand, saying Our Lady Matins, which had been since a strange sight in him.48

  Obviously in spite of his will he had no great reputation for piety in Wolsey’s household. On this occasion, however,

  he prayed no more earnestly than he distilled tears as fast from his eyes. Whom I saluted and bade good morrow; and with that I perceived his moist cheeks, the which he wiped with his napkin. To whom I said, ‘Why Mr. Cromwell, what means this dole? Is my lord in any danger that ye do lament for him, or is it for any other loss that ye have sustained by misfortune?’

  Given the circumstances of early November this might seem a disingenuous questio
n, but Thomas apparently answered, ‘Nay, it is for my unhappy adventure. For I am like to lose all that I have laboured for all the days of my life, for doing of my master true and diligent service.’

  Cavendish apparently sought to reassure him that he had done nothing without his lord’s commandment, and nothing of which he had any need to be ashamed:

  ‘Well, well,’ quoth he, ‘I cannot tell; but this I see before mine eyes, that everything is as it is taken; and this I know well that I am disdained withal for my master’s sake, and yet I am sure that there is no cause why they should do so. An evil name once gotten will not lightly be put away.’49

  His mood of despair did not last, however, because even before his conversation with Cavendish had come to an end, he had formed a remedial plan of action. He would take the bull by the horns and ride to the court, where he would ‘make or mar, or ever I come again’, perhaps hoping that he had attracted sufficient good opinions for his loyal service to overcome the collapse of the cardinal’s fortunes. As we shall see, his hopes were justified, but not without further effort on his part. That same afternoon, having assisted in paying off Wolsey’s menial servants, a process in which he persuaded his master’s chaplains (whose benefices were unaffected by Wolsey’s disgrace) to help, he sought permission and rode to London.50 There he picked up a plan which he had already formulated, because a letter from his servant Ralph Sadler, dated that same day, makes it clear that he had earlier sent Sadler to speak to John Gage, the vice-chamberlain of the household, about the possibility of securing a place in the parliament which had been called on 9 August. This was now urgent, as the assembly was due to meet on 4 November, but Sadler had not been idle:

  I spake with Mr Gage and according to your commandment moved him to speak to unto my Lord of Norfolk for the burgess room of the parliament on your behalf. And he accordingly so did without delay like a faithful friend. Whereupon my said Lord of Norfolk answered the said Gage that he had spoken with the king his highness and that his highness was very well contented that you should be a burgess…51

  provided that he ordered himself in accordance with such instructions as Norfolk should give him from the king. These conversations must have taken at least a few days, and Cromwell’s gloom on 1 November may have been occasioned by the fact that he had not at that time received Sadler’s encouraging letter, and his urgent ride to the court that same afternoon may well have been prompted by the need to know what progress his quest had made. It was one thing, however, to secure the king’s approval and another to find a seat, because Henry did not offer any help in that connection. It is natural to assume that Norfolk, who controlled several boroughs, was the relevant patron, but this appears not to have been the case. Having approached his friend Sir Thomas Rush unsuccessfully to secure a nomination for Orford in Suffolk, he then asked Sir William Paulet, who had been Wolsey’s steward in the diocese of Winchester, to get him selected for one of the Winchester boroughs.52 This worked, and in the nick of time, on 3 November, he was named as one of the burgesses for Taunton. We do not know who was displaced to achieve this, but on 4 November Cromwell was able to take his seat in the House of Commons, and the first step in his escape strategy had been taken.

  How he used his opportunity is a matter of some controversy, because helping his employer and helping himself were not clearly distinguishable. He appears to have persuaded the cardinal to grant annuities to certain key members of the court, and took the credit for these gifts himself, which would not have been hard to do. Residing at Esher, and out of touch with affairs, Wolsey was wholly dependant upon Cromwell for his hopes of redemption. In December, for instance, he wrote to him asking him to find some way to assuage the displeasure of Lady Anne: ‘All possible means must be used for attaining her favour … I commit me to your wise handling.’53 The following month Anne sent a token to the disgraced minister, so it does not appear that Cromwell’s efforts were altogether in vain. The unknown factor in this equation is of course the king’s own attitude. He seems to have allowed the cardinal’s enemies to promote a Bill of attainder against him early in the session, and then permitted Cromwell with a ‘wise and pithy’ speech to talk it out. He had evidently decided that Wolsey’s submission was sufficient, and by the new year he had pardoned his praemunire and reinstated him at York.54 For both these developments his good servant took a share of the credit, and justly so because he never seems to have relaxed his efforts on the cardinal’s behalf, but it was the king who was responsible, and it is not surprising that rumours of his reinstatement should have been rife by January 1530. His redemption, however, only went so far; neither St Albans Abbey nor the palace of Richmond were recovered, and Wolsey’s treasured creations at Oxford and Ipswich remained forfeit. On 22 November William Capon wrote to Cromwell from Ipswich to say that the king’s commissioners had been to the college and removed various items, but that he had not relinquished his title to them, and asked for instructions as to how to proceed.55 We do not know what answer he received, but the handover of both colleges seems to have been completed by February 1530, when John Williamson sent Cromwell copies of the surveys which had been made. He, more than anyone else, would be able to judge their accuracy. Meanwhile Wolsey continued to be almost pathetically dependent on his servant, addressing him as ‘my only comfort and my only help … mine own good Thomas and my only refuge and aid’.56 Whether Cromwell was deserving of this trust is another matter, but on the whole the evidence is positive. He did his best for Wolsey’s treasured colleges, and may have been responsible for Henry’s decision to continue the foundation in Oxford as his own, a move which seems to have been made by the end of December. In 1546 the King’s College became Christ Church. Whether he deserves any of the credit for the king’s decision to allow the Archbishop of York to proceed to his diocese (which he had never visited) at the beginning of April is uncertain, but Sir John Gage did choose him to write to with a warning not to allow the cardinal to make a grand procession of his journey to the North, because the king would hold him answerable for any unnecessary display.57

  Meanwhile Wolsey’s health was giving cause for concern. On 19 January de Augustino, his physician, wrote to Cromwell urgently requesting that Dr Butts, who served the king in the same capacity, should be sent down to Esher and should bring some electuaries with him. What was wrong with him we do not know, but the crisis seems to have passed because he was soon writing to Cromwell again in the same pleading tone as before. He will do nothing without his advice, and begs him to come down to Esher. How often Cromwell made that trip is not clear, but it was not often enough to satisfy Wolsey. On 6 February he was disappointed not to have seen him the previous night, and on 10 March he was expecting a visit in the morning.58 Obviously they had much to discuss, not least the diocese of Winchester from which Wolsey was soliciting a pension. It may have been the result of his poor health, but the cardinal’s letters during the spring of 1530 became increasingly querulous. Perhaps he suspected his servant of playing a double game, and not without justice because Cromwell was naturally seeking to turn his constant presence in the court to his own advantage. As early as 3 February 1530 Stephen Vaughn wrote from Antwerp to congratulate him on his success; ‘you now sail in a safe haven,’ he declared, obviously in response to news of the king’s favour, and on 13 April Cromwell carried out a profitable exchange of lands with the king. This cost him £500 as he had little land to offer, but was well worthwhile, because in addition to the profits of the lands secured, such an exchange was a sure token of the royal grace.59 Interestingly enough, a subsidy assessment of Wolsey’s household made in January 1530 includes both John and Robert Cromwell, who were presumably kinsmen, but makes no mention of Thomas.60 This may have been for the simple reason that he was no longer resident, but it may also represent another step in his gradual detachment from the cardinal. If that was the case, neither of them was admitting it; William, Lord Sandys, wrote to Cromwell on 17 June about the keepership of the manor of Farnham on
the assumption that he spoke for Wolsey, who was still the bishop there in spite of his forfeitures, and at the end of the same month Cromwell wrote to the cardinal what can only be described as a friendly letter about diverse pieces of business which they had in hand. On 30 July Wolsey wrote to him again, expressing appreciation for all the pains that he had taken. Whatever was left of his estate he owed to Cromwell’s efforts, for which he would requite him when he was able. However he also complains of his renewed illness, and how he cannot sleep for weeping, which makes the reader suspect that he was already in the grip of that ailment which was to carry him off in November.61 On 18 August it was noted that Mr Cromwell had such opportunities of access to the king that it was to be hoped that he would remember Wolsey in his misfortune, and a few days later Thomas replied to his letter of the 30th, discussing various bits of business and ending, ‘I am, and during my life shall be, with your Grace in heart, spirit, prayer and service, to the uttermost of my power.’62 There is no reason to suppose that he was being dishonest, but his access to the king had opened opportunities which he could not afford to ignore, and he was briefly in the position of the man who serves two masters. Either Wolsey would be restored to grace or he would be forced to cut his ties with him, no matter what professions he might make.