Mary, Queen of Scots, and the Murder of Lord Darnley

by Alison Weir

  The two gentlemen whom Mary was sending respectively to London and Paris were Robert Melville and Sebastien Pagez. Pagez left Edinburgh, in the company of M. Dolu, Mary’s Treasurer for her French dowry, on 18 February,34bearing letters from the Queen to Archbishop Beaton, Mondovi and Queen Elizabeth, although there is no trace of the latter letter or any reply.35

  Mary was still at Seton when, on 18 February, a letter in Scots was sent in her name to Archbishop Beaton thanking him “heartily” for his letter of warning and touching on various other matters. It was either dictated by Mary or sent by Maitland or her Council. It explained that, when she wrote to the Archbishop immediately after Darnley’s death, she had been so grievous and tormented, we could not make you answer [to] the particular heads of your letter . . . Alas, your message came too late, and there was over-good cause to have given us such warning. Even the very morning before your servant’s arrival was the horrible and treasonable act against the King’s person, that may well appear to have been conspired against ourselves, the circumstances of the matter being considered; whereupon, at this present, we will be no more tedious, abiding until God manifest the authors to the world. For knowledge thereof, neither we nor our Council shall spare the travail that possibly may be made, wherethrough truth may come to light, and therein is our chief care and study at this present.36

  On that night, or the next, a second placard appeared in Edinburgh, denouncing three of Mary’s foreign servants—Sebastien Pagez, Joseph Rizzio and Francisco de Busso—as Darnley’s murderers. Clearly, Mary’s presence was needed in the capital, and on the 19th she returned from Seton to Holyrood.37

  That day, Queen Elizabeth sent Lady William Howard and Mildred Cooke, Lady Cecil to the Tower of London to gently break the news of Darnley’s death to his mother,38who was still a prisoner. They also, in good faith, told her that Lennox had been murdered with him. Lady Lennox was so overcome with grief that the ladies feared for her sanity, and, within the hour, after hearing their report, the Queen sent her own physician, Dr. Robert Huick, and the Dean of Westminster, to calm the stricken Countess. Later that day, Cecil learned that Lennox was not dead, and sent a messenger to the Tower to convey this news to Lady Lennox, but she remained inconsolable. Cecil told de Silva she “could not be kept by any means from such passion of mind as the horribleness of the fact did require.”39

  Robert Melville arrived in London that night,40and was immediately admitted to the Queen’s presence so that he could give her the official account of Darnley’s murder, which was that the conspirators had planned to kill Mary but that she had, by a lucky chance, avoided death. De Silva sought out Melville and “asked him certain questions to try and get at the bottom of the suspicions as to who had been the author of the crime, but could get nothing definite. Even if the Queen clears herself from it, the matter is still obscure.” Clearly there was already speculation in London that Mary had had a hand in Darnley’s death, for de Silva added, “The heretics here publish the Queen’s complicity as a fact, but they are helped in their belief by their suspicion and dislike for her. The Catholics are divided, the friends of the King holding with the Queen’s guilt, and her adherents to the contrary. However it may be, this event will give birth to others, and it is quite possible that this Queen [Elizabeth] may take the opportunity of disturbing the Scots, more for her own ends than for any love she bore the King.”41In his speculations, de Silva displayed an acute grasp of the situation.

  Du Croc arrived in Paris on 19 February,42and was the first to convey a report of the murders of Darnley and Lennox to Charles IX, Catherine de’ Medici and Mondovi. The next day, Cecil informed Sir Henry Norris, the English ambassador in Paris, that Lennox had not after all been killed.

  Buchanan says that the regicides were already disturbed by the accusations that were beginning to be levelled at them, “but the numerous complaints of the Earl of Lennox disturbed them more. He dared not come to court on account of the overweening power and licence of Bothwell, but he bombarded the Queen with letters.” The second was sent on 20 February from Houston Castle, Renfrewshire, and read:

  Notwithstanding the travail and labour which I perceive Your Majesty takes for the just trial of this last cruel act, and yet the offenders not being known, to my great grief I am therefore forced, by nature and duty, to be so bold as to give Your Majesty my poor and simple advice for bringing the matter to light: which is, to beseech Your Majesty most humbly, for God’s cause and the honour of Your Majesty and this your realm, that Your Highness would, with convenient diligence, assemble the whole nobility and estates of Your Majesty’s realm, and they, by your advice, to take such good order for the perfect trial of the matter, as I doubt not, with the grace of Almighty God, His Holy Spirit shall so work upon the hearts of Your Majesty and all your faithful subjects, as the bloody and cruel actors of this deed shall be manifestly known. And although I need not to put Your Majesty in remembrance thereof, the matter touching Your Majesty so near as it does, yet I shall humbly desire Your Highness to bear with me in troubling Your Highness therein, being the father to him that is gone.43

  It might be inferred from this letter that Lennox felt that Mary was not doing enough to seek out and punish the murderers. The reference to her honour is quite pointed.

  The distraught Lady Lennox was released from the Tower on compassionate grounds on 21 February, and placed in the house and care of Queen Elizabeth’s cousin, Sir Richard Sackville; her surviving son Charles, a boy of about twelve, was allowed to join her there. De Silva heard from Robert Melville that the Countess “used words against his Queen [Mary], whereat I am not surprised, as I told him, because grief like this distracts the most prudent people, much more one so sorely beset. She is not the only person that suspects the Queen to have had some hand in the business, and they think they see in it revenge for her Italian secretary; and the long estrangement which this caused between her and her husband gave a greater opportunity for evil persons to increase the trouble.”44In the weeks to come, Lady Lennox would not cease to bombard Queen Elizabeth and de Silva with demands for vengeance on the killers of her adored son.

  Cecil noted that the news of Darnley’s private burial caused great indignation in London: it was felt that, as King of Scots, he had deserved all the pageantry of a state funeral, and the fact that Mary had not accorded him one fuelled people’s suspicions.

  Not everyone suspected Mary. On 21 February, after speaking with du Croc, Giovanni Correr, the Venetian ambassador in Paris, concluded with great perspicacity that, “until further advices are received, this assassination is considered to be the work of the heretics, who desire to do the same to the Queen, in order to bring up the Prince in their doctrines, and thus more firmly establish their own religion to the exclusion of ours.”45

  By 21 February, Mary was back at Seton,46and this time Bothwell was in attendance on her. Buchanan later asserted that “Seton had so many conveniences that they had to go back there, to the detriment of their reputations.” When Queen Elizabeth heard an unfounded rumour that Mary was exercising herself in shooting, golf and pell-mell with Bothwell, Huntly and Lord Seton, she refused to believe it, which was probably wise of her, for, according to Robert Melville, who had had the news from his brother James, Mary had gone “to Seton to repose there and take some purgations,”47which is evidence enough that she was unwell. Mental stress often had an adverse effect on her physical health.

  From Seton, on the 21st, Mary wrote a warm letter in reply to Lennox: We have received your letter giving us thanks for the accepting of your goodwill and counsel in so good part, in that we did only that which was right. And in showing you all the pleasure and goodwill that we can, we do but our duty and that which natural affection may compel us unto. Always of that ye may assure yourself.

  And for the assembly of the estates, it is indeed convenient that such should be, and even shortly before the receipt of your letter, we had caused proclaim a Parliament, at the which we doubt not but you all f
or the most part shall be present, where first of all this matter, being most dear to us, shall be handled, and nothing left undone which may further the clear trial of the same. And we, for our own part, as we ought, and all noble men likewise, we doubt not, shall most willingly direct all our wits and judgements to this end.48

  On 22 February, de Silva had an audience with Queen Elizabeth, “principally to speak about Scottish affairs and find out her opinion with regard to them. She spoke of the matter with much apparent sorrow, and said she thought it very extraordinary, but cannot believe the Queen of Scotland can be to blame for so dreadful a thing, notwithstanding the murmurs of the people. I told her I thought the rumours were set afoot by people who desire to injure her and make her odious in this country in respect to this succession, but I agreed with her that the thing was incredible. She tells me she had already taken precautions, by certain signs and words she had used, to exculpate the Queen of Scots.”49

  Two days later, Moretta arrived in London and de Silva took the opportunity of sounding him out about Darnley’s death. “His account of the matter is almost the same as that published, although he makes certain additions, which point to suspicion that the Queen knew of, or consented to, the plot. When I asked him what he thought, or had been able to gather as to the Queen’s share in it, he did not condemn her in words, but did not exonerate her at all. He thinks, however, that all will soon be known, and even gives signs that he knows more than he likes to say.”50Had Moretta been hoodwinked by Balfour into believing that Mary knew about the conspiracy? If so, such sensational allegations would certainly have deflected public attention from the real murderers.

  It is unlikely that Moretta had a chance to speak with Elizabeth, but she had read Drury’s reports, and public opinion in England was becoming so vociferous against Mary that, on 24 February, the English Queen felt she had to offer urgent advice to her sister monarch; she wrote her an unusually frank letter, couched in far more forthright terms than she normally used. Even her customary greeting, “Ma chère soeur,” was omitted.

  Madam,

  My ears have been so astounded, my mind so disturbed and my heart so frightened to hear of the horrible and abominable murder of your late husband and my slaughtered cousin, that I have scarcely spirit to write; and however I would express my sympathy in your sorrow for his loss, so, to tell you plainly, I cannot conceal that I grieve more for you than for him.

  O, Madam, I should ill fulfill the office of a faithful cousin or an affectionate friend if I did not urge you to preserve your honour. I cannot but tell you what all the world is thinking. Men say that, instead of seizing the murderers, you are looking through your fingers while they escape; that you will not seek revenge on those who have done you so much pleasure, as though the deed would never have taken place had not the doers of it been assured of impunity.

  For myself, I beg you to believe that I would not harbour such a thought for all the wealth of the world, nor would I entertain in my heart so ill a guest, or think so badly of any prince that breathes. Far less could I so think of you, to whom I desire all imaginable good and all blessings which you yourself could wish for. For this very reason, I exhort, I counsel, I beg you deeply to consider of the matter—at once, if it be the nearest friend you have, to lay your hands upon the man who has been guilty of the crime; to let no interest, no persuasion, keep you from proving to everyone that you are a noble princess and a loyal wife. I write thus vehemently not that I doubt, but for affection. You may have wiser counsellors than I am, but even Our Lord, as I remember, had a Judas among the twelve; while I am sure that you have no friend more true than I, and my affection may stand you in as good stead as the subtle wits of others.51

  The references to Mary not fearing to proceed even against her nearest friend and a Judas among the twelve almost certainly point to Bothwell. Elizabeth was to a degree sincere in her advice to her fellow sovereign, for she was quick to perceive the damage that scurrilous rumours could do to her cousin’s reputation. In Elizabeth’s opinion, Mary was not taking vigorous enough action to track down the murderers, which was the only way to counteract the gossip. However, Elizabeth’s greatest concern was that, if Mary’s honour was impugned because of her apparent passivity, the prestige of queens regnant in general would be tarnished, justifying the prejudices of many who believed women unfit to rule. And if Mary’s subjects took it upon themselves to depose her, an even more alarming precedent would be set.

  Catherine de’ Medici took the same view as Elizabeth, and wrote to Mary in a similar vein. Her private opinion was that the Queen of Scots was well rid of her young fool of a husband, but she warned her that she must find and prosecute his killers expeditiously and ruthlessly in order to proclaim her own innocence in the eyes of her subjects. Catherine had never liked Mary, and, unlike Elizabeth, pointedly sent no envoy to express the condolences of the French government on her sad loss.

  It is often said that Mary did not heed the wise advice of these two seasoned stateswomen, but it is difficult to see what else she could have done to pursue the murderers, in the absence of any substantial evidence or willing informers. She had entrusted the investigation of the matter to her Councillors (little realising that many of them had a vested interest in preventing the crime being solved), issued a proclamation offering a handsome reward to anyone identifying the murderers, and summoned Parliament to debate the next steps in the inquiry—Melville reported on 26 February that it had been proclaimed for 14 April.52It was in the interests of her enemies, however, for people to believe the worst of her.

  Reports of Mary’s conduct, false though they may have been, did not help matters. On 26 February, according to Drury,53she dined at Lord Seton’s house at Tranent in East Lothian, “where he and the Earl of Huntly paid for the dinner, the Queen and the Earl Bothwell having, at a match of shooting, won the same of them.” Drury may yet again have got his facts wrong, for on the day that Mary was supposed to have been at Tranent she was in fact unwell,54but the damage had been done. This was not, people felt, the behaviour expected of a woman who was supposed to be in mourning.

  On 26 February, Robert Melville reported to Cecil that Pagez and Dolu had arrived in London with Mary’s lost letter to Elizabeth, and said he had had no word himself from the Queen. He had heard that Prince James had been moved to Holyrood, and that Atholl and Tullibardine had departed to the country but had immediately been recalled to Edinburgh under pain of the penalty for rebellion.55Clearly, Bothwell and Maitland were taking steps to prevent them joining forces with Lennox.

  That same day, Lennox, who was too agitated to wait for Parliament to meet, fearing that by then any trails would have gone cold, wrote again to Mary with what seemed a very reasonable request:

  I render most humble thanks unto Your Majesty for your gracious and comfortable letter. I hear of certain tickets [placards] that have been put on the Tolbooth door of Edinburgh, answering Your Majesty’s first and second proclamations, which name in special certain devisers of the cruel murder. I therefore most humbly beseech Your Majesty, for the love of God [and] the honour of Your Majesty and your realm, that it may please Your Majesty not only to apprehend and put in sure keeping the persons named in the said tickets, but also with diligence to assemble Your Majesty’s nobility, and then, by open proclamation, to admonish and require the writers of the said tickets to compare [i.e., come forward and confront those named], according to the effect thereof. At which time, if they do not, Your Majesty may, by the advice of your nobility and Council, relieve and put to liberty the persons in the tickets aforesaid. So shall Your Majesty do an honourable and godly act in bringing the matter to such a narrow point, as either the matter shall appear plainly before Your Majesty, to the punishment of those who have been the actors of this cruel deed, or else the said tickets to be found vain of themselves, and the persons who are slandered to be exonerated and put to liberty.56

  In effect, however, Lennox was asking Mary to arrest people—among them
members of her Council and her personal servants—on the highly dubious evidence of persons unknown. His request placed her in an impossible dilemma, for if she did as he wished, she would be violating the law, but if she refused to do so, she would be accused of failing in her duty to pursue her husband’s killers.

  Balfour returned to Edinburgh on the night of the 26th, accompanied by thirty horsemen. He came furtively and, according to Drury, “when he was near unto the town, he alighted and came in a secret way. He is hateful to the people.”57Evidently rumours about Balfour’s involvement in Darnley’s murder were spreading as a result of the first placard, and Balfour must have heard about them. The next day, however, Drury heard that another placard had appeared during the night, “where were these letters written in Roman hand, very great, M.R., with a sword in hand near the same letters; then an L.B. [for Lord Bothwell?] with a mallet near them.”58Increasingly, Mary’s subjects were linking her with Bothwell and Darnley’s death. In Scotland, “Bothwell was much suspected of this villainous and detestable murder, and the impression was strengthened by the many evil reports circulated about him.”59The same thing, to a lesser degree, was happening with Mary, and the favour she had hitherto shown to Bothwell was subject to the most unfavourable interpretations.

  On the morning after the placard had appeared, a furious Bothwell appeared in Edinburgh “and openly affirmed, by his oath, that if he knew who were the setters up of the bills and writings, he would wash his hands in their blood. His followers, who are to the number of fifty, follow him very near. Their gesture, as his, is of the people much noted. They seem to go near and about him, as though there were [those] who would harm him; and his hand, as he talks with any that is not assured unto him, upon his dagger, with a strange countenance.”60