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

by Alison Weir

  20

  “LAYING SNARES FOR HER MAJESTY”

  CONTRARY TO THE PERCEPTIONS OF Archbishop Beaton and others, Mondovi reported on 12 March that most people in Paris imputed Darnley’s murder to Moray, “who has always had the throne in view, although he is a bastard. He is persuaded by the [Protestants] that it is his by right, especially as he maintains that his mother was secretly espoused by the King his father.”1It will be remembered that Mondovi had spoken with du Croc, who believed the murder was the work of the heretics, with Clernault and, more recently, with Pagez. Shortly after Mondovi wrote his report, du Croc was sent back to Scotland by Catherine de’ Medici to obtain more information about the political situation there.2

  In Scotland too, there were rumours that Moray was not entirely guiltless, and on 13 March, Moray himself wrote to Cecil:

  However these last accidents have altered many men’s judgements, yet, being assured that constant men will mean constantly, I would not [pass by] this occasion to signify the constancy of one thankful heart for the many and large benefits I have from time to time received by your means. And, as I am touched myself, so do I judge of you and all men that feareth God and embraced the life of Christianity and honour, as concerning this late accident so odious and so detestable. Yet am I persuaded discreet personages will not rashly judge in so horrible crimes, but, of honest personages, mean honestly, until truth declare and convince the contrary—neither for particular men’s enterprises so ungodly, withdraw their good will from so great a multitude as, I am sure, detests this wild attempt even from their hearts.

  Moray also revealed his intention of leaving Scotland in the near future, and asked Cecil to procure “a safe conduct to be sent me in convenient haste.”

  This is a highly ambiguous letter: although Moray admits he is touched himself by suspicion, he does not actually say he is innocent, but uses rhetoric to imply it. Moray’s more important communication was confided verbally to the returning Killigrew, whom Moray had commissioned to carry his letter and speak with Cecil and Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, for “he hath heard or seen more nor I can write.”3This suggests a close collaboration with the English government in a covert enterprise that almost certainly concerned the downfall of Bothwell, added proof of which may perhaps be found in a letter from Justice Clerk Bellenden to Sir John Forster dated 15 March, stating that he should “never give him trust in time coming if the Earl Bothwell and his accomplices gave not their lives ere midsummer for the King’s death.”4On the same date, in a letter to Cecil, Drury listed Bothwell, Black Ormiston, Hepburn, Hay, Cullen and others including the Laird of Beanston (another Hepburn) and James Edmonstoun as the assassins.5Already, the official version of Darnley’s murder was being rewritten.

  Maitland also wrote to Cecil on the 13th, referring to some candid suggestions made by the latter in two letters that are now lost:

  By Mr Killigrew and Mr Melville, I received your letters of 25th and 26th February, and thank you heartily for your frank speech. For my own part, I like your intention, so I know it does not offend such here as have most interest to wish the matter to be earnestly recommended to such as you be; for they mean to demand nothing but right, and that in due time and orderly. For the third mark you wish I should shoot at, to wit, that Her Majesty would allow of your estate in religion [i.e., that she would convert to the reformed faith], it is one of the things in Earth I most desire. I dare be bold enough to utter my fancy in it to Her Majesty, trusting that she will not like me the worse for uttering my opinion in that [which] is profitable for her every way. And I do not despair, but although she will not yield at the first, yet, with progress of time, that point shall be obtained. I pray God it may be shortly.6

  Unlike Moray’s letter, this one is almost certainly connected with the negotiations for the English succession, for it would have been more advantageous for all concerned if Mary became a Protestant. The fact that Maitland thought she would eventually convert suggests that she was not as committed to her faith as the Pope would have liked: certainly her concessions to the Kirk give this impression.

  Killigrew left for London with both letters on 14 March.

  On that day, after intensive investigation, the Council, namely Moray, Argyll, Huntly and Bothwell, issued a proclamation for the arrest of James Murray of Purdovis (brother of Tullibardine) for treasonably setting up placards “tending to Her Majesty’s slander and defamation.”7James Murray was an enemy to Bothwell and an adherent of the Lennoxes; in 1565, he had been in trouble for alleging that Bothwell intended to murder Moray and had made salacious remarks about the Queen. It is not known what evidence the Lords now held against him, but it seems likely that someone had informed on him. We do know that, after the mermaid placard appeared, the Queen, who was particularly upset by it, had summoned the Minister of Dunfermline “and asked him if he knew the deviser,” which he did not. By this time, Murray was already on the list of suspects, and Bothwell asked the Minister if Murray had spoken evil of him. “I have never heard him say well” was the answer.8

  On learning of this new proclamation, Murray immediately fled into England, after sending a letter to Queen Elizabeth, “begging her favour.”9Then he wrote to the Scottish Council, offering to come with six men, “armed or naked,” to support his allegations in court.

  Mary was becoming increasingly uneasy as a result of the clamour over Darnley’s death, and decided that the Prince would be safer back in Stirling in Mar’s care. On 15 March, Bishop Leslie was sent there to make the necessary arrangements. That day, de Alava reported from Paris that the Queen was so alarmed by the worsening situation in Scotland that she was talking of going to live in France, a prospect that was by no means welcome to her former mother-in-law, Catherine de’ Medici, in whose opinion Mary’s place was in Scotland and nowhere else.10Catherine’s disgust at Mary’s failure to apprehend Darnley’s murderers moved her to write to the Scottish Queen, in the name of herself and King Charles, that, “if she performed not her promise of seeking by all her power to have the death of the King their cousin revenged, and to clear herself, she should not only think herself dishonoured, but to receive them for her contraries, and that they would be her enemies.”11

  Moretta and Father Hay arrived in Paris on 15 March.12The next day, having spoken with them both and learned further details of Darnley’s death, Mondovi wrote that he was now able to understand fully the state of the affairs in Scotland. At this moment, they are in such confusion owing to the death of the King, that there is fear of a very extensive insurrection, for the Earls of Moray, Atholl, Morton and other Lords have joined with the Earl of Lennox, the King’s father, under the pretext of avenging his death. The Earls of Bothwell, Huntly and many other men of importance are with the Queen for the same purpose. Both sides are suspicious of each other. Hence it is thought that [Moray], (as I wrote on the 12th instant), aiming at the succession to the throne, desires upon this occasion to murder the Earl of Bothwell, a courageous man, much trusted and confided in by the Queen, with the intention of being afterwards able to lay snares for the life of Her Majesty with greater ease, especially as he can hope, through the slothfulness of the Earl of Lennox, to obtain, by his permission and consent, the governorship of the Prince and, by consequence, the whole realm. If he should gain this, which may God avert, he may be able to accomplish the wicked end he has set before himself, and herein the favour of England will not be wanting. The English Queen is jealous of the Prince as the legitimate heir of both those realms, and will not omit to favour the said Moray, her dependant, being bound to her by many obligations as well as religion.13

  In this breathtaking indictment of Moray there is no hint of any suspicion of Mary, as Moretta had implied in London, nor is Bothwell linked to Darnley’s murder; instead he is referred to merely as an obstacle in the way of Moray bringing about Mary’s ruin. Moretta had left Scotland around 11/12 February, but Moray, Morton and Lindsay did not meet up with Atholl and Caithness until after this date, s
o Moretta must have maintained contact with his very knowledgeable sources in Scotland after his departure, and received new information that made him revise his opinion of the Queen. Apart from his assumption that Moray wanted Mary dead, Moretta’s report appears to be a reasonably perceptive summation of the situation, given what was soon to happen.

  Mondovi also reported that, according to Father Hay, Mary was anxious that he himself should go to Scotland, but both Hay and Moretta warned him not to. Mondovi could not resist adding that, “if the Queen had done that which was recommended and proposed to her from our side, with promise of all the aids necessary for that most just execution, she would now find herself really mistress of her kingdom.”14

  Moretta saw Giovanni Correr on 20 March; afterwards, Correr reported to the Signory slightly, but not substantially, different details of Darnley’s murder from those that Moretta had given Mondovi. Much has been made of these trivial discrepancies, but they may be accounted for by minor inaccuracies or omissions in both reports; in each case, Moretta gave essentially the same story, asserting that Darnley was awakened by suspicious noises and/or frightened by the sight of armed men outside the house, whereupon he fled, only to be strangled in the garden. In one version, Darnley escaped by a gate into the garden, in the other he escaped out of the window; but if he had got out of the window, he would still have had to go through the postern gate into the south garden, so the two stories are not irreconcilable. It was on this occasion that Moretta imputed the murder to the heretics, and in particular to Mary’s “bastard-half brother.” Correr concluded, “It is widely believed that the principal persons of the kingdom were implicated in this act, because they were dissatisfied with the King.”15

  On 17 March, Lennox replied to the Queen’s letter asking him to name those whom he wished to accuse of Darnley’s murder:

  For the names of the persons aforesaid, I marvel that the same have been kept from Your Majesty’s ears, considering the effect of the said tickets, and the names of the persons are so openly talked of: that is to say, in the first ticket, the Earl of Bothwell, Master James Balfour, Master David Chambers [sic] and Black John Spens; and in the second ticket, Signor Francis[co Busso], Bastien [Pagez], John de Bordeaux and Joseph [Rizzio], David’s brother; which persons, I assure Your Majesty, I, for my part, greatly suspect. And now, Your Majesty knowing their names, and being the party as well and more nor I am, although I was the father, I doubt not but Your Majesty will take order in the matter according to the weight of the cause.16

  Mary was now committed to sending Bothwell and the other men named for trial, but it seems that the decision to do so had not been hers alone. According to Bothwell himself, in a passage in his memoirs headed “My urgent request for a public trial,” “as soon as I realised that these [placards] were laying upon me the blame and odium of having committed a crime of which I and all with me were innocent (of which I call God to witness), I prayed Her Majesty and the Council to allow me to stand trial. If, on close inquiry, I were to be found guilty, I would expect to pay the penalty; but if declared innocent (which in all truth I am), such slanderous attacks should cease. This was agreed to.”17

  Leaving aside Bothwell’s protestations of innocence, which were crucial to his survival in 1568 when this was written, a trial that would clear his name of the charge of regicide was a highly desirable, if not essential, preliminary to his proposal of marriage to the Queen. Once he was declared innocent, none could accuse him of murdering her husband in order to wed her. As for the trial itself, he must have realised that very little could be proved against him, and that too many people had a vested interest in him keeping his mouth shut. They would have been aware that Bothwell was almost certainly in possession of a copy of the Craigmillar Bond, which would have proved compromising to most of the Queen’s leading advisers.

  In his letter, Lennox also asked Mary to decide whether or not he should be made guardian of the Prince in place of Mar, a matter that had evidently been referred to in the lost letters that commenced this correspondence.

  In fact, Mary had decided that Mar should retain his guardianship of the Prince, and on 19 March, in consequence of this, he reluctantly relinquished his command of Edinburgh Castle and was formally appointed Governor of Stirling Castle instead.18Buchanan claims that Mary justified her decision to deprive Mar of the more prestigious post on the grounds that he was ill at the time and that “she could not keep in check the Edinburgh mob, who were then giving trouble, unless she had the castle under her own authority”; however, Nau says that she did it “by the advice of her Council, who considered these trusts too important to be both in the hands of one single individual.” It was probably Bothwell who was behind the move, because it was his adherent, Sir James Cockburn of Skirling, who was made Governor of Edinburgh Castle in Mar’s place, which effectively placed the fortress in Bothwell’s hands. According to the Diurnal of Occurrents , the citizens were unhappy about the transference of the governorship.

  On 19 March, Argyll and Huntly left with the Prince for Stirling, and on the following day entrusted him to Mar’s custody. The fact that the Queen did not travel with her son is perhaps indicative of the state of her health at this time. Had Mary been aware of who her true enemies were, she might well not have entrusted her son to the care of Mar, a leading Protestant, whose wife was the sister of James Murray, the man who was believed to have been behind the placard campaign.

  The Countess of Bothwell had now recovered from her serious illness, and on 20 March, she made the first move towards divorcing her husband on the grounds of his adultery with Bessie Crawford:19the first procuratory—a document authorising legal action—was signed on this day. What prompted this timely and accommodating gesture on the Countess’s part is uncertain. Bothwell’s affair with Bessie Crawford belonged to May 1566; why had the Countess waited so long to divorce him for it?

  It is possible that Bothwell had told her of his ambitions and secured her agreement to a divorce that would benefit them both. The Book of Articles alleges that her brother Huntly persuaded her to it after Mary had restored his ancestral lands, but Parliament did not grant this until 19 April, a month after Jean had applied for a divorce, and Drury reported on 29 March that Huntly misliked the idea of Bothwell divorcing his sister and had only reluctantly agreed to it.

  It is also possible that the Countess’s action had been prompted by fear for her life. Drury, when reporting that she was thought to be dying, had perhaps implied that foul play had been the cause of her illness, and on 29 March, Sir Henry Norris, the English ambassador in Paris, announced that Lady Bothwell had actually died after being poisoned, and that the marriage of the Earl to Queen Mary would soon follow.20It is not beyond the bounds of credibility that Bothwell had tried to poison Jean: he had, after all, plotted Darnley’s murder in order to satisfy his ambitions. But the attempt on the Countess’s life—if attempt it was—failed, and with public opinion rising fiercely against him, Bothwell may not have dared to try again, for two convenient deaths would have been far too coincidental. According to Leslie, rumour had it that Bothwell had offered his wife the choice of divorce or a cup of poison. Whether he had tried to poison her or not, Jean may have believed he had, and it may have been this that impelled her to give him his freedom.

  Accusations against Moray were by now more widespread, and on 21 and 30 March, Drury reported that the Earl had set up two challenges, offering to defend his honour by personal combat against any person defaming him as a regicide.21There is no other record of these challenges, so it may be that Drury was again repeating idle gossip.

  On 21 March, a Council was held at which Bothwell was present but not Balfour, who appears to have been maintaining a low profile.22Two days later, after noon on Palm Sunday, at the Queen’s command, a solemn requiem Mass and dirge for the soul of the late King was sung at Holyrood;23 Mary was present, for this marked the end of her forty days of mourning, but Drury heard that she broke down during the Mass and that m
any people witnessed it.24Buchanan, of course, claims that she was deliberately trying “to placate the popular indignation by simulating grief.”

  On that day or the next, Mary replied to Lennox, informing him that she had received his letter “naming the persons you greatly suspect,” and agreeing to his demands:

  For the convention of our nobility and Council, we have prevented [acted in anticipation of]25the thing desired by you in your letter, and have sent for them to be at us in Edinburgh this week approaching, where the persons nominated in your letter shall abide and undergo such trial as by the laws of this realm is accustomed, and being found culpable in any wise of that crime and odious fact nominated in the tickets, and whereof you suspect them, we shall even, according to our former letter, see the condign punishment as rigorously and extremely executed as that fact deserves. For indeed, as you write, we esteem ourselves party if we were resolute of the authors. And therefore we pray you, be at us here in Edinburgh this week approaching, where you may see the said trial and declare the things which you know may further the same, and there you shall have experience of our earnest will and affectionate mind to have an end in this matter, and the authors of so unworthy a deed really punished.26