by Derek Wilson
John Lascelles (d. 1546) was a member of Henry VIII’s chamber staff and a dedicated evangelical. In 1546 he became one of the few members of the upper classes to be burned as a heretic.
Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester (1483?–1555), was a leading ecclesiastic, politician, councillor and diplomat. Together with the Duke of Norfolk, he led the Catholic party that engineered Cromwell’s downfall and continued attempts to frustrate the evangelical Reformation, action which resulted in his incarceration in the Tower during the reign of Edward VI.
Sir Richard Cromwell (1502–44) was born Richard Williams, the son of a Welsh lawyer who set up business in London early in Henry VIII’s reign and married Cromwell’s sister, Elizabeth. The careers of Thomas and his nephew were closely intertwined. He associated himself enthusiastically with the minister’s reformist regime and even took the name Cromwell in preference to Williams. His legal expertise was of great value to the minister during the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Richard was the great-grandfather of Oliver Cromwell.
Stephen Vaughan (d. 1549) was a close associate of Cromwell’s from about 1520, and possibly a distant relative. They were involved together in mercantile activities in Antwerp, the great commercial entrepôt of northern Europe. Thanks to Cromwell’s patronage, Vaughan became the king’s commercial agent in Antwerp and head of the English House there. He was committed to the new evangelical movement (and particularly in supporting the Bible translator and religious exile William Tyndale). As early as 1529 he was being investigated for alleged heresy. He received several royal offices and grants, and was fortunate to survive Cromwell’s fall.
John Rogers (c. 1505–55) was Chaplain to the English House in Antwerp and a passionate evangelical who adopted the reformed faith probably at the instigation of William Tyndale, who carried out much of his Bible translation work while a refugee in the English House. He was an ardent activist in the production and dissemination of English Bible translations. After the accession of Mary Tudor (1553), Rogers was one of the first marked for investigation by Stephen Gardiner, who adjudged him guilty of heresy. Rogers was burned at the stake in February 1555.
Alessandro della Fava was for some years Frescobaldi’s agent in Southampton. Early in the sixteenth century the Florentine merchant/banking house of Frescobaldi had offices in Venice, Antwerp, London, Southampton and other major commercial centres. They profited considerably from lucrative business with Henry VII, though they reeled from occasional financial crises in subsequent decades.
Edward Wilmot (d. 1570) is recorded in the Southampton municipal records as a merchant adventurer, substantial landholder, innkeeper of The Dolphin and one-time mayor.
John Mill (c. 1476–1551) was an example of the industrious burgess class. He served Southampton and advanced his own prospects throughout a long career. Originally from Sussex, he acquired property near Southampton and was elected freeman there in 1510. Over ensuing decades he served the city in various civic capacities, becoming Member of Parliament in 1523. He accumulated much property in and around the city, but his fortunes received a check in 1535 when he became financially involved with the speculations of John Huttoft and Antonio Guidotti.
Dr Augustino de Augustinis (c. 1500–51) was a shadowy, not to say sinister, figure moving around European royal and diplomatic circles, ever on the lookout for information he could turn to his own advantage. As a physician to Cardinal Wolsey, and later to King Henry, he was in a position to learn secrets – and to profit from them. In the 1520s his career moved in parallel with Cromwell’s and Cromwell found him useful, being too shrewd to allow himself to be manipulated by the Venetian doctor.
Charles de Marillac (c. 1510–60) was a French career diplomat who served his country as Ambassador at the court of Henry VIII from 1538 to 1543.
Richard Morison (c. 1510–56) was a humanist scholar and a career diplomat who owed his early preferment to Wolsey and Cromwell. His progressive beliefs sometimes hampered his advancement, but he served as envoy and ambassador under Henry VIII, Edward VI and Mary I.
Lady Elizabeth Cromwell (c. 1518–68) was the sister of Edward Seymour, Lord Hertford, and in 1537 married Thomas’s son, Gregory. It appears to have been a love match, though the union was dynastically advantageous for both families. It created a reformist caucus linked by marriage to the king. But Queen Jane’s death in 1537 weakened those ties and Thomas Cromwell’s sudden fall threatened to drag the Seymours down. Extricating herself and her kin from this near catastrophe called for some very shrewd tactics.
Gregory Cromwell (1520–51), Thomas’s only son, was but a pale reflection of his father. He survived the disaster of 1540 by keeping a low profile. After months of uncertainty Gregory was rehabilitated, created Baron Cromwell of Oakham, and allowed sufficient lands to support his new honour. He spent the rest of his comparatively brief life tending and extending his estates.
Miles Coverdale (c. 1488–1569) was, after Tyndale, the second most important translator of the Bible. Because of his radical views he was obliged to go into exile in 1528 and spent much of his time for the next twenty years in Antwerp. There he produced a complete Bible, incorporating much of Tyndale’s work. Cromwell subsequently employed him in the preparation of the Great Bible of 1539. After Cromwell’s death Coverdale again went into exile, where he remained for the rest of Henry VIII’s reign. Under the Protestant King Edward VI he was appointed Bishop of Exeter.
Thomas Cranmer (1489–1556) was a Cambridge academic, surprisingly appointed Archbishop of Canterbury by Henry VIII to bring the English Church into line with the king’s religious policy. He worked closely with Cromwell on the work of reform in the 1530s and managed to cling to his position after the minister’s fall. He was a major target for Mary Tudor’s revenge and was burned at the stake in 1556.
Mercy Prior Little is known of this lady, who was the mother of Cromwell’s wife, Elizabeth. She was already widowed by the time of her daughter’s marriage and she lived with the Cromwells, presumably until the end of her days. Scant references in family letters suggest that she was loved and admired by those who knew her.
John Chambers (d. 1556) was the last abbot of the Benedictine abbey of Peterborough. He was canny enough not to resist closure in 1539 and, when the monastery was redesignated as Peterborough Cathedral in 1541, he remained as bishop. He was typical of a by no means small group of ex-religious who ‘moved with the times’.
Richard Bisley (dates unknown) is the most elusive ‘real person’ in the story. Yet he may, in some ways, have been the most significant figure in the life of Cromwell. His reformist credentials are confirmed by his flight to Frankfurt during the reign of Mary Tudor. He was a noted preacher, subsequently Rector of Cumnor, near Oxford, and a committed Protestant. The only direct connection with Cromwell for which we have documentary evidence is a record in a Berkshire archive in which Cromwell tantalizingly stated, ‘I owe him all.’ That is a remarkably emphatic testimonial, especially from someone like Thomas Cromwell who was careful to guard his innermost thoughts and feelings so stringently. In evangelical circles it invariably implies a profound spiritual obligation. Cromwell seems to have been grateful to Bisley for significant religious enlightenment.
All the other participants in the foregoing pages are inventions – but, I venture to claim, plausible inventions.