The King's Cardinal: The Rise and Fall of Thomas Wolsey (Pimlico)

by Gwyn, Peter

  It was while he was staying with Shrewsbury that the first symptoms of the illness that was to kill him appeared, difficult to diagnose at this distance in time, but he himself seems to have thought that he was suffering from some form of dysentery,171 and certainly diarrhoea and sickness were the most obvious symptoms. He had no illusions about his chances of surviving, and was to predict the exact hour of his death the day before it occurred,172 if that is not a literary embellishment of Cavendish’s. In a final interview with Sir William Kingston, keeper of the Tower, who had recently arrived to escort him on the last part of his journey south, he was very conscious of his impending death, and that it was going to be God rather than the king to whom he would have to answer, and that God could in no way be deceived.173 His remarks were, therefore, much more than a defence against a specific charge; and in fact his last words were a warning of the dangers of ‘this new perverse sect of the Lutherans’ who, like past heretical sects, would destroy not only the clergy but the whole natural order of things, unless Henry moved swiftly against them. As for what had befallen him, he saw it as God’s judgment; for, in those much quoted words, he felt sure that if he had served him ‘as diligently as I have done the king, he would not have given me over in my grey hairs. Howbeit this is the just reward that I must receive for my worldly diligence and pains that I have had to do him service, only to satisfy his vain pleasures, not regarding my godly duty’.174 He then ventured to issue Kingston a warning, which has perhaps been too often ignored by historians. Henry, he told his custodian, was

  a prince of royal courage, and hath a princely heart; and rather than he will either miss or want any part of his will or appetite, he will put the loss of one half of his realm in danger. For I assure you 1 have often kneeled before him in his privy chamber on my knees the space of an hour or two to persuade him from his will and appetite; but I could never bring to pass to dissuade him therefrom. Therefore, Master Kingston, if it chance hereafter you to be one of his privy council (as for your wisdom and other qualities ye be meet so to be) I warn you to be well advised and assured what matter ye put into his head; for ye shall never pull it out again.175

  The picture is of a Henry that readers of this book will recognize. It is hoped that what also emerges is a Wolsey who will be recognized, not least the man who, even at this unpropitious time, in his complimenting of Kingston did not fail to show his accustomed charm. It may be objected that what is being presented here is fiction. The source for this last scene, as indeed for Wolsey’s arrest and subsequent journey south, is almost entirely Cavendish, and it can be argued that he could hardly have remembered the conversations he purported to have had with Wolsey when, nearly thirty years later, he sat down to write. At worst, the whole account could have been a white lie. The truth that Cavendish was concerned with was not the kind that the professional historian of today spends much time worrying about; and, particularly where Wolsey’s downfall and the destruction of the Catholic Church in England merge, it may well be that he thought the message was more important than any literal report. Be that as it may, I find his account of Wolsey’s last weeks on the whole convincing; and without wanting to be paradoxical, it is fair to say that even those aspects of his account that have not been accepted help to reinforce this conviction. In the circumstances that Wolsey found himself in, it would be surprising if he had not come to believe that there were enemies at work determined to destroy him. That someone to whom one has devoted one’s life no longer needs one is the kind of unbearable fact that many people have chosen to ignore, even when the evidence is there for all to see. Moreover, when that person is a sixteenth century king it becomes even harder, for built into the panoply of sixteenth century kingship was the notion that he could do no wrong. And, of course, if Wolsey did believe that it was his enemies who destroyed him, then Cavendish was right to record the fact. That he accepted it is no more surprising than that Wolsey believed it – none of which, however, is proof that either man was right.

  As an account of what took place, and of what Wolsey was thinking Cavendish’s rings true, and, for what it is worth, receives some support from the very few other surviving accounts of Wolsey’s last days, especially as regards the issue that has been of most concern: whether or not he had conspired against the king. On 4 December Chapuys noted that Wolsey had ‘prepared for his death like a good Christian. At the time of receiving the holy sacrament he protested that he had never undertaken anything to his sovereign’s prejudice’.176 Two days earlier the Milanese ambassador had sent home a somewhat fuller account. Like Cavendish, he refers to Kingston’s sympathetic treatment of the cardinal, and his account of the medical symptoms is very similar. As for the deathbed scene itself, the Milanese ambassador’s was, in fact, the more dramatic:

  According to report, his mind never wandered at the last, and on seeing Captain Kingston, he made his attendants raise him in his bed, where he knelt, and whenever he heard the king’s name mentioned, he bowed his head, putting his face downwards. He then asked Captain Kingston where his guards were, and being answered that lodging was provided for them in several chambers on the ground floor of the palace, he requested that they might all be sent for into his presence. As many having entered as the place would hold, and having raised himself as much as he could, he said that on the day before he had taken the sacrament and expected to find himself soon before the supreme judgment seat, and that in such extremity he ought not to fail in speaking the truth, or leave any other opinion of him than such as was veracious. He added, 1 pray God that that sacrament may be the damnation of my soul if ever 1 thought to do disservice to my king.177

  According to Cavendish, Wolsey had spent all his remaining energies in his final interview with Kingston, so that by the time the guards were summoned to witness the end he was already almost unconscious. Moreover, in that interview he had been less concerned with the issue of his guilt as regards the particular charge of treason. Instead, he took a longer view, asking to be

  commended unto his royal majesty, beseeching him in my behalf to call to his most gracious remembrance all matters proceeding between him and me from the beginning of the world unto this day, and the progress of the same. And most chiefly in the weighty matter yet depending (meaning the matter newly begun between him and good Queen Catherine) then shall his conscience declare whether I have offended him or no.178

  The answer that Wolsey wanted and expected is the answer that this book has ended up providing. Unfortunately, what has also emerged is that it was a terrible error of judgement for him to have believed that his king would take his past record into consideration when deciding on his future. But then, as one of the most perceptive observers of the English political scene, the French ambassador du Bellay, had realized, the key to an understanding of Thomas Wolsey is that he loved his master more than himself.179

  1 Elizabethan copies of three letters from Henry to Bryan recently discovered in the British Library by L.R. Gardiner; see Gardiner. The reference numbers are BL Add MS 48066. fos.184, 186-7.188.

  2 For Agostini see A.F. Pollard, p.295, n.3.

  3Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.630. One of them must have been Agostini. Another seems to have been a chaplain arrested while crossing the Channel; see Mil. Cal, 832. Could the third have been Cromwell?

  4Sp. Cal, iv (i), pp.600-1, 619.

  5 Gardiner, p.103.

  6Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.805.

  7Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.819.

  8Mil. Cal, 833.

  9LP, iv, 6763 (PRO SP1/58/fo.215).

  10 Bradford, p.306-7; Sp. Cal,iv (i), pp.448, 486, 514.

  11SP. Cal, iv (i), pp.600-1 (‘plus grandes censures et a la invocacion du bras seculier, cart maintenant yl ny a nulnerf.’).

  12Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.600.

  13Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.692.

  14Sp. Cal, iv (i), 486.

  15St. P, vii, p.194 (LP, iv, 5797).

  16 Logan, p.13 ff.

  17Sp. Cal, iv (i), pp.599-601. It was not until Jan. 1532 t
hat Clement formally rebuked Henry for cohabiting with Anne, and not until that November that he threatened excommunication.

  18 Ibid, pp.601, 673, 736.

  19 Ibid, pp.514-5.

  20Inter alia LP, v, 62; Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.690; Sp. Cal, iv (ii), p.40.

  21Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.672.

  22 Herbert, pp.331 ff. (LP, iv, 6513); for further details see A.F. Pollard, p.287.

  23Inter alia his letters to Montmorency of 12 and 17 Oct 1529; see Correspondence, pp.104-11 (LP, iv, 6003, 6011).

  24St. P, vii, p.213 (LP, iv, 6733).

  25St. P, vii, p.213 (LP, iv, 6733).

  26Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.805.

  27 Boleyn’s embassy to the emperor early in 1530 was an attempt to take advantage of this opportunity; see Parmiter, pp.133-5.

  28 This was Chapuys’s assessment (Sp. Cal, iv (i), 712); and almost all du Bellay’s reports confirm it.

  29LP, iv, 6271, 6273, 6307; Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.486; Rymer, xiv, p.372 for the agreement; also Friedmann, i, pp.110-2.

  30 Bradford, pp.326-7. (Sp. Cal,iv (i), p.820).

  31Sp. Cal., iv (i), pp.486-7; and following Wolsey’s arrest Joachim was cleared of any suspicion of plotting by Henry and the Council; see LP, iv, 6720.

  32 Gardiner, p.102.

  33Ven. Cal., iv, 638.

  34 A.F. Pollard, p.291; Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, p.239.

  35 BL, Add, 25114, fos.47-8 (LP, iv, 6705).

  36 For full details see Scarisbrick, Bibl. d’Humanisme et Renaissance, xxiv, pp.212-5.

  37 Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.805.

  38 Ibid.

  39 Ibid, pp.718-20.

  40 He left Greenwich on 1 Nov.

  41 Cavendish, p.163.

  42LP, iv, 6335, 6344, 6436, 6447, 6496, 6545, 6571.

  43St. P, i, p.347 (LP, iv, 5999).

  44Sp. Cal., iv (i), p.303.

  45 Ibid.

  46 Cavendish, p.102-3.

  47 St. P, i, p.352 (LP, iv, 6098), but see also St. P, i, pp.351-2, 354, 359 (LP, iv, 6114, 6203-4).

  48St. P, i, 351(LP, iv, 6114).

  49LP, iv, 6151.

  50 Cavendish, pp.120-2.

  51Sp. Cal., iv (i), p.486.

  52 Rymer, xiv, p.366 (LP, iv, 6313).

  53 Rymer, xiv, pp.371-4 (LP, iv, 6220).

  54King’s Works, pp.300-8.

  55 Rymer, xiv, p.373 (LP, iv, 6220); see also Registrum Thome Wolsey, pp.184-7.

  56 Rymer, xiv, pp.374-5 (LP, iv, 6214 (ii)) for a schedule of what was given.

  57Inter alia £500 for ‘the defraying of my servants’ (LP, iv, 6226); and perhaps a further gift of £1,000 (Cavendish, p.132).

  58St. P, i, p.354 (LP, iv, 6204), a figure apparently first suggested by Gardiner.

  59LP, iv, 6663, William Capon’s to Wolsey of 4 Oct. outlining steps taken to dissolve the college on the king’s command; but as early as 20 July he was reporting that the decision had been taken (LP, iv, 6523).

  60LP, iv, 6679 for More’s invlovement; but see also LP, iv, pp.6377, 6510, 6574-5, 6579, 6666.

  61 Bodleian Library, MS Jesus Coll, 74, fo.194v (otherwise known as the Masters MSS); Lord Herbert’s often detailed summaries of letters between Wolsey and Cromwell for his Life and Reign of King Henry the Eighth, useful where, as in this case, the original has not survived.

  62St. P, i, pp.347-8 (LP, iv, 5999). It begins: ‘Though that I, your poor, heavy and wretched priest, do daily pursue, cry and call upon your royal majesty for grace, mercy, remission and pardon, …’

  63 As Wolsey explained to Cavendish, by confessing to something that Henry knew that he was not guilty of, ‘the king (I doubt not) had a great remorse of conscience, wherein he would rather pity me than malign me’. (Cavendish, pp.136-7).

  64LP, iv, 2576 Darcy to Wolsey, 15 Jan. 1514, a passionate plea for Wolsey not to forget ‘such as were your lovers and friends’.

  65LP, iv, 5749, p.2554 ‘Item, voiding me upon his promise to recompense me of the offices of treasurer, chamberlain and customer of Berwick …’

  66LP, iv, 541.

  67LP Add, 538.

  68 See pp.228-9.

  69 Palsgrave, pp.ix-liv for still probably the best account of his life, though G. Bernard has suggested to me that his charges may predate his dismissal from Richmond’s household and most of the specific things he mentioned are earlier than 1522.

  70 PRO, C54/396, m.31 I owe this reference to S.J. Gunn.

  71 That there was a search is indicated by the endorsements to the charges; see LP, iv, 5750, pp.2561, 2562.

  72LP, iv, 6204.

  73 At least as summarized by Lord Herbert: ‘As touching the articles laid unto me, whereof a great part be untrue, and those which be true are of such sort that by the doing of them no malice nor untruth can justly be arrected unto me … This may be urged to the king.’ (Bodlean Library, MS Jesus Coll, 74, fo.193v). The letter itself is more ambiguous, partly because defective, but certainly Cromwell was urged to be ‘plain’ with Fitzwilliam and Gardiner, both involved in drawing up the details of his pardon. (St. P, i, p.354).

  74 As reported to Wolsey by a messenger, Robert Smythe; see LP, iv, 6447.

  75LP, iv, 6496.

  76St. P, i, p.367(LP, iv, 6571).

  77 Both Bismarck and Gladstone had such moments, but not apparently Mrs Thatcher!

  78 Cavendish, p.138-9.

  79 Morison, p.E 11v.

  80St. P, i, 352 (LP, iv, 6098).

  81Inter alia LP, iv, 6098, 6112, 6114, 6181, 6182.

  82St. P, i, p.352 (LP, iv, 6098).

  83St. P, i, p.355 (LP, iv, 6181).

  84St. P, i, p.356 (LP, iv, 6181).

  85St. P, i, p.355 (LP, iv, 6181).

  86 Cavendish, p.136 for the statement that even some of Henry’s legal advisers thought the grounds for Wolsey’s indictment for praemunire shaky.

  87 Herbert, pp.294-302 (LP, iv, 6075); see Pollard, p.261 for a discussion of the status of the charges.

  88 Art. 6.

  89 Pollard, p.287.

  90Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.387.

  91 See pp.578-9. See also outgoing Venetian ambassador’s report to the senate, 10 Nov. 1531: Catherine was ‘so loved and respected, that the people already commence murmuring; and were the faction to produce a leader, it is certain that the English nation, … would take up arms for the queen.’ (Ven. Cal, iv, p.300.)

  92 Cromwell’s significance has been especially pushed by Elton; see Reform and Reformation, pp.130 ff. for a summary of his views, but see inter alia Parmiter, pp.144 ff. A strong counter was provided by Scarisbrick in his Henry VIII, pp.241 ff, but I suspect that the orthodoxy would still be that Henry was incapable of engineering a ‘break with Rome’ on his own. Significantly, however, Dr Guy, an Elton pupil, who, in his Sir Thomas More, p.130, accepted his master’s view, now rejects it; see inter alia his EHR, xvii, passim.

  93 See p.518.

  94 H.A. Kelly, p.123.

  95 Surts and Murphy, pp.xxii.

  96 Parmiter, p.124; Cambridge on 9 Mar., Oxford 8 April.

  97 Ibid; Sp. Cal., iv (i), pp.475-6.

  98St. P, iv (i), pp.598-9.

  99 See pp.49-50.

  100 Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, pp.261 ff. still seems to me to be the best account.

  101 See p.53-5.

  102Sp. Cal, iv (i), p.599.

  103LP, iv, app.262.

  104LP, iv, 6667 he continued, however, to keep his options open, instructing that if Clement would not accept their arguments they were to continue to press for delay.

  105TRP, p.197.

  106 Bernard, JEH, 37, p.265 for best account, though he is sceptical of the ambassadors’ reasons.

  107Sp. Cal., iv (i), pp.734-5.

  108 Ibid, pp.760-1, 797, 832-3.