The Boleyns: The Rise & Fall of a Tudor Family

by David Loades

  Rowley Williams, J., Sabine Johnson (2012).

  Weikel, A., ‘The Marian Council re-visited’, in The Mid-Tudor Polity, 1540–1560, ed. J. Loach and R. Tittler (1980).

  * * *

  [1] History of Parliament, Biographies (1936), p. 90.

  [2] Calendar of the Patent Rolls, 1452–61, p. 216.

  [3] A. B. Beavan, The Aldermen of the City of London (1904), I, pp. 90, 272; II, pp. 10, 164.

  [4] History of Parliament, loc cit.

  [5] Cal. Pat., 1446–1452, pp. 130, 225.

  [6] Ibid, p. 472. Gascony fell to the French in 1453.

  [7] History of Parliament, loc.cit.

  [8] Ibid.

  [9] Charles Ross, Edward IV (1974), pp. 166-7.

  [10] R. Sharpe, Letter Books of the City of London (1894–9). Letter Book L, p. 19.

  [11] ODNB, sub Thomas Boleyn. Thomas Butler was the brother and heir of John Butler, 6th Earl of Ormond, who died in October 1476.

  [12] Cal. Pat., 1476–85, pp. 343, 466. William Boleyn’s story is complicated by the fact that there was another William Boleyn, described as a gentleman, who was a collector of taxes in Lincolnshire in 1463, and for the Port of Boston in 1485. However, that William appears to have died in 1491. Cal. Fine., 1461–1471, p. 104, and Cal. Fine., 1485–1509, pp. 36-7, 136.

  [13] Ibid, pp. 397, 490.

  [14] Calendar of the Close Rolls, 1485–1500, no. 143.

  [15] Cal. Pat., 1485–1494, pp. 294, 349.

  [16] ODNB. The Earl of Surrey was restored to his father’s dukedom of Norfolk in 1514. His son, who succeeded him in the dukedom in 1524, married Anne, a younger daughter of King Edward IV.

  [17] It was normal practice for noblemen and major gentry to run these schoolrooms when they had children of an appropriate age. It was also quite usual for children to be sent to other suitable homes for their upbringing, although there is no sign of that happening in this case.

  [18] Calendar of the Fine Rolls, 1485–1509, no. 668. Cal. Pat., 1494–1509, no. 273.

  [19] ODNB. The birth dates of all Thomas’s children are conjectural. See G. W. Bernard, Anne Boleyn: Fatal Attractions (2010), pp. 4- 19.

  [20] Ibid, p. 5.

  [21] Cal. Pat., 1494–1509, pp. 479, 484. On enfeofment to use, see K. B. MacFarlane, The Nobility of Later Medieval England (1973), pp. 76-8, 217-219.

  [22] Cal. Fin., 1485–1509, no. 829, 11 November 1505.

  [23] S. T. Bindoff, The House of Commons, 1509–1558 (1982), sub. James Boleyn.

  [24] Ibid.

  [25] Ibid. The earldom of Wiltshire was revived for William Paulet, Lord St John, in 1550.

  [26] For Jane Rochford’s behaviour in the summer of 1541, see D. Loades, The Tudor Queens of England (2009), pp. 144-8 and L. B. Smith, A Tudor Tragedy (1961), pp. 173-207. Jenny Rowley- Williams, Jane Rochford, (2011).

  [27] Bindoff, House of Commons.

  [28] Letters and Papers … of the Reign of Henry VIII, I, no. 698. He was supporting Sir Charles Brandon.

  [29] For Henry’s essentially backward looking attitude at this time, and particularly his obsession with Henry V, see J. J. Scarisbrick, Henry VIII (1968), pp. 23-4. He commissioned a life of his hero, which was translated into English in 1513, and edited by C. L. Kingsford in 1911.

  [30] Calendar of State Papers, Spanish, II, p. 44. Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, p. 26.

  [31] Garrett Mattingly, Catherine of Aragon, (1963), p. 97.

  [32] Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, pp. 26-7.

  [33] Polydore Vergil, Anglica Historia, ed. D. Hay, (Camden Society, 1950), p. 163.

  [34] Edward Hall, Chronicle (ed. 1806), pp. 520 et seq.

  [35] Letters and Papers, I, nos. 81 (11 May 1509), 707 (27 February 1511).

  [36] Ibid, no. 1186. War had been declared at the end of April. Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, p. 29.

  [37] Letters and Papers, I, no. 1229.

  [38] L & P, I, no. 1448. Eric Ives, The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn, (2004), p. 11.

  [39] L & P, I, no. 2055.

  [40] Ibid, no. 1279. On Thomas’s ease of manner, both with the Archduchess and the King, see Ives, Life and Death, pp. 11, 18.

  [41] L & P, I, no. 1587.

  [42] Edward Echyngham to Wolsey, 5 May 1513. Alfred Spont, Letters and Papers relating to the War with France, 1512–1513 (1897), pp. 145, 53.

  [43] For a discussion of the deployment of this household, see Charles Cruikshank, Henry VIII and the Invasion of France (1990), pp. 30- 31. His Chamber Staff totalled 579.

  [44] Ibid, pp. 105-7.

  [45] Calendar of State Papers, Venetian, II, no. 316.

  [46] F. Nitti, Leo X e la Sua Politica (1892). Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, p. 51.

  [47] L & P, I, no. 2964.

  [48] For an assessment of Mary’s character, see ODNB sub Mary Stafford.

  [49] L & P, II, no. 1501. A total of eighteen courtiers took part in this performance.

  [50] S. J. Gunn, Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk (1988) , pp. 35- 8.

  [51] L & P, II, no. 125, 6 February 1515.

  [52] Cal. Ven., II, nos. 594, 596, 635.

  [53] For a full discussion of Wolsey’s manoeuverings at this juncture, see P. Gwynn, The King’s Cardinal (1990), pp. 613-8.

  [54] L & P, II, nos. 1309, 1573, and p. 1470.

  [55] Ibid, no. 1277.

  [56] State Papers of Henry VIII, (1830–52), II, 35, 49, 58. D. B. Quinn, ‘Henry VIII and Ireland, 1509–1534’, Irish Historical Studies, 12, 1961, p. 331.

  [57] L & P, II, no. 1517.

  [58] Ibid, nos. 3756, 3783.

  [59] Garrett Mattingly, Catherine of Aragon. For Catherine’s jointure, see L & P, II, no. 1363.

  [60] Cal. Ven., II, 1074. Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, p. 71.

  [61] There were violent protests against the intrusion of a foreigner. Charles had been born in Ghent, and brought Netherlandish advisers with him, who were much resented. The revolt is known as the Comuneros.

  [62] L & P, II, nos. 4469, 4475.

  [63] L & P, III, no. 70. The danger lay in the fact that Charles now controlled three of Francis’s five possible frontiers – the Low Countries, Germany and Spain. The fourth was the English Channel, and the fifth, where conflict was most likely, was in northern Italy.

  [64] BL. Cotton Vitellius B xx, ff.165, 170. L & P, III, nos. 240, 241. Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, pp. 98-101.

  [65] L & P, III, no. 306.

  [66] Ibid, no. 702. J. G. Russell, The Field of Cloth of Gold (1969), p. 57.

  [67] Cal. Ven., III, no. 108.

  [68] Wolsey appears to have been attempting to impute some disloyalty to Sir Thomas early in 1515, although nothing came of it. L & P, II, nos. 124, 125. On the promise of the comptrollership, see ibid, III, no. 223.

  [69] L & P, III, no. 1004, 1011. Surrey tended to take the Irish side in this dispute.

  [70] Ibid, no. 1762.

  [71] Ibid, no. 1994.

  [72] Hall, Chronicle, p. 462. D. Loades, The Tudor Navy (1992), pp. 105-6.

  [73] L & P, III, nos. 2333, 2481.

  [74] Ibid, no. 3008.

  [75] Ibid, no. 2982. Helen Miller, Henry VIII and the English Nobility (1986), p. 19.

  [76] L & P, III, no. 3213. Wolsey wrote that Charles was ‘encouraged’ by the efforts of Bourbon, but Henry was expecting the latter to advance on Paris.

  [77] S. J. Gunn, ‘The Duke of Suffolk’s March on Paris in 1523’, English Historical Review, 101, 1986, pp. 596-634.

  [78] State Papers of Henry VIII, VI, pp. 221, 233 Cal. Span., Further Supplement, p. 318.

  [79] L & P, III, no. 3386.

  [80] L & P, IV, no. 137.

  [81] State Papers, IV, pp. 120 et seq. Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, p. 133.

  [82] Ibid, p. 138.

  [83] Ibid, p. 140.

  [84] G. W. Bernard, War, Taxation and Rebellion in Early Tudor England (1986), p. 99.

  [85] Hall, Chronicle, pp. 699, 701-2.

  [86] L & P, IV, no. 1298.

  [87] TNA SP1/55, ff.14-15. L & P, IV, no.
5807. Miller, Henry VIII and the English Nobility, pp. 20-21.

  [88] D. Loades, Mary Tudor; the Tragical History of the First Queen of England (2006), pp. 22-3.

  [89] L & P, IV, no. 1939.

  [90] J. Gairdner, ‘Mary and Anne Boleyn’, and ‘The Age of Anne Boleyn’, in English Historical Review, 8, 1893, pp. 53-60 and EHR, 10, 1895, p. 104.

  [91] E. W. Ives, The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn (2004), pp. 15-17. G. W. Bernard, Anne Boleyn; Fatal Attractions (2010), pp. 5-6.

  [92] G. de Boom, Marguerite d’Autriche-Savoie et la Pre-Renaissance (Paris, 1935), p. 118. Ives, Life and Death, p. 16.

  [93] Letters and Papers, I, no. 3348 (3), 3357.

  [94] L & P, II, I, no. 224. S. J. Gunn. Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk (1988). pp. 35-38.

  [95] L & P, I, nos. 826, 827. Scarisbrick, Henry VIII, pp. 57-8.

  [96] Claude had been born on 13 October 1499. Lancelot de Carles in Ascoli, L’Opinion, lines 37-42.

  [97] Cal. Ven., 1509–1519, no. 1235. Giustinian and Surian to the Signory, 16 June 1519.

  [98] Ibid no. 1269.

  [99] L & P, II, p. 1539. The King made an offering of 6s 8d. at the wedding.

  [100] L & P, XII, I, no. 822.

  [101] L & P, III, no. 559. Hall, Chronicle, p. 631.

  [102] For a discussion of the succession issue, see D. Loades, The Tudors (forthcoming).

  [103] John Hale, the Vicar of Isleworth confessed in the early 1530s that one of the priests of the Brigittine nunnery of Syon ‘… did show to me young master Carey saying he was our sovereign lord the king’s son by our sovereign lady the Queen’s sister …’ TNA SP1/92, f. 37. L & P, VIII, no. 567. Bernard, Anne Boleyn, p. 22.

  [104] L & P, III, no. 3358. N.A. M. Rodger, The Safeguard of the Sea (1997), p. 477.

  [105] L & P, IV, no. 4409 (misdated), see ODNB.

  [106] ODNB.

  [107] Philip Mowat, History and Antiquities of the County of Essex (1768), Vol.I, p. 154.

  [108] L & P, V, no. 306.

  [109] The Manner of the Triumph at Calais and Boulogne (1532), in A. F. Pollard, Tudor Tracts (1903), p. 7.

  [110] S. T. Bindoff, The House of Commons, 1509–1558 (1982).

  [111] L & P, VII, no. 1554.

  [112] Ibid, no. 1665.

  [113] Bindoff, House of Commons.

  [114] L & P, XII, no. 822. Ibid, XIV, no. 236.

  [115] Ibid, no. 572. 22 November 1539.

  [116] L & P, XVII, no. 1012. Grants in October 1542.

  [117] L & P, XVIII, no. 832. Idem, XIX, no. 273.

  [118] L & P, XVIII, nos. 421, 19 April 1543, 478, 1 May. William was one of several gentlemen similarly charged.

  [119] L & P, XVIII, no. 623 (66).

  [120] L & P, XXI, under ‘undated grants in 1546’. This grant is clearly misdated, since it refers to Mary as ‘widow, one of the daughters of the late Earl of Wiltshire and Ormond, and lately wife to William Carey deceased …’ It must have been made at some point between 1539 and her own death in 1543. Her marriage to William Stafford is ignored.

  [121] Bindoff, House of Commons.

  [122] L & P, XX, no. 418.

  [123] Acts of the Privy Council, IV (1552–4), 24 June 1554.

  [124] C. H. Garrett, The Marian Exiles (1938/66), pp. 295-6.

  [125] Ibid. Bindoff, House of Commons.

  [126] Hugh Paget, ‘The Youth of Anne Boleyn’, Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research, 54, 1981, pp. 162-70.

  [127] Ibid, p. 166. Ives, Life and Death of Anne Boleyn, p. 19.

  [128] For a discussion of the political significance of these images, see Anglo, Spectacle, Pageantry and Early Tudor Policy.

  [129] G. de Boom, Marguerite d’Autriche-Savoie et la Pre-Renaissance, p. 123.

  [130] Ives, Life and Death, p. 23.

  [131] G. W. Bernard, Anne Boleyn, pp. 7-8.

  [132] De Carles in G. Ascoli, La Grande-Bretagne devant l‘Opinion Francaise.

  [133] John Taylor’s account of the campaign. BL Cotton MS Cleo. C v, ffs.64 et seq. L & P, 1, no. 2391.

  [134] Paget in BIHR, p. 167.

  [135] Ives, Life and Death, pp. 27-8.

  [136] S. J. Gunn, Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, pp. 29-30.

  [137] De Carles in Ascoli, La Grande-Bretagne, lines 39-51.

  [138] Ives, Life and Death, p. 29. Blois was Claude’s own, but was nevertheless the site of Francis I’s first major building project. R. J. Knecht, Renaissance Warrior and Patron: the Reign of Francis I (1994), pp. 114-6, 134-7.

  [139] L & P, II, nos. 4440-1, 4462. Rymer, Foedera, XIII, p. 624.

  [140] State Papers of Henry VIII, VI, p. 56.

  [141] J. G. Russell, The Field of Cloth of Gold, (1969) p. 123.

  [142] It is possible that Sir Thomas’s wife, Elizabeth, was also present among Catherine’s ladies, because she had been a member of the Queen’s Privy Chamber since 1509.

  [143] Ives, Life and Death, pp. 32-3.

  [144] This was Edward Herbert’s opinion in the seventeenth century. Herbert, History of England under Henry VIII, ed., White Kennett (1870), p. 399. See Cal. Span. Supplement, 1513–42, p. 30. L & P, III, no. 1994. Ives, Life and Death, pp. 32-3.

  [145] L & P, II, no. 1277.

  [146] L & P, III, no. 1628. State Papers, II, p. 49. D. B. Quinn, ‘Henry VIII and Ireland’, Irish Historical Studies, 12, 1961, pp. 318-44.

  [147] L & P, III, no. 1762.

  [148] S. G. Ellis, Tudor Ireland (1985), pp. 104-5.

  [149] Hall, Chronicle, p. 631. L & P, III, no. 1559.

  [150] Nicholas Sander, The Rise and Growth of the Anglican Schism, ed. D. Lewis (1877), p. 25.

  [151] George Wyatt in The Life of Cardinal Wolsey, by George Cavendish, ed. S. W. Singer, (1827), p. 424. George Wyatt was writing in about 1597, deriving his information from Anne Gainsford, then very aged, who had known Anne Boleyn as a young woman.

  [152] For the latest round in these investigations, see Bernard, Anne Boleyn, pp. 15-18. The most satisfactory explanation is that given by Ives, Life and Death, pp. 63-83.