Mary Queen of Scots

by Retha Warnicke

  ESCAPE, DEFEAT, AND FLIGHT TO ENGLAND

  The next day aided by William Douglas’s brother, George, and his cousin, Willie Douglas, she escaped from Lochleven. Disguised in shabby clothes, she traveled with Willie in a stolen boat to the shore where George awaited her with horses. They met Lord Seton, accompanied him to his Castle of Niddry near Winchburgh, and then journeyed to Hamilton House, a few miles from Glasgow. On the 4th she notified Moray that she had repudiated her abdication. In the next few days she attracted a large number of warriors to support her restitution: 9 earls, 9 bishops, 17 lords, 12 abbots, 14 commendators, numerous lairds and their followers, totaling in all about 6,000 men. Many must have joined her army because they were appalled at Moray’s treatment of her. Her supporters continued to be a broad mixture of Catholics and Protestants. Indeed, following her captivity in England, the Scottish civil war and Marianism more generally were never synonymous with Catholicism. She continued to have many Protestant adherents.

  With Argyll serving as her lieutenant general, the army began escorting Mary toward Dumbarton Castle, which Fleming had controlled since 1565, but unfortunately for her and her allies, Moray was nearby at Glasgow holding a justice ayre. On 13 May with Grange’s brilliant tactical assistance, Moray’s smaller force of 4,000 defeated her army at the village of Langside. Her overconfident supporters misjudged Moray’s intentions, assuming that since his army was smaller than theirs, he would permit them to pass on to Dumbarton. Because of their superior numbers, Mary’s allies had also anticipated victory if Moray unexpectedly chose to engage them in battle. James Melville recalled that having just gained her freedom after almost a year in close confinement, Mary was more interested in reaching the safety of Dumbarton than in challenging Moray in battle. Cecil also remarked that her forces were stopped in flight past Glasgow.

  Her behavior following the defeat lends credence to their opinions. Having witnessed the conflict from the hillside and seen scores of soldiers killed or captured after Argyll fell ill possibly from a mild stroke or heart attack, the frightened queen fled in disguise southward, reaching Dundrennan Abbey in Galloway by the 15th. Later, she explained to Elizabeth that Moray’s soldiers had stopped pursuing her straggling troops and had turned to prevent her from reaching Dumbarton. She also criticized the misguided method of her allies who defended themselves in a disorderly fashion and marched in a confusing manner. This experience made her realize how warfare diminishes the authority of queens regnant. Having relinquished the command of her army to her warriors, she was forced to rely on their strategies for her defense. Unable to reach Dumbarton, Mary decided to seek refuge in England over the protests of her adherents, who surely reminded her of the 18-year English captivity of her ancestor, James I. To Richard Lowther, deputy governor of Carlisle, she wrote, explaining that she was being forced into exile and requesting permission to enter England. Enclosed with the message was the ring from Elizabeth, which Robert Melville retrieved for her. On the 16th without waiting for a reply, Mary boarded a fishing boat at a small bay called Abbey Burnfoot and disembarked on the Cumberland side four hours later at a place then called Ellensport. Fleming, Herries, Lords Livingston and Boyd, George and Willie Douglas, and nine or so others moved with her to Workington Hall, where Lowther with 400 horsemen greeted her and then escorted her to Carlisle in the absence of Henry, ninth Lord Scrope, the warden of the west marches. Having reached Carlisle by 18 May without funds or a change of clothing, Mary requested assistance from both Elizabeth, who was surprised to learn of her arrival, and Catherine, who soon would be unable to aid her since France was on the brink of another religious conflict: Condé declared war on the crown in August.

  With hindsight it is clear that the flight to England was a blunder, but Mary had few options. Even a France on the brink of another civil war was a better destination, but traveling there on the fishing boat was impossible: she had no French fleet to defend her against pirates or other enemies and the uncertain weather made sea voyages perilous at any time. Recalling Elizabeth’s sympathetic messages when she was at Lochleven, relying on their kinship, an important impulse in this society, and recognizing the significance of the ring, an assurance of aid sent to her by her good sister, Mary seems to have thought, incorrectly as it turned out, that her cousin would assist her in recovering her throne. It is also true that the losing faction in Scottish struggles usually sought refuge in England.

  After reaching Carlisle with Scrope on the 28th to become Mary’s guardian, Sir Francis Knollys, vice-chamberlain of the royal household, reported that she fled to England because she lacked a secure refuge in Scotland or safe passage to France. Indeed, eight days before he arrived, she wrote to Cassilis, explaining that “for the safety of my body finding no sure access nor place within my realm to retire,” she was constrained to depart for England. She further informed him that within a few days she planned to leave for France to obtain aid against her rebels.5

  Her flight left her allies with certain psychological and strategic disadvantages in the ensuing civil war, but she could not have anticipated that Lethington and Grange, who replaced Balfour as captain of Edinburgh Castle in September 1567, would join her forces in 1569 or that the struggle on her behalf would survive without significant foreign aid until 1573. She did know in 1568 that her supporters were somewhat unreliable. The Hamiltons, led by the archbishop during Châtelherault’s exile, had challenged her authority in 1559–60 and again in 1565; Argyll, the losing general at Langside and probably an endorser of her husband’s murder band, had been a Chaseabout raider. Huntly, one of her most trusted supporters, had not only conspired against Henry but had also joined Archbishop Hamilton and Argyll in signing the Ainslie band. From her perspective, their present loyalty must have been gratifying, but as they were all descendants of her Stewart ancestors and related to the Hamiltons through the female line, they possessed reversionary interests to the regency that her half brother controlled and, indeed, also to the royal succession.

  If Mary had remained in Scotland, she would have had to respond to the belief of many of her subjects that she needed the aid of a husband to rule the realm. At Lochleven when she was still pregnant, Throckmorton learned that plans were underway to marry her to a Campbell or a Hamilton to consolidate her political position. Entering either of these unions would have diminished her authority; with English or French aid, however, she might avoid another Scottish alliance and retain governmental flexibility. Her noblemen’s views seemed to have accorded with Sir Anthony Weldon’s later remark in his chronicle of the English kings that he had omitted Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth because he would have nothing to do with women. Indeed, in September 1567, de Silva reported to Philip that the Scots hate the rule of kings but despise even more the governance of a woman.

  The wives of Scrope and Knollys, Mary’s first guardians, were Elizabeth’s maternal relatives. Margaret Howard, Lady Scrope, was one of Norfolk’s sisters and the cousin of the English queen, whose maternal grandmother was a Howard. One of Elizabeth’s favorite ladies was Catherine Carey, Lady Knollys, who was the daughter of Mary Boleyn Carey, the queen’s maternal aunt. When Lady Knollys became seriously ill while her husband served as Mary’s guardian, a post he reluctantly accepted, Elizabeth refused either to send his wife to him or to release him from his duties so that he could attend her. She died on 15 January as he was transferring Mary to the control of George Talbot, sixth earl of Shrewsbury.6

  Even before Knollys reached Carlisle, his duty to secure the Scottish queen had begun. Having learned that Thomas Percy, seventh earl of Northumberland, was attempting to gain access to her, Knollys wrote to him, but before sending the letter, encountered the earl en route to Carlisle and complained to him about his actions. Northumberland, who, of course, would be one of the important rebel leaders in the Northern Rising of 1569, responded that he sought only to protect Mary from enemies who might follow her into England and then retired from the scene. In fact, Mary, herself, expressed con
cerns that Moray might cross the border and attempt to capture her.7

  Knollys and Scrope offered interesting observations about the Scottish queen. Noting that she was a pleasant woman with an eloquent tongue, discreet head, stout courage, and a liberal heart, she was, they also believed, impervious to flattery and undaunted by the plain speech of persons she deemed honest. They judged her to have a high opinion of her worth, citing her claim that no one but God could judge her and her prediction that she would revenge her wrongs with her enemies’ blood. Her ready wit impressed them: they discovered that she understood her allies’ motivations, some joining her for her sake, some for the French cause, and others for the Hamilton claim. Then, there were the opportunists.

  Mary sent Herries and Fleming to Elizabeth on 28 May with three requests. She asked for a private meeting with her good sister and her aid in restoring her regal authority, but if her cousin could not help her, she required a passport for Fleming so that he could seek assistance for her in France. She also reminded Elizabeth that it was the rebels she asked Mary to pardon who forced her into exile. In the next few days Elizabeth and her councilors came to an agreement on three issues concerning Mary and her requests. First, responding to Knollys’s warning that she might escape on horseback if she remained housed so close to the frontier, Elizabeth decided to transfer her to a residence farther away from the border. Second, she decided she would not meet with Mary until after a hearing was held in England to settle the Scottish disputes. Third, she declined to provide Fleming with a passport to seek aid from Catherine and Charles because a major English priority was preventing renewed French involvement in Scotland.

  In June Elizabeth dispatched Henry Middlemore, Throckmorton’s cousin who had served as his secretary in France, on a dual mission. He carried with him her correspondence for Mary at Carlisle and for Moray in Scotland, as well as Cecil’s instructions with additional explanations. On the 14th Middlemore delivered Elizabeth’s letter to Mary, which promised that she would be as careful of her cousin’s life and honor as any parent would be. The English queen also explained that it would damage her honor if she invited Mary to court before her acquittal of the crimes charged against her. Responding emotionally to Middlemore, Mary protested that she had expected a better welcome than this from Elizabeth to whom she wished personally to reveal matters that she had never told anyone else. He tried to assuage her concerns by pointing out that once she was declared innocent, Elizabeth would see that she was restored to her regal dignity. If, furthermore, his queen were to meet with Mary before the hearing, he explained, her Scottish adversaries would not view Elizabeth as a neutral judge. It was also Middlemore’s duty to convey the news that his queen wanted her to be located closer to her court. Expressing a strong disinterest in moving farther from Scotland, Mary asked him if she would have a choice in the matter or if she would be forcibly taken like a captive to another residence. Also concerned about the delays in hearing from Herries, she asked Middlemore if Elizabeth were holding him as a prisoner. Middlemore denied, of course, that either of them was his government’s captive.

  On 14 June before departing for Scotland, Middlemore sent a report about his discussion with Mary to Cecil along with a note from her to Elizabeth. Mary wrote that she regretted her confidence in requesting her cousin for assistance had been so misplaced. She asked Elizabeth’s permission to seek aid elsewhere and reminded her of her audience with Moray in 1565, when he was an English refugee. Middlemore then left to deliver Elizabeth’s letter to Moray, which informed him about the inquiry and ordered him to refrain from attacking or injuring Mary’s allies.

  Although the privy council originally recommended that Mary be housed at Tutbury in Staffordshire, a royal castle of the duchy of Lancaster, she refused to move to that location. Under protest she finally agreed to go to Bolton, Scrope’s castle in Wensleydale. On 13 July claiming that she preferred relocating to Dumbarton or to France, Mary commenced the two-day journey to Bolton, a walled structure in a mountainous area of Yorkshire described by Knollys as desolate and wild. Just before their departure, more of her servants and attendants reached her, including Mary Seton with wigs for the queen’s hair, which had been clipped for the incognito flight from Langside. These newcomers, including Lady Livingston who arrived in August, increased Mary’s household to 30 gentlefolk and 45 domestics; the number of the latter, referred to by Knollys as the baser sort, grew to 60 at Bolton. In addition, another 30 allies, among them, Skirling and Lord Claud Hamilton, commendator of Paisley, the fifth and youngest son of Châtelherault, resided in town at their own charge.

  At Bolton Mary installed procedures as though she were holding court. She ordered erected in her great chamber a canopy or cloth of state made of satin figured with gold, which arrived from Scotland along with some of her clothes and furnishings. The canopy was a symbol of high social rank, usually indicating some degree of royal status. Noting that she hunted and hawked daily, Knollys predicted that preventing her from pursuing these sports, which brought her such pleasure and delight, would greatly depress her.

  Among Mary’s retrieved possessions were her sewing materials, making it possible for her to resume the needlework that she greatly enjoyed. One of her English guards, Christopher Norton, later described an encounter with her at Bolton. His recollection indicates that she customarily joined other members of her guardians’ household in their leisure moments at dinnertime. While Knollys and Scrope played chess and Lady Scrope stood by the fireside, Mary sat at the window knitting. Deciding to warm herself at the fire, she asked Norton to hold her sewing for her. When Knollys’s chess game was over, he noticed Norton assisting the queen with her sewing and warned him to stop watching her, for she would make a “fool” out of him.8

  As Mary’s guardian, Knollys contended with many of the same problems that were to plague his successors. Her uncertain status did make his duties somewhat more awkward than theirs, however. Under his charge she was neither completely free nor yet entirely a prisoner. He struggled daily with preventing her household from increasing in size, with acquiring sufficient funds to purchase provisions, and with finding sufficient quantities of them. That she was winning support in the community for her personal cause and for her faith also deeply concerned him. Then, too, her secret correspondence and numerous visitors, especially Francis Montmorin, seigneur de Saint-Herem, a French envoy, complicated his supervision of her. Finally, he was forced to respond to claims that he was treating her too leniently.

  Imprisoned with few occupations beyond her daily exercise, Mary wrote numerous letters. By 22 October four months after reaching England, she had addressed more than 20 to Elizabeth concerning several issues. Mary asked her to prevent Moray’s forfeiture of her friends’ estates at a pretended parliament and charged him with stealing her jewels. She denied she was guilty of any wrongdoing and repeated her desire for a meeting with her good sister. Other letters to Elizabeth referred to the plague at Edinburgh Castle where many of Mary’s allies were imprisoned, to Border violence, and to arrangements for the inquiry in England to settle the differences between her and her subjects.

  In treating Scottish problems Cecil, among other Englishmen, advocated his realm’s feudal superiority, which he justified with documentary evidence. He claimed that it was appropriate for an investigation concerning the dissension between Mary and her subjects to occur in England because its rulers had the right to settle disputes over the Scottish crown, as could be proved by many records and precedents.

  When Herries finally returned from court, reaching Bolton on 24 July, he briefed Mary about the proposed inquiry. Like Middlemore before him, Herries gave assurances to Mary that following her acquittal, the English queen would restore her cousin to her regal authority in Scotland. In her letters, as for example, one written on 22 June, Elizabeth was less specific, promising only that when Mary was found innocent, her English cousin would aid and honor her and do nothing to harm her. After consulting with Herries, Mary info
rmed Elizabeth that she would consent to the inquiry under two conditions: she must maintain her royal rank in it, as she would not allow her subjects a status equal to hers, and its purpose must be limited to arranging her restitution. She would not accept anyone as judge over her except God. Attempting to appear conciliatory, she offered to establish English Protestantism in Scotland at her return.

  In September after her attendance at prayer services fueled rumors of her conversion to Protestantism, she explained at a meeting in her great chamber that she remained a faithful Catholic. To Knollys’ protest concerning her dissimulation, she responded:

  Why would you have me to lose France and Spain and all my friends...by seeming to change my religion, and yet I am not assured that...my good sister will be my assured friend to the satisfaction of my honor and expectation?9

  That same month she confided to Elizabeth of Valois in Spain that her Protestant captors were trying to convert her but that she would never change her religion. If she made concessions, it was only because she was a prisoner. Later in December she confessed to Pius V that as Elizabeth had denied her a priest, she listened to a minister praying in English. She pleaded for his pardon and absolution and promised to be an obedient member of the Roman Catholic Church.

  THE INQUIRY INTO MARY’S RESTITUTION AND THE CASKET LETTERS

  From the outset Moray viewed the inquiry as her murder trial, believing that only if she were declared innocent of complicity in the king’s death would the English demand her restitution. Prompted by a strong dislike of rebels against legitimate authority, Elizabeth seemed initially to promise through intermediaries more favorable treatment to Mary than she ultimately delivered. Elizabeth could not, moreover, control the behavior of her councilors, many of whom were satisfied with Moray’s regency. Mary later complained that throughout the inquiry English officials conspired with her brother and his allies against her.