"Sir, for the reverence of God, take heed what you do in marrying my daughter; for if you record your conscience well, she is your own daughter as well as mine."34
The King didn't care and told Elizabeth that he would marry her regardless of who her father was.
Of course, we have to remember that Bailey/Hall was writing a sympathetic account of the life of John Fisher, a man who was executed for refusing to accept Henry VIII as the supreme head of the church and also for his support of Catherine of Aragon. Fisher had advised Catherine during the annulment proceedings and had spoken up in her defence at the Legatine Court.
My Thoughts
It's difficult to sort truth from fiction, fact from legend, nearly five hundred years later, but the only sources we have for the alleged affair between Elizabeth Boleyn and Henry VIII are suspect in my opinion because they:
• Are hostile to the Boleyns and to Henry VIII's annulment
• Have an agenda; a reason why they are attacking Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII or Elizabeth I
• Seem to be based on the same rumour stemming from Friar Peto
These sources are not separate, all backing each other up; and I don't believe there is any evidence that Elizabeth Boleyn did indeed have an affair with Henry VIII, never mind have a child by him. As Alison Weir states, Thomas Boleyn was not in France when Anne Boleyn was conceived or born. He went to the Low Countries on an embassy in 1512 and to France in 1519. He was in England in 1501 and 1507 and surely would have noticed if his wife had got pregnant by the King. Also, would the paranoid Henry VIII, who worried about his marriage to Catherine of Aragon being contrary to God's law because she was his brother's widow, really marry his own daughter? I think not.
I'm sure that if there was any truth in these rumours then the rumours would have been used to stop Henry annulling his marriage to Catherine so that he could marry Anne; Chapuys would have gleefully passed such news on to Charles V. I just cannot see the opposition ignoring such ammunition.
In her book on Mary Boleyn, Alison Weir ponders whether these rumours spread and were believed "because of Elizabeth Howard's dubious reputation" and whether she "had gained some ill fame for straying from the connubial couch".35 Weir even wonders if "the fact that all her offspring became notorious in one way or another for sexuality might suggest that she herself had set them a poor example by her loose morals and by betraying her marriage vows." Weir supports this theory with the poetry of John Skelton, who compared Elizabeth to the beautiful Cressida, a woman who pledged undying love to Troilus but then betrayed him with Diomedes. Weir writes that by the 14th century, Cressida's name "had become synonymous with female inconstancy" and that a Tudor audience would "have instantly grasped the double entendre." Weir does admit that Skelton may simply have been praising Elizabeth's looks, "but if so, he had chosen a strange and compromising comparison, when there were plenty of others to be drawn." I don't agree with Weir's theory. Here are Skelton's words:
"To My Lady Elisabethe To be your remembrancer, Madam, I am bownd:Lyke to Aryna maydenly of porte,Of vertew and konyng the wel and parfight grownd,Whome Dame Nature, as wele I may reporte,Hath freshely enbewtid withe many a goodely sorte Of womanly feturis: whos florisshinge tender age Is lusty to loke on, plesant, demure and sage.Goodely Creisseyda, fairar than Polycene,For to envyve Pandarus appetite:Troylus, I trow, if that he had yow sene,In yow he wold have set his hole delight:Of alle your bewte I suffice not to wright,Bot as I sayde your florisshynge tender age Is lusty to loke on, plesant, demure and sage."36
This allegorical poem was written in praise of the ladies of the Countess of Surrey at Sheriff Hutton Castle, who made Skelton a garland of silks, golds and pearls in a pageant around 1495. It praised not only Elizabeth Howard, but also the Countess and other ladies such as Jane Hasset, Isabell Pennel, Geretrude Statham and Isbell Knyght (Skelton's spellings). Although it was not printed until 1523, I cannot see Skelton changing a poem complimenting these ladies to one of satire. I think it should just be taken as praise of Elizabeth's beauty, without "a sting to its tail". To read it as evidence of a dubious reputation and infidelity is a huge leap, in my opinion.
Elizabeth and Anne
I receive emails on a fairly regular basis asking me for my views on the idea that Anne Boleyn had a stepmother. The email writers refer to novels which give Anne a stepmother, for example Jean Plaidy's Lady in the Tower which has Elizabeth Boleyn dying before Anne goes to France and Anne talking affectionately of her stepmother. My correspondents want to know if this is true. Now, those may be novels but this myth actually has its roots in history books. Agnes Strickland, the Victorian author, seems to have been the first to write about Anne having a stepmother. In Lives of the Queens of England, Strickland writes:
"The first misfortune that befel Anne was the loss of her mother, Lady Boleyn, who died in the year 1512, of puerperal fever… Sir Thomas Boleyn married again; at what period of his life we have no record, but it is certain that Anne's step-mother was a Norfolk woman of humble origin."37
This "fact" is repeated in Hester W. Chapman's 1974 biography of Anne Boleyn,38 so it is likely that Chapman used Strickland as her source and novelists have then used Strickland or Chapman. Joanna Denny also writes, "it is said that Thomas remarried, giving his children a stepmother, a new Lady Boleyn", although she does comment that there are "conflicting dates" given for Elizabeth's date of death.39 Strickland cites her sources for Elizabeth's death in 1512 and for Thomas Boleyn's second marriage as Thoms Traditions, Camden Society and Howard memorials by Mr Howard of Corby, so I looked them up and found Annecdotes and Traditions illustrative of Early English History and Literature edited by William J. Thoms on Google Books. In that book, I found Strickland's reference, which is a note by Thoms on an anecdote told by Sir Nicholas L'Estrange about Elizabeth I. L'Estrange's anecdote is:
"One begg'd of Queene Elizabeth, and pretended kindred and alliance, but there was no such relation. "Friend," says she, "grant it be so, do'st thinke I am bound to keepe all my kindred? Why that's the way to make me a beggar." L'Estranye, No. 124. Mr. Derham."40
Thoms notes that "Queen Elizabeth had numerous maternal relations, and many of them among the inferior gentry particularly in Norfolk, an inconvenience which arose from her father having selected for his second consort a subject of no very elevated extraction, whilst the blood of the Boleynes was widely diffused by the intermarriages of numerous junior branches."
As Philip Sergeant points out in his The Life of Anne Boleyn,41 Strickland seems to have misread Thoms' note. He is talking about Queen Elizabeth's father's second marriage, i.e. Henry VIII's marriage to Anne Boleyn, NOT Thomas Boleyn's second marriage.
I was unable to obtain a copy of Indication of Memorials, Monuments, Paintings and Engravings of Persons of the Howard Family by Henry Howard, but Philip Sergeant discusses the record on Elizabeth Boleyn in his book. In this privately printed memorial of the Howard family, Howard apparently records Elizabeth Howard, wife of Thomas Boleyn, as dying of puerperal fever on 14th December 1512 and being buried at Lambeth. Sergeant searched for a funeral certificate but was unable to find one. However, he notes that J. Nichols's History of the Parish of Lambeth (1786) stated that there used to be a brass plate at St Mary's Church, Lambeth (now a garden museum), which was inscribed "Here lyeth the Lady Elizabeth Howard, some time Countess of Wiltshire". I've got a copy of this book, which is actually published by Nichols but written by Thomas Allen, and I cannot find any mention of Elizabeth's brass. I did, however, find mention of the brass plate in John Aubrey's The Natural History and Antiquities of the County of Surrey. No date of death was mentioned, but we know for certain that Lady Wiltshire, Thomas Boleyn's wife, was buried in the Howard aisle of St Mary's Church, Lambeth on 7th April 1538. This information can be found in a letter written by John Hussey to Lady Lisle on 9th April 1538:
"My lady Wiltshire was buried at Lamehithe on the 7th… She was conveyed from a house beside Baynard's Castle by barge to Lambeth
with torches burning and four baneys (banners?) set out of all quarters of the barge, which was covered with black and a white cross."42
This Lady Wiltshire must have been a Howard woman to be interred with other Howard women in the Howard aisle of the church, rather than being some other "Norfolk woman of humble origin". She must surely have been Elizabeth Boleyn (nee Howard).
So why the confusion?
Sergeant couldn't understand the confusion; nor could he find another Elizabeth Howard who died in 1512. However, there is a Howard woman who died in December 1512; namely, Elizabeth's sister, Muriel Howard, wife of Sir Thomas Knyvett. Muriel died during or shortly after childbirth, in December 1512, and was buried at Lambeth. Her will was proved on 12 January 1513.43 44 45 This must be the Howard woman that Henry Howard was referring to in his memorials on the family; the two sisters have been conflated.
Unfortunately, once a "fact" is written in a book, or these days in a blog post or online somewhere, it quickly spreads. Elizabeth Boleyn's mythical early death is in many novels, so people will continue to believe that Anne Boleyn had a stepmother.
Elizabeth appears to have had a close relationship with her daughter Anne, acting as a chaperone when Henry was courting her. We know from Chapuys that Elizabeth accompanied Anne and the King to view York Place in October 1529 after Wolsey had fallen from favour:
"The downfall of the Cardinal is complete. He is dismissed from the Council, deprived of the Chancellorship, and constrained to make an inventory of his goods in his own hand, that nothing may be forgotten. It is said that he has acknowledged his faults, and presented all his effects to the King. Yesterday the King returned to Greenwich by water secretly, in order to see them, and found them much greater than he expected. He took with him "sa mye" (his darling—Anne Boleyn), her mother, and a gentleman of his chamber (Norris?)"46
And Eric Ives writes that in 1530, "Anne Boleyn's one refuge was Wolsey's former palace of York Place, soon to be known as Whitehall... Anne and her mother could lodge in the chamber under the cardinal's library."47 In those frustrating days of waiting, Anne's mother seems to have been there for her daughter, and Anne appreciated it. Around 1531 Anne Boleyn wrote a letter to her good friend, Lady Bridget Wingfield, telling Lady Wingfield, "And assuredly, next mine own mother I know no woman alive that I love better",48 showing that she loved her mother dearly.
Elizabeth attended her pregnant daughter at her coronation in 1533, riding in one of the carriages in the procession. I'm sure that Elizabeth would have enjoyed this day of triumph after years of struggle.
Anne's love for her mother is again shown in words she spoke to Sir William Kingston at her arrival at the Tower after her arrest on the 2nd May 1536:
"O, my mother, [thou wilt die with] sorow."49
Now, it is not known whether Anne was simply worried that her mother would be heartbroken at the news of what had happened or whether she was concerned because her mother was already in ill health, but we do know that Elizabeth had recently been ill. On 14th April 1536, Thomas Warley wrote to Lady Lisle commenting that Elizabeth was suffering from a bad cough:
"Today the countess of Wiltshire asked me when I heard from your Ladyship, and thanked you heartily for the hosen. She is sore diseased with the cough, which grieves her sore."50
This may have just been a simple cough, but it could also have been something more serious, something which led to Elizabeth's death in April 1538. On 7th April 1538, Warley wrote to Lady Lisle reporting Elizabeth's death:
"My lady of Wiltshire died on Wednesday last beside Baynard's castle."51
And two days later, John Hussee wrote to Lady Lisle of Elizabeth's funeral:
"My lady Wiltshire was buried at Lamehithe [Lambeth] on the 7th... She was conveyed from a house beside Baynard's Castle by barge to Lambeth with torches burning and four baneys (banners?) set out of all quarters of the barge, which was covered with black and a white cross."52
Sir John Russell, Lord Comptroller, was the chief male mourner and Elizabeth's half-sister, Katherine Howard, Lady Daubenay, was the chief female mourner.
Elizabeth's Resting Place
In May 2013, I visited Elizabeth Boleyn's resting place. St Mary's Church, Lambeth, is no longer a place of worship; it is now the Garden Museum. This is a bit of a disappointment for Tudor history fans because the Howard Chapel, where Elizabeth and other Howard family members were laid to rest, is now a café. However, we have to thank our lucky stars; if the Garden Museum had not been set up in 1977 to preserve the tomb of famous botanist and gardener John Tradescant (ca.1570 – 1638 ), the church would have been demolished. OK, so the Howard Chapel has a counter and tables, and people sit there eating salads and drinking coffee, but the tombs have been preserved under the wooden floor. The museum has not messed with the structure of the building and no tombs have been desecrated; that had already happened during the rebuilding work in Victorian times.
It is frustrating that we can't see Elizabeth's tomb but she is there, somewhere under that floor.
Some people wonder if Elizabeth's burial at Lambeth, rather than at Hever, is evidence of a breakdown in her marriage after the execution of her son and daughter, but I feel that this is reading far too much into it. Elizabeth was a Howard woman and it appears to have been traditional for Howard women to be buried at Lambeth in the Howard Chapel. Norfolk House, where Catherine Howard spent part of her upbringing and the London home of the Howard family, was just down the road, and Elizabeth died in London. Just what she was doing at the home of the Abbot of Reading is a mystery, but perhaps she was taken ill nearby and then died there. Her husband had been at court since January 1538, so it appears that she had accompanied him to London.53 Whatever the truth of the matter, there is no evidence that Elizabeth and Thomas Boleyn had marital problems.
The History of St Mary's Church, Lambeth
We know from the Domesday Book that there has been a church on the site since before the Norman Conquest, but the oldest part of St Mary's as we know it today is the tower, which was built ca. 1378. In the 18th century, the only part of the medieval church still standing was the tower, but the church had been rebuilt from Henry VII's reign on. The Howard Chapel was built around 1522. Unfortunately, the main structure of the church was pulled down in 1851 and the church was restored, or rather rebuilt, opening again in February 1852.
One brass that still survives at Lambeth is that of Lady Katherine Howard, who died in 1535 and who "is depicted wearing pedimental head-dress and a long mantle which bears the arms of Howard with the Flodden augmentation. At her feet is a squirrel holding a nut."54 John Aubrey recorded the inscription which accompanied her brass:
"Here lyeth Katherine Howard,one of the Sisters and Heires of John Broughton, Esq, Son and Heire of John Broughton, Esq,and late Wife of the Lord Willm. Howard,one of the Sonnes of the Right High and Mighty Prince Lord Thomas, late Duke of Norfolke, High Treasurer and Earl Marshal of England; which Lord William and Lady Catherine left Issue between them,lawfully begotten, Agnes Howard, the only Daughter and Heir; which said Lady Catherine deceased the xxiii. Day of Aprill Anno Dni. MCCCCCxxxv. Whose Soule Jesu pardon."55
Lambeth
If you're in London visiting Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament, do take the time to walk across the bridge over the Thames to Lambeth. The Garden Museum is right next door to Lambeth Palace, which is a good photo opportunity, and it is free to visit the café. Also, just down the road from the museum is the Novotel London Waterloo Hotel, which stands on the former site of Norfolk House at 113 Lambeth Road. Norfolk House was once the London home of the Dukes of Norfolk, Elizabeth's family, coming into their possession when Elizabeth FitzAlan, wife of Thomas Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk, inherited it from her brother, Thomas FitzAlan. Agnes Tilney, wife of Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk, resided at Norfolk House where she brought up a household of ladies, including her step-granddaughter Catherine Howard. It was at Norfolk House, and at the Dowager Duchess' other home, Chesworth H
ouse near Horsham, that Catherine was said to have had relationships with her music tutor Henry Manox and with Francis Dereham. The Dowager Duchess lost Norfolk House when she was imprisoned after the fall of Catherine Howard in 1541, but in 1543 it was granted to her stepson, Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, who used it as his London residence until he was imprisoned in December 1546. When he was released by Mary I in 1553, he eventually regained possession of Norfolk House. After Norfolk's death in 1554 his grandson, Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk, sold the house to Richard Garthe and John Dyster. The house then went through a number of owners, including Margaret Parker (wife of Archbishop Matthew Parker) and her sons, Matthew and John, Archbishop Whitgift, Sir George Paule and John Dawson who bought it in 1618. In a 1951 survey of London, I found the following information on Norfolk House and what it consisted of in the early 17th century:
"Sir George Paule bought the house from Whitgift's son in 1608 and lived there until his death in 1635. From the details contained in this sale some idea can be gained of the size of Norfolk House and the disposition of the buildings. There was a great gate from 'the King's highway leading from Lambeth Town to St. George's Fields' (i.e. Lambeth Road) leading into a paved yard. On the west was the Duke's chapel which, by 1590, had been partitioned to make a hall, buttery and parlour, and a number of small rooms; on the east were the kitchen offices with 'a greate chamber' on the first floor, a gallery, oratory and several closets and the hall opening on to the garden on the south. The total width of the garden was 125 feet, and it is a reasonable assumption that the street frontage was approximately the same."56
Figure 40 - St. Marys Church, Lambeth Resting place of Elizabeth Boleyn
The Anne Boleyn Collection II: Anne Boleyn & the Boleyn Family Page 20