Elizabeth's Rival

by Nicola Tallis

  Walter’s grandfather and namesake had been in great favour with both Henry VIII and Edward VI, proving himself to be a man of exceptional ability in both a military and a political capacity.56 On 2 February 1550, the young King rewarded Walter’s grandfather for his loyalty by creating him Viscount Hereford. His appointment was also a grateful acknowledgement of his dutiful support in the coup to topple the King’s uncle, the Lord Protector, from power. His involvement in a later coup – that to make Lady Jane Grey queen – sadly landed him in the Tower. On 27 August 1553, he was granted ‘the commodity of the garden and gallery’, and was later released, retiring to his manor house of Chartley in Staffordshire and leaving public life behind him.57 His son, Richard, was also well favoured by Edward VI, and was made a Knight of the Bath at the young King’s coronation on 20 February 1547.58 The previous year Richard had acquired the lordship, manor and park of Lamphey in Pembrokeshire in an exchange with the Bishop of St David’s, and it was a wise investment. The fourteenth-century Lamphey Palace would become an important Devereux manor, and the family began to firmly establish themselves in Wales.

  On 16 September 1539, three years after Richard’s marriage to Dorothy Hastings, the couple’s eldest son was born at Carmarthen Castle in Wales.59 He was named Walter after his grandfather, and according to The Complete Peerage he was christened at Carmarthen in the church of St Peter’s two days after his birth.60 Carmarthen was a mighty fortress of Norman origin that formed the administrative centre for South Wales. It had been significantly rebuilt in the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries, and was an important stronghold. It was at Carmarthen that, in 1456, Edmund Tudor, father of the first Tudor king Henry VII, died.61 By the time of Walter’s birth, Carmarthen was still very much a medieval castle set in one of the oldest towns in Wales: there could have been no greater contrast to the picturesque country house of Greys Court in which Lettice had been born. Walter was one of four surviving children.62 Carmarthen, however, was not suitable for raising children, and the Devereux siblings seem to have spent much of their childhoods at Lamphey, in the rolling countryside of Pembrokeshire. It was here that Walter’s widowed mother continued to live following the death of his father, Sir Richard Devereux, in 1548, and here that she would remain until her own death in 1566. Richard had died during the lifetime of his father – Walter’s grandfather and namesake. Thus, when the older Walter died on 17 September 1558, he was succeeded by his grandson who had turned nineteen the previous day.63 Walter the elder was laid to rest in Stowe church in Chartley, Staffordshire, where the tomb he shares with both of his wives still survives.64 With his death, the young Walter succeeded to the titles of Viscount Hereford, Lord Ferrers of Chartley, Bourchier and Louvaine. Until he reached the age of twenty-one he was still a minor, and was therefore unable to assume responsibility for his finances and estates.

  Camden described Walter as ‘A very excellent man’ in whom ‘honesty of manners strived with nobility of birth’, and at nineteen he was in his prime.65 As a young man with a bright future, the glitz and glamour of the court in London was a far more alluring prospect than a life in distant Wales. Following the accession of Elizabeth I, in the same manner as many other young men, Walter began to spend much of his time at the new Queen’s court. He spent lavishly on clothes during this period; his tailor’s bill reveals that between October 1559 and May 1561 over £150 (£25,500) was laid out on finery, ensuring that he had all of the fashionable garments that were essential in order to make a good impression.66

  It was while he was at court that Walter first encountered Lettice Knollys, who was growing into a woman possessed of charm and character. The court was full of beautiful and eligible young ladies, but Lettice clearly stood out. The two may have begun by exchanging nothing more than polite pleasantries, but Bourchier Devereux describes how Walter ‘soon became captive to the charms of Lettice Knollys, a fair maiden of the court, celebrated for her beauty and spirit’.67 We have no information about the couple’s courtship; we do not know when it started or how it was conducted, but what is clear is that Walter fell in love with Lettice, and she in turn fell in love with him.68

  In September 1560, Walter reached his majority, and as a result was able to come into his full inheritance; in material terms this meant that he was granted an annuity of £200 (£34,000). Now in a position where he was able to support a wife financially, Walter set his sights firmly on Lettice, just shy of her seventeenth birthday. They were both young, and were both from families who were keen advocates of Protestantism. It was a good match on both sides; Walter’s old and noble lineage combined with the favour Lettice’s family held with the Queen meant that they were well suited. In many respects they also shared similar personality traits, both Walter and Lettice would later become known for their fiery tempers.

  The Queen made no secret of the fact that she preferred her ladies to remain single, so the subject of Lettice’s marriage must have been approached tentatively. It was presumably a match that met with the approval of Lettice’s parents, and it may have been one of them who broached the matter with the Queen. In this case, though, there is no suggestion that the marriage of Lettice and Walter was met with anything other than her approval – there is certainly no evidence that she voiced any objections, so, presumably, she viewed it as significantly advantageous for Lettice. Consequently, plans for the couple’s wedding were able to proceed.

  No details of Lettice and Walter’s wedding survive, and even the date is unknown. Various possibilities have been suggested, from late 1560, after Walter attained his majority, to the first few months of 1562 at the very latest.69 A date in 1561 seems to be plausible, given that that same year Lettice’s salary ceased, indicating that she had left the Queen’s service. The wedding is likely to have taken place in London, and it is certainly possible that, given her familial relationship to the Queen and her presence in the Royal Household, the Queen may have attended the wedding.70

  Lettice was the first of her siblings to marry, and, to all appearances, her marriage was based at least as much on personal feelings as on policy. What is certain is that Lettice had made a very respectable match. More than that, at sixteen years old she was also Viscountess Hereford. Her looks, charm and family connections had secured her a husband, but Walter Devereux had not been the only one who had noticed her. Indeed, while at court there was another man with whom Lettice became acquainted – one who would transform the course of her life: his name was Robert Dudley.

  CHAPTER 4

  The Goodliest Male Personage in England

  THE CHARISMATIC AND attractive Robert Dudley, described by a contemporary as ‘the goodliest male personage in England’, was Queen Elizabeth’s favourite.1 What was more, everyone at court, as well as the rest of the country and abroad, knew it too. In the sixteenth century, the idea of a favourite was by no means new. In a world in which rules of etiquette and deference dictated the way in which people behaved towards their sovereign, monarchs encouraged different forms of relationships. Favourites were those individuals closest to the monarch, who entertained them, were loyal to them, and perhaps offered the most intimate personal connection outside of their family. They also attracted gossip and jealousy. Of all of Elizabeth’s favourites, it is Dudley who has gained the most fame and notoriety, and Dudley who came the closest to wooing the ‘Virgin Queen’.

  Born on 24 June, probably in 1532, Robert was the son of John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, and Jane Guildford.2 The Dudley family had first come to prominence through the machinations of Robert’s grandfather, Edmund. Edmund had been an able financial administrator to Henry VII, and throughout the course of his royal service he had amassed great wealth for himself. He was vastly unpopular, and at the onset of Henry VIII’s reign he was imprisoned and executed on a charge of treason on 17 August 1510. Edmund’s son John, Robert’s father, was highly ambitious, and was determined to claw back the Dudley family honour. Henry VIII did not hold a grudge, and John’s influence steadily incr
eased throughout the King’s reign. He distinguished himself as a soldier, and was knighted by the Duke of Suffolk at the age of nineteen during the French expedition of 1523. John’s star continued to rise under Henry VIII, and in 1544 he joined the King’s invasion force for the siege of Boulogne. Three years later, he was also among the ranks of the Lord Protector when he headed the invasion of Scotland in 1547.

  Having achieved glory in a military capacity, John turned his attentions to the political arena. Forgetting any former loyalty he once had to the Lord Protector, John instigated his overthrow in 1549, and established himself firmly in his place. It was under the young King that John rose to the height of his influence, and he was created Duke of Northumberland in 1551: he was now the most powerful man in the kingdom.

  John had married Jane Guildford, the daughter of his former guardian Sir Henry Guildford, in whose house he had been raised. It was a genuine love match, and together the couple would have thirteen children. The third of five surviving sons, Robert may have been born in London, perhaps in the fourteenth-century Ely Place in Holborn (once the home of the bishops of Ely) that was his father’s main residence in the capital.3 Though he was interested in learning, John Dudley was a soldier rather than a scholar, and it was his wife who garnered a reputation as a great intellect. However, both she and John perceived the importance of knowledge, and had determined to ensure that all of their children were well educated. The family were a close one, and would remain so for the entirety of their lives.

  As well as Ely Place, John Dudley also owned estates in the southeast, particularly in Kent, but as time went on, his power base began to shift increasingly to the Midlands. Dudley Castle, situated in between Birmingham and Wolverhampton, was his main stronghold, but in 1547 he had also been granted the former royal fortress of Warwick Castle.4 Warwick was described by the Tudor traveller John Leland as ‘magnificent and strong’, and would have been well known to Robert, who took a great interest in the town.5 John Dudley’s tactic of building up his base in the Midlands would be a pattern that was later followed by Robert and his elder brother, Ambrose.

  Robert’s education would stand him in good stead, and for the rest of his life he would be celebrated for his scholarly interests – in 1564 he was even appointed Chancellor of Oxford University. He was good at languages and understood both Latin and Italian, and probably also French. He also enjoyed maths and science, and had a lifelong interest in navigation; he and his brother Ambrose would later be the main backers for one of Sir Martin Frobisher’s expeditions to locate the Northwest Passage, and Robert also supported and took a great interest in the career of the privateer Sir Francis Drake.6 The great John Dee, the same astrologer who had suggested the date of Queen Elizabeth’s coronation, may have influenced his interest in this area. Dee had spent some time acting as tutor to Robert’s eldest brother, John, and so it is reasonable to suppose that he also had some contact with Robert. The seventeenth-century antiquary Anthony Wood would later claim that nobody knew Robert better than Dee.7

  In years to come, Robert would be regarded as an important and influential patron of many scholars and artists. Throughout his life more than a hundred books would be dedicated to him – more than to any other courtier.8 Notably, the chroniclers John Stow and Richard Grafton would both dedicate their work to him. He was a great collector who was fond of art, amassing a huge collection of paintings by the time of his death. He also commissioned numerous portraits of himself, and sat for various artists at least twenty times.9 Many of these likenesses still survive, bearing testament to Robert’s prepossessing appearance – his portrait appears more in contemporary collections than that of anyone else, with the exception of Elizabeth I.10 He was dark in looks, earning him the nickname ‘The Gypsy’ from his enemy the Earl of Sussex, and he was undeniably handsome.11 At a little under six feet he was tall by contemporary standards, with a slender and athletic build. Even Camden, who was hostile to him, described him as being ‘a man of a flourishing age, and comely feature of body and limbs’.12 He had a long nose and grew a beard in accordance with the latest trends, and was always dressed in the latest fashions. An inventory of his wardrobe taken just months before he died reveals that he owned numerous costly garments, including cloaks, nightgowns and doublets. His surviving accounts, meanwhile, reveal regular payments for items of clothing such as gloves from Spain.13

  Robert also enjoyed more energetic pursuits, for he was remarkably athletic and a keen sportsman. He was interested in dogs, and made regular payments to his spaniel keepers for their upkeep; on one occasion compensation had to be made to the owner of ‘a hen which the spaniel killed’.14 He was also an expert horseman and a talented jouster, and would regularly take part in tournaments. Edward VI once recorded in his journal that Robert and seventeen others, including his brother Ambrose and a ‘Mr Knollys’, who may have been Lettice’s father or uncle, Henry, ‘ran six courses each at tilt against the challengers and accomplished their course right well’.15

  Robert was also a committed Protestant. In the years to come he would demonstrate his enthusiasm for his faith on many occasions, earning him a reputation as a religious radical. Like Sir Francis Knollys, his beliefs were considered to be Puritanical, and his accounts show that he paid preachers to preach for him on many occasions. This did not, however, prevent him from employing Catholics in his household. The Blounts, a noble and traditionally Catholic family, were just one example, and one of its members would later come to be closely linked with Lettice’s story.

  On 4 June 1550, Robert had married Amy Robsart, the daughter of a Norfolk landowner, Sir John Robsart. The two had probably met the previous year, when Robert had accompanied his father into Norfolk in order to suppress Kett’s Rebellion, an armed protest against land enclosure.16 It was a love match, and although a more advantageous match could most certainly have been made for Robert, his parents were indulgent and, already having a brilliant marriage lined up for their eldest surviving son, John, gave their consent. Their second son, Ambrose, was already married, to Anne Whorwood, the daughter of Sir William Whorwood of Staffordshire.17 The Dudleys were also aware that, as Amy was her father’s heir, Robert would eventually inherit substantial lands in Norfolk, and for that reason may have deemed the marriage a wise investment for their son’s future. Significantly, though, after Amy’s death Cecil would observe that ‘carnal marriages begin in joy and end in weeping’.18

  The day before Robert and Amy’s wedding, Robert’s eldest brother John was married to Anne Seymour, the eldest daughter of the toppled Lord Protector.19 It was a lavish ceremony at the royal Palace of Sheen, and was attended by the King.20 The following day Robert and Amy were also married at Sheen, and the King made a note in his journal of the gruesome entertainment that was provided after the wedding ceremony: ‘certain gentlemen tried to see who could be the first to take away a goose’s head which was hanged alive on two crossed posts’.21 Robert’s father was unfortunately unable to attend, for he had fallen ill. In spite of that, he must have been pleased to know that the marital prospects of two of his sons were now settled. Little is known of Robert and Amy’s life together – there is no evidence to suggest that they were anything other than happy – but the time that they were able to spend with one another was limited. Robert’s frequent absences at court meant that they were often separated, and as the events of 1553 began to spiral out of control, that looked unlikely to change.

  It was with Northumberland’s connivance that, when Edward VI fell fatally ill in 1553, he drew up his famous will ‘My Devise for the Succession’. This was to have serious consequences for the Dudley family, including Robert. On 25 May, Robert’s younger brother, Guildford, was married to Lady Jane Grey, binding the two families together. Jane’s bridegroom may have been Robert, had he himself not been already married by this time. When the King died and Northumberland began making moves to establish his daughter-in-law, Lady Jane Grey, as queen, he was embarking on a dangerous plot in wh
ich Robert and his brothers were to become hopelessly entangled. The Dudleys were a close-knit family who always stuck together, and there was no question of Robert doing anything other than supporting his sister-in-law’s claim. With this in mind, his father had entrusted him with an important task, and on 7 July he had been sent at the head of a force to apprehend the Lady Mary. Mary had fled to East Anglia, and it was there that Robert journeyed, determined to achieve his mission. He made it to East Anglia, but did not succeed in capturing Mary. He was still there when Mary was proclaimed Queen on 19 July, a situation that spelled disaster for the Dudleys.22

  Robert’s father and three of his four brothers, John, Ambrose and Harry, were captured in Cambridge, where they had travelled in order to support Robert’s mission. They were returned to London and imprisonment in the Tower, where Jane and Guildford were already incarcerated. Robert, meanwhile, was apprehended in King’s Lynn, and taken to join his father and his brothers in the Tower, arriving on 26 July. These were dark days for the Dudleys, for they had all committed treason, and the penalty for treason was death. Uncertainty loomed over Robert, but it seemed that only his father would suffer for his crimes. While Northumberland was executed, Robert and his brothers remained imprisoned.

  Thus far, Queen Mary had been merciful towards Lady Jane Grey and the Dudley brothers, but she did concede that justice needed to appear to have been done. On 13 November, Robert’s brothers Ambrose, Guildford, Harry and his sister-in-law, Jane, were forced to stand trial at London’s Guildhall.23 They were all found guilty of treason, and condemned to death. Robert, meanwhile, remained in the Tower, his trial delayed. The reason for this was that, unlike his father and his brothers, Robert had been sent to East Anglia immediately upon the death of Edward VI. Therefore the majority of his treason had been committed outside of London. Because of this it was believed that he fell under jurisdiction outside of London, and as such, further preparations were required before he could be tried in the capital.