On a political level, Leicester’s death could not have come at a worse moment. The threat posed by Philip of Spain still loomed large, and the Queen needed all of the support that she could get. Already, though, there were those at court who were eager to fill his shoes. Just days after his death it was observed that ‘The Lord Chancellor [Sir Christopher Hatton], now that Leicester is dead, has much more power than before, and is helped by Secretary Walsingham, with whom he is very friendly.’37 In reality, however, Lettice’s son Essex remained the favourite.
DESPITE THE SHOCK that was felt by many at Leicester’s death, in retrospect it is evident that his health had long been in decline. Though he died from natural causes – almost certainly malaria – this did not prevent whispers of something more sinister. A Spanish contemporary reported that ‘The Earl of Leicester died almost suddenly on his way to the baths, and in the same house as that in which he had caused his wife to be killed, the master of it having invited him to dinner.’38 He had evidently got Cumnor and Cornbury mixed up, but he was not the only one to hint that Leicester’s death may have been caused by something other than a natural illness. It was later rumoured that Lettice had been responsible for poisoning her husband, and that a servant had witnessed ‘the Lady Lettice give the fatal cup to the Earl’.39 The playwright and poet Ben Jonson gave a slightly different version. He supposedly related that Leicester had given Lettice ‘a bottle of liquor which he willed her to use in any faintness, which she, not knowing it was poison, gave him, and so he died’.40 Both of these tales are completely baseless, and it is perfectly clear that Lettice had no reason for wanting her husband dead. In fact, precisely the opposite was true; not only did she love Leicester deeply, but while he was alive he also served as her protector, and had helped to advance her children. That rumours of poison were circulating for the second time in her life following the death of Lettice’s husbands must have been devastating for her. It is nevertheless easy to see why such rumours came about. Not only had Leicester apparently died suddenly, but he had also given orders that the sole executor of his will was to be his ‘most dear well beloved wife’.41 He had rewritten his will on three occasions, and two days after his death his final will was proved: by its terms, when it came to property and material goods Lettice was left an extremely wealthy widow. This was in stark contrast to the condition in which she had been left following the death of her first husband, who had bequeathed her very little. The main reason for this was Walter’s spiralling debts, but it transpired that in terms of cash, Leicester’s situation was no better.
Leicester had taken much time and great care when composing his will, and he had discussed one of his primary desires with Lettice: ‘I have always wished, as my dear wife doth know, and some of my friends, that it might be at Warwick, where sundry of my ancestors do lie’, he wrote, concerning where he hoped to be buried.42 His choice was hardly surprising, for it was here that the ornate Beauchamp Chapel that housed the remains of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, stood – a man of great renown with whom Leicester wished to be associated.43 More poignantly, it was also here that the ‘Noble Imp’ lay entombed. If for whatever reason it were not possible for Leicester to be buried there, he had requested that he should instead be laid to rest, ‘where the Queen’s Majesty shall command, for as it was when it had life, a most faithful, true, loving servant unto her, so living, and so dead, let the body be at her gracious determination, if it shall so please her’.44 Like his love for Lettice, his loyalty and devotion to Elizabeth had endured until the end, and he referred to her as his ‘most gracious sovereign, whose creature under God I have been, and who hath been a most beautiful, and most princely mistress unto me’.45 In material terms, though he acknowledged that he had little to give her, he did bequeath the Queen
the jewel with the three great emeralds with a fair large table diamond in the middest, without a foil, and set about with many diamonds without foil, and a rope of fair white pearls, to the number six hundred, to hang the said jewel at; which pearl and jewel was once purposed for her Majesty, against a coming to Wanstead, but it must now thus be disposed, which I do pray you, my dear wife, see performed, and delivered to some of those whom I shall hereafter nominate and appoint to be my overseers for her Majesty.46
Perhaps Leicester thought that Lettice might be reluctant to part with such a jewel, hence his request for her to ensure that his wish was carried out. He had even asked her to deliver the jewel to someone at court, knowing that Elizabeth was unlikely to grant his wife a personal audience. Lettice did carry out his wish, however, for when the Queen was painted by George Gower – a magnificent portrait that celebrated her victory over Spain, and became known as the Armada Portrait, she was wearing Leicester’s pearls.47 In Leicester’s eyes the Queen had, and by needs must, always come first, but ‘Next her Majesty I will now return to my dear wife, and set down that for her, which cannot be so well as I would wish it, but shall be as well as I am able to make it, having always found her a faithful, loving, and a very obedient, careful wife.’48
In her husband’s eyes, Lettice had always conformed to the behaviour that was expected of a good wife. The will was also a testament to his love for her, which was still strong after ten years of marriage, and the admiration that he had for her. He did not doubt that she would be willing ‘every way to the utmost of her power, to do all I have committed to her charge, not thinking good to trouble any other of my friends, but herself, with my hard and broken estate’.49
The Earl was well aware that he had ‘many debts’, and knowing that it would be a weighty task to satisfy them, he exhorted his wife to take on the burden of overseeing that they were paid: ‘for all love between us, that she will not only be content to take it upon her, but also to see it faithfully and carefully performed’.50 His trust in Lettice was evident, although he knew what a huge weight of obligation he was placing upon her shoulders. This says much for his belief in her abilities, but it was a task that would cause Lettice a great deal of stress and worry. And the Queen was determined to make things worse.
IN ACCORDANCE WITH his wishes, on 10 October Leicester’s funeral took place in Our Lady Chapel of St Mary’s Church, Warwick, ‘a fine large building’.51 As was customary, Lettice did not attend, and it was her son, the Earl of Essex, who played the role of chief mourner – a duty that he had been unable to assume for his own father. The funeral party was several hundred people strong, and was attended by a whole host of relatives and courtiers, including Lettice’s son-in-law, Lord Rich, her brothers William and Francis, and the Earl of Huntingdon. Despite Leicester’s request that he be buried with ‘little pomp or vain expenses of the world’, it was a costly affair that amounted to £4,000 (£597,000).52 Leicester’s remains were ‘honourably interred’ in the Beauchamp Chapel, close to the tomb of his young son.53 On Lettice’s orders, an epitaph commemorating her husband’s achievements was placed there: ‘to her best and dearest husband on account of her love and faith as his wife’. She would later erect a splendid monument to his memory, which she also intended to share. Another tangible reminder of Leicester’s presence in Warwick and the contribution he had made to the town was Lord Leycester’s Hospital, which he had founded in 1571, and for which he left provision in his will. It was later intended to care for soldiers who had been injured during the Netherlands campaign, and its presence ensured that the association with his memory in the town endured. The hospital still survives, and is now a retirement home for ex-servicemen.
Leicester’s death was not universally mourned, though. Ben Jonson is supposed to have penned the following epitaph to honour Leicester:
Here lies a valiant warrior, who never drew a sword;
Here lies a noble courtier, who never kept his word;
Here lies the Earl of Leicester, who governed the Estates,
Whom the earth could never, living, love, and the just heaven now hates.54
This may well have accurately described the way in which some of
his contemporaries viewed him – particularly his enemies at court – but the same could certainly not be said of Lettice and the Earl’s family. Not only was Lettice devastated by his loss, but her children – Leicester’s stepchildren – were equally distraught. For the second time in her life, Lettice – now forty-five years old – was a widow. Also for the second time, she now attempted to pick up the broken pieces of her life and carry on. She did so with remarkable speed.
CHAPTER 17
My Best Friend
LETTICE MAY HAVE been disappointed that Leicester’s death did nothing to heal the breach between herself and the Queen, but matters were about to become a whole lot worse. Although Leicester had been a wealthy man and Lettice had been left well provided for in terms of land, his debts to the Crown were extensive. As he had himself acknowledged in his will, he was ‘I know not how many thousand, above twenty in debt; and, at this present, not having in the world five hundred pounds towards it.’1 The Queen was not prepared to let this pass, and in a move doubtless intended to hurt Lettice, quickly seized some of his estates in order to ensure that they were paid. Her venom towards her kinswoman was as potent as ever, and there was nothing that the helpless Lettice could do about it.
For the second time, Lettice found herself dealing with the financial worries and debts that a husband had left her with. Leicester may not have realized that the actual amount he owed totalled around £50,000 (£7,465,000) – an exorbitant sum. He had been aware that he was shouldering his wife with a huge burden, and Lettice in turn had even been advised that it may not be wise to accept the role of executor for this reason; however, she paid little heed.2 Once again, her determined spirit shone through. The result was that she was unsurprisingly inundated with requests for money from those who were worried that the debts owed to them would not be repaid. Many of these debts stretched back several years, including one from Elizabeth Sutton, who urged Lettice to settle ‘the great charge I was at when you with the young lord and other your honour’s friends and company lay with me’, amounting to £393 (£58,700).3 The young lord to whom Elizabeth Sutton referred was Lettice’s young son, Lord Denbigh. Lettice dealt with these matters as best she could, and once again she turned to her friend, Lord Burghley, for assistance. On 20 November, just two months after Leicester’s death, she wrote to him from Leicester House about her attempts to convince the Queen to take a valuable ship from her as part of a deal whereby she also sold her interests in the Fine Office. The ship lay at ‘a continual charge’ to her, but the servant whom she had sent to convey the request had returned ‘without any mention or motion of it’.4 She begged for Burghley’s intercession, but no further reference to it is made. Burghley had been a constant friend, and in 1590, recognizing all that he had done for her over the years, she thanked him for his ‘compassion’ towards ‘distressed debtors’, bewailing ‘the misery into which she is likely to fall without his help’.5 Lettice also received some assistance from her brother-in-law, Ambrose, who, as his brother’s heir, had inherited many of his lands. Nonetheless, raising the funds to meet Leicester’s debts was a thankless task, and caused Lettice no end of stress.
Although Leicester was dead, the Queen continued to make life as difficult as possible for Lettice, showing a ruthless and cruel side to her character that had perhaps been exacerbated by her grief. Even with the favour in which Elizabeth held her son, Essex, Lettice was powerless to resist her malevolence. She needed a protector – a partner – and in the same way as she had always done, she took matters into her own hands.
IN THE WARM summer days of July 1589 – ten months after Leicester’s death – Lettice took her third set of marriage vows.6 On this occasion her groom was not an earl or a member of the nobility, but was instead a former member of the Earl of Leicester’s household: Sir Christopher Blount.
Sir Christopher Blount was the second son of Thomas Blount of Kidderminster, and his wife Margery Poley.7 Unlike Leicester, he was a Catholic, and it was a faith to which he was utterly devoted. This in itself made him a curious choice of husband, for Lettice and her family were all stringently Protestant. It was also a dangerous time to be a Catholic in England: following her excommunication from the Church of Rome and the Papal Bull of 1570, the Queen and her government were making life increasingly difficult for English Catholics. In the 1580s the government’s treatment of them became harsher still, as a result of the numerous plots against the Queen’s life: the Throckmorton Plot in 1583 and the Babington Plot in 1587 were just two of many. As a result, many had now resorted to worshipping in secret, and a growing number of priest holes were being built into Catholic households across the country.8 Blount, though, had managed to avoid persecution, having spent many of his formative years abroad. He had been educated primarily at Louvain, where his tutor was the English Cardinal William Allen, who had supported Philip II in his plans for the Spanish Armada.9 Allen’s tutelage naturally brought Blount under many Catholic influences, but at some point he got mixed up in other affairs: it appears that, despite his faith, he had begun working as a double agent for Sir Francis Walsingham in the plot to secure the fall of Mary, Queen of Scots. His motives for doing so are unclear – many Catholics joined Walsingham’s ranks in order to avoid the religious persecution in England and to protect their families, while also benefiting materially. This is likely to have been Blount’s motivation too, and he does not seem to have been naturally duplicitous in character. Moreover, his later declarations would reveal that he remained a devout Catholic.
Blount was a younger son, and as such his fortune rested on his own shoulders. Alongside working for Walsingham he had also entered the entourage of the Earl of Leicester, who was probably aware of his double-dealings. Employed as his Master of Horse, Blount had been well favoured by his master, and this was little surprise; frequent references to Blount family members appear in Leicester’s accounts, and Christopher’s employment followed on from many of his relatives who had been a part of the Earl’s household. His father, for example, may have been the same Thomas Blount who Leicester had once tasked with ascertaining the truth of the mysterious events at Cumnor. Christopher had accompanied Leicester to the Netherlands, and it was there that Lord Willoughby had knighted him for his bravery. Following his injury, however – the very same which had once caused Leicester great concern – Blount had returned home to recover. His presence in Leicester’s household brought him into regular contact with Lettice, and it is plausible that the two would have got to know each other reasonably well during this time. This certainly never went beyond the bounds of decorum, and Blount’s name was not mentioned in relation to Lettice’s until after his master’s death.
There is no way of knowing if Blount was attracted to Lettice prior to Leicester’s death, but if he was then it was not reciprocated. Lettice was utterly devoted to her husband, and probably paid Blount little heed. He was also twelve or thirteen years her junior, having been born around 1555 or 1556. Hence, her decision to marry him came as a surprise to her contemporaries and caused a sensation – not least because of the speed with which it took place following Leicester’s death. There is no surviving information that allows us to ascertain how their relationship took shape, or when it began. The motivations for the marriage probably stemmed from two factors. As a widow Lettice was certainly under no obligation to marry if she did not so wish, but all of the evidence suggests that the couple were happy; she would later refer to Blount as ‘my best friend’.10 Clearly, then, there was a genuine physical attraction and warmth of feeling between the pair. At around thirty-four, Blount was known to be handsome; his contemporary Thomas Morgan described him as a ‘tall gentleman and valiant’, and Lettice, while being older at forty-five, was still an attractive woman.11 It is interesting, though, to consider that she never referred to him as her husband, nor he to her as his wife. It is possible that, as her daughter Penelope’s biographer Sylvia Freedman suggests, this was because Blount ‘retained a most respectful attitude to his late
master’s widow even after he married her’.12 The second factor that may have prompted their marriage was the matter of Leicester’s former debts to the Crown. Lettice was struggling to pay the balance, and though Blount did not have the financial means to aid her, or any known standing with the Queen, he would at least have been able to provide her with essential male support. A husband by her side provided Lettice with a strong figure who could alleviate some of the burden – who could deal with creditors, sell items to raise funds without being ripped off, and take control of the situation. As a member of Leicester’s household, Blount also had some understanding of his former master’s affairs, which Lettice may have deemed helpful. For Blount, the advantages of marrying Lettice were obvious. Aside from her personal qualities, he had now acquired a wealthy wife and a prestigious family connection.
Lettice was not the first woman of her class to marry a man beneath her in social status. She was following a precedent that had long since been set by other noble women: Frances Brandon, Duchess of Suffolk, had also married her Master of Horse, and her stepmother Katherine Willoughby had done the same.13 There is no record of how the Queen reacted upon hearing of Lettice’s marriage, nor is it clear when she was informed. By this point, though, Lettice had long since realized that Elizabeth would not approve of any of her actions. Similarly, the reaction of Lettice’s father Sir Francis Knollys is unknown, but as a stringent Protestant he would have disapproved of Blount’s religious motivations. By contrast, others made their feelings about the newlyweds very clear. Lettice’s son the Earl of Essex was initially deeply suspicious of the marriage, referring to it as an ‘unhappy choice’.14 But Blount was determined to win him over, and as time progressed he proved himself to be both a useful ally and a loyal stepfather who eventually earned Essex’s trust. In one letter to his stepson he signed himself ‘wholly your Honour’s most faithful servant’, words that Lettice was gratified to see.15
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