by Derek Wilson
One of Elizabeth Tudor’s more impressive characteristics was that she was an excellent judge of character. She surrounded herself with men of talent and, unlike her father, she did not falter in her loyalty towards those who served her. She found Walsingham irritating and would have no truck with his religious opinions, because, as she rightly divined, extreme evangelicalism was ultimately inimical to episcopal (and, by implication, to monarchical) good order. But she recognized her secretary’s talents and his invaluable network of contacts. By the spring of 1578 Mendoza could mournfully report to his master: ‘Some of the councillors are well disposed towards your majesty, but Leicester, whose spirit is Walsingham, is so highly favoured by the Queen . . . that he centres in his hands and those of his friends most of the business of the country.’ This common perception missed the subtleties of the relationships at the centre of England’s power politics. Leicester had, by now, become more a consort than a favourite. The queen trusted him and his ‘spirit’ and allowed them considerable political latitude but she always stayed in control and if her reason – or, more commonly, her intuition – told her that they were wrong she simply rejected their advice.
This is well borne out by the Grindal affair, which came to a head at the same time as Elizabeth and her advisers were dealing with the bewildering complexities of the Netherlands. The archbishop’s sequestration took place in the spring of 1577 and Walsingham may well have felt some relief that he was away from court at the time. A recurrence of his urinary complaint (possibly a kidney stone) kept him out of his office for two or three months. He, therefore, did not have to confront Elizabeth face to face with the news that her instructions to set Grindal’s deprivation in motion were of dubious legality. As he lay in his chamber, slowly recovering his health, Walsingham may have hoped that his mistress, by temperament so changeable, would come round to a more reasonable frame of mind. He knew from personal experience that she could be thunderous storms one day and smiling sunshine the next. But in this instance she was utterly implacable. The archbishop’s reproach had stung her to the quick because it exposed the very limited nature of her own Protestantism. This is clear from the speech Sir Nicholas Bacon (Lord Keeper of the Great Seal) was deputed to give at a special hearing before the Council (which did not, in fact, take place due to Grindal’s illness). If the queen had not intervened, Bacon’s written address stated, ‘it was like that religion, which of his own nature should be uniform, would against his nature have proved milliform, yea, in continuance nulliform, specially in rites and ceremonies and sometimes also in matters of doctrine.’9 Unhindered exposition of the word of God was not at the top of the queen’s religious agenda. The importance of the church for Elizabeth was its adhesive quality. It was the cement which held society together. Weaken it, and the structure, including the Crown, would tumble.
For Walsingham and his friends this attitude was incomprehensible because in their view the real danger to state and monarchy came not from Puritan preachers, who proclaimed their message openly, but from Catholic priests who worked insidiously in secret to destroy the religious settlement. To them this was so obvious that it was a matter of real astonishment that Elizabeth could not see it. The wake-up call came in June 1577 at about the time that Walsingham returned to court.
In April of that year a young man called Cuthbert Mayne took up the post of steward to Francis Tregian of Wolvedon, Cornwall. In fact, Mayne was a priest come hotfoot from Douai to spearhead the English mission. His activities soon aroused suspicion. He was arrested and tried before Sir Roger Manwood at the next Michaelmas assize. Manwood seems to have been something of an expert at dealing with religious dissidents. He was a commissioner for examining immigrants – not in search of Catholics but of Anabaptists, two of whom he sentenced to death by burning. He was also a scourge of Puritans. Mayne presented something of a problem for him since it was difficult to discern any capital crime with which to charge the man. However, he had been found in possession of a papal bull. Since this implied introducing foreign jurisdiction into England it counted as a treason and the priest was condemned to be hanged, drawn and quartered. The judgement had to be submitted to the Council for approval. It was not until the end of November that the sentence was carried out. Even then Mayne might have had an eleventh-hour reprieve. He was offered his life if he would acknowledge Elizabeth as supreme governor of the Church of England. He not only refused but asserted what was official Vatican policy: that, one way or another, England should be returned to papal obedience and that loyal English Catholics should be ready to enlist under the banner of any foreign prince who would lead a crusade against the heretical island.
The threatened revival of Catholicism presented a quandary to the government. Reports coming in to Walsingham and his colleagues from their various networks indicated a growth of recusancy and the Council was aware that, despite diligent watch being kept at the ports, young zealots from Douai were slipping into the country disguised as merchants, tradesmen, artisans and students. Their numbers were, so far, small (some thirty to forty since 1574) but their influence, through the gentry and noble patrons who supported them, was out of all proportion to their numerical strength. ‘The heretics are as much troubled at the name of the Anglo-Douai priests – which is now famous throughout England – as all the Catholics are consoled thereby.’10 So one of William Allen’s young men reported in 1576. It was the kind of excited bravado that might be expected from front-line troops engaged in an ideological war but it did highlight the fact that a new stage had been reached in the struggle for the soul of England.
We might expect that committed Protestant radicals such as Walsingham would have demanded a thorough offensive against underground sedition and subversion. Images of Catholic persecution against Protestants were seared into Walsingham’s memory. It would have been understandable if he had believed that payback time had come. In fact, he did not urge severe repression and the reaction of the government was mild by any contemporary standards.
If any religious group in England was hounded in the early to mid-seventies it was the Puritans or, at least, those of them who were presbyterially inclined. The contrast of Elizabeth’s attitude towards Puritans was demonstrated in a cause célèbre which excited nationwide attention some two years after the Mayne affair. John Stubbe was a young zealot who was appalled at the prospect of Elizabeth’s marriage to a Catholic prince. In August 1579 he expressed his pungent views in a pamphlet whose title left no doubt about his position: The Discovery of a gaping gulf whereinto England is likely to be swallowed by another French marriage if the Lord forbid not the banes [banns] by letting her majesty see the sin and punishment thereof. Stubbe made much of the queen’s age and the unlikelihood of her bearing children. As for Anjou, Stubbe could scarcely have been more scathing. He likened the Frenchman to ‘the old serpent . . . in the form of a man, come a second time to seduce the English Eve and ruin the English paradise’.11 That being the case, marriage to Anjou would increase Catholic influence with no counterbalancing advantage. Elizabeth was incensed and her response was swift. She issued a proclamation forbidding circulation of the Discovery and ordered the arrest of Stubbe, his printer and publisher. She was all for having the offenders summarily hanged but eventually agreed to their being tried for sedition. They were sentenced to having their right hands cut off. (It took three blows with a butcher’s knife to sever Stubbe’s wrist.) Their condemnation was a travesty of justice because the Marian statute invoked was a temporary measure designed to protect Philip II, the queen’s husband from libellous attack. When Robert Monson, a prominent judge of Common Pleas, pointed this out he was packed off to the Fleet and dismissed from his post. Elizabeth remained deaf to all pleas on Stubbe’s behalf. She was determined to leave no one in any doubt that she would not be lectured to in matters of religion by anyone, be he archbishop or vulgar scribbler. She can scarcely have been unaware that Stubbe’s reservations were shared by many prominent men, including her principal secret
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Meanwhile, bishops had the queen’s wholehearted support in suppressing the prophesyings. Elizabeth took the view that most of her people were, like her, not extremists and that, if she and the episcopal shepherds of the flock protected it from the influence of Rome and Geneva, the via media would triumph in the long term. Complacency ruled.
The purity of the Christian religion is flourishing and prosperous among us, and can neither be overturned nor defiled by any devices of Satan. For although we are unable to banish from the church . . . those new men whom we call Puritans, who tread all authority underfoot, or the veteran papists, who celebrate their divine service in their secret corners, or the profane disputants who deride the true worship of God, such, however, is the number and influence of the truly faithful, that both in numbers and appearance it very far takes the lead of all the separatists.12
So the Archbishop of York reported to a friend in Zurich.
It was not an attitude Walsingham could share. Writing to John Sturmius in Strasbourg he grumbled:
One evil attending prosperity, which, if not the only one, is certainly a very grievous one, [is] that it makes us forget or at least be very indifferent . . . to those events and calamities by which others are oppressed. If in these circumstances you would arouse us who are in deep sleep and heedlessly secure, and by your more frequent letters would warn us of impending danger, you would show most honourable zeal and do us a most useful service.13
Walsingham shared the queen’s disinclination to religious persecution per se because he had witnessed at first hand what happened when people were whipped into action by unholy zeal. He was well aware that the making of martyrs was no way to kill a religious movement. He was convinced of the importance of winning hearts and minds and this is why he was so depressed at the suppression of Puritan preachers. He well understood that the majority of his fellow countrymen were ignorant of or indifferent to the fundamentals of the Christian faith. He regarded an educational programme as vital to the creation of a truly godly commonwealth. Most importantly of all, he had a pan-European perspective. No one in English government circles had stronger personal connections with the movers and shakers on the continent or was better informed of events there.
The infiltration of priests trained in the Low Countries, France and Rome was precisely the kind of activity he had long feared. As soon as reports from Cornwall reached his desk Walsingham set about planning countermeasures with Burghley. While William Allen at Douai was using the story of Mayne’s suffering to inspire other young men to seek death or glory in England, Walsingham was despatching letters to senior bishops summoning them to a conference. The colloquy considered various measures for the apprehending of immigrant priests and denying them succour. These included placing under house arrest prominent members of the Catholic community such as Thomas Watson, the Marian Bishop of Lincoln and John de Feckenham, ex-Abbot of Westminster; rigid scrutiny of school teachers and any who had influence over children; and the imprisonment of stubborn recusants. To proceed efficiently against those who persisted in ‘papistical error’ it was proposed to turn ten secure castles into detention centres. In these places the inmates would be subjected to a programme of re-education. Those who persisted in their error and refused to swear the oath of supremacy might then be punished with confiscation of property and continued imprisonment.
The ensuing investigation produced an alarming amount of evidence of Catholic resurgence. Leicester reported that in the Midlands ‘papists were never in that jollity they be at this present time’. John Aylmer, Bishop of London, told Walsingham ‘the papists marvellously increase both in numbers and in obstinate withdrawal of themselves from . . . the services of God.’ Similar information came from diocesan bishops and from Walsingham’s own agents throughout the country. Faced with this situation the government did – nothing. No new laws were enacted. Few if any reported recusants were prosecuted under the existing laws. The detention centres did not materialize. Walsingham had collected a large volume of information and painstakingly filed it. It remained unused. Worse than that, in 1579 he was obliged to write the following extraordinary and humiliating letter to several of his contacts in the shires:
[T]hough, in due and necessary policy, it were fit that Papists who will not conform themselves to resort to public prayer should receive punishment due to their contempt according to the laws provided in that behalf, yet the time serveth not now to deal therein, and therefore I cannot but advise you and such others of the best affected gentlemen in that shire to forbear to persecute by way of indictment such as lately were presented, whose names you certified us; for that if you shall proceed therein, you shall not prevail to do that good you desire, but shall rather fail through some commandment from hence, prohibiting you to surcease in proceeding in that behalf, which would breed no less discredit unto you than encouragement to the papists.
Walsingham explained that he was writing personally and confidentially in order to save both his correspondents and himself from public embarrassment.
If I had not prevented the same, there had been written unto you a general letter from my Lords of the Council to inhibit you from prosecuting the matter against the parties presented and by you certified, which things assuredly will follow if you shall not take profit of this secret advertisement I give you, which I shall request you that the same may be so used as my name be concealed, for that otherwise some may take occasion to make some curious construction of this my good and sincere meaning to other end than by me is meant.14
Why was it that ‘the time serveth not’? The answer is not just that the queen had changed her mind. Her advisers were well used to that by now. A kind of policy paralysis afflicted the government because Elizabeth was undergoing the worst emotional and mental turmoil of her life. Over several issues she could not make her own decisions and she would not take advice. She fancied herself betrayed by some of those closest to her and when she did turn to her Council for support she found that body so divided as to be useless. Under the strains of the years 1577–80 there were times when the Burghley, Leicester, Walsingham caucus fell apart. This was the period when the deluge Walsingham had long prophesied finally burst forth. In foreign affairs disaster followed hard on the heels of disaster and Elizabeth’s personal relationships mirrored events abroad.
A series of ominous occurrences within a few weeks in 1578 provided the first act in the tragedy. In January Don John won a spectacular victory over the army of the Estates General. In February the Duke of Anjou opened negotiations with the Dutch rebels. In March the Earl of Morton was dismissed as Scottish regent. Simultaneously, news arrived that Thomas Stukeley had embarked papal troops in Italy for his proposed assault on Ireland.
But it was not fresh complications in English relations with her neighbours that immobilized the queen. That was down to her own intimate relationships with two men. As we have seen, it was in March 1578 that Anjou revived in earnest his marriage offer to Elizabeth. The ambitious prince still entertained visions of himself in an English crown or, at least, a regent’s coronet. Failing that, he hoped that Elizabeth would bolster his position in the Netherlands. For her part, the queen welcomed his overtures because it gave her a lever with which to manipulate Anjou’s behaviour in the sensitive Dutch situation. Yet there was more than that to her response. In September 1578 she celebrated her forty-fifth birthday. If marriage and, more specifically, motherhood were to be realities for her, it was a case of now or never. She entered into negotiations with enthusiasm, even – or so it seemed to her advisers – with abandon. Walsingham followed Leicester’s lead in opposing the match. As well as his religious objection to Anjou and his suspicion of the prince’s motives, he was concerned about Elizabeth’s safety. Childbirth could only be risky for her and if it should result in her death England would be left at the mercy of Anjou and the French royal house.
However, the real reason for the queen’s obduracy over the marriage was a crisis in her relationship
with Robert Dudley. Her love for the widower earl ran deep and had evolved over the years from youthful passion to emotional reliance. This parsimonious woman showered gifts on her favourite. She listened to his advice on matters of state. She tolerated his opposition to her decisions on religion and foreign affairs. She winked at his passing love affairs. The other side of the coin was her utter possessiveness. She could not tolerate the merest suggestion that another woman might replace her in Leicester’s affections. When, therefore, she learned that her ‘Sweet Robin’ had clandestinely married she was completely devastated. For Dudley, his relationship with the queen was a trap. He was dependent on her for everything – estates, political status, social position, luxurious lifestyle – but the price he was expected to pay for all this was remaining single. Elizabeth would not marry him but he could not marry anyone else. Not only was this sexually frustrating; it was dynastically disastrous. He could not sire a legitimate heir; the Dudley line was doomed to extinction. After twenty years of this increasingly intolerable situation Robert Dudley was married in September 1578 to Lettice, daughter of his conciliar colleague, Sir Francis Knollys. She was already pregnant with their first child.
The news was kept secret as long as possible and it is not clear when or under what circumstances Elizabeth heard it. According to one story she did not discover Leicester’s ‘betrayal’ for over nine months. It is, however, difficult to believe that the information would not have leaked earlier, that the earl’s enemies would not have grasped the opportunity to discredit him, or that Elizabeth would not have pricked up her ears at rumours flying round the court. What is important is that when she did hear the devastating news she was thrown into a rage of self-pity and indignation. What particularly galled her was that while Leicester was opposing her marriage he was himself entering into a clandestine union with one of her own attendants. She reacted by pursuing the Anjou relationship with ostentatious vigour, by refusing to hear any criticism of it and by launching on a vendetta against Leicester’s ‘friends’, the Puritans, especially those who presumed to criticise her actions.