Soon she was known to have moved to Framlingham, the twelfth-century castle of the Howards given to Mary by her brother shortly before his death. There, as her colours flew over the gateway of the great curtain wall, men appeared in their thousands, armed with everything from guns to pitchforks, to proclaim her their rightful queen.
Next she was acclaimed at Norwich, from whence came more men and arms as the leading landowners of Suffolk, including Lord Wentworth, clad in full armour, rode up to Framlingham to declare Mary their queen. Under the command of the Earl of Sussex, her army prepared to do battle with Northumberland, nearly 30 miles away,
But as Northumberland reached Cambridge he was told that in London, the council, headed by the Earl of Arundel, had decided that Mary, as her father’s daughter, was the rightful heir to the Crown. Arundel himself rode to Framlingham, where, on 19 July, on bended knee before her, he told her that she now was queen.
The coronation of Queen Mary, on 1 October 1553, took place at Westminster Abbey. Surprisingly, her cousin and greatest friend, Margaret Lennox, was not present, due to the fact that after her return from Scotland she had given birth to a baby, which, as so often happened in those days of dreadful infant mortality, very shortly died.
Shortly after the coronation, however, Margaret was certainly at Mary’s court, as the French ambassador de Noailles reported that the Princess Elizabeth was much annoyed that her sister made their cousins Margaret Lennox and Frances Dorset take precedence over her, despite the fact that the latter’s daughter (Lady Jane Grey or Dudley as she by then had become) was closely imprisoned in the Tower. Elizabeth, who had so much of her father’s character, from this time on disliked Margaret, partly on account of their difference in religion but also because she thought that Margaret influenced her half-sister against her, as she was always too ready to believe.
Fortunately, Margaret was back at Temple Newsam when the Protestant rebellion, led by Thomas Wyatt, threatened the City of London and the very life of the queen. Wyatt, always rebellious, had witnessed the horrors of the Inquisition when his father had taken him to Spain. Hating the Spanish thereafter, on Mary’s decision to marry Prince Philip, he had led a party of protestant protestors, purportedly in the name of Princess Elizabeth, from Kent. By the time that the news reached Yorskshire, Margaret would only have heard of how it had ended with Wyatt’s supporters deserting him after Mary, with a rousing speech at the Guildhall, rallied the Londoners to her side. The rebels who did reach Tyburn (now Hyde Park Corner) made for the city, but, trapped in the narrow streets, they were decimated by the pikes, swords and cudgels of the armed men of London.
No one rejoiced more greatly than did Margaret on hearing that Mary was safe and the leader of the rebellion against her in the Tower. Nonetheless, perhaps she felt some sympathy for Thomas Wyatt. It had, after all, been none other than his father of the same name, then himself a prisoner, who, when she with her first love Thomas Howard had been sent to the Tower, had been the inspiration of the smuggled verses of poetry which she and her lover had exchanged.
The father had been pardoned, but no mercy was given to the son. Tried on a count of treachery, he offered no defence, but on the scaffold he swore that Elizabeth had not been in any way involved in the rising, which had it been successful would have made her a Protestant queen.
Most tragically, however, Wyatt was not the only one to die. Northumberland, tried and convicted of treachery, had been executed in August 1553. A month after his arrest, his son, Guildford Dudley, together with his wife, the former Lady Jane Grey, to whom Mary, on her accession, had shown mercy, had been sent to imprisonment in the Tower. Mary had hoped to release them, but now as the Duke of Suffolk, Jane’s father, was proved to have been involved in the rebellion, her councillors insisted that it was too dangerous for them live. Faced with this ultimatum, Mary, with utmost reluctance, gave the order for their execution, and on 12 February 1554 first Guildford and then Jane were beheaded before the Tower.
Margaret Lennox, thankfully, was with her children at Temple Newsam when her cousin, the quiet little Lady Jane Grey, who had never wanted to be queen, died for the ambition of her father-in-law in which she had been so unwillingly involved.
Meanwhile, at Temple Newsam Henry Darnley, the focus of his mother’s affection, was continuing to show exceptional promise at the age of only 8. It would seem to have been at Margaret’s instigation that, under the guidance of his tutor John Elder, the little boy laboriously translated Sir Thomas More’s Utopia from the original Latin into English. The result was sent to Queen Mary, who was so touched by his thoughtfulness and delighted with his progress that she sent a special messenger galloping up to Yorkshire with presents which included a rich gold chain. Henry may or may not have been delighted. Dictated to by his mother, he had to remain indoors to write a letter of thanks.
The presence of John Elder, leaning over his shoulder, emerges in the faint lines on the paper between which the little boy wrote, in terms which must have been dictated to him, so sycophantic is his prose.
Lyke as the Monuments of ancient authors, most triumphaunte, moste victorious, and moste gracious Princesse, declare how that a certane excellent, Timotheus Musicus, was wounte with his swete proporcioned and melodious armonye to enflame Alexander the greate Quonquerour and King of Macedonia to civill warres, with a most fervent desire; evenso, I remembering with myself oftentimes how that (over and besides suche manifolde benefites as your Highness heretofore haith bestoued on me) it haith pleased your moste excellente Majestie laitlie to accepte a little Plote of my simple penning, which I termed Vtopia Nova; for the which it being base, vile, and maimed, your Maiestie haithe given me a riche cheane of golde. The noyse (I saye) of such instrumentes, as I heire now and then, (although ther melody diffre muche from the swete strokes and sounds of King Alexanders Timotheus) do not only persuade and move, yea pricke an spurre me forwarde, to endevoure my wittes daylie (all vaniities set aparte) to virtuous lerning and study, being therto thus encouraged, so oftentimes by your Maiseties manifolde benefites, giftes and rewardes; but also I am enflamed and stirred, even now my tendre aige not withstanding, to be served by Your Grace , wishing every haire in my heade for to be a wourthy souldiour, of that same self hert, mynde, and stomake that I am of. But wher as I perceave that neither my wite, power, nor yeares ar at this present corresponding unto this, my good will; thes shall be therefore (most gracious Princesse) most humbly rendring unto your Maiestie immortall thankes for your riche Cheane, and other your Highnes syndrie giftes, gyven unto me without anny my deservinges, from tyme to tyme. Trusting in God, one day, of my moste bounden duetie, to endevour my self with my faithful hertie service, to remembre the same. And being afraid, with thes my suerflous woordes to interturbe (God forfende) Your Highness, whois moste excellent Maiestie is always and specially now, occupied in most weightie maters, thus I make an end: praing unto Almightie God, most humbly and faithfully to preserve, keipe, and defende your Maiestie, long reigning oeuer us all, your true and faithfull subjectes, a most victorious and triumphant Princesse, Amen.
From Temple Newsome, the xxviii of Marche, 1554.
Your Maiesties moste bounden and obedient
Subjecte and seruaunt,
Henry Darnley.1
Note
1 British Library. Cottonian MS,.Vespasian,F. III. f.378
25
A CONSPIRATOR’S SMILE
Following Thomas Wyatt’s execution, Princess Elizabeth had been held in custody. Taken first through the Traitor’s Gate to the Tower, she believed, as the arch of the dark stone building closed above her, that she would be the next to die. Despite Wyatt swearing on the scaffold that she was totally innocent of any involvement in his attempt to overthrow her sister and make her queen, she knew that the headsman’s axe was ready, sharpened after use for Jane Grey. Daily she waited to be summoned and led as a traitor to her death. But, surprisingly, Mary was merciful, allowing after some time that Elizabeth should be held und
er house arrest at Woodstock, near Oxford.
In her absence, Margaret Lennox, as the nearest kinswoman to the Crown, was first lady at the wedding of Queen Mary to Prince Philip, son of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, who, on the eve of his wedding, created him King of Naples and Duke of Milan.
The marriage took place on 25 July, appropriately the feast of St James, the patron saint of Spain. The ceremony was held in the ancient cathedral of Winchester, thought to be safer than London, where protests against the queen marrying a Roman Catholic foreigner might still have been raised. During the ceremony Margaret Lennox, as mistress of the robes and purse bearer, was in close attendance on the bride. Queen Mary was dressed in regal magnificence in a gown of white satin beneath a mantle of cloth of gold, glittering with precious stones. At one point in the service King Philip, as then was customary when promising to endow a wife with worldly goods, put no less than three handfuls of gold and silver on the Bible. Margaret was pushing it quickly into the queen’s purse, when Mary, catching her eye, gave her a conspirator’s smile.
One observer of the wedding was Henry Darnley’s tutor, John Elder, apparently in charge of his pupil. He described it all in detail to his mentor Robert Stuart, Bishop of Caithness, younger brother of Matthew Lennox. In addition he sent him specimens of Henry Darnley’s scholastic progress, some pages of translations from Latin into English, of which Elder was inordinately proud. Explaining to his uncle that the boy was not yet 9, he told him that, for one of his age, he showed amazing ability in speaking and writing both Latin and French, ‘and in sundry other virtuous qualities, whom also God and nature hath endowed with a good wit, gentleness and favor’.1
This letter, dated from London, on New Year’s Day 1555, proves that the Lennox family were at that time still at court. Princess Elizabeth, told of it, apparently decided that far from being the angelic genius of his tutor’s estimation, young Henry Darnley was in fact a precocious brat, an opinion which as he got older, she notably failed to change. As for Margaret, his mother, Elizabeth became convinced that it was she who was advising her sister to keep her a prisoner at Woodstock, an accusation Margaret categorically denied. ‘Never in my life, I had, or meant to have, any such words with the Queen Mary.’ she emphatically declared, but Elizabeth, who once her mind was made up seldom changed it, continued to regard her as enemy on whom she planned revenge.
Note
1 From John Elder, dated from the City of London, this New Year’s day, and the first of the Kalenda of January, 1555, by your humble orator
26
DISPUTED INHERITANCE
Margaret’s third son was born at Temple Newsam in 1556. Perhaps in memory of Charles Howard, she called him Charles. His birth was the reason why she could not travel up to Tantallon when word came that her father, now in his sixty-ninth year, was dying. Instead she sent her priest, Sir John Dicconson, in whose arms he died at Tantallon in the fierce cold of the winter month of January 1557.
Dicconson had made the acquaintance of Margaret’s father when, following her own visit, she had left him at Tantallon in the spring of 1553. He knew of Angus’ resentment over the letter she had written to him after he had refused to let her come to Tantallon when she was almost at the door. Guessing at duplicity, he contrived to lay his hands on the old earl’s papers after he had died. Sure enough, amongst them he found confirmation of all that he had feared. In his will Angus had decreed that after the deaths of his two young sons by the Lady Maxwell, there was no entail on his daughter and that he was minded to have the same entailed on the Earl of Morton, one of his nephews.1
The nephew, James Earl of Morton, was none other than the Master of Morton, one of the outlawed relations to whom, at her father’s request, she had given sanctuary to save them from imprisonment in 1548. As already related, it was Margaret’s priest, Dicconson, whom she had left at Tantallon to give the last rights to her dying father, who had taken his will to the Scottish head of Civil Law and had it stopped. Morton, however, insisting that his bequest from Angus was legal, assumed both the lands and titles of his late uncle.
On learning from her priest what had happened, Margaret was understandably furious, and from then on, in defiance of her cousin, continued to sign herself Lennox and Angus.
Not content to let the matter rest, she asked Queen Mary to intercede with Mary of Lorraine (for the last three years, following the resignation of Châtelhérault, Regent of Scotland) to honour her claims as heiress of her father’s titles and estates. It was not a good time. War between Scotland and England was about to break out again and the Queen Regent herself was terminally ill.
Nonetheless, from her sickbed she managed to dictate an official application, which was taken in person by the lawyer Doctor Laurence Hussey to the Scottish Chancery. At this point the French ambassador to Scotland, Monsieur d’Oysell, aware of the value of the lands involved, advised the Queen Regent to declare them forfeited to the Crown. On 22 January 1557, writing to his predecessor de Noailles, now back in France as Bishop of Dacqs (or Dax), an ancient city of Gascony on the Loire, he told him what had occurred.
Monsieur
I can add nothing to the dispatch of du Faultrey, but the death of the Earl of Angous [sic], of whom Lady Lennox is the principal heiress, and that I much think that the Queen of England will favour as much as she can the claims of that lady to the succession, and that she will do all she can, by one way or another, for that purpose. I pray you to take heed of that, and employ all the pains you can to discover what they mean to do about it where you are.
For my part, I have had the boldness to advise this Queen [Mary of Lorraine] to seize a strong place named Tanrasson [Tantallon] which pertained to the late Earl; and at all events, and for many sound reasons … I hold that there ought not to be any other hairess to that succession but the young Queen of Scotland …2
Soon after writing this, Monsieur d’Oyseil announced that an English agent was waiting at Berwick for a passport. This proved to be Lady Margaret’s agent, Doctor Laurence Hussey, who rode from Edinburgh to Stirling Castle on 5 April 1557 to have an interview with the Queen Regent. Mary of Lorraine was sympathetic to Margaret, fellow Catholic as she was, but, as she pointed out in a letter to Queen Mary in England, ‘she stands in some cases far different from the privileges that are common to the subjects of this realm’.
By this she was intimating that Margaret was the wife of a man, who, for his association with Henry VIII, had been outlawed by the Scottish government. Thanks to the influence of Mary of Loraine, Margaret’s case was brought before the Chancery but was disallowed on the grounds that her husband, the Earl of Lennox, did not have any civil rights.
However, Margaret did not give up; by permission of the queens of both England and Scotland, on the following 14 November a meeting took place between Lord Wharton, warden of the English marches, and Kirkaldy of Grange, one of the Lords of the Congregation, as the Protestant lords who adhered to the Reformation were called. When Lord Wharton asked whether it would be possible for the Lennoxes to return to Scotland, Kirkaldy prevaricated. But he did agree that they ought to have Tantallon Castle – held since the death of Angus by the Laird of Craigmiller for the Crown – returned to them. This, as he pointed out, would ensure the support of the Douglasses to the Queen Regent, with whom the Lady Margaret was known to be on good terms.
Told of this happening, Morton then made a contract of marriage between his son Archibald, designated Angus’ heir, with the daughter of d’Oysell, who had much influence with Mary of Lorraine.
The argument over the Angus inheritance was still undecided when Tom Bishop of all people, the man Matthew most trusted as his secretary, betrayed him to Queen Mary of England as a heretic. Mary, by now extremely ill, for some reason believed Bishop and according to his own word, without telling Margaret, renewed his pension ‘and, to the end of her Majesty’s days in the affairs of Scotland trusted me where she did not her deare cousing of Levanax’.3
This see
ms hardly credible; yet Bishop was so plausible that Mary, paranoid in her fear of heresy, may, in her last illness, have become distrustful even of Margaret, for so many years her greatest friend.
While determined to win the title which was rightly hers, Margaret also badly needed the income from the Angus estates. Matthew, for his allegiance to the English king, had lost not only his land of the Lennox in Scotland but also, thanks to the alliance between that country and France, all his land in France. Reduced to living on the 5 marks a day which Matthew was allowed for his war service, they were so desperate for money that, according to Bishop, they were selling timber, bark and stone from the estate and even stripping lead from the roof of Jerveaux Abbey.
They were impoverished; however, they still managed to find enough money to send their son’s tutor to France to elicit the help of Matthew’s younger brother, John Stuart, in presenting their case to the young Queen of Scots, still in France since her escape from Scotland in July 1548. John Stuart, the Sieur d’Aubigny (the title inherited from the great uncle who had brought them up as boys) owed his brother a favour for fighting for the French king: he had been taken prisoner at the Battle of St Quentin in 1557 and released only thanks to Matthew paying part of his ransom. John Elder went out to France, armed with some of the examples of his pupil’s penmanship, which he proudly presented to the young queen, now 16 years old. Promised as she was to the dauphin, she nonetheless showed interest in Darnley, as the prodigy which his tutor claimed him to be. Also intrigued were the French princes and the King of Navarre.
Elder came home with a much welcome present of 50 crowns from the Cardinal of Lorraine to the Lennoxes, as was discovered by Bishop, the indefatigable spy. Bishop also sent word to London that Matthew Lennox was a victim of what appears to have been a virulent form of influenza, which was sweeping the country at the time. To help him recover, the family moved to Settringham House in the south-east of Yorkshire, which, as Bishop hastened to report, was not only a healthful location but conveniently near to Bridlington, a port much used by vessels from the Continent traversing the North Sea.
Margaret Douglas Page 12