Katherine Howard: A New History

by Byrne, Conor

  Norfolk’s decision to appoint three of his female relatives to the household of the new queen, Anne of Cleves, illustrates his desire to further the influence of the Howards within the intimacy of the queen’s chambers, but it does not signal that he intended for one of them to seduce the king and emulate Anne Boleyn in becoming a Howard Queen of England. Indeed, a rather more realistic aim of the duke was for his nieces to contract excellent marriages, a political and social goal that would consolidate and enhance the influence and prestige of the Howard family within the setting of the court. As has been noted, like other noble families the Howards appreciated that women within the family could play important roles, especially in marriage alliances, in bolstering the prestige of the family. Since rumours were to circulate shortly after Katherine’s arrival at court that she was about to marry Thomas Culpeper, gentleman of the king’s privy chamber, it is possible that the duke, aware of the family connection with the Culpepers, considered marrying his niece to an individual who enjoyed enviable influence and proximity to the king. Katherine, however, was ignorant of such rumours, informing Francis Dereham when he accused her: ‘What should you trouble me therewith, for you know I will not have you, and if you heard such reports, you heard more than I do know.’4

  Female relatives at court played an essential role, both in maintaining their family’s honour and furthering its influence and prestige. The renowned court poet Thomas Wyatt cynically opined: ‘In this also see you be not idle: thy niece, thy cousin, thy sister or thy daughter, if she be fair, if handsome by her middle, if thy better hath her love besought her, if thy better hath her love besought her, advance his cause, and he shall help thy need [...]’5 Aware of this, it is certain that both the duke and the dowager duchess instructed Katherine and her cousins on the necessity of maintaining modesty, purity and chastity at the court of Henry VIII, for any scandal that threatened the Howard name would be injurious. Chastity and modesty were closely associated with maids-of-honour at court. Earlier, in 1537, when Anne Basset was appointed to serve Jane Seymour, it was emphasised that she should ‘be sober, sad, wise and discreet and lowly [...] and to be obedient’ to the queen and ‘to serve God and to be virtuous’. If she did not do so, it would have grave consequences on her family’s honour, to their own ‘discomfort and discontentation’. The dangers of the court were well-known, being ‘full of pride, envy, indignation and mocking, scorning and derision’.6

  Katherine was surely aware of the prestigious nature of her appointment, for competition to become a maid-of-honour to the queen was intense. Maids were expected to dress fashionably, maintain a modest and proper demeanour in court functions, have musical capability, escort the queen in functions such as processions, and sing and dance well. The repeated emphasis on maintaining honesty, chastity and purity can only be understood in light of prevailing cultural and social beliefs that associated the female body with evil, licentiousness and whoredom. One popular rhyme ran thus: ‘Nine times a night is too much for a man / I can’t do it myself, but my sister Nan can.’ Nicholas de Venette was to write that women ‘are much more amorous than men, and as sparrows, do not live long, because they are too hot and too susceptible of love’, associating a woman’s caresses with sin and ‘a capital crime’.7 Robert Cawdry, writing in the reign of Elizabeth, warned: for ‘a maid, the honesty and chastity is instead of all [...] the which thing only if a woman remember, it will cause her to take great heed who, and be more a wary and careful keeper of her honesty, which alone being lost [...] there is nothing left’.8 In view of this it is inconceivable that the duke and his stepmother, the dowager duchess, would have promoted Katherine to a place within the household of Anne of Cleves had they been aware of the full extent of her childhood affairs with Manox and Dereham. Obsessed with maintaining family honour, they would almost certainly have sought a place for an alternative female relative who they knew was chaste and virginal, potentially Katherine’s younger sister.

  In December 1539, Katherine received a maiden’s stipend, probably having already travelled to Greenwich Palace in anticipation of Anne of Cleves’ arrival.9 On 3 January, Anne became acquainted with the dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and was welcomed by prestigious ladies within the kingdom, including Margaret Douglas, niece of the king, Frances Marchioness of Dorset, Mary Howard, Duchess of Richmond, and the countesses of Rutland and Hereford. Following these greetings, the gentlemen of the king’s privy chamber, ‘some apparelled in coates of velvet embrodered’, the barons, the bishops, the earls, foreign ambassadors, and finally Cromwell amongst other officers rode forth to meet their new queen. The king himself shortly followed, ‘apparelled in a coate of purple velvet, somewhat made lyke a frocke, all ouer embrodered with flatte golde of Dammaske with small lace mixed betwene of the same gold, and other laces of the same so goyng trauerse wyse [...] the sleues and brest were cut lyned with cloth of golde, and tyed together with great buttons of Diamondes, Rubyes, and Orient Perle [...] his bonnet was so ryche of Iuels that fewe men coulde value them.’10 Hearing of the king’s arrival, Anne came forth to greet him, ‘beyng apparelled in a ryche goune of cloth of golde reised, made rounde without any trayne after the Dutche fassyon, and on her head a kall, & ouer that a rounde bonet or cappe set full of Orient Perle of a very propre fassyon, & before that she had a cornet of blacke velvet, & about her necke she had a partelet set full of riche stone which glystered all the felde.’ Riding forth to the king, Anne was personally welcomed and ‘embrased [...] to the great reioysyng of the beholders’, replying with ‘sweete woordes and great thankes’.11 It is likely that Katherine was present at this occasion, for Hall records the presence of ‘Ladies, Gentlewomen & Maydens in a gret nombre’.12 The new queen’s household was comprised of great ladies, including Mary Arundell Countess of Sussex, Frances Brandon, Lady Margaret Douglas, Elizabeth Grey Lady Audley, Mary Howard and the Countess of Rutland. Gentlewomen included Lady Wriothesley and Lady Elizabeth Cromwell, and maids-of-honour included Katherine Howard, Katherine Carey and Anne Basset, who had previously served Queen Jane.13

  Evidence suggests that the king was not personally delighted with his prospective wife, lamenting: ‘I see nothing in this woman as men report of her’, speaking ‘very sadly and pensively’. He continued: ‘And I marvel that wise men would make such report as they have done.’14 Cromwell, who had been greatly involved in the marriage negotiations, asked the king how he liked his new wife. Replying that he found her ‘nothing so well as she was spoken of’, the king insisted that Cromwell find a ‘remedy’. Yet Cromwell was forced to admit that he knew ‘none’, adding that ‘he was very sorry therefore’.15 The king, however, was required to put aside personal feelings for the needs of the kingdom and married Anne on 6 January at Greenwich: ‘[...] on Twelfe daie, which was Twesdaie, the Kinges Majestie was maried to the said Queene Anne, solemply, in her closett at Greenwych, and his Grace and shee went a procession openlie that daie, she being in her haire, with a rytch cronett of stones and pearle sett with rosemarie on her Graces heade, and a gowne of rich cloath of silver, and richlie behanged with stonne and pearle, with all her ladies and gentlewomen following her Grace, which was a goodlie sight to behold.’16 The new queen, dressed in a gown of rich cloth of gold set with large flowers and orient pearl, with her ‘fayre, yelowe and long’ hair loose, chose the motto for her wedding ring: ‘GOD SEND ME WILL TO KEEP.’17

  The next day, Cromwell visited the king in his privy chamber to ask again ‘how [he] liked the Queen’, presuming that the newlywed royal couple had consummated their marriage. The king bluntly responded: ‘Surely, as ye know, I liked her before not well, but now I like her much worse. For I have felt her belly and her breasts and thereby, as I can judge, she should be no maid. [The] which struck me so to the heart when I felt them that I had neither will nor courage to proceed any further in other matters’. He then admitted, ‘I have left her as good a maid as I found her’.18 When read in light of cultural customs and belief
s about the female body, the king’s comments take on new meaning. Contemporaries believed that maidens should have small breasts and flat stomachs, while demonstrating modest behaviour and a ‘sober’ appearance.19 Believing that his new wife was not a virgin, Henry may have feared that she would steal his manhood or bewitch him into loving her.20 The king’s concerns with his wife, particularly with her body, occurred at a crucial time, for governments during this era interpreted women’s fertility as a political concern.21 Aware of such matters, the king reported that ‘he found her body in such sort disordered and indisposed to excite and provoke any lust in him’, and ‘could not in any wise overcome that loathsomeness, nor in her company be provoked or stirred to that act’. Yet he ‘thought himself able to do the act with other, but not with her’.22

  Clearly, the modern notion that it was Anne of Cleves’ personal ugliness that offended her husband is incorrect, for the king’s comments demonstrate that, once more, fertility concerns threatened the future of his marriage. Indeed, court observers unanimously praised the new queen’s beauty, with Cromwell informed that ‘everyman praiseth the beauty of the said Lady [Anne], as well for the face, as for the whole body, above all other ladies excellent’.23 The king’s disgust with his wife’s breasts and belly signifies his fear that she had surrendered her maidenhead to another man.24 Anne herself was aware of her predicament, for she informed her ladies-in-waiting that her husband had failed to consummate the marriage: ‘She knew well she was not with child.’ The Countess of Rutland, an experienced courtier who was aware of the king’s obsession over the English succession, warned her mistress: ‘Madam, there must be more than this, or it will be long ere we have a Duke of York.’25 Cromwell, fearful in light of his prominent involvement in this new marriage, instructed the Earl of Rutland, lord chamberlain of the queen, to behave more pleasingly towards the king her husband, in an attempt to encourage the consummation of the marriage.

  Anne’s marital problems were compounded by the fact that the king had fallen in love with her maid-of-honour, Katherine, some time beforehand. Most historians see the king’s affection for the young Katherine as a consequence of his marital difficulties, occurring only in the late spring or early summer of 1540 when the king had set in process the events that would culminate in the annulment of his fourth marriage.26 It is possible, however, that when Henry VIII had first become acquainted with Katherine in the closing months of 1539, before the arrival of Anne, he had developed a strong affection and love for her that consequently impaired his relations with his fourth wife. Katherine’s step-grandmother was later informed that the ‘King’s Highness did cast a fantasy to Catherine [sic] Howard the first time that ever his Grace saw her’.27 If Henry had personally presided over the selection of appropriate maidens for his wife’s household, as has been conjectured, then he may have fallen in love with this young maid-of-honour before his wife had even arrived in the kingdom.28 It is interesting that ambassadors who resided at court only learned of the king’s new love in the summer of 1540, when his disaffection with Queen Anne had become obvious. It is likely that Henry maintained considerable discretion and secrecy, for the French ambassador reported only in July that the king planned to marry ‘a lady of great beauty’ who was niece of the Duke of Norfolk.29

  The king’s desire for Katherine probably occurred mainly due to her renowned beauty, of which most contemporaries unanimously agreed was uncommon. Nikander Nucius, who appears to have served the imperial ambassador at Henry VIII’s court, remembered her as ‘the most beautiful woman of her time’.30 George Cavendish emphasised Katherine’s ‘beawtie freshe and pure’, while Marillac commented on Katherine’s ‘attractive deportment’ and modesty.31 The glaring contrast between Katherine and Anne only made the king more determined to annul his marriage and remarry, for he publicly admitted that he was unable to consummate his fourth marriage. Henry’s subjects, however, were not as understanding, for they viewed the king’s frequent visits to the dowager duchess’s household in Lambeth or to Gardiner’s Winchester Palace as evidence of adultery: ‘the bishop of Winchester also very often provided feastings and entertainments for them in his palace; but the citizens regarded all this not as a sign of divorcing the queen, but of adultery.’32

  Had Henry been convinced that his union with Anne of Cleves would be fertile and provide a secure solution to the pressing issues that continued to plague the Tudor succession, it is reasonable to assume that Katherine would have become merely his mistress, as both Elizabeth Blount and Mary Boleyn had been previously. The fact that Dereham became aware of rumours in the spring of 1540 that suggested that Katherine was promised to Thomas Culpeper, a gentleman of the king’s privy chamber, evidences the incredible secrecy surrounding this relationship, for it is possible that the king had been in love with Katherine as early as December 1539. However, the king’s intention to annul his marriage to the queen and marry Katherine as his fifth wife seemed to be confirmed in April, when she was granted the forfeited goods and chattels of two murderers on the 24th day of that month. In May, Katherine was granted twenty-three quilts of quilted sarcenet.33 Similarly to the Dereham affair, the king provided Katherine with elaborate gifts as a means of courting her and signalling to the court his intent to marry her, for as has been noted, gifts formed an essential part of courtship during this period.34 The Howards, appreciative of Katherine’s efforts to raise the prestige of their family, commended and praised her ‘for her pure and honest condition’.35

  Henry’s conviction that marriage to Katherine, whom he believed to be fertile and virginal, would remedy the pressing issues of the English succession cast Cromwell into further difficulties, for he had been known to favour the now barren alliance with Cleves. Notwithstanding this, the king chose to reward him in the spring and early summer of 1540, culminating in Cromwell’s acquirement of the earldom of Essex and the position of Lord Great Chamberlain in April.36 However, with the benefit of hindsight, observers later believed that ‘this was all an artifice’ in which Henry was presented in the best possible light and Cromwell’s treachery made to look worse.37 But, as the educated observer Richard Hilles stressed in his letter abroad to Henry Bullinger, the king’s fourth marriage was questioned openly by the nobility only when ‘they had perceived that the king’s affections were alienated from the lady Anne to that young girl Catharine [sic], the cousin [sic] of the duke of Norfolk, whom he married immediately upon Anne’s divorce’.38 Intriguingly, in light of later events, on 12 June Thomas Culpeper, cousin to Katherine and a member of the privy chamber, was granted reversion of properties in crown leases in Yorkshire ‘grant in fee, in consideration of his true and faithful service’, some of which had previously been held by the Yorkshire gentlemen Sir Ralph Ellerker and Sir William Fairfax.39

  Culpeper’s rewards must be set in context of the nature of the politics and social institutions that comprised the Henrician court. The court emerged as the centre of national politics during Henry’s reign, leading to a distinct form of court politics that modern historians have tended to interpret as factional, but which had medieval antecedents, as recorded by Chaucer in The Knight’s Tale: ‘And therefore, at the Kynges court, my brother, Ech man for himself, ther is noon other.’40 David Starkey’s seminal research demonstrated the fundamental divisions within the royal household, with the ‘below-stairs’ comprised of rooms such as the hall and kitchens run by the lord steward, while the ‘above-stairs’ encompassed private apartments headed by the lord chamberlain. The private apartments gradually became increasingly complex, which granted the king greater privacy. The privy chamber itself had its own staff, headed by the groom of the stool, and included half a dozen other grooms and pages of modest gentry backgrounds who intimately served the king.41

  Culpeper, by virtue of his intimate position within the reformed royal household, was demonstrably one of the king’s favourites. He had possibly began his career as a page who lit fires and warmed his sovereign’s clothes, before progressin
g to the station of groom, before becoming a gentleman of the privy chamber in around 1537.42 His influence was well-known, for in 1537 Lady Lisle and John Hussey had disputed as to whether Sussex or Culpeper was in a stronger position to be helpful at court, and who should be granted a hawk as a gift. They both agreed that ‘there is no remedy; Culpeper must have a hawk’.43 Lady Lisle also granted him two bracelets, promising ‘they are the first that ever I sent to any man’.44 On 5 May 1540, at the annual May Day celebrations, Culpeper participated in the jousts as a defendant and was overthrown by Sir Richard Cromwell, challenger.45 Culpeper was distantly related to Katherine, for he was the second son of Sir Alexander Culpeper of Bedgebury and Constance Harper. His father probably died sometime in 1540 or 1541, for his will was made on 20 May 1540.46 The eldest son of that union was also, somewhat confusingly, named Thomas, and he had served Thomas Cromwell. Later, in May 1542, Richard Hilles described the younger Thomas thus: ‘two years before, or less, [he] had violated the wife of a certain park-keeper in a woody thicket, while, horrid to relate! three or four of his most profligate attendants were holding her at his bidding. For this act of wickedness he was, notwithstanding, pardoned by the king, after he had been delivered into custody by the villagers on account of this crime [...]’47