Crown of Blood

by Nicola Tallis

  [h]er pardon for the offence committed in the reception of the Lady Jane of Suffolk, and perform the ceremonies usually gone through in England when pardon has to be demanded for so heavy a crime, which are said to consist in the guilty party appearing on his knees with a dagger turned towards his stomach in recognition of his offence and submission to the penalty deserved.18

  As Mary absorbed the news, she showed herself to be both gracious and merciful to the two men. After all, this was her moment of triumph, and it was one that she was determined to savour. She had been victorious and won her kingdom without bloodshed – she was now Queen of England.

  In the days that followed, ‘many nobles and knights presented themselves in the castle where the Queen was’; men who had once supported Jane, and were now eager to ingratiate themselves with Queen Mary in order to procure her forgiveness and goodwill.19 Mary showed herself to be equally merciful, and declared that in spite of their treachery, they would be forgiven and their lives spared. But there was one for whom forgiveness was not an option – one who was still at large. Soon after his arrival at Framlingham, ‘her Highness gave commission to the said Arundel to go with armed men and take order that the Duke of Northumberland and his chief partisans should be apprehended and kept in safe custody’.20 With orders issued for Northumberland’s arrest and the rest of her enemies now reconciled or imprisoned, nothing now remained but for Mary to assume her rightful place as queen in her capital city. As she began to prepare for her departure, her cousin Jane, the fallen queen, imprisoned within the Tower’s walls, could only wait, and pray, that the Queen would be as merciful to her as she had been to Jane’s former supporters.

  QUEEN MARY WAS triumphant, and having sent the Earl of Arundel in pursuit of the Duke of Northumberland, ‘as a first priority she arranged with her chaplains that they should give thanks and pour forth prayers to Almighty God, the first and sole author of this victory’.21 Of Mary’s ‘humility, piety, and religion it is unnecessary to speak’, so renowned was her devotion to the Catholic faith.22 It was her faith that had seen her through some of the most trying times in her life, and a faith that she would do all that she could to restore to her land. A steadfast adherence to religion was, in fact, something Queen Mary shared with her young cousin Jane, now languishing in the Tower.

  On 24 July, five days after Jane’s deposition, Queen Mary departed from Framlingham Castle on the first stage of her journey to London, to take possession of her kingdom. Mary was jubilant – at the age of thirty-seven she had at last come into her rightful inheritance. While the new Queen had the adoration of her people and the unswerving devotion of those who served her, she was, nonetheless, twenty years her cousin Jane’s senior. The years had not been kind to Mary, and though ‘her face is well formed’, she had prematurely aged.23 She ‘is of low rather than of middling stature’, with auburn hair, and her voice was ‘rough and loud, almost like a man’s, so that when she speaks she is always heard a long way off’.24 Nevertheless, she was ‘never to be loathed for ugliness’, and more importantly, ‘she shows herself to have been born of truly royal lineage’.25 In the Tower, news that the Queen was journeying to London reached Jane. Just seven short months ago as the year 1553 began, nobody could have envisaged the tumultuous events that had led to Jane’s rise, fall and imprisonment, for there had been no indication of what lay ahead. The year’s events had come as a complete surprise to those involved, for only once before had England witnessed a year of three sovereigns – and that had been disastrous.26 Equally, never before had Jane been considered as a serious contender for the English throne, though her right had been there from the moment of her birth.

  THE DUKE OF Northumberland was nowhere to be seen. On 20 July the Imperial ambassador had reported: ‘I know nothing more of the Duke’s movements for the moment: but he must have heard of what has happened here. He will hardly escape.’27 Northumberland, who had ridden from London bound for East Anglia in an attempt to secure Jane’s throne by apprehending Mary just days earlier, had indeed heard of what had happened. No sooner had his wearied horse arrived in the city of Cambridge, than it became clear from the cool response of the citizens and Mary’s evident popularity that his visions of power, and all of his hopes, were to come to nothing – and worse.

  On the same day as the Imperial ambassador’s letter, Northumberland received word from the Council in London that Mary had been proclaimed Queen of England in London. Realizing that he now had no chance of victory, he ‘was so thunderstruck that he immediately ordered her Highness to be proclaimed Queen, and took down and tore with his own hands the proclamation of Jane’.28 With no thought for the welfare of the girl whom he had so recently made every effort to proclaim queen, Northumberland proceeded to throw a hat full of gold coins into the air in the marketplace at Cambridge and ‘so laughed that the tears ran down his cheeks for grief’.29 In shock, and doubtless planning his next move, he retired for the evening with his sons to the house of John Cheke, tutor to King Edward, and ‘ye same night after he was laid in his bed ye guard came and ceased upon his weapons and his body and took him in charge’.30 Finding himself confronted by his one-time ally the Earl of Arundel, the same man who had informed Mary that she was now queen, Northumberland ‘fell down on his knees and desired him to be good to him, for the love of God’.31 He tried to reason with Arundel, arguing that ‘I have done nothing but by the consent of you and all the whole council.’32 But it was no use. ‘I am sent hither by the queen’s majesty, and in her name I do arrest you,’ Arundel replied.33 Though he accepted his former colleague’s charge, Northumberland begged him to ‘use mercy towards me, knowing the case as it is’.34 Arundel could only reply by telling him that ‘ye should have sought for mercy sooner; I must do according to my commandment’.35

  Together with his two eldest sons, John and Ambrose, and his youngest son Harry – Guildford’s brothers – and his own brother Sir Andrew Dudley, who had been captured alongside their kinsman and leader, the prisoners were taken back to London, ‘guarded by about three thousand soldiers’.36 Their destination was a foregone conclusion: the Tower, ‘where he has sacrificed his victims and practiced his tyrannical immolations’.37 Arriving on 25 July, ‘one can hardly convey the size of the crowds which filled the streets to see the prisoners, so enormous that they could scarcely ride on through it’.38 The crowd were so hostile on seeing Northumberland, this evil councillor who had tried so hard to deprive Queen Mary of her rightful inheritance, that they could not resist hurling stones and jeering at him as he passed, and ‘had it not been for the strong guard of soldiers, it would not have been possible to bring Northumberland to prison alive’.39 Though his youngest son Harry wept, Northumberland retained ‘a calm countenance’, and as he reached the Tower, ‘his remorse and evil conscience were astonishing’.40 Greeted at the gate to the fortress by the recently reappointed Constable, Sir John Gage, ‘a man of advanced age but of great steadfastness and long experience’, who was also Northumberland’s brother-in-law, and the newly appointed Lieutenant, Sir John Brydges, Northumberland and his sons were escorted to their prison lodgings.41 Shortly afterwards they were joined in their imprisonment by Guildford’s brother Robert.42

  Jane, from her lodgings near Tower Green, would have been able to hear the commotion of the hostile crowd outside, and see the party of prisoners pass as Guildford’s brothers were taken to join him in the Beauchamp Tower, while Northumberland was lodged in St Thomas’s Tower.43 It must have been a pitiful sight: the fallen Duke, so recently the most powerful man in England, captured alongside his four sons – all young, all handsome – and returned to the very fortress that Northumberland had left just days ago, full of hope for the future. His fate was already sealed, but for his sons, and for Jane, there was no telling what the future might hold. It was still all to play for, and the wheel of fortune remained undecided.

  CHAPTER 17

  Jane of Suffolk Deserved Death

  AS QUEEN MARY approached London
, her adoring subjects flocking to see her along the way, she broke her journey at her Palace of Beaulieu. She may have recollected with sadness unpleasant memories of the visit made to her by her teenage cousin at Beaulieu almost four years earlier. For the moment, however, there was little time to dwell on this, for at two o’clock on the morning of 30 July, a visitor arrived at the Palace, desperately seeking an audience with the Queen: Frances had come to beg for the lives of her family.

  Despite the fact that Frances and her husband had fled the Tower for the Charterhouse, it was not long before Queen Mary’s officers had clattered into the courtyard. On 28 July, Henry was arrested and returned to the Tower. There, whether feigned or in truth, he ‘was taken ill’, and was reported to be ‘in such case as no man judgeth he can live’.1 Frances, realizing that the task of saving her family now lay in her hands, immediately set off to beg the Queen for mercy in person.

  Despite the awkward circumstances in which they now found themselves, Mary had no qualms about meeting with Frances. The two were, after all, cousins, and cousins who had been reasonably close before the disastrous sequence of events that had so recently taken place. The two women now came face-to-face within the Royal Apartments at Beaulieu, and Frances began her appeal. She told Mary that she had come to ‘intercede for her most unfortunate husband – of whom (for shame!) much must be said in a more appropriate place – and obtain his liberty on parole from the most merciful queen’.2 Henry was not to blame, Frances told the Queen, for the fault lay solely at Northumberland’s door. The Imperial ambassadors reported that Frances claimed that

  [h]er husband had been the victim of an attempt to poison him, and that the Duke of Northumberland had done it. She then prayed for her husband’s release from the Tower, where he had been imprisoned two days previously. We have also heard that an apothecary, on learning that the Duke of Northumberland had been taken, went and drowned himself.3

  Frances’s accusations of poison caught Mary’s attention, and she immediately demanded proof of the poison attempt. But she also hated Northumberland vehemently, and was probably all too willing to believe Frances’s claims. As to freeing Henry from the Tower, having heard that ‘his sickness was getting worse’ and concerned lest he should die, ‘she freely conceded this, won over by cousinly affection, by her entreaties and by her own merciful nature’.4 However, she insisted that he remain under house arrest at the Charterhouse, and could be returned to the Tower at any time. Mary’s forgiveness suggests more than cousinly affection, for after all, Frances’s daughter Jane had attempted to wear the crown that Mary believed was rightfully hers, an act of high treason. It indicates that she truly believed that Frances and her family had played no willing part in the events of the past few months; in essence, Mary rightly believed that Northumberland was the instigator, and for that he would be punished.

  Thus far, Frances’s mission had proven to be successful, due in part to her persuasive charms, bolstered by her familial links with the Queen and Mary’s desire to be merciful. But what of Jane, who like her father, lay incarcerated in the Tower? No contemporary source makes any reference to Frances interceding with Queen Mary on behalf of her eldest daughter during her audience at Beaulieu. Such an omission has always been taken as a demonstration of a lack of maternal feeling on Frances’s part, but this is not necessarily the case. The comment that Henry had made to his daughter at the Tower that she must ‘be content with a private life’ following her deposition suggests that he believed that Mary would be merciful to her, and Frances probably shared this belief. Alternatively, Mary may have already made it clear that she would spare Jane on account of her tender age, and comments made by the Imperial ambassadors in their report of 16 August confirm that Mary had informed them that ‘she could not be induced to consent that she [Jane] should die’.5 Whatever the circumstances, Frances was able to leave Beaulieu with some relief and a great measure of success: she had an assurance that her husband’s life would be spared, and probably some intimation that Jane would also be allowed to live.

  The Queen was true to her word, and the day after she met with Frances she ordered Henry’s release from the Tower. He immediately returned home to join his wife and younger daughters at the Charterhouse, there to commence his house arrest.6 Given his crime, he was fortunate. For Jane, there was no such swift end to her imprisonment, and she remained incarcerated in the Tower. Moreover, the conditions of her captivity were relatively strict, and it was observed that she and Guildford ‘receive sour treatment, somewhat different to that meted out to them during their eight [sic] days’ reign’.7 The young couple had been forbidden from meeting with one another, and were being kept in close confinement. Jane’s parents, realizing how fortunate they were to be alive and free, but aware that they were by no means out of danger, lay low while events unfolded, and trusted to the Queen’s mercy on behalf of their daughter.

  Frances was not the only one who had rushed to approach Queen Mary directly. A short distance behind, the Duchess of Northumberland, who had been ‘let out of prison sooner than was expected’, made her way to Beaulieu, desperate to persuade the Queen, ‘to move her to compassion towards her children’ and her husband.8 She came to within five miles of the Palace when word reached her that ‘the Queen ordered her to return to London, and refused to give her audience’.9 It was a crushing blow for the Duchess, and one that communicated Queen Mary’s firm resolution to destroy her husband. Bitterly disappointed, the Duchess had no choice but to turn back. But even then, determined to be her husband’s champion and the only person to speak in his defence, the desperate woman wrote to Lady Paget. In her letter to the wife of William, one of Jane’s former Councillors who had now ingratiated himself with Mary, the Duchess begged Lady Paget to urge her husband to try to intercede with the Queen on behalf of her sons, ‘although I do not so much care for them as for their father who was to me and my mind the most best gentleman that ever living woman was matched’.10 The marriage of Guildford’s parents was a love match, and theirs had been a happy family. But despite the Duchess’s grovelling pleas, it was on the verge of collapse, for, as she would soon discover, her words could not save her husband.

  ON 3 AUGUST, Queen Mary made her state entry into London ‘and took possession of her kingdom’.11 With her came ‘a large escort of infantry and cavalry, to the number of 12,000 men’, and many of those who had hurried to dance attendance on their new queen, all ‘arrayed sumptuously’.12 The new Queen ‘was in rich apparel, her gown of purple velvet French fashion, with sleeves of the same’, and she was dripping in rich jewels.13 Her half-sister the Lady Elizabeth, who had written a congratulatory note upon hearing of her accession, and was determined to share in her glory, accompanied Mary. A ‘great number of ladies after them’, and many of the same lords who, just a few short weeks previously had declared for Jane joined them.14 Among them was Jane’s uncle, the Earl of Arundel, who rode before the Queen, ‘bearing the sword in his hand’.15 Mary had readily forgiven this ‘sorry crew of scoundrels’ when they had admitted their mistake and begged her pardon, and they now revelled in her triumph.16 Her subjects ‘with general and marvellous rejoicings’ cheered the Queen rapturously; they were overjoyed that she had at last received her rightful inheritance.17 That same evening, at seven o’ clock, she arrived to take up residence at the Tower ‘where all her prisoners were in confinement; and there was such a discharge of ordnance, that the like has not been heard there these many years’.18 As she arrived, four prisoners ‘met the queens grace at the Tower gate, and there they kneeling down saluted her grace, and she came unto them and kissed them and said, “These are my prisoners.”’19 Jane, however, was not among them. The prisoners were Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester; the old Duke of Norfolk; the Duchess of Somerset, the wife of the executed Lord Protector; and Edward Courtenay, all of whom had been imprisoned through the auspices of Henry VIII or Edward VI.20 Moved to compassion, ‘in her incomparable goodness she not only gave them liberty but
also restored their original honours and positions’.21 Several other prisoners were released shortly afterwards, and ‘This most notable example of mercy did much to win her subjects’ affections.’22 The Tower was being emptied of its prisoners in a sign of goodwill and reconciliation for the start of the new reign, but this did not extend to everyone.

  From her room in the Tower, Jane had heard the rapturous celebrations of the Londoners as Queen Mary made her entry into the city, a reception that differed so greatly from her own. She knew that Mary had arrived at the Tower, had freed many of those who had been locked within the fortress’s walls for years – but not her. Though the Queen was now residing in the same fortress, Jane realized that she would be deprived of a personal audience with her, and instead took up her pen. She had always been a scholar of astonishing ability, but the letter that she wrote now would be the most important of her life. She was writing her version of events; she was writing for her life. Sadly, the original letter has not survived, but it was probably very similar to a declaration that Commendone and Pollini reported that Jane made just months later, in which she acknowledged her guilt in the circumstances in which she found herself:

  Although my fault be such that, but for the goodness and clemency of the queen, I can have no hope of finding pardon, nor in craving forgiveness, having given ear to those who at that time appeared, not only to myself, but also to a great part of this realm, to be wise, and now have manifested themselves the contrary, not only to my and their great detriment, but with the common disgrace and blame of all, they having with such shameful boldness made so blameable and dishonourable an attempt to give others that which was not theirs, neither did it become me to accept (wherefore rightly and justly am I ashamed to ask pardon for such a crime), nevertheless, I trust in God that as now I know and confess my want of prudence, for which I deserve heavy punishment, except for the very great mercy of your majesty, I can still on many grounds conceive hope of your infinite clemency, it being known that the error imputed to me has not been altogether caused by myself. Because, although my fault may be great, and I confess it to be so, nevertheless I am charged and esteemed guilty more than I have deserved.23