Anne became convinced that bleeding a person was not only barbaric but that there had to be a way to improve medical care. At the conclusion of that meeting, the Queen asked Henry to task the Ambassador with providing her hospital with some of these new techniques. In the interests of his Caliph’s desire to find potential European allies, the Ottoman Ambassador assented. England would thereafter be among Europe’s leaders in medicine.
In the fall of 1544, Henry and Anne went on a three-week progress from Sudeley to visit her hospital in London to give alms to the poor and show Henry’s desire to heal the sick. At the time it was thought that the touch of a King could heal the sick because he had been ordained by God. Due to the city’s size, Anne’s hospital saw a large number of patients each day. When word spread of the hospital opening, patients from far across the realm sought its remedies for a variety of ailments. Henry took an avid interest in his wife’s project and wanted to visit it to see for himself all she had done. Anne checked on the progress with the nurses and after listening to their needs she decided that a Nursing College would be needed to improve medical treatment. To reduce costs and combine medicine with the religious reforms she decided this new program would have to be a part of her continuing education reforms. With Henry’s blessing Anne called Tyndale and Cranmer to meet to review their progress and to propose a new college for nursing.
Impressed with Anne’s work, Henry approved her college program and ordered that the surgeon licensing mandate be put in place as soon as they had returned from London. The fee for each surgeon would be set for the first year at 10 pounds, until the crown could assess the impact of the cost. True to his word, that October he had Audley draw up the licensing mandate, bypassed Parliament with little fuss, and was spreading the decree by courier that autumn. One immediate impact was that the majority of back door surgery shops closed down and their operators went back to cutting hair and other grooming services.
Most of those practicing medicine at that time assented to the cost of the licensing fee with relatively little negative impact. If a patient was unhappy with the level of pain, scarring, or overall care that he received, there was no recompense for his injury. The surgeon still was paid and the patient had to deal with their lot. Nevertheless, the licensing program led the commons to favor licensed physicians as having the skills a mere barber lacked. This licensing fee ensured that only dedicated healers to the craft, with the ability to pay for their own supplies, would stay in the industry. The King’s personal physician, Dr. Butts, highly commended the King and Queen for this new license practice and sent their Majesties a fine scalpel, made of gold and inscribed with a verse from the Book of Matthew, 10:8 Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give. Henry gave Anne full credit for this and she kept the scalpel on display in her chambers until she died.
Dr. Butts was invited as a member of the council, along with his recommended doctors, to create the curriculum for the nursing program at Oxford. The council did not come to an immediate consensus and worked diligently throughout the fall, winter and into the spring of 1545 to address solutions to complex medical questions. The main concerns were being able to put these theories into solid practice, and not everyone agreed on the standards to agree upon.
Additional experts from Europe were summoned to advise as to the program’s content. The curriculum would finally be presented to their Majesties in early 1546. They both eagerly approved and ordered its adoption to start enrolling students that fall. Henry also ordered that the program be adopted by the other English universities. He also requested that the top medical experts of the day be brought from places such as the Ottoman Empire, France, regions of Italy, and even Spain to help assist in a medical knowledge transfer. Anne had managed to convince him that a doctor’s oath to heal would persuade these experts to spread their talents where they were needed the most. With that, he ordered Lord Audley to begin making the official requests. When these doctors arrived they would train skilled professors who could further spread their knowledge at universities across the land. Thanks to Anne, he could now count this medical program as the first of its kind in the country.
9.4 Henry VIII’s Last Minister
Back in the end of 1544, the rioting over the policies of land enclosures had died down. Audley had sent out proclamations across the land that the nobles and gentry were being investigated by the King for their actions; this was enough to quell the enclosures and remove the motivation for uprisings without the need to use force. Before the proclamations had been distributed Parliament was briefed, but the minister wanted to ensure the commons that their oppressive overlords were being looked into. It did not hurt their case that massive rains came that autumn as well. Although the country was still overcoming that season’s wheat shortage, they were able to make a moderate harvest in spring of 1545. The anger that had swept over most of the country over the nobles’ activities had, at least temporarily, subsided with the peasantry’s ability to once more earn a meager living off wheat profits. Although tempers began to subside, the government inquest continued.
Most of the people in the north were happy to hear that the crown was actually doing something to ease their plight and highly approved of the investigations. When interviewed by the crown’s administrators they were eager to supply any information they could on their landlords. This was seen as the common peoples’ only chance to get back at their overlords, who for years had treated them poorly, often overcharging their families for basic supplies and tricking them into indentured servitude. This practice had been ongoing for decades and was well known, but little formal documentation existed proving the commons’ claims about their plight.
While the Queen was receptive to Audley and had liked him well enough, certainly compared to her previous dealings with Wolsey, More, and Cromwell, she distrusted any future ministers the King would have. She also feared that perhaps Audley too would seek to supplant her own influence with the King. This she could not abide and personally began to keep her eye on Audley. She had George find out who Audley’s grooms were and where the minister stored his files. It could be viewed that Anne sought to influence the King’s actions regarding his minister. The past three had not worked out and Anne reasoned that her guidance and unending support during his reign had been invaluable.
According to modern historians, there was no specific incident that appeared to set the Queen to keeping a watchful eye on Audley, but it was rumored that after Cromwell’s downfall she wanted to be her husband’s sole advisor, and not only his principal counselor in private; she wished to be acknowledged the King’s chief counsel publicly as well. Anne lacked the relationship with Audley that she had built with Cromwell before those two had come to be rivals, and so she was unable to view Audley as anything more than a political competitor.
She saw the position of the King’s minister as one of doing the King’s bidding and advising him on important matters of the realm, nothing more; yet previous ministers had sought to exert their own control over official matters. Audley thus far had kept himself in line, and was proving to be loyal, but Anne lacked the assurance that this minister held her best interests at heart as well. In addition to having George investigate Audley’s activities she charged her ladies to keep their eyes and ears open. She also had not forgotten the Clifford affair, and remained wary because of Audley’s empty allegations against a trusted friend to the crown. Anne saw Audley as a formidable opponent that nearly got away with the murder of a true subject merely for having spoken out against the minister’s policies. Anne resolved to be cautious in her approach towards the crafty Audley. The King thus far had been supportive of her advice regarding the minister, but she was not privy to their intimate conversations and she had no knowledge of how he might attempt to persuade Henry to his cause. Anne saw this as a dangerous situation, which she needed to fortify herself against.
Southwel
l had revealed, under the “enhanced interrogation” tactics being employed at Audley’s orders (approved by the King) scandals involving most every Member of Parliament and the nobility. Ironically, that included Lord Audley. He spared no one and at any cost was determined to save his own hide by casting allegations in most every direction. Some of the information he quite possibly made up completely, as no evidence was ever found to corroborate his stories. Despite this, a report was drafted by the chief constable detailing each of the prisoner’s allegations. Southwell accused the Chancellor of inflating the cost of shipping supplies in the deal he made with Thomas Boleyn in the 1530s, and paying only those revenues to the crown that were based on the Actual cost of the products involved, instead of the appropriate tax for the inflated the price he actually sold the goods for. As an example, Audley was charging 20 pounds for 5 yards of heavy-duty rope for ship sails; the rope’s Actual cost was a mere 6 pounds so the chancellor paid only 1 pound of taxes to the crown, instead of the 3 pounds he should have paid based on the profit he made. This was a damning accusation, indeed, for the man now charged with minding the royal treasury.
Boosting the credibility of the report, the constable had no direct involvement in any of the accused or accuser’s affairs; he was simply doing his job. By all accounts he executed his duty well and stayed out of the political sphere. He followed Lord Audley’s precise directions of interrogation to the letter. The original orders he had received from the Chancellor required that a formal report of his findings be compiled with one copy going to the King and the other to the Chancellery. Audley’s own hand had ensured his destruction.
The King received the report the first week of November 1544, when the Constable felt that the interrogations had procured all the evidence available. He felt confident enough that the report detailed every aspect of the prisoner’s confessions and implications of other associates. The King read the report and once more feared that he had been brooking serpents in his employ, in this case, with a third trusted Chancellor. Henry had never known the security and safety of a single state minister. He spent the better part of the day pondering what to do and called Archbishop Cranmer to hear his confession and absolve him of any sins he might need to undertake. Before Cranmer could advise him, the King ordered Audley’s arrest. When the guards came for the Chancellor he was reading the report alleging his own criminal Acts. He said nothing during his arrest.
Cranmer paid a visit to Anne before heading out. He informed her of the King’s heavy conscience and advised her to pay him a visit to bring him good cheer. She found Henry gazing out the window and he told her about Audley’s arrest. Anne listened for a while before comforting him, assuring him that he had done the right thing in ordering the arrest. During Henry’s weakest moments was when Anne’s greatest strengths came out. She genuinely comforted him and listened with compassion and sincerity, while carefully noting any phrase that might help to serve her purposes later. Politics was a dangerous game with Henry and no matter how deeply she was in love with him, she had to be careful to maintain his love at all costs in the face of so many enemies at court who would seek to turn the King against her. For quite a while, Anne had felt that Henry needed to abolish the entire post of a state minister and take full and absolute power unto himself, and ultimately, to her.
Anne convinced Henry that this fourth straight betrayal showed that it was time to terminate that office of Chancellor entirely. She reminded him of his idol, Henry V, who had (temporarily) unified the English and French thrones in his crushing defeat of French forces at the Battle of Agincourt. She compared her husband to this earlier Henry, proclaiming that his forbearer would not have hesitated to take direct charge of his country. She went on to tell him how, like Henry V, he too had brought their enemies to heel, even while being betrayed by close advisors about him (some of whom had been implicated in an attempt to assassinate Henry V before he set sail to make war with France.
Finally, she advised him to keep Audley in prison while he contemplated his next move, but encouraged him to be deliberate, but swift and decisive. She convinced him that a King was born to rule and it was time that he took charge of his Kingdom. Her argument was so convincing that, had the necessary orders been before him right then and there, he would have. As a final thought before leaving she kissed him and urged him to ponder carefully on their discussion. She entreated that he let no other man take what should rightfully, by will of God, be his. She also reminded him that the beloved Prince Henry was coming to court the following day and they needed to secure the throne for their heir. This played on the King’s ego masterfully, working like a charm.
That evening, Henry called Sir Richard Rich to advise him as to what documents he would need to formally abolish the Chancellor’s post. Rich was shocked and advised the King that he could of course do so, but that Parliament would have to be notified and would need to approve such a move. Henry burst into anger, grabbing Rich about the throat, threatening him that if Parliament stood in his way they would all find their heads at the bottom of a basket. He ordered Rich and his chief Yeoman Warder to visit any Member of Parliament that might be troublesome, and rattled off a few names of those who should be monitored because they might attempt to override his command.
By removing the entire office of the Chancellorship, which had been in place since Henry II had entrusted the position to Sir Thomas Becket (another Chancellor who, as Henry would have noted, had betrayed his King) the King would be burdened with far more responsibilities. Still, this would also ensure that complete and utter power was in his firm grasp. By December 1544, Henry would have complete and utter control of his kingdom in all affairs. Parliament was dismissed, subject to his recall, and he relied on the Privy Council to swiftly enact his reforms, rather than entrust them to a chief minister.
Audley, Southwell, and four other nobles were tried on the same day, December 7th, 1544, and found guilty of treason and usurping the King’s rightful authority. When asked if the prisoners had any statements, only Southwell made a statement, thanking his majesty’s court for leniency; Southwell was informed ahead of time that he would be allowed the quick death of a beheading in exchange for graciousness to the King at trial, and thanks to having provided the information leading to the others’ arrests. Audley remained silent not only at trial but at his execution as well. He and the other men were put to death December 10th. Audley was hung, drawn, and quartered. Southwell and the other nobles were beheaded. Three state ministers had now been killed in Henry’s reign (with Wolsey having died of natural causes before he would have been executed). England would not have another state minister until his son’s reign. Anne had gotten her way once more and Henry, with his Queen as his chief advisor, was now the unitary head of state.
9.5 The Spread of Reformation
Domestic affairs during this time revolved around the design of a second edition of an Anglican Book of Common Prayer. The Queen and Archbishop Cranmer worked closely together with various other theologians to develop and enhance their church’s doctrine. Given the successful spread of the Ten Articles, the Book of Common Prayer was relatively easy to produce and distribute. Vital lessons in the production and distribution process had been learned and Cranmer also spoke often of how grateful the commons were to be able to embrace their faith in their own language. Whether or not this was the true pulse of the commons is questionable; most of the country, especially the north, had not genuinely adopted the Anglican reforms; however, the Archbishop remained optimistic and advised the Queen to speed and intensify the reforms, much to her delight.
Henry gave the revised book his blessing and introduced it to the English people in 1546, with a dedication to Queen Anne. She was invited, as a guest of honor, to the planning meetings that discussed doctrinal changes. This alone is significant; women in that time were not invited for high level meetings of state. They were deemed inferior creatures, with feeble minds. This Queen had changed tha
t entire understanding. It may not have been Henry’s desire to have his wife so politically able, but his grandmother Lady Margaret Beaufort was also a strong woman and he grew up understanding her impact in his own life, including how well his household was run under her strict instruction.
It is interesting to note that the original book had specific guidance on matters such as how the clergy should dress, while the new edition had more freedom for variations in dress while yet being sanctioned by the state. This lifting of various such ceremonial bans was viewed as a step forward, as strict regulation of things like Priestly garb was seen as hewing too much to Catholic tradition. A common complaint amongst the people had been the requirement that they ritualistically continue to dress their Priests and remove their vestments after mass; with this single Act the Queen was acknowledging failings to go far enough in the original reforms.
Anne was instrumental in determining both the changes in the prayer book and how it would be spread to the people. She had reviewed Cranmer’s speeches with him so they could present a unified message concerning the new teachings. Her vision of educating the masses about the reforms also extended to children and included teaching the people how to read and write. This radical education plan was not popular amongst the nobility who felt threatened by the prospect of the rise of a new enlightened class. Anne felt very strongly, however, that for the people to understand their faith, they would have to be enabled to read it for themselves.
Had the Queen Lived: Page 32