61. Clarence was close to the Duchess and the Duke of Norfolk – Eleanor’s sister and brother-in-law – and he might have heard about the alleged Talbot marriage from them.
62. On Tuesday 14 April 1478 Stillington was appointed to a commission of the peace for Berkshire, which implies (but does not guarantee) that by that date he was once again at liberty: CPR 1476–1485, p. 554.
63. Jones/Commynes, p. 397.
64. CPR 1476–1485, p. 102.
65. Act of Attainder against George, Duke of Clarence, January 1478, RP, vol. 6, pp. 193–95.
66. C.A.J. Armstrong, ed., D Mancini, The Usurpation of Richard the Third, Gloucester 1989, pp. 62–63; 96–97.
67. Letter from Simon Stallworthe to Sir William Stonor. J. Ashdown-Hill, Richard III’s ‘Beloved Cousyn’, p. 93, citing Facsimiles of National Manuscripts, part 1, Southampton 1865, item 53.
68. Secondary evidence against the Woodville marriage – including the allegations of witchcraft against Elizabeth Woodville and her mother – also featured in the list of factors enumerated in the Act.
69. The children of his brother Clarence being already debarred from the succession by Edward IV’s Act of Attainder.
70. A Parliament had been summoned, but not all the members had yet arrived.
71. ‘King Edward was and stoode marryed and trouth plight to oone Dame Elianor Butteler, doughter of the old Earl of Shrewesbury.’
72. The invalidity of the Woodville marriage was based upon several considerations, but what most concerns us here is the fact that it was both bigamous and secret.
73. Armstong/Mancini pp. 62–63.
74. Ashdown-Hill, ‘Norfolk Requiem: the Passing of the House of Mowbray’, Ricardian 12 (March 2001), pp. 198–217 (p. 208).
75. For details, see Ashdown-Hill, ‘Lady Eleanor Talbot’s other husband’, and ‘Lady Eleanor Talbot: new evidence; new answers; new questions’.
76. H.C. Maxwell-Lyte, ed., The Registers of Robert Stillington, Bishop of Bath and Wells 1466–1491 and Richard Fox, Bishop of Bath and Wells 1492–1494, Somerset Record Society, 1937, p. xiii.
77. Compare, for example, RP, vol. 6, p. 190; pp. 284–85; pp. 305–06.
78. The text of the 1484 act survived, however, because it was inscribed in the rolls of parliament.
79. A.N. Kincaid, ed., G. Buck, The History of King Richard the Third, Stroud 1979, p. 181.
80. Eleanor made legal provision to transfer all her landed property to her sister less than a month before she died.
81. Eleanor’s only surviving brother, Sir Humphrey Talbot, accompanied Elizabeth, Duchess of Norfolk, to the royal wedding of Charles the Bold and Margaret of York in the Low Countries. See Beaune and d’Arbaumont, eds., Mémoires d’Olivier de la Marche, vol. 3, p. 111, where he is described as ‘son frere, l’ung des filz de monsigneur de Talbot’.
82. Weightman, Margaret of York, pp. 47–59.
83. L.T. Smith, The Itinerary of John Leland, parts 6 and 7, London 1907–10, p. 120.
84. Ashdown-Hill, Eleanor, pp. 173–74.
85. Bernard André (who wrote for the Tudors, and esteemed the claimant an impostor) said the first Yorkist pretender of Henry VII’s reign impersonated Elizabeth Woodville’s second son by Edward IV, Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York: G. Smith ‘Lambert Simnel and the King from Dublin’, Ricardian 10 (December 1996), pp. 498–536, p. 499.
86. ‘… there [was] never a new torche but old torches’, MS BL Arundel 26, f. 30, quoted in A.F. Sutton & L. Visser-Fuchs, The Royal Funerals of the House of York at Windsor, London 2005, p. 73.
10 THE INFANTA AND THE NYGHT CROWE
1. ‘The Nyght Crowe’ was Cardinal Wolsey’s term for Anne Boleyn. Probably it referred to her opportunity to caw into the king’s ear at night!
2. This is a reference to Jane Seymour.
3. Those who refer to Henry’s ‘divorce’ of Catherine of Aragon use an erroneous term.
4. Loades, The Politics of Marriage, p. 131.
5. For the possible allegation of bigamy in respect of Catherine Howard, see below.
6. Richmond was born in 1519, and his mother only married in 1522.
7. Letters & Papers, III part 2, p. 1539.
8. K. Hart, The Mistresses of Henry VIII, Stroud 2009, p. 137. Not surprisingly, perhaps, the king and his minions had been very anxious to ensure that this particular allegation received no public airing, and Thomas Cromwell was reportedly furious when they failed, and word of it did leak out.
9. Modern interpretations of the notes left by Henry VIII’s physicians do not support the view that the king suffered from syphilis.
10. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/the-jousting-accident-that-turned-henry-viii-into-a-tyrant-1670421.html (May 2012).
11. Inside the Body of Henry VIII, The History Channel (consulted on the internet, April 2012).
12. A. Sutton & L. Visser-Fuchs, The Royal Funerals of the House of York at Windsor, London 2004, pp. 113–24.
13. Henry VIII’s younger sister, Mary, Queen of France and Duchess of Suffolk, does, however, seem to have had reddish hair, based on the evidence of two surviving locks of her hair which the present writer has researched: J. Ashdown-Hill, The Last Days of Richard III, p. 126.
14. Loades, The Politics of Marriage, p. 130.
15. Catholic canons 1060; 1085.2.
16. los reyes católicos.
17. Loades, The Politics of Marriage, p. 9.
18. J Ashdown-Hill, ‘The Lancastrian Claim to the Throne’, Ricardian, vol. 13 (2003) (pp. 27–38), p. 37.
19. ‘Catherine of Aragon is believed to have stayed in the village in 1501 on her way to marry Prince Arthur’: http://www.charmouth.com/History.htm (April 2012). ‘The Queens Arms, a famous building in the village, was built for an abbot. Catherine of Aragon used it as her residence in 1501’. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charmouth (April 2012). Forde Abbey was a Cistercian foundation, a little inland from Charmouth. The former ‘Queen’s Arms’ has now been renamed ‘The Abbot’s House’. http://www.abbotshouse.co.uk/index.php?id=11 (April 2012).
20. Hart, The Mistresses of Henry VIII, p. 19.
21. On her wedding day Catherine was one month short of her sixteenth birthday – 16 being the age at which a marriage with a child bride could be consummated (see above). However, her husband Arthur (born 19/20 September 1486) was almost a year younger than she was. Moreover, he was probably sexually inexperienced.
22. Hart, The Mistresses of Henry VIII, p. 18. Later, however, Henry VIII tried to retract his statement: Letters and Papers, VI, p. 168.
23. Arthur had caught tuberculosis from his father.
24. See above, p. 17.
25. See above, p. 23.
26. The royal pilgrimage took place on 19 January 1511: H M Gillett, Walsingham, London 1946, p. 37.
27. Charles was elected emperor in 1519.
28. The relationship probably ended in 1522, when Elizabeth Blount married.
29. The mother of Mary and Anne Boleyn, Lady Elizabeth Howard, was a daughter of the second Howard Duke of Norfolk, and a descendant of Edward I (see Family Tree 3).
30. Historians have debated which of the Boleyn girls was the elder, but the point seems to be settled clearly by the fact that Mary’s son, Lord Hunsdon, stated explicitly that Mary was older than Anne when he was petitioning Anne’s daughter, Elizabeth I, for the reversion of the earldom of Ormonde. If Hunsdon had made a mistake on this point his cousin the queen would obviously have noticed.
31. It is uncertain whether Mary’s son, Henry Carey, later Lord Hunsdon (born 4 March 1526), was fathered by the king or by his mother’s husband. However, the king’s paternity in the case of Lord Hunsdon is even more doubtful than in the case of Hunsdon’s sister, Catherine.
32. Anne Boleyn’s date of birth is unknown, but she was probably born in about 1500–1501.
33. Like some of the alleged deformities of King Richard III, they may have been later inventions, intended to illustrate and
confirm that Anne’s underlying personality was essentially evil.
34. 25 January 1533 may possibly have been the date.
35. Archbishop Warham, who had been somewhat equivocal in his policy but who, in the final analysis, had generally been in favour of the status quo, had died in August 1532. Cranmer, who was much more inclined to do what the king wanted, was nominated to succeed Warham in October 1532, and the papal bulls for his appointment were finally obtained in March 1533.
36. The embalmer of Catherine’s body reported that all her organs were sound with the exception of the heart, which was black. This might possibly have been a secondary symptom of a melanotic carcinoma.
37. The fact that the Anglican Church now sees no impediment to marriage with a deceased sibling’s widow(er) might offer a new possible interpretation of the situation, but to apply it retrospectively to the early sixteenth century would be anachronistic.
11 REVIEW OF SECRET AND BIGAMOUS MEDIEVAL ROYAL MARRIAGES
1. The ODNB entry on Edmund Beaufort is, however, more circumspect.
12 THE VIRGIN QUEEN
1. The known suitors of Queen Elizabeth, with the dates of their aspiration to her hand, were: 1534 the Duke of Angoulême (third son of Francis I of France); 1544 Prince Philip of Spain (King Philip II); (?)1547 Sir Thomas Seymour; 1553 Edward Courtenay (a descendant of Edward IV and the house of York); 1554 Emanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy; 1554 Prince Frederick of Denmark; Prince Eric of Sweden; 1556 Don Carlos (son of King Philip II of Spain); 1559 King Philip II of Spain; (?)Sir William Pickering ; 1559 James Hamilton, Earl of Arran; 1559 Henry Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel; 1559 Lord Robert Dudley (later Earl of Leicester); King Eric XVI of Sweden; the Duke of Holstein; 1560 King Charles IX of France; 1560 Henry of France, Duke of Anjou; 1563 Lord Darnley; 1568 Archduke Charles of Austria; 1570 Henry of France, Duke of Anjou; 1572 Francois of France, Duke of Alençon and also later Duke of Anjou (http://www.elizabethan-era.org.uk/suitors-of-queen-elizabeth-i.htm – June 2012). Not all of these suitors were countenanced or seriously considered by Elizabeth herself, however.
2. Philip was the widowed husband of Elizabeth’s dead sister – an ominous echo of the relationship of his great-aunt, Catherine of Aragon, with Prince Arthur and Henry VIII.
3. Monsieur – tout court – was the traditional form of address for the eldest surviving brother of a reigning king of France. The Duke of Anjou was the brother and heir of King Henri III.
4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Monsieur%27s_Departure (June 2012).
5. The Duke of Anjou died in June 1584.
6. http://www.elizabethan-era.org.uk/teenage-scandal-of-queen-elizabeth-i.htm (June 2012).
7. C. Paul, ‘The “Prince Tudor” dilemma: hip thesis, hypothesis or old wives’ tale?’, The Oxfordian, vol. V (2002), pp. 47–69 (p. 48).
8. Paul, ‘The “Prince Tudor” dilemma’.
9. Paul, op. cit., pp. 48–49, 53–54.
10. Quoted in Paul, op. cit., p. 56.
11. W. Camden, The Historie of the Most Renowned and Victorious Princesse Elizabeth, Late Queene of England, quoted in Paul, op. cit., p. 57. Present writer’s emphasis.
12. Both were Elizabeth’s cousins on her mother’s side. As the daughter of Catherine Carey, Lettice Knollys may also have been descended from Henry VIII.
13. S. Adams, I. Archer & G. W. Bernard, eds., ‘A Journall of Matters of State happened from time to time within and withoute the Realme from and before the Death of King Edward the 6th until the Yere 1562’, in I. Archer, ed., Religion, Politics and Society in Sixteenth-Century England, pp. 35–122, CUP 2003.
13 OLD ROWLEY AND MRS BARLOW
1. Historical Manuscripts Commission, Bath MSS, II, pp. 170–171; A. Browning, ed., English Historical Documents, 1660–1714, OUP 1953, pp. 119–120.
2. Since the accession to the English throne of his grandfather, James I, in 1603, the kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland had shared a common sovereign, but as yet there was no such institution as the United Kingdom.
3. Quoted in B. Masters, The Mistresses of Charles II, London 1997, pp. 9–10.
4. Masters, Mistresses, p. 24.
5. Officially Anne was in the Netherlands as a maid of honour to Princess Mary, the Princess Royal, elder sister of Charles [II] and James [II], wife of the Prince of Orange and mother of the future King William III.
6. C. Humphery-Smith in P. Beauclerk-Dewar & R. Powell, Royal Bastards, Stroud 2008, 2010, p. 264.
7. Their first child, Charles of York, Duke of Cambridge, was born on 22 October 1660 and died on 5 May 1661.
8. Quoted in Masters, Mistresses, pp. 11; 15.
9. Anne’s father was Sir Edward Hyde, later created first Earl of Clarendon, her mother was Frances, daughter of Sir Thomas Aylesbury.
10. Lucy was descended from Edward I, and was related to Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard – see below.
11. The use of the word ‘condom’ is first documented in 1706. The contraceptive is reputed to have been named after a Dr (or Colonel) Condom. This person has not been identified, but the surname (with variant spellings) was current in seventeenth-century England.
12. He is sometimes considered Charles II’s eldest child, but in fact the king had earlier bastards; Masters, Mistresses, p. 10.
13. Which disease is not specified.
14. She was therefore of approximately the same age as Charles II, who was born on 29 May 1630.
15. T.G. Lamford, The Defence of Lucy Walter, Ammanford 2001, p. 5.
16. B.A. Murray, ‘Lady Eleanor Butler and John Crowne’s The Misery of Civil War’, Ricardian, vol. 14 (2004), pp. 54–61.
17. Lamford, Defence, pp. 204–06.
18. ‘Both of whom had sound political reasons for disparaging Lucy in order to discredit her son’. R. Hutton, Charles the Second, King of England, Scotland and Ireland, Oxford 1989, p. 25.
19. ODNB: R. Clifton, ‘Lucy Walter’.
20. Hutton, Charles the Second, p. 26.
21. Masters, Mistresses, p. 22.
22. Masters, Mistresses, p. 21; Lamford, Defence, p. 190, citing Clarendon State Papers, vol. 2, p. 346.
23. Anne-Marie-Louise of France, Duchesse de Montpensier, only daughter and heiress of Charles’ maternal uncle, Gaston, Duc d’Orléans.
24. Hutton, Charles the Second, p. 40.
25. Hutton, Charles the Second, p. 26.
26. ODNB, T. Harris, ‘Scott [formerly Crofts], James, Duke of Monmouth and first Duke of Buccleuch (1649–1685)’.
27. Quoted in Masters, Mistresses, p. 14.
28. Masters, Mistresses, p. 16.
29. An untrustworthy pamphlet of 1683 gives Monmouth’s date of birth as 9 April 1649. This appears to be the only available evidence.
30. When Monmouth became James II’s rival for the throne, the latter did all in his power to discredit his nephew.
31. ODNB, Harris, ‘Monmouth’.
32. Mercurius Politicus, 16 July 1656, published in Lamford, Defence, p. 192.
33. For example: ‘If seventh sons do things so rare,/In you seven fathers have a share’. http://www.campin.me.uk/Dalkeith/Scotts/Scotts.htm (June 2012).
34. Beauclerk-Dewar & Powell, Royal Bastards, p. 36.
35. ODNB, Harris, ‘Monmouth’.
36. ODNB, Harris, ‘Monmouth’.
37. Masters, Mistresses, p. 31.
38. ODNB, Harris, ‘Monmouth’.
39. Hutton, Charles the Second, p. 77.
40. Princess Mary, wife of the Prince of Orange, and mother of the future English King William III.
41. Letter dated The Hague, 9 November 1654 (Calendar of the Clarendon State Papers, vol. 2, p. 419); letter dated The Hague, 20 May 1655, and letter dated Hounslerdike, 21 June 1655 (Lambeth Palace Library MS 645, ff. 14, 26). Extracts published in Lamford, Defence, pp. 183–85.
42. 9 November 1654; Masters, Mistresses, p. 24.
43. Hutton, Charles the Second, p. 96. In many European languages the words ‘wife’ and ‘woman’ are identica
l. See also Masters, Mistresses, pp. 24–25.
44. Masters, Mistresses, pp. 24–25.
45. Henrietta Catherine of Orange was Princess Mary’s sister-in-law. See A. Fraser, King Charles II, London 1979, p. 155.
46. Mercurius Politicus, p. 7108, 16 July 1656. Text published in Lamford, Defence, p. 192.
47. R. Fergusson, A Letter to a Person of Honour concerning the ‘Black Box’, London 1680, p. 3.
48. Masters, Mistresses, p. 25.
49. Masters, Mistresses, p. 23.
50. Masters, Mistresses, p. 23.
51. Masters, Mistresses, p. 25. (I have been unable to trace the original source. There are letters from O’Neill to Charles in Lambeth Palace Library, but this letter is not among them.)
52. Hutton, Charles the Second, p. 126.
53. See, for example, Murray, op. cit. (2004). In fact, of course, the two cases were not entirely parallel. For instance Eleanor had actually borne no son by Edward IV – though in the seventeenth century it was thought that she might have done so.
54. Masters, Mistresses, p. 29.
55. Fraser, King Charles II, pp. 387, 483, n. 19 and illustration between pp. 400–01.
56. Hutton, Charles the Second, p. 188.
57. http://www.archive.org/stream/roxburgheballads05chapuoft/roxburgheballads05chapuoft_djvu.txt (June 2012).
58. Mobile = fickle people, easily swayed.
59. Fergusson, ’Black Box’, p. 1.
60. Fergusson, ‘Black Box’, p. 8.
61. Walter Montagu Douglas Scott, 1806–1884.
62. Quoted in Masters, Mistresses, p. 28.
63. Charles II.
64. Queen Catherine.
65. Monmouth.
14 DR AND MRS THOMSON
1. http://www.lawpack.co.uk/cohabitation/articles/article1585.asp (May 2012).
2. She may have been created Countess of Albestroff by the Holy Roman Emperor Francis of Lorraine, husband of Maria Theresa, and father (inter alia) of Queen Marie Antoinette of France. Alternatively the title may have been granted by the Bishop of Metz. See H. Douglas, Bonnie Prince Charlie in Love, Stroud 1995, p. 177, citing L. Berry, The Young Pretender’s Mistress.
Royal Marriage Secrets Page 31