Elizabeth's Women

by Tracy Borman

  As well as losing a dear friend, Katherine had also lost the only witness to her wedding with Edward Seymour, for she had no idea where to find the priest who had performed the ceremony. In her desperation, her hopes alighted upon an unlikely savior: Henry Herbert, to whom she had been betrothed in 1553. She tried to persuade him to renew their attachment, somehow thinking that he would either not notice her pregnancy or accept the child as his own. It seems that he was initially prepared to consider her proposal, for he sent a gracious reply together with some tokens of his affection. But as the weeks went by, rumors of Katherine’s condition began to circulate at court, and they eventually reached Herbert’s ears. He immediately wrote her a letter filled with furious indignation, demanding that she return his letters and gifts and railing against her for using “the enticement of your whoredom … to entrap me with some poisoned bait under the colour of sugared friendship.” He assured her: “I will not now begin with loss of honour to lead the rest of my life with a whore.” To Katherine’s horror, Herbert told her that her “deserts” were by now “openly known to all the world,” and he threatened to tell the Queen.31

  It seemed that he had made good his threat in June 1561, when, for no apparent reason, Elizabeth suddenly turned on Katherine, making it clear that she had greatly offended her. “Whatsoever is the cause I know not, but the Queen has entered into a great misliking with her,” reported Sir Nicholas Throckmorton’s agent at court.32 Had Elizabeth guessed Katherine’s secret? If she had, then she did not confront her lady-in-waiting at this stage. Perhaps she enjoyed watching Katherine’s obvious torment as the weeks went by and her pregnancy became ever more difficult to conceal.

  In late July 1561, when Katherine was in her seventh month, she was obliged to accompany her royal mistress and the rest of the court as they went on progress to East Anglia. The discomfort she suffered on the long and arduous journey can only be imagined. Perhaps it was this that convinced her that she could not carry on any longer, for just a few days after the court had arrived at Ipswich, she decided to confess everything to one of the other ladies attending the Queen.

  The lady she chose was Elizabeth (Bess) St. Loe, whom she had known since the age of seven, when Bess had entered the Grey household as an attendant to Lady Frances. Although Bess had subsequently left the household to marry, she had kept in touch with the Greys and had always been a friend to Katherine. The latter therefore felt that she could trust her with the secret. On the night of August 8, after the Queen had retired, Katherine sought out Bess and in whispered tones confessed everything. Her confidante was so appalled when she heard of the girl’s recklessness that she burst into tears, realizing that the marriage amounted to nothing less than treason. Worse still, Katherine had not just married without the Queen’s consent; she had allied herself to a family that had long proved a troublesome threat to the Crown and was uncomfortably close in blood to the Tudor dynasty. Furious at being dragged into the scandal by association, Bess reprimanded Katherine for her foolishness, telling her “she was sorrie therefore becawse that shee had not made the Queene’s Majestie pryvie thereunto.”33 She then told Katherine to go to bed while she thought upon the matter, and hurried off to join her husband.

  The next morning, Katherine noticed little clusters of courtiers staring and apparently talking about her. The thought that “her beeing with Childe was knowen and espied out” and that her marriage was common knowledge filled her with horror.34 In her panic, she cast about for an ally who could intercede with the Queen on her behalf. Robert Dudley was then high in favor, and he was also a kinsman of Katherine—albeit a distant one—because her late sister, Jane, had married his brother, Guilford. Anxiously waiting out the day, she stole from her bedchamber late that night and made her way to Dudley’s quarters. Coming upon him on a sudden, she went down on her knees and gave a tearful confession of her misdemeanors, begging him to present the matter in a favorable light to Elizabeth and use his influence to win her forgiveness. But Dudley was as horrified by the tale as Bess had been. Alarmed lest the sight of a pregnant young woman in his bedchamber at so late an hour should set tongues wagging, he ordered Katherine back to her rooms.

  The following day, Dudley went to the Queen and told her everything. Whether he tried to present it favorably is not recorded, but it would doubtless have done little good. Elizabeth was incandescent with rage, convinced that the whole affair was a plot to oust her from the throne. She immediately ordered Lady Katherine’s arrest and that of Bess St. Loe, both of whom were to be “clapt” in the Tower and interrogated by her commissioners. “Our pleasure is, that ye shall, as by our Commandment, examyn the Lady Catharyne very streightly, how many hath bene pryvee to the love betwixt the Erle of Hertford and hir from the beginning; and let her certenly understand that she shall have no Manner of Favor, except [unless] she will shew the truth,” Elizabeth ordered Sir Edward Warner, lieutenant of the Tower. Meanwhile, she directed him to put Bess “in awe of divers matters confessed by the Lady Catherine and so also deal with her, that she may confess to you all her knowledge in the same matters,” adding: “It is certain that there hath been great practises and purposes and since the death of the Lady Jane she [Bess] hath been most privy.” Clearly the Queen believed that there had been a widespread conspiracy. “Sondry Personagees have delt herin; and when it shall appeare more manifestly, it shall increase our Indignation ageynst hir, if she will forbeare to utter it.”35

  In vain Bess protested that she had known nothing of the affair until Katherine had confided in her. The Queen was adamant that one of her political guile and cunning must have been in on it from the start. And so Bess continued to languish in the Tower, pleading for her release. This was eventually granted after several months, but Elizabeth was not prepared to allow her back to court. She was sent home in disgrace to her estates in Derbyshire, where she remained for the next few years.

  News of the affair spread like wildfire. On August 12, Cecil wrote to the Earl of Sussex: “The tenth of this [month] at Ipswich was a great mishap discovered. The Lady Catherine is certainly known to be big with child, as she saith by the Earl of Hertford, who is in France.”36 News had also reached Katherine’s husband, who was aghast to learn that his worst fears had been realized. Fearful lest he escape, Elizabeth let it be known that she “intended no evil to him or Lady Catherine, but on her account desired to have him in England, in order that it might be decided by law that the Lady Catherine was his wife, whom he had married for his pleasure.” But Seymour was not fooled. He held out for as long as he could before finally obeying the royal summons. Upon arrival in London that September, he was immediately “cast into the Tower,” and it was reported that “his life is in peril, as also his wife’s.”37

  The Queen’s commissioners, led by the Archbishop of Canterbury, spent days “streightly” questioning the couple in an attempt to uncover the truth about the affair. They were also to find out whether the marriage had been lawful—or, indeed, whether it had taken place at all. Elizabeth made it clear that they should conclude it had not. This would be the simplest way of neutralizing the threat their union posed to her crown. In her distress, Katherine gave as detailed an account of her courtship and marriage as she could. Her husband did the same, and even though there was a high degree of correlation between the two, their interrogators seized upon the minor differences and concluded that their statements were “contradictory.”38 When confronted with this, Katherine broke down and pleaded that “shee was then in such troble of minde for feare of the Queene’s Majesty’s displeasure and for absence of her husband and her Imprisonment and beeing great with Child that she was not then soe well advised in her saied Answeares as shee hath sithence considered the same.”39

  Katherine’s and Seymour’s statements might have differed on points of detail, but they both insisted that the marriage had been legal. Even so, their verbal testimonies were not enough; they needed proof either in the form of documentary evidence or witnesses. With J
ane Seymour dead, the only other witness to the wedding was the priest who had performed the ceremony, but as neither Katherine nor her husband knew his name or place of abode, he would be almost impossible to track down. Furthermore, even though they were able to describe certain aspects of his appearance and dress, they admitted that they probably would not recognize him if they saw him again.40 Despite the lack of evidence to support the marriage, Elizabeth was still gravely troubled by the threat that she perceived to her crown. “The Queen is not without anxiety about it,” reported the Spanish ambassador. The root of her suspicion was the fear that “some greater drift was in this.”41 It was rumored that the wedding had been “effected with the connivance and countenance of some of the nobles,” among them Elizabeth’s chief minister, William Cecil. However, her commissioners had found nothing to substantiate this.42

  It was the Queen who would have the final say. Much as she despised Lady Katherine, she might have been more inclined to clemency had it not been for the event that took place on September 24. A little over a month after her arrest, Katherine gave birth to a son in the Tower. All Elizabeth’s fears seemed to have been realized. It was bad enough that two rival claimants had been united in marriage. Now they had a male heir whose claim would be even stronger than their own because he combined the royal blood of both his parents. An Italian agent at court reported that the Queen was “particularly embittered” by the news, and was “already … bent on having the child declared a bastard by Parliament.”43 Determined to legitimize her baby son, Lady Katherine arranged for him to be baptised in secret “by a lady.” He was christened Edward, after his father, and was later created Viscount Beauchamp. But unless Katherine could prove that her marriage to the boy’s father had taken place, his illegitimacy would be assured.

  The birth of Katherine’s son could not have come at a worse time for Elizabeth. Just a month before, Mary Stuart had arrived back in Scotland. She had stayed in France for eight months after the death of her husband, unsure of what to do next. Her hesitation had allowed others to seize the initiative. Lady Margaret Douglas, Countess of Lennox, had welcomed the news of the young French king’s death, for she spied a chance to realize her long-standing dynastic ambitions. His widow had a strong claim to the English throne, and Margaret resolved to ally their families in order to create an incontestable heir. She therefore hatched a plan to marry her eldest son, Henry, Lord Darnley, to his beautiful young cousin. With Darnley as king of Scotland, he and his formidable Lennox family could build up resistance to the English queen from among the Catholic nobles and their European allies. She duly dispatched her son to France on the pretext of offering his condolences to Mary.

  When she heard of this, Elizabeth at once suspected the countess’s motives. Margaret Douglas had long been her adversary. The fact that both Henry VIII and Mary Tudor had for a time considered making her heir to the throne gave her a lofty sense of self-importance that never diminished, despite her being subsequently declared illegitimate and passed over in favor of Elizabeth. Her desire to secure the crown for herself or her descendants was so strong that it became the driving force of her whole life. Although she and her husband had made a show of deference to Elizabeth upon her accession, it was clear that they bore her no goodwill, and they had soon retreated to their Yorkshire estates. The feeling was mutual. “Queen Elizabeth loved them not,” remarked one contemporary, and she made it plain to everyone at court.44 At Elizabeth’s coronation, it had been expected that Margaret would bear her train—a privilege that was due to her as one of the highest-ranking ladies in the kingdom. But at the last minute, the new queen had replaced her with the Duchess of Norfolk. This was a studied insult, and Margaret had felt it keenly.

  It seems that Margaret’s son made quite an impression on Mary Stuart. Like his father, Henry was handsome, with a tall, athletic physique and fair hair. His looks were matched by his charming, courtly manners, and as well as being intellectually gifted, he was also a skilled musician. His proud mother was certain that a glittering future lay before him and that the surest means of achieving this was to marry him to the Queen of Scots. Not leaving it to chance, the countess moved to Settrington House on the East Yorkshire coast in order to facilitate communication with Mary. There she conspired with a host of secret agents from both sides of the channel, all united by the objective of securing the throne for Mary and Darnley. Margaret bombarded Mary with messages extolling Henry’s virtues and insisting that he would make an ideal husband. She also persuaded the widowed queen of the political advantages that such a match would bring. “The Countess, to allure the Queen of Scots to her purpose, set forth her own title here, declaring what a goodly thing it were to have both the realms in one, meaning that her son should be King both of England and Scotland,” reported a foreign agent. In order to secure Mary’s loyalty, Margaret made herself as useful to her as possible, offering to “become an espial for her against the State here.” She was as good as her word, for a short while later it was reported that “the Countess informs the Queen of Scots of all that passes.”45

  Margaret’s efforts seemed to have paid off when, in August 1561, Mary decided to return to Scotland. Although she was still welcome at the French court, she no longer had a role there. The prospect of returning to her faction-ridden native country was hardly more appealing, but in the end it seemed the only possible choice. The easiest passage to Scotland was to cross the channel and then ride northward through England. Mary duly made peaceable overtures to the English queen, telling the latter’s emissaries that she desired “amity” with their mistress, considering that “they were both in one isle, of one language, the nearest kinswomen that each other had, and both queens.”46 But when one of the emissaries urged her to prove this amity by ratifying the Treaty of Edinburgh—something that she had henceforth refused to do because it involved renouncing her claim to the English throne—Mary became evasive, claiming that she wished to discuss it with her council first. When she heard of this, Elizabeth retorted sharply: “We assure you your answer is no satisfaction,” and refused to grant Mary the necessary passport.47 Highly offended by such intransigence, the Scottish queen declared that she would make her way to Scotland without Elizabeth’s help, adding that she was only sorry that she had asked for a favor she did not need.

  Although her will had proved the greater, Elizabeth’s reputation suffered by this hostile exchange. International opinion sided with Mary, who played up to her image as the victim of her cousin’s petty vengeance. Elizabeth therefore tried to make amends by sending an envoy to congratulate Mary upon her safe arrival in Scotland. She assured her cousin that her dearest wish was “to unite in sure amity and live with you in the knot of friendship, as we are that of nature and blood.”48 The Scottish queen graciously accepted her goodwill and expressed her equal desire for friendship, claiming that she wished “to be a good friend and neighbour to the Queen of England.”49 Introducing a theme that she would repeat again and again over the years to come, Mary stressed the natural solidarity that she and Elizabeth should share as female rulers: “Yt is fetter for none to lyve in peace then for women: and for my parte, I praye you thynke that I desyer yt with all my harte.” Thenceforth, she addressed her cousin as “sister” in all her letters, and urged her to write in her own hand in order to make their correspondence more personal.50

  Mary’s letters to Elizabeth have often been taken at face value. She is represented as genuinely well meaning and affectionate toward her cousin, in contrast to the English queen’s suspicion and double-dealing. After all, she was still only eighteen, whereas Elizabeth was in her midtwenties and had a good deal more experience of political intrigue. One of Mary’s own envoys admitted that “he finds no such maturity of judgement and ripeness of experience in high matters in his mistress, as in the Queen’s Majesty [Elizabeth], in whom both nature and time have wrought much more than in many of greater years.”51 But Mary was not so innocent as all that, and it is likely that her effusive sen
timents were aimed at achieving more than just sisterly affection. Thomas Randolph, the English ambassador to Scotland, certainly thought so: “Of this Queen’s [Mary’s] affection to the Queen’s Majesty, either it is so great that never was greater to any, or it is the deepest dissembled, and the best covered that ever was. Whatsoever craft, falsehood or deceit there is in all the subtle brains of Scotland, is either fresh in this woman’s memory, or she can fett [summon] it with a wet finger.”52

  Just a few days after her arrival in Scotland, Mary’s true intentions were made clear. She dispatched William Maitland to secure an agreement from Elizabeth that she would name Mary as her heir. Maitland arrived at court in September 1561, and the initial signs were promising. He received a warm welcome from the English queen, who expressed great affection toward his mistress and claimed that she had forgiven her for laying claim to her throne three years earlier. She said that while this “had given me just cause to be most angry with her, yet could I never find [it] in my heart to hate her.”53 Mary evidently also had a number of supporters among Elizabeth’s political elite, notably Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, the ambassador to France, who enthused: “The Queen of Scotland, her Majesty’s cousin, doth carry herself so honestly, advisedly, and discreetly, as I cannot but fear her progress. Methinketh it were to be wished of all wise men and her Majesty’s good subjects, that the one of these two queens of the Isle of Britain were transformed into the shape of a man, to make so happy a marriage as thereby there might an unity of the whole isle and their appendants.” He also wrote to Elizabeth directly, urging her: “The best means that has been thought on for the quietness of the two Queens is … that Queen Elizabeth should for herself and her heirs peaceably enjoy the crown of England; and failing herself and her heirs, that the Queen of Scotland should be accepted next heir of England.”54