1540-1542
THE KING'S "GOOD SISTER" AND THE KING'S BAD WIFE--THE LUTHERANS AND
ENGLISH CATHOLICS
During her few months of incomplete wedlock with the King, Anne had felt
uneasily the strange anomaly of her position. She accompanied Henry in his
daily life at bed and board, and shared with him the various festivities
held in celebration of the marriage; the last of which was a splendid
tournament given by the bachelor courtiers at Durham House on May-day. She
had studied English diligently, and tried to please her husband in a
hundred well-meant but ungainly ways. She had by her jovial manner and
real kindness of heart become very popular with those around her; but yet
she got no nearer to the glum, bloated man by her side. In truth she was
no fit companion for him, either physically or mentally. Her lack of the
softer feminine charms, her homely manners, her lack of learning and of
musical talent, on which Henry set so much store, were not counterbalanced
by strong will or commanding ability which might have enabled her to
dominate him, or by feminine craft by which he might have been captivated.
She was a woman, however, and could not fail to know that her repudiation
in some form was in the air. It was one of the accusations against
Cromwell that he had divulged to her what the King had said about the
marriage; but, so far from doing so, he had steadily avoided compliance
with her oft-repeated requests for an interview with him. Shortly before
Cromwell's fall, Henry had complained to him that Anne's temper was
becoming tart; and then Cromwell thought well to warn her through her
Chamberlain that she should try to please the King more. The poor woman,
desirous of doing right, tactlessly flew to the other extreme, and her
cloying fondness aroused Henry's suspicion that Cromwell had informed her
of his intention to get rid of her. Anne's Lutheranism, moreover, had
begun to grate upon the tender conscience of her husband under the
prompting of the Catholic party; although she scrupulously followed the
English ritual, and later became a professed Catholic; and to all these
reasons which now made Henry doubly anxious for prompt release, was added
another more powerful than any. One of Anne's maids of honour was a very
beautiful girl of about eighteen, Katharine, the orphan daughter of Lord
Edmund Howard, brother of the Duke of Norfolk, and consequently first
cousin of Anne Boleyn. During the first months of his unsatisfying union
with Anne, Henry's eyes must have been cast covetously upon Katharine; for
in April 1540 she received a grant from him of a certain felon's property,
and in the following month twenty-three quilts of quilted sarsnet were
given to her out of the royal wardrobe. When Cromwell was still awaiting
his fate in the Tower, and whispers were rife of what was intended against
the Queen, Marillac the observant French ambassador wrote in cipher to
his master, telling him that there was another lady in the case; and a
week afterwards (6th July) he amplified his hints by saying that, either
for that reason or some other, Anne had been sent to Richmond, on the
false pretence that plague had appeared in London, and that Henry, very
far from joining her there, as he had promised, had not left London, and
was about to make a progress in another direction. Marillac rightly says
that "if there had been any suspicion of plague, the King would not stay
for any affair, however great, as he is the most timid person that could
be in such a case."
The true reason why Anne was sent away was Henry's invariable cowardice,
that made him afraid to face a person whom he was wronging. Gardiner had
promptly done what Cromwell had been ruined for not doing, and had
submitted to the King within a few days of the arrest of his rival a
complete plan by which Anne might be repudiated.[208] First certain
ecclesiastics, under oath of secrecy, were to be asked for their opinion
as to the best way to proceed, and the Council was thereupon to discuss
and settle the procedure in accordance: the question of the previous
contract and its repudiation was to be examined; the manner in which the
Queen herself was to be approached was to be arranged, and evidence from
every one to whom the King had spoken at the time as to his lack of
consent and consummation was to be collected. All this had been done by
the 7th July, when the clergy met at Westminster, summoned by writ under
the great seal, dated the 6th, to decide whether the King's marriage was
valid or not in the circumstances detailed. The obedient Parliament,
sitting with closed doors, a few days previously had, by Norfolk's orders,
petitioned the King to solve certain doubts that had been raised about the
marriage, and Henry, ever desirous of pleasing his faithful lieges, and to
set at rest conscientious scruples, referred the question to his prelates
in Synod for decision.
Anne, two days before this, summoned to Richmond the ambassador of her
brother, who came to her at four o'clock in the morning; and she then sent
for the Earl of Rutland, the chief of her household, to be present at the
interview. The King, she said, had sent her a message and asked for a
reply. The effect of the message was to express doubts as to the validity
of their marriage, and to ask her if she was content to leave the decision
of it to the English clergy. The poor woman, much perturbed, had refused
to send an answer without consideration, and she had then desired that her
brother's envoy should give, or at all events carry, the answer to the
King, but this he refused to do; and she in her trouble could only appeal
to Rutland for advice. He prated about the "graciousness and virtue" of
the King, and assured her that he would "do nothing but that should stand
by the law of God, and for the discharge of his conscience and hers, and
the quietness of the realm, and at the suit of all his lords and commons."
The King was content to refer the question to the learned and virtuous
bishops, so that she had cause to be glad rather than sorry. Anne was
confused and doubtful; for she did not know what was intended towards her.
But, considering the helplessness of her position and the danger of
resistance, she met the deputation of the Council that came to her next
day (6th July) in a spirit of complete surrender. She was, she said in
German, always content to obey the King, and would abide by the decision
of the prelates; and with this answer Gardiner posted back to London that
night, to appear at the Synod the next morning.
Neither Anne, nor any one for her, appeared. The whole evidence, which was
that already mentioned, was to show the existence of a prior contract, of
the annulling of which no sufficient proofs had been produced, the avowals
of the King and the Queen to their confidants that the marriage had never
been consummated, and never would be; and, lastly, the absence of "inner
consent" on the part of the King from the first. Under the pressure of
Gardiner--for Cranmer, overshadowed by a cloud and in hourly fear of
Cromwell's fate, was ready to sign anything--the union was declared to be
invalid, and both parties were pronounced capable of remarriage. A Bill
was then hurriedly rushed through Parliament confirming the decision of
Convocation, and Cranmer, for the third time, as Primate, annulled his
master's marriage. Anne was still profoundly disturbed at the fate that
might be in store for her; and when Suffolk, Southampton, and Wriothesley
went to Richmond on the 10th July to obtain her acceptance of the
decision, she fainted at the sight of them. They did their best to
reassure her, giving her from the King a large present of money and a
specially affectionate letter. She was assured that if she would acquiesce
and remain in the realm she should be the King's adopted sister, with
precedence before all other ladies but the King's wife and daughters; a
large appanage should be secured to her, and jewels, furniture, and the
household of a royal princess provided for her. She was still doubtful;
and some persuasion had to be used before she would consent to sign the
letter dictated to her as the King's "sister"; but at last she did so, and
was made to say that "though the case was hard and sorrowful, for the
great love she bears to his noble person, yet, having more regard for God
and His truth than for any worldly affection, she accepts the judgment,
praying that the King will take her as one of his most humble servants,
and so determine of her that she may sometimes enjoy his presence."
This seemed almost too good to be true when Henry read it, and he insisted
upon its being written and signed again in German, that Anne might not
subsequently profess ignorance of its wording. When Anne, however, was
asked to write to her brother, saying that she was fully satisfied, she at
first refused. Why should she write to him before he wrote to her? she
asked. If he sent a complaint, she would answer it as the King wished; but
after a few days she gave way on this point when further pressed.[209] So
delighted was Henry at so much submission to his will, that he was
kindness and generosity itself. On the 14th July he sent the Councillors
again to Richmond, with another handsome present and a letter to his
"Right dear, and right entirely beloved sister," thanking her gratefully
for her "wise and honourable proceedings." "As it is done in respect of
God and His truth; and, continuing your conformity, you shall find us a
perfect friend content to repute you as our dearest sister." He promised
her L4000 a year, with the two royal residences of Richmond and
Bletchingly, and a welcome at Court when she pleased to come. In return
she sent him another amiable letter, and the wedding-ring; expressing
herself fully satisfied. She certainly carried out her part of the
arrangement to perfection, whether from fear or complaisance; assuring the
envoys of her brother the Duke that she was well treated, as in a material
sense indeed she was, and thenceforward made the best of her life in
England.
Her brother and the German Protestants were of course furiously
indignant; but, as the injured lady expressed herself not only satisfied
but delighted with her position, no ground could be found for open
quarrel. She was probably a person of little refinement of feeling, and
highly appreciated the luxury and abundance with which she thenceforward
was surrounded, enjoying, as she always did, recreation and fine dress, in
which she was distinguished above any of Henry's wives. On the day after
the Synod had met in Westminster to decide the invalidity of the marriage
(7th July), Pate, the English ambassador, saw the Emperor at Bruges, with
a message from Henry which foreshadowed an entire change in the foreign
policy of England. Charles received Pate at midnight, and was agreeably
surprised to learn that conscientious scruples had made Henry doubt the
validity of his union with Anne. The Emperor's stiff demeanour changed at
once, and, as the news came day by day of the progress of the separation
of Henry from his Protestant wife, the cordiality of the Emperor grew
towards him,[210] whilst England itself was in full Catholic reaction.
The fall of Cromwell had, as it was intended to do, provided Henry with a
scapegoat. The spoliation and destruction of the religious houses, by
which the King and many of the Catholic nobles had profited enormously,
was laid to the dead man's door; the policy of plundering the Church, of
union with Lutherans, and the favouring of heresy, had been the work of
the wicked minister, and not of the good King--that ill-served and
ungratefully-used King, who was always innocent, and never in the wrong,
who simply differed from other good Catholics in his independence of the
Bishop of Rome: merely a domestic disagreement. With such suave hypocrisy
as this difficulties were soon smoothed over; and to prove the perfect
sincerity with which Henry proceeded, Protestants like Barnes, Garrard,
and Jerome were burnt impartially side by side with Catholics who did not
accept the spiritual supremacy of Henry over the Church in England, such
as Abell, Powell, Fetherstone, and Cook. The Catholic and aristocratic
party in England had thus triumphed all along the line, by the aid of
anti-Protestant Churchmen like Gardiner and Tunstal. Their heavy-handed
enemy, Cromwell, had gone, bearing the whole responsibility for the past;
the King had been flattered by exoneration from blame, and pleased by the
release from his wife, so deftly and pleasantly effected. No one but
Cromwell was to blame for anything: they were all good Catholics, whom the
other Catholic powers surely could not attack for a paltry quarrel with
the Pope; and, best of all, the ecclesiastical spoil was secured to them
and their heirs for ever, for they all maintained the supremacy of the
King in England, good Catholics though they were.
But, withal, they knew that Henry must have some one close to him to keep
him in the straight way.[211] The nobles were not afraid of Cranmer, for
he kept in the background, and was a man of poor spirit; and, moreover,
for the moment the danger was hardly from the reformers. The nobles had
triumphed by the aid of Gardiner, and Gardiner was now the strong spirit
near the King; but the aims of the nobles were somewhat different from
those of Churchmen; and a Catholic bishop as the sole director of the
national policy might carry them farther than they wished to go. Henry's
concupiscence must therefore once more be utilised, and the woman upon
whom he cast his eyes, if possible, made into a political instrument to
forward the faction that favoured her. Gardiner was nothing loath, for he
was sure of himself; but how eager Norfolk and his party were to take
advantage of Henry's fancy for Katharine Howard, to effect her lodgment by
his side as Queen, is seen by the almost indecent haste with which they
began to spread the news of her rise, even before the final decision was
given as to the validity of the marriage with Anne. On the 12th July a
humble dependant of the Howards, Mistress Joan Bulmer (of whom more will
be heard), wrote to Katharine, congratulating her upon her coming
greatness, and begging for an office about her person: "for I trost the
Quyne of Bretane wyll not forget her secretary."
Less than a fortnight later (21st July) the French ambassador gives as a
piece of gossip that Katharine Howard was already pregnant by the King,
and that the marriage was therefore being hurried on. Exactly when or
where the wedding took place is not known, but it was a private one, and
by the 11th August Katharine was called Queen, and acknowledged as such by
all the Court. On the 15th Marillac wrote that her name had been added to
the prayers in the Church service, and that the King had gone on a hunting
expedition, presumably accompanied by his new wife; whilst "Madame de
Cleves, so far from claiming to be married, is more joyous than ever, and
wears new dresses every day." Everybody thus was well satisfied except the
Protestants.[212] Henry, indeed, was delighted with his tiny, sparkling
girl-wife, and did his best to be a gallant bridegroom to her, though
there was none of the pomp and splendour that accompanied his previous
nuptials.[213] The autumn of 1540 was passed in a leisurely progress
through the shires to Grafton, where most of the honeymoon was spent. The
rose crowned was chosen by Henry as his bride's personal cognisance, and
the most was made of her royal descent and connections by the enamoured
King. "The King is so amorous of her," wrote Marillac in September, "that
he cannot treat her well enough, and caresses her more than he did the
others." Even thus early, however, whispers were heard of the King's
fickleness. Once it was said that Anne of Cleves was pregnant by him, and
he would cast aside Katharine in her favour, and shortly afterwards he
refrained from seeing his new wife for ten days together, because of
something she had done to offend him.
The moral deterioration of Henry's character, which had progressed in
proportion with the growing conviction of his own infallibility and
immunity, had now reached its lowest depth. He was rapidly becoming more
and more bulky; and his temper, never angelic, was now irascible in the
extreme. His health was bad, and increasing age had made him more than
ever impatient of contradiction or restraint, and no consideration but
that of his own interest and safety influenced him. The policy which he
adopted under the guidance of Gardiner and Norfolk was one of rigorous
enforcement of the Six Articles, and, at the same time, of his own
spiritual supremacy in England. All chance of a coalition of Henry with
the Lutherans was now out of the question ("Squire Harry means to be God,
and to do as pleases himself," said Luther at the time); and the Emperor,
freed from that danger, and faced with the greater peril of a coalition of
the French and Turks, industriously endeavoured to come to some _modus
vivendi_ with his German electors. The rift between Charles and Francis
was daily widening; and Henry himself was aiding the process to his full
ability; for he knew that whilst they were disunited he was safe. But for
the first time in his reign, except when he defied the Pope, he adopted a
policy--probably his own and not that of his ministers--calculated to
offend both the Catholic powers, whilst he was alienated from the
reforming element on the Continent.
By an Act of Parliament the ancient penal laws against foreign denizens
were re-enacted, and all foreigners but established merchants were to be
expelled the country; whilst alien merchants resident were to pay double
taxation. The taxation of Englishmen, enormous under Cromwell, was now
recklessly increased, with the set purpose of keeping the lieges poor,
just as the atrocious religious executions were mainly to keep them
submissive, and incapable of questioning the despot's will. But, though
Englishmen might be stricken dumb by persecution, the expulsion or
oppression of foreigners led to much acrimony and reprisals on the part
both of the Emperor and Francis. An entirely gratuitous policy of
irritation towards France on the frontier of Calais and elsewhere was also
adopted, apparently to impress the Emperor, and for the satisfaction of
Henry's arrogance, when he thought it might be safe to exercise it. The
general drift of English policy at the time was undoubtedly to draw closer
to the Emperor, not entirely to the satisfaction of the Duke of Norfolk,
who was usually pro-French; but even here the oppressive Act against
foreigners by which Henry hoped to show Charles that his friendship was
worth buying made cordiality in the interim extremely difficult. When
Chapuys in the Emperor's name remonstrated with the Council about the new
decree forbidding the export of goods from England except in English
bottoms, the English ministers rudely said that the King could pass what
laws he liked in his own country, just as the Emperor could in his.
Charles and his sister, the Regent of the Netherlands, took the hint, and
utterly astounded Henry by forbidding goods being shipped in the
Netherlands in English vessels.
The danger was understood at once. Not only did this strike a heavy blow
at English trade, but it upset the laboriously constructed pretence of
close communion with the Emperor which had been used to hoodwink the
French. Henry himself bullied and hectored, as if he was the first injured
party; and then took Chapuys aside in a window-bay and hinted at an
alliance. He said that the French were plotting against the Emperor, and
trying to gain his (Henry's) support, which, however, he would prefer to
give to the Emperor if he wished for it. Henry saw, indeed, that he had
drawn the bow too tight, and was ready to shuffle out of the position into
which his own arrogance had led him. So Gardiner was sent in the winter
to see the Emperor with the King's friend Knyvett, who was to be the new
resident ambassador; the object of the visit being partly to impress the
French, and partly to persuade Charles of Henry's strict Catholicism, and
so to render more difficult any such agreement being made as that aimed at
by the meeting at Worms between the Lutheran princes and their suzerain.
Gardiner's mission was not very successful, for Charles understood the
move perfectly; but it was not his policy then to alienate Henry, for he
was slowly maturing his plans for crushing France utterly, and hoped
whilst Catholic influence was paramount in England to obtain the help or
at least the neutrality of Henry.
The fall of Cromwell had been hailed by Catholics in England as the
salvation of their faith, and high hopes had attended the elevation of
Gardiner. But the crushing taxation, the arbitrary measures, and, above
all, the cruel persecution of those who, however slightly, questioned the
King's spiritual supremacy, caused renewed discontent amongst the extreme
Catholics, who still looked yearningly towards Cardinal Pole and his
house. It is not probable that any Yorkist conspiracy existed in England
at the time; the people were too much terrified for that; but Henry's
ambassadors and agents in Catholic countries had been forced sometimes to
dally with the foreign view of the King's supremacy, and Gardiner, whose
methods were even more unscrupulous than those of Cromwell, suddenly
pounced upon those of Henry's ministers who might be supposed to have come
into contact with the friends of the House of York. Pate, the English
ambassador with the Emperor, was suspicious, and escaped to Rome; but Sir
Thomas Wyatt, who had been the ambassador in Spain, was led to the Tower
handcuffed with ignominy; Dr. Mason, another ambassador, was also lodged
in the fortress, at the suggestion of Bonner. Even Sir Ralph Sadler, one
of the Secretaries of State, was imprisoned for a short time, whilst Sir
John Wallop, the ambassador in France, was recalled and consigned to a
dungeon, as was Sir Thomas Palmer, Knight Porter of Calais, and others;
though most of them were soon afterwards pardoned at the instance of
Katharine Howard. In the early spring of 1541 an unsuccessful attempt was
made at a Catholic rising in Yorkshire, where the feeling was very bitter;
and though the revolt was quickly suppressed, it was considered a good
opportunity for striking terror into those who still doubted the spiritual
supremacy of Henry, and resented the plunder of the monasteries. The
atrocious crime was perpetrated of bringing out the mother of Pole, the
aged Countess of Salisbury, last of the Plantagenets, from her prison in
the Tower to the headsman's block. Lord Leonard Gray was a another
blameless victim, whilst Lord Dacre of the South was, on a trumped-up
charge of murder, hanged like a common malefactor at Tyburn. Lord Lisle,
Henry's illegitimate uncle, was also kept in the Tower till his death.
When the reign of terror had humbled all men to the dust, the King could
venture to travel northward with the purpose of provoking and subjecting
his nephew, the King of Scots, the ally of France. All this seems to
point to the probability that at this time (1541) Henry had decided to
take a share on the side of the Emperor in the war which was evidently
looming between Charles and Francis. He was broken and fretful, but his
vanity and ambition were still boundless; and Gardiner, whose policy, and
not Norfolk's, it undoubtedly was, would easily persuade him that an
alliance in war with Charles could not fail to secure for him increased
consideration and readmission into the circle of Catholic nations, whilst
retaining his own supremacy unimpaired. Henry's pompous progress in the
North, accompanied by Katharine, occupied nearly five months, till the end
of October. How far the young wife was influential in keeping Henry to the
policy just described it is impossible to say, but beyond acquiescence in
an occasional petition or hint, it is difficult to believe that the
elderly, self-willed man would be moved by the thoughtless, giddy girl
whom he had married. If the opposite had been the case, Norfolk's
traditions and leanings would have been more conspicuous than they are in
Henry's actions at the time. It is true that, during the whole period, a
pretence of cordial negotiation was made for a marriage between Princess
Mary and a French prince, but it is certain now, whatever Norfolk may have
thought at the time, that the negotiation was solely in order to stimulate
Charles to nearer approach, and to mislead Francis whilst the English
preparations for war and the strengthening of the garrisons towards France
and Scotland went steadily on.
An alliance with the Emperor in a war with France was evidently the policy
upon which Henry, instigated by his new adviser, now depended to bring
him back with flying colours into the comity of Catholic sovereigns,
whilst bating no jot of his claims to do as he chose in his own realm.
Such a policy was one after Henry's own heart. It was showy and tricky,
and might, if successful, cover him with glory, as well as redound greatly
to his profit in the case of the dismemberment of France. But it would
have been impossible whilst the union symbolised by the Cleves marriage
existed; and, seen by this light, the eagerness of Gardiner to find a way
for the King to dismiss the wife who had personally repelled him is easily
understood, as well as Cromwell's disinclination to do so. The
encouragement of the marriage with Katharine Howard, part of the same
intrigue, was still further to attach the King to its promoters, and the
match was doubtless intended at the same time to conciliate Norfolk and
the nobles whilst Gardiner carried through his policy. We shall see that,
either by strange chance or deep design, those who were opposed to this
policy were the men who were instrumental in shattering the marriage that
was its concomitant.
Henry and his consort arrived at Hampton Court from the North on the 30th
October 1541, and to his distress he found his only son, Edward, seriously
ill of quartan fever. All the physicians within reach were summoned, and
reported to the anxious father that the child was so fat and unhealthy as
to be unlikely to live long. The King had now been married to Katharine
for fifteen months, and there were no signs of probable issue. Strange
whispers were going about on back stairs and ante-chambers with regard to
the Queen's proceedings. She was known to have been a giddy, neglected
girl before her marriage, having been brought up by her grandmother, the
Dowager-Duchess of Norfolk, without the slightest regard for her welfare
or the high rank of her family; and her confidants in a particularly
dissolute Court were many and untrustworthy. The King, naturally, was the
last person to hear the malicious tittle-tattle of jealous waiting-maids
and idle pages about the Queen; and though his wife's want of reserve and
dignity often displeased him, he lived usually upon affectionate terms
with her. There was other loose talk, also, going on to the effect that on
one of the visits of Anne of Cleves to Hampton Court after Henry's
marriage with Katharine, the King and his repudiated wife had made up
their differences, with the consequence that Anne was pregnant by him. It
was not true; though later it gave much trouble both to Henry and Anne,
but it lent further support to the suggestions that were already being
made that the King would dismiss Katharine and take Anne back again. The
air was full of such rumours, some prompted, as we shall see, by personal
malice, others evidently by the opponents of Gardiner's policy, which was
leading England to a war with France and a close alliance with the
imperial champion of Catholicism.
On the 2nd November, Henry, still in distress about the health of his son,
attended Mass, as usual, in the chapel at Hampton Court,[214] and as he
came out Cranmer prayed for a private interview with him. The archbishop
had for many months been in the background, for Gardiner would brook no
competition; but Cranmer was personally a favourite with the
King,--Cromwell said once that Henry would forgive him anything,--and when
they were alone Cranmer put him in possession of a shameful story that a
few days before had been told to him, which he had carefully put into
writing; and, after grave discussion with the Earl of Hertford (Seymour)
and the Lord Chancellor (Audley), had determined to hand to the King. The
conjunction of Cranmer, Seymour, and Audley, as the trio that thought it
their duty to open Henry's eyes to the suspicions cast upon his wife, is
significant. They were all of them in sympathy with the reformed religion,
and against the Norfolk and Gardiner policy; and it is difficult to escape
from the conclusion that, however true may have been the statements as to
Katharine's behaviour, and there is no doubt that she was guilty of much
that was laid to her charge, the enlightenment of Henry as to her life
before and after marriage was intended to serve the political and
religious ends of those who were instrumental in it.
The story as set forth by Cranmer was a dreadful one. It appears that a
man named John Lascelles, who was a strong Protestant, and had already
foretold the overthrow of Norfolk and Gardiner,[215] went to Cranmer and
said that he had been visiting in Sussex a sister of his, whose married
name was Hall. She had formerly been in the service of the Howard family
and of the Dowager-Duchess of Norfolk, in whose houses Katharine Howard
had passed her neglected childhood; and Lascelles, recalling the fact,
had, he said, recommended his sister to apply to the young Queen, whom she
had known so intimately as a girl, for a place in the household. "No,"
replied the sister, "I will not do that; but I am very sorry for her."
"Why are you sorry for her?" asked Lascelles. "Marry," quoth she, "because
she is light, both in living and conditions" (_i.e._ behaviour). The
brother asked for further particulars, and, thus pressed, Mary Hall
related that "one Francis Derham had lain in bed with her, and between the
sheets in his doublet and hose, a hundred nights; and a maid in the house
had said that she would lie no longer with her (Katharine) because she
knew not what matrimony was. Moreover, one Mannock, a servant of the
Dowager-Duchess, knew and spoke of a private mark upon the Queen's body."
This was the document which Cranmer handed to the King, "not having the
heart to say it by word of mouth": and it must be admitted that as it was
only a bit of second-hand scandal, without corroboration, and could not
refer to any period subsequent to Katharine's marriage, it did not amount
to much. Henry is represented as having been inclined to make light of it,
which was natural, but he nevertheless summoned Fitzwilliam (Southampton),
Lord Russell (Lord Admiral), Sir Anthony Browne, and Wriothesley, and
deputed to them the inquiry into the whole matter. Fitzwilliam hurried to
London and then to Sussex to examine Lascelles and his sister, whilst the
others were sent to take the depositions of Derham, who was now in
Katharine's service, and was ordered to be apprehended on a charge of
piracy in Ireland sometime previously, and Mannock, who was a musician in
the household of the Duchess.
On the 5th November the ministers came to Hampton Court with the shocking
admissions which they had extracted from the persons examined. Up to that
time Henry had been gay, and had thought little of the affair, but now,
when he heard the statements presented to him, he was overcome with grief:
"his heart was pierced with pensiveness," we are told, "so that it was
long before he could utter his sorrow, and finally with copious tears,
which was strange in his courage, opened the same." The next day, Sunday,
he met Norfolk and the Lord Chancellor secretly in the fields, and then
with the closest privacy took boat to London without bidding farewell to
Katharine, leaving in the hands of his Council the unravelling of the
disgraceful business.
The story, pieced together from the many different depositions,[216] and
divested of its repetitions and grossness of phraseology, may be
summarised as follows. Katharine, whose mother had died early, had grown
up uncared for in the house of her grandmother at Horsham in Norfolk, and
later at Lambeth; apparently living her life in common with the
women-servants. Whilst she was yet quite a child, certainly not more than
thirteen, probably younger, Henry Mannock, one of the Duchess's musicians,
had taught her to play the virginals; and, as he himself professed, had
fallen in love with her. The age was a licentious one; and the maids,
probably to disguise their own amours, appear to have taken a sport in
promoting immoral liberties between the orphan girl and the musician,
carrying backwards and forwards between the ill-matched pair tokens and
messages, and facilitating secret meetings at untimely hours: and Mannock
deposed unblushingly to have corrupted the girl systematically and
shamefully, though not criminally. On one occasion the old Duchess found
this scamp hugging her granddaughter, and in great anger she beat the
girl, upbraided the musician, and forbade such meetings for the future.
Mary Hall, who first gave the information, represents herself as having
remonstrated indignantly with Mannock for his presumption in pledging his
troth, as one of the other women told her he had, with Katharine. He
replied impudently that all he wanted of the girl was to seduce her, and
he had no doubt he should succeed in doing so, seeing the liberties she
had already permitted him to take with her. Mary Hall said that she had
warned him that the Howards would kill or ruin him if he did not take
care. Katharine, according to Mary Hall's tale, when told of Mannock's
impudent speech, had angrily said that she cared nothing for him; but he
managed the next time he saw her, by her own contrivance, to persuade her
that he was so much in love as not to know what he said.
Before long, however, a more dangerous lover, because one of better rank,
appeared in the field, and spoilt Mannock's game. This was Francis Derham,
a young gentleman of some means in the household of the Duke of Norfolk,
of whom he seems to have been a distant connection. In his own confession
he boldly admitted that he was in love with Katharine, and had promised
her marriage. The old Duchess always had the keys of the maids' dormitory,
where Katharine also slept, brought to her chamber after the doors were
locked; but means were found by the women to laugh at locksmiths, and the
most unbridled licence prevailed amongst them. Derham, with the lovers of
two of the women, used to obtain access almost nightly to the dormitory,
where they remained feasting and rioting until two or three in the
morning: and there can remain little doubt that, on the promise of
marriage, Derham practically lived with Katharine as his wife thus
clandestinely, for a considerable period, whilst she was yet very young.
Mannock, who found himself supplanted, thereupon wrote an anonymous letter
to the Duchess and left it in her pew at chapel, saying that if her Grace
would rise again an hour after she had retired and visit the gentlewomen's
chamber she would see something that would surprise her. The old lady, who
was not free from reproach in the matter herself, railed and stormed at
the women; and Katharine, who was deeply in love with Derham, stole the
anonymous letter from her grandmother's room and showed it to him,
charging Mannock with having written it. The result, of course, was a
quarrel, and the further enlightenment of the Duchess with regard to her
granddaughter's connection with Derham. The old lady herself was
afterwards accused of having introduced Derham into her own household for
the purpose of forwarding a match between him and Katharine; and finally
got into great trouble and danger by seizing and destroying Derham's
papers before the King's Council could impound them: but when she learnt
the lengths to which the immoral connection had been carried, and the
shameful licentiousness that had accompanied it, she made a clean sweep of
the servants inculpated, and brought her granddaughter to live in Lambeth
amongst a fresh set of people.
There is no doubt that Katharine and Derham were secretly engaged to be
married, and, apart from the immoral features of the engagement, no very
great objection could have been taken to it. She was a member of a very
large family, an orphan with no dower or prospects, and her marriage with
Derham, who was a sort of relative, would have been not a glaringly
unequal one. With lover-like alacrity he provided her with the feminine
treasures which she coveted, but which her lack of means prevented her
from buying. Artificial flowers, articles of dress, or materials for them,
trinkets and adornments, not to speak of the delicacies which he brought
to furnish forth the tables during the nightly orgy. He had made no great
secret of his engagement to, and intention of marrying Katharine, and had
shown various little tokens of her troth that she had given him. On one
of his piratical raids, moreover, he had handed to her the whole of his
money, as to his affianced wife, and told her she might keep it if he came
not back, whilst on other occasions he had exercised his authority, as her
betrothed, to chide her for her attentions to others. When at last the old
Duchess learnt fully of the immoral proceedings that had been going on,
Katharine got another severe beating, and Derham fled from the vengeance
of the Howards. After the matter had blown over, and Katharine was living
usually at Lambeth, Derham found his way back, and attempted clandestinely
to renew the connection. But Katharine by this time was older and more
experienced, as beseemed a lady at Court. It was said that she was
affianced to her cousin, Thomas Culpeper; but in any case she indignantly
refused to have anything to do with Derham, and hotly resented his claim
to interfere in her affairs.
So far the disclosures referred solely to misconduct previous to
Katharine's marriage with the King, and, however reprehensible this may
have been, it only constructively became treason _post facto_, by reason
of the concealment from the King of his wife's previous immoral life;
whereby the royal blood was "tainted," and he himself injured. Cranmer was
therefore sent to visit Katharine with orders to set before her the
iniquity of her conduct and the penalty prescribed by the law; and then to
promise her the King's mercy on certain conditions. The poor girl was
frantic with grief and fear when the Primate entered; and he in compassion
spared her the first parts of his mission, and began by telling her of
her husband's pity and clemency. The reaction from her deadly fear sent
her into greater paroxysms than ever of remorse and regret. "This sudden
mercy made her offences seem the more heinous." "This was about the hour"
(6 o'clock), she sobbed, "that Master Heneage was wont to bring me
knowledge of his Grace." The promise of mercy may or may not have been
sincere; but it is evident that the real object of Cranmer's visit was to
learn from Katharine whether the betrothal with Derham was a binding
contract. If that were alleged in her defence the marriage with the King
was voidable, as that of Anne of Cleves was for a similar cause; and if,
by reason of such prior contract, Katharine had never legally been Henry's
wife, her guilt was much attenuated, and she and her accomplices could
only be punished for concealment of fact to the King's detriment, a
sufficiently grave crime, it is true, in those days, but much less grave
if Katharine was never legally Henry's wife. It may therefore have seemed
good policy to offer her clemency on such conditions as would have
relieved him of her presence for ever, with as little obloquy as possible,
but other counsels eventually prevailed. Orders were given that she was to
be sent to Sion House, with a small suite and no canopy of state, pending
further inquiry; whilst the Lord Chancellor, Councillors, peers, bishops,
and judges were convened on the 12th November, and the evidence touching
the Queen laid before them. It was decided, however, that Derham should
not be called, and that all reference to a previous contract of marriage
should be suppressed. On the following Sunday the whole of the Queen's
household was to be similarly informed of the offences and their gravity,
and to them also no reference to a prior engagement that might serve to
lighten the accusations or their own responsibility was to be made.
Katharine Howard's fate if the matter had ended here would probably have
been divorce on the ground of her previous immorality "tainting the royal
blood," and lifelong seclusion; but in their confessions the men and women
involved had mentioned other names; and on the 13th November, the day
before Katharine was to be taken to Sion, the scope of the inquiry
widened. Mannock in his first examination on the 5th November had said
that Mistress Katharine Tylney, the Queen's chamberwoman, a relative of
the old Duchess, could speak as to Katharine's early immoral life; and
when this lady found herself in the hands of Wriothesley she told some
startling tales. "Did the Queen leave her chamber any night at Lincoln or
elsewhere during her recent progress with the King?" "Yes, her Majesty had
gone on two occasions to Lady Rochford's[217] room, which could be reached
by a little pair of back stairs near the Queen's apartment." Mrs. Tylney
and the Queen's other attendant, Margery Morton, had attempted to
accompany their mistress, but had been sent back. Mrs. Tylney had obeyed,
and had gone to bed; but Margery had crept back up the stairs again to
Lady Rochford's room. About two o'clock in the morning Margery came to bed
in the same dormitory as the other maids. "Jesu! is not the Queen abed
yet?" asked the surprised Tylney, as she awoke. "Yes," in effect, replied
Margery, "she has just retired." On the second occasion Katharine sent the
rest of her attendants to bed and took Tylney with her to Lady Rochford's
room, but the maid, with Lady Rochford's servant, were shut up in a small
closet, and not allowed to see who came into the principal apartments.
But, nevertheless, her suspicions were aroused by the strange messages
with which she was sent by Katharine to Lady Rochford: "so strange that
she knew not how to utter them." Even at Hampton Court lately, as well as
at Grimsthorpe during the progress, she had been bidden by the Queen to
ask Lady Rochford "when she should have the thing she promised her," the
answer being that she (Lady Rochford) was sitting up for it, and would
bring the Queen word herself.
Then Margery Morton was tackled by Sir Anthony Browne. She had never
mistrusted the Queen until the other day, at Hatfield, "when she saw her
Majesty look out of the window to Mr. Culpeper in such sort that she
thought there was love between them." Whilst at Hatfield the Queen had
given orders that none of her attendants were to enter her bedroom unless
they were summoned. Margery, too, had been sent on mysterious secret
errands to Lady Rochford, which she could not understand, and, with others
of the maids, had considered herself slighted by the Queen's preference
for Katharine Tylney and for those who owed their position to Lady
Rochford; which lady, she said, she considered the principal cause of the
Queen's folly. Thus far there was nothing beyond the suspicions of jealous
women, but Lady Rochford was frightened into telling a much more damning
story, though she tried to make her own share in it as light as possible.
The Queen, she confessed, had had many interviews in her rooms with
Culpeper--at Greenwich, Lincoln, Pontefract, York, and elsewhere--for many
months past; but as Culpeper stood at the farther end of the room with his
foot upon the top of the back stairs, so as to be ready to slip down in
case of alarm, and the Queen talked to him at the door, Lady Rochford
professed to be ignorant of what passed between them. One night, she
recalled, the Queen and herself were standing at the back door at eleven
at night, when a watchman came with a lantern and locked the door. Shortly
afterwards, however, Culpeper entered the room, saying that he and his
servant had picked the lock. Since the first suspicion had been cast upon
the Queen by Lascelles, Katharine, according to Lady Rochford, had
continually asked after Culpeper. "If that matter came not out she feared
nothing," and finally, Lady Rochford, although professing to have been
asleep during some of Culpeper's compromising visits, declared her belief
that criminal relations had existed between him and the Queen:
Culpeper, according to the depositions,[218] made quite a clean breast of
it, though what means were adopted for making him so frank is not clear.
Probably torture, or the threat of it, was resorted to, since Hertford,
Riche, and Audley had much to do with the examinations;[219] whilst even
the Duke of Norfolk and Wriothesley, not to appear backward in the King's
service, were as anxious as their rivals to make the case complete.
Culpeper was a gentleman of great estate in Kent and elsewhere, holding
many houses and offices; a gentleman of the chamber, clerk of the armoury,
steward and keeper of several royal manors; and he had received many
favours from the King, with whom he ordinarily slept. He deposed to and
described many stolen interviews with Katharine, all apparently after the
previous Passion Week (1541), when the Queen, he said, had sent for him
and given him a velvet cap. Lady Rochford, according to his statement, was
the go-between, and arranged all the assignations in her apartments,
whilst the Queen, whenever she reached a house during the progress, would
make herself acquainted with the back doors and back stairs, in order to
facilitate the meetings. At Pontefract she thought the back door was being
watched by the King's orders, and Lady Rochford caused her servant to
keep a counter watch. On one occasion, he said, the Queen had hinted that
she could favour him as a certain lady of the Court had favoured Lord
Parr; and when Culpeper said he did not think that the Queen was such a
lady as the one mentioned, she had replied, "Well, if I had tarried still
in the maidens' chamber I would have tried you;" and on another occasion
she had warned him that if he confessed, even when he was shriven, what
had passed between them, the King would be sure to know, as he was the
head of the Church. Culpeper's animus against Lady Rochford is evident.
She had provoked him much, he said, to love the Queen, and he intended to
do ill with her. Evidence began to grow, too, that not only was Derham
admittedly guilty with the Queen before marriage, but that suspicious
familiarity had been resumed afterwards. He himself confessed that he had
been more than once in the Queen's private apartment, and she had given
him various sums of money, warning him to heed what he said; which, truth
to tell, he had not done, according to other deponents.
Everybody implicated in the scandals was imprisoned, mostly in the Tower,
several members of the house of Howard being put under guard; and Norfolk,
trembling for his own position, showed as much zeal as any one to condemn
his unfortunate niece. He knew, indeed, at this time that he had been used
simply as a catspaw in the advances towards France, and complained
bitterly that the match he had secretly suggested between the Princess
Mary and the Duke of Orleans was now common talk, which gave ground for
his enemies who were jealous of him to denounce him to the King as
wishing to embrace all great affairs of State. It is clear that at this
period it was not only the Protestants who were against Norfolk, but his
own colleagues who were planning the alliance with the Emperor; which to
some extent explains why such men as Wriothesley, Fitzwilliam, and Browne
were so anxious to make the case of Katharine and her family look as black
as possible, and why Norfolk aided them so as not to be left behind. When,
on the 15th December, the old Dowager-Duchess of Norfolk, his stepmother,
his half-brother, Lord William Howard and his wife, and his sister, Lady
Bridgewater, were imprisoned on the charge of having been privy to
Katharine's doings before marriage, the Duke wrote as follows to the King:
"I learnt yesterday that mine ungracious mother-in-law, mine unhappy
brother and his wife, and my lewd sister of Bridgewater were committed to
the Tower; and am sure it was not done but for some false proceeding
against your Majesty. Weighing this with the abominable deeds done by my
two nieces (_i.e._ Katharine Howard and Anne Boleyn), and the repeated
treasons of many of my kin, I fear your Majesty will abhor to hear speak
of me or my kin again. Prostrate at your Majesty's feet, I remind your
Majesty that much of this has come to light through my own report of my
mother-in-law's words to me, when I was sent to Lambeth to search Derham's
coffers. My own truth, and the small love my mother-in-law and nieces bear
me, make me hope; and I pray your Majesty for some comfortable assurance
of your royal favour, without which I will never desire to live.
Kenninghall Lodge, 15th December 1541."[220]
On the 1st December, Culpeper and Derham had been arraigned before a
special Commission in Guildhall, accused of treason.[221] The indictment
set forth that before her marriage Katharine had "led an abominable, base,
carnal, voluptuous, and vicious life, like a common harlot ... whilst, at
other times, maintaining an appearance of chastity and honesty. That she
led the King to love her, believing her to be pure, and arrogantly coupled
with him in marriage." That upon her and Derham being charged with their
former vicious life, they had excused themselves by saying that they were
betrothed before the marriage with the King; which betrothal they falsely
and traitorously concealed from the King when he married her. After the
marriage they attempted to renew their former vicious courses at
Pontefract and elsewhere, the Queen having procured Derham's admission
into her service, and entrusted secret affairs to him. Against Culpeper
it was alleged that he had held secret and illicit meetings with the
Queen, who had "incited him to have intercourse with her, and insinuated
to him that she loved him better than the King and all others. Similarly
Culpeper incited the Queen, and they had retained Lady Rochford as their
go-between, she having traitorously aided and abetted them."
It will be noticed that actual adultery is not alleged, and the indictment
follows very closely the deposition of the witnesses. The _liaison_ with
Derham before the marriage was not denied; nor were the meetings with
Culpeper after the marriage. This and the concealment were sufficient for
the King's purpose, without adding to his ignominy by labouring to prove
the charge of adultery.[222] After pleading not guilty, the two men,
in face of the evidence and their own admissions, changed their plea to
guilty, and were promptly condemned to be drawn through London to Tyburn,
"and there hanged, cut down alive, disembowelled, and, they still living,
their bowels burnt, the bodies then to be beheaded and quartered:" a
brutal sentence that was carried out to the letter in Derham's case only,
on the 10th December, Culpeper being beheaded.
[Illustration: _KATHARINE HOWARD_
_From a portrait by an unknown artist in the National Portrait Gallery_]
Although the procedure had saved the King as much humiliation as possible,
the affair was a terrible blow to his self-esteem as well as to his
affections; for he seems to have been really fond of his young wife.
Chapuys, writing on the 3rd December, says that he shows greater sorrow at
her loss than at any of his previous matrimonial misfortunes. "It is like
the case of the woman who cried more bitterly at the loss of her tenth
husband than for all the rest put together, though they had all been good
men; but it was because she had never buried one before without being sure
of the next. As yet, it does not seem that he has any one else in
view."[223] The French ambassador, a few days later, wrote that "the grief
of the King was so great that it was believed that it had sent him mad;
for he had called suddenly for a sword with which to kill the Queen whom
he had loved so much. Sometimes sitting in Council he suddenly calls for
horses, without saying whither he would go. Sometimes he will say
irrelevantly that that wicked woman had never had such delight in her
incontinency as she should have torture in her death; and then, finally,
he bursts into tears, bewailing his misfortune in meeting such
ill-conditioned wives, and blaming his Council for this last
mischief."[224]
In the meanwhile Henry sought such distraction as he might at Oatlands and
other country places, solaced by music and mummers, whilst Norfolk, in
grief and apprehension, lurked on his own lands, and Gardiner kept a firm
hand upon affairs. The discomfiture of the Howards, who had brought about
the Catholic reaction, gave new hope to the Protestants that the wheel of
fate was turning in their favour. Anne of Cleves, they began to whisper,
had been confined of a "fair boy"; "and whose should it be but the King's
Majesty's, begotten when she was at Hampton Court?" This rumour, which the
King, apparently, was inclined to believe, gave great offence and
annoyance to him and his Council, as did the severely repressed but
frequent statements that he intended to take back his repudiated wife. It
was not irresponsible gossip alone that took this turn, for on the 12th
December the ambassador from the Duke of Cleves brought letters to Cranmer
at Lambeth from Chancellor Olsiliger, who had negotiated the marriage,
commending to him the reconciliation of Henry with Anne. Cranmer, who
understood perfectly well that with Gardiner as the King's factotum such a
thing was impossible, was frightened out of his wits by such a suggestion,
and promptly assured Henry that he had declined to discuss it without the
Sovereign's orders.
But the envoy of Cleves was not lightly shaken off, and at once sought
audience of Henry himself to press the cause of "Madam Anne." He was
assured that the King's grief at his present troubles would prevent his
giving audience; and the Protestant envoy then tackled the Council on the
subject. As may be supposed, he met with a rebuff. The lady would be
better treated than ever, he was told, but the separation was just and
final, and the Duke of Cleves must never again request that his sister
should be restored to the position of the King's wife. The envoy begged
that the answer might be repeated formally to him, whereupon Gardiner flew
into a rage, and said that the King would never take Anne back, whatever
happened. The envoy was afraid to retort for fear of evil consequences to
Anne, but the Duke of Cleves, who was now in close league with the French,
endeavoured to obtain the aid of his new allies to forward his sister's
cause in England. Francis, however, saw, like every one else, that war
between him and the Emperor was now inevitable, and was anxious not to
drive Henry into alliance with Charles against him. Cleves by himself was
powerless, and the trend of politics in England under Gardiner, and with
Henry in his present mood, was entirely unfavourable to a union with the
Lutherans on the Continent; so Anne of Cleves continued her placid and
jovial existence as "the King's good sister," rather than his wife, whilst
the Protestants of England soon found that they had misjudged the
situation produced by Katharine Howard's fall. All that the latter really
had done was to place Norfolk and the French sympathisers under a cloud,
and make Gardiner entirely master of the situation whilst he carried out
the King's own policy.
Henry returned to Greenwich for Christmas 1541, and at once began his
bargaining to sell his alliance with the Emperor at as high a price as
possible. He had already in hand the stoppage of trade with Flanders,
which his ministers were still laboriously and stiffly discussing with the
Emperor's representatives. Any concession in that respect would have to be
paid for. The French, too, were very anxious, according to his showing,
for his friendship, and were offering him all manner of tempting
matrimonial alliances, and when Henry, on the day after Christmas Day,
received Chapuys at Greenwich, he was all smiles, but determined to make
the best of his opportunities. The Emperor had just met with a terrible
disaster at sea during his operations against Algiers, and had returned to
Spain depressed at his losses, and the more ready to make terms with Henry
if possible. Chapuys was a hard bargainer, and it was a fair game of brag
that ensued between him and Henry. Chapuys began by flattering the King:
"and got him into very high spirits by such words, which the Lord Privy
Seal (_i.e._ Fitzwilliam) says are never thrown away upon him," and then
told him that he would give him in strict confidence some important
information about French intrigues.
After dinner the ball opened in earnest, Chapuys and Henry being alone and
seated, with Fitzwilliam, Russell, and Browne at some distance away. The
imperial ambassador began by saying that the King of France had made a
determined bid to marry his second son, Orleans, with the Infanta of
Portugal. This was a shock to Henry, and he changed colour; for one of his
own trump cards was the sham negotiation in which Norfolk had been the
tool, to marry the Princess Mary to Orleans. For a time he could only
sputter and exclaim; but when he had collected his senses he countered by
saying that Francis only wished to get the Infanta into his power, not for
marriage, "but for objects of greater consequence than people imagined."
Besides, the French wanted the Princess Mary for Orleans, and were anxious
to send an embassy to him about it: indeed, the French ambassador was
coming to see him about it with fresh powers next day. Chapuys protested
that he spoke as one devoted to Henry's service; but he was sure the
French did not mean business. They would never let Orleans marry a
Princess of illegitimate birth. "Ah!" replied Henry, "but though she may
be a bastard, I have power from Parliament to appoint her my successor if
I like;" but Chapuys gave several other reasons why the match with Mary
would never suit the French. "Why," cried Henry, "Francis is even now
soliciting an interview with me with a view to alliances." "Yes, I know
they say that," replied the ambassador, "but at the same time Francis has
sent an ambassador to Scotland, with orders not to touch at an English
port." This was a sore point with Henry, and he again winced at the blow.
Then he began to boast. He was prepared to face any one, and James of
Scotland was in mortal fear of him. Chapuys then mentioned that France
had made a secret treaty with Sweden and Denmark to obtain control of the
North Sea, and divert all the Anglo-German trade to France, which Henry
parried, by saying that Francis was in league with the German Protestants,
and, notwithstanding the new decree of the Diet of Ratisbon, could draw as
many mercenary soldiers as he liked from the Emperor's vassals. He felt
sure that Francis would invade Flanders next spring; and if he, Henry, had
cared to marry a daughter of France, as her father wished him to do, he
might have had a share of his conquests. This made Chapuys angry, and he
said that perhaps Holstein and Cleves had also been offered shares. Henry
then went on another tack, and said that he knew quite well that Francis
and Charles together intended, if they could, to make war on England.
Considering, however, the Emperor's disaster at Algiers, and the state of
Europe, he was astonished that Charles had not tried to make a close
friendship with him. Chapuys jumped at the hint, and begged Henry to state
his intentions, that they might be conveyed to the Emperor. But the King
was not to be drawn too rapidly, and would not say whether he was willing
to form an alliance with the Emperor until some one with full and special
powers was sent to him. He had been cheated too often and left in the
lurch before, he said. "He was quite independent. If people wanted him
they might come forward with offers." This sparring went on for hours on
that day and the next, interspersed with little wrangles about the
commercial question, and innuendoes as to the French intrigues. But
Chapuys, who knew his man, quite understood that Henry was for sale; and,
as usual, might, if dexterously handled, be bought by flattery and feigned
submission to his will, hurriedly wrote to his master that: "If the
Emperor wishes to gain the King, he must send hither at once an able
person, with full powers, to take charge of the negotiation:" since he,
Chapuys, was in ill health and unequal to it.
Thus the English Catholic reaction that had been symbolised by the
repudiation of Anne of Cleves, and the marriage with Katharine Howard, was
triumphantly producing the results which Henry and Gardiner had intended.
The excommunicated King, the man who had flung aside his proud Spanish
wife and bade defiance to the vicegerent of Christ, was to be flattered
and sought in alliance by the head of the house of Aragon and the
appointed champion of Roman orthodoxy. He was to come back into the fold
unrepentant, with no submission or reparation made, a good Catholic, but
his own Pope. It was a prospect that appealed strongly to a man of Henry's
vain and ostentatious character, for it gave apparent sanction to his
favourite pose that everything he did was warranted by the strictest right
and justice; it promised the possibility of an extension of his
Continental territory, and the establishment of his own fame as a warrior
and a king. We shall see how his pompous self-conceit enabled his ally to
trick him out of his reward, and how the consequent reaction against those
who had beguiled him drew his country farther along the road of the
Reformation than Henry ever meant to go. But at present all looked
rose-coloured, for the imperial connection and the miserable scandal of
Katharine Howard rather benefited than injured the chances of its
successful negotiation. Cranmer, Hertford, and Audley had shot their bolt
in vain so far as political or religious aims were attained.
In the meanwhile the evidence against Katharine and her abettors was being
laboriously wrung out of all those who had come into contact with her. The
poor old Duchess of Norfolk and her son and daughters and several
underlings were condemned for misprison of treason to perpetual
imprisonment and confiscation,[225] and in Parliament on the 21st January
a Bill of Attainder against Katharine and three lady accomplices was
presented to the Lords. The evidence presented against Katharine was
adjudged to be insufficient in the absence of direct allegations of
adultery after her marriage, or of specific admissions from herself.[226]
This and other objections seem to have delayed the passage of the Bill
until the 11th of February, when it received the royal assent by
commission, condemning Katharine and Lady Rochford to death for treason.
During the passage of the Bill, as soon, indeed, as the procedure of
Katharine's condemnation had been settled, Henry plucked up spirits again,
and with characteristic heartlessness once more began to play the gallant.
"The King," writes Chapuys, "had never been merry since first hearing of
the Queen's misconduct, but he has been so since (the attainder was
arranged), especially on the 29th, when he gave a supper and banquet with
twenty-six ladies at the table, besides gentlemen, and thirty-five at
another table adjoining. The lady for whom he showed the greatest regard
was a sister of Lord Cobham, whom Wyatt, some time ago, divorced for
adultery. She is a pretty young creature, with wit enough to do as badly
as the others if she were to try. The King is also said to fancy a
daughter of Mistress Albart(?) and niece of Sir Anthony Browne; and also
for a daughter, by her first marriage, of the wife of Lord Lisle, late
Deputy of Calais."[227]
Up to this time Katharine had remained at Sion House, as Chapuys reported,
"making good cheer, fatter and more beautiful than ever; taking great care
to be well apparelled, and more imperious and exacting to serve than even
when she was with the King, although she believes she will be put to
death, and admits that she deserves it. Perhaps if the King does not wish
to marry again he may show her some compassion."[228] No sooner, however,
had the Act of Attainder passed its third reading in the Commons (10th
January) than Fitzwilliam was sent to Isleworth to convey her to the
Tower. She resisted at first, but was of course overpowered, and the sad
procession swept along the wintry river Londonward. First came
Fitzwilliam's barge with himself and several Privy Councillors, then, in a
small covered barge, followed the doomed woman, and the rear was guarded
by a great barge full of soldiers under the aged Duke of Suffolk, whose
matrimonial adventures had been almost as numerous as those of his royal
brother-in-law. Under the frowning portcullis of the Traitors' Gate in the
gathering twilight of the afternoon, the beautiful girl in black velvet
landed amidst a crowd of Councillors, who treated her with as much
ceremony as if she still sat by the King's side. She proudly and calmly
gloried in her love for her betrothed Culpeper, whom she knew she soon
would join in death. There was no hysterical babbling like that of her
cousin, Anne Boleyn; no regret in her mien or her words now. Even as he,
with his last breath, had confessed his love for her, and mourned that the
King's passion for her had stood in the way of their honest union, so did
she, with flashing eyes and blazing cheeks, proclaim that love was
victorious over death; and that since there had been no mercy for the man
she loved she asked no mercy for herself from the King whose plaything of
a year she had been.
On Sunday evening, 12th February, she was told that she must be prepared
for death on the morrow, and she asked that the block should be brought
to her room, that she might learn how to dispose her head upon it. This
was done, and she calmly and smilingly rehearsed her part in the tragedy
of the morrow. Early in the morning, before it was fully light, she was
led out across the green, upon which the hoar-frost glistened, to the
scaffold erected on the same spot that had seen the sacrifice of Anne
Boleyn. Around it stood all the Councillors except Norfolk and Suffolk:
even her first cousin, the poet Surrey, with his own doom not far off,
witnessed the scene. Upon the scaffold, half crazy with fear, stood the
wretched Lady Rochford, the ministress of the Queen's amours, who was to
share her fate. Katharine spoke shortly. She died, she said, in full
confidence in God's goodness. She had grievously sinned and deserved
death, though she had not wronged the King in the particular way that she
had been accused of. If she had married the man she loved, instead of
being dazzled by ambition, all would have been well; and when the headsman
knelt to ask her forgiveness, she pardoned him, but exclaimed, "I die a
Queen, but I would rather have died the wife of Culpeper;" and then,
kneeling in prayer, her head was struck off whilst she was unaware.[229]
Lady Rochford followed her to the block as soon as the head and trunk of
the Queen had been piteously gathered up in black cloth by the ladies who
attended her at last, and conveyed to the adjoining chapel for sepulture
close to the grave of Anne Boleyn.
Katharine Howard had erred much for love, and had erred more for ambition,
but taking a human view of the whole circumstances of her life, and of the
personality of the man she married, she is surely more worthy of pity than
condemnation. Only a few days after her death we learn from Chapuys (25th
February) that "the King has been in better spirits since the execution,
and during the last three days before Lent there has been much feasting.
Sunday was devoted to the lords of his Council and courtiers, Monday to
the men of the law, Tuesday to the ladies, who all slept at the Court. The
King himself did nothing but go from room to room ordering and arranging
the lodgings to be prepared for these ladies, and he made them great and
hearty cheer, without showing special affection for any particular one.
Indeed, unless Parliament prays him to take another wife, he will not be
in a hurry to do so, I think. Besides, there are few, if any, ladies now
at Court who would aspire to such an honour; for by a new Act just passed,
any lady that the King may marry, if she be a subject, is bound, on pain
of death, to declare any charge of misconduct that can be brought against
her; and all who know or suspect anything against her must declare it
within twenty days, on pain of perpetual imprisonment and confiscation."
Henry, with five unsuccessful matrimonial adventures to his account, might
well pause before taking another plunge; though, from the extract printed
above, it was evident that he had no desire to put himself out of the way
of temptation. The only course upon which he seemed quite determined was
to resist all the blandishments of the Protestants, the German Lutherans,
and the French to take back Anne of Cleves, who, we are told, had waxed
half as beautiful again as she was since she had begun her jolly life of
liberty and beneficence, away from so difficult a husband as Henry.