THE EXETER CONSPIRACY
On 12 October 1537, Queen Jane gave birth to a son. Froude
enthusiastically describes the public rejoicings: “The crown had an
undoubted heir. The succession was sure. The King, who was supposed to
be under a curse which refused him male posterity, was relieved from the
bane. Providence had borne witness for him and had rewarded his policy.
No revolution need be looked for on his death. The Catholics could not
hope for their ‘jolly stirring.’—The insurrection was crushed. A prince
was born. England was saved.”[1567] No doubt the birth of the prince
greatly strengthened the King’s position. But perhaps the rejoicings of
the people were not quite so heart-felt nor so universal as appeared
outwardly. At least the following story shows that the hidden hatred of
the King extended itself to his innocent baby son.
Some months after the birth of the prince a group of idlers were
watching the funeral of a child in a London churchyard. For some reason
the priest became suspicious, and, opening the shroud, found no child
but a waxen image with two pins stuck through it. One of the bystanders
went to a friend, a scrivener, said to be skilled in conjuring, and
asked what this might mean. “Marry,” said the scrivener, “it was made to
waste one. But,” quoth he, “he that made it was not his craft’s master,
for he should have put it either in horse-dung or in a dunghill.” “Why,
may one kill a man after this sort?” cried the other. “Yea, that may be
done well enough,” said the man skilled in magic[1568]. The story of the
wax child was rumoured through the country[1569], and it was said that
the life so uncannily attacked was that of the baby Prince. On the death
of Queen Jane rumours had been blown abroad that both the King and the
Prince were dead as well[1570].
Any discussion of the general state of Europe would be out of place
here, but a rough sketch of the situation is necessary. Henry was
virtually at war with the Pope and though he was at peace with all the
other powers he was on bad terms with his nephew James V of Scotland,
his relations with the Emperor were strained, and his friendship with
Francis far from cordial. His only real allies were the Protestant
States of Germany. In these circumstances the Pope was naturally making
every effort to obtain an ally who would fight for him against Henry.
James would not invade England without French help; and Francis could
not afford to have a second war on his hands. The Pope’s scheme was
therefore to reconcile Francis and Charles, and then publish his
censures on the understanding that they would refuse to continue their
treaties with Henry unless he returned to the pale of the Church. If
this had not the desired effect they were to forbid all trade whatsoever
between their dominions and England. This, as the court of Rome thought,
could not fail to end in a complete and bloodless victory. It was a
beautiful plan; wiser men in later ages have believed it possible to
stop the trade of nations by a word. On account of her isolation both in
place and policy, England has often been the intended victim of such
interdicts. Once, long afterwards, one was really attempted; there is no
reason to believe that the Pope would have been more successful than
Napoleon.
The first step was to reconcile Francis and Charles; one bond between
them was their common dislike of the King of England. On becoming a
widower Henry proposed to use his hand as a prize in the game of
international politics. To his intense annoyance he found it was a prize
which no one very much coveted. It was in vain he tried to strengthen
himself by proposing to the Emperor a marriage with the Dowager Duchess
of Milan and hinting to Francis that he was anxious to bestow his hand
on a French Princess. He even made overtures for Mary of Guise when she
was already betrothed to the King of Scots. In December peace was
concluded between Francis and the Emperor; Henry hoped that by a skilful
use of all opportunities to inflame their jealousy it might be a short
and disturbed one, but for once the Pope decidedly had the advantage. In
May 1538, Charles and Francis met at Nice: the Pope joined them there,
with Pole among his attendant Cardinals. The two princes agreed on a ten
years’ truce and parted the best of friends. They did not pledge
themselves to anything with regard to England, though they listened
politely to the Pope’s schemes and made no definite refusal. They were
firm in their temporary friendship and Henry in vain tried to make
Francis distrust his new ally by sending reports that Mary was to be
betrothed to Don Luis of Portugal and the Duchy of Milan settled upon
them. Moreover he had deeply offended the whole French Court by
suggesting that several of the princesses might meet him at Calais and
he would choose a bride among them.
If Henry was no nearer his re-marriage in August 1538 than he had been
nine months before, neither was the Pope nearer his dream of the
submission of England. Charles was preoccupied with the Turks and his
own Protestants in Germany, and had no time to look for infidels and
heretics in other countries. As to Francis, all his ambitions were fixed
on strengthening his position on the continent, nor did he care in the
least about the unity of the Faith, for which Charles had some regard.
Neither of them would take the risk and expense of invading England
without the other’s help; but a joint expedition was out of the
question, for Charles would only have undertaken it on behalf of Mary,
and Francis only in hopes of establishing James V on the thrones of both
kingdoms. The appearance of a legitimate male heir to Henry was equally
embarrassing to the rival schemers; and no doubt they determined to wait
for a better time. The Prince might die in infancy, as all Katharine’s
sons had done, or in youth, like the Duke of Richmond. As to the Pope’s
plan of stopping England’s trade, it would mean considerable loss and no
particular profit for both, and that matter was tacitly dropped. In
spite of the truce and the meeting at Nice, Henry was in little more
danger than before, and in much less than he appeared to be. The fate of
the Poles was hastened because Henry feared an invasion by the Emperor
at the Pope’s instigation—and feared it more than he need have done. But
in them he was punishing if not exactly the innocent, at least the
helpless. No European monarch had Exeter’s claim to the crown at heart:
quite the contrary. If Charles relied on the Pole faction to raise a
popular commotion in his favour (as Froude suggests), he was leaning on
a very feeble reed[1571].
Meanwhile in England itself the King’s policy was triumphant. The
destruction of the shrines, the surrenders of the great monasteries went
merrily forward. Our Lady’s images and the bones of St Thomas were burnt
in company with numerous “heretics,” who denied orthodox doctrines, and
Friar Forest, who denied the King’s Supremacy[1572]. More commonplace
executions for treason made a little variety. One of these was a sequel
to the Pilgrimage, and the victim was no other than Thomas Miller,
Lancaster Herald. He had been zealous for the King if ever man was: he
had gone fearlessly to and fro between the rebels and the King’s troops,
respected by all; he had turned the course of the Archbishop’s famous
sermon at Pontefract; he had been “ungoodly handled” when he carried the
King’s pardon to Durham; and all to end in his sharing the Pilgrims’
fate. In the summer of 1538 the following charges were brought against
him:—
(1) He encouraged the rebels by kneeling before Robert Aske in
Pontefract Castle.
(2) He promised the rebels that Cromwell should be delivered to them and
their demands granted.
(3) He discouraged the King’s troops by saying the rebels had ten
thousand horsemen, each with twenty angels in his pocket.
(4) He showed the King’s plans to the rebels.
(5) He defamed Cromwell and spread lying rumours against him, which
chiefly made the northern men hate him.
(6) He answered, when asked how the northern men could be brought
together seeing they had but two flags and no trumpets, drumslades,
tabors or other instruments, that “it was marvel, but such was God,” by
which he traitorously implied that God could help rebels[1573].
All these accusations, except the first and the last, were based on the
unsupported evidence of two of the other heralds, who were his personal
enemies, and could not possibly know what he had said while in the rebel
host[1574]. Lancaster had knelt to Robert Aske, but from anything rather
than disloyal motives; the remark in the last articles might have been
made without any treasonable intent; all the rest look much like pure
inventions. It was very easy in Tudor times to swear an enemy’s life
away; if he had no near kinsfolk, there was nothing to trouble the
perjurer afterwards but his own conscience.
Thomas Miller was hanged at York on 1 August, and the judge “devised
that Lancaster’s head should be set up by the body of Aske.”[1575] It
was not two years since Aske had greeted the herald so proudly in
Pontefract Castle Hall. Two others, the vicar of Newark and a monk of
Fountains, died for treason at the same time[1576].
At most of the northern assizes at this time one or two priests were
executed for preaching against the Supremacy, or kindred offences. John
Dobson, who dealt so largely in prophecies[1577], paid a heavy penalty
for his string of rhymes, and another priest suffered with him. A third
offender was a woman accused of witchcraft[1578]. Her name was Mabel
Brigg, and she was a widow and farm-servant in Holderness. She was
condemned for keeping the “Black Fast” or “St Trynian’s Fast” against
the King and the Duke of Norfolk. It was said that she had once before
fasted in the same way “for a man, and he brake his neck or it were all
fasted, and so she trusted that they should do that had made all this
business, and that was the King and this false Duke.” The witnesses did
not agree as to how the fast was kept. It seems to have lasted six
weeks, one day in each week being kept a fast day, and each week a day
later than the last. This method of fasting was also used when money had
been lost, in hopes of bringing about its recovery. It seems possible
that Mabel Brigg was really fasting for this end and not for the King’s
death, for the evidence is not very satisfactory, and the whole case is
complicated by blackmail and private malice[1579].
These stories are told for the sake of such light as they may throw on
the state of England during 1538. The outstanding events of the year,
especially the universal destruction of the abbeys, are too well known
to need any description[1580]. The Protestants, in spite of the burning
of heretics, were rapidly increasing. The Papists, still vastly more
powerful in numbers, were crushed in spirit. Everyone, from the greatest
noble to the poorest commoner, could if he tried make something out of
the fall of the monasteries; this fact influenced all classes, but
especially the gentlemen, who sold, if not their souls, at least their
honour, for a parcel of abbey lands. Only a few of the commons had
enough intelligence to see that the King was killing the goose that laid
his subjects golden eggs. Even if the worst accusations against the
monks were true, if they all lived in idle luxury, careless of their
old-time hospitality, spending on themselves the alms due to the poor;
still as long as the abbeys remained in their hands they were not wholly
lost to the people. The lands were still there; a religious revival
might return them to their original uses; wise legislation might convert
the abbeys into schools and hospitals. But when all the dedicated wealth
of the religious passed through the King’s hands into those of
extravagant favourites and grasping landlords, then, indeed, they were
lost for ever to the poor of England. Whether the Reformation was good
or bad it is useless to consider; that it was inevitable is quite clear;
but that it was most grossly mismanaged and caused endless misery and
injustice it is surely impossible to deny.
When Cardinal Pole returned to Rome from his first legation he found
that the Pope had caused his book, _De Unitate_, to be printed.
Characteristically he objected to this decided step, and had the entire
edition bought up[1581]. Concluding too much from the King’s anger on
reading it, he believed it was a good weapon to hold over Henry’s head.
It seems almost pitiful that any man should expect to frighten Henry
into better behaviour with a book. After the meeting at Nice, Pole
retired to Venice for the summer of 1538. Theobald, an English student
in Italy, and also a member of Cromwell’s secret service, sent amusing
accounts of his way of life to the English Government[1582]. He got his
news from Michael Throgmorton, who may have been unsuspicious, or may
have sent through him such reports as he thought would do good in
England. Cromwell heard of the Cardinal’s fear of assassination, and the
precautions taken against it, which Theobald rather humorously imputed
to his evil conscience[1583]. Pole lived quietly in Venice, and it was
there that he heard in September of Sir Geoffrey’s arrest.
During 1538 the conduct of the White Rose party was neither better nor
worse than before. They were still out of favour, and still grumbled
among themselves, but they were becoming more indifferent to the King’s
proceedings[1584]. They contented themselves with showing their dislike
to the religious changes by dismissing any servants who favoured the new
learning, and keeping conservative priests about them. Montague and
Exeter assumed a fictitious “strangeness” towards each other on account
of the suspicion in which they were held. By the court they were
slighted and insulted. In the summer of 1538 Henry made a progress
through the south, and stayed near Warblington where the Countess of
Salisbury lived, but he passed by and did not come to visit her,
although she was his kinswoman, and in the days of Queen Katharine’s
power he had loved and venerated her. “Well, let it pass,” said
Montague, speaking of this slight, “we shall thank them one day. This
world will turn upso-down, and I fear me we shall have no lack but of
honest men.” A little while before this Geoffrey had told Montague of
the messages he had received from Reginald a year before.
About the same time Cromwell sent his nephew Richard to Exeter to beg
him “to be frank in opening certain things.” This seems to mean that the
Marquis was offered safety and pardon if he would accuse his friends. He
refused[1585]. The King set about finding other witnesses.
The first that presented himself was Gervaise Tyndale, late a
schoolmaster at Grantham[1586], a “new-fangled fellow” of “heretic”
opinions. Three or four years before, the friars had driven away his
pupils. In the spring of 1538 he came to Warblington in bad health and
took up his quarters with Richard Eyre, a surgeon, who administered a
kind of hospital kept up by the Countess of Salisbury’s bounty. Here he
heard all the whispering and gossiping of her household and was filled
with the true Protestant horror of her Papist bigotry. She dismissed any
servants who favoured the new learning, or as Tyndale said “God’s word”;
she openly forbade her tenants to read the New Testament in English and
other books which the King had licensed; nothing passed in all the
countryside but the Lady presently knew it, for the priests learnt
everything in confession and then told her. No wonder this was resented,
though people admitted that the Countess used her power kindly; her
servants blamed the chaplains rather than their mistress. “There were a
company of priests in my lady’s house which did her much harm and kept
her from the true knowledge of God’s word.”
Tyndale was discovered to be a heretic and asked to depart. He refused
stoutly; “I would not depart neither for lord nor lady till I were
better amended.” The Countess then ordered the surgeon to send away all
his patients. Tyndale did not leave the neighbourhood until he had
picked up a good deal of information. Eyre told him “very secretly” that
“there is a knave which dwelleth by, whose name is Hugh Holland, and he
beginneth now of late to act the merchant man and the broker, for he
goeth over sea and conveys letters to Master Heliar ... and he playeth
the knave of the other hand and conveyeth letters to Master Pole the
Cardinal, and all the secrets of the realm of England is known to the
Bishop of Rome.”
As far as can be made out (for the document we quote is mutilated in
parts) Tyndale wished to open a school in the neighbourhood and was
opposed by all the priests. In a quarrel with one of them he called him
a knave and accused him of “scarcely” being the King’s friend. The
constable, standing by “in a great fume,” defended the priest saying,
“It was merry in this country before such fellows came, which findeth
such faults with our honest priests”; but he was rather frightened by
the turn the conversation had taken, and told the whole matter to Sir
Geoffrey Pole[1587]. Sir Geoffrey was troubled on finding that Hugh
Holland’s voyages were so much talked about. He took Holland and Eyre,
who was a gossip and a grumbler but not really ill-disposed to his
mistress, and rode to the Lord Privy Seal. He had an explanation with
Cromwell about his correspondence with Heliar[1588] “and made such shift
that the matter was cloaked.” Heliar’s goods had been seized on the
report that he had fled after speaking traitorous words; they were now
restored, and no doubt Sir Geoffrey thought the affair settled, probably
by a bribe to Cromwell. But the little group of heretics at Warblington
were very ill satisfied: they believed that if only they could get word
with the Lord Privy Seal they could “so discover the matter that they
should no longer blind him in it as they have done.” At length they drew
up a long and rambling statement of everything suspicious they had seen
or heard in the Countess’ household and despatched it to Cromwell. It is
undated but probably belongs to May or June 1538[1589].
The only serious accusation was that Hugh Holland had carried
treasonable letters to the Cardinal, and the first result was his
arrest. He was taken at Lord Montague’s house at Bockmore and there was
a “ruffle” with the King’s officers[1590]. As he was being carried
prisoner “with his hands bound behind him and his legs bound under his
horse’s belly,” along the London road, he met Sir Geoffrey who asked him
where he was “bound to go.” Hugh answered he could not tell, but he bade
Sir Geoffrey “keep on his way, for he should not be long after.”[1591]
This was the popular story, spread through the country by a certain
harper of Havant, and there is something rather balladlike about it,
though that is no reason for supposing it untrue.
Sir Geoffrey kept on his way to Bockmore, where he was living at the
time, and took counsel with his brother[1592]. He suggested “that the
keeping of letters might turn a man’s friends to hurt.” Montague
answered, “Nay, they shall hurt no friend of mine, for I have burnt all
my letters.”[1593] Sir Geoffrey had not been so prudent, and he at once
despatched John Collins, the chaplain, to his house at Lordington[1594].
He gave him a ring as a token to his wife, Dame Constance, and on
receiving this she took the priest to her husband’s closet, and there he
burnt all the letters he could find[1595].
This burning of letters was afterwards made much of by the Government
prosecution, which said that they must have contained treasonable
matter. The circumstances were certainly suspicious, but not a single
treasonable paper was proved to have existed, though the papers of both
brothers were remembered and described by servants and friends. Among
Geoffrey’s there was an old letter to Heliar, which may have contained
treason, but seems to have been quite harmless[1596]. There was also a
bundle of letters from John Stokesley, the Bishop of London, who was a
friend of Sir Geoffrey[1597]. He was reported to be one of the few
honest bishops[1598], and though heretics might preach at Paul’s cross
it was with none of his goodwill[1599]; he may have been the friend Sir
Geoffrey feared bringing to harm. There was a copy of a letter from Sir
Geoffrey to the Imperial Ambassador; Collins loyally declared that it
merely begged favour for Heliar, but of all described this is the most
likely to have contained treason. Finally he burnt a letter or letters
concerning Latimer; when told of this last, Sir Geoffrey said, “What,
you have burnt that also? Those letters were shown before the Council,
and my lord of Norfolk told me I might keep those letters well enough.”
Collins rode back to Bockmore and told Montague his errand was done. His
master asked him how Dame Constance did, and he replied “as a woman in
her case might, meaning that she was in heaviness for such news as was
of her husband ... and opening of Hugh Holland’s going overseas.”[1600]
Montague had been in the habit of burning all his letters shortly after
receiving them; a habit perhaps not common in the days when letters were
scarcer than they are now. Among them had been copies of three letters
from Reginald Pole to the King, Cromwell, and the Bishop of Durham
respectively. These were the letters brought by Michael Throgmorton in
1536[1601]; Starkey must have given Montague the copies; and as both he
and his mother had been required to write and reprove Reginald for
sending them there seems nothing very strange in that. Montague had
showed them to Collins with some triumph; the chaplain said his brother
“wrote somewhat roughly to the Lord Privy Seal.” “Marry, I warrant you,”
cried Montague, “he uttereth his mind plainly.”[1602] There were two
other letters from Reginald to his mother and brother; but they had been
written before the quarrel with the King and were about family affairs;
in the one to his brother, Reginald advised that his nephew Henry,
Montague’s only son, should be brought up at home to live an active
life[1603]. Montague had also burnt letters from Exeter and his wife—at
least he had received such letters several times during the last three
years, and they were not found on his arrest: none of their contents was
discovered except the most ordinary enquiries and answers about
health[1604]. They may very well have contained nothing else, for they
seem to have passed only when one or other of the friends was ill.
After Collins’s return from Lordington, Montague and Sir Geoffrey rode
together to London[1605], determined to face the matter out as well as
they might. All these things, from Hugh Holland’s arrest onward,
happened “between Whitsuntide and Midsummer,” or about “the feast of
Corpus Christi” (10 June). They spent many weeks of uncertainty before
Sir Geoffrey was committed to the Tower on 29 August[1606].
Some time before Lord Montague had told his brother to disclose nothing
if ever he were examined “for if he opened one all must needs come
out.”[1607] This was very sound advice. A study of various confessions
shows that a prisoner often began by intending to say very little, and
ended by blurting out everything he knew, and sometimes even more. At
first Sir Geoffrey tried to do his brother’s bidding, but he lacked the
strength of body and mind which can carry a man silent through two
months in the Tower. His wife was allowed to visit him and she presently
told Montague that her husband “was in a frenzy and might utter rash
things.” Montague replied, “It forceth not what a madman
speaketh.”[1608] On 26 October Sir Geoffrey made his first answers to
the interrogatories administered. They did not satisfy the examiners,
for he accused hardly anyone but himself. Montague, Exeter, and
Delaware, he said, had once disliked the King’s proceedings but of late
years their minds had changed. At the end he beseeches the King “that he
may have good keeping and cherishing, and thereby somewhat comfort
himself, and have better stay of himself,” and he will then tell all he
knows even though it touch his own mother or brother[1609].
In the first days of November his friends heard that, knowing his
steadfastness gone, he had made one last effort to save their lives and
his own honour, and had “almost slain himself.”[1610] He must have made
the attempt immediately after the first examination, for it was known in
London on 28 October, when John Hussee wrote to Lord Lisle, “Sir
Geoffrey Pole was examined in the Tower by my Lord Admiral. They say he
was so in despair that he would have murdered himself, and has hurt
himself sore. Please keep this secret as yet.”[1611] There is a
contemporary account of the matter though it really throws less light on
poor Geoffrey’s character than on the religious ideas of the court
party. It tells how for a long time the prisoner would reveal nothing
though “conscience and God” worked in his mind against “blood and
nature,” urging him to tell all. “This motion ran oft in his head, but
the devil, continual adversary to God’s honour and man’s wealth, put in
his foot, and so tossed this wretched soul, that out of many evils he
chose even the worst of all, which was a full purpose to slay himself.
The commodities of his death were many, as the devil made them to show:
his brother should live still, their family continue in honour, the Lord
Marquis should have great cause to love all his blood, which had killed
himself to save him; with many such fantasies as desperate men find to
help them to their end.... His keeper being absent, a knife at hand upon
the table, he riseth out of his bed, and taketh the knife, and with full
intent to die, gave himself a stab with the knife upon the breast. The
devil lacketh strength, when God has anything to do, and can better
begin things than bring them to effect.” The knife was blunt and the
wound not mortal. But in great fear of death and hell he began to think
it better his friends should lose their heads than he his soul. He sent
for the Lieutenant of the Tower and certain of the Privy Council and
disclosed everything then and there. Thus the devil’s subtle provision
of the knife was turned against himself[1612].
The last part of this account is more or less untrue. Sir Geoffrey did
not reveal everything in instant fear of death; he was examined seven
times in all at intervals of a day or two[1613]. But of course the
examiners made the most of the state of moral collapse likely to follow
a weak man’s attempted suicide.
Chance played into their hands. Fitzwilliam, the Lord Admiral, who had
lately been created Earl of Southampton, was at Cowdray, his seat in
Sussex, during September. On the 17th he was out hawking with Lord
Delaware when a poor man came to beg favour of him. His wife, he said,
had been committed to Chichester prison by John Gunter, J.P., for saying
that Sir Geoffrey Pole would have sent a band of men oversea to the
Cardinal if he had not been sent to the Tower. Southampton seized upon
the clue like a modern sleuth hound, and brought to light a great deal
of country gossip about the Poles, who were the great family of the
neighbourhood[1614]. Going abroad to the Emperor’s wars was a recognised
career for adventurous young men, as the following story shows. In May
1538, a serving-man of Chichester said: “Master, I can have no living
here. I will go beyond sea: for I know one John Stappill hath been there
in the Emperor’s wars, and is now come home like a jolly fellow
apparelled in scarlet, and a hundred crowns in his purse”; this friend
would get the King’s licence for him to go abroad, and also “for
half-a-score more of my Lady of Salisbury’s servants.” If they could not
get service under the Emperor they would go to Cardinal Pole, “and there
we shall be sure to be retained.”[1615] According to popular rumour Sir
Geoffrey had intended to despatch this band to his brother in March. It
was also whispered that the King and his Council would have burnt my
Lady of Salisbury when they were in Sussex if she had been a young
woman. The reports were traced to Lawrence Taylor, the harper of Havant,
who confessed he had heard of the matter from the surgeon Richard Eyre,
the tattler who was at the bottom of all the trouble. After examining
him, John Gunter had released Taylor, who went off to a wedding. When
Southampton heard this he turned on the unfortunate magistrate, accusing
him of negligence and saying he had acted “like an untrue man. He waxed
pale and with tears and sobbing besought me (Southampton) to be good to
him; he had not seen the importance of the matter at the beginning, but
would make amends by his diligent search for the said Lawrence.”[1616]
He delivered the harper to Southampton next day[1617], and was so worked
upon by his fears that he himself reported to Southampton some private
conversations he had had with Sir Geoffrey Pole. Two years afterwards
Sir Geoffrey “did sore hurt and wound” John Gunter, because “he had
dealt unkindly with him in his trouble by uttering things they had
communed of in secret.”[1618]
Primed with so much information, Southampton rode to London to conduct
Sir Geoffrey’s examination. He knew quite enough to make it appear that
he knew everything; he had only to perform the common lawyer’s trick of
making a desperate man believe it is useless to conceal what he knows,
that he may save himself by confession but can save no one else by
silence. It is easy for a man like Froude, who was a weak sentimentalist
and so unable to sympathise with weakness in others, to condemn Sir
Geoffrey as a traitor. But the prisoners of those days had to undergo
something far worse than the most savage modern cross-examination. To
begin with, a man charged with treason was in a hopeless case: no jury
would acquit him. His one chance was the King’s mercy, and that could
only be gained by accusing others.
A man who does not fear death (Sir Geoffrey had tried to destroy
himself) may fear torture. There is nothing to prove that Pole was
threatened with the rack, and it seems to have been the custom to spare
men of noble birth. Popular rumour said he was so threatened[1619], and
Richard Moryson denied it with much elaboration[1620]: both assertions
are quite untrustworthy. An openly spoken threat was not needed; a
prisoner worn out with two months of close confinement and low living
does not need any reminder; the fact that he is in the Tower, helpless
before men who wield the powers of life and death and pain is threat
enough. We can understand this only too clearly when we read this letter
to the King, added in Sir Geoffrey’s hand to his second examination,
taken on 2 November[1621]:—
“Sir, I beseech your noble Grace to pardon my wretchedness that I have
not done my bounden duty unto your Grace heretofore as I ought to have
done, but, Sir, grace coming to me to consider your nobleness always
to me, and now especially in my extreme necessity, as I perceive by my
Lord Admiral and Mr Comptroller (_the examiners_), your goodness shall
not be lost on me, but surely as I found your Grace always faithful
unto me, so I refuse all creature living to be faithful to you. Your
humble slave, Geffrey Pole.”
When this letter was written he had as yet accused no one but himself
and Hugh Holland of serious offences[1622]. But his confessions became
rapidly more and more compromising to his friends[1623]. He told the
details of many political conversations with Exeter, with Sir Edward
Neville, with Croftes the chancellor of Chichester Cathedral, but
chiefly with his own brother. Jerome Ragland, a confidential servant of
Montague “who was as it were his right hand,”[1624] made a long
confession against his master on 28 (?) October[1625]. Perhaps Sir
Geoffrey was confronted with this. The most pitiful record of all is a
statement in Sir Geoffrey’s own hand telling of Montague’s words against
the King[1626]. It seems to have been written in a frenzy of hysterical
rage against the man who had chosen to stay in England when they might
have escaped safely across the seas. Everything came out, as Montague
had foreseen; and not only through Sir Geoffrey, but, as more and more
of the little faction were brought to the Tower, many others made
equally long and unwilling confessions.
Montague and Exeter were committed on 4 November. The French Ambassador
wrote to the Constable of France, in cypher, the following account of
the King’s intentions:—
“En escrivant ceste lettre ce matin, este adverty que le Roy
d’Angleterre fit mettre hier au soir en la Tour de Londres Monsieur le
Marquis d’Exestre ..., qui est apres les enfans du Roy le plus proche
de ceste couronne, et milort de Montagu.... Il y a bien longtemps que
ce Roy m’avoit dict qu’il vooloit exterminer ceste maison de Montagu,
qui est encore de la Rose Blanche, et de la maison de Polle dont est
le Cardinal. Je ne scay encore qu’on veult faire dudit Marquis; par le
premier je vous en advertiray. Il semble qu’il cherche toutes les
occasions qu’on peult penser pour se ruyner et destruyre. Je croy que
peu de seigneurs sont asseures en ce pays; je ne croy pas qu’il n’en
advienne quelque miquemaque. Je vous advertiray en diligence de ce que
j’en entendray.”[1627]
Sir Edward Neville, George Croftes of Chichester, John Collins, and
several servants were all arrested shortly after the two lords[1628].
Gertrude, the Lady Marquis of Exeter, followed her husband to the Tower
before 21 November[1629], with her little son Edward Courtenay. It is
not certain whether Henry Pole, Montague’s heir, went at this time with
his father, or later with his grandmother. Of the evidence given in
their examinations little need be said; the most important consists of
reports of conversations which came within the new treason act, and
several of these have been mentioned already. The evidence is singularly
full and we probably have more before us than was read at the trials,
for there are two copies of many of the papers, and a great many
repetitions in successive examinations. The only paper which may
possibly be missing is the answer of the Marquis of Exeter to a set of
interrogatories[1630]; but as no statement of the Marquis is mentioned
in Cromwell’s notes and summaries or in the indictments, he may never
have answered, and if he did his evidence must have been unimportant.
There is absolutely no proof of a conspiracy: the White Rose party were
working on no sort of plan and had come to no definite agreement among
themselves. We have once or twice spoken of their dreams of Cardinal
Pole’s marriage with Mary, after an invasion in her favour by the
Emperor[1631]. But a careful study of their statements shows that we
have put these aims in a much more definite form than they ever did
themselves. Even Froude, who finds no difficulty in believing in an
organised plot just about to take effect, was puzzled by the fact that
their schemes must have included two pretenders to the throne, Mary and
Exeter[1632]. The explanation is that they never thought the matter out.
They were less a political party than a group of friends, who loved the
old Faith, hated Cromwell, and longed for a change of policy. They met
and talked treason and sang political songs in the Marquis’s garden at
Horsley, and in the woods at Bockmore. They did not trouble themselves
about anything so strenuous and intellectual as a plot. The King’s
version of the matter, that Exeter meant to seize the Crown and slay the
entire royal family, was simply ridiculous, considering that he had no
one to help him but Mary’s especial friends[1633].
Montague and the rest were guilty of treason under the new laws but not
under the old[1634]. The case against them rested on nothing but words.
They had not done anything treasonable with the exception of Sir
Geoffrey Pole and Hugh Holland who had sent warning to a traitor beyond
the seas. They had not compassed or purposed the King’s death: they had
only said they would be glad if he died. They had not levied war against
him: they had only wished someone else would. There must have been some
feeling against the new treason law, for Henry himself was troubled at
putting it into execution and did his very best to make the world
believe that the “conspirators” were guilty of more serious offences
than those for which they were indicted.
Under the Act of 1534 there was no difficulty in convicting Montague and
Sir Edward Neville; quick and careless of tongue, they had both fallen
under the law “that if any person ... do maliciously wish, will or
desire, by words or writing or by craft, imagine any bodily harm to be
done or committed to the King’s most royal person” he is guilty of high
treason[1635]. Against both of them Sir Geoffrey was the chief witness;
both made short confessions in the Tower, in which there was nothing
that could be used against their friends[1636]. “I have lived in prison
all these six years,” Montague told his examiners; he thought it better
to lie in the Tower than to go abroad in suspicion, and he had never
felt free since Reginald had offended the King[1637].
The two priests, Collins and Croftes, both confessed their secret
attachment to the Pope[1638]. Croftes had said, “The King is not Supreme
Head of the Church of England but the Bishop of Rome is Supreme Head of
the Church,” and also “There was none act or thing that ever he did more
grieved his conscience than the oath which he took to renounce the
bishop of Rome’s authority”; Lord Delaware had persuaded him to receive
it after he had determined rather to fly abroad[1639]. Collins said “the
King will hang in hell one day for the plucking down of abbeys”; and
when talking with Montague of the fall of monasteries: “I fear that
within a while they will pull down the parish churches also.”[1640] He
had instructed a friend to burn his sermons if he was sent to the
Tower[1641]; the burning of papers was in the King’s eyes quite
sufficient proof that they contained treason.
It was against Exeter that the Government had most difficulty in making
out a case. Neither Montague nor Neville would accuse him, and in none
of his conversations with Sir Geoffrey had he spoken against the King.
In 1531 he had been banished the court and perhaps put under arrest for
a short time, on account of the gossiping of his servants[1642], who had
gone about saying “My Lord Marquis would be King and they lords,” and
“our master shall wear the garland at the last.”[1643] But if this
charge was not thought serious in 1531, there was no reason why it
should be seven years later; nevertheless the King’s lawyers thought it
worth reviving.
Another charge, this time against the Lady Marquis, was equally out of
date. As her gentlewoman confessed, she had gone in disguise to speak
with the Nun of Kent, and had afterwards received her at Horsley[1644].
It was not about political hopes she had consulted the Holy Maid; all
her babies had died at birth, and she desired the Nun’s prayers for the
child she was then expecting[1645]; there was no proof that they had
conversed treasonably. If the King knew of the Lady Marquis’s
correspondence with Chapuys a really grave charge might have been
brought against her[1646]. But the Marquis was not implicated in either
of these mysterious expeditions. The straits to which Cromwell was put
to make out a rational case against him is shown by this passage in one
of the depositions:—
“About three years past when lord Montague began to recover from his
sickness he sent examinate (_his servant Jerome Ragland_) to Horsley
to show the lord Marquis of his recovery: the lord Marquis said he was
glad thereof”;
This is solemnly noted in the margin “Against the Lord Marquis.”[1647]
In the end the Crown lawyers were obliged to be contented with two
scraps of conversation—“I trust once to have a fair day upon these
knaves which rule about the King, and I trust to see a merry world one
day”; and “Knaves rule about the King; I trust to give them a buffet one
day.” Also the general declaration “I like well the proceedings of
Cardinal Pole, but I like not the proceedings of this realm,”[1648]
which is not to be found in the evidence, and was a kind of profession
of faith attributed to all the prisoners. To one who is no lawyer these
sayings do not appear to bring the Marquis under the Act of 1534. There
is no wish or thought expressed against the King’s person; at the worst
they are against the King’s ministers and policy, and these are not
mentioned in the Act; no doubt by an oversight.
Exeter was to be tried by his peers on 3 December, Montague on 2
December[1649]. On this last date Thomas West, Lord Delaware, was
committed to the Tower[1650]. It was whispered that he had dared to
refuse to take a place in the jury of peers[1651]. This rumour may have
been true, for on 1 December the Council wrote to Henry humbly
apologising for not having sent Delaware to the Tower; they had done
their best, they assured the King, but as yet they had found nothing
sufficient against him. They had commanded him to keep to his house, and
to make a full confession[1652]. It may have been merely through Henry’s
impatience that he was sent to the Tower next day; or perhaps he had
determined after Darcy’s trial to pass no more of the King’s sentences.
It would be good to think there was one nobleman in England who was
capable of so acting.
Montague was brought to trial on 2 December[1653], indicted of speaking
against the King, approving Cardinal Pole’s doings, and dreaming that
the King was dead[1654]. He pleaded not guilty and was condemned to
death.
Exeter was brought to the bar on the 3rd, and the same judgment was
pronounced against him[1655]. There is an account of a strange scene
which took place at his trial, given by a contemporary but not by an
eye-witness. Exeter, Montague and Neville
“all the time of their arraignment stood stiff, with a casting up of
eyes and hands, as though those things had been never heard of before
that then were laid to their charge. The Marquis of all the rest stuck
hardest, and made as though he had been very clear in many points, yet
in some he staggered, and was very sorry so to do, now challenging the
King’s pardon, now taking benefit of the act, and when all would not
serve he began to charge Geoffrey Pole with frenzy, with folly, and
madness. It is much to be noted what answer Geoffrey made to the
Marquis in this point. Some men, saith Geoffrey (as I hear), lay to my
charge that I should be out of my wit and in a frenzy. Truth it is, I
was out of my wit, and in a great frenzy when I fell with them in
conference to be a traitor, disobedient to God, false to my prince,
and enemy to my native country. I was also out of my wit and stricken
with a sore kind of madness when I chose rather to kill myself than to
charge them with such treasons, as I knew would cost them their lives,
if I did utter them. But Our Lord be thanked, God wrought better with
me than I thought to have done with myself. He hath saved my soul at
the last, the knife went not so far as I would have had it gone: His
goodness it is that I have not slain myself:... His work that I have
declared myself, my brother, the Marquis, with the rest to be
traitors. And where I thought, said Geoffrey, rather to have put my
soul in hazard for the saving of these men, God, I thank Him, so
wrought in me and so changed my mind, that if I had ten brethren, yea,
ten sons, I would rather bring them all to this peril of death than
leave my country, my sovereign lord, and mine own soul in such danger
as they all stood in if I had kept these treasons secret. Let us, let
us die, we be but a few, better we have according to our deserts than
our whole country be brought to ruin....
“Geoffrey hath never been taken for any pleasant or sage talker, his
wit was wont to serve his tongue but so so. I dare say, they that were
the wisest of the King’s most honourable council did much wonder that
day, to hear him tell his tale, and looked for nothing less than that
he should have so handled himself. God is a marvellous God, He can
make both when Him list and whom He will eloquent, wise, pithy; He can
make the tongues of the dumb serve His elect, when His will is. The
Marquis was stiff at the bar, and stood fast in denial of most things
laid to his charge, yet in some he failed and staggered in such sort
that all men might see his countenance to avouch that, that his tongue
could not without much faltering deny.”[1656]
Sir Geoffrey Pole with Sir Edward Neville, George Croftes, John Collins,
and Hugh Holland, were brought to trial on 4 December. All pleaded
guilty but Neville, who maintained his innocence to the last. All were
found guilty[1657].
Exeter, Montague and Sir Edward Neville were beheaded on Tower Hill on 9
December and buried within the Tower. The same day Croftes, Holland and
Collins were executed at Tyburn, and “their heads set on London
Bridge.”[1658] Sir Geoffrey Pole remained in the Tower[1659]; the state
of mind in which he had borne evidence against the others can hardly
have outlasted their deaths. On 28 December he again attempted suicide
by suffocating himself with a cushion[1660].
Meanwhile the Countess of Salisbury had not been left to mourn her
sorrows in quiet. She had been plunged into anxiety by Geoffrey’s arrest
in August. About the beginning of November the news of his first
attempted suicide found its way to Warblington. “I pray God, madame, he
do you no hurt one day,” said her frightened steward. “I trow he is not
so unhappy that he will hurt his mother,” she answered, “and yet I care
neither for him, nor for any other, for I am true to my Prince.”[1661]
It must have been at this time that she wrote to her eldest son:—
“Son Montague I send you heretely goddes blessing and myne. This is the
gretist gift that I can send you for to desire god of his helpe wich I
perceave is great need to pray for. And as to the case as I ame informed
that you stand in myne advise is to refer you to god principally and
upon that ground so to ordre you both in word and deed to serve your
prince not disobeyeng goddys commandment as far as your power and lief
woll serve you for of to doo above all ordre for ... hath brought you
upe and maynteyned you ... but his highnes who if you woll ... with your
lerning serve to the content ... of his mynd as your bounden duetie
is ... that you may so serve his highness ... daylie pray to god ...
orelles to take you to his mercy.” It appears that he did not receive it
until he was in the Tower[1662].
On 12 November, Southampton and the Bishop of Ely were sent down to
Warblington to interrogate the Countess. She had spoken truly of Sir
Geoffrey; in all his confessions there is no word that could be twisted
into an accusation against her. Nor had the other prisoners laid
anything to her charge; she strongly disliked heretics, but no one
accused her of speaking against the Royal Supremacy. Nevertheless
Southampton had no doubt that he could soon make her commit herself. He
was an experienced examiner and had just come from questioning her sons
in the Tower. He was much disappointed with his first results. The
Countess answered every question in the most straightforward way. She
had had, she said, no secret confidences with, nor any letter from, her
son Reginald and the Vicar of East Meon. She knew nothing of Holland’s
voyage. She had never heard Montague or Sir Geoffrey wish they were
abroad or propose to go; she solemnly denied that they ever uttered
treasonable words in her presence. She had never burnt letters
concerning the King, nor was there any agreement between herself and her
sons to conceal anything. This was the substance of Margaret Pole’s
confession[1663].
The examiners wrote to Cromwell—“Yesterday, 13 Nov., as we wrote we
would do, we travailed with the Lady of Salisbury all day, both before
and after noon till almost night; but for all we could do she would
confess nothing more than the first day.” On the 14th they went to her
again, as they were ordered; first they called all her men-servants
before them and arrested one called Standish. “We then entreated her
with both sorts, sometimes with douce and mild words, now roughly and
asperly, by traitoring her and her sons to the ninth degree, yet will
she nothing utter, but maketh herself clear.” They thought such a woman
had never been heard of, she was so earnest and precise and “manlike in
continuance.” Everything was so “sincere, pure, and upright on her part
that we have conceived and needs must deem and think the one of two
things in her: that either her sons have not made her privy nor
participant of the bottom and pit of their stomachs, or else she is the
most arrant traitress that ever lived.”
They seized her goods and told her that it was the King’s pleasure that
she should leave her home at once. “She seemeth thereat to be somewhat
appalled. And therefore we deem that if it may be so, she will then
utter somewhat when she is removed, which we intend shall be tomorrow.”
They spoke with the neighbouring gentlemen and bade them “to have
vigilant eye to repress any stirring that may arise.”[1664] They
examined Thomas Standish, the clerk of the kitchen, but he confessed
nothing[1665]; the Protestants who lodged the first information against
the Countess had named him as a crafty fellow from whom it would be hard
to get information[1666]. Hugh Holland had told him of his visit to the
Cardinal, and if the Countess knew of it, it would probably be through
him[1667].
On 15 November the Countess was taken from her home to Cowdray,
Southampton’s house. It was no wonder that the thought of being left in
the keeping of such a man appalled even so brave a lady. Southampton and
the Bishop of Ely wrote again to Cromwell on 16 November. They were
rather better pleased with themselves. They had got something out of
Standish, whose confession is lost, though apparently nothing against
his mistress. They despaired of making the Countess accuse herself. “We
assure your Lordship we have dealt with such a one as men have not dealt
withal to fore us; we may call her rather a strong and constant man than
a woman.”
Their hopes revived when some papers were found at Warblington: two or
three old bulls in Standish’s room, and a copy of the Countess’s letter
to Montague in a gentlewoman’s chest. “Travailing sundry times and after
sundry sorts with her,” the examiners thought she had at last admitted
something of importance[1668]. She did not deny the letter was hers; she
had caused it to be written before Montague was in the Tower but after
Sir Geoffrey was taken[1669]. She described a conversation with the
comptroller of her household who said he was afraid Sir Geoffrey would
“slip away.”[1670] The servant himself gave a different account of the
matter, and if he used these words he must have meant Sir Geoffrey was
likely to die, for he had just injured himself in the Tower[1671].
Finally the Countess was asked whether Sir Geoffrey had not told her
that the King went about to cause Reginald to be slain; she answered
that he had “and she prayed God heartily to change the King’s mind.”
Both her other sons told her that he had escaped “and for motherly pity
she could not but rejoice.”[1672] These were “the principal points” of
her confession. Southampton, “putting her in such order [and] surety
here as the King’s pleasure is she should be left in,” hastened back to
court[1673], and two weeks later took his part in the condemnation of
her eldest son[1674].
The fate of the White Rose party caused more stir in court circles than
in the country. Except for the disturbance that Southampton feared at
Warblington, there is no sign that the sympathy of the lower orders was
roused on their behalf. On the other hand the only people really pleased
were the favourers of the New Learning; Exeter and Montague had been too
long out of favour to be much disliked by the nobility. Latimer’s
congratulations to Cromwell on their fate and the Cardinal’s terrible
position have been too often quoted to need inclusion here[1675]. The
Londoners, who every year inclined more towards Protestant opinions,
were distinctly against Exeter and the Poles. A goldsmith was chatting
with two men in a boat at Paul’s Wharf on 13 November. One of these was
“a servant of the King’s within the Tower”; said he, “We have great pain
in watching of these naughty men lately brought into the Tower. Would to
God every man would know their duties to God and their Prince.” The
goldsmith asked if Sir Geoffrey Pole were dead or alive, and what was
the news “of that naughty fellow Pole, his brother beyond sea.” The
King’s servant said he was made Bishop of Rome.
“How know you that?” asked the goldsmith.
“I have heard it of great men.”
“Of whom?”
“Of some of my Lord Privy Seal’s house.”
The third man broke in, “I have heard as much as this comes to, for the
council doth know this thing well enough.”
“I pray you,” said the goldsmith, “how do you know they know it?”
“By the ambassadors and others.”
“There was one in our house (i.e. the Tower) prisoner,” said the King’s
servant, “who being delivered by the King’s favour and sent to the said
Pole beyond sea, to show unto him the King’s pleasure, doth yet there
remain, and now is one of the greatest in favour with him.” The
goldsmith asked his name, and was told “Throgmorton.”[1676]
A Protestant community sending the London news to friends abroad
referred to the executions, not without triumph:—“The principal
supporters of Popery among us have been cut off.”[1677]
Strangely enough most indignation was aroused abroad, especially in
France, where the nobility had long regarded Henry with aversion. In a
letter to Montmorency, the French ambassador urged that such an
opportunity for a successful invasion of England had never before been
offered to a Constable of France. What glory he might gain by avenging
at length all the wrongs that England had done their country in times
past[1678]! In another letter he related how Henry complained to him of
the way he was spoken of in France, and wished to know if Francis could
not prevent his subjects from using such unseemly railing against his
(Henry’s) heresy and inhumanity. For the first, they should rather
praise him; for the second, the Exeter party had been most justly
punished. The ambassador replied that in France people had so much
greater liberty of speech than in England that it was very difficult to
prevent talking; Francis allowed his people “to say many things” of
himself[1679].
Lord Delaware was set free on 21 December[1680]. Nothing had been
deposed against him as far as is known except that he disliked the New
Learning and certain new laws, such as the Act of Uses; also that he was
intimate with Exeter and Croftes and had heard the latter deny the royal
supremacy without informing against him[1681]. This was little enough,
but it might have cost him his head. He was, however, released on heavy
securities and went back to his quiet life as an undistinguished
baron[1682].
On the last day of December the last man to suffer for this visionary
conspiracy was sent to the Tower. This was Sir Nicholas Carew, the
Master of the Horse[1683], and a certain mystery surrounds his fate. For
years he had been high in the King’s favour[1684]. The only explanation
of his sudden fall is given by Chapuys, who, writing on 9 January, tells
all the court gossip about this arrest and the late executions. Cromwell
himself explained to the ambassador that Exeter had been plotting to
destroy the King and the Prince, seize the throne himself and marry his
little son to Mary. He added that “their treasons had been fully proved
since their deaths.” It was true they had burnt the incriminating
letters, but fortunately a number of copies of them had been found in a
coffer belonging to the Lady Marquis[1685]. There is no evidence beyond
this bare statement that these letters ever existed except in Cromwell’s
brain. One of them, however, was supposed to implicate Carew[1686]. “The
testimony of young Pole is not sufficient,” wrote Chapuys, “these
men ... want to form the process after the execution.”
At court it was said that Carew was especially urged to accuse Exeter,
and that he had confessed that when he told the Marquis of the Prince’s
birth he seemed sad; “which,” wrote Chapuys, “I believe was only on
account of the love he bears to the Princess, in whose service he would
willingly, as he had often sent to tell me, shed his blood.”[1687]
Exeter had never made any secret of his attachment to Queen Katharine
and her daughter[1688]. Chapuys thought that if Carew had written to the
Lady Marquis it must have been about Mary, for he too had always shown
himself her devoted servant. “It would seem they wish to leave her as
few such as possible.” Carew had looked for help rather from France than
from the Emperor, “for which he has been frequently reproached by good
Edward Neville.”
Cromwell hinted that some compromising letter from Chapuys himself might
be found in the Lady Marquis’s collection; but the ambassador felt safe,
for he had written no private letters except to Mary and Katharine, and
he was sure that these had been destroyed. But as burning letters was
now as dangerous as keeping them, he wrote the Princess half a dozen
which she could show to anyone if commanded; he lived in hopes that
Henry would discover them[1689].
Sir Nicholas Carew was brought to trial on 14 February, 1539. The charge
against him contained the following clauses:—That he knew Exeter to be a
traitor and falsely encouraged him; that he talked to him of the state
of the world; that they exchanged letters which they afterwards burnt.
Carew was on the Surrey jury which sat on Exeter’s indictment, and had
indiscreetly said, “I marvel greatly that the indictment against the
Lord Marquis was so secretly handled and for what purpose, for the like
was never seen.”[1690]
Very little of the evidence against him has been preserved. He was
Mary’s friend. He was one of the guests who frequented the Marquis’s
garden at Horsley. He seems to have tried to intercede for the Lady
Marquis when she was sent to the Tower[1691]. But the slightness of the
indictment points to the flimsiest of evidence. He pleaded not guilty
and was sentenced as usual[1692].
He was beheaded on Tower Hill, 3 March, 1539[1693], “where he made a
goodly confession, both of his folly and superstitious faith, giving God
most hearty thanks that ever he came in the prison of the Tower, where
he first savoured the life and sweetness of God’s most holy word,
meaning the Bible in English, which there he read by the means of one
Thomas Philips then Keeper.”[1694]
Chapuys remarked that when confiscating Sir Nicholas’ goods the King
would do well to remember “the most beautiful diamonds and pearls and
innumerable jewels” which he formerly gave to Lady Carew, and which once
had been Queen Katherine’s[1695]. No doubt Henry did remember, for Lady
Carew was soon begging for some provision for herself and her
daughters[1696]. As to the offices held by the late Master of the Horse,
they had been promised to others even before his arrest[1697].
Though there was little popular feeling about the death of the Exeter
conspirators, it must have alarmed all but the most secure of the
nobility. Some men must have been revolted by the severity of the new
treason laws; the story of the Lady Marquis’s letters, found after the
trial, was meant to reconcile these malcontents. Henry made another
attempt to persuade public opinion to take his view of the case. Richard
Moryson, one of those quick-witted, talented, heartless, faithless
“knaves” of Cromwell’s, was commissioned to write a book setting forth
the heinousness of treason with special reference to the White Rose
party. This was the tract called “An invective against the great and
detestable vice, treason, wherein the secret practices, and traitorous
workings of them that suffered of late are disclosed,” which was
published in London during 1539.
In defiance of the title the book contains no coherent account of
Exeter’s alleged plot. We have twice quoted from it at some length, but
it is really more remarkable for its blood-curdling theology and
spirited abuse than for serious historical worth. The letters of the
Lady Marquis are never even mentioned and no proofs of treason are
produced at all. Montague and the rest were detestable traitors; their
guilt is assumed and they are abused for it with abundance of classical
and scriptural illustrations. There is only one belated allusion to
their possible motives for being so gratuitously wicked. It was because
they were Papists; anyone who believes the Pope to be Supreme Head of
the Church “may well lack power or stomach to utter treason, but he can
not lack a traitorous heart.”[1698] Henry was pleased with the book. He
wrote to Hutton, for circulation in the Netherlands, his own account of
the conspiracy, “whereupon of late there is a pretty book printed in
this our realm which ye shall receive herewith.”[1699]
As an example of Moryson’s style we may quote a part of his invective
relating to Cardinal Pole: “To come at the last, to the archtraitor, and
to speak somewhat of him whom God hateth, nature refuseth, all men
detest, yea and all beasts too would abhore, if they could perceive how
much viler he is than is even the worst of them: what man would ever
have thought that Reynold Pole could have been by any gifts, by any
promotion, by any means in this world brought from the love which for so
many the King’s high benefits of all men he ought (_owed_) his grace the
most?” His true friends are those who wish him dead, for only by death
can he escape “the gripes, the wounds, the tossing and turmoiling, the
heaving and shoving that traitors feel in their stomachs.” Probably God
leaves him alive “only because thy life hath many more torments, much
more shame in it, than any cruel death can have.... What greater shame
can come to thee than to be the dishonour of all thy kin, a comfort to
all thine enemies, a death to all thy friends?” “O Pole, O whirl pole,
full of poison, that wouldest have drowned thy country in blood.... God
be thanked thou art now a Pole of little water, and that at a wonderful
low ebb.” Moryson in fact is quite unable to keep off the subject of the
Cardinal, and always strays back to him. In another place he says: “Pole
came somewhat too late into France, at the last commotion. If he had
come in season, he would have played an hardier part than Aske did, he
would surely have jeopardied both his eyes, where Aske ventured but one.
He would have had not only a foot in their boat but in spite of Aske and
his company would have ruled the stern.”
As an example of Moryson’s theology his remarks on the end of the
Pilgrimage are instructive. He is never tired of bidding England praise
God’s goodness in sending so wise and beneficent a Prince to reign over
her. She must also give praise for the ending of the rebellion without
bloodshed; God’s goodness was still further shown by His causing the
“rank captains” and deceivers of the people to commit further treason
and “testify upon the gallows that traitors must come to shameful
death.” And though the King in his mercy pardoned the common people,
“God hath this last summer by a strange kind of sickness well declared
unto the commons of the north that he was not contented so few were
punished where so many offended.” Also the plague had been in other
parts of the country, which, as God knew “had hearts evil enough, though
their deeds were unknown.”[1700] This is a particularly revolting form
of the ancient superstition that any great calamity is a punishment from
God, especially if it befalls an enemy. Men who sincerely love God have
striven against this relic of devil-worship ever since Euripides wrote:—
“This land of murderers to its god hath given
Its own lust; evil dwelleth not in heaven”;
but the superstition is not yet dead.
Of the surviving members of the White Rose party, Sir Geoffrey was
pardoned early in the New Year[1701]. The Lady Marquis of Exeter
remained in the Tower, with the two boys, her son Edward Courtenay, who
was twelve years old, and Henry Pole “a child, the remaining hope of our
race,” as the Cardinal called him with a touch of human feeling[1702].
Courtenay must have been a spirited boy even in his childhood. Some
months before, his schoolmaster had fled the Marquis’ household because
certain of the young gentlemen had threatened him for administering
correction to the young lord[1703]. The Countess of Salisbury was still
at Cowdray[1704].
Parliament met in April 1539 and sat until 28 June. During May it passed
an Act of Attainder including all who had suffered after the Pilgrimage,
Exeter and his friends, Cardinal Pole and other Englishmen who had fled
abroad; Gertrude Courtenay, Marchioness of Exeter, and Margaret Pole,
Countess of Salisbury[1705]. It has commonly been said that the two boys
were also attainted; but it can have been only by implication as an
examination of the Parliament Roll shows that they were not named[1706].
An account of the passing of the Act was sent by a correspondent in
London to Lord Lisle:—
“Pleaseth your lordship, so it is that there was a coat armour found
in the Duchess of Salisbury’s coffer, and by the one side of the coat
there was the King’s Grace his arms of England, that is the lions
without the flower de lys, and about the whole arms was made pansies
for Pole, and marygolds for my lady Mary. This was about the coat
armour. And betwixt the marygold and the pansy was made a tree to rise
in the midst, and on the tree a coat of purple hanging on a bough, in
token of the coat of Christ, and on the other side of the coat all the
Passion of Christ. Pole intended to have married my lady Mary and
betwixt them both should again arise the old doctrine of Christ. This
was the intent that the coat was made, as it is openly known in the
Parliament house, as Master Sir George Speke showed me. And thus my
lady Marquis, my lady Salisbury, Sir Adrian Fortescue, Sir Thomas
Dingley, with divers other are attainted to die by act of Parliament.
Other news here is none.... At London the xviiith day of May”
(1539)[1707].
Froude gives the following account:
“A remarkable scene took place in the house of Lords on the last
reading of the act. As soon as it was passed Cromwell rose in his
place, and displayed in profound silence, a tunic of white silk which
had been discovered by Lord Southampton concealed amidst the Countess’
linen.... It was shown, and it was doubtless understood, as conclusive
evidence of the disposition of the daughter of the Duke of Clarence
and the mother of Reginald Pole.”[1708]
Of course such a piece of evidence cannot be conclusive. The work might
have been done years before, when a match between Mary and Reginald Pole
was proposed by Queen Katherine. The symbol of the Five Wounds was far
too common to fix the date as the time of the Pilgrimage. The Countess
may have been innocent; but we may prefer to believe she was guilty. It
is pleasant to think of her setting her maids to work when the first
news came from the north, and of all the prayers for the faith and the
hopes for her banished son that must have gone to the embroidering. The
bill was passed on 12 May and shortly after she was removed from Cowdray
to the Tower. This change must have been very welcome, for Southampton
and his lady had treated her with all discourtesy, and in the Tower she
would be near her grandson[1709].
She spent two years in the Tower. Her experience there and that of the
Lady Marquis may be gathered from a petition presented on their behalf
to a Privy Councillor by the kind-hearted warder, Thomas Philips, who
had given Sir Nicholas Carew the English Testament[1710]. “By reason
that I am daily conversant with them that are pensive,” he wrote, “(_I_)
can no less do but utter the same to your honourable lordship.” The Lady
Marquis begs favour and “saith she wanteth raiment, and hath no change
but only that that your lordship commanded to be provided.” Her
gentlewoman, Mistress Constance Bontane, “hath no manner of change and
that that she hath is sore worn. Another gentlewoman she hath, that is
Master Comptroller’s maid, and hath been with her one whole year and
more, and very sorry is she that she hath not to recompense them, at the
least their wages.” Finally, “the Lady Salisbury maketh great moan for
that she wanteth necessary apparel both for to change and also to keep
her warm.”[1711]
This petition must have been presented before April 1540, when the Lady
Marquis was released[1712]; it was expected at the time that the old
Countess would be pardoned shortly. But she remained alone, except for
her waiting woman and the two boys, who were not kept very close and
would probably be allowed to see her.
On 1 March, 1541, the Council sent an order to the Queen’s tailor for
certain apparel and necessaries for the Countess[1713]. All thanks be to
Thomas Philips who has left one kindly story to adorn the Tower; he had
been himself a prisoner there some years before[1714]. In April the
clothes were delivered:—“a night-gown furred, a kirtle of worsted and
petticoat furred, another gown of the fashion of night-gown of saye,
lined with satin of Cyprus and faced with satin, a bonnet with a
frontlet, four pairs of hose, four pairs of shoes and a pair of
slippers.” But the Countess did not long enjoy this ample
provision[1715].
In May 1541 Henry was about to set out on his gorgeous progress through
the north[1716]. Before he left London the Tower was cleared of
traitors[1717]. The Countess was the first to suffer, at seven o’clock
on the morning of May 27. Chapuys briefly records the event:—
“About the same time took place the lamentable execution of the
Countess of Salisbury at the Tower, in the presence of the Lord Mayor
and about one hundred and fifty persons. When informed of her
sentence, she found it very strange, not knowing her crime; but she
walked to the space in front of the Tower, where there was no
scaffold, but only a small block. There she commended her soul to God,
and desired those present to pray for the King, Queen, Prince and
Princess.”[1718]
The Lady Marquis of Exeter had been pardoned a year before[1719], and
her son, who was still a prisoner, lived to be set free by Queen
Mary[1720]. The Countess suffered under the Act of Attainder without any
trial; the two boys were not even included in the Act[1721]; and were
simply held by a sovereign power that no one dared to question. Henry
Pole had been allowed to go about inside the Tower before his
grandmother’s death; after it he was more strictly guarded. “It is to be
supposed that he will follow his father and grandmother,” wrote
Chapuys[1722]. Edward Courtenay had a tutor, but Henry Pole was “poorly
and strictly kept, and not allowed to know anything.”[1723] He is last
mentioned in 1542[1724]. Nothing more is known of him. The Tower must
have been an unhealthy place for any child, and this one was an orphan
without friends. He had, indeed, two uncles living. The Cardinal was
helpless, for if he had attempted interference through the Emperor it
would certainly have had an unhappy effect. Perhaps Sir Geoffrey did all
he dared and lost touch with the boy on his closer confinement. He was,
besides, hardly responsible for his actions.
Southampton, of all people least inclined to mercy, advised that Pole’s
assault on John Gunter should be overlooked “considering the ill and
frantic furious nature of the unhappy man.”[1725] An account of his
subsequent life is given in the Spanish Chronicle. Although the greater
part of this work is entirely untrustworthy, particular passages may be
accepted when the writer describes facts which he had himself witnessed,
and his account of Sir Geoffrey Pole is fairly reliable because there is
reason to believe that the Chronicle was written at Liége while Geoffrey
was living there[1726]. The Chronicler gives the following story of how
Sir Geoffrey crossed the seas at last[1727]. After he was pardoned “he
went about for two years like one terror-stricken, and, as he lived four
miles from Chichester, he saw one day in Chichester a Flemish ship into
which he resolved to get and with her he passed over to Flanders,
leaving his wife and children. Thence he found his way to Rome, and
throwing himself at the feet of his brother the Cardinal, he said, “My
lord, I do not deserve to call myself your brother for I have been the
cause of our brother’s death.” The Cardinal, seeing he had sinned
through ignorance, pardoned him, and brought him to the feet of the
Pope, and procured forgiveness and absolution for his sin. Then the
Cardinal sent him back to Flanders, with letters to the Bishop of Liége,
who has him with him to this day, treating him with all honour, and
allowing him a ducat a day, and food for himself, two attendants and a
horse.”[1728]
It was quite right of the Cardinal to forgive Sir Geoffrey; but should
all the forgiveness have been on one side? Geoffrey, yielding to
circumstances, had endured all that Reginald had escaped by taking his
own path. Reginald had been in safety while Geoffrey had seen
imprisonment and despair. Did the man whose uprightness had brought ruin
on all he loved never for a moment accuse himself? When the Cardinal
first heard the news of his mother’s death, he spoke of it in these
words: “Until now I had thought God had given me the grace of being the
son of one of the best and most honoured ladies in England, and I
gloried in it, returning thanks to His Divine Majesty; but now He has
vouchsafed to honour me still more by making me the son of a martyr....
Let us rejoice for we have another advocate in Heaven.”[1729] Perhaps it
is because this speech has an appearance of having been thought out
beforehand that it sounds cold and even heartless. The Cardinal seems
more human in a letter written to one of Montague’s daughters, who,
after Mary’s accession, sent him good news of herself and her children,
the first he had received from his kinsfolk for many years:—“Albeit as I
say all this did comfort me greatly, yet I ensure you I could not read
your whole letter through, though it were not long, at all one time, for
the sorrowful remembrance it brought me of the loss of those which I
left in good state at my departing, to whom you were most dearest. But
when I consider even what servants of God they were and so died, this
ever doth comfort me with that certain hope of their good estate in all
felicity to the which all we trust to come when it shall be God’s
pleasure to call us.”[1730]
NOTES TO CHAPTER XXIII
Note A. The internal dissensions of the College of Heralds are
described at length in Lancaster Herald’s statement, L. and P. XIII
(1), 1313. The details are intimate and rather sordid.
Note B. L. and P. XIII (2), preface; Haile’s Life of Cardinal Pole,
chap. XII. The Romanist writers do not generally add that the same
letter contains a kindly appeal for a well-famed priory, the head of
which “is old and feedeth many.... Alas! my good lord, shall we not
see two or three in each shire changed to such remedy?”[1731]
Note C. This is founded on a half-intelligible note, L. and P. XIII
(2), 830, at the bottom of page 342. For such evidence as remains see
L. and P. XIV (1), 189 and 190.
Note D. Henry Pole and Edward Courtenay were, however, excepted by
name from a general pardon confirmed by Parliament 16 July 1540[1732].
The latter appears to have been liberated for a time in 1547[1733].
Note E. Sir Geoffrey Pole probably fled from England after his assault
on Gunter in 1540. He was amnestied and returned to England in
1551[1734]. He died in 1558[1735].