An Accidental Tragedy (56 page)

Philips had provided Gifford with a secret code for Mary’s exclusive use – in fact, most of the letters she received were, unknown to her, in Philips’s handwriting. Walsingham made sure that Elizabeth was kept informed, so in April she told the French ambassador, ‘I know everything that is done in my kingdom . . . I know what artifices prisoners use.’

Mary met Gifford on 16 January 1586 and, in a state of delight, read her first letters for over a year. Apart from the official correspondence between embassies and their queen, Morgan wrote long and gossipy letters of the doings of the royal families of Europe, opening a window on the world she had once inhabited and from which she was now cut off. Gifford also explained to Mary and her secretaries the system by which she now could have secure communication with the outside world. Mary would dictate her letters to Nau or to Gilbert Curle, her master of horse and sometime secretary, who would present them to her as a ‘minute’ or fair copy. After her approval the secretaries would encrypt them in the code provided by Philips. The letters were then wrapped in a leather satchel and placed in an empty beer
barrel which was taken to Burton for refilling. In Burton the satchel was given to Gifford, who either passed the contents to Philips at Chartley or rode with them to London, where they were decoded and given to Walsingham before being resealed and passed to the French embassy for onwards transmission to Morgan in Paris. The process would be repeated in reverse for letters written to Mary. The carter was always referred to as ‘the honest man’, but, since his wife dealt with the satchel in his absence without any knowledge of her husband’s rewards, he was only slightly honest. Gifford said of him, ‘There never was so fortunate a knave.’ The system was very simple and Mary now believed that all the correspondence she received by this route was genuine and totally secure. Gifford felt that Mary trusted him to the extent of asking her to provide him with a pension for his efforts.

Mary was completely deceived by the ruse and wrote immediately to Morgan, ‘I thank you heartily for this bringer [Gifford] whom I perceive very willing to acquit himself honestly.’ Philips would have been delighted to read this letter. Mary described him: ‘This Phellipes is of low stature, slender every way, dark yellow haired on the head and clear yellow bearded, eated in the face with pocks, of short sight, thirty years of age by appearance, and, it is said, Secretary Walsingham’s man.’ He had not only successfully set up the communication system with the brewers and the carter – both of whom were being paid by Paulet as well as Mary – but also operated as an intelligence gatherer for his master, Walsingham. Walsingham, in turn, had only to wait for Mary to implicate herself in a plot which could be reasonably thought of as treasonous under the catch-all Act of Association. There is no evidence that Walsingham encouraged such a plot directly – he had no need to do so – but if any such plot appeared he would know of it almost before Mary herself. The trap was set, the alarm bells were ready to sound; all Walsingham had to do was to wait for the bait to arrive.

In February 1586 Mary was given a new bed. Paulet thought it ‘uncharitable to refuse’ and late in the month she received
M. Arnault from the French embassy in London. Their conversation was supervised by the ever-vigilant Paulet, but Paulet panicked when Arnault offered a girdle with silver lace for Mary and books of tables, presumably almanacs of some sort, as a present for Nau. Mary gave Arnault 500 crowns and Paulet was so terrified by the last letters he had received from Philips that he feared ‘to handle the girdle, the books of tables or any such thing’ and promptly sent the presents to Walsingham.

His vigilance was necessary, since on 16 March Mary suggested to Châteauneuf that secret letters could be sent in the cork soles of shoes. The ambassador wisely rejected the idea since he probably knew that all correspondence was being read and the long letters from Morgan and the Bishop of Ross were all in Philips’s hand. Mary did use an unbroken code for communication with the exiled Spanish ambassador Mendoza, but he reported that neither Catherine nor Henri III wanted the ‘speedy reduction of England and chastisement of the Queen’. Philip of Spain agreed, in principle, with Mary’s restoration, as did the Pope, but neither man offered anything tangible.

We have seen that in the past there were enough romantic young men willing to risk their lives to release Mary and see her on the throne of England. By 1586 the focus had changed. Now the plots only involved Mary insofar as she would stabilise the situation politically and reward the plotters after the assassination of Elizabeth. Elizabeth’s death would be a master-stroke against heresy, sanctioned, it was erroneously believed, by the Bull of excommunication and endorsed by Catholic interests on mainland Europe. Mendoza burned with bitter hatred for the disgrace of his exile and promised military support from Spain, although without the authority of Philip II. Mendoza told Philip on 12 May, ‘I am advised from England by four men of position who have the entry into the Queen’s house, that they have discussed for at least three months the intention of killing her.’ Mary had assured Mendoza that if James continued to embrace Protestantism, she would will all her rights in the English crown to Spain. Around Mendoza circled John Ballard, sometimes known as Fortescue, a
priest with the fanatical belief that his God-given mission was to achieve the assassination of Elizabeth. Burghley said of him that he was ‘a man vainglorious and desirous of his own praise and to be meddling in things above his own reach’. All of these plotters were in constant touch with Morgan and Paget, and all of their correspondence with Mary was read by Walsingham. Father J.H. Pollen, the Jesuit historian, said of these schemes: ‘A lunatic was at the helm. Shipwreck was certain.’

Ballard made his way secretly to England and contacted Sir Anthony Babington. Babington was a rich 25-year-old Catholic from Derbyshire who had spent some time with Shrewsbury as his ward, and at that time he undoubtedly formed a romantic passion for the imprisoned queen. He had visited France and met Morgan but was now the centre of a circle of Catholic friends in London. They were attracted not only by his religious fidelity but also by the generous use of his wealth. One of Babington’s fellow conspirators was John Savage, a zealot of limited intelligence who told Babington that he was ready at any time to kill Elizabeth. When Babington suggested that he go to court and carry out his intention that very day, Savage replied that he could not attend court ‘for lack of apparel’! Babington and his plotters lacked the ruthless efficiency needed for success; their fanaticism clouded their judgment to the extent that they even posed for a group portrait to be painted.

Mary did hear that Babington was holding some letters for her, and on 25 June she wrote to him asking for any correspondence he might have to be sent on to her via Gifford. Walsingham was watching both Ballard and Babington closely and was keen to read his reply. Babington fell straight into the trap and replied at once giving details of a rescue of Mary, a plot to assassinate Elizabeth by six men and a plan for a foreign invasion followed by a Catholic hegemony. He told her that he was determined to go abroad but he assured Mary of foreign support: ‘Ballard, a man of virtue and learning . . . informed me of great preparation by Christian princes for the deliverance of the country from the extreme and miserable state wherein it hath long remained.’ He
assured Mary of the deliverance of herself and the despatch of the ‘usurping competitor’: ‘there be six noble gentlemen, all my private friends, who for the zeal they bear to the Catholic cause and your Majesty’s service will undertake the tragical execution.’ He ‘with ten gentlemen and 100 followers [would] undertake her deliverance’. He would wait in Lichfield for Mary’s reaction to his plan.

Before Mary could reply, Gifford told Walsingham that he had been contacted by Ballard who complained about inactivity by Morgan and Paget. Walsingham made notes as to how to deal with ‘practitioners and conspirators’ since he now had ample evidence to undertake the arrest and conviction of Babington, Ballard, Savage and his group. By her inaction – not immediately informing Paulet of Babington’s intentions – Mary could already be seen to be guilty of treason under the terms of the Act of Association, but Walsingham waited to see if she would actually put an endorsement in writing. Philips merely said, ‘We await her very heart with the next.’

Finally, Mary replied to Babington on 17 July, and of all her doubtful actions writing this letter was without question the least wise. Her previous decisions to return to Scotland and subsequently to flee into England both led to disasters, her involvement with the Craigmillar Bond was rash in the extreme, as was her marriage to Bothwell, but now she had put her head firmly on the block. It was a very long letter, dictated first to Nau as a minute in French, translated by Curle and then encrypted.

It began,

Write to me as often as you can of all occurrences which you may judge important to the good of my affairs, whereto I shall not fail to correspond with all the care that is in my power . . . In the meantime the Catholics here, exposed to all sorts of persecution and cruelty, daily diminish in number force means and power . . . in respect of the public good of this state, I shall always be ready to employ my life and all I have or may ever look for in this world therein.

Mary then addressed the points of logistics raised by Babington:

[W]hat forces on foot and horse may be raised amongst you all? What towns, ports and havens may you assure yourselves to receive succour from the Low Countries, Spain and France? What place you esteem fittest to assemble the principal company of your forces? What foreign forces you intend to use and for how long would they be paid? What munitions and forts are fittest for their landing in this realm? What provision will be made for armour and money?

So far in her reply Mary had condoned open revolt by endorsing Babington’s plans to put herself at the head of an invading army. But then the most contentious passage in the letter appeared. When all the foregoing was in place, then, ‘Set the six gentlemen to work, taking order upon the accomplishment of their designs [that] I may be suddenly transported out of this place.’ Or, in another version which would be revealed later, ‘Let the six gentlemen who have undertaken to assassinate Elizabeth proceed to their work and when she is dead come and set me free.’ Mary wanted to know ‘The manner of my getting from this hold.’ Mendoza was to be kept informed, and Mary’s code for letters to him was still unbroken. She besought Babington to make sure everything was in place before he made his move. She asked for military support – ‘Set me in the midst of a good army’ – and voiced her fear that if Elizabeth caught her she would ‘enclose me forever in some hole from which I should never escape, if she used me no worse’. Mary promised to try to make the Catholics of Scotland rise and to put her son in their hands. ‘I would also see some stirring in Ireland were laboured for.’

Then she settled to details: ‘That at a certain day appointed in my walking abroad on horseback on the moors between this and Stafford, where ordinarily you know very few people pass, fifty or three score men well horsed and armed come and take me there, as they easily may, my keeper having with him ordinarily but
eighteen or twenty horsemen with daggers only.’ A second method suggested was to set fire to the barns and stables and in the confusion to rescue her. As a third option, Babington could use carts to get men into Chartley before the garrison was summoned. Wisely she wrote, ‘Fail not to burn this present quickly.’ The letter ends with a postscript asking for the names of the ‘six noble gentlemen’, although this is now generally regarded as a forgery inserted by Walsingham to improve his chances of arresting them. The letter is written in Philips’s hand and endorsed ‘This is a copy of the letters the Queen of Scotland.’ Before sending the decrypted version to Walsingham, Philips drew a gallows on the outside of the letter. He was sure that this letter was the document that would send Mary to the scaffold. On 29 July – twelve days after Mary had sent it – the letter was delivered to Babington and decrypted by him and his ally, Chidiock Tichborne.

Was Mary now directly endorsing a plot to assassinate her cousin? If the second alternative version is to be believed, then there is no doubt. But what exists is Philips’s copy – and he had the letter for some days before sending it on to Walsingham. The original minute and any notes were presumably destroyed at Chartley. If the original phrase – ‘set the six gentlemen to work’ – was the intended one then there is a little room to wriggle. Did Mary not question the ‘designs’ the six gentlemen were to accomplish? Babington’s letter to her had made that clear – he talked openly of ‘execution’. Was Mary now presuming that they would seize Elizabeth and convey her to some secure prison, so that Mary and she would reverse their roles? This could be maintained since Mary insisted that her rescue must be achieved, even though Elizabeth was still alive and able to commit her to ‘some hole’. What is very possible is that Mary simply entered into a state of denial as to what the task of the ‘six gentlemen’ would be, just as she never questioned why French Paris was so ‘begrimed’ before Darnley’s murder. That she should try to escape is perfectly understandable. Mary was a sovereign queen imprisoned on very doubtful grounds, but now, consciously or
not, she was endorsing a royal assassination followed by a total revolution, both political and religious.

Philips would understand that the original version was quite sufficient for a verdict of treason, but he knew the difficulties that arose when it was not only the Privy Council, but also Elizabeth who had to be convinced, and so he probably added some extra salt to the mixture. Even without it, the inference is fatally clear.

On the same busy day Mary wrote five other long letters to Mendoza, Morgan, Châteauneuf, the Archbishop of Glasgow, and Sir Francis Englefield, thanking them for their promised help and informing them that she embraced Babington’s intentions. She noticed that Philips had arrived at Chartley but suspected nothing. She was now ready for rescue and installation on the English throne. On 19 July, however, Philips had written to Walsingham about Babington: ‘I look for your honour’s speedy resolution touching his apprehension.’ He hoped that Elizabeth would hang Nau and Curle and was sorry to hear that Ballard had not been taken. On 2 August, Babington and others were proclaimed traitors, although before his arrest Babington wrote to Mary not to be dismayed: ‘What they have vowed to do they will perform or die.’ Walsingham hoped that Babington would reply to Mary in detail but decided ‘it is better to lack the answer than to lack the man’ and gave the orders for mass arrests. Gifford fled to France on 21 July, writing to Walsingham on 3 September asking him to pay a bill for £40, and was ordained priest the next year. He was subsequently arrested in a brothel for disorderly conduct and he later died in prison in November 1590.