Elizabeth (13 page)

At Ashridge, Elizabeth had her usual reaction in time of crisis: she took to her bed with a serious illness. False rumours flew to London – that Elizabeth had fortified Ashridge to withstand a siege, or that she was on her way to the more easily defended Donnington Castle. In fact, she stayed put, suffering from blinding headaches and swelling in her face, arms and legs, which might have been nephritis or, perhaps, inflammation of the kidneys.

Mary sent a message saying that she should come to London for her own safety, although probably with the intention of arresting her for treason. The message came back that Elizabeth was far too ill to move. She requested the Court’s doctors to attend her, but the Council refused. When it was suggested she see local doctors, she replied, ‘I am not minded to make any stranger privy to the state of my body.’
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Mary arranged for Dr George Owen and Dr Thomas Wendy to come and examine Elizabeth and oversee her travel, accompanied by Lord William Howard (Elizabeth’s great-uncle), Sir Edward Hastings and Sir Thomas Cornwallis. Lord William
wrote to the Queen that he found Elizabeth very willing, but that she had feared that she was so weak as to be unable to travel without fear for her life. She ‘therefore desired some longer respite until she had better recovered her strength; but in conclusion, upon the persuasion … she is resolved to remove hence tomorrow towards your Highness …’
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It was agreed that Elizabeth could move, but only very slowly and carefully. On 12 February, they set out, although when Elizabeth was brought to the litter ‘she was very faint and feeble and in such case that she was ready to swound three or four times.’ They had 30 miles to travel, which Lord William estimated would take 5 days: in fact, it took 10.
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At the outskirts of London, Elizabeth had the curtains of the litter drawn back so that she could be seen lying there, thin and pale. She was dressed in white, the colour of innocence and purity. This gesture was, in part, in response to new rumours that she was pregnant, this time by Courtenay. Renard had reported as much to Charles V: ‘Wyatt [who had been arrested] cannot be executed until he has been confronted with the Lady Elizabeth, who is so unwell that she only travels two or three leagues a day, and has such a stricken conscience that she refuses meat or drink. It is taken for certain that she is with child.’ A week later Renard reported that a French plot had been uncovered regarding Courtenay and Elizabeth, ‘who, they say, has lived loosely like her mother, and is now with child.’
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For a princess suspected of treason, with powerful enemies, London was horrific. There were gallows on the streets with the hanged bodies of traitors. Courtenay had been arrested and was incarcerated in the Tower, as was Henry Grey, 1st Duke of Suffolk, who had tried to raise a rebellion in the Midlands with the aim of restoring his daughter, Lady Jane Grey, to the throne. His lunatic
scheme led to both of their deaths on the block. On 12 February 1554, Lady Jane Grey and her husband, Guildford Dudley, were executed in the Tower. On 21 February, two days before Elizabeth arrived in London, the French Ambassador de Noailles described the gibbeted bodies and severed heads on display, adding ‘… the Princess Elizabeth, for whom no better fate is foreseen, is lying ill, about seven or eight miles from hence, so swollen and disfigured that her death is expected …’
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Elizabeth was taken to Whitehall Palace, where she was confined to her rooms, and her servants were sent away and replaced with supporters of the Queen. The evidence against her in plotting to overthrow Mary was circumstantial; a letter from her to Mary had been found in the possession of the French Ambassador’s messenger, suggesting she had been in written contact with him. The rebel Wyatt had also sent letters to her at Ashridge, and another rebellion leader, Sir James Crofts, had actually visited the house.

On 15 March, Bishop Gardiner came to Whitehall with about 20 of the Councillors and confronted Elizabeth, accusing her of being party to the uprisings of Sir Peter Carew and Sir Thomas Wyatt. Elizabeth was due to be sent to the Tower the following day, but managed to delay matters by writing a letter to the Queen. Her guardians, William Paulet, 1st Marquess of Winchester, and Thomas Radclyffe, 3rd Earl of Sussex, were divided over whether the letter should be sent, with the latter winning out. Elizabeth pleaded for her sister to hear her out:

This desperate attempt to prick the Queen’s conscience gained Elizabeth 24 hours, but infuriated Mary, who lashed out at the nobles who delivered the letter, saying they would never have dared thwart her father in such a manner.

Thus, on 17 March, Elizabeth, accompanied by her guardians, went by river to be imprisoned in the Tower. She was attended by three of her ladies-in-waiting, three of the Queen’s, a gentleman usher and two grooms. Sir John Gage, the Lord Chamberlain and
acting Constable of the Tower, was with them. Radclyffe, mindful that Elizabeth might survive and become heir to the throne, reminded them that they should remember who they were dealing with. If Elizabeth was found guilty of treason, it would be the perfect opportunity to rid themselves of her permanently. Renard and the Spanish delegation put pressure on Mary, warning that Philip would be unwilling to come to England as her husband as long as traitors like Elizabeth posed a threat, and that even if Elizabeth’s part in Wyatt’s rebellion could not be proved, she was still a possible focus for future uprisings. Renard wrote in his dispatches ‘… that it was of the utmost importance that the trials and executions of the criminals, especially those of Courtenay and Elizabeth, should be concluded before the arrival of the prince … as long as Elizabeth was alive, there was no hope that the kingdom could be tranquil.’
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Bishop Gardiner, desperate to protect a precariously Catholic England, was convinced of Elizabeth’s guilt and sought to find solid proof against her, beyond the circumstantial evidence that he had. The incriminating letter held by the French Ambassador was a copy, so it might not have come from Elizabeth since it could have been copied by anyone, including any number of spies at Court hired by the French. Equally, although Wyatt had sent letters to Ashridge, there was no evidence that they had ever reached Elizabeth or that she had responded to them. Crofts might have visited Ashridge, but even he admitted that he had spoken only to one of Elizabeth’s servants and had no idea if she had ever got his message or if she supported him. As for the alleged link between Elizabeth and Courtenay, Lord William Paget had to admit that he had once, on instructions from the Council, asked Courtenay if he might consider marrying Elizabeth, and Courtenay had very firmly refused.

Even the accusation that Elizabeth wanted to flee to the well-fortified Donnington Castle proved to be suspect; whatever the rebellion leaders might have wanted, Elizabeth had not gone anywhere. The interrogations carried on, but there was no additional evidence, and what little there was became more shaky by the day. When the rebellion leader Sir James Crofts was brought to the Tower to confront Elizabeth with his evidence, he knelt to her, and according to the report confessed that: ‘He was heartily sorry to be brought in that day to be a witness against her Grace, but he took God to record that he never knew anything of her, worthy the least suspicion.’
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On 11 April 1554, Wyatt was executed; eyewitnesses reported that on the scaffold he exonerated Elizabeth from any part in the plots.

While her enemies lobbied for her execution, Elizabeth’s life in the Tower improved slightly. She was permitted to walk through the adjacent rooms, and eventually she was allowed to go out into a small, walled garden. The five-year-old son of the Keeper of the Wardrobe and two little girls visited her until they were forbidden to do so: it was thought they might be passing her messages from Courtenay, who was also in the Tower at the time.

Outside, there was chaos among the Councillors. Renard wrote to Charles V that ‘… quarrels, jealousy and ill-will have increased among the Councillors, becoming so public that several of them, out of spite, no longer attend the meetings. What one does, another undoes; what one advises, another opposes; one strives to save Courtenay, another Elizabeth; and such is the confusion that one can only expect the upshot to be arms and tumult.’
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The political vacillation was due to the fact that everyone recognized that Elizabeth was still heir to the throne until Mary married and produced a child.

Despite Mary’s reverence for Charles V, her burgeoning love for Philip and her respect for Renard, she would not agree to
Elizabeth being tried for treason when there was so little evidence against her. While Mary would have preferred to find Elizabeth guilty, she could only do so, in all conscience, in the face of serious and convincing proof. Without this, Mary stood firm.

Realizing that Elizabeth might escape execution, Renard devised a back-up plan and proposed that she should be married, preferably to a Spanish dependent, and should live abroad. The primary candidate was Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy and Prince of Piedmont, which were grand-sounding titles for a ruler without a kingdom. He was, however, Philip’s cousin. His mother, Beatriz, was the sister of Philip’s mother, Isabel, both daughters of Manuel I (King of Portugal 1495–1521) and Maria of Aragon, Catherine of Aragon’s sister. Elizabeth, however, refused to entertain the marriage, knowing that she would have the support of the Council, who would oppose any attempt to have her married abroad to an insignificant Spanish nobleman.

After two months of uncertainty and fear in the Tower, Elizabeth was appointed a new jailer, Sir Henry Bedingfield. On 19 May 1554, they left the Tower for the palace of Woodstock, where Elizabeth was to be held under house arrest. Bedingfield had hoped for a quiet, anonymous journey, but he was rudely disabused of this almost immediately. Passing through Windsor, the boys of Eton College turned out in force to cheer the princess, while local women made cakes and ‘wafers’ (biscuits) for her and tossed them into her litter. At Aston, they rang the church bells, and a frustrated and angry Bedingfield ordered that the bell-ringers be arrested. At Ricote ‘Her Grace was marvellously entertained’ at the house of Sir John Williams, Baron Williams of Thame, who had accompanied Bedingfield from the Tower. Somewhat annoyed at the turn of events, Bedingfield told Williams that Mary I might not care for his actions. Williams replied that ‘he was well advised
of his doing and that her grace [Elizabeth] might and should in his house be merry.’34

All along the route to Woodstock, people came to cheer Elizabeth. Mary I had become increasingly unpopular with the people because of her violent repression of non-Catholics. During her rule, hundreds of Protestants were burned at the stake, earning her the name ‘Bloody Mary’. For Elizabeth, the obvious and public signs of the people’s affection were a clear indication of her popularity over Mary and would surely help her endure the months to come.

Arriving at their destination, they found the palace had virtually fallen into ruin; Elizabeth and her servants were obliged to make their home in four rooms in the gatehouse. While Bedingfield proved an exasperating, pedantic guardian, checking even the smallest request with the Council before granting or refusing it, he meant her no harm and was not cruel to her. She might not be allowed to send or receive letters without permission, but she was able to read any book she could get her hands on and to take walks in the gardens and orchard when the weather permitted.

Elizabeth was always aware of spies around her, reporting every word and deed to the Council and to the Imperial Ambassador. As if to reinforce her claim of innocence, she is reported to have written a short verse in charcoal on the wall of one of her chambers (others say on a window shutter). Although it faded with time, copies were made in the 1590s and early 1600s. The verse starts by blaming Fortune for causing the writer to be at Woodstock, a helpless prisoner:

The verse ends with a version of the saying that God will send ‘evil to he who evil thinks’. The message is clear – although surrounded by evildoers, the innocent will have the final vengeance.