The King's Cardinal: The Rise and Fall of Thomas Wolsey (Pimlico) (52 page)

Alas, there is very little evidence for all this; nothing to compare, for instance, with the speech made to the 1472 parliament, perhaps by the chancellor, Robert Stillington, in which one of the chief justifications for a campaign against the French was that since the Norman conquest internal peace had never long prevailed ‘in any King’s day, but in such as have made war outward’.
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The appearance in 1513 of a new and slightly expanded translation of Titus Livius’s biography of Henry v may be a straw in the wind. It does not appear to have been commissioned by the king (though this has been alleged),
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but its message – that the virtuous king with justice, and therefore God, on his side would be successful in battle and thereby win great honour and lasting fame – was calculated to rally the nobility of England behind a king who shared both the name and some of the qualities of the great victor of Agincourt. And Lord Berners’s translation of Froissart’s
Chronicles
, the first volume of which appeared in 1523 when England was again at war with France, was made ‘at the high commandment of my most redoubted sovereign, Lord King Henry the Eighth’.
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Berners’s purpose was to spur on ‘the noble gentlemen of England’ by enabling them ‘to see, behold, and read the high enterprises, famous acts, and glorious deeds done and achieved by their valiant ancestors’. And if two translations hardly make a very convincing case, Henry’s and Wolsey’s determination to conduct a forward foreign policy was bound to enhance the role of the nobility.

As I have argued elsewhere in this book, a forward foreign policy did not necessarily mean war; peace could bring just as much honour as long as it was achieved in the right way. The signing of the Treaty of London in October 1518 had been a great coup for Wolsey, and had brought great honour to his master. Not surprisingly it had been accompanied with the greatest ceremonial possible: the marriage settlement by which the Princess Mary was betrothed to the dauphin was signed by no less than three dukes, a marquess and three earls.
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Two years later even more noblemen graced the Field of Cloth of Gold than had taken part in the expedition of 1513, and with retinues almost as large.
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And whatever its diplomatic significance, the event itself was a glorious celebration of chivalry. When, by 1522,
the alliance with France had broken down, the Emperor Charles paid a visit to England to inaugurate the Great Enterprise against England’s former ally. On arriving at Canterbury he was greeted by no less than eighteen noblemen, nine of whom were to put their signature to the ensuing Treaty of Windsor.
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By 1527 England’s ally was once again France, in a year that saw much diplomatic ceremonial, the highlight had been an exchange between the two monarchs of the premier chivalric orders – that of St Michael and the garter.
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All in all, the evidence is overwhelming that Henry and Wolsey set out to create an impression, not only at home but throughout Europe. Whether it was as warrior or peacemaker did not matter very much. Both involved a deliberate use of ceremonial and courtly entertainments for propaganda purposes. In all these the nobility’s presence was vital, even if it meant that they had to take part in the dancing and ‘disguising’ along with the more traditional jousting and tourneying. And it should be said that by and large Henry and Wolsey were indeed impressive. Many foreign observers reported favourably. One such, Francesco Chieregato, writing to Isabella d’Este in July 1517, described in great detail the entertainment offered to the Archduke Charles’s ambassadors. At their first meeting with Henry were present

the Queens [Catherine or Aragon and Mary dowager queen of France and subsequently duchess of Suffolk] the dukes, the marquess, and all other barons all arranged in cloth of gold with chains around their necks; everything glistened with gold. They were banqueted daily until Tuesday week, first by the cardinal, then by the lord mayor of London, and by various noblemen in succession
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One day there was a solemn mass, on another ‘a most stately joust … at which all the princes and barons of the kingdom were present’, followed by a supper which appears to have lasted for seven hours. In conclusion Chieregato declared that ‘the wealth and civilization of the world are here; and those who call the English barbarians appear to me to render themselves such’.
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There is just the suspicion that the whole thing had gone to his head, perhaps literally as well as metaphorically; but then, of course, it was meant to.

Whether or not there was an element of calculation in all this, it is certainly true that Henry
VIII
seems to have been at ease in the company of his nobility – and why not? Something has already been said about the young Henry; his outstanding gifts, his great charm and imposing physical presence.
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Although it was his elder brother who had been christened Arthur, it was Henry who really deserved the name, for he it was who determined to make his court into a second Camelot where knightly pursuits and, in keeping with the new fashions, Renaissance pastimes such as masquing and music-making, flourished. Or to put it more prosaically, Henry
VIII
, unlike his father, had been brought up at court, and, since the death of his elder brother in 1502, had expected to succeed to the throne without having to fight for it. The precise nature of Henry
VII
’s rule has been much debated. The notion of the ‘New Monarchy’ has rather gone out of fashion, and with it the belief that
Henry
VII
set out deliberately to remove the stranglehold which the nobility had supposedly secured during the travails of the fifteenth century. Nevertheless, the fact that, having spent most of his formative years in precarious exile in Brittany, he had not had the typical upbringing and training for someone of his high social status; that he had had to to obtain the throne on a battlefield in which many of the nobility were on the other side, including such as the Howards; that for most of his reign he had faced the possibility of foreign intervention on behalf of rivals, however spurious, to his throne – none of this can have helped to foster good relations with the ruling classes. One must not exaggerate. There were lots of noblemen at Henry
VII
’s court, many of whom played an active part in his government; but he was reluctant to create new peers (only nine new creations in almost twenty-four years), he was not generous with rewards, and his determination to extract every financial advantage from the royal prerogative was not to their advantage. Above all, there was his extensive use of bonds and recognizances, so that by the end of his reign about four-fifths of the nobility were under some kind of financial obligation to the Crown, in many cases for no very good reason.

Undoubtedly, the son’s style, reflecting both the different circumstances of his accession and his different personality, was not like the father’s. His earliest companions had been taken from such noble families as the Bourchiers, Howards, Nevilles and Staffords, and, as has been stressed already, he loved to participate in the pursuits that such families enjoyed.
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Amongst his closest personal friends during the 1520s were Henry Courtenay, created marquess of Exeter in 1525, and Thomas Grey marquess of Dorset, and they, as gentlemen of the privy chamber, were in constant attendance on him.
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And Henry was quite happy to create new noblemen. Someone whom he raised from a mere esquire in 1509 to a dukedom in 1514 was another close friend, Charles Brandon. Thomas Howard earl of Surrey was a hardly a close friend, if only because he was nearly fifty years older than the king, but he too in 1514 became a duke, though restored to a title that his father had previously held. Along with the three dukes Henry created during Wolsey’s time – the third being his illegitimate son, who became duke of Richmond in 1525 – he also created five new earls, one marquess, four viscounts and four barons. His father only managed three earls, two of whom were restorations, and the other was a foreigner who appears to have died, with his title, in less than a year. As for the elevation of those not previously connected with the nobility, the number seems on close inspection to dwindle to two or three, of whom the best example is Giles Daubeney, created Lord Daubeney in 1486, leaving only two ‘new creations’ for the remaining twenty-two years of his reign.
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One way and another, there is good reason to believe that during the 1510s and 1520s the nobility would have been well satisfied with their king, and with his leading councillor. And even if they did not especially like Wolsey – though there is precious little evidence that they did not – so far no reason has been discovered to suppose that they found his presence in any way inimical to their interests, or that it prevented them from playing that leading role both at court and in the localities to
which their high rank entitled them. However, for such a conclusion to carry conviction there are two aspects of Henry
VIII
’s government that need further consideration: his relationship with his Council and courtiers, and the way in which royal patronage was bestowed. Both matters were of some concern to the nobility. It was all very well to adorn the court, to take part in the king’s pastimes, even to perform a key military role, but if real power was denied the nobility and if, for instance, Wolsey had managed to gain complete control both over the advice that reached the king and the favours that he bestowed, then indeed they may have had a genuine grievance against ‘the butcher’s cur’.

But before these important matters are looked at, it is necessary to make the point that however anxious Wolsey may have been to get on with the nobility, and more generally with the ruling classes – and the distinction between the nobility and leading gentry was fairly artificial – both as lord chancellor and a leading royal councillor, he was bound to have to do things that would not be popular with them. Most obviously, the duke of Buckingham would not have welcomed having his head chopped off, and may well have blamed Wolsey for this unfortunate occurrence! And it was after Sir William Bulmer had been hauled up before the Council in Star Chamber in 1519 that the duke was alleged to have contemplated Henry’s assassination. As we saw in chapter 4, a number of noblemen, among them the earl of Northumberland and Lord Bergavenny, were brought before Star Chamber. Others, such as the earl of Derby, had to appear there at the instigation of those who felt maltreated by them.
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None of them would have been especially delighted at having to put in an appearance, particularly when the verdicts went against them. ‘Indifferent justice’ did mean what the words suggest, that both high and low would be treated impartially. The high-born of any period have a tendency to believe that decisions should go in their favour; and the fact that, contrary to normal practice, noblemen were made to answer on oath in Star Chamber, may also not have endeared its presiding royal councillor to them.
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And outside Star Chamber Wolsey may have ruffled the
amour propre
of a section of society unaccustomed to being thwarted in other ways. It has been suggested that they would have strongly resented the prosecutions for illegal enclosure that some, including the dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk, found themselves caught up in.
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It is a suggestion that should be treated with some caution. Most of the ruling classes were not directly involved in enclosure, and insofar as they were royal councillors they almost certainly supported any moves to do something about a practice that was considered by many to be harmful to the common weal.
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Still, at the very least, to have to appear or to be represented in court would have caused inconvenience and expense. What also may have depleted the nobility’s resources was Wolsey’s decision to transfer from local commissioners to a committee of leading royal councillors, headed by himself, the responsibility for assessing them for tax purposes.
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What none of this shows, though, is any undifferentiated animosity or personal spite by Wolsey against the ruling class. If they offended against the law or did
things detrimental to the common weal, then it was his job to bring them to book, just as it was his task to criticize them if, as sometimes happened, they failed to carry out the king’s instructions. And that they appreciated this is indicated, for instance, by the fact that, despite his appearance in Star Chamber in 1516 the 5th earl of Northumberland was prepared to entrust his eldest son to Wolsey’s care. Historians have been too quick to assume an arrogance or lack of tact, when all Wolsey was doing was trying to ensure that the king’s policy was being carried out in the best possible way. Thus, in August 1524 he was prepared to tell the duke of Norfolk off, but only because his failure to carry out instructions was endangering the king’s policy towards Scotland.
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Moreover, it is quite wrong to see Wolsey as somehow pitted against the rest. When in May 1525 the request for an Amicable Grant led to serious unrest, Henry was warned to keep an eye on the Lords Bergavenny and Henry Stafford, respectively the duke of Buckingham’s son-in-law and son, on the grounds, presumably, that they might be tempted to avenge the duke’s fall; but the warning came not from Wolsey but from none other than the dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk.
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Similarly, the suggestion that a ‘good watch’ should be kept, probably in 1518, on at least six leading noblemen, including the dukes of Buckingham and Suffolk, came from the king himself.
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It was always true that the greatest threat to any king was likely to come from the ranks of the nobility, and as Henry’s leading councillor it was one of Wolsey’s tasks to protect him; but it was a task that he shared with his fellow councillors, not excluding those of noble rank.