The Other Tudors (29 page)

In 1530, Henry began suffering the first signs of the ill health that was to dog him for the rest of his life. He suffered from bad headaches and pains and ulcers in his legs. These were believed to be the result of earlier jousting and hunting injuries. This suggested to him that he had to get his divorce and remarry as soon as possible. To make matters worse, on 21 March Pope Clement issued a bull forbidding any criticism of Henry’s marriage to Catherine, thereby giving it the full backing of the Catholic Church and forcing Henry to look for another way out of his marital predicament.

Finally a petition was drawn up and signed by most of the nobles and a few senior churchmen, begging the Pope to issue a divorce for the good of England and offering veiled threats about alternative options. It was circulated for signature by nobles who were away from London by William Brereton, Groom of the Privy Chamber, and Thomas Wroithesley, a protégée of Stephen Gardiner. Edward Fox, Bishop of Durham, led a team collecting scriptural and historical precedents for the King to make decisions separately from Rome (the
Collectanea satis copiosa
). They came up with two possibilities. One was that in the early days of Christianity, each province of the Church had had its own powers, under the loose authority of the Pope. This meant the Church in England could settle its own problems. The second was that the king was (as Tyndale had suggested) the sole representative of God in his own country. Thus it was the Popish Church that was corrupting the intention of the founding fathers, not Henry seeking to overthrow the authority of the Mother Church.

The formal ending of the marriage of Henry and Catherine finally came in June 1531. The court moved from Greenwich to Hampton Court, then to Windsor. From there Henry moved away, leaving Catherine without any explanation. When she wrote to him, Henry claimed that the whole mess was her fault for being so unreasonable. He ordered her to leave Windsor before he returned; she could go to The More (Wolsey’s old house), a nunnery, or any small manor – anywhere away from him. She was to cut down on her household and would not see their daughter Mary again.

Catherine moved to The More, then to Easthampstead, then back to The More again. The threat to reduce her staff was lifted for a time (in November 1531 she had a staff of 200), partly because of the intervention of Chapuys who gave the impression that Charles V would go to war for Catherine if she were treated too badly. In fact, Charles thought she was a nuisance to his political plans.
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On New Year’s Day 1532 Henry gave Anne a set of room and bed hangings made of crimson satin, cloth of silver and cloth of gold. At the same time, he forbade anyone to give Catherine presents; he gave her nothing, and returned a gold cup she sent him before it could be formally presented in the name of the Queen.
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On 11 May 1532, Henry raised the question of whether the clergy were loyal to him, or to Rome. On 15 May the clergy responded by passing the Act of Submission of the Clergy, giving their support to the King. Cromwell, meanwhile, also encouraged Parliament to attack the abuses of the Church, which culminated in the Commons’ Supplication against the Ordinaries, in January 1532. This petition complained about the Church’s expense, delays and corruption, the abuses of Church law, and the fact that it was not under the control of the King and Parliament. This was closely followed by squeezing a bill through to stop annates or first fruits (taxes raised) of bishoprics being sent to Rome without the King’s express permission. This hurt the Papacy, which enjoyed vast revenues from England. In the end, the churchmen agreed to the Submission of the Clergy, on 15 May 1532, that the Church should make no new laws and all the existing ones should be ratified or rejected by Henry.

On 23 August 1532, William Warham, 82-year-old Archbishop of Canterbury, died. With the prospect of putting an agreeable replacement in office, Anne finally surrendered to Henry and they moved on to a physical relationship. She had held out for six years. On 1 September she was created Anne Rochford, Marquess of Pembroke, owning her title in her own right. To support her title, Anne was given Crown lands with a value of £1,000 a year. Her title and possessions were to pass to her ‘heirs male of her body’, but the usual accompanying phrase ‘lawfully begotten’ was left out.
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This supports the fact that Anne was having sexual relations with Henry that might end in pregnancy before they could be married.

On 11 October 1532, Henry visited the English-controlled Calais to meet with Francis I, and took Anne with him. Originally it had been hoped that some royal or high-ranking noble French lady could have come as hostess to welcome Anne and give her credibility as the queen-presumptive. In the event, the Queen Eleanor (Catherine of Aragon’s niece) refused; the King’s sister, Marguerite, backed out due to ‘illness’, and the only lady who would agree to come was the King’s own mistress. Francis I didn’t want to cause trouble in public. He had recently arranged the marriage of his second son, Henri, to Catherine de Medici, a wealthy heiress and the niece of the Pope; so he hardly wanted to offend the Papacy by formally recognising Anne’s relationship with the English King.

Anne was attended by some 20 ladies-in-waiting and robed like a queen; she was also decked out in Catherine’s jewels, which Henry had ordered his wife to surrender (the first request was met with the reminder that at New Year Henry had forbidden Catherine to give him anything, and anyway it would be wrong to give her jewels into the possession of a woman she described as ‘the scandal of Christendom’). At the great banquet that night Anne made her appearance, leading a noble dance troupe, comprising her ladies: Mary Carey, her sister; Dorothy, Countess of Derby, her aunt; Elizabeth, Lady Fitzwalter, her aunt; Lady Jane Rochford, her sisterin-law; Honor, Lady Lisle (the wife of Henry’s bastard uncle, Arthur Plantagenet, Lord Lisle, the illegitimate son of King Edward IV), and Lady Wallop, wife of the Ambassador to France. They wore cloth of gold gowns with gold lace over-dresses, crimson satin sashes ornamented with cloth of silver, and were masked. They led out various French nobles to dance, and Anne partnered Francis I.
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On 29 October Henry escorted Francis back to French soil. Bad weather intervened, and Henry and Anne had to stay at Calais until 12 November, lodging at the Exchequer, with adjoining bedrooms (linked by a door). It is believed that either in Calais, or on their return, Henry and Anne were definitely sleeping together. By the end of December, Anne believed she was pregnant, and some time around 25 January 1533 Henry and Anne were married at York Place. Anne had remarkably kept Henry interested in her for eight years now, only giving in when their marriage was imminent.

In February 1533, Thomas Cranmer was elected Archbishop of Canterbury and on 23 May, he wrote to Henry confirming that the divorce had been granted. On 9 April, the Dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk visited Catherine at Ampthill to tell her that her marriage had been annulled, that she was to be referred to as Dowager Princess, the late Prince Arthur’s widow, and that her daughter was illegitimate, that Henry was free to remarry and her income was to be cut by three-quarters. Catherine responded by saying that all she needed was her confessor, her physician and two maids; if there was no money, she could always go out into the streets begging. Norfolk finally broke the news to her that Henry and Anne were married.

Time was now of the essence. On 12 April, the day before Easter Sunday 1533, Anne went to church as Queen of England, dressed in cloth of gold, dripping with jewels, attended by 60 maids of honour and with her cousin Mary Howard, the future Duchess of Richmond, holding her train. On 8 May 1533, Cranmer summoned a formal court at Dunstable, near Ampthill, and when Catherine failed to answer its summons, he publicly declared her marriage annulled on the grounds that she had had sex with Arthur and no man, including the Pope, had any right to override church law on this point. This was followed by a communiqué on 25 May when Cranmer publicly stated that Henry and Anne were married legally. Henry’s latest marriage was therefore the only lawful one he had entered into. The child would be legitimate. On the same day, Cranmer hurried to Lambeth Palace where he carried out a marriage service, finally officially uniting Henry and Anne. She had achieved her aim, and, six months pregnant, she formally became queen.

On 1 June Anne Boleyn rode into London. A grand pageant had been organised, but even with the incentive of free wine there were a lot of adverse comments. Cromwell’s spies reported that someone had called Anne a ‘goggle eyed whore’, that another had called ‘God save Queen Catherine, our own righteous lady’, while one man said he was not stupid enough ‘to take that whore Nan Bullen to be queen.’
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Anne was escorted to Westminster Abbey where she was crowned queen. The High Steward responsible for the coronation was Henry’s old friend Charles Brandon. Henry seems to have gone to great lengths to make the event as magnificent as possible, with all the nobility in attendance, as well as representatives of the government and the London guilds. When she came by barge from Greenwich to the Tower she was met with a salute of a thousand guns, as well as those fired from ships as she passed.

Later there was a banquet at the Great Hall at Westminster, where Anne sat in state, served by the greatest nobles of the Court. One prominent member of the court was absent, however. Charles Brandon organised the celebrations, then hurried to his house at Westhorpe Hall, where his duchess lay dying. She had always been a partisan of Catherine of Aragon, and the terminal illness under which she was suffering was enough to excuse her from attending Anne Boleyn in her moment of glory. Despite her support for Catherine, Mary was reconciled with her brother before her death, which both he and Charles Brandon deeply mourned.

The secret marriage of Henry and Anne was attended by a small number of witnesses. Rumours reported that these included Henry Norris and Thomas Heneage of the privy chamber, Anne Savage (later Lady Berkeley) as Anne’s attendant, and a groom (possibly William Brereton, who had a family connection with Anne Savage). The date may be significant, as Anne had probably just confirmed she was pregnant. On the occasion of Anne’s coronation, 18 Knights of the Bath were created. These included Francis Weston (the King’s page), Henry Parker (George Boleyn’s brother-in-law), Thomas Arundel (married to Anne’s cousin), the Earl of Derby (married to Anne’s aunt) and Lord Berkeley (husband of Anne’s attendant at her secret marriage).
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The Act of Succession was passed to confirm that Henry’s marriage to Catherine was annulled; his marriage to Anne was the only lawful one and the throne would go to their children, lawfully born. It was now a treasonable offence to question or deny the marriage. Not only that, everyone had to take an oath to abide by this Act. Catherine and her daughter Mary were now in real danger, but Catherine was prepared for martyrdom. She wrote to Charles V, ‘I could not endure so much, did I not think these things suffered for God’s sake … As long as I live I shall not fail to defend our rights.’

The Pope finally acted. In March 1534 the Papal Consistory found that Henry and Catherine’s marriage was ‘lawful and good’. It was too late for England and for the Queen, however. Catherine was now officially the Dowager Princess and her servants were being forced to take the Oath of the Act of Succession. When Dr Edward Lee, Archbishop of York, and Cuthbert Tunstall, Bishop of Durham, read the Act to her and warned her she must obey, she replied, ‘If one of you has a commission to execute this penalty upon me, I am ready. I ask only that I be allowed to die in the sight of the people.’
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In the face of such calm defiance, all Parliament could do was to order her removal to Kimbolton Castle in Huntingdon, even more bleak and remote than Buckden. Here, those of her servants who had already been arrested were replaced. Sir Edmund Bedingfield became her steward and Sir Edward Chamberlayne, her chamberlain. She was to receive no visitors without the King’s written permission. Since Catheine would not receive anyone who refused to call her queen and her new servants were instructed to call her Dowager Princess, she remained in her private rooms with just a few of her old servants, all of whom had refused to take the Oath of Succession, risking imprisonment and death.

Henry certainly recognised Catherine’s strength and her forbearance. He told the Council in 1535, ‘The lady Katherine is a proud, stubborn woman of very high courage. If she took it into her head to take her daughter’s part, she could quite easily take the field, muster a great array, and wage against me a war as fierce as any her mother Isabella ever waged in Spain.’
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Chapuys was finally allowed to see Catherine on 2 January 1536, when she was dying. She begged Chapuys to ask Henry to pay her debts, settle her servants’ outstanding wages, and make some few small bequests out of the little she had left. She wished to be buried in a convent, and to have masses said for her soul. After three days Chapuys had to leave; Catherine seemed a little better, but still weak. On the last night, a visitor arrived without permission, and refused to go away; Maria de Salinas, widowed Countess Willoughby d’Eresby, was with her mistress once again. The next day, Chapuys went back to London leaving Maria attending her mistress. By the evening, Catherine’s condition had deteriorated. At 10 a.m. the next morning she received extreme unction, and died at 2 p.m. on 7 January 1536. She was buried at Peterborough Abbey on 29 January, with the dignities of a Dowager Princess.

When Henry heard of Catherine’s death, he organised a ball at Greenwich, dressed in yellow with a white feather in his cap, and carried his daughter Elizabeth shoulder high, telling those present, ‘God be praised, the old harridan is dead, now there is no fear of war.’
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On the day Catherine was buried Anne Boleyn had a miscarriage of a boy. She was in dire trouble. Had Henry divorced Anne while Catherine lived, he would have been under enormous pressure to take Catherine back. Now, if he were free of Anne, Henry would be able to marry again. She had to get pregnant again as quickly as possible and pray that this time she gave birth to a living, lusty boy. Even if Henry did not divorce her, Anne was realising that he no longer loved her so wholeheartedly. There was a very real danger that he would look for love with another Lady.