The Temptation of Elizabeth Tudor (45 page)

26. The draft articles against Thomas (Article 19c) first stated that Seymour ‘procured the L. Protector to labour for the queen’, before amending it to ‘speak to the queen’ (BL Harley MS 249).

27. Edward VI to Catherine Parr, 7 February 1547 (Parr, pp. 128–9).

28. Somerset kept Catherine politically at arm’s length, for example see Catherine Parr to Thomas Seymour,
c
. April 1547 (Parr, p. 135).

29. TNA E15/340 f. 23v.

30. Edward VI to Catherine Parr, 30 May 1547 (Parr, pp. 144–5).

31. Catherine Parr to Thomas Seymour, late May 1547 (ibid., p. 139).

32. Catherine Parr to Thomas Seymour, late May 1547 (ibid., p. 140). There is no record of a visit to court in Catherine’s accounts for May, but she did travel to St James’s Palace in June (TNA E15/340 f. 24v, f. 25). The letter most likely dates to early that month.

33. Edward VI to Catherine Parr, 30 May 1547 (Parr, p. 144) notes that the pair had still not met and, giving up hope, Edward had decided to write to his stepmother.

34. E15/340 f. 24v, f. 25.

35. See
CSP Spanish
, Vol. IX, p. 101 for her loneliness, and p. 220 for her depression.

36. Ibid., p. 89.

37. Princess Mary to Thomas Seymour, 4 June 1547 (Parr, p. 146).

38. 
History of Parliament
, for John Fowler.

39. Deposition of John Fowler (SP 10/6/24).

40. Articles Against Thomas Seymour (Cobbett
et al.
).

41. Deposition of John Fowler (SP 10/6/24).

42. Edward VI to Catherine Parr, 25 June 1547 (Parr, pp. 147–8).

43. 
CSP Spanish
, Vol. IX, p. 123.

44. Articles Against Thomas Seymour (Cobbett
et al.
), and Edward VI (
Diary
), p. 21.

45. 
CSP Spanish
, Vol. IX, p. 101.

46. SP 68/14 f. 71.

47. The similarity of the two men’s signatures is particularly noticeable in SP 68/1 f. 159, for example: in this document, from December 1547, the signatures are of comparable size and larger than those of the other councillors.

48. 
CSP Spanish
, Vol. IX, p. 123.

49. Leti (in Bernard, p. 213).

50. Elizabeth to Mary, 1547. Leti, translated in M. A. E. Wood (ed.),
Letters of Royal and Illustrious Ladies
, Vol. 3 (London, 1846), p. 93, sets out that this was what Mary said to Elizabeth in her earlier letter, which does not survive.

51. Surrey History Centre, LM 1865.

52. 
CSP Spanish
, Vol. IX, p. 429. James (p. 272) considers that there was truth in the rumours of the duchess’s influence over Somerset.

53. HMC,
Salisbury
, Vol. I, p. 256.

54. Princess Mary to My Lady of Somerset, 24 April 1547 (Tytler, p. 52).

55. Princess Mary’s and Queen Katherine’s Joint Letter to Anne Seymour, Countess of Hertford, 3 June 1544 (Parr, p. 78).

56. Later Apprehension and Examination of Anne Askew (
Writings of Edward VI…
, pp. 27–8).

57. SP 10/1 f. 120. In this letter of 20 April 1547, Thomas asked to be commended to ‘My Lady’s Grace my sister’ when he wrote to his brother.

58. 
CSP Spanish
, Vol. IX, p. 123.

59. Vives, p. 228.

60. Inventory of Catherine Parr’s Personal Effects (Parr, 635).

61. SP 10/6/72.

62. James, p. 271.

63. Inventory of Catherine Parr’s Personal Effects (Parr, p. 628).

64. Deposition of John Fowler (SP 10/6/24).

65. Hume.

66. ‘A Journal’, p. 55.

67. A note in
Vincent’s Baronage
in the College of Arms states that Catherine was ‘
repudiata quia pater ejus post nuplias, eam cognovit
’, which suggests that her lover was also her father-in-law. The seventeenth-century writer Peter Heylin (Locke, p. 31) also alludes to this rumour.

68. Somerset’s mother, Margery, stood as godmother to the second of the two elder sons (PROB 11/33/458).

69. BL Egerton MS 2815, which contains the accounts of Somerset’s cofferer of the household between April 1548 and October 1551, includes annuities of £20 each to Lord Edward Seymour and John Seymour Gentleman. John Seymour’s will (PROB 1/29) also includes his brother, Edward, as his sole executor, indicating that there was no estrangement between the brothers. The fact that John Seymour, unlike his younger full brother Edward, does not appear to have been styled ‘Lord’ after his father became a duke is telling as to Somerset’s thoughts on his paternity. John Seymour was, however, employed in Somerset’s household and his name appears regularly in the accounts of Somerset’s cofferer. John is particularly likely to be the illegitimate son, since the reference to Catherine Filiol’s affair with her father-in-law states that they had sexual relations immediately after the wedding – so his paternity may well have been unclear. This is also suggested by the private Act of Parliament that Somerset obtained in April 1540, in which his lands were entailed first on his male heirs by his second wife, then his male heirs by any subsequent wife, then on Edward Seymour (his son by Catherine Filiol), then on his brothers Henry and Thomas in turn, and finally on his daughters, ‘with remainder to the right heirs of the said Edward Seymour’. John Seymour’s exclusion from this exhaustive list almost conclusively demonstrates that his father thought him illegitimate (
L&P
, Vol. XV, Acts of Parliament, c78).

PART 2: THE SCANDAL DEEPENS

1.  Confession of Katherine Ashley (S. Haynes, p. 99).

2.  M. Hayward, p. 169.

Chapter 5: The Young Damsels

1.  Strangford, p. 30.

2.  Ibid.

3.  
L&P
, Vol. X, 1187 (list 1).

4.  Strangford, p. 31.

5.  In Strangford, the laundress is Elizabeth Ballard (p. 11).

6.  
L&P
, Vol. X, 1187 (list 2).

7.  Richardson (2007), p. 4.

8.  Blanche’s tomb depicts Elizabeth as something of a religious icon, for example (Richardson, 2009, p. 13).

9.  Garrett , p. 73.

10. Ascham to Princess Elizabeth, 1545 (Ascham,
Letters
, p. 77).

11. Ascham to John Cheke,
c
. 13 September 1544 (Ascham,
Whole Works,
Vol. I, Part 1, letter XXIII).

12. Strype (1821) suggests that the pair were related.

13. Ascham to John Cheke,
c
. 13 September 1544 (Ascham,
Whole Works
, Vol. I, Part 1, letter XXIII).

14. Payment to Johannes Spithovius, in Strangford (p. 39).

15. Strangford notes that she received a book from her tutor, Johannes Spithovius.

16. Adams and Gehring.

17. Ascham to Princess Elizabeth, 1545 (
Letters
, p. 77).

18. Ascham to John Astley, 1545 (ibid., pp. 77–9).

19. Ascham to Princess Elizabeth, 1545 (ibid., p. 77).

20. Ascham to John Astley, 1545 (ibid., pp. 77–9).

21. Richardson (2007), p. 45.

22. Strangford, p. 40.

23. TNA PROB 11/21/327.

24. Richardson (2007), p. 55.

25. New Year’s gifts to Elizabeth, 1562.

26. Sir Robert Tyrwhitt to Somerset, 31 January 1549 (SP 10/6/16).

27. Parr, p. 29.

28. Perry, p. 17.

29. Elizabeth, ‘A Godly Medytacyon… ’.

30. Deposition of John Fowler (SP 10/6/24).

31. 
See
letters from Edward VI written from there, including 24 August 1547 (Edward VI,
Literary Remains
).

32. 
CSP Spanish
, Vol. IX, p. 141.

33. Depositions of Sir William Sharington, January 1549 (SP 10/6/35).

34. 
CSP Foreign
, p. 64.

35. Knighton and Loades, p. 6.

36. Instructions to Lord Clinton, 1 August 1547 (ibid., p. 22).

37. Depositions of Sir William Sharington, January 1549 (SP 10/6/35).

38. Edward VI’s Confession (Edward VI,
Literary Remains
, p. 59).

39. Surrey History Centre, LM 1865.

40. 
CSP Spanish
, Vol. IX, p. 50.

41. Edward VI’s Confession (Edward VI,
Literary Remains
, p. 59).

42. Ibid.

43. ‘A Journal’, p. 54.

44. Vertot, Vol. I, pp. 129–31.

45. TNA E15/340 f. 28v.

46. Ibid., f. 29.

47. Nicholas Udall’s Letter to Catherine Parr, prefacing the first volume of English translations of Erasmus’s
Paraphrases upon the New Testament
, 31 January 1548 (Parr, p. 160).

48. TNA E15/340 f. 24.

49. Ibid., f. 26v, f. 28.

50. Answers of Katherine Ashley, 2 February 1549 (Elizabeth,
Complete Works
, p. 25).

51. Ibid.

52. John, Earl of Warwick to Somerset, 30 September 1547 (SP 50/1/128).

53. Instructions to Lord Clinton, 1 August 1547 (Knighton and Loades, p. 22).

54. Strangford, p. 10.

55. Sir Robert Tyrwhitt to Somerset, 31 January 1549 (SP 10/6/16).

Chapter 6: Go Away, For Shame

1.  
L&P
, Vol. XXI, Part I, 321 and Vol. XIX, Part II, 400.

2.  Lambert, pp. 462–3.

3.  ‘North View of Arundel House’, 1646 (BM 1880, 1113.2930). Seymour Place and Arundel House are the same building.

4.  ‘The Ground Plot of Arundel House and Gardens’, 1792 (BM Q, 6.86).

5.  After the death of Adrian Stokes, Frances’s second husband, he was found to possess a portrait of Catherine Parr. This almost certainly came from his wife and implies a fond relationship with Catherine.

6.  Frances Brandon to Thomas Seymour (S. Haynes, p. 78).

7.  John Ascham to Lady Jane Grey, 18 January 1551 (Ascham,
Whole Works
, Vol., Part II, p. 240)

8.  Strype (1821), pp. 195–6.

9.  Clifford, p. 86.

10. Cole, p. 5.

11. Clifford, p. 80.

12. Merton (p. 64) notes that Elizabeth would usually rise before 9 o’clock.

13. The Confession of Katherine Ashley (S. Haynes, p. 99.).

14. Vives, p. 144.

15. TNA E15/340 f. 29v, f. 30, f. 30v.

16. Colvin Vol. IV, Part II, pp. 64–5.

17. TNA E15/340 f. 42 concerns payments for lodgings for servants at Hanworth and also close to Seymour Place when the household moved to London. Folio 21 notes that some of Catherine’s yeomen and grooms left her service in May 1547.

18. Ibid., f. 42v, f. 49v, f. 50.

19. James, p. 278.

20. TNA E15/340 f. 24, f. 25v, f. 28v, f. 29, f. 29v.

21. Ibid., f. 30.

22. A clear example of Catherine’s passionate nature can be seen in her letter to Thomas of late May 1547, when she referred to wanting to bite the Protector when he angered her in an argument (Parr, p. 140).

23. TNA E15/340 f. 29, f. 38.

24. Ibid., f. 39v.

25. Colvin, Vol. IV, Part II, p. 65.

26. Elizabeth to the Lord Protector, 7 March 1547 (Elizabeth,
Collected Works
, p. 34).

27. Ibid.

28. Catherine dated letters from Hanworth that month, including TNA E101/426/3 f. 3, f. 1 and f. 25. She was still there in September (f. 21). She had previously been based at Chelsea, into the summer, as letters dated May and June show (f. 5 and f. 17).

29. Lysons and
VCH Middlesex
, Vol. II, pp. 391–6.

30. TNA E15/340 f. 28.

31. Dugdale.

32. TNA E15/340 f. 21v, f. 25, f. 26.

33. TNA E101/424/12 f. 11, f. 14.

34. Thomas Seymour gives these details of Catherine’s household in his letter to the Marquess of Dorset, 17 September 1548 (S. Haynes, pp. 77–8).

35. Evans, p. 37.

36. BL Harley MS 6807 f. 11.

37. 
Statutes of the Realm
, Vol. 3 (London, 1817) – ‘Chapter XXIII: The Assurance of the Titles of the King’s Manor of Hanworth’, pp. 143–4.

38. Ibid.

39. Camden (1789), Vol. II, p. 2.

40. Thomas Seymour to Elizabeth, early 1547.

41. Confession of Sir Thomas Parry (S. Haynes, p. 96).

42. Ibid.

43. Confession of Katherine Ashley (ibid., p. 99).

44. Further Confession of John Harington Concerning the Lord Admiral, 2 February 1549 (
Calendar of the Cecil Papers
, Vol. 1, p. 281).

45. Vives, p. 155.

46. Confession of the Lady Elizabeth (S. Haynes, p. 102).

47. TNA E101/426/3 is a letter of Catherine’s dated 29 July 1547, from Sheen, when she was otherwise staying at Hanworth.

48. TNA E101/426/3 f. 21.

49. Katherine Ashley’s First Handwritten Deposition, late February 1549 (Elizabeth,
Collected Works
, p. 28).

Chapter 7: A Dress So Trimmed

1.  See letters by Edward VI, including that of 18 September 1547 to Somerset and 19 September 1547 to Catherine Parr (Edward VI,
Literary Remains
, p. 510).

2.  TNA E15/340 f. 41v. Catherine’s accounts record a payment in this month to Dr Huicke, her personal physician, for ‘diverse charges’.

3.  Ibid., f. 28.

4.  Ibid., f. 28v, f. 29.

5.  Alford, p. 39.

6.  Articles Against Thomas Seymour, No. 8 (Cobbett
et al.
).

7.  Edward VI to Catherine Parr, 19 September 1547 (Parr, p. 148).

8.  Loach, p. 4.

9.  Colvin, Vol. IV, Part II, p. 147, and Lysons, p. 93.

10. Further Deposition of Katherine Ashley, 4 February 1549 (SP 10/6/55).

11. This deposition was originally printed, erroneously, with the claim that Elizabeth was wearing a black dress. In fact, the colour is not given in the original deposition.

12. Confession of Katherine Ashley (S. Haynes, p. 99).

13. Vives, p. 145.

14. TNA E15/340 f. 42.

15. Ibid., f. 30v and f. 32.

16. Edward VI’s Deposition (Edward VI,
Literary Remains
, pp. 57–8).

17. Deposition of Sir John Cheke (Tytler, p. 155).

18. Ibid.

19. Articles Against Thomas Seymour, No. 3 (Cobbett
et al.
).