Edward knew that if his half-sister Mary were passed over in favour of the Protestant Elizabeth there would assuredly be legal, and possibly physical, challenges to the throne. It would be far better if both of them were denied the throne and another Protestant named to succeed him. Henry VIII’s precaution of having declared both Mary and Elizabeth illegitimate gave Edward a perfectly legal means of accomplishing this end. From the minutes of Edward’s Last Will and Testament comes the following: ‘Item the Second: Our said executors shall not suffer any piece of religion to be altered. And they shall diligently travail to cause Godly ecclesiastical laws to be made and set forth . . .’. Following this was Edward’s intent for the future of his sisters: ‘Fifthly, my will is, that my sisters Mary and Elizabeth shall . . . be bound to live in quiet order . . . and . . . that they . . . shall have our gift of one thousand pounds yearly.’ With that single sentence, King Edward VI pensioned off the two nearest claimants to the throne.
Now, a new monarch had to be selected. Outside Edward’s immediate family there were no less than eight legitimate claimants to the crown and all except one of them were women. No matter who Edward named the next ruler of England would most likely be the kingdom’s first female monarch. Immediately in line behind Henry VIII’s three children was Frances Grey, Duchess of Suffolk. Following her was her eldest daughter Jane. Certainly, unlike Edward’s sisters, the legitimacy of the wife and daughter of Henry Grey, Duke of Suffolk were beyond question. It was to these two women that Edward left his throne. In his Devise for the Succession, Edward stated: ‘For lack of issue (male) of my body . . . to the Lady Frances’s heirs male, for lack of such issue (before my death) to the Lady Jane and her heirs male.’ In simple language, this meant that the throne would go first to Frances Grey and then, unless Frances gave birth to a son, to her daughter Jane. Twenty-four members of the council including the Protector, Northumberland and the Duke of Suffolk, Frances’ husband and Jane’s father witnessed this Devise.
It was at this point that the devious Northumberland implemented his master strategy. If he could arrange a marriage between Edward’s cousin Jane Grey and one of his own sons, when Jane inherited the throne her husband would undoubtedly be crowned king – because there was no precedent for a female ruler – and Northumberland could then rule through him. Jane’s parents zealously agreed to the proposed marriage, the Duchess of Suffolk even stepping aside from the line of succession in favour of her daughter. Whether Northumberland’s only unmarried son, Guildford Dudley, or Lady Jane Grey, were consulted in the matter of their marriage remains a mystery. It is certain that neither of them was aware of the new Articles of Succession.
By all accounts Jane Grey was an extraordinary young woman. In 1546 she had been sent to court at the age of nine under the wardship of Queen Katherine Parr, last wife of Henry VIII. Katherine was a warm, pious, loving surrogate parent to Jane, but died in childbirth (by her third husband) less than two years after taking charge of Jane. Now Jane’s wardship fell on the machiavellian John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland.
Despite the presence of Northumberland, Jane developed a mind of her own, probably out of self-defence. At the time her marriage was arranged in 1553, Jane was a tiny, delicate fifteen-year-old. Standing barely 5 feet tall, she had a startling mane of bright auburn hair and a pale, heavily freckled complexion. But it was her mind that really set Jane apart. She could read, write and speak Latin, Greek, French, Hebrew and Italian; she was also amazingly pious for a teenager and her most treasured possession was a copy of the New Testament in Greek.
While the years had taught Jane to fear and hate her guardian Northumberland, she was barely acquainted with the fourth of his five sons, Guildford. But bending to what she called ‘the urgency of my mother and the violence of my father’ she agreed to marry this twenty-year-old stranger. With Edward nearing death, the wedding had to be arranged as soon as possible. There was no time to have the elaborate wedding clothes made, so they were borrowed from the Master of the Royal Wardrobe. On 25 May 1553 Jane Grey and Guildford Dudley wed at the London home of the Duke and Duchess of Northumberland. On the same day Jane’s younger sister Mary was married to Lord Herbert and Guildford Dudley’s sister Catherine was married to the young Earl of Huntingdon. In one bold move, the Northumberlands had intermarried their family with nearly everyone of importance in the kingdom.
Almost six weeks to the day after the triple wedding, sixteen-year-old King Edward VI died at Greenwich, but no public announcement was made of his passing. There were too many preparations to be made and precautions to be taken. Immediately on Edward’s death, Northumberland ordered the Tower brought to a full state of defence in the name of Queen Jane, and sent his son Lord Robert Dudley with a troop of cavalry to take Princess Mary prisoner. Mary had been kept more than 20 miles outside London and under heavy confinement throughout Edward’s five-year reign but somehow, before Robert Dudley and his troops got to her, she had learned of her brother’s death and escaped into the Suffolk countryside to begin rallying her own forces. It was not an auspicious beginning to the new reign.
On Sunday 9 July, Jane’s sister Mary arrived by barge at Jane and Guildford Dudley’s house. Here, Mary told Jane that she was ordered to come at once to their parents’ home, Sion House, where there was important news from the king. Although Jane had been ill for several days and was running a fever, she agreed, and the two returned by barge to Sion. When they arrived at the Suffolks’ home, the great hall was empty, but almost immediately members of the family and the council began filtering in. According to Jane’s diary, they ‘began to make me complimentary speeches, bending the[ir] knee . . . all of which made me blush. . . . My distress was still further increased when . . . my mother-in-law entered and paid me homage.’ Jane’s embarrassment and confusion were heightened when Lords Pembroke and Huntington entered the room, knelt and kissed her hand; ‘with unwonted caresses they did me reverence as was not at all suitable to my state’. Obviously, Jane knew something was very wrong, but she was not kept guessing for long.
Within minutes, Jane’s father-in-law, Northumberland, entered the hall and announced to Jane what everyone else in the room already knew. The king was dead and Jane Grey was to succeed him. When the announcement was over, the assembled company knelt before Jane, stating, according to Jane’s diary, ‘that they . . . swore to shed their blood and give their lives to maintain the same’. Already weak from fever, Jane collapsed and fainted. In her own words, ‘On hearing this I remained stunned and out of myself and I call on those present to bear witness who saw me fall to the ground weeping piteously and dolefully lamenting the death of the king, I swooned and lay as dead.’
When she was roused, Jane insisted, ‘The crown is not my right and pleaseth me not.’ But once again, out of loyalty to her parents, she allowed herself to be persuaded that it was her duty to her family and the kingdom to take the throne. Finally, she agreed and addressed herself not to those in the room, but to God, ‘if what hath been given me is lawfully mine, may I . . . govern to Thy glory and service, and to the advantage of the realm.’ Later, Jane would write, ‘It did not become me to accept . . . [it showed] a lack of prudence’.
The following day, Monday 10 July, at around three in the afternoon, Jane, her husband, family and in-laws, travelled by barge from Sion House to London where the new queen could be kept safely behind the ancient walls of the Tower. For the official procession into the Tower, Jane was dressed in the splendour befitting her new station in life. Her brocaded gown was heavily decorated with seed pearls and the bodice beneath it was bright green, embroidered with gold. Behind her, the train of her gown was borne by her mother and at her side was Guildford who, reportedly, was ‘showing her much attention’. To make Jane’s diminutive figure visible to the crowds that had gathered, over her shoes she wore a pair of wooden clogs with soles 3 inches thick. A merchant from Genoa who witnessed the scene described her as ‘graceful and well made, and when she smiles she shows her
teeth. . . . In all she is a charming person graziosa e animata’ (graceful and lively).
At the gates of the Tower Jane was greeted by the Marquis of Winchester, the Lord Chancellor, and Sir John Bridges, the Lieutenant of the Tower, who knelt to present her with the keys to the ancient fortress. But before Jane could step forward to accept, her father-in-law intervened, taking the keys and handing them to Jane. It was clear that from now on, all power, even the symbolic power of the Tower keys, would pass through Northumberland’s hands before being transferred to the new monarch.
As Queen Jane stepped into the Tower a herald proclaimed her, ‘Jane, by the Grace of God, Queen of England, France and Ireland, Defender of the Faith and Church of England and Ireland, under Christ on Earth, the Supreme Head’. It was far too heavy a burden to lay on an unprepared fifteen-year-old, and far too delicate a responsibility to slip into the hands of Northumberland.
The following day, Tuesday, the Lord High Treasurer brought the crown to Jane to check its fit and make arrangements for any necessary adjustments. At first, Jane refused, insisting that she had not asked to see the regalia. She was told, ‘You must take it . . . and soon I will have another made to crown your husband with.’ To the Lord Treasurer the phrase had been completely innocent, but to Jane it revealed the extent of Northumberland’s entire ugly plot. This wasn’t about her and never had been. The plan was to make Guildford Dudley king; she was nothing but a pawn in a massive game of power politics. Was Guildford a part of the plot? Were her parents? Understandably, Jane was furious. She called her council and confronted them with what she knew and what she suspected. Then she informed them that under no circumstances would she allow Guildford Dudley to become king. Her parents were beside themselves and her in-laws were fuming, but Jane stood her ground.
That same evening, word came to the tower that Princess Mary still eluded capture and was now asserting her right to the crown, demanding that Jane relinquish the throne immediately. The council responded by formally rejecting Mary’s claims and asserting the rights of ‘our Sovereign lady Queen Jane’. But if the councillors feared Mary and her religion, they also hated the scheming, power-hungry Northumberland, and their support for Jane was largely a matter of political expediency. For their own protection as much as Jane’s, the council demanded that Jane’s father, the Duke of Suffolk, lead an army to capture Mary and defeat whatever forces she might have assembled. Jane refused. Her father would remain at the Tower to protect her; Northumberland would lead the hunt for Mary. Little could Jane have known that the populace of England hated her father-in-law as much as she did. Four days later, on Saturday the 15th, Northumberland and his army set out to suppress the Marian rebellion, heading north towards Cambridge, Mary’s last known location.
With the coercive influence of Northumberland now absent from court, the ministerial will to oppose Mary began to falter, a matter not helped when word arrived on Sunday that Mary was openly being proclaimed queen in towns and cities throughout the south and common people everywhere were refusing to take up arms against her. In truth, popular support for Mary was not as strong as it was made to seem. Most people were aware of the possibility of religious upheaval if she took the throne, but she was Henry VIII’s rightful heir and that alone brought her a lot of support.
Both sides in the growing confrontation were now actively campaigning for their chosen candidate and doing their best to raise an army large enough to defeat the opposition. While there is no doubt that Mary was firmly in charge of her party, we have no way of knowing if Jane even understood the terrible implications of all this. As a teenage girl who had led a sheltered and privileged life, she can hardly have been expected to grasp the real gravity of her situation. What we do know is that the stress of the situation was already taking a horrible physical toll on the girl. Her hair had begun to fall out and her skin was peeling. Sleep became impossible.
When some of the ships of the Royal Navy stationed at Yarmouth mutinied and defected to Mary’s side, the already timorous ministers went into a panic and began looking for the quickest way out of the Tower and as far as possible from the teenage girl they had put on the throne. At around seven o’clock in the evening of the 16th, the tower warders, loyal to Jane, locked the Tower gates, preventing the ministers from leaving. The keys to the Tower were then handed to Jane.
Despite these precautions, by Tuesday the 18th virtually the entire council had abandoned Jane and the Tower, slipping away one at a time to meet at Baynard’s Castle where they unanimously declared the hated Northumber-land a traitor and asserted Mary’s right to the crown. To give weight to their action they drafted a letter to the Duke of Suffolk demanding that his daughter relinquish the throne which only nine days earlier she had tried so hard to refuse.
When a copy of the letter was delivered to Suffolk, who had remained in the Tower with his daughter, he rode immediately to Baynard’s Castle where he added his name to the proclamation acknowledging Mary as rightful queen. This done, he returned to the Tower to confront Jane whom he found sitting alone in her chair of state in the empty audience chamber. ‘Come down off there, child. That is no place for you’, he told her sadly, and proceeded to tear the canopy bearing Jane’s device from its place above the throne. Then he told her to remove her crown and royal robes.
Not surprisingly, Jane’s reaction was one of immeasurable relief. Exhausted beyond words, she is reported to have replied to her father, ‘I much more willingly put them off than I put them on. Out of obedience to you and my mother, I have grievously sinned. Now I willingly relinquish the crown.’ Finally, she asked him ‘May I go home now?’ Guilt-ridden, Henry Grey could not bring himself to answer his daughter. He and his wife had already decided they would leave the Tower, abandoning their daughter as a hostage to Mary, as a guarantee of their own future good behaviour.
Among those in the council who had actively plotted Jane’s downfall was the Earl of Arundel. When Northumberland left the Tower on his way to confront Mary’s army, Arundel had made a great show of support for the enterprise, insisting that he would gladly have gone along, but his age and duties at the Tower prevented it. In truth, only hours after Northumberland left London, Arundel had slipped away and was on his way to Cambridge to join Mary’s followers. There he would meet up with Northumberland on the afternoon of 20 July.
Even before Northumberland reached Cambridge he realised that his cause had virtually no popular backing. At best, the towns and villages the army passed through were indifferent; at worst, they were openly hostile to the duke and his men. By the time they arrived in Cambridge, Northumberland knew his cause was lost and he made a public announcement supporting Mary, saying, ‘Queen Mary is a merciful woman who will pardon me.’ Standing in the crowd that had gathered to hear him was none other than the Earl of Arundel. Stepping forward at the end of the speech, Arundel shouted, ‘Do not flatter yourself. [Even] if the Queen were inclined to pardon, those who rule her will destroy thee, whomsoever else be spared.’
Realising there was no escape, Northumberland and his army disarmed, most of them slipping away into the countryside, while Northumberland, the would-be kingmaker, and his closest followers were taken into custody and marched off to London.
Even as Northumberland was laying down his arms, Queen Mary was marching on London with an army more than ten thousand strong.
At thirty-seven years of age Mary Tudor was already a sour-tempered old woman who had grown to mistrust and dislike almost everyone, mostly as a result of the abuse she and her mother had received at the hands of her father. Mary’s only consolation, and the guiding force in her life, was her fanatically strong Catholic faith – which she clung to with an almost morbid devotion. When Mary entered the Tower, many of her old supporters, pillars of the Roman Catholic church, were brought out of the cells where they had been kept in confinement since her father reformed the church nearly fifteen years earlier. Casting her cold eyes over the sorry lot of bent and malnourished old men, Mary
said ‘You are my prisoners!’ Then she kissed each one of them on the cheek, set them free and began plotting her revenge on everyone who had kept her off the throne and those who had supported her father’s new Church of England.
Jane Dudley was removed from the state apartments to the Gentleman Gaoler’s lodgings on Tower Green where she would be kept in relative comfort, but under close guard. Guildford Dudley was taken to the Beauchamp Tower to be joined there three days later, on 24 July, by Northumberland, his father and his three brothers, Robert, Ambrose and Henry. Three weeks later, on 18 August, the Duke of Northumberland was taken to trial at Westminster where he was immediately found guilty of treason, with the execution set for five days later. In an attempt to save his head, Northumberland converted to the Catholic faith and made a public statement enumerating all the troubles Protestantism had brought to England. It was a good ploy, but Mary was not fooled. Even on the morning of his execution, the wily duke played for every possible minute of time. The execution had to be delayed for nearly an hour when he demanded to hear mass. On the scaffold, the duke begged for his life, pleading that ‘even the life of a dog’ was better than death. Finally realising that there would be no reprieve, he wrung his hands crying ‘This must be!’ and lowered his head on to the block.
With Northumberland’s death, Mary relaxed the conditions of Jane’s confinement. She was allowed 93 shillings a week to spend, allowed to walk in the Tower gardens, occasionally going outside the Tower and as far as Tower Hill, but always under heavy guard. Occasionally she was allowed to share dinner with the Gentleman Gaoler, Mr Partridge, and his wife. It was at one such dinner eleven days after her father-in-law’s execution that she fell into conversation with another dinner guest, Rowland Lea. During their discussion, talk came around to her father-in-law, his plots and his humiliating end. According to Lea’s diary, Jane said, ‘He hath brought me and our stock in most miserable calamity and misery by his exceeding ambition.’ Of Northumberland’s eleventh-hour religious conversion, she said, ‘Perchance he thereby hoped to have his pardon . . . what man is there living, I pray you, although he had been innocent, that would hope of life in that case, being in the field against the Queen in person as General, and after being so hated and evil spoken of by the common [people]? Who was [to] judge that he should hope for pardon, whose life was so odious to all men? But . . . like as his life was wicked and full of dissimulation, so was his end . . . I pray God, I nor no friend of mine die so.’ Here was obviously a great personal statement of faith, because Jane knew that she, too, was about to go on trial for her life on charges of treason.
Tales From the Tower of London Page 10
