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

by Gwyn, Peter

  Why Catherine chose to resist remains something of a mystery. It is not enough to say that she was fighting for her daughter’s interests, for, as Wolsey more than once pointed out,38 compliance with Henry’s wishes would have done much more to further them. It is also the case that nothing stood in the way of good relations between Henry and Charles more than Catherine’s unwillingness to yield gracefully to her husband’s wishes. Thus, what might be called the sensible reasons for taking the stand she did are not all that credible. What seems to have sustained her was a strong sense of the rightness of her position: that her marriage being holy and good, no power on earth could dissolve it. Whether this belief was coupled, as has been suggested,39 with an intense bitterness at being rejected by a man of whom she had deserved nothing but good, and whether this bitterness translated itself into a determination to thwart his every wish, a not uncommon reaction to the break up of a marriage, must remain speculation, though there are reasons for rejecting it.

  One reason is that her comments about Henry’s behaviour towards her reveal distress and sadness, not anger. Her anger was reserved for Wolsey, whom she blamed for what had happened. It was he, she told Campeggio, who had ‘blown this coal’ between herself and Henry,40 and it is her views that provide the most convincing evidence that Wolsey was the author of her troubles, even if in the end they must be rejected. It is easy enough to see why she thought as she did. Whatever Wolsey’s responsibility for instigating the divorce, much of its management was bound to fall to him. It was he who presided over the two legatine courts which tried the matter. It was he whose task it usually was to persuade her to comply with Henry’s wishes; he who was chiefly responsible for the divorce negotiations with the Curia and other European courts; and, in particular, it was he who was most clearly asssociated with the new francophile policy that coincided with, and was in part dictated by, the search for a divorce. It must have seemed to Catherine at this time that everywhere she turned the figure of the cardinal blocked her way. And not only was her conclusion that he was responsible for both the conception of the divorce and its management a very natural one, but it was probably psychologically necessary too. What Catherine had to explain to herself, and in the least hurtful way possible, was Henry’s rejection of her. The wiles of a younger and more attractive rival were not by themselves enough. For one thing, there had been other rivals in the past, but none had previously threatened her marriage.41 For another, such an explanation would attach rather more blame to Henry as willing accomplice of these wiles than she was prepared to allow. What was required was an Iago-like figure, powerful and sinister enough fatally to corrupt her husband, and this Wolsey provided. Moreover, by blaming him, she gave herself the hope that if only his evil influence could be removed, Henry would return to his senses and come back to her. Wolsey thus became the scapegoat who hid from her the unbearable truth that Henry himself was the author of all her misfortunes.

  That Henry was the author, if something of a simplification, must surely be the truth. None of the arguments and evidence that point to Wolsey in the end convince. Moreover, other suggested candidates turn out to be men of straw. One such is John Longland, bishop of Lincoln and one of the king’s confessors; but what he could possibly have been up to in taking the initiative in such a sensitive matter defies the imagination. Then there is Gabriel de Grammont, bishop of Tarbes, of whom more shortly, but he is no more likely an author than Longland: in such a matter no foreign ambassador’s view could have carried sufficient weight. Unless one sees Henry as at the mercy of every passing whim and fancy that blew in his direction, it is only he himself who could have been the author of his own divorce: he was the king and it was his marriage.

  Why did he want a divorce? Both at the time and since a number of reasons have been put forward, some more creditable to him, and more credible, than others. It is, of course, likely that there was more than one reason, but what was surely central was his passion for Anne Boleyn. In making this perhaps not very controversial statement there are, nevertheless, problems of evidence. It is not even possible to ascertain when their relationship began: nearly twenty love letters have survived, but none of them is dated.42 As for what it was about Anne that attracted him, that too remains something of a mystery. She was no obvious beauty, apart from her dark almond-eyes, about which most people commented.43 She had spent some time at the French court, so perhaps it was her sophisticated French ways that enticed him; at any rate, she was probably a great deal more fun than Catherine, who in 1527 was in her early forties, and even ten years previously had been considered ‘rather ugly than otherwise’.44 Moreover, not only did Catherine lack beauty, but she also lacked sons; and as her last pregnancy had occurred as long ago as 1518, by 1527 it was certain that she would never bear one.45 This cannot have helped the marriage, but whether it destroyed it is another matter. In Mary, Catherine had produced a legitimate female heir. There also existed an illegitimate male heir in Henry Fitzroy, the son of an early mistress, Elizabeth Blount. In 1525 Fitzroy, aged six, had been created duke of Richmond, and appointed nominal head of the Council of the North. There was, thus, no question of him remaining a skeleton in the cupboard, but whether Henry ever seriously contemplated naming him his heir it is impossible to tell.46 As for a legitimate male heir, of course Henry talked about the need for one, but not quite as often as historians have done; and, when he did so, it appears to have been for tactical reasons rather than out of concern that the lack was proof that God was against his marriage, or that it endangered the future well-being of his kingdom. For instance, as we shall shortly discover, one of Henry’s problems, when he tried to make use of the Levitical prohibition against a marriage to one’s brother’s widow, was the very existence of Mary. Proof of this prohibition was supposedly that such a marriage would be childless. Fortunately, there was a way round this, not invented by Henry, which was to argue that only the lack of a male child was relevant, even though that was not strictly what the text said.47 This being so, Henry had to stress such a lack, whether it really bothered him or not. When it suited him he was perfectly happy not to stress it.

  When, in November 1528 he addressed a meeting of notables in a major propaganda exercise to prove to his audience that his ‘great matter’ was entirely motivated by a concern for the common weal, he concentrated only on the effect on Mary’s legitimacy, put in doubt by his invalid marriage, and on her right to succeed, at no stage suggesting that her gender was any impediment.48 He did not convince his audience, and he should not convince us. The trouble with all seemingly altruistic reasons for the divorce is that they appear to be entirely geared to the demands of the moment. And the course of his relationship with Anne does nothing to strengthen the view that concern for a male heir was uppermost in Henry’s mind. If it had been, a more compliant lady might have served his purpose better and, while it is true that Anne’s miscarriage in January 1536 may well have had something to do with her downfall in the following April, the marriage was under stress well before then, and, unlike Catherine, she was still capable of bearing him other children. But though Henry’s concern for a male heir does not carry great conviction, it is possible that in 1527 Catherine’s inability to bear him more children and Anne’s potential to do so, may have played some part in Henry’s thinking.

  Again care needs to be taken about the role assigned to the bishop of Tarbes both at the time and since. During the course of the Anglo-French negotiations in the early spring of 1527 he does seem to have raised the question of Mary’s legitimacy, this in response to English questioning about Francis I’s precise marital status following his pre-contract to Eleanor of Austria.49 Given that one of the options being discussed was a marriage between the French king and Mary, such diplomatic manoeuvring was to be expected, but, it is possible that the bishop’s question triggered in Henry a chain of thought that made it easier for him to question his marriage. If the French could challenge its validity there must be something wrong with it. But that t
he bishop’s intervention played only an accidental part is suggested by the way it was made use of in the months ahead. Wolsey mentioned it in that first tricky interview with Fisher on the subject of the divorce in July 1527, presumably because it offered a neutral explanation of how a scruple about the marriage had entered Henry’s head at that particular time50 and certainly it was better than talking to Fisher about Anne! It was also used, this time by Henry, at that meeting of notables already referred to.51 On the other hand, when explaining the origins of Henry’s ‘scruple’ to the pope or emperor it was more usual to stress that it had first arisen out of the king’s own biblical studies, an edifying picture indeed!52 As with the arguments about the lack of a male heir, so with the bishop of Tarbes’s role, it was the circumstances that dictated whether or not they were used, and this in turn suggests that scepticism is called for. The one argument for the divorce that Henry never made in public was that he had fallen in love with Anne, for to have done so would have been tactically foolish. Yet in February 1529 Campeggio was to say that Henry’s love was ‘something amazing, and in fact he sees nothing and thinks nothing but Anne. He cannot stay away from her for an hour; it is really quite pitiable, and on it depends his life, and indeed the destruction or survival of this kingdom.’53 Surely Campeggio had got to the heart of the matter, for without the intensity of that love, or perhaps it should be called infatuation, it is difficult to see how Henry could have sustained the campaign for the five and half years that were needed, or that he would have jeopardized so much in order to do so.

  Henry was the author of his own divorce. So where does that leave Wolsey? Perhaps as an opponent of it, if not from the start, though Cavendish said he was,54 at least from the moment he realized that Henry was in deadly earnest about Anne? There are reasons for believing this. The most important is that the divorce confronted him with enormous problems, for which there may never have been any satisfactory solutions. This alone suggests that it was a foolish thing to wish for – unless, like Henry, one was in love. As regards the succession to the throne, it raised more questions than it solved. As regards foreign policy, it meant that England became a hostage to the other European powers, for once it became apparent that there was something that Henry wanted almost regardless of the cost, they were in the strongest of positions to raise their terms. The possibility that the divorce would lead to schism unless Clement complied was a threat that Wolsey was to use frequently, but it was also a real possibility and one that would have worried Wolsey a good deal. Religious divisions would enormously complicate the conduct of foreign policy, leaving Henry dangerously exposed to attack from his two main rivals, Francis and Charles. In addition, they would undermine the internal peace of the kingdom, and at the same time make a mockery of the Christian faith. Wolsey was never a papalist, and, despite what was said earlier about his churchmanship, might just have accepted an English Church free of Rome’s authority; but he was no friend of heresy and his acceptance would have been extremely reluctant. With his firm grasp of all the implications, Wolsey must have had many misgivings about a policy dictated to him by his master’s foolishness. And there is the possibility that he may have feared for his own position if Anne ever became queen and, as a result, her faction ruled. Against all this, however, there is one compelling argument: that failure to obtain what the king so passionately wanted was the quickest route to his own destruction. It is this argument which should be borne in mind while we consider the episode that has lent most support to the opposite point of view.

  The importance of William Knight’s mission to the Pope in the autumn and winter of 1527 is that not only was he chosen as emissary to the pope against Wolsey’s advice, but the king did not inform Wolsey of the true purpose of his mission, which was to obtain for Henry a dispensation to remarry irrespective of his existing marital status.55 In the event, Wolsey got to know about the purpose, was intensely critical of it, but failed to prevent the mission going ahead. It is evidence of a lack of confidence between king and leading councillor more serious than any that had occurred before, for previous differences had been stated, not hidden, and had never concerned such a central matter. Henry’s doubts probably set in in June 1527, when Wolsey had pointed out the difficulties for Henry’s case if consummation of Catherine’s first marriage could not be proved,56 and were certainly over by the following May, when Wolsey’s tactics were beginning to bear fruit. But that these doubts existed does not prove that Wolsey was an opponent of the divorce. Most people have felt, mistakenly, that because Henry had been anxious to keep the information from him, Wolsey was slow to appreciate that what he really wanted was a marriage to Anne.57 In support of this view has been that contention that while Wolsey was in France during the summer of 1527 he had been working on his own plan to marry Henry off to a French princess. Since it has been argued here that he never had such a plan, it cannot be used as evidence that he was in the dark about Anne. And is it probable that he would have been? Since at least April of that year he had been heavily involved in Henry’s great matter, presiding over the first legatine trial and discussing it at length with Warham, Fisher and Richard Sampson, not to mention the king himself. He must have thought a great deal about why, after all these years, Henry should suddenly be so anxious to discard Catherine. Whatever respect he may have had for Henry’s biblical interests and the ensuing ‘scruple’, he would surely also have taken the trouble to check up on who his current favourite was, and so could hardly have failed to find out about Anne.

  All this is, of course, to assume that Henry would not have told Wolsey about Anne, and, given Wolsey’s major role in obtaining the king what he wanted, it is surely a curious assumption to make. And there is one piece of evidence which suggests quite strongly that Henry had indeed informed him, and at an early stage. While Wolsey was in France, he received a letter from Sampson, already deeply involved in the divorce, which informed him that:

  The great matter is in very good train; good countenance, much better than was in mine opinion; less suspicion or little; the merry visage is returned not less than was wont. The other party, as your grace knoweth, lacketh no wit, and so showeth highly in this matter. If that I perceive otherwise or more, I shall not fail to advertise your grace with diligence. The 23rd day the king’s highness departed from Hunsdon to Beaulieu. And though his grace was ready to depart by a good space, and yet he tarried for the queen. And so they rode forth together.58

  There are a number of ways of interpreting this passage, but the suggestion here is that the ‘merry visage’ refers to Catherine, the ‘other party’ to Anne. What is being described is a deliberate deception of Catherine to which Wolsey was privy, and for which, indeed, he was probably responsible. Catherine had not in the first instance been told of Henry’s ‘scruple’, or even about the first legatine trial, the intention being to present her with a fait accompli that she could not have reversed. However, it was soon realized that the case was too complicated to be rushed through in this way. On 31 May the trial had been called off, and on 22 June, Catherine was informed by the king himself of his ‘scruple’:59 no doubt this became necessary because rumours were already circulating and had, for instance, been picked up by the Imperial ambassador as early as 18 May.60 Of course, the calling off of the trial was not intended to end the matter. It was simply that difficulties had been encountered, and time was needed to resolve them. Meanwhile, Henry had a deeply unhappy and potentially dangerous wife on his hands, and the question was how best to manage her. Not surprisingly, it was decided to play the whole thing down and to induce in her a false sense of security: the ‘scruple’ needed to be cleared up (the bishop of Tarbes’s raising of the subject would have been useful here) but Catherine need not worry because it would all quickly be sorted out and Henry would end up more securely married to his dear wife than ever. With Catherine’s fears allayed, negotiations could proceed at Rome without any interference from her. This, at any rate, was the plan.

  Wolsey
knew about Anne from the start. So it was not any sudden discovery that so upset him when he divined the true purpose of Knight’s mission, nor, of course, could it have been Henry’s intention, in sending him to Rome, to keep knowledge of Anne from Wolsey. So why did Henry send Knight, and, in particular, why did he send him while trying to keep from Wolsey any knowledge of the instructions he had given him? Something that has so far perhaps been underplayed is the extreme foolishness of those instructions. There was first the point that Wolsey had felt able to put directly to the king, which was that Knight was poorly qualified to conduct such negotiations with the pope.61 There was also the obstacle that Wolsey had spent so much of the summer trying to get round: namely, that Clement was a prisoner of the Imperial army in Rome, so that even access to him was extremely difficult. But the real foolishness was the one already mentioned: by seeking to secure a dispensation to remarry before securing an annulment of his first marriage, Henry had effectively blown any cover of respectability that his case might have had. The rumours circulating in Rome, one of which was that Anne was already expecting Henry’s child,62 must be true, for why else would Henry want such a dispensation? What was at stake was not a ‘scruple’ but lust, and lust was not something that the Vicar of Christ should encourage, especially when the legal arguments for doing so were not very strong.