by Linda Porter
Her accession was viewed with some passing interest by Anglophile and Protestant Scots north of the border and a few tentative links were opened, notably with the ever-flexible Châtelherault, but there was little firm encouragement given that Scotland would abandon the Auld Alliance, or that England could make much of a practical commitment to help. If there was to be change in Scotland, it would need to come from within the country itself. In France, the latest Tudor lady to occupy the English throne was viewed with disdain. She was not Mary but though she lacked a Spanish husband, the French still saw her as a Habsburg client. Elizabeth had made it clear to the astonished and contemptuous count de Feria, Philip II’s representative in England, that she did not regard herself as beholden to Spain, but the reality was somewhat different. There would be no friendly overtures from Henry II. His immediate reaction to the advent of this woman with what he saw as a dubious, not to say, spurious claim to the English throne was to quarter the arms of England alongside those of his son and daughter-in-law, the king and Queen of Scots. This calculated insult did not bode well for Anglo–French relations. But it reminded the world that Mary Queen of Scots, of undisputed legitimate descent from Henry VII, was a serious claimant to the English throne. Elizabeth’s father had, after all, expended much effort to unite her with his son for precisely that reason. As far as Henry of France was concerned, Elizabeth’s accession strengthened his hand. 1558 had been, for him, an extremely successful year. He had no inkling of what lay ahead.
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THE MARRIAGE OF Mary Stewart did not settle the Scottish kingdom for long. Matters came to a head in the troubled summer of 1559, when outright rebellion ended Mary of Guise’s regency and undermined all the gains that Henry II had achieved over a decade of domination of the country. And it was all the more remarkable for being largely unforeseen. ‘The revolt of May 1559,’ says historian Alec Ryrie, ‘seemed to come from a clear sky.’ Perhaps it did for the regent, apparently unaware of the growth of resistance to her autocratic French style and the depth of resentment at her withholding of patronage from Scottish lords in favour of her French entourage. Even for the English, as Bishop Aylmer of London dismissively remarked: ‘The piddling Scots … are always French for their lives.’ It was a long-held view and the weight of history lay behind it. There was genuine gratitude in Scotland towards France as their centuries-old protector against the English, but there was, by the late 1550s, growing unease at having to support French troops and the superior attitude of their ally, which the French were poor at concealing, that ‘this little country is useful and necessary to us.’ Not hiding their patronizing attitude that Scotland was like some embarrassingly unkempt little brother that one had patiently to raise to respectable adulthood, the French and Mary of Guise conveniently forgot that Scotland had a claim to nationhood going back as far as 330 BC. And by 1559, if the Scots still did not regard themselves as an occupied colony of France, there were undercurrents of alarm, unfocussed and without any real direction, that this might yet be the eventual outcome. Added to the growth of religious dissent and the Catholic authority that Mary of Guise represented, the elements for rebellion were certainly there. It was simply that no one had foreseen the swiftness with which, in May 1559, they would coalesce.
The origins of the Wars of the Congregation, as the revolt against Mary of Guise came to be known, are obscure. There are very few contemporary sources and most accounts were written much later and have a heavy Protestant bias, as one would expect from the victors. The most detailed explanation is that of John Knox, but he is unreliable, confusing and completely lacking in objectivity. Furthermore, he did not return to Scotland until the revolt broke out in May, so his knowledge of its background is not first-hand. Even the sequence of events by which Knox was initially invited back to Scotland in 1557 by four influential Scottish lords – the long-time Anglophile earl of Glencairn, Lord Erskine, Lord Lorne (soon to become the earl of Argyll) and, perhaps most significantly, Lord James Stewart, the queen’s half-brother – is puzzling. Having assured Knox that the realm of Scotland was safe for him, Knox left Geneva, with some reluctance, only to find a letter awaiting him when he arrived on the coast of Normandy effectively rescinding the invitation. Not a man to take such a rebuff meekly, Knox vented the full fury of his wonderfully effective pen on these doubters and vacillators:
My words shall appear to some sharp and indiscreetly spoken; but as charity ought to interpret all things to the best, so ought wise men to understand that a true friend cannot be a flatterer, especially when the questions of salvation, both of body and soul, are moved; and that not of one nor of two, but as it were of a whole realm and nation. What are the sobs and what is the affliction of my troubled heart, God shall one day declare. But this I will add to my former vigour and severity, to wit, if any persuade you, for fear of dangers that may follow, to faint in your former purpose, be he never esteemed so wise and friendly, let him be judged of you both foolish and your mortal enemy. Foolish, because he understandeth nothing of God’s approved wisdom. Enemy unto you because he laboureth to separate you from God’s favour; provoking His vengeance and grievous plagues against you, because he would that ye should prefer your worldly rest to God’s praise and glory, and the friendship of the wicked to the salvation of your brethren.12
If Knox’s words sound intemperate to modern ears, they still echo down the years. The men whose constancy he sought to encourage were all politicians themselves and the pursuit of personal power was never far from their thoughts. But their fast-changing world was still framed by an overarching belief in God, fear of His vengeance and a yearning for salvation, not just for themselves but for the wider commonwealth. Knox was the most compelling speaker and writer of his generation – he could, of course, be much more intemperate when he felt the occasion warranted it – and no one who met him or heard him was untouched by what he had to say. But the question of open rebellion against the Crown was something that even Knox could not yet condone. Both he and his wavering backers hoped for further religious concessions from Mary of Guise and the nobles clearly felt, at this stage, that they could achieve their aims better if Knox stayed well away. For much of 1557 and 1558 it seemed that a compromise allowing Protestant preaching in private and a vernacular liturgy (the Bible was already available in Scots) for matins and evensong, and perhaps also for baptism, would offer the best solution. But, as became apparent in the parliament of 1558, even as a new regime took over in England with a Protestant queen, this set of compromises, vague around the edges and difficult to police, did not go far enough for a group of increasingly vocal and extreme Protestants. When they petitioned Mary of Guise for greater freedoms, the regent was gracious and appeared to be accommodating. But between the end of 1558 and May 1559 her policy changed suddenly and she was, ever after, viewed as a dissembling Catholic bigot by her detractors.
Mary of Guise was caught between the shifting international situation, where Elizabeth’s succession had thrust forward her own daughter’s claim to the throne and highlighted their religious differences, the determination of Henry II to crack down on heresy in France after the treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis had ended the Habsburg–Valois struggle in April 1559, and the growing threat of radical Protestantism in Scotland. These men did not want to compromise with someone they viewed as the duplicitous mouthpiece of the French. As Mary of Guise cracked down on iconoclasm and issued an urgent appeal for the proper observation of Easter in 1559, it was obvious that serious battle lines were being drawn. Religious disputes, escalating out of hand and threatening the authority of the regent, were the occasion, but there was a rising undercurrent of resentment against French rule.
The two main centres of Protestant strength were in southwest Scotland and the east coast towns. But neither of these ‘congregations’ had yet come together as one force and they still lacked the support of some key members of the nobility. At this crucial moment, Knox finally returned to join the eastern movement and his interventi
on sparked rebellion. Perhaps he had not intended this outcome and merely sought to fire up his listeners. But Mary of Guise had banned Protestant preaching in public and he was in defiance of her law. At Perth on 11 May 1559, Knox preached a sermon that so inflamed one of his listeners that a stone was thrown at a passing priest. It apparently missed but hit the tabernacle on the altar. What followed was a wholesale iconoclastic attack on the Church and its ornaments.
Knox’s account in his History of the Reformation in Scotland makes it sound like an accident with unforeseen consequences but this is disingenuous. It was almost certainly premeditated violence. The regent could not let it pass without a suitable show of force and her reaction emboldened the ‘Congregation’, as the Protestant lords now styled themselves. When Lord James Stewart and the earl of Argyll finally joined their number, the Wars of the Congregation can be said to have begun. The longtime Protestant and pro-English Kirkcaldy of Grange wrote in triumph to the earl of Northumberland that the queen regent and d’Oisel had taken refuge in the heavily fortified castle of Dunbar. He went on: ‘The Congregation came this last of June, by three o’clock in the morning, to Edinburgh, where they will take order for the maintenance of the true religion and resisting the King of France, if he send any force against them. The Duke [Châtelherault] with almost the whole nobility, has declared to the Queen that they are of the same religion as the Congregation, and will take part with them in that behalf.’ Those who professed God’s word in Scotland bore the queen of England ‘an unfeigned love, which they shall prove indeed or it be long.’13
It seemed that Mary of Guise had lost. A woman of her mettle, however, was not so easily to be pushed aside and in the febrile climate of the summer of 1559 in Scotland many lords and even the people themselves were not persuaded of the legitimacy of the revolt. The citizens of Edinburgh greeted the Congregation’s forces with notable coolness and many men simply preferred to wait and see what would happen. During July, Mary of Guise forced the Congregation to withdraw from Edinburgh and was busily fortifying the port of Leith. More than one thousand French troops arrived to back her up but this was viewed as a sign of an intended conquest rather than an attempt to restore order against rebels. Leading Protestants believed that this would strengthen defections to their cause. Certainly the brutality of the French during the winter of 1559–60, a desperate phase for the Congregation, bore out this view. Attacks on Fife and Glasgow further inflamed sentiment against the French. Even long-term backers of Mary of Guise began to withdraw their support. France now seemed no better than England in its disregard for the Scottish people and their livelihoods. Eventually, the French garrison withdrew in July 1560, effectively marking the end of the Auld Alliance amidst hatred and civil war in Scotland.
In England, Elizabeth’s chief adviser, William Cecil, saw the Wars of the Congregation as an opportunity not to be lost. He felt that England had been humiliated by the Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis, which underlined the loss of Calais and seemed to threaten a sinister closing of ranks in Catholic Europe against his Protestant monarch. Establishment of English influence in Scotland would distract from many of the difficulties Elizabeth faced as well as building a solid bulwark against the claims of the Catholic Mary Queen of Scots to the English throne. But English help was not automatic. Elizabeth needed some persuading that she should interfere at all and she had been greatly offended by the publication of John Knox’s diatribe against female rulers, recently published, with exquisitely bad timing from the English perspective, as The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women.
Nor was the idea that England might come to their rescue necessarily comfortable for all Scots who opposed Mary of Guise. Mistrust still lingered and there were many Scots suspicious of replacing one ‘protector’ with another. Nevertheless, the arrival of English ships in January 1560 was received more warmly than the English themselves expected. The army did not follow until April, but was anticipated by Scots who wanted to know when the English ‘would deliver them out of their misery and captivity of the French’. Thomas Randolph, the English diplomat in Scotland, called Anglo–Scottish cooperation in the summer of 1560 a miracle. The English had learned much from the mistakes of the 1540s and were keen to avoid all accusations of pillage and high-handed behaviour. For once, they wanted to be seen as good neighbours. And this is unsurprising, for both the Congregation and the English were not proceeding from positions of strength, and yet the outcome was of far-reaching significance.
The Treaty of Edinburgh of July 1560 has been called one of Cecil’s greatest triumphs. In the words of his biographer, Stephen Alford, ‘it became the touchstone of his career; he would measure everything by it, and judge everything against it, for nearly thirty years.’14 The French were compelled to recognize Elizabeth’s right to rule England but, crucially, French influence in Scotland was brought to an end. A council of twelve Scottish lords would rule, chosen by the Queen of Scots and the Scottish parliament, who would have the right to approve Mary’s nominations. Mary’s heirs were confirmed as the House of Hamilton, a belated triumph for Châtelherault, though perhaps a hollow one, as he watched his son and heir, talked of as a possible husband for the queen of England, fall into insanity. Finally, if Mary and her husband Francis refused to ratify the treaty, then the English would intervene in Scotland to protect the Protestant Reformation there.
Cecil, however much he may have believed that the British Isles could be united by the word of God, was in 1560 much more concerned to ensure that Scotland could never be the springboard for a wholesale assault on Elizabeth’s shaky throne by the French, who would supplant her with Mary Stewart. His determination and absolute clarity of purpose had been greatly aided by one of those pivotal moments in history that could not possibly have been anticipated. In the end, all Mary of Guise’s hopes for Scotland, her years of hard work and scheming and sacrifice, had been shattered by the blow of a jousting lance.
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ON 30 JUNE 1559, as the Lords of the Congregation were seeking to establish themselves in the Scottish capital, an impressive public spectacle was taking place in Paris. Buoyed by the end of years of conflict with Spain, proud of the marriages arranged for his sister Marguerite with Duke Emmanuel Philibert of Savoy (a husband rejected by Elizabeth of England) and his daughter Élisabeth with King Philip II of Spain, Henry II celebrated in style. As well as these diplomatic successes on the European mainland he was optimistic, too, that his son and daughter-in-law might not have to wait long before joining the English Crown to that of Scotland. These were heady times for the forty-year-old king. In his portraits, his downcast eyes suggest more of the melancholy he had felt as a boy-prisoner in Spain, but his demeanour on that warm afternoon in Paris was joyful and confident. Three days of festivities preceded the tournament being held on the Place Royale outside the Hôtel de Tournelles and the French king was an eager participant at the lists, as his godfather, Henry VIII, had been. But jousting was a young man’s sport, though no one would have tried to tell the king that, and it was late in the afternoon when, unheeding the concerns of Catherine de Medici and Diane de Poitiers, whose colours he still wore, Henry challenged Gabriel de Montgomery, the captain of his Scottish Guard, to another bout. As the two men clashed, Montgomery’s lance shattered, the splinters flying up to penetrate the king’s visor, lodging in his eye and causing damage to his brain.
Intermittently conscious and in great pain Henry lingered until 10 July. Given the extent of his injuries and the state of medical knowledge at the time, it says something for his constitution that he survived so long. In fact, his life was not despaired of initially and Elizabeth’s ambassador in Paris, Nicholas Throckmorton, reported that ‘by common opinion, he is in no danger of life, but will lose his eye.’ Queen Catherine and his family, including, of course, Mary Queen of Scots, kept vigil at his bedside as this proud and ambitious man, who had effectively been ruler of both France and Scotland, faded away. Catherine would not let Dian
e de Poitiers see him, despite his pleas, and banished her from court after his death. The mistress might have dominated her in Henry II’s lifetime but his queen took charge of his death. Mary Queen of Scots, the child he had raised and loved as his own daughter, now became queen consort of France. She had been very unwell before her father-in-law’s demise but, even at this moment of both crisis and fulfilment, it is unlikely that the troubles that were convulsing her native land were at the forefront of her thoughts. Her faith in her mother was always strong. Sadly for both of them, Mary of Guise’s own health was beginning to falter under the strain of events.
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HENRY II’S DEATH exposed more clearly the developing struggle over religion in France that would shortly lead to thirty years of bitter civil war. Repression against the Huguenots, the French Protestants, continued; indeed, it was the main plank of the policies followed by the Guise family, who now assumed complete control of Francis and Mary, alienating the Constable of France, Montmorency, and the Bourbons, the junior branch of the French royal family who would succeed if the Valois line failed. In 1560 this seemed highly unlikely – Catherine de Medici’s belated production of so many sons appeared to secure the future of the Valois for years to come – but the calculated insult of not giving any government post to Henry of Navarre, the head of the Bourbons, was a costly mistake. Unable as yet to assert herself fully, the queen mother watched as the opprobrium for her late husband’s policies and the draconian attempts to recover the huge debts of his wars fell on the increasingly unpopular family of her daughter-in-law. She would bide her time. But the developing crisis in France left the Scottish regent, Mary of Guise, isolated. Her brothers could not help her any more and, thanks to English intervention, she was losing her struggle with the Lords of the Congregation at home. All of this took a tremendous toll on her health. Suffering from dropsy (what we would call congestive heart failure today), Mary of Guise swelled up and became lame. Her spirit remained strong despite the setbacks and she continued, as was the habit of this hardworking woman, a politician to her finger tips, to send reports back to her brothers in France. At the end of May 1560 she wrote her last letter, referring to the parliament that the rebels, as she termed them, had called for July and noting, ‘my health has been quite good until two days ago, when I had a relapse and for two nights now have had a return of the fever. I do not know what will happen.’15
