The Rise and Fall of Thomas Cromwell
Page 30
Cromwell’s career as a lawyer, and all the cases concerning land deals in which he was involved, may have provided the impetus to substantial reforms on law and property. He made plans to bring in a comprehensive system of land registration that would consign to history the endless claims and disputes that arose after bargains and sales had been made without any written agreement. The resulting Statute of Enrolments required all land transactions to be sealed and enrolled within six months in a court or before a justice. However, as with his Enclosure and his Poor Law bills, the act was somewhat more modest than the drafts; Elton suspects that Cromwell ran into organized opposition from landowners and conveyancers.52
Landowners and landlords did not always react positively to Cromwell’s ideas. One study of the conditions of towns sent to Henry by a servant of his, John Baker, blamed landlords for raising rents far too high for local tenants, with the result that homelessness was increasing, and many buildings falling into decay. Many local corporations received parliamentary authority to intervene and repair decaying properties if the landlords failed to do so. Cromwell, however, recognized the practical difficulties of central government getting too involved in such affairs. He preferred to work with local contacts and interests, using persuasion and influence rather than statute.53
This chapter has outlined Cromwell’s main official, public policies. The next two will examine the nature of his rule, his relations with the Tudor populace, and also the persona of the king’s chief minister.
Notes
1 Elton, Tudor Rev., pp. 99–100, 119–20
2 Elton, Tudor Rev., p. 126–7; G.R. Elton, England under the Tudors (London, 2001), pp. 182–3.
3 Elton, Tudor Rev., pp. 122, 127–8, 130, 132–3.
4 Elton, Tudor Rev., pp. 129, 133.
5 CSP Span., 1534-5, no. 228, p. 569; LP 12 (2), no. 445; G.R. Elton, Reform and Renewal: Thomas Cromwell and the Common Weal (Cambridge, 1973), pp. 10–12.
6 Life of Thomas More, by William Roper (London, 1907), p. 55.
7 For a discussion of Luther’s ‘two kingdoms’, see Brecht 2, pp. 116–19.
8 PRO SP 1/125, fol. 253 = LP 12 (2), no. 952; LP 10, no. 901.
9 CSP Ven. 4, no. 601; LP 6, no. 1479, p. 595.
10 CSP Span., 1536–8, no. 61, p. 161; no. 71, p. 189; no. 98, p. 257.
11 See Chaps 6 (Lutherans), 8 (Poor Law), 9 (Anglo-Imperial relations), 10 (justification and the Bible), 15 (priestly marriage).
12 Henry & Cromwell: SP 2, pp. 551–3; LP 13 (1), nos 999–1000, 1021, 1303; LP 13 (2) no. 433. Cromwell & Cranmer: Foxe 8, p. 27.
13 For discussions on this see Elton, Tudor Rev., pp. 318, 320, 329–32, 342–51; Elton, England under the Tudors, pp. 180–84, 479–80; A. Fox and J. Guy, Reassessing the Henrician Age: Humanism, politics and reform, 1500–1550 (Oxford, 1986), pp. 142–3; J. Guy, Tudor England (Oxford, 1988), p. 157, 160–64. However, there is no evidence that the fall of Anne Boleyn or the Pilgrimage of Grace had much to do with Cromwell’s governmental reforms.
14 Elton, Studies 3, p. 8–9, 11, p. 216; Elton, Tudor Const., pp. 20–21.
15 Elton, Reform and Renewal, pp. 70–80; 92–7; 161; 164–5; Elton, Tudor Const., pp. 22, 27–30; S. Lehmberg, The Later Parliaments of Henry VIII: 1536–1547 (Cambridge, 1977), pp. 75–9; M. Graves, Tudor Parliaments (London, 1985), p. 75.
16 Gardiner, S., Letters of, ed. J.A. Muller (Cambridge, 1933), p. 399; Merriman 2, pp. 13, 199, 209–10; Lehmberg, Later Parliaments, pp. 41–50.
17 S. Lehmberg, The Reformation Parliament: 1529–1536 (Cambridge, 1977), pp. 255–6; Elton, Studies 2, p. 233.
18 Merriman 1, pp. 388–92; Lehmberg, Reformation Parliament, pp. 239–41.
19 Lehmberg, Reformation Parliament, pp. 209–10.
20 Lehmberg, Reformation Parliament, pp. 241–2; P.R. Roberts, ‘The Union with England and the Identity of “Anglican Wales”, TRHS 22 (1972), pp. 49–70; G. Williams, Renewal and Reformation: Wales c. 1415–1642 (Oxford, reprint 2002), pp. 259–60; J. Davies, A History of Wales (London, 1993), 230–33.
21 Ellis 10, pp. 369–72; 11, pp. 13–14; LP 8, no. 947; LP 13 (1), no. 152.
22 Ellis 11, pp. 47–9; LP 13 (1), no. 371. The Morgan case was followed up by Lee and Cromwell, but the outcome is not certain: see LP 13 (1), nos 519, 624, 675, 824.
23 PRO SP 1/98, fol. 7 = LP 9, no. 608; LP 9, no 607.
24 Wright, pp. 189, p. 207; LP 11, no. 1418; LP 13 (2), nos 1072–3; G. Williams, Wales and the Reformation (Cardiff, 1997), pp. 123–4.
25 F.W. Brooks, The Council of the North (London, 1953).
26 S. Ellis, Ireland in the age of the Tudors, 1447–1603 (London, 1998), pp. 11; 121–3, 125, 132–3.
27 B. Bradshaw, ‘Cromwellian reforms and the origin of the Kildare rebellion’, TRHS 5th series (1977): 69–94; S.G. Ellis, ‘The Kildare rebellion and the early Henrician Reformation’, HJ 19 (1976): 807–30.
28 CSP Span., 1534–5, no. 70, pp. 204–5; LP 7, nos 1457, 1575, 1567, 1573.
29 LP 8, no. 1004; LP 9, nos 308, 331, 575; LP 10, nos 822, 1030 (2.5); Ellis, Ireland, pp. 144, 205–7.
30 LP 9, nos 234 (p. 78), 1051, 1054; LP 10, nos 1032; 1210; 1223–4; LP 11, no. 266; LP 12 (2), no. 628.
31 LP 11, no. 1434; Merriman 2, pp. 80–81; LP 12 (1), no. 503; LP 14 (1), nos 993–7; Ellis 5, pp. 93–104.
32 See discussion in Ellis, Ireland, 195–205.
33 Browne to Cromwell: PRO SP 60/3, fol. 112 = LP 11, no. 120. Pelles: Lambeth MS 602, p. 136 = LP 11, no. 1248.
34 SP 2, pp. 465, 512.
35 SP 2, p. 569; SP 3, pp. 1, 6, 8, 35; LP 13 (1), nos 1037, 1161; LP 13 (2), no. 64.
36 LP 10, nos 1102–4, 1113, 1196; LP 11, nos 1149–50.
37 LP 12 (1), no. 1077; LP 13 (1), nos 50, 1224, 1303; LP 13 (2), nos 181, 195–6, 216, 504, 769, 1027, 1032; LP 14 (1), no. 302–3.
38 LP 12 (2), nos 76, 86, 146–7.
39 BL Cottonian MS Titus B. IX, fol. 111 = LP 10, no. 1030, Cap. 16.
40 SP 3, p. 123; LP 13 (1), nos 114, 1420; Merriman 2, p. 194. A qualifier may be prudent here. Another piece of legislation passed by the Irish parliament in 1536 was an ‘Act against marrying or fostering with Irishmen’ – hardly a measure designed to encourage harmony between Gaelic and English Irish (LP 10, no. 1030, Cap. 13). But Cromwell was not directing the Dublin parliament in everything because the same session (June 1536) confirmed the succession in favour of Henry and Anne – just when Henry and Cromwell were changing the succession laws in favour of Jane! Obviously some failure in communications between London and Dublin had occurred. The point about Cromwell and the Gaelic Irish remains valid, as the cases of Nangle and the Irish speaking agents show.
41 LP 14 (2), nos 355, 363, 617–18, 709–10; LP 15, nos 327–8, 341, 441, 649, 654, 683, 830; SP 3, p. 208
42 See also the discussion in Ellis, Ireland, pp. 352–8.
43. Foxe 5, p. 395; CSP Span., 1534–5, no. 142, p. 427.
44. CSP Span., 1534–5, no. 7, p. 23; LP 8, no. 647; LP 9, no. 730.
45. Foxe 8, p. 27; Merriman 1, pp. 370–71.
46. LP 9, nos 746, 765; LP 12 (2), no. 26. On Henry, Cromwell and Pole, see chapter 13.
47. Elton, Tudor Const., pp. 129–3; See also the detailed discussion on Cromwell’s supervision of finances in Elton, Tudor Rev., pp. 139–57.
48. TRP 1, nos 180–82, pp. 264–6; no. 189, p. 281–3; Elton, Reform and Renewal, pp. 113–21.
49. See the discussion in R.B. Outhwaite, Inflation in Tudor and Early Stuart England (London, 1982), p. 12.
50. Cromwell’s period seems, from these statistics, to be so different from the rest that it would be worthwhile to investigate this subject further. This, however, is a task for a specialist in economic and social history.
51. Elton Reform and Renewal, pp. 101– 6; Merriman 1, p. 373; Lehmberg, Reformation Parliament, p. 188.
52. Elton, Ref
orm and Renewal, pp. 143–7. Cromwell’s role in the Statute of Wills, 1540, is less clear: see Lehmberg, Later Parliaments, pp. 98–9.
53. Elton, Reform and Renewal, pp. 107–8.
12
The Widows’ Helper
A note survives from Cromwell’s remembrances, as recorded in the Letters and Papers, to send the Abbots of Reading and Glastonbury ‘to be tried and executed’ for offences against the king’s Supremacy. This served as a cue for Merriman to deliver a sternly sanctimonious lecture on Tudor, and specifically Cromwellian, injustice – ‘no pretence of a fair hearing … it mattered little whether this serious charge was proved or not, his execution was determined beforehand’. However, as Elton and others have since pointed out, the original document in the British Library contains the rider to ‘see that the evidence be well sorted, and the indictments well drawn against the said abbots and their accomplicies’.1
Now a truer picture emerges. Both abbots had almost certainly offended against the law as it stood. Anticipating the dissolution of his abbey, the abbot of Reading had been selling sheep, corn and other items to reduce the value of his lands. At Glastonbury three government agents – Pollard, Moyle and Layton – found a book opposing Henry’s first divorce, as well as ‘diverse pardons, copies of bulls, and the counterfeit life of Thomas Becket’. They examined the abbot and sent a detailed report to Cromwell, which, they claimed, made manifest his ‘cankered and traitorous heart’. They also found a gold chalice and other items which ‘the abbot hath hid secretly from all other commissioners’. More extensive searches of the abbey uncovered money and plate hidden in walls and vaults. Further investigations revealed that other valuables had been ‘conveyed to diverse places of the country’, and that the abbot and some of his monks had allegedly ‘embezzelled and stolen’ enough plate and ornaments ‘to have begun a new abbey’. Cromwell’s agents then paid the servants six months’ wages, and the monks not involved in the swindle were given their pension and allowed to leave. ‘We find them very glad to depart’, Pollard added. Other witnesses, including the French ambassador, linked the abbots with the Exeter conspiracy as we will see in Chapter 14, though this does not seem to have been part of the original set of charges against them. Cromwell later received a report of the execution of the abbot of Glastonbury; he had asked ‘God’s mercy and the king’s for his great offences’, before he took his death ‘very patiently’.2
So Cromwell’s note about the abbots was not quite the grim indictment of a despotic ruler arbitrarily singling out one or two hapless monks and sending them to death regardless of facts or the due processes of the law. Under the law of the land the case against them seemed clear and straightforward, but Cromwell insisted that all evidence should be properly prepared. This was the Cromwell that Tudor people knew, as Elton’s magisterial study of law enforcement in the Cromwellian regime has shown. It is a far cry from the Cromwell imagined by Victorians and Merriman, and some of our modern writers who copy him.
Treason trials in Cromwell’s day were by no means foregone conclusions. The king’s supremacy laws were enforced rigorously, but invariably fairly, and in accordance with the due processes of law. The accused had first to be presented or indicted by the grand jury of the shire. Presentation was a charge made by the jury. For an indictment to be brought, the jury considered a charge put before it by the crown. If the grand jury rejected the charges, the accused was free to go, otherwise he was sent for trial. There the crown had to prove the case before a new trial jury, and although the defendant had no legal representation, trials were seldom a pushover for the prosecution. The evidence had to convince. Technically the accused could be convicted on the testimony of one witness, but the government generally preferred two.3
Here are some bare facts of Henrician and Cromwellian justice. From 1532–40, nearly 900 people were investigated for treason. Of 74 cases, practically nothing is known of the outcome. Of the remainder, 308 are known to have been executed, while 20 more might have been – the evidence is not certain. This figure of 320 or so deaths includes high profile cases like Anne Boleyn and the Exeters, as well as 178 rebels condemned for their part in the northern risings. It also includes over 40 executions that had nothing to do with Henry’s Supremacy laws – these were people who would have died as traitors under the previous reign – and a further 23 who were sentenced by the Council of the North without reference to London during the years 1537–40.
Regarding cases of treason by words only, brought under the revised 1534 Treason act, Elton’s estimate is that Cromwell investigated nearly 350 such allegations. Of this number, 40 persons were convicted and put to death. About 20 were pardoned or reprieved. This gives a conviction rate of approximately 16 per cent (60 out of nearly 350), and an execution rate of 11 per cent. These surprisingly low figures cannot be explained by the reluctance of local justices to implement the law, or of juries to convict. In only 16 cases did the government fail to secure an indictment from the grand jury, and in only 14 did the trial jury return a verdict of not guilty. But these 30 acquittals make up less than one tenth of the total allegations. The real reason for the low conviction rate was that more than half of the cases reported to Cromwell never reached the courts at all, because after investigating the matter Cromwell decided that the evidence was not strong enough to proceed. Elton’s researches reveal that 89 cases were dropped and 95 were probably dropped, though we cannot be absolutely sure of this second figure. The outcome of 68 more allegations is unknown due to missing evidence, but it is at least plausible that these were dropped as well. Some are believed to have fled or died in prison; again the number is not certain.4
Treasonous words or acts were frequently reported by ordinary folk to local authorities, who would then inform Cromwell or the Council. Informers were not rewarded, and Elton suggested that the patron-client structure of Tudor society served as Cromwell’s eyes and ears, with much of the information being supplied from those who might have sought his patronage or good opinion. An elaborate police state did not exist in Tudor England. Cromwell never went beyond sketching a few very general ideas for creating any sort of national law and order enforcement unit, though these ideas might have developed into something more substantial had he lived longer. For the most part, Cromwell heard of suspicious words or activity only when someone close to the accused, or a local justice, wrote to him about it.5
All treason allegations in England were referred to Cromwell except those in the north of the country, which could be dealt with by the Council of the North. Cromwell studied each case on its merits, and all charges were rigorously investigated. Cromwell was well aware that allegations might be motivated by malice or revenge. Occasionally he wrote to the men accused to summon them to him. This could be an intimidating prospect, as it was for one William Wetheral. Escorted by Bishop Tunstall from Kent to London to be examined by Cromwell, Wetheral contrived his escape after breakfasting with the bishop. He was soon caught, however, and confessed that fear of coming face to face with Cromwell drove him to flight. Of the many men questioned by Cromwell, few left any record of the experience. Two who did were Gabriel Pecock, warden of the Observant Franciscans who resented the new teaching against papal authority, and Richard Master, a cleric and associate of the Maid of Kent. Pecock was allowed to go free and Master received a pardon; both described Cromwell as fair, reasonable, even ‘noble’ in manner. In fact, the only surviving evidence of Cromwell behaving aggressively towards a defendant is the Spanish Chronicle’s tall story about Mark Smeaton with a knotted rope tied and tightened around his head.6
Evangelicals reported to Cromwell on suspicion of heresy could count on a sympathetic hearing, but the case of Dr John London shows that Cromwell did not try to fix charges against men of the old faith on flimsy evidence. London, warden of New College at Oxford, was reported by his nephew Edward, apparently an over enthusiastic young evangelical, for allegedly Papist sympathies. Actually London had supported Henry’s marriage to Anne an
d had taken the oath of succession promptly. London defended himself against Edward’s claims, and he wrote to Cromwell personally. He lived on untroubled.7
Even on the most controversial aspect of Henry’s treason laws – where malicious words alone could send the accused to his death – examples survive of those who escaped justice after living and speaking dangerously. The pulpit was a common platform for criticism of the Supremacy and the Reformation, sometimes diplomatically, other times less so. One priest was alleged to have urged his flock ‘not to follow the saying of evil princes or evil rulers, but rather put on your harness and fight against them’; but there is no evidence that he was ever prosecuted. The government could be lenient. A few anti-supremacy preachers escaped with a caution, maybe after a climb down. One William Smyth, servant to Sir Roger Wentworth, allegedly asked a visiting evangelical in an inn: ‘Were there not in times past as wise kings reigning over us as this king is now, and yet they all obeyed the pope’s power? And I beg thee, who gave the king leave to put him down?’ Smyth was reported to Cromwell, but there is no evidence that he was committed for trial. The religious and constitutional changes also produced a number of fanciful prophecies up and down the land – Henry and Cromwell were cursed of God, England would soon be ruled by king of Scotland, Henry would be made to do public penance, and more of the same. Some of these were investigated, but only a few were deemed serious enough to be sent for trial; many were simply dropped. It is likely that, except in the most watertight cases, suspects were given the benefit of the doubt, maybe after an acceptable apology and a profession of loyalty, followed by a warning from Cromwell to behave in future.8
In Tudor England, unlike most of Europe, torture was not normally used in criminal investigations. Nevertheless, there could be exceptional cases, mainly when national security was believed to be in danger. Cromwell once committed two ‘very sedicious’ friars to custody until Henry had time to consider their case. Cromwell suspected that they would ‘confess some great matter if they be examined as they ought to be, that is to say by pains’. One of them in particular was a ‘subtle fellow and much given to sedition’. In the event, these friars suffered no pains. Maybe the threat was enough to loosen their tongues.9