“Why have you not come to see me?” she asked him.
“Mistress,” he said, “it is forbidden. Two men came to see my father and they asked me a lot of questions. They said I had taken you letters hidden within the flowers but I told them that it was not so.”
Elizabeth sighed. “You’re a brave boy,” she comforted him.
“So, Mistress,” the little boy continued. “I can bring you no more flowers.”
“Do not fret yourself,” she soothed, “you must do as your father bids you for I know that you are a good boy and perhaps later you may be allowed to come and see me once more.”
She listened sadly as the childish footsteps faded away. So someone’s suspicious mind had noted these visits and the poor child had been questioned. She felt dispirited for she had loved those little visitors but apparently it was deemed that she was too dangerous a person even to be allowed to talk to innocent babes.
That she was not the only prisoner she knew full well. Isabella Markham—one of her own ladies—was imprisoned here with other members of her household. John Harrington, Tom Seymour’s faithful servant was still held a prisoner. Northumberland’s son, Robert Dudley, too, languished away the weeks and months within these grim walls. Occasionally she caught a glimpse of him; the Tower had not subdued him for he waved to her and called cheerful greetings whenever she caught sight of his dark, curly head. He was a handsome young man and her heart and spirits lifted a little after each encounter and so there was born within that depressing prison, the affection they would hold for each other in later years.
Sir Thomas Wyatt was executed on the 11th April, and from the scaffold he denied that either the Princess Elizabeth or Edward Courtney had any knowledge of the rebellion. The Council made a desperate attempt to suppress this denial—but it leaked out just the same. The citizens of London received the news with joy and Elizabeth’s popularity grew. The Council now knew defeat and a week later Nicholas Throckmorton was acquitted of treason by a London jury.
The spectre of the block began to recede from Elizabeth’s mind and the long nights of fear were over.
The Lord High Admiral, Lord William Howard, her kinsman, had already had words with the Lieutenant Governor of the Tower opposing any undue acts of severity towards her. Renard had written to his master that “the lawyers can find no evidence sufficient to condemn her and even if there were evidence they would not dare to proceed against her because her relative, the Admiral, has espoused her cause and controls all the forces of England at his command.”
Elizabeth was bitter when she heard these remarks. “He has espoused my cause too late,” she thought. “Where was this all-powerful relative when I needed him most? Where were the powerful forces he commands when they brought me here? You may help me now, William Howard, but the hardest battle I fought alone!”
The fear of death had not totally receded for she sometimes feared death from the hand of an assassin and took what precautions she could against poison. She had also received a very nasty shock when a warrant for her execution had been delivered to the Lieutenant, no doubt sent by Gardiner, but the Lieutenant was an honest and observant man and upon reading the warrant closely he had noticed that the Queen’s signature was missing. He had therefore refused to act upon it.
Just as her racked nerves had begun to calm themselves a little, Sir John Gage was relieved of his office and Sir Henry Bedingfield was appointed in his place. The old terrors descended upon her once more.
“Who is this man?” she asked herself for she knew nothing of him. “Has the Lady Jane’s scaffold been taken away?” she asked one of her guards.
“Yes, Madam,” he assured her but she continued to live in fear of this unknown Governor.
Within a few days of Sir Henry’s instatement she realised that she had been foolish to fear him for he was no monster. Sir Henry was a Knight from Norfolk. A staunch Catholic and one of the few who had gone to Mary’s aid at Framlingham. As her fears began to recede she began to wonder what Mary intended to do with her. Was she to be kept here forever? She had been proved innocent but she knew that her disgrace was far too deep for her to be allowed complete freedom.
A few days later she found out for Sir Henry came to inform her in his kindly but dour way, that she was to be taken to the country manor of Woodstock. She was however still under his wardenship, he added with resignation.
“So I am still in truth a prisoner!” she thought.
On Saturday, 19th May, she left the Tower thanking God in her heart for his mercy. As she sat in the barge she looked up at the gaping maw of Traitors Gate. God had indeed been good to her for no prisoner ever left the Tower by this gate. Anne had not. Again she was drawn by the conviction that Anne’s spirit watched over her for to-day was the 19th May, and it had been on the 19th May, 1536, almost at this very hour that Anne had walked for the last time across the soft, green turf to her death.
Elizabeth remained silent as the barge was rowed up river towards Richmond. The news of her release had already reached the City for as she passed the Steelyard a salute was fired by the Hanseatic merchants.
When she reached Richmond however, she found that it was only for a brief visit—just for the night. She saw no one and next morning she set out for Woodstock accompanied by a guard of forty archers.
The day was fine and her spirits rose in spite of her guard and the condition of the litter that had been provided for her. She was obviously not going to ride forth in state for anything less regal than that litter would be hard to find. It was broken and twisted and its cushions and curtains were dingy and faded. But despite the dowdy conveyance that—to Sir Henry’s growing concern—was just what her journey became.
Everywhere she passed people came out to cheer her and to call their blessings. She passed through Windsor where the streets were lined with cheering people. The scholars of Eton College turned out en masse to greet her. Her spirits rose rapidly as she returned their salutations with smiles.
“They have not forgotten me,” she thought joyfully. When she had been desolate and fighting for her life she should have remembered these people—the common folk whose affection for her was not fickle. She had always been ‘their Elizabeth’ and as she sat in the broken-down litter surrounded by the cheering crowds of shopkeepers, scholars, tradesmen and labourers she vowed that she would always trust them and their welfare would be her main concern. She would be ‘England’s Elizabeth’.
In every village the scene was the same. The housewives hearing of her approach had prepared cakes and bread with which they presented her until she sat laughing amidst a mountain of confectionery. By the time the party reached Lord William’s house at Ricote it was late but Elizabeth was royally entertained. Sir Henry who had grown more and more alarmed as the day had progressed, felt that Lord Williams had rather surpassed the bounds of duty and testily told him so, reminding him that Elizabeth was still the Queen Majesty’s prisoner and no otherwise.
“I am well advised of my doings. Her Grace might and shall in my house be merry!” retaliated his host.
Next morning Elizabeth thanked her host cordially and left to resume the last stage of her journey. As yesterday, the sun shone and the people cheered her and she was in high spirits upon her arrival at Woodstock but her heart sank when she first set eyes upon her future home.
It was virtually a ruin. She was therefore relieved to find that four rooms had been prepared for her in the Gatehouse which was in a reasonable state of repair. These were to be her home until such times as the house could be made habitable.
“At least it is not the Tower,” she thought and resolved to make the best of the situation.
Sir Henry was in his way a kindly man although extremely conscious of his duty. She was therefore not allowed to converse with anyone whom he suspected out of his hearing, nor was she allowed to receive or send any form of letter or message. Mary had instructed that she was to be treated in a reasonable manner and so she was allowed to wal
k in the nether-garden and the orchards and was allowed certain books which Sir Henry had first vetted.
After a few weeks of this boring existence she began to ask for small favours but Sir Henry stuck to his instructions and no favours were forthcoming. She did however hear that there were plans afoot to send her to the Emperor’s sister, the Dowager Queen of Hungary and as she had no intention of being forced to leave her country she began to ask for permission to write to her sister. The threat to send her abroad was not a new one for marriage to the Duke of Savoy—a vassal of King Philip—had been suggested earlier but she intended to resist to the full any plans which would remove her from the land she loved.
Finally permission was granted and Elizabeth wrote the first letter to her sister since that day they had taken her to the Tower, although this letter did her as much good as that one had. Mary sent Sir Henry a sharp note informing him that she did not wish to receive any more “colourable and disguised” letters from her sister. When this news was relayed to Elizabeth she sent for Sir Henry. He found her in the garden.
“Sir Henry, I have heard the news of my sister and I wish you to write direct to the Council on my behalf,” she said.
Sir Henry was horrified! “Madam, that I dare not do!” he said.
After some argument she lost her temper. “I am worse treated than any prisoner in the Tower!” she stormed. “Yea, even than the worst prisoner in Newgate!”
It started to rain which depressed her still further.
“It waxes wet, therefore I will depart to my lodgings!” she said peevishly as she swept past him to return to the house.
*
The weeks passed and she fell ill again. Her body became swollen and she suffered excruciating pain in her limbs. Again she requested that Mary’s own doctors attend her but unfortunately they were not available. Dr Owen did write to her recommending a Dr Barnes and a Dr Welbeck who resided near-by in Oxford. Elizabeth was outraged!
“I am not minded to make any stranger privy to the state of my body, but commit it to God!” she fumed to her perplexed Governor.
Fortunately a month later she recovered and was told that Mary had finally agreed to allow her to write to the Council, via Sir Henry of course. To Sir Henry’s indignation it was three weeks before she condescended to write.
“This present 30th July, required me to make of Her Grace’s mind a report as her suit to your honours, to be means to the Queen’s Majesty on her behalf to this effect. To beseech your Lordships all to consider her woeful case, that being but once licensed to write as an humble suitress unto the Queen’s Highness and received thereby no such comfort as she hoped to have done, but to her further discomfort in a message by me opened, that it was the Queen’s Highness’s pleasure not to be any more molested with Her Grace’s letters. That it may please the same, and that upon very pity, considering her long imprisonment and restraint of liberty, either to charge her with special matter to be answered unto and tried, or to grant her, liberty to come unto Her Highness’s presence, which she sayeth she would not desire were it not that she knoweth herself to be clear even before God, for her allegiance.”
She ended her appeal with a reference to their father’s will, thereby reminding her sister that though a prisoner, she was still Heir to the throne.
At the end of the month she heard the news that Philip of Spain had at last arrived at Southampton and was even then en route to the cathedral town of Winchester where the marriage was to take place.
Elizabeth’s prospects were gloomy should Mary produce a child. She thought about this matter as she looked out over the sudden gardens of Woodstock. Even the weather seemed to be set against this foreign prince.
“It has poured with rain for two days,” she thought. “One thing is certain, His Majesty of Spain will receive no tumultuous welcome for there will be few Englishmen who will be prepared to be soaked to the skin to watch the arrival of a man they hate and fear.”
In this assumption she was correct. Philip’s first sight of his new country was a dismal one. A few curious souls came out to watch the procession as it passed while Philip’s apprehension grew. He had left his warm and sunny land where he was revered as a great Prince, to come to this damp and forbidding island, inhabited—he had been assured—by barbarians. That he gave the appearance of being serious and grave he knew well but in spite of that he was only twenty-seven while he had come to marry an ailing woman of nearly forty.
“It is expedient for both countries,” he thought as the rain dripped from the brim of his hat and slid uncomfortably down his neck.
And so a few days later amidst great pomp and ceremony in the beautiful cathedral of Winchester, Mary Tudor achieved her heart’s desire. God had given her this serious young man who, like herself, was devoted to the true faith, for her husband. She smiled shyly while her heart was filled with happiness. Everything would be put right, she thought. Her people would be brought back into God’s own Church and some of the burden of State would be lifted from her shoulders, but most of all Philip would know how to deal with her devious termagant of a sister. She blushed as she thought that the best way to deal with Elizabeth would be for herself to bear a son and with this young man as her bedfellow she had every hope of doing just that.
Elizabeth was not invited to the wedding.
“’Twas natural enough,” she thought despondently for the country was wholeheartedly against this marriage and only the provision of free wine had induced the people to any show of goodwill. For herself to have been numbered amongst the guests would really have put the cat amongst the pigeons. An uneasy thought crept into her mind, one which had been nagging her for some time. “What if Mary should produce a child? That would be the end of all my hopes and dreams, the Crown would be lost to me forever!” she thought. Common sense came to her rescue. “Mary is nearly past the age of bearing children. She is thirty-nine and she is a sick woman,” she told herself firmly. But stranger things had been heard of! Idly she passed her hand across the window and the diamond from one of her rings scratched the glass. She stared at the scratch and then removed the ring from her finger. Cutting each letter in the glass with the diamond, she left a message for all who came after her to read:
“Much suspected of me
Nothing proved can be
Quoth Elizabeth, Prisoner.”
The rest of that summer she spent badgering Sir Henry to let her write to the Council herself as she had received no reply to her previous letter. He refused to take any responsibility unless he first obtained the necessary permission. At length upon receiving this, she informed him that she had changed her mind and required him to write for her. The poor man was completely exasperated! He was at his wit’s end for never had he met such a complex and infuriating young woman. Added to the daily frustrations of dealing with “this Great Lady” as he called her, the financial situation was becoming dreadful. The Council seemed to have completely forgotten that money was required for the upkeep of such an establishment and even the Queen’s soldiers who had been sent to guard Elizabeth had not been paid for a month and Sir Henry had been obliged to pay the outstanding debts out of his own pocket. Winter would soon be upon them and the house was in desperate need of repair. Sir Henry sat down and once more wrote to the Council although he despaired of meeting with any success.
Elizabeth’s health was still causing her some concern. She suffered from violent headaches and nausea and her body at times became swollen and painful. On the 28th October, Doctors Owen and Wendy arrived at last from London to try to alleviate her suffering by taking some blood from her arm and leg. After which she had to admit she felt much better in health, although not in spirit.
Chapter Eleven
On the 12th November, the bombshell fell! Mary announced that she was pregnant. Elizabeth’s heart sank as she foresaw the end of all her dreams. She thought of all the hours of study, of the galling experiences she had endured and now her shining dream of the Crown—the only thing tha
t had made it all worthwhile—lay in the dust at her feet. To add to her troubles Mary and Philip had opened Parliament and the main object of this Parliament was to pass the Act which would re-establish the Church of Rome in England and if this came to pass Elizabeth knew that she would have to present to the world at least the facade of a Catholic.
On the 24th November, Cardinal Pole arrived bringing with him the Pope’s absolution for the excommunicated country. Reginald Pole had not set foot in his native land for nearly thirty years having chosen exile rather than deny his beliefs. He was the first Papal representative to arrive in England since the days of Cardinal Wolsey. With his coming Elizabeth could count one more enemy and a few days after his arrival the reconciliation took place and England was for the last time in her history a Catholic Country.
Elizabeth was now forced to attend Mass daily and to receive the Sacrament. She had received a letter from her sister concerning her belief in the Doctrine of Transubstantiation. Obviously Mary was again testing her sincerity. To her letter Elizabeth replied with a very cleverly composed verse;
Christ was the word that spake it
He took the bread and brake it
And what his word did make it
That I believe and take it.
Unknown to Elizabeth, Gardiner was once again urging Mary to disinherit her sister by Act of Parliament, on the grounds of Heresy. Mary hesitated for as her pregnancy advanced she turned more and more to her husband for advice and it was Elizabeth’s new brother-in-law who saved her rights. A Bill had already been passed giving Philip the Powers of Regency should Mary die in childbirth but that astute young man realised that should both Mary and the child die, he would be hard put to reach the safety of his own shores and in such a case he realised that Elizabeth would make a very useful ally. According to the reports Sir Henry Bedingfield sent she was giving the outward appearance of a good Catholic and besides she was of a marriageable age and would prove useful in the game of European chess that Philip played so cautiously.
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