Mary Tudor: The First Queen

by Linda Porter

  Those spared by the weather might equally succumb to disease. Epidemics did not always follow bad harvests but their effects were just as devastating. In 1558, the year of Mary’s own demise, a virus probably related to influenza caused one of the greatest losses of life in England in a single year since the Black Death.

  Outsiders viewed Mary’s England as an unattractive place to live. Physically, its countryside was pleasing enough and London, with its skyline of churches, impressive, but there were few other positive aspects. Visitors saw a land fractured by religious dissension, very much prey to its treacherous nobility and unstable climate. It was not, as one Spaniard discovered in 1554, a healthy environment.‘I am’, reported Juan de Barahona, ‘full of furuncles and of the itch, the doctors tell me it is due to the water, because I do not drink beer and now I drink water boiled with cinnamon, because the water of this country is very bad and becomes putrid in the stomach.’4

  This was the reason why Englishmen consumed so much alcohol and spent far too long in taverns, a lifestyle that foreigners thought contributed to disorder and moral degeneracy. Scheyfve, the imperial ambassador, spoke for many observers when he noted that ‘the subjects of this realm are wont to live in pleasure-seeking and intemperance, haunt taverns and become wholly idle and disorderly’.5 Nicolaus Mameranus, an imperial commentator on his first visit to England, was shocked by the intemperance he witnessed. He proposed a sweeping remedy for this ‘nuisance of public drinking, (introduced by Satan) by both sexes in public taverns’. The solution amounted to a prohibitive levy on anyone who drank just for the sake of drinking, by requiring them to pay the equivalent of what they spent on drink directly into the national coffers. ‘This would be beneficial to the commonwealth and public salvation. Such ruinous disgrace exists nowhere else in Christendom and ought to be permitted in no Christian state.’6

  Incorrigible as the lower orders were, the nobility were hardly any better. They were all ‘ambitious, revengeful, seekers after novelties, inconstant, given to conspiracies, only held in check by fear of the sword’.7 Not one of the new men raised up by her father spoke out in defence of Mary’s claim or came to her aid. The old families, who supported the princess and her mother in the 1530s, had suffered, sometimes with their lives, and seen their power and influence eroded. They disliked the upstarts as much as she did but, until now, were unable to raise their voices without fear of recrimination. Henry, Lord Stafford, the son-in-law of Margaret Pole, tried repeatedly to obtain some restitution from Northumberland that would help him pay off his debts, but got nowhere. He hoped for better things under Mary, and in his heartfelt letter to her of October 1553 he reminded her of all that his family had endured over two decades: ‘I am bold to declare my state, remembering that my wife’s friends chose death rather than consent to your disinheritance in your tender years. I desire neither high authority nor dukedom, but the inheritance I was born to if malice had not defeated me … why should I despair, having so merciful a mistress, who daily restores rightful heirs? Pardon me troubling you; consider the old saying, need and necessity have no laws.’8 His petition resulted in his being granted one of the two offices of chamberlain of the exchequer four months later.

  Yet there was a certain disingenuousness in Stafford’s appeal to Mary which mirrors the complications of noble life in mid-Tudor England and also casts light on the queen’s suspicions of those she might otherwise, in more stable times, have consulted with confidence. The baron had always been keen to keep on the good side of those who were in power. As a warm supporter of Somerset he supported religious change and would not receive his sister Elizabeth, the duchess of Norfolk, who had also risked much for Katherine of Aragon. And his two children were a dreadful embarrassment.Thomas led an unsuccessful invasion in 1557 and Dorothy, a committed Protestant, chose exile in John Calvin’s Geneva rather than live under Mary Tudor. The queen did not restore Stafford to his executed father’s dukedom of Buckingham, no doubt mindful of the long-standing uneasy relationship between the Crown and the Staffords. If she wanted guidance, she would have to look elsewhere. In fact, there were, in her mind, very few people she could trust in her unpredictable country. But govern it she must and, with God’s help, she would make it a better place.

  The picture of Mary as a woman who had little grasp of what was going on, who could not work with her politicians and was essentially run by her cousin, Charles V, is entirely false. From the very beginning, the queen had a clear idea of what she wanted to do and the utter determination to achieve it. She never, even when unwell, shrank from the business of government, and she knew that she must draw on the experience of the men who had tried to deprive her of her throne. Without their expertise, and their very real sense of duty to the Crown, nothing could function, and Mary recognised this from the outset. She did not like them and it is fair to say they probably did not like her, but their need was mutual. Her strong voice and personality, coupled with a notable temper at times, meant that she was no pushover, to be manipulated as they saw fit. On one occasion, she reduced William Paget to tears, something that her father never did. She was naturally outspoken and found it hard to hide her feelings. As queen, she was not obliged to curb her tongue lest she be hectored as she had been by her brother’s privy council.

  The most pressing priority for Mary was to re-establish the structure of orderly government. Uncertainty over the succession had distracted from the smooth running of affairs, and it was time to address the many issues of day-to-day administration, as well as putting down markers on key policies. On the day Mary was proclaimed, William Cecil, a councillor who she believed bore her little goodwill, set off to meet her at Ipswich, armed with a list of areas for early resolution. Whatever they thought of each other, the past could not be allowed to intrude into the demands of the present. Cecil had a veritable shopping list of matters of state, ranging from the burial of Edward VI (which had not yet taken place) to foreign policy, the economy, the restitution of law, the calling of Parliament and the coronation. There was, interestingly, no specific mention of religion. At the top of his agenda was the need to establish a council. He could have served on it if he had wished, but he declined the offer when it was made and returned to private life. His Protestantism was not of the strident kind, but it was deeply held, and he knew he would be uncomfortable working with Mary.

  At the time of her proclamation, Mary had 21 councillors with her in East Anglia. They were her household officers and the leading local men who answered her summons for assistance. None of them had any experience of national government, and though they had been successful in putting Mary on the throne, they were not necessarily well qualified to run the country. Uncomfortable as it might be, only an injection of Edwardian councillors could supply the continuity that the government must have if it was to function effectively and without challenge. By mid-August more than a dozen of them had been nominated. At the same time, various opponents of her brother’s policies, churchmen and aristocrats like Gardiner and Norfolk, were also added, swelling the total to 44.

  Much was made at the time - and has been subsequently - of the unwieldiness of such a large group of councillors. How could they possibly be effective, especially since many of them could not stand each other, and what might be expected of people like Robert Rochester and the country knights, men who had never functioned at this level before? The answer, like much to do with Mary’s reign, is not the most obvious one.The council soon split into two groups, a smaller core of about 20, with regular attendees who handled much of the responsibility, and a wider circle whose presence was much less frequent. Mary could not deprive those who had served her so loyally, and she was faced with their complaints at the injustice of finding themselves sharing power with men who had tried to keep her off the throne. Lord Derby confided in the imperial ambassadors that there was discontent among those who had stood by the queen in her days of adversity, because she had ‘admitted so readily to the council those who conspired against he
r life’.9 But the first councillors felt, with considerable justification, that the assumption that they had no skills to bring to government was insulting. Rochester was clearly a superb organiser who knew how to call on public support. He had delivered for Mary in a way that completely outclassed anything that the Edwardian councillors achieved in respect of the unfortunate Jane Grey. So he held firm, as one of the inner core.

  Paget, Arundel and their colleagues from the previous government, on the other hand, were determined to ignore the past. Like Edward, it was dead and gone. They saw service to the Crown as something to which they had committed their lives, and were pragmatic about whom they served. Confident in their ability, quick to exploit opportunities, they emphasised moving forward. They would compromise where necessary, but only to get their way. Stephen Gardiner, appointed Lord Chancellor shortly after his release from the Tower of London, was a more difficult proposition than the Marian household officers, and tensions inevitably arose. But though he and Paget detested one another, and had done since Paget’s abandonment of his former mentor under Henry VIII, the impact of their feuding has been overemphasised.

  They appeared to have drifted far apart, these two doughty survivors of Mary’s father.Yet their mutual antipathy seemed more serious than was actually the case. It may have been a distraction but it was not automatically an impediment to getting things done. They had more in common than either felt inclined to admit. Both had supported, over many years, a pro-imperial policy, and neither fully enjoyed the queen’s confidence. Gardiner’s political career was made by his role in the divorce of Katherine of Aragon, when he was sent on mission to Rome by Henry, who expected him to manage the presentation of his case so as to bring about the pope’s acquiescence. He failed, but his endeavours and the subsequent support he gave to the idea of the royal supremacy over the Church in England earned him a prominent place among Henry’s advisers. None of this endeared him to Mary, but as his fortunes changed, and his disputes with Archbishop Cranmer grew, her opinion of him seems to have modified. Gardiner quarrelled with the reformers throughout the bitterly disputed struggle for power in the 1540s, and under Edward this theme continued, leading to his incarceration in the Tower. He paid for his refusal to accept the new religious legislation with the loss of his liberty, and Mary acknowledged his steadfastness during these difficult times when she raised him to the Lord Chancellorship, but he was never really her man. Gardiner was still more politician than theologian. Mary was soon to discover that, when it came to the question of her marriage, his views were quite different from her own.

  Paget’s Catholicism was less public but it was the faith that he embraced. In his mind, it bound the people of England together more effectively than Protestantism, and for that reason above all he supported its restitution. Mary remained unenthusiastic about him, lumping him in her mind with the other new men of her father’s time, raised up from nothing to assume the greatest offices of the land. But no one could deny his experience, his linguistic ability or his diplomatic skills. The queen knew she could not rule without his input, even if she found him distasteful. He was as committed to the Habsburg connection as she was, and his vision for England’s international role was the closest to Mary’s of any councillor.

  Most of the criticisms of the privy council came from the imperial ambassador, Simon Renard, who had no direct knowledge of how its business was actually transacted and wanted to represent it to Charles V in the worst possible light. He thought the chancellor and Paget were both flawed. For him, Gardiner was too inclined to find an English solution for everything, ignoring the might and influence of the emperor. His view of Paget was even less flattering, and he delighted in depicting the minister as a greedy chancer who wanted only financial reward.This misrepresentation was fuelled by unwarranted ambassadorial pride. Renard’s ability to get along with Paget was compromised from the start of his mission by the coolly perceptive but cruel warning of the bishop of Arras that ‘he [Paget] is more than a match for you’. Renard, who had a high opinion of himself, did not take the hint. More generally, he interpreted personal friction, which certainly did exist among Mary’s advisers, as a sign that the council was incapacitated. It was not. Discussion and debate, however heated, did not equate to debilitation. There had been many and frequent arguments among councillors in the two preceding reigns. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about Mary’s council is how well, not how badly, it worked.

  She was determined that it should, and that she must swallow her doubts and establish herself as its head. On 16 August, the imperial representatives were evidently irritated to find their audience with the queen postponed, because Mary was so heavily involved in council meetings that if she had tried to fit them in as well she would have lost the tide that would take her down to Richmond. They viewed Mary’s dealings with the council in an entirely negative light, evidently assuming that the queen was completely under the thumb of these ‘inconstant and variable’ men.‘We perceive by the evidence of our own experience and by the messages she sends us that she places herself so much under the authority of her council that she does not grant any except public audiences. ’10 But the assertion they went on to make, that she was afraid of her advisers, is unsubstantiated. It did not occur to Renard and his colleagues that Mary might have her own reasons for wanting to appear transparent in her handling of important matters of state, or that she could believe that her authority would be enhanced by working with the council rather than marginalising it. Too many private audiences with diplomats in these weeks immediately after her accession sent out the wrong messages. She soon demonstrated that when she wanted to keep things to herself, she would do so without any fear at all.

  Queen and council had much to absorb their attention in these early weeks of the reign. The state of the economy, the conduct of foreign policy, the question of religion - all vied as issues for immediate consideration and action. At the same time, the coronation must be arranged, with appropriate ceremonial and imagery, Parliament called and the royal household established.The council could advise, but nothing could be undertaken without Mary’s consent. In this strongly patriarchal society, 20 men had to learn how to deal with a woman as monarch for the first time. But there was no real time to agonise over what it might mean, and Mary’s gender was not viewed as a barrier to getting things done, except, interestingly, by her cousin Charles V and the imperial diplomats. There was much to be learned, and quickly, on all sides, but the first impressions of Mary’s intentions were very positive.

  By early September significant moves were being made to get the finances of the house of Tudor back into good order. A proclamation fixing the value of newly minted gold and silver coins and the publication of their comparative value with the much-adulterated coinage of EdwardVI produced an immediately beneficial effect, lowering prices by one-third. And on top of this, Mary repaid the debts of her father and brother, which greatly strengthened public goodwill.‘No one’, commented the imperial ambassadors,‘expected so much … the publication came very opportunely and will turn many an old servitor, minister, officer, besides merchants, bankers, captains, pensioners, soldiers and others, who had no expectations of the kind and hoped nothing from the queen, from their tendencies to evil.’ In general, the public mood could not be better: ‘The people … are full of hope that her reign will be a godly, righteous and just one, and help to establish her firmly on the throne.’11

  For Mary personally, however, an equally pressing concern was religion. The queen heard the advice that was being given from all sides, that she should be circumspect in her approach to undoing the changes of her brother’s reign, particularly as Protestant opinion in London itself was strong and there were outbreaks of violence when the mass was reintroduced. But family matters intruded and played on her conscience. Edward’s funeral had not yet taken place and she was swayed from her plans to bury her brother using Catholic rites only with considerable difficulty. The part of her that had always thought of
him as her godson and a little boy was hard to suppress. He might be dead, but she knew what was best for him, what his soul needed. In life, she was convinced that he had been the tool of schemers who wanted to use religion for their own ends. She could never accept that his beliefs were as deeply held as hers, and she wanted his funeral to be her final gift to him, the expression of her love and desire to return him to the religion in which he had been born. It was what propriety and her father’s will demanded, she told the dismayed Simon Renard. ‘It would too sorely violate her conscience to allow the late king, her brother, to be buried otherwise than as religion dictated, for she was bound by the late King Henry’s will, in which he left instructions for masses and prayers to be said.’ If she had got her way it would, of course, have also been a very public, stinging blow to the Protestant cause, and her own words show how much she understood that aspect.‘If she appeared to be afraid, her subjects, particularly the Lutherans, would only become more audacious, and would proclaim that she had not dared to do her own will. She was determined to tell the council that she was going to have a mass said at the funeral’.

  But others demurred and eventually prevailed on the queen to think again. At a time when there was still concern about her hold on the crown, those around her thought it was a step too far. She had already been compelled, before she even reached London, to issue a proclamation for the suppression of false rumours, the ‘light, seditious or naughty talk’ that was still circulating.12 So a compromise was reached, whereby Edward was buried in Westminster Abbey following Protestant liturgy. The service, on 8 August, was presided over by Cranmer and the bishop of Chichester. With the marquess of Winchester as his chief mourner, Edward was laid to rest, while his sister salvaged her troubled conscience by hearing a requiem mass in St Peter’s chapel, in the Tower of London.