by Neil Hanson
CHAPTER SEVEN
The Sea Beggars
The launching of the Armada was the greatest but by no means the only part of Philip’s masterplan for the subjugation of England. His diplomats, military commanders, spies, agents provocateurs, foreign clients and puppets had also been set to work in a dozen different states, each attempting to bring his part of the great enterprise to fruition at the right time to influence the course of events in England. Philip’s envoy in Constantinople was endeavouring to ensure that the Turks did not seek to take advantage of his military preoccupation with northern Europe by launching a surprise attack on Spain’s Mediterranean coast. The Doge of Venice was also wooed to ensure his support or, at the least, his neutrality, and Philip’s ambassador in Prague was tasked with securing military and financial support from the Emperor, Rudolf II. His mission was only partially successful; Rudolf sent a contingent of troops to aid Parma, but no money to defray the costs of the Armada. Agents among the German princedoms and the Swiss cantons worked to spread disinformation and sow divisions that would hamper any move against Flanders from the east.
Philip’s agents and clients were also active in Ireland, Scotland and France, but their efforts in those countries were not directed towards diplomacy; their aim was nothing less than to foment rebellion and insurrection. The native population of Ireland was both Catholic and pro-Spanish, and despite the brutal English reprisals that had followed the failure of the Hispano-Papal invasion in 1580, rebel chieftains such as O’Rourke, O’Doherty and McDoe were still willing to rise against the hated English at the first sign of wholehearted support from Philip, but it had to take tangible form, for they had been let down by his promises before. If they were armed, funded and reinforced with Spanish troops, there seemed no reason why they could not sweep the Protestant settlers and their English defenders into the sea. The English garrison, mostly based in Dublin and the Pale (the fortified area around Dublin controlled by the English), was very modest in size, under 2,000 soldiers, and apart from a handful of castles and strongpoints the entire west of the country was hostile territory. But when Philip abandoned his original plan for the Armada to make a diversionary landing in Ireland, he seems also to have ceased to encourage the Irish rebel chieftains to begin an insurrection. Whether that was through oversight, a shortage of funds or troops, or a reluctance to involve himself in too many arenas at once, the result was to remove a great deal of the pressure to divide her forces that Elizabeth would otherwise have faced.
However, if Ireland was largely left to its own devices, much greater efforts were expended on Scotland. The defeat and expulsion of Mary, Queen of Scots, and her French troops in 1568 had established Scotland as a Protestant kingdom, but it was more a loose federation of warring nobles and clans than a coherent state, and the writ of its king, James VI, did not extend far into the highlands and islands of his realm. Scotland was “not like other States, solid and stable, where no changes can be brought about except after great preparations. In Scotland any accident will bring about a change, as the realm is so divided and dismembered and anyone attacking it with force is assured of victory as there are no strong towns and but few fortresses.” A group of powerful Catholic lords had never accepted the Protestant regime imposed upon them and, supported by Spain, were willing to take up arms to overthrow it. Catholics still formed a majority of the population and, as the threat from Spain grew, Elizabeth had tried to secure “the realm’s postern gate” by binding James ever closer to her. She would not grant the one thing that would have bound him closest—public acknowledgement as her chosen heir, for she continued to refuse to name her successor—but as she grew older and the prospect of her ever having a child diminished from remote to literally inconceivable, James was given private assurances that he would succeed to the throne.
In July 1586, in confirmation of an informal agreement reached the previous summer, Elizabeth and James signed the Treaty of Berwick, guaranteeing to maintain the current religion of their countries, not to enter into any treaty prejudicial to the other party and to provide armed intervention in the event of an attack upon either. The twenty-one-year-old James received £4,000 in cash, a pension of £4,000 a year and an assurance that “nothing would be done that imperilled his title to the English Crown,” and in return he promised to control his perennially troublesome Catholic lords and acquiesce in the continuing imprisonment of his mother. Although James infuriated Elizabeth “by refusing to listen to her increasingly hectoring advice,” as he realized and regretted almost as soon as he had put his signature to the treaty, it gave her everything she sought at a very modest price; “after all the golden mountains offered, [he] received only a fiddler’s wage.” It is even arguable that the treaty removed the last obstacle to the execution of his mother, by driving a wedge between James and his Catholic subjects and forcing him into ever greater dependence on England, but his own long-term interests were best served by supporting Elizabeth. If she lived out her reign, he would then inherit her crown; if she was deposed by Spain, Philip would place his daughter on the throne.
Despite the Treaty of Berwick, continuing rumours and reports reached Elizabeth of “plots at [the Scottish] court,” “Spanish gold” and “offers from the Duke of Parma.” Since January 1587 Mendoza had been urging that she “should be assailed on the Scottish side,” to compel her to divide her forces and fight on two fronts at once. “It would upset the Englishwoman to find herself attacked on that side, besides being a great thing to get a footing and a free port in the island in view of eventualities”—by which he can only have meant the landing of Spanish troops. Robert Bruce, the intermediary between Mendoza and Parma and the Scottish Catholic lords, even claimed that “the easiest means” for invading England “[was] the entrance from Scotland. This would divide the English forces . . . No less advantage may be looked for from the conquest and conversion of England by the Catholic Lords than from the [Catholic] League in France, which at first did not possess so much force. The country was never in so favourable a condition for being conquered as at present, owing to the disputes that exist.”1
Philip responded by ordering that three Catholic lords on the Spanish payroll, the Earls of Huntly and Morton and Lord Claud Hamilton, were to be “kept in hand and encouraged to expect the aid they require.” After the execution of Mary he gave them further encouragement, promising weapons, Spanish troops and “150,000 crowns three or four months after they have taken up arms and liberated their King [from Elizabeth’s influence].” They were ready to revolt at once, but Philip wanted them held back until the Armada was approaching England: “It will be well to consult the Duke of Parma as to the best time for the earls to rise.” But the delays in launching the Armada thoroughly alarmed Bruce, for the preparations for rebellion could not be wholly hidden from the spies of James and Elizabeth. On 18 February 1588, Bruce complained that “if the support agreed upon does not arrive quickly, the Catholic Lords will be obliged to defend themselves prematurely under overwhelming difficulties and to the great risk of the cause.” Philip responded in March, authorizing Bruce to “pay the Catholic Lords the 10,000 crowns” he had been given as soon as the exiled Earl of Morton and Colonel William Semple, the traitor of Lierre in The Netherlands, had returned to Scotland to prepare the ground for the planned insurrection. Parma at once made arrangements for the two men to “embark at night from Dunkirk.” Meanwhile the Scots were to be “urgently shown the importance of securing the port of Little Leith [on the Firth of Forth].” Philip voiced his optimism about the prospects of success for Morton and Semple. They were “going on an excellent mission . . . some good effect may be produced.” “It is well that they should make what effort they can to see whether the blood of his mother will not arouse him [ James VI] to vengeance.” But whatever urge for vengeance had been aroused in James’s heart, he would not have forgotten that the Spanish King had encouraged Mary to disinherit her son and name Philip as her chosen heir. Philip continued, “Even if the
King will not declare himself, it will be most advantageous for Morton to cross the English border at the time the main blow is struck.”2
Morton and Semple had fair weather and made a clandestine landing in Scotland only four days after they departed from Dunkirk, but the plan began to go badly wrong soon afterwards. The Armada’s one-month halt at Corunna, following the delays in leaving Lisbon, left it well behind the agreed schedule, and as it absorbed ever more of Philip’s attention and his treasure no further military or financial support for the Scottish Catholic lords was forthcoming. James had also been alerted to the presence of the traitors on his soil and on 7 July Mendoza reported that the Scots King had “declared himself much more openly than before against the Catholics . . . The English faction are desirous that the King should arrest Morton,” who had “retired further into the North and raised troops. Morton, Huntly and Claud Hamilton were in close union and had collected a large force in case the King should attempt to attack them.” Ten days later it was reported that as James was “trying to seize him, the Earl of Morton had therefore been obliged to embark and had gone in search of the Spanish fleet . . . After his embarkation, the Earl fell ill and was obliged by contrary weather and his illness to land secretly and obtain medical help. He was then captured by an enemy of his and the King now has him in his hands under guard. The Queen in consequence of this has sent a Secretary of the Council to Scotland with £4,000 in cash and great efforts were being made to have Morton executed.”
It is probable that Morton was betrayed by another Spanish client, Henri, Duc de Guise. Catherine de’ Medici had tried to ease the pressure on her son, Henri III, and stop the fighting in France by persuading de Guise to use his forces to “assist the King of Scotland in his English enterprise, since he now shows signs of turning Catholic.” Mendoza was scathing. “In the face of the fact that the Duc de Guise, Cardinal Bourbon and the other confederate princes are in arms to extirpate heretics, it is a fine idea to persuade them to help to the throne of England the King of Scotland, who has been a heretic from his cradle.” Spain’s interests required that de Guise continue his destabilizing campaign in France. Despite de Guise’s claim that his loyalty to Philip “outweighs all other considerations . . . if the King of Scots is his cousin, he looks upon the King of Spain as the father of all Catholics and especially of him,” Mendoza had not kept him informed of the plans to stir revolt in Scotland, and when he discovered them the furious de Guise passed the information to James. “This was mainly instrumental in rendering it abortive.”3
William Ashley, Elizabeth’s new ambassador in Scotland, had his first meeting with James on 3 August. The King told him that his continued loyalty required something more tangible than “fair promises,” and he hinted at the offers being made to him by Spanish emissaries. Elizabeth was well aware of the threat that a revolt in Scotland could pose, and as the Armada approached she took further steps to assure herself of James’s loyalty. Five thousand pounds was handed by Robert Bowes “to the Laird of Carmichael for the King of Scots,” and when the news of the sighting of the Armada reached Edinburgh on 8 August, Ashley offered James enough “to satisfy His Majesty for the time and to qualify the minds of the nobility to keep all in quiet.” James was to receive the Duchy of Lancaster and its revenues, an increased pension, a royal guard of 50 gentlemen, and a company of 100 cavalry and 100 foot, all maintained at Elizabeth’s expense. He was also left with the clear impression that he would at last be publicly proclaimed as her chosen successor. Elizabeth wrote to him giving oblique references to the succession. “If by leaving them [the Spaniards] unhelped, you may increase the English hearts unto you, you shall not do the worst deed for your behalf.”
As a result James wrote to Elizabeth expressing his undying loyalty, offering “unto you my forces, my person and all that I command . . . I promise to behave myself not as a stranger and foreign prince, but as your natural son and compatriot . . . I with honour and all my good subjects with a fervent goodwill may embrace this, your Godly and honest cause, whereby your adversaries may have ado, not with England, but with the whole island of Britain.” James was also reported to be “willing to hazard his Crown and life in defence of Her Majesty,” and gave Elizabeth further reassurance by arresting Lord Maxwell, another prominent Scottish Catholic, who had intrigued on Spain’s and Mary, Queen of Scots’, behalf on numerous occasions, and since April 1588 had been assembling followers to secure a base to assist an invasion of either Scotland or England. James had a proclamation read at every market cross in Scotland, ordering his people to repel any attempted Spanish landing on their shores.
Without a direct intervention by Spanish troops, Philip’s hopes of a rebellion and a second front in Scotland now looked as doomed as his plans for Ireland, but, aided by Mendoza’s intrigues, Spanish plans in France were much closer to fruition. Lord Charles Howard’s reading of the European situation was remarkably acute. “This abusing [of ] the treaty of peace does plainly show how the King of Spain will have all things perfect [as] his plot is laid, before he will proceed to execute. I am persuaded he will see the Duke of Guise bring the French [King] to his purpose before he will act.” As Howard had predicted, de Guise and his supporters in the Catholic League were indeed active on their own and Philip’s behalf.4
Under relentless pressure from Spain and the League, the weak and vacillating Henri III had agreed to revoke the royal edicts of toleration of Protestants and outlaw the Reformed Church. Henri, the last of the Valois line since the death of his brother François, Duc d’Anjou, in 1584, had no children—his penchant for women’s clothing and the company of handsome young men suggested that none would ever be born to him—and his heir apparent was the Huguenot leader Henri Bourbon of Navarre. In September 1585 Pope Sixtus had issued a Bull denouncing Navarre as a heretic, absolving his vassals of allegiance to him, depriving him of his estates and declaring him unfit to succeed to the throne of France. The Catholic League demanded that he should be replaced as heir by the geriatric Cardinal Charles of Bourbon, as much a Spanish stalking horse as Cardinal Henry had been in Portugal. The subsequent “Guerre des Trois Henris”—Valois, de Guise and Navarre, who battled over the crown and the succession—led to a fresh slaughter of Protestants by Catholics, and Catholics by Protestants.
Navarre’s forces had waged a guerrilla campaign but had been defeated in almost every open battle until Coutras in October 1587, where they overwhelmed the forces of the Duc de Joyeuse, one of the King’s favourites. Instead of exploiting his victory by linking up with a force of Swiss and German mercenaries recruited with Elizabeth’s money and marching on Paris, Navarre sent an emissary offering his support to the King in return for concessions. His armies then disbanded and returned home, leaving the mercenaries to fight alone against the forces of de Guise. The King had hoped that the two forces would exhaust each other in battle in Lorraine, but the mercenaries had only the most minor skirmishes with de Guise’s men before marching into the heart of France, to the fury of the King’s secretary Pinart. “The devil take them, why could they not have stayed in Lorraine where they could have done what was required?” Increasingly impoverished and disillusioned, and abandoned by both Navarre and Elizabeth, who was unwilling to invest further money, they lost their stomach for a fight and remained in France only in the hope of exacting a ransom from the King. Despite being outnumbered by six to one, de Guise’s forces then launched a surprise attack and slaughtered thousands. Those left alive were allowed to return home under a safe conduct from the King, who then tried to claim credit for the victory at such minimal loss of French life. However, it was de Guise’s name that echoed from every pulpit in Paris.
Mendoza was delighted with the success of Spain’s clients and wrote to Philip from Paris, “On the whole, in spite of the victory of the King of Navarre . . . events here could hardly have gone the more happily for Your Majesty’s affairs. The people of Paris can be relied on at any time; they are more deeply than ever in obedience to
the Duc de Guise.” Their obedience would soon be put to good use. The Parisian supporters of the Catholic League had established secret caches of arms, cobblestones and barrels filled with earth and stones, as barricades proof even against musket fire. With the confidence of a puppet-master, Mendoza reported that Paris would be ready to revolt at any time after Martinmas [11 November] 1587 but he would need some weeks’ notice of the launching of the Armada to bring matters to a head at the appropriate time. When word came from Philip that Santa Cruz would sail not later than 15 February, Mendoza and the League set events in train for that date. De Guise issued a manifesto early that month, demanding the removal of suspected heretics from the King’s entourage and a declaration of his unequivocal support for the Catholic League. Chambers of the Inquisition were to be established in every province, Huguenot property confiscated and all prisoners who refused to recant their heresy put to death. It was—deliberately—an impossible manifesto for the King to accept, and he announced instead that he would raise an army against the League. 5
At this crucial stage, Mendoza received the news of Santa Cruz’s death and the postponement of the Armada. The next morning the French Queen Mother, Catherine de’ Medici, as adept at manipulation and dissimulation as Mendoza himself, persuaded her son to enter negotiations with de Guise rather than confront him on the battlefield. However, Henri did not intend to sit on his hands while Spain crushed the English and the Dutch, completing the encirclement of his country, and he also feared that the Armada might be targeted not at England but at France. He “found it hard to believe that they were going to attack England because, as the Catholic King [Philip] had no ports to protect his ships from the furious storms of those seas . . . it would be rash to send a powerful fleet.” He had reason to fear that the allies of de Guise might help the Armada to capture one or more Channel ports, or that the Army of Flanders might storm into France and seize Calais, threatening Henri and England alike. Henri’s latest favourite, the Duc d’Epernon, prepared to launch a campaign to secure the Channel ports. He would then join forces with the English fleet or, if the Armada had already triumphed, invade Flanders and Artois before Parma’s troops could return from England.
