The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn (23 page)
Read The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn Online
Authors: Eric Ives
How proud Henry VIII was of his ability to ‘dissemble’. Securing a favourable judgement in England would outflank the emperor’s pressure and give the pope just the excuse he was supposedly looking for to help Henry. Confidence was maintained even when news arrived that imperial envoys were pressing Clement to revoke the case to Rome. Henry and Wolsey were sure the pope would never do that, any more than Francis I, who up to that time had stood solidly with them against Charles V, would make peace with the Empire at the international conference then being planned for Cambrai, and leave England in the cold. Suddenly Campeggio found himself rushed into action. A decision was wanted, now!
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The opening of the legatine court at Blackfriars on 31 May 1529 was, therefore, the latest in a succession of manoeuvres that king and cardinal were confident would give them what they wanted and vindicate Henry’s faith in his minister. Few other people were as sure. Campeggio knew he was under papal orders to avoid a decision at all costs.
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Anne and her allies went on with their preparations against the cardinal, confident that only the miracle of a legatine decision could now save him. The letters from her supporters in Italy kept up an insidious denigration of Wolsey. Ostensibly Campeggio was the target, but there is little doubt who Bryan had in mind when he wrote: ‘Whosoever made your grace believe that he [Clement] will do for you in this cause hath not, as I think, done your grace the best service.’
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Already, when on his way to Italy in December, Bryan had passed on a warning from Francis I that Henry had quislings among his advisers.
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In May, when Wolsey’s ally, Sir John Russell, was ordered to France as the cardinal’s representative and to stiffen the war effort there, he was recalled in the actual process of embarking his horses at Sandwich. Anne Boleyn had reminded the king of Bryan’s warning, and Suffolk was dispatched to France instead, with secret orders to probe the matter.
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The duke did so in a transparent attempt to implicate Wolsey, and although Francis spoke well of the minister’s loyalty and his warning had actually been against Campeggio, under pressure he did (or so Suffolk reported) add the innuendo that Wolsey had:
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Anne and her allies went on with their preparations against the cardinal, confident that only the miracle of a legatine decision could now save him. The letters from her supporters in Italy kept up an insidious denigration of Wolsey. Ostensibly Campeggio was the target, but there is little doubt who Bryan had in mind when he wrote: ‘Whosoever made your grace believe that he [Clement] will do for you in this cause hath not, as I think, done your grace the best service.’
39
Already, when on his way to Italy in December, Bryan had passed on a warning from Francis I that Henry had quislings among his advisers.
40
In May, when Wolsey’s ally, Sir John Russell, was ordered to France as the cardinal’s representative and to stiffen the war effort there, he was recalled in the actual process of embarking his horses at Sandwich. Anne Boleyn had reminded the king of Bryan’s warning, and Suffolk was dispatched to France instead, with secret orders to probe the matter.
41
The duke did so in a transparent attempt to implicate Wolsey, and although Francis spoke well of the minister’s loyalty and his warning had actually been against Campeggio, under pressure he did (or so Suffolk reported) add the innuendo that Wolsey had:
marvellous intelligence with the pope, and in Rome and also with Cardinal Campeggio. Wherefore, seeing that he hath such intelligence with them which have not minded to advance your matter, he [Francis] thinketh it shall be the more need for your grace to have better regard to your said affair.
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There was a second motive too behind the sending of Suffolk: to have an anti-Wolsey partisan to represent England at the peace conference which was beginning to assemble in Flanders, to put him in a position ‘to do “a cardinal of York at Amiens”’
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Wolsey had intended to go himself, if the king had been in favour, but he had to content himself with hamstringing Suffolk’s instructions and precipitating his early return.
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Wolsey had intended to go himself, if the king had been in favour, but he had to content himself with hamstringing Suffolk’s instructions and precipitating his early return.
When Brandon got back in the first week of July, he found that Anne’s faction was ready for the showdown.
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His wife’s humanist schoolmaster, John Palsgrave, who also had links with the duke of Richmond and his mentor, the duke of Norfolk, had been called up to prepare a propaganda pamphlet mocking Wolsey’s period in office as a time of pride, waste, autocratic repression and ineffective tinkering.
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Lord Darcy, one of the principal supports of the previous reign who considered that he had been very badly treated by the cardinal, had drawn up a plan of action - an immediate arrest of Wolsey and his agents, the impounding of their papers and a thorough investigation of his administration: precisely the sort of coup that had destroyed Empson and Dudley in 1509.
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The topics to be scrutinized were listed in detail, the texts drafted of proclamations inviting complaints, all with the obvious end of securing a parliamentary Act of attainder. The only refinement Suffolk needed to add when he got back was to have his own men keep watch on the posts going across the Channel. All that was lacking was the occasion for Anne to ‘prove’ to Henry that the suspicions about Wolsey that had been fed to him were justified. Deprived of royal favour, the cardinal would then be ‘naked to his enemies’.
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His wife’s humanist schoolmaster, John Palsgrave, who also had links with the duke of Richmond and his mentor, the duke of Norfolk, had been called up to prepare a propaganda pamphlet mocking Wolsey’s period in office as a time of pride, waste, autocratic repression and ineffective tinkering.
45
Lord Darcy, one of the principal supports of the previous reign who considered that he had been very badly treated by the cardinal, had drawn up a plan of action - an immediate arrest of Wolsey and his agents, the impounding of their papers and a thorough investigation of his administration: precisely the sort of coup that had destroyed Empson and Dudley in 1509.
46
The topics to be scrutinized were listed in detail, the texts drafted of proclamations inviting complaints, all with the obvious end of securing a parliamentary Act of attainder. The only refinement Suffolk needed to add when he got back was to have his own men keep watch on the posts going across the Channel. All that was lacking was the occasion for Anne to ‘prove’ to Henry that the suspicions about Wolsey that had been fed to him were justified. Deprived of royal favour, the cardinal would then be ‘naked to his enemies’.
47
The fiasco at Blackfriars appeared exactly the opportunity which was wanted. Anne herself was close enough to Henry during the hearings to deliver the
coup de grâce,
so close, indeed, that du Bellay, the French ambassador, confidently expected to hear that she was pregnant.
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Katherine of Aragon had no doubt that a failure of the legatine hearing would provide the opportunity to break the bond between king and cardinal, and Edward Hall certainly states that it was the failure there which convinced Henry of Wolsey’s double dealing.
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This allowed the attack prepared by Anne and the rest to go in. A ‘book’ detailing thirty-four charges against the minister was presented to the king before he left for his summer progress, that is, between 31 July and 4 August, probably alleging that Wolsey was guilty of praemunire, the offence of introducing an illegal foreign authority into England, in other words, acting on the alien authority of the pope.
coup de grâce,
so close, indeed, that du Bellay, the French ambassador, confidently expected to hear that she was pregnant.
48
Katherine of Aragon had no doubt that a failure of the legatine hearing would provide the opportunity to break the bond between king and cardinal, and Edward Hall certainly states that it was the failure there which convinced Henry of Wolsey’s double dealing.
49
This allowed the attack prepared by Anne and the rest to go in. A ‘book’ detailing thirty-four charges against the minister was presented to the king before he left for his summer progress, that is, between 31 July and 4 August, probably alleging that Wolsey was guilty of praemunire, the offence of introducing an illegal foreign authority into England, in other words, acting on the alien authority of the pope.
To the chagrin of the conspirators, Henry took no action. The only part of their scheme which was put in hand was the issue of writs to summon parliament.
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The reason why the attack stalled was that Wolsey had pre-empted it. He had moved the very next day after the closure of the Blackfriars court to conciliate Rochford and the king with what each appreciated most, money. The previous February the cardinal had exchanged the bishopric of Durham (which he held in addition to the archbishopric of York) for the richest English see, Winchester. This had left the revenues of Durham at the king’s disposal, and in the last week of July he had granted them to Anne’s father. Wolsey thereupon threw in the four months’ income due to him for the period October 1528 to February 1529, saying that he had always regarded that as belonging to the king and offering to expedite payment to Rochford.
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Following the success of the bribe, Wolsey’s indispensability rapidly reasserted itself, not only in the management of the divorce, where he was still the key man in relations with Rome, but also in diplomacy. All the evidence suggests that the summer vacation of 1529 began and promised to continue in the normal way, with the king and minister pursuing their own ways until Michaelmas but keeping up an active communication by letter and occasional meetings. The story that Henry refused to visit Wolsey is incorrect.
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The king did call off an intended visit to his country home at the More near Rickmansworth, during which the cardinal would have stayed ten miles away at his abbey of St Albans. However, the reason was fear of the sweat - a motive which one may well credit, given the royal terror of the previous year - and Henry went instead to another Wolsey house, Tittenhanger, which had kept him safe in the 1528 epidemic. This was only three miles from St Albans and the king expected to ‘take such cheer of your Grace [Wolsey] there as he should have had at the More’.
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When drafting his plans Darcy had noted that, if Wolsey were pushed to answer the complaints against him, ‘he clearly doubts not, as he and his affirms, but that he hath the guile and understanding to discharge him of all this light flea- biting or flies-stinging, and yet so to handle all matters that he shall reign still in more authority than ever he did, and all to quake and repent that hath meddled against him.’
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It began to look as if he was right.
50
The reason why the attack stalled was that Wolsey had pre-empted it. He had moved the very next day after the closure of the Blackfriars court to conciliate Rochford and the king with what each appreciated most, money. The previous February the cardinal had exchanged the bishopric of Durham (which he held in addition to the archbishopric of York) for the richest English see, Winchester. This had left the revenues of Durham at the king’s disposal, and in the last week of July he had granted them to Anne’s father. Wolsey thereupon threw in the four months’ income due to him for the period October 1528 to February 1529, saying that he had always regarded that as belonging to the king and offering to expedite payment to Rochford.
51
Following the success of the bribe, Wolsey’s indispensability rapidly reasserted itself, not only in the management of the divorce, where he was still the key man in relations with Rome, but also in diplomacy. All the evidence suggests that the summer vacation of 1529 began and promised to continue in the normal way, with the king and minister pursuing their own ways until Michaelmas but keeping up an active communication by letter and occasional meetings. The story that Henry refused to visit Wolsey is incorrect.
52
The king did call off an intended visit to his country home at the More near Rickmansworth, during which the cardinal would have stayed ten miles away at his abbey of St Albans. However, the reason was fear of the sweat - a motive which one may well credit, given the royal terror of the previous year - and Henry went instead to another Wolsey house, Tittenhanger, which had kept him safe in the 1528 epidemic. This was only three miles from St Albans and the king expected to ‘take such cheer of your Grace [Wolsey] there as he should have had at the More’.
53
When drafting his plans Darcy had noted that, if Wolsey were pushed to answer the complaints against him, ‘he clearly doubts not, as he and his affirms, but that he hath the guile and understanding to discharge him of all this light flea- biting or flies-stinging, and yet so to handle all matters that he shall reign still in more authority than ever he did, and all to quake and repent that hath meddled against him.’
54
It began to look as if he was right.
However, when Henry and Wolsey separated for the summer progress of 1529 there was one crucial difference from the year before: Anne Boleyn. There would be no more of the courteous communications and elegant gifts of 1528. Instead, as Wolsey well knew, Anne would have the field to herself and her supporters, who were dedicated to bringing him down and who now had a ready welcome at court - Norfolk, Suffolk, and particularly Rochford, whose duties as chaperon made him almost ‘counsellor in residence’. Yet progresses end, and Wolsey could know that if he sat tight, the autumn would come and with it the chance to work his magic with the king once again; he could still prove himself too strong for them. August proceeded and the cardinal continued to handle English affairs as usual. Then, with a month or six weeks of the progress still to go, the cardinal began to make mistakes, mistakes which handed his enemies the issue that they had been looking for, not merely to curb his authority but to destroy him completely. His own errors did what the carefully planned coup in July had failed to do, and incredibly, these were in the two areas of his greatest competence - his understanding of the king and his handling of diplomacy. Cardinal Wolsey was not deprived of royal favour following the abortive divorce hearing at Blackfriars, or even after the aristocratic attack on his position which followed that fiasco. He lost Henry’s confidence from late August onwards by miscalculating the king’s mood and by mishandling the Treaty of Cambrai, in which Francis I totally deceived him and caused him, in turn, to mislead his master.
Exploring the diplomatic maze of 1529 would take us too far from Anne Boleyn herself, but a brief account will reveal how it enabled her and her faction to bring him down. Wolsey had for months recognized the probability of peace between Francis I and Charles V, and as early as March 1529 had begun to behave again as the doyen of European summit diplomacy, his favourite role, and one which opened up the possibility that Anglo-French co-operation might force the emperor to abandon Katherine of Aragon as part of the price for peace.
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Wolsey and Henry were agreed on this approach, but the decision in early May to go for a legatine trial in England posed the question of priorities, and the cardinal found to his horror that the king believed that the hearing took precedence over international trouble-shooting.
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Wolsey knew the odds against a decision at Blackfriars and that the only hope was to keep up diplomatic and military pressure to persuade the pope to oblige Henry, but he had to acquiesce.
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Wolsey and Henry were agreed on this approach, but the decision in early May to go for a legatine trial in England posed the question of priorities, and the cardinal found to his horror that the king believed that the hearing took precedence over international trouble-shooting.
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Wolsey knew the odds against a decision at Blackfriars and that the only hope was to keep up diplomatic and military pressure to persuade the pope to oblige Henry, but he had to acquiesce.
The consequence was, first, that Russell had to be sent to France instead of Wolsey, only to be recalled, as we have seen, at the insistence of Anne, in favour of Suffolk,. Then, when Wolsey had managed to neutralize that embassy, he found to his horror that his requests to have the peace conference delayed until after the Blackfriars verdict were being ignored by the French, thanks in part (though he was not aware of this) to the obstructive tactics of the French ambassador in London, du Bellay, whom he imagined was his firm ally.
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Even then, with the negotiations at Cambrai due to begin on 5 July, Henry still refused to let Wolsey go, sending instead Bishop Tunstall and Thomas More, and the cardinal had to waste his time at Blackfriars while 175 miles away Europe’s future was being settled between France and the Empire, with the English envoys (once they had arrived) kept in ignorance and on the sidelines.
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Something of Wolsey’s frustration became evident in an attempt he made in July to embarrass Suffolk (and Anne). The duke’s probing of Francis I on the cardinal’s loyalty had been under a strict pledge of secrecy, but Francis told du Bellay and the ambassador let something of this slip to Wolsey, who promptly complained to Henry that Suffolk had maligned him to the French king.
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The king, unable to admit publicly his own complicity, had to side with the minister until a fortunate (or perhaps wise) indisposition kept Suffolk away from court and, with the simultaneous absence of du Bellay, made it difficult for Wolsey to make more of the affair.
57
Even then, with the negotiations at Cambrai due to begin on 5 July, Henry still refused to let Wolsey go, sending instead Bishop Tunstall and Thomas More, and the cardinal had to waste his time at Blackfriars while 175 miles away Europe’s future was being settled between France and the Empire, with the English envoys (once they had arrived) kept in ignorance and on the sidelines.
58
Something of Wolsey’s frustration became evident in an attempt he made in July to embarrass Suffolk (and Anne). The duke’s probing of Francis I on the cardinal’s loyalty had been under a strict pledge of secrecy, but Francis told du Bellay and the ambassador let something of this slip to Wolsey, who promptly complained to Henry that Suffolk had maligned him to the French king.
59
The king, unable to admit publicly his own complicity, had to side with the minister until a fortunate (or perhaps wise) indisposition kept Suffolk away from court and, with the simultaneous absence of du Bellay, made it difficult for Wolsey to make more of the affair.
The Treaty of Cambrai was signed on 3 August 1529, but this did not mean the end of Wolsey’s nightmare. He had been forced to stand by powerless as the French had duped him.
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Henry now faced the situation that he had most feared: a pope who was the emperor’s man; the ending of the French pressure to force Charles out of Italy; the revocation of the divorce suit by Clement and the prospect of being cited to appear before a hostile tribunal in Rome. How could Wolsey now rescue his king and his own credit? He did manage to stall the citation but it was equally vital that the rapprochement between the Empire and France should not put an end to Francis I’s support for the divorce. The only available lever was that Cambrai had to be ratified by England. This was because Henry had loaned money to Charles V and particularly to Francis I to pay for his ransom after being captured at Pavia. His two sons were hostages in imperial hands and, without the rescheduling of these debts, Francis I stood no chance of raising the ransom money. If Wolsey were to cause difficulties, it might be possible to push France into giving England greater support, and in particular to do more for the king’s divorce - and, no doubt, for Wolsey.
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It was not a policy without risk. The cardinal recognized the danger that the French and the imperialists might ratify the Cambrai peace bilaterally, leaving Henry to face Katherine’s nephew unsupported.
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Nevertheless, with Henry’s concurrence, he set out to try.
60
Henry now faced the situation that he had most feared: a pope who was the emperor’s man; the ending of the French pressure to force Charles out of Italy; the revocation of the divorce suit by Clement and the prospect of being cited to appear before a hostile tribunal in Rome. How could Wolsey now rescue his king and his own credit? He did manage to stall the citation but it was equally vital that the rapprochement between the Empire and France should not put an end to Francis I’s support for the divorce. The only available lever was that Cambrai had to be ratified by England. This was because Henry had loaned money to Charles V and particularly to Francis I to pay for his ransom after being captured at Pavia. His two sons were hostages in imperial hands and, without the rescheduling of these debts, Francis I stood no chance of raising the ransom money. If Wolsey were to cause difficulties, it might be possible to push France into giving England greater support, and in particular to do more for the king’s divorce - and, no doubt, for Wolsey.
61
It was not a policy without risk. The cardinal recognized the danger that the French and the imperialists might ratify the Cambrai peace bilaterally, leaving Henry to face Katherine’s nephew unsupported.
62
Nevertheless, with Henry’s concurrence, he set out to try.
Wolsey’s notion of keeping Francis under pressure enjoyed considerable support during August because of the dubious behaviour of the French ambassador. He badgered Henry to implement the treaty but again and again failed to provide a full text of it.
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Francis was also making demands based on the earlier Treaty of Madrid, and on 28 August the king asked the minister for private advice before he discussed this with the council and the ambassador.
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An interim meeting with du Bellay the next day only increased Henry’s suspicion.
65
In reply, Wolsey emphasized England’s potential exposure to a claim by the French for military support and implied bad faith on their part in omitting a caveat he himself had negotiated at Amiens in 1527. Henry read his letter late on Monday, 30 August, when he came in from a good day’s hunting, and his suspicions of the French were confirmed: he was ‘much kindled and waxed warm and thought himself not well handled by them’.
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However, he called for Wolsey’s detailed points to be checked overnight against both the text of the Treaty of Madrid (to which the Cambrai accords frequently alluded) and the Amiens agreement.
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Rochford and Gardiner were in attendance, and they were charged with the task. The following day sentiment changed. Further discussion convinced Henry that Wolsey had it wrong and that his recommendations should be ignored. The cardinal was told that full concessions would be made to France, and that he was allowing resentment at the Cambrai débâcle to cloud his judgement.
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Francis was also making demands based on the earlier Treaty of Madrid, and on 28 August the king asked the minister for private advice before he discussed this with the council and the ambassador.
64
An interim meeting with du Bellay the next day only increased Henry’s suspicion.
65
In reply, Wolsey emphasized England’s potential exposure to a claim by the French for military support and implied bad faith on their part in omitting a caveat he himself had negotiated at Amiens in 1527. Henry read his letter late on Monday, 30 August, when he came in from a good day’s hunting, and his suspicions of the French were confirmed: he was ‘much kindled and waxed warm and thought himself not well handled by them’.
66
However, he called for Wolsey’s detailed points to be checked overnight against both the text of the Treaty of Madrid (to which the Cambrai accords frequently alluded) and the Amiens agreement.
67
Rochford and Gardiner were in attendance, and they were charged with the task. The following day sentiment changed. Further discussion convinced Henry that Wolsey had it wrong and that his recommendations should be ignored. The cardinal was told that full concessions would be made to France, and that he was allowing resentment at the Cambrai débâcle to cloud his judgement.
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