The Queen's Agent: Francis Walsingham at the Court of Elizabeth I (14 page)

7
Ursula: PRO, PROB 11/100, fol. 92r–v; PRO, PROB 11/75, fol. 262v; ‘Journal of Sir Francis Walsingham’, 7; C. H. and T. Cooper,
Athenae Cantabrigienses
(Cambridge, 1858), II, 87; NPG 1705. Don Antonio’s diamond: Read,
Walsingham
, II, 56–7, 81–2.

8
Barn Elms: ‘Journal of Sir Francis Walsingham’, 38–40, 48; John Nichols,
The Progresses and Public Processions of Queen Elizabeth
(New York, 1973), II, 440 and III, 27–8. Horses: TNA SP 12/224, fol. 160–3. Odiham: TNA SP 12/109, fol. 11r; Simon Adams, Alan Bryson and Mitchell Leimon, ‘Sir Francis Walsingham’ in
Oxford DNB
. Portrait, house and garden: Roy Strong,
The Artist and the Garden
(New Haven and London, 2000), 47 and plates 49, 50. Dutch gables and banqueting houses: Mark Girouard,
Elizabethan Architecture
(New Haven and London, 2009), 96, 104–6, 171, 274. Cosyn and Bacheler: S. Sadie (ed.),
The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
(London, 1980), I, 880–1 and IV, 827.

9
English royal arms: John Guy,
My Heart is My Own: The Life of Mary Queen of Scots
(London, 2004), 95–6, 105.

10
Cecil and the ‘casket letters’: ibid., chapters 25–6; Stephen Alford,
Burghley: William Cecil at the Court of Elizabeth I
(New Haven and London, 2008), 151–3.

11
Franchiotto: TNA, SP 12/47, fol. 84; TNA SP 70/101, fol. 4; TNA SP 12/48, fol. 50; TNA SP 70/122, fol. 167;
HMC Salisbury
(London, 1883–1976), I, 361. Security: Walsingham to Cecil 20 Dec. 1568, TNA SP 12/48/61, fol. 165r.

12
The earls’ proclamation: BL Harley 6990, fol. 90. Northumberland’s confession: TNA SP 15/21, fol. 108–15. Other details from K. J. Kesselring,
The Northern Rebellion of 1569
(Basingstoke and New York, 2007); Mervyn James, ‘The Concept of Honour and the Northern Rising, 1569’,
PP
60 (1973), 49–83; Julian Lock, ‘Thomas Percy, seventh Earl of Northumberland’ in
Oxford DNB
. 

13
Ridolfi and his plot: TNA SP 12/59, fol. 11–13, 81–2, 84–5, 86, 102; TNA SP 12/74, fol. 43–5; Alford,
Burghley
, chapter 12; Robyn Adams, ‘The Service I am Here For: William Herle in the Marshalsea Prison, 1571’,
HLQ
72 (2009), 217–38. The Papey: John Stow,
A Survey of London
, ed. C. L. Kingsford (Oxford, 1908), under ‘Aldgate warde’.

14
Atrocity stories: Natalie Zemon Davis, ‘The Rites of Violence: Religious Riot in Sixteenth-Century France’,
PP
59 (1973), 51–91; Mack P. Holt,
The French Wars of Religion
(Cambridge, 2005), 62–3.

15
Saint Marceau: John Tedeschi, ‘Tomasso Sassetti’s Account of the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre’, in A. Soman (ed.),
The Massacre of St Bartholomew: Reappraisals and Documents
(The Hague, 1974), 143, ‘si salvò nel borgo di San Marceo in casa del medesimo ambasciatore’. Read followed Karl Stählin in placing Walsingham’s house in the Faubourg Saint Germain, and every other account has followed Read. Visitors to the embassy: ‘Journal of Sir Francis Walsingham’, 3, 8, 10 (Languet), 12 (Franchiotto), 13 (Sassetti and Ramus).

16
Walsingham’s dinner: Dudley Digges,
The Compleat Ambassador, or, Two Treaties of the Intended Marriage of Qu. Elizabeth
(London, 1655), 28. Cooks in my kitchen: TNA, SP 70/146, fol. 29. Man in black: Read,
Walsingham
, I, 93.

17
Continual increase of charges: TNA, SP 70/120, fol. 59r. Advancement of the gospel: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 121. God’s glory and the queen’s safety: TNA, SP 70/117, fol. 179v.

18
Coligny: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 135; Susan Doran,
Monarchy and Matrimony: The Courtships of Elizabeth I
(London and New York, 1996), 99–101, 120. Massacre at Wassy: Stuart Carroll,
Martyrs and Murderers: The Guise Family and the Making of Europe
(Oxford, 2009), 12–19. Cardinal of Lorraine: N. M. Sutherland,
The Massacre of St Bartholomew and the European Conflict 1559–1572
(London, 1973), 66–74.

19
Walsingham’s instructions: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 18–20. Mary’s possible release: Alford,
Burghley
, 161–3.

20
Anjou’s appearance: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 29. His sexuality: Katherine B. Crawford, ‘Love, Sodomy, and Scandal: Controlling the Sexual Reputation of Henry III’,
Journal of the History of Sexuality
12 (2003), 513–42. Elizabeth’s first speech to Parliament: Leah S. Marcus, Janel Mueller and Mary Beth Rose (eds),
Elizabeth I: Collected Works
(Chicago and London, 2000), 56–8 (the Lansdowne version).

21
Ursula Walsingham as Leicester’s cousin: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 96. Not for lack of goodwill: ibid., 90.

22
Elizabeth’s conditions: ibid., 62–6.

23
Walsingham, Burghley, and Anjou’s religion: ibid., 67–70, 89–92; Doran,
Monarchy and Matrimony
, 107–10. 

24
Anjou’s demands: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 83–6. Book of Common Prayer: ibid., 98–9.

25
Rarest creature: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 101. De Foix’s prediction: TNA, SP 70/11, fol. 141v. Her majesty’s state: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 97. De l’Archant: Doran,
Monarchy and Matrimony
, 114–15. Plain dealing: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 112. Straiter alliance and confederacy: ibid., 134.

26
My disease: TNA, SP 70/120, fol. 59r; ‘Journal of Sir Francis Walsingham’, 12, ‘I began my diet’. Pheasants and peacocks: TNA, SP 70/146, fol. 29.

27
Devilish Italian practice: TNA, SP 70/122, fol. 153r. Assassination plot, Norfolk and the Queen of Scots: Alford,
Burghley
, 184–95.

28
Smith’s embassy: Mary Dewar,
Sir Thomas Smith: A Tudor Intellectual in Office
(London, 1964), chapter 12. Four orders of friars: TNA, SP 70/122, fol. 29v. Fire and water: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 170.

29
Treaty of Blois: ibid., 199; Read,
Walsingham
, I, 189–97; James M. Osborn,
Young Philip Sidney 1572–1577
(New Haven and London, 1972), 39–43.

30
The enterprise of Burgundy: BL Harley 168, fol. 54r–57v. Conyers Read apparently missed this important treatise. Its attribution to Walsingham rather than Burghley is discussed in
Oxford DNB
. God and the Prince of Orange: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 226.

31
Rascal multitude: François Hotman,
A True and Plaine Report of the Furious Outrages of Fraunce
(1573), STC 13847, 59. Massacre: Carroll,
Martyrs and Murderers
, 20. On St Bartholomew see Holt,
French Wars of Religion
, chapter 3; Davis, ‘Rites of Violence’; Barbara B. Diefendorf,
Beneath the Cross: Catholics and Huguenots in Sixteenth Century Paris
(New York and Oxford, 1991), especially 102–3; Philip Benedict, ‘The Saint Bartholomew’s Massacres in the Provinces’,
HJ
21 (1978), 205–25.

32
On Marlowe and Walsingham see below, chapter 5.
De Furoribus Gallicis:
Robert M. Kingdon,
Myths about the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacres 1572–1576
(Cambridge, Mass. and London, 1988), 118–19, 129; Sutherland,
Massacre of St Bartholomew
, 317–18.

33
Ursula: ‘Journal of Sir Francis Walsingham’, 6; Read,
Walsingham
, I, 261 and III, 425 n. 3. Sidney: Osborn,
Young Philip Sidney
, 67–70. A very sanctuary: Timothy Bright,
An Abridgement of the Booke of Acts and Monumentes of the Church
(1589), STC 11129, and see also below, chapter 6. Spanish ambassador: Read,
Walsingham
, I, 222 n. 3.

34
Absence of eyewitness accounts: Carroll,
Martyrs and Murderers
, 193. Discourse after the murder in Paris: BL Cotton Titus, F. III, fol. 302r–308v. 

35
Ursula’s attempted escape: Arlette Jouanna,
La Saint-Barthélemy: Les Mystères d’un Crime d’État
(Paris, 2007), 188.

36
Spiritual comfort: Digges,
Compleat Ambassador
, 250–1. Disquietness of this state: ibid., 253–8.

3 Armed with Innocence

The St Bartholomew massacre sent a shockwave through the Protestant community in England. Francis Walsingham had gone to Paris at a time of relative toleration for the Huguenots, but he departed from the front line of a confessional war. The carnage in France was a lurid stimulus to the imagination. A service was rapidly printed for use in parish churches, summoning the English to repent or face a similar punishment: ‘The ungodly bend their bows, and make ready their arrows within the quiver: that they may shoot at those that call upon the name of the Lord’. Preachers called for public fasts in imitation of ancient Israel, but the book trade was hungry for atrocity stories. The survival of the reformed faith seemed to be at stake, not only in France but in the Netherlands, Scotland, even England itself. As Robert Beale put it, now was the time to awake out of sleep.
¹

It had all looked so different earlier that same summer. The signing of the treaty of Blois was commemorated in a group portrait of the English royal family now known as the Allegory of the Tudor Succession. According to its inscription, the painting was presented by Queen Elizabeth to Francis Walsingham as a ‘mark of her people’s and her own content’. The artist didn’t sign his name but was probably Lucas de Heere, a Flemish Protestant who fled to England with his family in the 1560s. He later acted as an envoy between Walsingham and William of Orange. Like so many images of the time, the Allegory was intended to be decoded as well as admired. The setting is a throne room in one of the royal palaces. Henry VIII
presides under the Tudor coat of arms, surrounded by his three children. Edward VI kneels beside his father, accepting the sword of justice, but it is Elizabeth who dominates the foreground of the painting. She is pictured entering the chamber hand in hand with Peace, a goddess with an olive branch. Weapons are trampled and burst into flames, while Plenty follows behind with her cornucopia. To the rear of the royal dais stand Queen Mary and Philip of Spain attended by Mars, god of war.
²