The death of Catherine Howard

Today is the 470th anniversary of the execution in 1541/2 on Tower Green of Catherine Howard, whose marriage to King Henry VIII had been annulled a few days before the execution at Tyburn of Thomas Culpeper and Francis Dereham on the preceding December 10th for committing adultery. I posted about that in A gentleman of the bedchamber, where I pointed out the part the castle in my home town played in this rather squalid and sordid drama. Executed with her was Lady Rochford for her complicity in the affair.

Retha M. Warnicke's Oxford DNB life of the Queen includes biographies of both of these men and can be read here. There is also an online life of Culpeper here, and one of Queen Catherine here.
Lacey Baldwin Smith's book on the story A Tudor Tragedy is eminently readable, as are all his books on Tudor history, and there is also Joanna Denny's more recent Katherine Howard: A Tudor Conspiracy which reflects on the social context of her upbringing and the court intrigues over marriages in the royal circle.

Queen Catherine Howard
Minaiture by Hans Holbein the Younger
The portrait has been persuasively identified through the jewels on her dress, which match those in her inventory.

Image Wikipedia, from the Royal collection

It is tempting to dismiss Catherine Howard as a dim-witted, sly teenage nymphomaniac who had not learned from the fate of her cousin Anne Boleyn only five years earlier in 1536. It is quite reasonable to see that, whatever her other faults, Anne Boleyn was 'set up' in May 1536 because she had become a hinderance to policy as far as Thomas Cromwell was concerned - such is Eric Ives' interpretation in his biography. Catherine Howard set herself up with her backstairs affair with Thomas Culpeper and employing her former lover Francis Dereham as her secretary.

This was however not just a disastrous tale of adultery and retribution. As the failure of the marriage of the monarch it had a very considerable impact on contemporary politics. Had Catherine remained Queen, with or without any additional heirs, the position of her family the Howards headed by the Duke of Norfolk would have been that much stronger. They managed to extricate themselves from her downfall and survived, only to be marked down for destruction in 1546 as everyone jockeyed for position in the approach of the King's death.

The effect on the King was noted by the French ambassador who thought Henry never quiter recoverd from the shock of his wife's infidelity. Once more free to wed his marriage to Catherine Parr brought into the heart of the court an intelligent woman who was sympathetic to reformist, evangelical religion and shrewd enough to avoid attempts to ensnare her. Thus whatever the conservative inclined government did was counterbalanced by a court circle around the Queen and, more importantly, Prince Edward, which was favourable to the type of change that came into play afer the old King's death in January 1547. To what extent King Henry VIII was aware of this remains a matter of some debate.

One legacy of these events is the means whereby the Royal Assent to Acts of Parliament is given. Hitherto it had been given by the monarch in person, but to spare the King distress at giving the assent to his ex-wife's Act of Attainder the process was devised whereby commisioners annouinced the Royal Assent to the assembled Lords and Commons. From this beginning that has developed as the normal practice - possibly influenced by King Henry's increasing infirmity and his son's youth - and the Royal Assent was last given in this country in person by Queen Anne. The present Queen delivered her Assent in Australia in an exceptional gesture when the Royal title in Australia was alterd in the 1970s. Incidentally, Catherine's Act of Attainder remained on the statute book until the 1960s when the Law Commissiopn got round to tidying otiose legislation out of the way.

The coat of arms of Queen Catherine Howard

Image: Wikipedia

A gentleman of the bedchamber

December 10th is the 470th anniversary of the execution in 1541 at Tyburn of Thomas Culpeper and Francis Dereham for adultery with Catherine Howard, whose marriage to King Henry VIII had been annulled a few days previously.

Retha M. Warnicke's Oxford DNB life of the Queen includes biographies of both these two men and can be read here. There is also an online life of Culpeper here, and one of Queen Catherine here. *

Queen Catherine Howard
Minaiture by Hans Holbein the Younger
The portrait has been persuasively identified through the jewels on her dress, which match those in her inventory.

Image Wikipedia, from the Royal collection

Quite apart from its interest as one of the more sensational episodes in an era of court sensations this story has always had the added interest of a connection with my home town of Pontefract. It had been during the King and Queen's progress to the north in the late summer of 1541 that the affair between Catherine and Culpeper flourished.

The one surviving letter from Catherine to Culpeper probably belongs to the earlier stages of the tour, being thought to have been written at Liddington or Lincoln. It can be seen and read both in the original and in transcript on this link to the National Archives website or by clicking on the red arrow under the photograph.

Letter from Catherine Howard to Thomas Culpeper, 1541

"Yours as long as life endures, Katherine"

The royal party arrived at Pontefract Castle on August 23 1541, and it was at Pontefract that four days later the Queen appointed Dereham, to whom was technically married, as her secretary. Whilst the King went on alone to visit Hull before he entered York in state with his Queen, and whilst the Privy Council were, amongst other things, confirming in meetings at Pontefract the new statutes of the King's new cathedral foundations at Gloucester and Peterborough, as well as those for the new secular chapter for that at Ely, elsewhere in the castle less salubrious activities were apparently taking place...

Pontefract Castle
A painting of circa 1630 now in Pontefract Museum.
In 1541 the castle would have appeared much the same, although possibly better maintained.

Image: Wakefield MDC Museums

On the internet I found an account of Thomas' father Sir Alexander Culpeper of Hardreshull and Bedgebury in Kent who had died the previous summer - probate on his will being granted on June 21st 1541. Thomas, the lover of Queen Catherine, was the son of his father's third marriage, and appears to have been about ten to fifteen years younger than his elder siblings. His mother died in 1542.

Details of his father's life, and those of his family, including the text of his will, which is interesting in itself with its extensive religious provisions, offering an insight into the spirituality of the gentry in the period, can be read here.

Sir Alexander and Lady Culpeper's tomb is in Goudhurst church:

Tomb of Sir Alexander Culpeper and his wife Constance in Goudhurst church, Kent

Image:pashnit.com

Stone relief of 'Old Sir Alexander' Culpeper and his family.
In the jamb of the bay window above the effigies of Sir Alexander and his wife is asmall stone relief dated 1537. It depicts God in Majesty, the Virgin and child, St George slaying the dragon, and kneeling figures of the Culpeper family.

Image: gen.culpepper.com

* The only episode of the recent televison series The Tudors I have seen was about the affair of Catherine Howard and Thomas Culpeper.The episode lived up to all I had been led to expect - serious or bizarre historical inaccuracies, anachronistic costuming and sets, indifferent acting, and some fairly pornographic scenes - but also, as others had indicated, there were the occasional flahes of insight. A curious production.