History Is Present

The Howard Girls

I'm going to do something different this time. I'm going to write about two women who both directed to one goal and shared the same fate. Need another clue? They were cousins. Yes that's right I'm going to do a post on Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard: The Howard Girls.

Anne Boleyn

Born: 1501, Blickling Hall in Norfolk

Parents: Thomas Boleyn and Elizabeth Howard

Titles: Marques of Pembroke and Queen of England

Spouse: Henry VIII, King of England

Children: Elizabeth Tudor (+ 3 others)

Religion: Anglican/Protestant, formerly a Roman Catholic

Died: 19^th May 1536 at the Tower of London

Catherine Howard

Born: c. 1521

Parents: Edmund Howard and Joyce Culpeper

Titles: Queen of England

Spouse: Henry VIII, King of England

Religion: Catholic

Died: 13^th February 1543 at the Tower of London

Both of these women were pushed by their family to become Queen of England and also share the same fate by the executioner's axe (or sword).

Anne as we all know played a major part in English History involving the break with Rome, but we know very little about her childhood.

Life in the French Court

She spent most of earlier days at the court of Archduchess Margaret of Austria from the age of 12. There she would of learnt languages, dancing and singing, all the skills a young women destined for court life would need.

In 1513, her father sent her to attend on Mary Tudor who was going to become Queen of France in 1514. Once Louis XII died Mary left France while young Anne stayed as lady-in-waiting for Queen Claude for 7 years completing her studies in French while taking interests in fashion, philosophy, French culture & etiquette, music and poetry.

When she finally returned back to England in 1521 she was placed into the household of Queen Catherine. Her sister, Mary, was the King's mistress.

Her return was for the marriage to her Irish cousin, James Butler, who was the 9th Earl of Ormond and 2nd Earl of Ossory. The union came to a halt and the two never married. Instead he wed a Cork girl called Joan Fitzgerald in 1532.

Genevieve Bujold

Anne’s Appearance

I know that Natalie Portman (The Other Boleyn Girl, 2008), Natalie Dormer (The Tudors, 2007-2010) and Geneviève Bujold (Anne of the Thousand Days, 1969) are absolutely beautiful in their portray as Anne, but was Anne really that beautiful?

Natalie Portman

Natalie Dormer

Anne apparently had six fingers and a mole on her neck. This were clear signs of her being a witch. But why would a King of England be attracted to such a woman with no real beauty?

Her French style in both her clothes and attitude charmed the English courtiers.

Anne was the opposite of her pale, blonde-haired, blue-eyed sister, instead she had dark, olive-coloured skin, thick dark brown hair and dark brown eyes. She was average in height with small breasts and a long, elegant neck.

Life in England

Anne's debut at court was on March the 1st 1521 at a masque ball.

After her marriage with James fell through she began an romance with Henry Percy who was the heir of the Duke of Northumberland. Percy and Anne entered a secret betrothal.

The relationship ended in 1522. He married Mary Talbot in 1525, but the marriage was unhappy and Talbot sought a divorce in 1532 on the basis that he and Anne had pre-contracted their relationship.

Thomas Wyatt was a young poet who lived nearby the Boleyn's family home in Kent. It is thought that he and Anne were in a relationship. Wyatt was separated from his wife and wanted to marry Anne. There is no evidence to suggest that they did marry, but it seems it was a courtly love.

When finally Henry noticed Anne he intended to make her his mistress like her sister before her but she refused. She said it was "Queen or nothing" implying that if he wanted her he must make her his Queen resulting in divorcing his Spanish, Catholic wife.

In 1527, Henry started to seek an annulment.

Henry is said to have sent a threatening letter to Pope Clement VII, which is only recently was publicly revealed at the Vatican archives. The letter is 60 ft long and 3 ft wide was signed by around 81 nobles.

Henry passion for Anne must of been powerful as he wrote 17 love letters to her. Henry hated writing letters.

Anne’s Rise

Henry doted upon Anne: buying her new clothes, giving her expensive jewels, nice apartments and even gave her precedence in the Christmas celebrations over the Duchess of Suffolk who was the King's younger sister, Mary.

In September 1532, she was created Marquess of Pembroke in her own right. She also was given the privilege of attending meeting between Henry and Francis I in Calais.

Henry was denied a divorce so instead broke from Rome and started his own church. He secretly married Anne on the 25th of January 1533. She was heavily pregnant at the time. It seemed that the Boleyns and Howards had complete power.

Queen of England

Henry wanted Anne's coronation to be spectacular. She was brought by water from Greenwich to the Tower of London dressed in cloth of gold where she would stay in the Royal apartments to awaited her coronation. The barges following her were said to stretch for four miles down the Thames.

On the 1st of June, she left the Tower for Westminster Abbey, where she was crowned with St Edward's crown (before only worn by reigning monarchs) and anointed Queen in a ceremony led by Thomas Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury. She was the last Queen Consort of England to be crowned separately from her husband.

Pope Clement at last took the step of announcing a provisional sentence of excommunication. He condemned the marriage to Anne and separation from Catherine of Aragon.

The eager waiting of a "prince" was over for Henry when on the 7th of September 1533 Anne bore a child at Greenwich Palace. But it was not a son. But a daughter. She was name in honour of Henry's mother Elizabeth of York whose marriage to Henry Tudor brought peace to England after 30 years of bloodshed.

Henry was disappointed at learning the sex of the child, but said "if we can have a healthy daughter, we can have a healthy son." Henry loved Elizabeth, but he needed a son to succeed him. Never before had a girl ruled England on her own accordance.

Elizabeth lived at Hatfield House in Hertfordshire. She was attended by many women including her half sister Mary. Anne visited her daughter as often as she could.

Anne’s Fall

On 8 January 1536, news of Catherine of Aragon's death reached the King and Anne, who were overjoyed. The following day, Henry and Anne wore yellow, the symbol of joy and celebration in England, from head to toe, and celebrated Catherine's death with festivities. With Princess Mary's mother dead, Anne, for her part, attempted to make peace with her.

The Queen, pregnant again, was aware of the dangers if she failed to give birth to a son. With Catherine dead, Henry would be free to marry without any taint of illegality. Mary rebuffed Anne's overtures, perhaps because of rumours circulating that Anne poisoned her mother.

Later that month, the King was unhorsed knocked unconscious for two hours, a worrying incident that Anne believed led to her miscarriage five days later. On the day that Catherine of Aragon was buried at Peterborough Abbey, Anne miscarried a baby which, according to the imperial Spanish ambassador Chapuys, she had carried for about three and a half months, and which "seemed to be a male child". For Chapuys, this was the beginning of the end of the Anne Boleyn.

Time was running out. Henry's eye was wandering to Lady Jane Seymour. Anne needed to secure her right as Queen by producing a male heir. She soon became pregnant once more but gave birth to a stillborn who was premature in early 1536. The child was a son.

As Anne recovered, Henry declared that he had been seduced into the marriage by means of sorcery. Anne was arrested on charges of adultery on May the 2nd. Mark Smeaton, Henry Norris George Boleyn, Francis Weston and William Brereton were charged with adultery with the Queen. Sir Thomas Wyatt was also arrested, but later released.

On Monday 15th, Anne and George were put on trial at the Great Hall of the Tower of London on charges of incest. They were found guilty by a jury of noblemen. Among them was their uncle Thomas Howard and Henry Percy.

George's wife, Lady Jane Parker, testified against him claiming she saw them together. Anne defended herself.

“The love I share with my brother is the natural love that anyone would have for someone they have grown up with, nursed when sick, played with as a child. Judge me my lords, but never forget your verdicts will be judged by God in the greatest court of all.”

But they were found guilty. They would either burn or have their head cut off.

George was beheaded on Tower Hill along with the other innocent men. It must of been terrible for Anne to see the beheading of those men including her own brother.

Anne knew her time was fast approaching. Henry had sent for a French swordsman from Calais to deliver a cleaner blow with a sharp sword than with the traditional axe. It was then that she made the famous comment about her 'little neck'.

Master Kingston was the Constable of the Tower recorded "This morning she sent for me, that I might be with her at such time as she received the good Lord, to the intent I should hear her speak as touching her innocency alway to be clear. And in the writing of this she sent for me, and at my coming she said, 'Mr. Kingston, I hear I shall not die afore noon, and I am very sorry therefore, for I thought to be dead by this time and past my pain.' I told her it should be no pain, it was so little. And then she said, 'I heard say the executioner was very good, and I have a little neck,' and then put her hands about it, laughing heartily. I have seen many men and also women executed, and that they have been in great sorrow, and to my knowledge this lady has much joy in death. Sir, her almoner is continually with her, and had been since two o'clock after midnight."

Death

At 8 in the morning on 19th May 1536, Anne was led to the scaffold dressed in a robe of black damask covered by an ermine mantle of white. She still denied her guilt as an adulteress and disciple of witchcraft and delivered a generous speech praising her former lord and lover Henry VIII.

Good Christian people, I am come hither to die, for according to the law, and by the law I am judged to die, and therefore I will speak nothing against it. I am come hither to accuse no man, nor to speak anything of that, whereof I am accused and condemned to die, but I pray God save the king and send him long to reign over you, for a gentler nor a more merciful prince was there never: and to me he was ever a good, a gentle and sovereign lord. And if any person will meddle of my cause, I require them to judge the best. And thus I take my leave of the world and of you all, and I heartily desire you all to pray for me. O Lord have mercy on me, to God I commend my soul.

After being blindfolded she knelt at the block, and repeated several times: to Jesus Christ I commend my soul; Lord Jesus receive my soul. She waited only a few seconds before a French swordsman severed her head from her delicate neck.

Anne was buried in an unmarked grave in the Chapel of St. Peter near Tower Green. In the reign of Queen Victoria, Anne's final resting place was marked in the marble floor.

Social ostracism

Shame and trauma hit the Boleyn family. Anne's father continued to work for the King in fear of what Henry may do to remaining members of the Boleyn family. After Thomas' wife died in 1537, a year after Anne's death, he shortly passed away himself. It was said Elizabeth had died from a broken heart from the loss of her children. Mary, died in 1542 but was survived by two daughters and two sons. By 1542 not one member of the immediate Boleyn household had survived. It is believed that remaining relatives, stigmatised by such tragic events, left England's shores for Ireland.

Legends

There are many legends and stories of Anne Boleyn such as her ghost haunts the Tower. One story is that she was secretly buried in Salle Church in Norfolk near the tombs of her Boleyn ancestors. Her body was said to have rested in an Essex church on its journey to Norfolk. Another is that her heart is buried in Erwarton Church, Suffolk.

Sicilian the peasants of Nicolosi believed that Anne Boleyn, for having made Henry VIII a heretic, was condemned to burn for eternity inside Mount Etna. This legend was often told for the benefit of foreign travellers.

A number of people have claimed to have seen Anne's ghost at Blickling Hall. It is said that on the anniversary of her death at the strike of midnight a ghostlike carriage pulled by black horses arrives at the gates and out comes Anne holding her head.

The most famous account of her reputed sighting has been described by paranormal researcher Hans Holzer. In 1864, Major General J.D. Dundas of the 60th Rifles regiment was quartered in the Tower of London. As he was looking out the window of his quarters, he noticed a guard below in the courtyard, in front of the lodgings where Anne had been imprisoned, behaving strangely. He appeared to challenge something, which to the General "looked like a whitish, female figure sliding towards the soldier". The guard charged through the form with his bayonet, then fainted. Only the General's testimony and corroboration at the court-martial saved the guard from a lengthy prison sentence for having fainted while on duty. In 1960, Canon W. S. Pakenham-Walsh, vicar of Sulgrave, Northamptonshire, reported having conversations with Anne.

Spooky or what!

Anne never gave Henry a son but Jane did, Edward. Edward reigned for seven years, but it was Elizabeth who reigned for 40 years in what was England's golden age.

Anne was the most influential and important queen consort England has ever had.

Catherine was the youngest of Henry's Queens becoming Queen of England at the mere age of 15. Unlike her cousin before her she was guilty of adultery. She loved the jewels, clothes and all of the pretty things she got but never really understood the responsibility of being the Queen. She was after all still a child.

Childhood

She did not know her mother very well as she died when she was very young and her father left her in the care of his step mother, Agnes Tignley the Dowager Duchess of Norfolk. There were many children in the household. She did not have a great education but vicarious, beautiful an buxom.

While living with the Dowager Duchess she had many secrets that would come back to plague her.

1540

Catherine came to court as a lady-in-waiting to Henry's fourth wife: Anne of Cleves. She immediately caught the attentions of the King whose marriage with Anne wasn't consummated. Catherine uncle encouraged to respond to the King.

Queen Catherine

On the 28th June 1540, Henry married the young Catherine. It was rumoured that she was carrying the King's child, but it proved to be false. Henry was 49 at the time. There was a lot of passion especially in the bedroom. Catherine lifted the King's spirit by making him feel young again. "I feel alive Charles. Sex, it's a great medicine." Henry showered his wife with gifts and called her his rose without a thorn.

Affairs

Soon Catherine snapped and made a mistake that the other four Queens never made. In 1541, Catherine began an affair with Thomas Culpeper. Catherine had considered marrying him while she was still a lady-in-waiting. The meetings were arranged by Catherine head ladies-in-waiting, Lady Rochford, who was her cousin-in=law through her marriage to George Boleyn.

Her past soon caught up with her as childhood friends began to contact her for a position in her household. Francis Dereham was among them.

Back in 1538, Catherine had been pursued by Dereham and they became lovers, addressing each other as "husband" and "wife". The relationship ended in 1539 when the Dowager Duchess discovered them together. Despite this disapproval, Catherine and Dereham had intentions to marry when he returned from Ireland.

This wasn't the first time that Catherine had done something like this. Catherine and Henry Mannox (her music teacher) had a sexual relationship in 1536, when she was 15. Catherine was even quoted as saying, "At the flattering and fair persuasions of Mannox, being but a young girl, I suffered him at sundry times to handle and touch the secret parts of my body which neither became me with honesty to permit nor him to require." The affair ended in 1538.

Downfall

Soon the affairs became knowledge and Catherine was arrested along with her lovers and Jane Parker. After being ordered to keep to her rooms, Catherine briefly escaped her guards to run to the chapel where Henry was hearing Mass where she banged on the doors and screamed his name. Eventually, she was recaptured by her guards and confined to her rooms at Hampton Court.

Imprisonment

She was questioned on 7th November 1541. During this time she was frantic, incoherent state pitiable, Cramner said, "I found her in such lamentation and heaviness as I never saw no creature, so that it would have pitied any man's heart to have looked upon her." The guards were given orders to remove any objects that she might use to commit suicide. She steadfastly denied any precontract, maintaining that Dereham had raped her.

Catherine was imprisoned in Syon Abbey, Middlesex, throughout the winter of 1541. Culpeper and Dereham were executed at Tyburn on 10 December 1541, Culpeper being beheaded and Dereham being hanged, drawn, and quartered. Their heads were placed on top of London Bridge.

Most of the Howard family were arrested and taken to the Tower where they were tried, found guilty of concealing treason, and sentenced to life imprisonment and forfeiture of goods. In time, however, they were released with their goods restored.

Catherine herself remained in limbo until Parliament passed a bill of attainder on 7 February 1542 claiming what she had done was treason, and punishable by death. She was taken to the Tower on 10th February.

Death

The night before her execution, Catherine spent many hours practising how to lay her head upon the block, which had been brought to her at her request. She died with relative composure, but looked pale and terrified and required assistance to climb the scaffold. She made a speech describing her punishment as "worthy and just" and asked for mercy for her family and prayers for her soul. According to popular folklore, her final words were, "I die a Queen, but I would rather have died the wife of Culpeper."

Catherine was beheaded with a single stroke, and her body was buried in an unmarked grave in St. Peter near her cousins, Anne and George Boleyn.

Ok. What have we learnt. These two Queens were cousins. They both were charged with adultery with other men, but only Catherine was guilty of this. Anne and Catherine are my favourite Queens of Henry VIII.