Anne Boleyn's Letter from the Tower Read online

  15 Cavendish, George, The Life of Thomas Wolsey, ed. Ellis, F. S., Kelmscott Press, London, 1893; and T. M. Parker, “Was Thomas Cromwell a Machiavellian?”, The Journal of Ecclesiastical History, Volume 1, Issue 01 , April 1950 pp 63 -75, published online by Cambridge University Press, 25 Mar 2011.

  16 Lord Herbert of Cherbury, The Life and Raigne of King Henry the Eighth, Thomas Whitaker, London; 1649, p 382.

  17 British Library; Stowe MS 151.

  18 Burnet, A History of the Reformation of the Church of England.

  19 British Library Online, Explore Archives and Manuscripts,

  Stowe MS 151.

  20 Flannagan, Roy,”Review of In Praise of Scribes”,Early Modern Literary Studies 5.1, May, 1999.

  21 Ibid.

  22 Lord Herbert of Cherbury, Life and Raigne of King Henry the Eighth.

  23 Burnet, History of the Reformation, Book III, p 206.

  24 Strype, Ecclesiastical Memorials, p 452.

  25 Ellis, Henry, Original Letters, Illustrative of English History, Vol II, Thomas Davison, Whitefriars, London 1815, p 53.

  26 Froude, James, History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth, Vol II, Scribner, New York, 1872, p 443.

  27 Strickland, Agnes, Lives of the Queens of England, Vols 4 and 5,

  Lea and Blanchard, 1851, p 208.

  The bequest of Thomas Cromwell

  In a catastrophic turn of events, in the early afternoon of 10 June 1540, Thomas Cromwell, newly raised as the Earl of Essex, was arrested and accused of heresy and treason. Cromwell had been perhaps more involved than ever in endless details involving state and personal matters on behalf of the king. Admittedly, his most recent work in attempting to cultivate a relationship and marriage between the king and the German princess Anne of Cleves had not gone well. Yet his own arrest and imprisonment must have been as much a shock to him as had Anne’s to her four years prior. Cromwell, in pleading for his life, wrote an impassioned letter to Henry. What an ironic twist of fate! It is said, though not proven, that Henry had the letter read aloud to him three times and almost yielded to its entreaty. He decided, though, against it, and Cromwell’s fate, just like Anne’s, was sealed. He was taken prisoner to remain in the Tower until his death by beheading on 28 July. During his time in prison, Cromwell leaned on his closest and perhaps most trusted companion, his personal secretary, Ralph Sadler. Sadler’s position and stature was due to his association with and tutelage by Thomas Cromwell. It was Sadler whom Cromwell relied upon to deliver directly to the king the letter in which he begged for mercy. In 1529, Cromwell had appointed Sadler as the executor of his will, and he was designated as a beneficiary of part of the estate.28

  This point, in particular, is of critical importance.

  Figure 7 - Ralph Sadler, Portrait of an Unidentified Man by Hans Holbein the Younger, Royal Collection, Windsor Castle, 1535

  As executor, Sadler would have been entitled to know the content of Cromwell’s estate. It is possible that Sadler knew the whereabouts of the letter Cromwell had hidden from the king – Anne’s letter.

  It is likely, even probable, that Cromwell had Sadler engage the appropriate scribe for the task of writing Anne’s letter. And it may well have been Ralph Sadler who, with Kingston, sat in Anne’s suite of rooms in the Tower and oversaw the transaction of the letter being written by the scribe.

  Pondering who Cromwell would have entrusted when he was told that Anne wished to send a communiqué to Henry, his confidante and loyal secretary Ralph Sadler is an obvious choice. We know that Cromwell did not make an appearance to visit Anne while she was imprisoned (“I ha[ve much marvel] that the Kynges conselle commes not to me”)29 and the pieces begin to fit knowing that a message from the king was delivered to Anne demanding her true confession. This royal directive would have been conveyed via one source only – and that would have been Cromwell. Since he did not deliver it in person, it would only have been carried by his closest associate, one who would understand the dire implications of both the request and the response. Sadler would have witnessed the scribe adding Anne’s reply to Henry’s demand. He would have assured her that the entire letter, with the addendum, would be promptly delivered to Cromwell and hence to the king. Sadler may then have taken the letter to Cromwell, who tucked it away with his private belongings with no intent of its dispatch to Henry, who likely never knew of its existence. It is not a far leap of imagination, then, to think that Sadler may have known, or have been told, where Anne’s letter, accompanied by Kingston’s, were kept, and importantly, that he could be depended upon to keep the secret.

  Therefore, when Cromwell’s belongings were seized upon his arrest, it is not improbable that Sadler knew of the letter’s location and was able to save it from being taken by the Crown.

  For how long did Ralph Sadler hold the letters after Cromwell died? There is no way of knowing, if indeed this is true. But we can develop a credible account of their disposition.

  The next step in the letter’s provenance seems equally probable. It is well-documented that Ralph Sadler and William Cecil, Lord Burghley (1520 – 1598), were close friends and colleagues. Burghley had relegated Sadler with handling closely guarded secrets as Elizabeth was being positioned to ally with the Protestants of Scotland. Letters between William Cecil and Sadler attest to their collaboration on matters of state as well as their friendship. At some point after 1540, the letter Anne composed may have been given by Ralph Sadler to William Cecil.

  Cecil was a man who loved books and owned, as well as collected, important documents. He was responsible for Elizabeth I’s most personal papers throughout their lives, even into their later years.30 He was her secretary, her champion and her advisor all the years of her queenship. He knew her well and cared for her greatly. It seems believable, then, that the fervent letter her mother wrote to her father was shown to Elizabeth.

  Many believe, even though she did not speak publicly of her, there are strong indicators that Elizabeth held her mother close to her heart and in high regard. Knowledge of the letter Anne composed while awaiting death in the Tower may have been one more heartrending detail in the impression Elizabeth maintained of the mother she scarcely remembered.

  Perhaps Queen Elizabeth commanded William Cecil, or it may have been the man himself who determined the importance of preserving the words Anne composed. It is suggested that William Cecil paid due to the letter’s legacy by arranging a commission for a copy of the letter to be made, thereby ensuring if the original was lost, a rendition would remain. The notion was prescient because, as we know, the original version was in fact almost lost in the Ashburnam fire, over 100 years later. Today, a copy made by the Feathery Scribe at some time in the early 1600s remains intact as a part of the Stowe collection of documents.

  Figure 8 - William Cecil, Lord Burghley

  Victorian Etching from Cassell’s History of England

  Among the friends and very close colleagues of William Cecil, Lord Burghley, was the antiquarian William Camden (1551 -1623). Burghley thought enough of Camden that he commended him to write a history of the reign of his beloved Queen Elizabeth. Camden spent some years labouring over this treatise, which was entitled Annales Rerum Gestarum Angliae et Hiberniae Regnate Elizabetha. Originally written in Latin, the biographical and historical account was translated and then published in English in 1628. He did not complete the commitment, though, until after both his sponsors, Burghley and Elizabeth, had died. A man dedicated to the preservation of history in its truest recitation, as told through genuine artefacts, Camden states:

  Mine own writings and remembrances I searched over, who though I have been a studious regarder of venerable Antiquity, yet as one not altogether carelesse of late and fresh matters, I have seen, observed, and received many things from my Ancestors, and credible persons, which have beene present at the handling of matters, and such as have been addicted to the parties on both sides in this contrariety of Religion. All which I have with the Ballance
of mine owne Judgement (such as it is) weighed and examined, lest I should at any time through beguiling credulity incline to that which is false. For the love of Truth, as it hath beene the onely spurre unto me to undertake this worke, so hath it also beene my onely scope and aime. Which truth to take from history, is nothing else but to plucke out the eyes of the beautifullest living creature, and in stead of wholesome nourishment, to offer a draught of poyson to the Readers mindes.31

  Burghley provided and also bequeathed a great store of his precious and private library of documents to Camden to enable his work, and because he knew William Camden would respect and protect them for the future. It would follow that included in the collection left to Camden upon Burghley’s death in 1598 was the packet of letters written by William Kingston along with the letter Anne composed. It seems almost indisputable that both men, who knew and respected documents that were true witness to history, believed this letter was credible, legitimate and very worthy of immense care and preservation.

  William Camden, as mentioned before, was the mentor, tutor and lifelong friend of Robert Bruce Cotton:

  I am beholden to that most excellent man Sir Robert Cotton, Knight and Baronet, who hath with great cost, and successefull industry, furnished himselfe with most choice store of matter of History and Antiquity (for from his light, he hath most willingly given great light to me). So (Reader) if I shall in any thing helpe or delight thee in this behalfe, thou art most worthily to give him thankes for the same.32

  It has been well-recorded that Camden left a significant bequest to Cotton – his compilation of documents, letters, epistles and books. Camden’s store of collected works therefore became a keystone of Cotton’s library.33

  The recordings made by William Kingston along with Anne’s Tower Letter, we may reasonably assume, were a part of the inheritance Robert Cotton received from William Camden.

  Anne’s letter was an important specimen in the Cotton Manuscripts.

  The Cotton Manuscripts comprised one of the foundations of the British Library upon its establishment in 1753.

  Thus, in the considered opinion of this author, within the British Library today remain the final words from Anne Boleyn to Henry VIII.

  Figure 9 - Portrait of William Camden, engraved by R.White, front piece to Camden’s Britannia.

  28 http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1509-1558/member/sadler-ralph-1507-87.

  29 British Library, Cotton MS Otho C X fol. 222.

  30 Nares, Edward, Memoirs of the Life and Administration of the Right Honourable William Cecil, Lord Burghley, Saunders and Otley, London, 1828, p 181.

  31 Camden, William, Historie of the Most Renowned and Victorious Princesse Elizabeth Late Queen of England, Benjamin Fisher,

  London, 1630, Foreward.

  32 Ibid.

  33 http://www.celm-ms.org.uk/introductions/CamdenWilliam.html

  Henry’s ‘Great Griefe’

  It is heartbreaking to think that Anne’s letter may never have been seen by Henry. She may or may not have believed her words would reverse his cruel decision to imprison her on what she knew were fictitious charges. But at the very least she would have wanted to tell him, as his wife – not as the queen – she had been devoted to him, that she had loved him and knew he had loved her, and she would never have betrayed him in such an egregious manner.

  Might it have made a difference in the dreadful outcome had he known of its message? It’s doubtful that Henry would have been moved from his committed intent to marry Jane Seymour. Added to his great disappointment at Anne’s failure to produce a son, he had been incited to rage against her by the humiliation of having possibly been cuckolded by his closest friends. His jealousy and fury made him susceptible to any and all impugning suggestions about her. Henry did what Henry most excelled at: he decisively shut out all unpleasantness and insulated himself against guilt and remorse through engaging distractions. And he had a significant distraction at the ready – his wedding. And so he paid scarce attention when the cannon boomed from the Tower signalling Anne’s death. His life proceeded, consumed by matters of state and his new bride.

  There was joy for Henry when Jane birthed the son he had longed for. The joy was short-lived, though, when Jane died leaving Henry in that most vulnerable state – lonely and unwed. Henry was a man who did not feel comfortable unless he was married, and of course a monarch should have a wife. The problem was that, after Anne, none of his wives fulfilled his expectations. Jane died, Anne of Cleves he considered entirely unsuitable, Catherine Howard betrayed him, driving him into a deep depression over his lost youth and robust health, and finally the saintly Katharine Parr was nursemaid to the shell of the man he had once been.

  Henry in his later life is considered by many as a tyrant – oppressive, unnaturally cruel and uncaring, manipulative and impulsive. Certainly, many of his behaviours reflect such a tyrannical nature. It is provocative, though, to consider the possibility that his physical and mental decline may have been aggravated by the guilt and sorrow suffered over his headlong destruction of wives and friends who he had at one time loved profoundly. In his moments alone, when he looked upon his daughter Elizabeth, was he reminded of the young Anne? Did he recognise, in his heart of hearts, those truths which she had expressed to him in her emotional and heart-wrenching final letter?

  Whether or not he ever privately acknowledged his own personal pain, it’s difficult to imagine there were no residual effects on his psyche after he had witnessed so much tragedy, even for such an egoist.

  As his health rapidly waned and his life drew to its end in January 1547, Henry’s close friends attended him. Sir Anthony Denny, the writer and religious theorist John Foxe, and perhaps several others quietly moved throughout his chambers providing for his final needs. It was Denny who, at the desperate appeal of the king’s physicians, was able to tell Henry that his death was imminent so he might prepare himself. At Henry’s request his spiritual leader, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, was summoned. It is said that by the time Cranmer arrived, Henry was unable to speak, but that his faith was confirmed by a squeeze of the archbishop’s hand.34

  In the thirty-six hours prior to his death there were just a few courtiers who saw and spoke with the king. We know that Anthony Denny served him and spoke with him about the most intimate subject, his impending death. What the nature of their conversation was, or other conversations were with the other few gentlemen who were permitted to see Henry in those last hours has not been documented.

  But there does exist today a most intriguing and curious written reference, which may at last illuminate the question that desperately begs for an answer: did Henry think of Anne after her death? Did he regret his actions concerning her last days?

  The British Library manuscripts collection houses the Lansdowne Catalogue, a series of archives and documents amassed by William Cecil and by the esteemed antiquarian Bishop White Kennett (1660 – 1728). The collection is quite large and consists of groupings of volumes. The volume of interest is entitled Biographical Memorials and was the work of Kennett. It’s said to be written in his own hand. The book of handwritten entries was produced around 1715 and in a folio labelled ‘Original Correspondence’ is a page dedicated to the death of Anne Boleyn. On this sheet is a series of seemingly disconnected recordings about Anne’s death. Close to the bottom of the thin parchment is written the following inscription:

  The King acknowledges with great griefe at his death the injuries he had done to the Lady Anne Boleyn and her daughter as Thevet in his Cosmogr. lib xvi a writer in no way partial hath testified.

  This statement is followed by several lines in old French. What could this mean? Let us examine a modern day transcription of the page:

  1536

  Memoirs of Queen Anne Boleyn

  beheaded 19 May 1536

  Some letters relating to the manner of accusing Queen Anne and the King’s departure from her May 1 1536 and her being sent prisoner to the Tower />
  Sententia

  Letter of Thomas Archbishop of Canterbury to the King in a soft and tender vindication of Queen Anne Prisoner in the Tower dat. 3 May

  Her dying speech 19 May

  20 May the K married Jane Seymour

  This cruelly hindered Melanchthon from thinking any longer of his intended voyage in to England ___ [the Latin inscription is loosely translated as: Philipp Melanchton and Joachimo Camerario date of journey June 1536 – I am now greatly relieved from the concern of making travel to England due to the dire changes there _________ the late Queen who was more wrongfully accused than convicted and who paid the ultimate sacrifice]

  In the learned reply to a libel of 16 persons entitled A Temperate Watchword to [by?] Sir Francis Hastings Turbulent Watchword [4th gov? p. 58]35

  The King acknowledges with great griefe at his death the injuries he had done to the Lady Anne Boleyn and her daughter as Thevet in his Cosmogr. lib xvi a writer in no way partial hath testified. Plusiers Gentilhommes Anglois (says he speaking of K. Henry’s death) [the French is translated as: Several English gentlemen have confided to me that he has repented, upon his deathbed, of the injustices done to Queen Anne Boleyn; of her having been falsely accused and for the punishment imposed upon her; that she died in good Christian standing and is to be buried in accordance with the Church of Rome. It is in association with this ordeal/situation that he (Henri) has attempted to right these injustices and, with his whole heart, signs his name to this testimony].