February 13, 1542 – Catherine Howard, the fifth wife of Henry VIII of England, is executed for adultery. Conclusion

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2nd Duke of Norfolk, Catherine Howard, Dowager Duchess of Norfolk, Execution, Francis Dereham, King François I of France, King Henry VIII of England and Ireland, Lady Rochford, Queen of England and Ireland, Royal Assent, Thomas Culpeper, Thomas Howard

Imprisonment and death

Prior to her marriage to the King, Catherine was pursued by Francis Dereham, a secretary of the Dowager Duchess of Norfolk, her father, Lord Edmund Howard’s stepmother, Agnes Howard (née Tilney). Catherine Howard had been placed in the Dowager Duchess’s care after her mother’s death.

Catherine Howard and Francis Dereham allegedly became lovers, addressing each other as “husband” and “wife”. Dereham also entrusted Catherine with various wifely duties, such as keeping his money when he was away on business. Many of Catherine’s roommates among the Dowager Duchess’s maids of honour and attendants knew of the relationship, which apparently ended in 1539, when the Dowager Duchess found out.

Despite this, Catherine and Dereham may have parted with intentions to marry upon his return from Ireland, agreeing to a precontract of marriage. If indeed they exchanged vows before having sexual intercourse, they would have been considered married in the eyes of the Church.

If it could have been established that there had been an existence of a precontract between Catherine and Francis Dereham it would have had the effect of terminating Catherine’s marriage to Henry, but it would also have allowed Henry to annul their marriage and banish her from court to live in poverty and disgrace instead of executing her.

However, there is no indication that Henry VIII would have chosen that alternative. Catherine steadfastly denied any precontract, maintaining that Dereham had raped her.

Thomas Culpeper denied ever having committed adultery with Queen Catherine and blamed the Queen for the situation, saying that he had tried to end his friendship with her, but that she was “dying of love for him”. Eventually, Culpeper admitted to intending to sleep with the queen, though he never admitted to having actually done so.

Culpeper and Dereham were arraigned at Guildhall on December 1, 1541 for high treason. They were executed at Tyburn on December 10, 1541, Culpeper being beheaded and Dereham being hanged, drawn and quartered.

According to custom, their heads were placed on spikes on London Bridge. Many of Catherine’s relatives were also detained in the Tower, tried, found guilty of concealing treason and sentenced to life imprisonment and forfeiture of goods.

Queen Catherine’s uncle, Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk, distanced himself from the scandal by retreating to Kenninghall to write a letter of apology, laying all the blame on his niece and stepmother. His son Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, a poet, remained a favourite of the King. Meanwhile, the King sank further into morbidity and indulged his appetite for food and women.

Catherine remained in limbo until Parliament introduced on January 29, 1542 a bill of attainder, which was passed on February 7, 1542. The Royal Assent by Commission Act 1541 made it treason, and punishable by death, for a queen consort to fail to disclose her sexual history to the king within 20 days of their marriage, or to incite someone to commit adultery with her.

This measure retroactively solved the matter of Catherine’s supposed precontract and made her unequivocally guilty. No formal trial was held.

When the Lords of the Council came for her, she allegedly panicked and screamed as they manhandled her into the barge that would escort her to the Tower on Friday February 10, 1542, her flotilla passing under London Bridge where the heads of Culpeper and Dereham were impaled (and where they remained until 1546).

Entering through the Traitors’ Gate, she was led to her prison cell. The next day the bill of attainder received Royal Assent and her execution was scheduled for 7:00 am on Monday February 13, 1542. Arrangements for the execution were supervised by Sir John Gage in his role as Constable of the Tower.

The night before her execution, Catherine is believed to have 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; she required assistance to climb the scaffold.

According to popular folklore her last words were, “I die a Queen, but I would rather have died the wife of Culpeper”, but no eyewitness accounts support this, instead reporting that she stuck to traditional final words, asking for forgiveness for her sins and acknowledging that she deserved to die “a thousand deaths” for betraying the king, who had always treated her so graciously.

She described her punishment as “worthy and just” and asked for mercy for her family and prayers for her soul. This was typical of the speeches given by people executed during that period, most likely in an effort to protect their families, since the condemned’s last words would be relayed to the King. Catherine was then beheaded with the executioner’s axe.

King François I of France when told by Sir William Paget how the queen had “wonderfully abused the king”, laid his hand on his heart and announced by his faith as a gentleman that “She hath done wonderous naughtly”.

Upon hearing news of Catherine’s execution, King François I wrote a letter to Henry regretting the “lewd and naughty [evil] behaviour of the Queen” and advising him that “the lightness of women cannot bend the honour of men”.

Lady Rochford was executed immediately thereafter on Tower Green. Both bodies were buried in an unmarked grave in the nearby chapel of St. Peter ad Vincula, where the bodies of Catherine’s cousins, Anne and George Boleyn, also lay.

Other cousins were also in the crowd, including the Earl of Surrey. King Henry did not attend. Catherine’s body was not one of those identified during restorations of the chapel during Queen Victoria’s reign. She is commemorated on a plaque on the west wall dedicated to all those who died in the Tower.

February 13, 1542 – Catherine Howard, the fifth wife of Henry VIII of England, is executed for adultery. Part I.

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2nd Duke of Norfolk, Anne Boleyn, Anne of Cleves, Catherine Howard, Executed, Joyce Culpeper, King Henry VIII of England and Ireland, Lord Edmund Howard, royal wedding, Thomas Cromwell, Thomas Howard

Catherine Howard (c. 1524 – February 13, 1542) was Queen of England from 1540 until 1542 as the fifth wife of Henry VIII.

Catherine had an aristocratic ancestry as a granddaughter of Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk (1443 – 1524), but her father, Lord Edmund Howard, was not wealthy, being the third son of his father – under the rules of primogeniture, the eldest son inherited all of the father’s estate.

Catherine Howard

Catherine’s mother, Joyce Culpeper, already had five children from her first husband, Ralph Leigh (c. 1476 – 1509) when she married Lord Edmund Howard, and they had another six together, Catherine being about her mother’s tenth child. With little to sustain the family, her father often had to beg for the help of his more affluent relatives.

Her father’s sister, Elizabeth Howard, was the mother of Anne Boleyn. Therefore, Catherine Howard was the first cousin of Anne Boleyn, and the first cousin once removed of Lady Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth I), Anne’s daughter by Henry VIII.

She also was the second cousin of Jane Seymour, as her grandmother Elizabeth Tilney was the sister of Seymour’s grandmother, Anne Say.

Catherine’s uncle, the Duke of Norfolk, found her a place at Court in the household of the King’s fourth wife, Anne of Cleves.

As a young and attractive lady-in-waiting, Catherine quickly caught Henry VIII’s eye. The King had displayed little interest in Anne from the beginning, but Thomas Cromwell failed to find a new match, and Norfolk saw an opportunity.

The Howards may have sought to recreate the influence gained during Anne Boleyn’s reign as queen consort. According to Nicholas Sander, the religiously conservative Howard family may have seen Catherine as a figurehead for their fight by expressed determination to restore Roman Catholicism to England. Catholic Bishop Stephen Gardiner entertained the couple at Winchester Palace with “feastings”.

King Henry VIII of England and Ireland

As the King’s interest in Catherine grew, so did the House of Norfolk’s influence. Her youth, prettiness and vivacity were captivating for the middle-aged sovereign, who claimed he had never known “the like to any woman”. Within months of her arrival at court, Henry bestowed gifts of land and expensive cloth upon Catherine.

King Henry VIII called her his ‘very jewel of womanhood’ (that he called her his ‘rose without a thorn’ is likely a myth). The French ambassador, Charles de Marillac, thought her “delightful”. Holbein’s portrait showed a young auburn-haired girl with a characteristically hooked Howard nose; Catherine was said to have a “gentle, earnest face.”

Marriage

King Henry VIII and Catherine Howard were married by Bishop Bonner of London at Oatlands Palace on July 28, 1540, the same day Thomas Cromwell was executed. Cromwell was an English lawyer and statesman who served as chief minister to King Henry VIII from 1534 to 1540

Thomas Cromwell fell from power, after arranging the king’s marriage to German Princess Anne of Cleves. Cromwell had hoped that the marriage would breathe fresh life into the Reformation in England, but Henry found his new bride unattractive and the marriage was a disaster for Cromwell, ending in an annulment six months later.

Cromwell was arraigned under a bill of attainder and executed for treason and heresy on Tower Hill on July 28, 1540. The king later expressed regret at the loss of his chief minister, and his reign never recovered from the incident.

Thomas Cromwell

The new Queen Catherine was a teenager, since her exact date of birth is unknown she was approximately 16 and the King was 49. Catherine adopted the French motto “Non autre volonté que la sienne”, meaning “No other will but his”.

The marriage was made public on August 8, and prayers were said in the Chapel Royal at Hampton Court Palace. Henry “indulged her every whim” thanks to her “caprice”.

Catherine was young, joyous and carefree. She was too young to take part in administrative matters of State. Nevertheless, every night Sir Thomas Heneage, Groom of the Stool, came to her chamber to report on the King’s well-being.

No plans were made for a coronation, yet she still travelled downriver in the royal barge into the City of London to a gun salute and some acclamation. She was settled by jointure at Baynard Castle.

Little changed at court, other than the arrival of many Howards. Every day she dressed with new clothes in the French fashion bedecked with precious jewels, decorated in gold around her sleeves.

Excommunication of Queen Elizabeth I of England and Ireland

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 Act of Supremacy of 1559, Church of England, Church of Ireland, Duke of Norfolk, Irish Catholics, Mary I of Scotland, Papal Bull, Pope Gregory XIII, Pope Pius V, Pope Sixtus V, Queen Elizabeth I of England and Ireland, Regnans in Excelsis, Ridolfi Plot, Thomas Howard

The other day I wrote about how Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk was arested for his role in the Ridolfi Plot. The Ridolfi Plot was the plan to murder Queen Elizabeth I, and replace her on the English throne with Mary I of Scotland. The historical event that paved the way for this plot was the excommunication of Queen Elizabeth I.

Regnans in Excelsis (“Reigning on High”) was a Papal Bull that Pope Pius V issued on February 25, 1570. The Bull excommunicated Queen Elizabeth I of England, referring to her as “the pretended Queen of England and the servant of crime”, declared her a heretic, and released her subjects from allegiance to her, even those who had “sworn oaths to her”, and excommunicated any who obeyed her orders: “We charge and command all and singular the nobles, subjects, peoples and others afore said that they do not dare obey her orders, mandates and laws. Those who shall act to the contrary we include in the like sentence of excommunication.” Among the queen’s alleged offences, “She has removed the royal Council, composed of the nobility of England, and has filled it with obscure men, being heretics.

The Bull, written in Latin, is named from its incipit, the first three words of its text.

Background

The Papacy had previously reconciled with Mary I, who returned the Church of England and Church of Ireland to Catholicism. After Mary I of England’s death in November 1558, Elizabeth’s Parliament passed the Act of Supremacy of 1559, which re-established the Church of England and Church of Ireland’s independence from papal authority. This bull can be seen as an act of retaliation for the religious settlement, but as it was delayed by eleven years, caused in part by a number of royal Catholic suitors who hoped to marry Elizabeth, and because she had tolerated Catholic worship in private.

Content

Pius V issued the bull in support of, but following, the failed Rising of the North of 1569, by which Catholic nobles attempted to depose Elizabeth and replace her with Mary I of Scotland, and the first Desmond Rebellion in Ireland, which broke out in June 1569. Although the Desmond Rebellion’s main goal was to preserve the independence of feudal lords from the English throne, it developed religious overtones as James FitzMaurice FitzGerald sought support from Catholic Europe.

The bull declared Queen Elizabeth excommunicated and absolved her subjects from any allegiance to her. It also excommunicated any that obeyed her orders. Its argument drew on the hierocratic theory of the papacy established by medieval canonists.

Pius did not consult any Catholic rulers. Both Felipe II of Spain and the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II disagreed with his approach. Felipe thought, correctly, that it would only harden the Crown’s treatment of English Catholics. According to Evelyn Waugh, It provided a convenient pretext for those in Elizabeth’s court, looking for an excuse to do so, to persecute Roman Catholics, and they took full advantage of it. To take effect in church law the bull had to be promulgated. This logistical effort relied on individuals such as John Felton.

Aftermath

The Bull provoked the English government into taking more repressive actions against the Jesuits, whom they feared to be acting in the interests of Spain and the papacy. This reaction soon seemed justified: it was the publication in England of Pius’s exhortation that gave the impetus in 1571 to the Ridolfi Plot, in which the Duke of Norfolk was to kidnap or murder Queen Elizabeth, install Mary I of Scotland, on the English throne, and then become de facto king by marrying her. Heinrich Bullinger of Zurich published a critique of the bull in 1571.

Suspension from 1580–84

At the request of the Jesuits and to relieve the pressures on Catholics in England, Pope Gregory XIII issued a clarification or suspension in 1580, explaining that Catholics should obey the queen outwardly in all civil matters, until such time as a suitable opportunity presented itself for her overthrow. How widely this was communicated to, and understood by, Catholics in England and Ireland is unknown. Later that year Pope Gregory XIII sponsored an abortive expedition to Ireland in support of the Second Desmond Rebellion that ended in the Siege of Smerwick, so the suggestion that the Bull was suspended earlier in 1580 cannot be taken seriously. Soon after the start of the Anglo-Spanish War (1585–1604), an English Act “against Jesuits, seminary priests and other such like disobedient persons” was passed into law.

Renewal in 1588

In 1588, Pope Sixtus V, in support of the Spanish Armada, renewed the solemn bull of excommunication against Queen Elizabeth I, for the regicide of Mary, Queen of Scots, in 1587 as well as the previously catalogued offences against the Catholic Church. During the threat of invasion by the Spanish Armada, it transpired that most of the Catholic residents in England remained loyal, and that those who were a real threat to the throne, like William, Cardinal Allen and Robert Persons, were already exiles.

While the bull had little impact in England, it caused a rift in Elizabeth’s Kingdom of Ireland where most of the population remained Roman Catholic; Gerald FitzGerald, 14th Earl of Desmond, had used the bull as justification for the Second Desmond Rebellion. While divisions had existed before 1570, after the bull the official world based in Dublin conformed to Anglicanism while the majority of the Parliament of Ireland were Catholics until 1613.

September 7, 1571: Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk is arested for his role in the Ridolfi Plot.

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4th Duke of Norfolk, Elizabeth Tudor, Mary I of Scotland, Mary Stuart, Pope Pius V, Queen Elizabeth I of England and Ireland, Ridolfi Plot, Thomas Howard

The Ridolfi plot was a plot in 1571 to assassinate Queen Elizabeth I of England and replace her with Mary I, Queen of Scots. The plot was hatched and planned by Roberto Ridolfi, an international banker who was able to travel between Brussels, Rome and Madrid to gather support without attracting too much suspicion.

Background

Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk, a cousin of Queen Elizabeth’s and the wealthiest landowner in the country, had been proposed as a possible husband for Mary I, Queen of Scots since her imprisonment in 1568. This suited Norfolk, who had ambitions and felt Elizabeth persistently undervalued him. In pursuit of his goals, he agreed to support the Northern Rebellion, though he quickly lost his nerve. Norfolk was imprisoned in the Tower of London for nine months and only freed under house arrest when he confessed all and begged for mercy. Pope Pius V, in his 1570 papal bull Regnans in Excelsis, excommunicated the Protestant Elizabeth and permitted all faithful Catholics to do all they could to depose her. The majority of English Catholics ignored the bull, but in response to it, Elizabeth became much harsher towards Catholics and their sympathisers.

Plot

Roberto Ridolfi, a Florentine banker and ardent Catholic, had been involved in the planning of the Northern rebellion and had been plotting to overthrow Elizabeth as early as 1569. With the failure of the rebellion, he concluded that foreign intervention was needed to restore Catholicism and bring Mary to the English throne, and so he began to contact potential conspirators. Mary’s advisor, John Lesley, the Bishop of Ross, gave his assent to the plot as the way to free Mary.

The plan was to have the Duke of Alba invade from the Netherlands with 10,000 men, foment a rebellion of the northern English nobility, murder Elizabeth, and marry Mary to Thomas Howard. Ridolfi optimistically estimated half of all English peers were Catholic and could muster in excess of 39,000 men. Norfolk gave verbal assurances to Ridolfi that he was Catholic, though as a pupil of John Foxe, he remained a Protestant all his life. Both Mary and Norfolk, desperate to remedy their respective situations, agreed to the plot. With their blessing, Ridolfi set off to the Continent to gain Alba, Pius V, and King Felipe II of Spain’s support.

List of co-conspirators

Ridolfi’s co-conspirators, some of them mentioned above, played an important role in the plot to overthrow Elizabeth:

Don Guerau de Espés: Spain’s ambassador to England, who was expelled after the discovery of his involvement. Elizabeth had raised her concerns about de Espés’ behaviour with Anna of Austria.

John Lesley: the Bishop of Ross, who was Mary Stuart’s chief agent; he arranged meetings and delivered letters for Mary during her house arrest.

Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk, who was Queen Elizabeth I’s second cousin. He was to marry Mary Queen of Scots and together with her restore Catholic rule to the English and Scottish thrones. After the plot was discovered he was given a day-long trial that ended with his execution.

Mary, Queen of Scots: after it became clear that Elizabeth I was not going to restore her to the Scottish throne or return her to France, Mary plotted for her freedom. She wrote to Ridolfi denouncing the French and soliciting Spanish aid, while simultaneously professing friendship and loyalty to Elizabeth I and England. Giving her consent to the plot in March 1571, her role was to marry the Duke of Norfolk, with the plan that when the troops arrived in London she would be returned to the Scottish throne. However, when the plot was uncovered, her deep involvement in it altered Elizabeth’s opinion of Mary; Elizabeth never spoke of restoring her to the throne again.

King Felipe II of Spain, who welcomed Ridolfi to court and, with the council, discussed the plot’s pros and cons. He supported overthrowing Elizabeth and later came to support the assassination. Felipe, however, disapproved of the papal bull against Elizabeth because, according to Cyril Hamshere, he feared it would “prompt Elizabeth to take reprisals against Catholics.”

Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, 3rd Duke of Alba, who was the leader of the Spanish army stationed in the Netherlands and was to lead more than 10,000 men to Harwich or Portsmouth. His army was to invade England and make its way to London to establish Mary on the throne, while either detaining or assassinating Elizabeth I.

Pope Pius V, who made Ridolfi his papal agent in England in 1567. Pius was not only aware of the plot but gave his written approval in a letter for Ridolfi to take to Felipe II.

Discovery

In 1571, Elizabeth’s intelligence network was sending her information about a plot against her life. By gaining the confidence of Spain’s ambassador to England, John Hawkins learned the details of the conspiracy and notified the government so as to arrest the plotters. Elizabeth was also sent a private warning by Cosimo I de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, who had learned of the plot against her. Charles Baillie, Ridolfi’s messenger, was arrested on about April 12, 1571 at Dover for carrying compromising letters, and by the use of torture and prison informers such as William Herle, he was forced to reveal the cipher of the messages he carried.

On August 29, 1571, Norfolk’s secretaries William Barker and Robert Higford entrusted to Thomas Browne, a Shrewsbury draper, what was purported to be a bag of silver coin for delivery to Laurence Bannister, one of Norfolk’s officials in the north of England. Browne grew suspicious of the bag’s weight, opened it, and discovered 600 pounds in gold from the French ambassador, destined for Scotland on Mary’s behalf, and ciphered letters.

Because he knew Norfolk was under suspicion, Browne reported his find to William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, the Secretary of State. Higford and Barker were interrogated, the letters were partly deciphered, and a search for the cipher key at Howard House uncovered a ciphered letter from Mary Stuart hidden under a doormat.

Norfolk’s servants were arrested and interrogated, and confessions were extracted from them by threats or application of torture. Sir Thomas Smith and Thomas Wilson were sent to confront Norfolk, who claimed the money was for his own private purposes. The deciphered letter, however, proved that he was lying. Unaware of his servants’ confessions or the survival of letters which, contrary to his instructions, had not been burnt, he denied the charges against him.

On September 7, the queen’s warrant for conveying him to the Tower of London arrived. Thereupon, the duke admitted a degree of involvement in the transmission of money and correspondence to Mary’s Scottish supporters. In January 1572, Norfolk was tried and convicted on three counts of high treason, and on June 2, he was beheaded on Tower Hill.
Guerau de Spes, the Spanish ambassador, was expelled from the country in January 1571. Still abroad when the plot was discovered, Ridolfi never returned to England; he became a Florentine senator in 1600.

Ridolfi’s role

Despite his plot’s ultimate failure, Roberto Ridolfi’s story is surprising and memorable. He’d played the relatively minor role of banker but nevertheless found himself at the centre of a major plot to overthrow the English government. Ridolfi had been jailed in 1568 because of a rumour that he had distributed money to dissenting nobles associated with the Northern Rebellion.

The Pope did, in fact, give him 12,000 crowns for that purpose, but Ridolfi was released in 1570 because no evidence could be found to incriminate him. Even after his arrest and release, Ridolfi remained a spy for the Pope. Ridolfi’s banking connections helped him become acquainted with the Duke of Norfolk, and he became a supporter of a marriage between Norfolk and Mary, Queen of Scots, who would, if the plot succeeded, rule England and reinstate Catholicism there.

After Norfolk’s release from prison in August 1570, Ridolfi “picked up the broken threads of Catholic intrigue”. Ridolfi was in an advantageous position to orchestrate a Catholic rebellion in England, since he was employed by the Pope, France, and Spain, and had ties to the Catholic contingent in England. He could use banking as an excuse to travel among these groups for the purpose of conspiring. When he travelled to mainland Europe to King Felipe II and the Pope of the plot, it is believed that he was still working for Elizabeth.

The Duke of Alba, the Spanish Viceroy in the Netherlands who was to lead the attack on England, felt Ridolfi was too garrulous to be the leader of a conspiracy, but Spanish Ambassador Don Guerau de Spes described Ridolfi as “A person of great truth and virtue and an intimate friend of mine.” Ridolfi’s talkative nature did eventually cause him trouble, as he was not very discreet and trumpeted his plan all over Europe. His boasting was partially responsible for the plot’s failure, as he told it to Cosimo I de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany who immediately informed Elizabeth of the plot. Ridolfi escaped execution, unlike some of his co-conspirators, and lived until 1612.

Modern criticism

According to historian Cyril Hamshere, retrospective critics of the conspiracy cited a number of reasons why the Ridolfi Plot would have been doomed to fail even if it had not been discovered prematurely. For one, the small number of Spanish soldiers (between 6000–10,000) would have been absurdly inadequate to the task of overthrowing the English government. Additionally, the vagueness of the invasion point was a logistical shortcoming.

The plan was to land at either Harwich or Portsmouth, but Ridolfi apparently did not know exactly where Harwich was. Also dubious was Ridolfi’s reliance on the Duke of Norfolk, who was regarded as a bad leader and was not even a Catholic. This did not make him an ideal co-conspirator, but, according to Hamshere, “his main merit lay in his title: in 1571 he was the only Duke in England”.

Norfolk’s Protestantism was but one irony of the Ridolfi Plot: Norfolk and Mary I, Queen of Scots had each been married three times before their proposed marriage to each other. Pope Pius was, apparently, willing to grant Mary an annulment of her marriage to her imprisoned husband, but the notion of two thrice wed royals leading England back to Catholicism is somewhat problematic, nonetheless.

This date in History: January 13, 1546, Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey is arrested for treason.

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3rd Duke of Norfolk, Anne Boleyn, Catherine Howard, Earl of Surrey, Edward the Confessor, Edward VI of England, House of Howard, King Henry VIII of England, Queen of England, Thomas Howard

Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (1516/1517 – January 19, 1547), KG, (courtesy title), was an English nobleman, politician and poet. He was one of the founders of English Renaissance poetry and the last known person execution by King Henry VIII. He was a first cousin of both Queen Anne Boleyn and Queen Catherine Howard, second and fifth wives of King Henry VIII.

Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey

Henry Howard, was born in Hunsdon, Hertfordshire, the eldest son of Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk by his second wife Elizabeth Stafford, a daughter of Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham. He was thus descended from King Edward I on his father’s side and from King Edward III on his mother’s side.

He was brought-up at Windsor Castle with Henry FitzRoy, 1st Duke of Richmond and Somerset, the illegitimate son of King Henry VIII. He became a close friend, and later a brother-in-law, of Fitzroy following the marriage of his sister, Lady Mary Howard, to him. Like his father and grandfather, he was a soldier, serving in Henry VIII’s French wars as Lieutenant General of the King on Sea and Land.

Howard was repeatedly imprisoned for rash behaviour, on one occasion for striking a courtier, on another for wandering through the streets of London breaking the windows of houses whose occupants were asleep. Henry Howard assumed the courtesy title Earl of Surrey in 1524 when his grandfather, Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk (1443-1524) died and his father, Thomas Howard, became 3rd Duke of Norfolk.

In 1532 he accompanied Anne Boleyn (his first cousin), King Henry VIII, and the Duke of Richmond to France, staying there for more than a year as a member of the entourage of King François I of France during the Field of the Cloth of Gold. The Field of the Cloth of Gold was a site in Balinghem that hosted a tournament field as part of a summit from June 7-24 1520, between the French king and King Henry VIII of England.

Frances de Vere, Countess of Surrey

The Earl of Surrey married Frances de Vere, a daughter of John de Vere, 15th Earl of Oxford, (by his wife Elizabeth Trussell). His first son was born, Thomas Howard (later 4th Duke of Norfolk) in 1536 and in the same year Anne Boleyn was executed on charges of adultery and treason. Also that same year the Duke of Richmond, the illegitimate son of Henry VIII died at the age of 17 and was buried at Thetford Abbey, one of the Howard seats. Another event in 1536 is when the Earl of Surrey also served with his father in the suppression of the Pilgrimage of Grace, a rebellion against the Dissolution of the Monasteries.

Downfall

Henry VIII, King of England of Ireland

King Henry VIII, consumed by paranoia because of his increasing illness, became convinced that the Earl of Surrey had planned to usurp the crown from his son the future King Edward VI. The Earl of Surrey suggested that his sister Mary FitzRoy, Duchess of Richmond and Somerset (a widow of Henry’s illegitimate son Henry Fitzroy) should seduce the aged King, her father-in-law, and become his mistress, to “wield as much influence on him as Madame d’Etampes doth about the French King”. The Duchess, outraged, said she would “cut her own throat” rather than “consent to such villainy”. She and her brother fell out, and she later laid testimony against Surrey that helped lead to his trial and execution for treason.

Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

The matter came to a head when the Earl of Surrey quartered the attributed arms of King Edward the Confessor into his family coat-of-arms. Although the arms of the Earl of Surrey’s ancestor Thomas Mowbray, 1st Duke of Norfolk shown that he was entitled to bear Edward the Confessor’s arms, Henry VIII thought that doing so was an act of pride and rebellion against him. In consequence, on December 12, 1546 both the Earl of Surrey and his father Thomas Howard 3rd Duke of Norfolk were arrested and sent to the Tower.

On December 24, 1546, the elder Howard acknowledged that he had “concealed high treason, in keeping secret the false acts of my son, Henry, Earl of Surrey, in using the arms of St. Edward the Confessor, which pertain only to kings”, and offered his lands to the King in compensation. The Duke of Norfolk’s family, including his estranged wife, his daughter Mary Fitzroy, Duchess of Richmond, and his mistress, Elizabeth Holland, all gave evidence against the father and son.

The two were sentenced to death on January 13, 1547 without a formal trial. On January 19, Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey was beheaded for treason. The dying King Henry VIII gave his assent to the death of the Earl of Surrey’s father, Thomas Howard 3rd Duke of Norfolk, by royal commissioners, and it was rumoured that he would be executed on the following day. However, King Henry VIII died on January 28, and was succeeded by his eldest son as King Edward VI. The Duke of Norfolk’s execution was stayed because the king’s Council did not want to inaugurate the new king’s reign with bloodshed.

The Earl of Surrey’s son, Thomas Howard became heir to the Dukedom of Norfolk in place of his father, which title he inherited on the 3rd Duke’s death in 1554.