Spring, 1536: The Conspiracy to Destroy a Queen

By spring of 1536, Henry VIII's passion for Anne Boleyn had soured into hatred. The son he had expected had turned out to be another worthless daughter, and Anne had miscarried of a son in January. The quick mind and spirited personality that had attracted him to Anne in the first place were now starting to irritate him. He was experiencing problems in the bedroom, which - knowing Henry's personality - he likely blamed on Anne. He wanted a placid, submissive wife now, and he had his eye on a woman who seemed to embody those very qualities: Jane Seymour.

But it had taken Henry seven long years to rid himself of his first wife, Katharine of Aragon. Anne was just as stalwart as Katharine, and well-versed in Scripture. She also had powerful and wealthy supporters in the religious reformist movement. Like Katharine, Anne deeply loved her daughter and would fight to her last breath to preserve Elizabeth's rights to the throne. Henry was in no mood for a protracted legal battle and another inconvenient ex-wife causing him grief.

But invalidating his second marriage might tacitly confirm the pope had been right to say it wasn't legal, and Henry couldn't have that. Chapuys noted Henry's predicament:

[T]he King would have declared himself earlier, but that some one of his Council gave him to understand that he could not separate from the Concubine without tacitly confirming, not only the first marriage, but also, what he most fears, the authority of the Pope.

Divorce also left his future marriage to Jane questionable. There were people who never accepted his marriage to Anne while Katharine still lived. Princess Elizabeth was considered a bastard by conservative Catholics, born of a bigamous relationship. Henry didn't want anyone to question the legitimacy of the heir he was certain he would father with Jane.

There was only one conclusion ...

Anne must die.

Thomas Cromwell later admitted he was the main architect of the plot against Anne. He had to have started working on it in April, 1536 - possibly earlier, but likely around then, because they needed to move fast in order to catch Anne and her supporters unaware.

Cromwell was a religious reformist himself, but he was the king's man first. His primary duty was to get Henry whatever he wanted - to find a "legal" way to obtain his desired end, that is. And Cromwell was extraordinarily good at his job.

Anne and Cromwell had worked together in the past, but lately, tensions between them had increased. On the 1st of April, Cromwell told the Imperial ambassador, Eustace Chapuys, that Anne would like to see Cromwell beheaded. Whether he was speaking with hyperbole to try to curry favor with Chapuys, or whether relations between Cromwell and Anne had really gotten so strained, is unknown.

One of the main sticking points between them was that Anne wanted the funds from the dissolved monasteries to go toward founding schools. Cromwell and the king wanted it to go to the royal treasury. Guess who won that particular dispute? Anne also favored an alliance with the French, and German religious reformers; Cromwell was courting the Emperor and a renewed friendship with the Spanish.

Some scholars have put the entire conspiracy on Cromwell's shoulders, making Henry an innocent dupe of the false accusations against the queen, but I doubt that highly. Henry's own behavior illustrates plainly that he was in on the plot. (Contrast his behavior during Anne's fall with how he reacted to the fall of Katheryn Howard for ample proof.) Henry said he wanted rid of his queen, and Cromwell supplied a way to make it happen.

Anne likely knew something was stirring. In January, Chapuys had written that the king had said he felt his marriage was invalid because he had been tricked into it by the promises of soothsayers ("sortileges") that Anne Boleyn would bear him a son. In late April, Chapuys reported that the Bishop of London had been asked whether the king's marriage to Anne might be found invalid. (The Bishop wisely responded he would only give his answer to the king himself, and only if he knew in advance what answer was wanted.) Henry was testing the waters.

Jane Seymour's supporters also knew the queen's days were numbered. Henry had already been speaking to her of their future marriage, even before Anne's arrest. Chapuys writes at the end of April that Nicholas Carew was daily conspiring with Jane toward the queen's ruin.

The Grand Esquire, Master Caro (Carew), was on St. George's Day invested with the Order of the Garter, in the room of Mr. De Bourgain, who died some time ago. This has been a source of great disappointment and sorrow for lord Rochefort [George Boleyn], who wanted it for himself, and still more for the concubine, who has not had sufficient credit to get her own brother knighted. In fact, it will not be Carew's fault if the aforesaid concubine, though a cousin of his, is not overthrown (desarçonee) one of these days, for I hear that he is daily conspiring against her, and trying to persuade Miss Seymour and her friends to accomplish her ruin. Indeed, only four days ago the said Carew and certain gentlemen of the Kings chamber sent word to the Princess to take courage, for very shortly her rival would be dismissed, the King being so tired of the said concubine that he could not bear her any longer.

Cromwell seems to have operated under the concept of "Go big, or go home." The plot against Anne had to destroy her reputation utterly, and leave the king's honor spotless. As a result, Anne could not be charged with mere adultery, because then people might laugh at the king for having a wife who prefered another man's caresses to his own. No, she had to be a depraved monster of lust, whose carnal appetites were so all-consuming that she would seduce her own brother to satisfy them. That's why so many men were accused with her, along with Mark Smeaton, whose inclusion was meant to show how truly depraved she was. She would even sleep with commoners!

Cromwell also seems to have used the case against the queen to solve some pesky problems he had on his desk. William Brereton, for example, was involved in a dispute over some land with one of the lords of the privy council. He was killing  all of his inconvenient birds with one stone.

Henry was kept aware of the progress of the plot. Chapuys reports that all-day council meetings ran late into the evening. Anne was also getting very nervous. On the 26th of April, she met with her chaplain, Matthew Parker, and made a special request of him. She asked him to watch over her daughter, Princess Elizabeth, if anything were to happen to her.

But Anne couldn't have known what was in store for her. Likely, she suspected Henry was trying to get his ducks in a row for an annulment suit, or put her under a state of perpetual house arrest, as had been done with Eleanor of Aquitaine. She would never have suspected what Henry actually had in mind. No queen of England had ever been executed.

On May 2nd, Anne Boleyn was arrested and charged with adultery and treason. Share on Tumblr

Elizabeth Browne Somerset, Countess of Worcester

While Jane Parker traditionally takes most of the blame for the incest allegations against Anne Boleyn and her brother, George, the Countess of Worcester may be the one who betrayed Anne and sealed her doom.

Elizabeth Browne was born around 1502, the eldest daughter of Sir Anthony Browne and his wife, Lucy Neville. Sir Anthony served as the lieutenant of Calais. Lucy was an avowed Yorkist and did not support the reign of Henry VII. She supposedly once intimated that if the king should happen to die, she would seize control of the fortress of Calais and hold it for her cousin, Edmund de la Pole. The king fired a heavy shot across the family's bow in 1507, imposing a huge fine on a trumped-up pretext. Lucy got the hint and kept her head down after that.

Elizabeth had a brother also named Sir Anthony Browne, who served as a close advisor to Henry VIII. He was so trusted by the king that he held a "dry stamp" of the king's signature, carved in wood, used for impressing the king's signature on minor documents, which would then be inked over.

Elizabeth Browne married well. In about 1527, she wed Henry Somerset, Earl of Worcester. Somerset had been married first to Margaret Courtenay, granddaughter of Elizabeth Woodville, and a cousin of the king. They had no children before Margaret died, supposedly from choking on a fish bone.

Elizabeth's marriage to Somerset was very fruitful. They had up to ten children together, though the number is somewhat in question because not all of the children lived to adulthood.

The couple seems to have had financial difficulties of some sort. Somerset never rose to a position of much prominence, and is barely mentioned in most histories of the era.

At one point, a "Mistress Browne," first name unknown, was said to be a short-term mistress of the king. It's generally assumed to have been Elizabeth, but there's no direct evidence of it. Things of that nature weren't considered important to the chroniclers of the era, and so the beginnings of most of Henry's relationships are shrouded in mystery. We don't know for certain that it was Elizabeth Henry was pursuing, or that the relationship ever progressed to the point of consummation. None the less, it may have given Elizabeth an unsavory reputation, or a vulnerability to accusations of that sort, as we will see later.

Elizabeth appears to have been a close friend of Anne Boleyn. Henry VIII's privy purse expenses detail a payment made to a midwife for Elizabeth in February, 1530, likely on Anne's behalf to assist her friend. Three years later, during Anne's coronation feast, Elizabeth knelt beside Anne with a silver ewer, tasked with holding up a cloth in front of the queen whenever she needed to spit out a bone. To modern eyes, it seems somewhat of a demeaning task, but in the Tudor era, it was a position of high honor.

After Anne became queen, Elizabeth was appointed as one of her ladies in waiting. It must have been somewhat of a relief to Elizabeth and Somerset for her to have a steady source of income, but living at court was expensive. The financial troubles of Elizabeth and her husband seem to have continued, because in April 1536, she borrowed from Anne the substantial sum of £100 (about $40,600 in today's money). Elizabeth did not tell her husband she had borrowed the money and later begged Cromwell not to mention it to him.

Less than a month later, Anne Boleyn was arrested on trumped-up charges of adultery and treason, and Elizabeth was named as one of the principal witnesses against her. How did Elizabeth come to betray a friend who had been so good to her?

Lancelot de Carles is the source which gives further details.

A lord of the Privy Council seeing clear evidence that his sister loved certain persons with a dishonorable love, admonished her fraternally. She acknowledged her offence, but said it was little in her case in comparison with that of the Queen, as he might ascertain from Mark [Smeaton], declaring that she was guilty of incest with her own brother.

Sir Anthony Browne

The "lord of the Privy Council" is identified as Elizabeth's brother, Sir Anthony Browne, by John Husee, writing to Lady Lisle.

As to the confession of the Queen and others, they said little or nothing; but what was said was wondrous discreetly spoken. "The first accuser, the lady Worcester, and Nan Cobham with one maid mo; but the lady Worcester was the first ground."

Sir Anthony Browne was a religious conservative and a proponent of Princess Mary. In fact, he later got in a dicey situation himself for trying to promote Princess Mary's claim to the throne over that of Princess Elizabeth. He probably wasn't troubled about helping to bring down the reign of Anne Boleyn.

Elizabeth herself does not seem to have testified directly. Indeed, we don't even have mention that she was ever personally questioned by the council or judges. We have only the mention that her brother said she'd made these accusations against the queen.

Lancelot de Carles has her offering the information freely, but his poem is a paraphrase of her brother's testimony. Sir Anthony Browne, knowing his sister was a close confidant of the queen, may have interrogated her personally as soon the "investigation" of the queen began. He was in the thick of the plot, and his sister could be a valuable tool to getting what the king wanted.

We can only speculate as to what happened, but Elizabeth must have been badly frightened if her brother approached her with the accusations of immoral behavior. She would have feared for her position at court. Anne was very strict about moral behavior in her ladies; she had even sent her own sister away from court for misconduct. Elizabeth must have been terrified the same thing would happen to her. Since Elizabeth was heavily pregnant at the time the allegation was made, she may have feared her husband would claim the child was not his.

With the secret loan from Anne and the accusations of immorality hanging over her head, Elizabeth could have thought her marriage, her child, and her future at court were all at stake.

Then, she would have realized the true scope of what was happening. If she did not "confess" to witnessing Anne's misconduct, Elizabeth might have feared she would be accused of assisting her. She could do only what the rest of the court was doing: obey the will of the king and hope that the shadow of the axe passed away her own family. Jane Parker may have faced the same sort of choice.

The Somersets did not escape unscathed. Elizabeth's husband's sister was married to William Brereton, one of the men accused of adultery with Anne Boleyn. Brereton  just so happened to be withholding control of some lands that Sir Anthony Browne wanted. In short, he had a financial incentive to see to it that his sister cooperated.

Anne didn't know that Elizabeth had betrayed her when she was imprisoned in the Tower. She is recorded to have worried about Elizabeth's pregnancy.

[Anne] myche lamented my lady of Worceter, for by c[ause that her child di]d not store in hyre body. And my wyf sayd, what shuld [be the cause? And she sai]d, for the sorow she toke for me.

The "sorrow" Anne spoke of was likely her own miscarriage in January and the subsequent loss of the king's favor.

Anne was executed, along with her brother and the other men accused of being her lovers. Elizabeth and her husband left court, probably when Anne Boleyn's household was dissolved. She resided afterward in Tintern, Monmouthshire, Wales.

Sometime before September, Elizabeth gave birth to a daughter she named Anne. Was it in remembrance of the doomed queen whom had once been her friend, or after her long-dead sister, Anne Browne, who had been the second wife of Charles Brandon, an enemy of Anne Boleyn?

Two years later, Elizabeth wrote a letter to Cromwell, thanking him for being so kind in the matter of the money she had borrowed from Queen Anne. She asked him not to tell her husband about the loan because he didn't know about it - or how she had spent it - and she didn't know how he would take it if he found out. There is no mention of whether she actually repaid the debt or not before her own death in 1565. If not, it would have been one of the debts paid for by her estate after her will was probated.

Elizabeth is buried beside her husband in Cheapstow. Her tomb can be seen here.


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