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The Fall of Cardinal Wolsey

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2009

Extract

It is sufficiently well known to the general reader of history that the cause of Wolsey's fall was his failure to obtain for Henry VIII. a divorce from Katharine of Arragon. Wolsey had certainly done his utmost in that bad cause, however unwillingly he engaged himself to it in the first instance; for it was a matter of life or death to him to give the king satisfaction. For years the old nobility of England, who were councillors by right of birth and standing, had resented his monopoly of the king's confidence. Several of them were related to Anne Boleyn, and others who were not personally interested backed the king's wishes in the divorce—unpopular as it was in the country generally—as a means of securing the downfall of the Cardinal. Even the Duke of Suffolk, no less an upstart than Wolsey himself, and whom Wolsey had saved at the outset of his career from the vengeance of the other nobles, now most ungratefully turned against him; and when the Legatine Court was prorogued by Campeggio, gave a great rap on the table and said with haughty mien, ‘It was never merry in England whilst we had Cardinals among us.’

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Historical Society 1899

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References

page 76 note 1 Her cousin, Sir Francis Brian, at Rome, had said in repeated letters to the king, that he durst not write the truth of matters there to her. See Letters and Papers of Henry VIII. vol. iv. Nos. 5481, 5519.

page 77 note 1 Poli Epp. i. pp. 116–123.

page 77 note 2 ibid. p. 126.

page 78 note 1 Some further details, indeed, are inaccurate or questionable; for the king is said afterwards to have removed to Greenwich, which he did not do (he had just come from Greenwich), and to have sent for Cranmer into Nottinghamshire, whither he had gone through Cambridge just after the conversation. See Foxe, viii. 6, 7 (Townsend's, ed.)Google Scholar.

page 80 note 1 Gardiner, however, had a perfect right to feel uncomfortable; for, as Dr. Ehses points out, it was his despatches from Rome that encouraged the king and Anne Boleyn to think the matter feasible, by the very coloured reports he had given of his own success in browbeating the Pope and Cardinals. See English Historical Review, vol. xi. 696–7. (10 1896Google Scholar.)

page 81 note 1 Even the Venetian Ambassador, Ludovico Falier, had ‘heard on good authority’ that Wolsey did not wish the divorce to take place, but he supposed it was only for fear he should lose his influence if Boleyn, Anne became queen (Venetian Calendar, vol. iv. No. 461)Google Scholar. This, no doubt, was Anne Bcleyn's own view.

page 81 note 2 See Letters and Papers, vol. iv. Nos. 5819–21, 5864.

page 82 note 1 See Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. pt. i. p. 272.

page 82 note 2 Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. pt. i. pp. 189, 195, 214, 235.

page 82 note 3 Letters and Papers, iv. No. 5936. See the original in State Papers, 343.

page 83 note 1 Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. pt. i. p. 235.

page 83 note 2 Ibid.

page 83 note 3 Cavendish 172–3.

page 84 note 1 Cavendish, 176–7.

page 85 note 1 Cavendish, 177.

page 85 note 2 The name is written ‘Eston’ in the MSS.

page 85 note 3 A good deal more than three statute miles certainly. A mile in the reckoning of our ancestors was often nearly two of ours.

page 86 note 1 Cavendish, 177, 179. It may be observed that Cavendish's statements are remarkably borne out by a letter of Chapuys to Margaret of Savoy, written on Sept. 27, where he says, ‘The Cardinal (Wolsey) has lately been at Court, owing to the influence and exertions of his colleague, Campeggio, and was there treated as I have informed you by my last despatch, although it must be said that the very evening of his departure he was three or four hours debating with the king.’ It is unfortunate that we have not the previous letter; but it is clear that the long interview with the king seemed out of harmony with Wolsey's reception as a whole. Indeed, Chapuys, says that both the legates had ‘as poor a reception as could possibly be.’ (Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. pt. i. p. 257.)Google Scholar

page 87 note 1 Letters and Papers, No. 5993. Comp. App., No 238.

page 87 note 2 Hall says the king sent the two dukes for it ‘the seventene day of November,’ evidently an error of the month only.

page 89 note 1 This inventory is No. 6184 in the Calendar of State Papers, where it is placed a little too late.

page 89 note 2 That he left for Esher about the date of the ‘indenture,’ October 22, is clear from Chapuys's letter of the 25th, printed (in translation) by Bradford, (Corr. of Charles V., p. 291)Google Scholar. He was already living at Esher (a place about ten miles from London, Chapuys calls it) on the 25th.

page 39 note 3 Chapuys, as we have just seen, mentions the sending of the ring, but evidently sees no further than other people did, as to the King's object. He thinks it was only that Henry was moved by pity, or by fear, lest the Cardinal should die before the whole extent of his property was known.

page 90 note 1 He is mentioned as having gone thither (the place is certain, though it is not named) in a letter of Du Bellay written on October 27. The fact that his appointment of attorneys is dated Westminster, that day, counts for nothing, as Westminster was only a formal date. In fact, he must have gone thither before the 25th, for Chapuys, writing on that day, mentions the ring having been sent to him.

page 90 note 2 Hall's, Chronicle (Ellis's, ed., 1809), 764Google Scholar.

page 90 note 3 See Rolls of Parliament, printed at the beginning of the Lords' Journals, cli.

page 90 note 4 Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. pt. i. p. 324.

page 91 note 1 Roper's, Life of More, 25, 26Google Scholar.

page 92 note 1 Roper's, Life of More, 60Google Scholar.

page 93 note 1 Campeggio was fully persuaded that this was the case after he had taken leave of the king in September; but an interview with Chapuys, shortly afterwards, filled him with misgivings, and he agreed that the queen ought to prosecute her defence to the utmost of her power. Even in November, however, there was a rumour that Anne Boleyn would be disposed ”of in marriage to some of the nobility—Chapuys said, to the son of the late Duke of Buckingham (Henry Stafford). But this must be a mistake, as he was already married, and had at the time seven children by his wife, Ursula Pole, who outlived him. See Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. pt. i. p. 325. Compare Ellis's, Letters, 2nd series, ii. 24Google Scholar.

page 93 note 2 Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. pt. i. p. 294.

page 94 note 1 Calendar, Henry VIII. vol. iv. p. 2684. See the original text in Bradford's, Correspondence of Charles V., p. 293Google Scholar.

page 94 note 2 See Chapuys's account of the speech, to which reference has already been made. It is probably more accurate than Hall's as regards the apology for the king in having trusted Wolsey so long. Hall makes More speak with contempt of Wolsey for supposing that the king did not see through him; which is very unlikely.

page 95 note 1 Letters and Papers, iv. p. 2781. Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. pt. i. p. 449. See the original in Bradford, 309.

page 98 note 1 Letters and Papers, iv. p. 2715.

page 99 note 1 The Imperial Ambassador, Chapuys, saw this plainly from several indications, and says distinctly that on this account the king would not allow Wolsey's case to be determined by Parliament, ‘for had it been decided against him, he could not, in the face of such a decision, have pardoned him, as he intended to do, and has since done.’ Chapuys, to Charles, V., 6 02, 1530Google Scholar. (See Calendar of State Papers, Spanish, , vol. iv. part i. p. 448Google Scholar.) This seems to be the earliest reference to the constitutional doctrine, that a royal pardon could not be pleaded against a Parliamentary impeachment.

page 99 note 2 The terror of Norfolk is the only possible excuse for his almost inconceivable language to Cromwell, . ‘Sir (quoth he) me thinketh that the Cardinal, your master, maketh no haste northward. Show him that if he go not away shortly, I will, rather than he should tarry still, tear him with my teeth!’ (Cavendish, 232)Google Scholar. Not long before the duke had shown himself highly courteous and humane towards Wolsey in his adversity, and was thanked for it by the Cardinal himself (Ib. 211–214).

page 101 note 1 Lett. & Pap. H. VIII., vol. v. No. 120.

page 102 note 1 See Friedmann's, Anne Boleyn, ii. 31Google Scholar.

page 102 note 1 Ibid. ii. 58.