(Cover image – © The Tudors – Showtime)
Arguably the darkest period of Henry VIII’s life was between the years of 1537 to 1540 following the tragic death of his third and most beloved wife, Jane Seymour, due to postnatal complications a mere twelve days after giving birth to her only child, the future King Edward IV. For those three years, it is said that Henry dressed completely in black to mourn the loss of his beloved wife and sheltered his precious son from practically everyone out of fear that he would also lose his only son as well.
Many within England would have seen or heard of how the Queen’s death had deeply impacted the King; from those outside of the King’s court, they would of heard of the King’s reluctance and firm desire to not marry again out of respect for the love that he had held for his wife and that the Prince was being kept safe within the Palace walls to protect him from any outbreaks of disease or those who would wish him harm. Yes, the King believed that now that he had the son he had desperately longed for after all these many years of devoted effort, his enemies or monarchs of foreign countries might want to do harm to England’s beloved Prince. Whilst those within the King’s court would have been gravely concerned with the King’s health, as well as ensuring the young Prince remained safe and well also, as they needed to make sure that the King could still perform his royal duties to the country and hopefully, in Thomas Cromwell’s mind at least, marry once more to provide a second male heir, otherwise known as the spare to the heir much like how Henry had been the spare to the heir, his brother Arthur.
Whilst the King’s grief consumed him and caused him to hide his son away from the public’s view, his eldest daughter Mary was the one who stepped up as a sort of mother figure to her infant brother. By 1537, Mary was no longer a child but a fine young woman of twenty-one years of age and the eldest sibling to a newborn Edward and four-year old Elizabeth, she must have felt a responsibility towards the education and upbringing of her siblings with her grief-stricken father’s mind elsewhere.
Mary’s relationship with her two younger siblings differed; as Mary saw her younger brother as her father’s legitimate heir due to him being a male and had formed a brief yet positive relationship with his late mother (leading to her being made Edward’s godmother when his mother died), Mary lavished affection constantly on the future king. She offered him luxurious gifts, doted on him quit often and even had a hand in his education, ensuring that he was brought up in the Protestant religion just like his mother (even though she was a Catholic, she believed it was right that he follow in his mother’s footsteps just like she and Elizabeth had for their own mothers). In regards to Elizabeth, their relationship was very different to the one that Mary shared with her younger brother; Mary held a hatred for Elizabeth’s mother, Anne Boleyn, whom she believed for the downfall of her late mother as well as herself and the fact that Elizabeth had briefly replaced her as Princess before Anne’s execution made her illegitimate like Mary—this made Mary harbour some negative emotions towards her younger sister, even though she must have loved her dearly as a sister regardless of this fact as Mary is said to have wished for younger siblings to dote on.
Interestingly, she is even said to have referred to her half-brother Henry Fitzroy, who died in 1536, as her brother although we know very little about what their relationship might have looked like. Mary might not have hated Henry’s mother Bessie like she did Anne Boleyn because Bessie knew her place; there was no way that the King would have divorced Catherine of Aragon in favour of Bessie, the only reason she held any importance to Henry was that she had shown he could have living male heirs. That is all and Mary would have known this. Unlike the huge age gaps between Mary and her other siblings, Henry was only three years younger than Mary and it is possible that he might have grown closer had he lived longer than he did as there was talk of Henry legitimising Henry Fitzroy but he died in 1536 as a teenager before Henry could act on it, if that had been his intention.
You can read more about her relationships with Edward and Elizabeth in our previous posts.
Mary, alike many others at court, must have wondered over what the death of the Queen meant for the King as well as for England. Remarrying after the death of a wife was quite a normal thing for a King to do, after all, you had to remember that having just one male heir was not always good enough for Kings. The more sons they had, the securer they felt in knowing that their line was safe following their inevitable death. Henry VIII, reluctant as he may be to marry for the fourth time after just losing what historians believe to be the love of his life, knew that he could not put off the subject forever and gave into the advice of his royal council—he would marry again.
In the three years following the Queen’s death, alongside busying herself with spending time with her younger siblings (most likely more Edward than Elizabeth), the Lady Mary filled her time with some of her favourite pastimes. Reading books, playing her instruments, hunting, riding as well as many other things were just a handful of the activities that filled the young woman’s days besides her daily prayers and visits to the Chapel to pray. But these carefree activities would soon be interrupted with the news of her father, the King’s, next course of action for his life as well as the future of England.
He was to marry again for the fourth time—this time as part of a foreign alliance for the purpose of bettering England’s alliances for the wars that he had planned.
Poor Henry, he just could not keep his mind off marriage or wars, could he?
I wish someone had told him there were better things to life than bloodshed and sex, for example spending time with your children or focusing on some of England’s glaring problems such as poverty or religious unrest but oh well, I doubt he would have listened either way.
Nonetheless, the King was to marry again and it would not be long before the new Queen of England would be brought to court and introduced to the King’s three children, meaning that Mary would have little time to content herself with the idea of having yet another stepmother and the high possibility of having another sister or brother to look after. She could only hope that her third stepmother was as kind and loving as the last in comparison to her first stepmother, whom she could continue to harbour a strong hatred towards for the remainder of her life.
Thomas Cromwell, the King’s top minister, set of to work to find the King the best bride, that provided England with the best alliance, that he could find. He had seen how Henry’s second marriage to Anne Boleyn had affected England’s relationship with other countries and therefore it was important to rebuild those relationships by having Henry marry a woman who was respected and would not hurt Henry politically.
His pick was Anna von Kleve, or Anne of Cleves as she is known, who was the daughter of John III of the House of La Marck, often referred to as the Duke of Cleves, and his wife Maria, the Duchess of Jülich-Berg. It is believed Anna was born in Düsseldorf on either 28th June or 22nd September 1515, with historians offering arguments for both of these dates. Very little information about Anna’s life prior to her marriage to Henry VIII is known but we are aware of a previous engagement between her and Francis, the son and heir of Antoine, the Duke of Lorraine in 1527. The engagement, for reasons unknown, did not follow through to marriage, leaving Anna unmarried in 1539, when Thomas Cromwell proposed her as a suitable bride for Henry VIII.
At first, Henry was quite taken with the idea; Anna’s brother William was the leader of the Protestants in Western Germany which could prove a useful asset in strengthening Henry’s defences against a possible attack from his old-time enemies; France and Spain. Sick of Henry’s constant trouble-making with religion for personal gain e.g., becoming the Supreme Head of the Church and breaking from Rome, the Catholic kingdoms of France and Spain became allies with the signing of the Treaty of Toledo in 1539. This treaty meant that they were declaring war against Henry VIII and England, and at this point, England did not have much to defend itself with. William’s influence could help Henry win the war against his enemies as well as Anna producing him with a son or two, this he was certain.
Negotiations for marriage between Anna and Henry commenced in March 1539 with Henry sending his court painter, the famous Hans Holbein, to the home of the Duke of Cleves to paint both Anna and her younger sister, Amalia so that he might choose between the two for his ideal bride. Upon seeing the two portraits, Henry was very taken with Anne’s portrait (as well her more favourable hereditary rights in her father's duchy) and demanded to be told more about her. Unlike Henry’s value of education and cultural sophistication in women, Anna lacked these traits; she had not been formally educated nor could she speak or write English. Instead, she could read and write in German, she was highly skilled in needlework and preferred to spend her time playing card games. Many commented on her gentle, virtuous, and docile nature to the King, which pleased him very much as he had already suffered two headstrong, outspoken wives who had given him trouble during their marriage and he did not want another wife doing that to him. He wanted a wife that would obey him and not answer back, as sad as it is to say, and that is why he believed Anne to be a fine choice, she could learn English with time, her main duty was to produce another son for the King, as he did not want to experience the same thing as his father; losing his firstborn son, only Henry could lose his only heir if he did not marry Anna and have more sons to prevent this.
With the King on-board with the marriage, Thomas Cromwell was set to work finalising the marriage details as he oversaw the talks and relayed anything of concern to the King. As the King was eager to be married (as if the notion of marriage had not bored him by now), he readily agreed to a dowry of 100,000 florins to Anna’s brother, as her father had unexpectedly died during the marriage negotiations and her brother took over the role of overseeing his sister’s betrothal. In return, William would do his best to aid England with the Protestants under his control and Anna would be a good wife and Queen to the King by doing her womanly duty and producing living children.
Pretty simple right?
If only Henry understood how much of a difficult task he was asking of his future wife, especially since many before her had refused him out of fear of ending up like his previous three wives—dead. I wonder why Anna’s father had even considered the betrothal in the first place, perhaps he knew that Henry could not behead Anna like Anne Boleyn because she was an influential figure much like his first wife, Catherine of Aragon.
Knowing that she was leaving her beloved homeland forever to live in a foreign country with a King known for his immoral ways must have been quite daunting for Anna, especially since she had no idea what to expect. What made things worst is that she was to travel alone with her cortège (a train of attendants) as the death of her father meant that her brother and mother were unable to accompany her. Initially, there were concerns about Anna travelling alone as she was a sheltered young woman who had never travelled such a long journey during the cruel Winter (which meant more chances of danger arising) and being unaccompanied left her unprotected against one who might want to harm her. In other words, the men on board could take advantage of her without there being someone there to watch over here. However, these concerns were thrown to the side as the King of England wanted his future Queen sent to him immediately and he did not like to be kept waiting, he had no patience left after all. The trip to England was a long one, with Anna leaving Düsseldorf to head to Cleves and from there to Antwerp before finally landing in England to be received by fifty English merchants. Hardly the best welcome for a future Queen, hmm?
After what must have been a tiring, anxiety-ridden journey from what we now call Germany to England, on the 27th December 1539, Anna was now ready to be received by her husband, the King. A thousand thoughts must have been going through Anna’s mind on the way towards the court; would the King like her? Would he think her handsome enough? Would he take a mistress like he had wit his other wives What would the royal court be like? What about the King’s three children—would they approve of her as their new stepmother?
There is no telling how anxious and frightened Anna must have been; her husband did not have the best reputation for a future husband, after all. However, she was about to become the new Queen of England, something she must have never thought possible and therefore she would have reminded herself to act as gracefully as she could before the King and his court. First impressions last forever, you know.
And the King’s first impression of Anna is what has made her known to history as the ‘ugliest’ of his wives—or a horse as the famous rhyme goes. Although in reality, she was the luckiest of his wives as not only did she survive him and thrive following their marriage but she was actually the last one to die!
On New Year’s Day of 1540 at Rochester Abbey, Anna travelled from Dover where her ship had docked to meet with the King in private—although this still meant he was accompanied by a few members of the court as a King was rarely alone. The King, surrounded by some of his most trusted courtiers including Charles Brandon and the Spanish ambassador Eustace Chapuys, decided to follow a court-love tradition where he went to Anna’s room disguised so that she would not recognise him. Almost so he could play a trick on his unsuspecting wife and fill the air with humour.
Although the non-English speaking and understandably anxious Anna did not appear to take it in the light-hearted manner of which Henry VIII had intended as Eustace Chapuys accounted the event later in a letter;
“[The King] so went up into the chamber where the said Lady Anne was looking out of a window to see the bull-baiting which was going on in the courtyard, and suddenly he embraced and kissed her, and showed her a token which the king had sent her for New Year’s gift, and she being abashed and not knowing who it was thanked him, and so he spoke with her. But she regarded him little, but always looked out the window .... and when the king saw that she took so little notice of his coming he went into another chamber and took off his cloak and came in again in a coat of purple velvet. And when the lords and knights saw his grace they did him reverence.” {1}
It was not just Anna’s unexpected and disappointing reaction that left Henry wanting in his wife but the fact that he found her ugly!
Yes, Henry VIII found his bride to be very disappointing in contrast to the beautiful portrait Hans Holbein had presented him with. It is said that he found her nose too long, her German clothes too unfashionable, lacking in social graces and after spending more time together, he believed the couple shared nothing in common and would make this marriage almost unbearable. However, despite Henry’s efforts to try and annul the marriage contract, it was much too late and so the wedding would proceed as planned, much to Henry’s dismay.
Imagine how Anna must have felt in knowing that her betrothed found her so dislikable and had wanted to avoid the marriage if he could. She must have felt so upset about herself but she need not have. According to both the French ambassador, Charles de Marillac, and chronicler Edward Hall, she was quite a beauty as she was said to have a lovely face, long fair hair that left “every creature rejoic[ing] to behold her”.
I think it was just the fact that Henry was judging her by English standards rather than her as an individual or did not taken into account her Germanic heritage.
Regardless, with the wedding to proceed as planned, this is the point where we can discuss the start of Anna’s relationship with her eldest stepchild; the Lady Mary Tudor. The exact date of which the two women met is unknown but many historians have attempted to pinpoint when this meeting would have taken place. David Loades stated in his book Mary Tudor: The Tragical history of the first Queen of England that Mary was present at the royal wedding on the 6th January and cited Retha Warnicke’s works on the marriage as his evidence, although her works seems to go against his point. This belief is also shared by Linda Porter in her book Mary Tudor: the First Queen although, once again, there is no evidence to support the validity of this claim. In regards to Retha Warnicke, she noted that there were plans in place for both of Henry’s daughters, Mary and Elizabeth, to welcome Anna to England but these were cancelled without reason. Edward, of course, was not included in these plans as the health of the Prince was of the utmost of importance and the Queen would have to recognise that even she was not as important as the Crown Prince.
In any case, it can be assumed that the two women met at some point following Anna’s wedding to the King on the 6th January 1540 however, although the two women would later become quite close, their relationship did not start off in the best way.
We are aware that a quarrel between Queen Anne and her new stepdaughter, the Lady Mary, occurred in the Easter holidays of that same year—when do families never fight or disagree on holidays, it is practically the best time for them to do so!
Either way—whilst the origin of the quarrel is unknown, it is said to have started when the King requested for his wife to call upon Lady Mary in her household and request her presence back at court. Whilst this request in itself was nothing out of the norm as Henry would later ask Anna’s replacement Katheryn Howard to do the same, this request is what seemed to cause the awkwardness between Anna and Mary. Anna was not a fool and understood that her husband was not too pleased with the marriage that he had been forced to enter into. He did not like Anna and nothing she seemed to do pleased her husband. The request of her stepdaughter’s presence at court is what appeared to annoy Anna, according to some historians’ theories. Mary, at this point in time, had gotten back into her father’s good graces and following the death of Jane Seymour, the two had grown closer to the point where Henry quite enjoyed when Mary was at court and often invited her to join him there.
For her husband to enjoy the company of his daughter over his own wife must have struck a cord in Anna as she did not seem too pleased with the request and made it known to her husband. And Mary must have felt it also.
Historians believe this might not have been the only reason behind the brief period of uncomfortableness in the women’s relationship. Whilst historians have discounted religion as having been the reason (due to Anna being falsely regarded as a Lutheran) because of the fact that, later in life, the two shared many religious interests and both died devout Catholics so this could not have been the reason, they have pinpointed age and Mary’s illegitimacy as two possible reasons.
The first possibility of age causing the ‘conflict’, if it can be called that, between Anna and Mary stems from the fact that Anna was only twenty-five years old when she married the forty-nine year old King Henry VIII whilst her eldest stepchild was twenty-four, only a year younger than her! Although still unmarried at her age with no suitors in site, Mary was considered a great beauty by many within and outside of the English court, even more so than Anna so might it have been a possibility that Anna experienced some unneeded jealousy that her stepdaughter might receive more attention than her, thus overshadowing the new Queen?
If so, this jealousy soon wore away as some historians theorised that Anna, during her short time as Queen, attempted to get Mary betrothed to someone related to her but her attempts proved unsuccessful, if they did indeed take place in the first place, following her swift marriage annulment, removing Queenship from her.
In regards to the possibility of Mary’s illegitimacy being the reason behind the quarrel, this is a very real possibility due to how illegitimate children were viewed at this time. Even though Mary had once been a Princess, higher in superiority to what Anna had been before becoming Queen, the fact of the matter was that she had now bene made illegitimate by her father, reducing her to the Lady Mary, which made her new stepmother, the Queen, higher in superiority and by legal rights also. Mary no longer had any right to the throne and was simply another of the King’s illegitimate children, except she was an acknowledged one—alongside that of Elizabeth and her late half-brother Henry Fitzroy.
To Anna, the fact that Henry wanted his illegitimate daughter to live at court alongside them might have offended his young wife who might not have truly understood the depth of Mary’s delicate situation—for all she knew, she was just a bastard daughter from a now deceased woman. Anna, after all, had not been informed of many things about the court as well as her new husband so it is possible, according to Retha Warnicke, that she might not have known about the situation of both Mary and Elizabeth’s illegitimacy, although she would have known about Jane Seymour and Edward, at least shortly before the marriage took place, of course. What is even more interesting is that she might have harboured some ill-feelings towards Mary due to her relationship to Charles V, Mary’s cousin, who was the enemy of both her brother and her brother-in-law, meaning that Anna must have thought Mary somehow supported her cousin’s decisions, of which Mary most certainly would have been unaware of as I’m sure she had very limited contact with her Spanish relations out of fear that Henry VIII would find out and punish her. And Mary had suffered enough.
Once again, even if this had been the source of the quarrel, Anna’s opinion (or knowledge of) Mary’s illegitimacy swiftly changed as it is reported that soon the Queen and the Lady Mary treated one another with respect and Mary often visited the Queen’s chambers per the former’s request, most likely to spend time together forming a bond as, due to Anna and Mary’s (along with most of the court’s) assumption that this marriage would be a long-lasting one, although it still was unconsummated but there was plenty of time to remedy that, right?
Sadly not as it would turn out that whilst Anna was spending time not just with the Lady Mary but with her other stepchildren to form lasting bonds, her husband was busy bedding his latest mistress Katheryn Howard and was already wanting to annul the marriage and wed his mistress in a fifth marriage. When the news of Henry’s intent to annul the marriage reached Anna, she was heartbroken and humiliated as one would naturally be when one’s husband cannot bear the thought of being married to you any longer. The fact that the marriage had only lasted months and yet the King was already bored must have shocked Anna as she was more than willing to do as the King pleased and consummate the marriage to produce the matter. However, the King cited Anna’s ugliness and unpleasantness as the reason for why the marriage was unconsummated, stating that he could not bed her for the life of him and therefore it was not a proper marriage in the eyes of God.
There is even a theory that Henry questioned Anna’s virginity and spoke about her body in such a way that would make one think that she was pregnant or had recently given birth, leading historians questioning whether Henry was accusing Anna of carrying another man’s child.
I think, by this point, God was sick of Henry’s constant complaining and sickening use of religion to get what he wanted, Henry was sinning by His standards.
Despite Anna’s pleas, she eventually gave in to the King and Henry was granted the annulment and Anna’s title of Queen was removed. However, due to Anna’s compliance with the annulment, the King granted her the lands and property of Hever Castle, which was the childhood home of his second wife Anne Boleyn, and permitted her use of the title the King’s Beloved Sister, as he still had some respect for her. Now, as a newly divorced woman, Anna would live as a free, rich woman in England and watch her now ex-husband marry the mistress whose bed he frequented rather than her own.
Anna must have felt so humiliated yet grateful to have survived the King in comparison to how his previous three wives had; she was not forced to live in poverty or squalor like Catherine or Aragon nor was her head cut off like Anne Boleyn and she didn’t die following childbirth—she was a remarkably lucky young woman but her luck did not end there.
As you might expect, Mary did not like her fourth stepmother. Not only was her new stepmother younger than her (and had already found a husband before Mary herself) but she was the cousin of Anne Boleyn, her first stepmother and a woman she hated even after her execution. Mary wanted nothing to do with her and had still remained friends with Anne following the annulment as she respected and admired Anna for her gracefulness, her character as well as how Anna had dealt with the King. She could have fought against the annulment in a similar fashion to how Mary’s mother had and instead, she had chosen the smart way out—making her someone even more deserving of respect in Mary’s book.
Although Anna herself was king and respectful towards the new Queen despite everything, which can be seen in how she sent the new couple an expensive gift as well as sending a Christmas gift to both the King and Queen, the new Queen Katheryn did not approve of how her new stepdaughter refused to offer her the respect that, as Queen, she deserved. When questioned, Mary remarked that the Lady Anne was deserving of her respect as she was what a good woman ought to be, suggesting that Mary did not think of Katheryn in the same way, angering her further. The King himself was even said to have viewed Anna in a similar light to Mary as he also sent Anna a gift in return for the one she sent him and gave permission for her to visit Mary and Elizabeth at court for a few days, annoying Katheryn further as neither of her stepdaughters really cared to bond with her, more Mary than Elizabeth though since Elizabeth and her were distant cousins through her mother Anne Boleyn.
Perhaps, like Anna, Mary hoped that, when Henry would later behead his fifth wife on the charges of adultery and treason, he would remarry Anna who was the perfect wife for him as she possessed grace, elegance, foreign allies and so much more—however, this hope was short-lived when Henry would remarry for the last time to Catherine Parr, a former friend of Mary’s.
The relationship of Mary and Anna only seems to have blossomed following the death of Henry VIII in 1547 as the two seemed to have seen each other a lot more in comparison to when Henry was alive. Whilst we do not know how often they visited one another, we do know of a recorded visit in 1551 but they might not have had enough time to visit one another considering they both had their respective problems at this time. Anna was suffering from financial struggles since she no longer received help from the King whilst Mary was in dangerous waters in regards to her Catholic faith now that her Protestant brother Edward VI was King—and he did not hold back in his practically demanding requests for her to conform to Protestantism.
But before we delve into their relationship during Edward’s and eventually Mary’s reign, let us briefly discuss how their relationship was portrayed in Showtime’s The Tudors, starring Joss Stone as Anna and Sarah Bolger as Mary.
Joss Stone first appears as Henry VIII’s ‘repulsive’ fourth wife in Season 3 Episode 6 where she portrays the anxious young bride excellently and soon after, Anne is introduced to the Lady Mary and Lady Elizabeth, both of which she forms long-lasting relationships with. Despite initially being reluctant to meet her new stepmother due to Anne’s Lutheran background, Mary begins to become closer with Anne who encourages her to pursue a courtship with her cousin, Duke Philip of Bavaria, whom she falls in love with in Episode 8. Sadly, when the news of their affection towards one another reaches the ears of the King, Duke Philip is sent away, leaving Mary heartbroken but tries to hide her despair by declaring to Anne that she would not have married him due to him being a Lutheran—whether this is true or not, we will never know. Anne is very sympathetic towards Mary following her cousin being sent away as Mary becomes upset by the thought that she will never marry because her father does not want her to. Anne, who is beginning to understand that her own husband does not want her and might seek others instead, comforts her by saying that she is still very young and that a husband will come along when she least expects it.
Following Henry VIII’s annulment of his marriage to Anne, the two women continue to bond and grow closer despite everything that has happened. We see Anne celebrate with her former husband and his new wife, Katheryn Howard, and offer her gifts; despite everything that Henry put her through, Anne is certainly grateful to have emerged the other side alive in comparison to his other wives. Mary, on the other hand, does not show the same respect towards Katheryn that Anne does as she refuses to treat her in the same way as she did Anne as she believes that Katheryn usurped Anne as Queen and is the reason why her father annulled their marriage. When confronted by Katheryn, Mary says that the Lady Anne ‘is worthy of all respect’ as she carries herself with great grace and dignity, as well as noting that she will do anything that God or the King asks of her, unlike Katheryn who has been sleeping with the King for quite some time yet has failed to meet his demand for a baby. Additionally, we also see Anne and Henry playing cards shortly following the execution of Katheryn Howard where they discuss Anne possibly remarrying and her talking about her newfound freedom and how much she enjoys life now. Although he never explicitly says it, the show leads us to believe that, in this moment, Henry was considering remarrying Anne but sees how happy she is and does not speak about the matter with her, choosing to think about other women he could marry instead.
Naturally, The Tudors is not 100% historically accurate, as most shows aren’t, which means that certain aspects of the characters featured are not true to reality. For example, Anna’s family might have been Lutheran but, as explained beforehand, it is very unlikely that she herself was one. Moreover, the scene where we see Anna and Henry play cards might have actually happened but it is in fact Anna and her brother who discussed the possibility of Henry remarrying Anna but, if he did actually consider it, he swiftly rejected it in favour of Katherine Parr, his sixth and final wife.
One thing to note about Katherine Parr; whilst she is known as the wife that survived him, it is actually Anna who best survived following her marriage from Henry, she emerged richer and free to do as she pleased as well as witnessing the coronation of two of Henry’s three surviving children. Katherine Parr, on the other hand, suffered further in her last marriage to Thomas Seymour who was cold and distant to her during their marriage and is believed to have attempted to abuse and marry the teenage Elizabeth once his very pregnant wife passed away as there was a high risk of her passing away during childbirth or afterwards similar to how his sister had. Regardless, each of Henry’s wives suffered at the hands of their husband and King who abused, used and neglected them for his own selfish gain, he cared little for the feelings and wellbeing of his wives and this is why their importance to history should be remembered.
Back to what happened to Anna following the death of Henry—as we mentioned beforehand, Anna and Mary were both suffering from their own issues during the reign of Mary’s younger brother, Edward VI—Anne’s troubles were financial. Although these financial troubles would not last long nor would the King’s reign as he would die a teenager in July 1553, meaning that Mary was next in line for the throne.
However, Mary’s journey to sitting on her rightful throne would be a difficult one. Her brother Edward had died unmarried (although there was numerous candidates for his future bride including his cousin the Catholic Mary, Queen of Scots who went on to marry the Dauphin of France) as well as childless, this meant that, as per Henry’s will, Mary was next in line for the throne with Elizabeth to follow should she also prove childless. The only problem was that Mary was a Catholic whilst Edward had been a Protestant and many in his royal court wanted to prevent Mary from becoming Queen and turning their Protestant country back into a Catholic one.
Their solution—to put Lady Jane Grey, the granddaughter of Mary Tudor and Charles Brandon, and a known Protestant on the throne before Mary had a chance to stop them. Legally, Jane was a relative of the King and *did* have a claim on the throne but it wasn’t as strong as Mary’s, meaning that her parents (mainly her father) had to encourage many Protestant members of the court to support her—the funny thing was that Jane did not *want* the throne nor did she want to be married to her husband, a distant relative, but her parents forced her to marry as well as accept the throne.
Jane’s reign only lasted nine days, hence her famous title as The Nine Days Queen, after Mary raised an army and marched to take her throne. Jane, known for her intelligence and wish to be relieved of her title as Queen, willingly surrendered to Mary and was placed in the Tower along with her husband, Guildford Dudley. From 19th July 1553 onwards, Mary’s reign had officially begun although she would not be coronated 1st October 1553. Historians believe that Mary was initially reluctant to have Jane executed as Jane herself swore that she did not want the throne in the first place and would not attempt to usurp Mary’s crown. This pleased Mary as she did not want to execute her cousin and had even discussed Mary and her husband converting to Catholicism and becoming a part of her court but there was one problem—Jane’s parents were planning and uprising to restore Jane to the throne.
Unable to take the risk, Mary was forced by her council to sign the death warrants for both Jane and her husband, with the latter dying first on the early morning 12th February 1554 and Jane following her husband in the afternoon after watching her husband’s dead body being moved past her window.
With no-one else there to challenge her rule as Queen, Mary would soon inform her allies and friends of her success and her plan to ride through the streets of London for her coronation procession. Anna was one of those she would have informed and she must have been relieved to have seen her former stepdaughter claim her rightful throne against the Protestants who might have brought more financial issues or tried to take her property away from her. On 29th/30th September Mary, alongside her half-sister Elizabeth, were dressed in elegant dresses, wore crimson velvet robes and rode in a ‘chariot lined with cloth of silver’. Anna followed behind her two former stepdaughters in a similar carriage, obviously decorated less glamorously as to not overshadow the new Queen.
On 1st October 1553, Mary was crowned Queen of England before many of her loyal subjects, including Anna, and later that night, Anna dined at the foot of Queen Mary’s table at the banquet to celebrate Mary’s coronation. Anna sat alongside Elizabeth, who showed support for her older sister despite many trying to sow seeds of doubt about Elizabeth’s intentions in Mary’s mind. Anna must have felt incredibly honoured for Mary to invite her to celebrate with her as many of Mary’s own relatives, including Lady Lennox whom Mary was fond of, were not invited. Perhaps Mary intended to spend time with a chosen few rather than making a huge fuss and inviting every single one of her relatives. Mary knew that her relatives were proud of her and that in Heaven, her mother was looking down at her and smiling proudly.
Anna had always conformed to the will of the Crown and with Mary now Queen, there would be no change in Anna’s loyalty. Edward had made a form of Protestantism mandatory for everyone in England to conform to and there is no evidence to suggest that Anna refused to convert. Similar with Mary and her Catholicism rule, Anna most likely conformed straight away to keep her close relationship with the Queen. Mary showered affection and favour upon Anne throughout her reign, especially in times of financial trouble where Anna requested the Queen help her and Mary readily and happily assisted.
Additionally, Anna did request that Mary and her government recognise her marriage to Henry VIII as valid so that the terms of the marriage treaty would allow Anna to return home with the status and wealth of a dowager queen—the terms of Henry’s annulment from Anna prevented her from leaving England and only Mary could overrule this.
Helping Anna in this matter must have been the least of Mary’s worries considering that she was constantly dealing with concerns about her sister plotting against her, trying to establish more foreign Catholic alliances as well as dealing with her distant, cold husband who was growing less and less interested in being married to her. Mary was aware of how important it was that she quickly conceive with her husband; after watching her mother struggle for years with her father’s demand for a male heir, Mary did not want to suffer the same fate and she wanted to preserve the Tudor line just as much as everyone else in her court wanted to.
In fact, Mary’s marriage to King Philip II of Spain is what caused what historians believe to be a conflict between the two women. Anna’s closeness to the Queen is believed to have made her feel that she could council the new Queen on finding a possible husband and proposed Mary’s cousin and preferred choice of her brother; the Archduke Ferdinand of Austria. Mary, as we know, did not take to Anne’s choice and selected Philip, another cousin, to be her husband and King of England. This marriage is what caused the famous Wyatt’s Rebellion and sparked other issues for Mary including problems with France but we can talk about that another time.
Regardless, Anna is said to have not approved of Mary’s marriage to Philip but if so, Anna would not have allowed Mary to know this as Anna would not have risked losing her position as one of the Queen’s closest ladies. However, there is no evidence to suggest that Mary would have questioned Anna’s loyalty… at least not at this point.
Inevitably, the friendship between Queen Mary and Anna turned sour in the Spring of 1554 when the deaths of Sibylle and Johann Friedrich meant that she had lost the Queen’s friendship due to the possible implication of Anna in the Wyatt Rebellion. This would lead to difficulties arising for Anna; the first was that Mary refused to take the matter of the validity of Anna’s marriage to Henry VIII further which left Anna in England indefinitely where Mary could keep her close to watch over her. Next, Mary began to show that she was no longer as close to Anna as she had once been by not inviting her to her and Philip’s wedding in July 1554, leaving Anna hurt over the thought of losing her place at the Queen’s side. In an attempt to mend the sourness in their relationship, Anna wrote to the Queen offering her congratulations and requested permission to visit them at court but there is no evidence to show that her request was successful.
It seemed there was no sign of their relationship improving as there is no evidence to show that the two spent time in each other’s company or that Mary ever showed favour on Anna but we do know that, despite everything, Mary still held a fondness for Anna even to the end of the latter’s life. On 16th July 1557 at the age of forty-one, Anna von Kleve passed away, most likely from cancer like Mary’s mother Catherine of Aragon, and had appointed “our most dearest and entirely beloved sovereign lady Queen Mary” as the overseer of her will. This decision must have pleased Mary during her grief of her former stepmother and friend as her final gift to Anna was holding an impressive funeral for her at Westminster Abbey on 4th August 1557. This was most likely due to the fact that Mary’s relationship with Anna had lasted much longer than her fond relationships with Jane Seymour and Katherine Parr, both dying due to after-affects of childbirth.
Despite everything that the two experienced in their lives, their relationship must have been a great comfort to them both; for Mary, she had a friend to rely upon in times of need and Anna had a friend to help her survive in a foreign land with no allies or relatives to support her. They both remained hopeful and resilient in the darkest of times and emerged stronger when all their troubles had passed.
Anna von Kleve might be the most underrated or less spoken about of Henry’s six wives with many thinking her to be boring or lacking the same tragedy that the other wives had in their lives, she is certainly just as interesting and strong-willed as them. She was dealt a bad card when she married Henry VIII but instead of fighting against the annulment and potentially ending up with a damaged reputation or being punished by Henry VIII, she emerged richer financially as well as possessing the future Queen Mary’s friendship, something that made her richer than a lot of the women in Mary’s court as having the Queen as a friend was not common.
She should be remembered for how she prospered following her annulment from Henry and how she managed to stay in Mary’s good graces for as long as she did because, even when they had issues in their relationship, Mary still rewarded her loyalty by giving her an impressive burial.
Until next time!
- Have a ‘Tudor-fic’ week!
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