Lissa

I mean… George could’ve written some kinky stuff to Martha… we don’t know… because SOMEBODY BURNED THEM…

I dislike talking politics, but history is my thing, and nothing irks me more than seeing it twisted to try to make some sort of political point.

Recently, a television pundit tried to qualify Michelle Obama’s statement that slaves built the White House by saying it wasn’t so bad… The slaves were well-fed and housed decently. 

The pundit claimed to be a history teacher, and I’m hoping that’s not true. Because if that’s what he was teaching his students, there’s a serious problem.

This person is ignoring historical fact in favor of opinion. Abigail Adams was there. She saw the slaves working on the White House, and wrote a first-hand eye-witness account of their living conditions.

half fed, and destitute of cloathing, or fit for —re, to labour,…”   

But even if he had been factually accurate about the slaves being “treated well,” there is no defending slavery. NONE.

There is no way to soften slavery’s horrors by saying “not all masters…”

Slavery meant having no bodily autonomy or rights. It meant rape without recourse. It meant being unable to prevent the molestation of your children. It meant seeing those children sold away, never to be seen again. It meant forced breeding. It meant scars crossing your flesh.. It meant being nothing, a THING to be used and abused subject to the whim of your owners.

Consider the fact that even “well-fed” or “well-treated” slaves would risk their lives to escape, traveling hundreds of miles to the North, where they faced starvation and desperation in trying to eke out a living, constantly looking over their shoulders for people who would kidnap them and sell them back into bondage. Pause for a moment and reflect on why that might be.

I’ve also seen people try to compare the experience of other immigrant groups to the lives of slaves, and that’s equally incorrect.  Even the most disdained groups could not be raped and murdered on a whim, the only punishment having to compensate the owner for the slave’s “value.” Even the most despised groups could still own personal property and retain the fruits of their labors. They could hope for a better future for their children. They could marry as their hearts led them and not have to fear their husband would be sold off, or be forced to sexually satisfy other people. They would be able to keep their children. They were permitted to educate themselves. And most importantly of all, they were considered human, even if their social status was low.

For a county which claims to value freedom so highly, it’s very odd we would say an utter lack of it is “not so bad” as long as people are fed and housed with a modicum of decency.

    Last night, there was a discussion in on of my “Hamilton” FB groups about the Founders and the fact some of them were slave-owners. The amount of excuses that came tumbling out both staggered and appalled me.

So, one last time...

“It was a different time!” 

Yes. Yes it was. And even during this different time, there were people who stood up and said slavery was wrong, so it’s not like the Founders had never been exposed to opposing viewpoints on the matter, or were unaware there was a different way they could live. Let us compare a few different examples.

     Lucy Webb Hayes would one day grow up tor be First Lady, but her childhood wasn’t one of wealth or comfort. Her family could best be described as “middle class.” Her father, Dr. Webb, was sent notice his aunt had died in Kentucky and left him about twenty slaves. Instead of replying, “Awesome! Auction them off and send me the money!” Dr. Webb packed his bags so he could go down to Kentucky personally to free them. Again, this wasn’t a rich guy by any means. His family needed that money. But he refused to even consider profiting from slavery. When he arrived in Kentucky, he found the slaves ill from a cholera epidemic. Instead of saying, “Uhhh, I’ll come back later,” Dr. Webb rolled up his sleeves and nursed them himself. He contracted cholera during his efforts and died. His widow, Mrs. Webb was now in a really bad spot, because her household had no income and there wasn’t any social safety nets like Social Security for her children. She was advised to sell the slaves to support herself and her children. Mrs. Webb said she would rather become a washerwoman (which was a low-paid and not-very-respectable position at the time) before she would support herself from the proceeds of slavery.

    On the other hand, George Washington married a woman who had inherited slaves from her first husband. He could choose to free those slaves, but that would entail purchasing them from the estate. George elected instead to leave those people in slavery and profit from their labor. (If they lived in Philadelphia for a certain period of time, they would be freed automatically by law, so George quietly sent them home on “vacations” or scheduled unnecessary trips across state lines in order to avoid establishing legal residency for the enslaved. He worried in his letters about the [white] public finding out about his deception.) Some of them were promised they’d be freed when the Washingtons died. One of them, Ona Judge, found that promise rescinded when Martha Washington decided to give her as a “wedding present” to her unpleasant granddaughter. The Washingtons then used underhanded tactics to try to kidnap Ona or trick her back into slavery until she was elderly and of no use to them.

Imma stop right here and point out again that George was really, really worried about the public finding out about this. He was concerned his actions might cause RIOTS. Because he knew what he was doing was  w r o n g  and he was taking steps - as he outlines in his letters - to make sure the public was “deceived” to keep himself safe from outcry.

    This is not a poor, ignorant “man of his time” just doing what was normal, and oh gosh we just shouldn’t judge him by our contemporary standards. Nor was he in such desperate financial straits that he had no choice but to leave things as they were.

    Another one of George’s fellow Founders, John Adams, refused to own slaves on general principle, and though he was not wealthy, employed free black workers on his farms instead. Adams, like the other Founders, wasn’t in favor of immediate emancipation because of the economic and political turmoil it would cause, but he made a stand in his personal life by refusing to take advantage of slave labor, even though it would have even more convenient and cost-effective for him.

    So, yes, it was a “different time,” but even during that time, there were people saying loudly that slavery was wrong and making personal financial sacrifices based on their principles. We shouldn’t make excuses for those who chose the easy and wealth-driven path just because it was legal at the time. They made their choices.

    “We should try to understand based on the context of the era!”

     Yes, but understanding is NOT excusing. The best modern comparison is that I can “understand” why a frat boy may feel he was entitled to abuse the body of an intoxicated girl because of the aura of rape culture on campus, but I’ll be damned if I excuse it in any fashion.

    By saying slavery was wrong, we are not judging them by 21st century ethos - we are judging them by the ethos of their own era. Again, the concept of the evils of slavery was not unknown or uncommon at the time. For reference please see the MASSIVE FRICKIN’ REAMS of abolitionist literature available at the time. Some people simply chose to accept slavery because it was personally convenient and were unwilling to make financial sacrifices.

    “Yes, but not everyone accepted that it was wrong and...” 

Katharine of Aragon died January 7, 1536, and was buried twenty-two days later in St. Peterborough Cathedral. Today, it seems like an incredibly long time between death and burial, but it was common for royals in the era. Funerals for the Tudors were elaborate affairs that involved a great deal of preparation. Henry VIII ostentatiously celebrated when he was told the woman who had stubbornly insisted she was his wife was dead. He ordered she be buried with the pomp and ceremony due a princess dowager - the title she had as the wife of his dead brother. It wasn’t a sign of respect; it was once again to make the point she was never legally his wife. (And it was probably at his behest that the funeral sermon included the false statement that Katharine had admitted on her death bed that she was never truly Henry’s wife.)

Funeral homes and morticians didn’t exist in the Tudor era. Katharine’s own servants would have to prepare her body for burial, rendering their final services to the queen. Her chamberlain wrote to Cromwell, offering an easy solution for the immediate issues.

 "The Groom of the Chandlery [candles] here can cere [embalm] her,“ but he added that a plumber (leadworker) needed to be sent for quickly to seal her in a coffin, ”for that may not tarry.“ Ambassador Eustace Chapuys, wrote to the emperor after she was embalmed, because the findings cemented in his mind the idea Katharine had been poisoned.

The good Queen breathed her last at 2 o'clock in the afternoon. Eight hours afterwards, by the King’s express commands, the inspection of her body was made, without her confessor or physician or any other officer of her household being present, save the fire-lighter in the house, a servant of his, and a companion of the latter, who proceeded at once to open the body.

Neither of them had practised chirurgy, and yet they had often performed the same operation, especially the principal or head of them, who, after making the examination, went to the bishop of Llandaff, the Queen’s confessor, and declared to him in great secrecy, and as if his life depended on it, that he had found the Queen’s body and the intestines perfectly sound and healthy, as if nothing had happened, with the single exception of the heart, which was completely black, and of a most hideous aspect; after washing it in three different waters, and finding that it did not change colour, he cut it in two, and found that it was the same inside, so much so that after being washed several times it never changed colour.

The man also said that he found inside the heart something black and round, which adhered strongly to the concavities. And moreover, after this spontaneous declaration on the part of the man,my secretary having asked the Queen’s physician whether he thought the Queen had died of poison, the latter answered that in his opinion there was no doubt about it, for the bishop [of Llandaff] had been told so under confession, and besides that, had not the secret been revealed, the symptoms, the course, and the fatal end of her illness were a proof of that.

Today, it’s believed the black growth they described was a cancerous tumor, but Chapuys was convinced that it was evidence of poison that had been in some Welsh beer that Katharine had drank before her final illness.

Katharine’s internal organs were removed to try to stave off decay and were either buried in separate containers with the deceased, or sometimes sent to other locations. The account of Nicholas Sanders states that Princess Mary Tudor ("Bloody” Mary I)

…was opened by her Physicians and Surgeons, who took out her bowels, which were coffined and buried solemnly in the Chapel [of St. James Palace], her Heart being separately enclosed in a coffin covered with purple velvet, bound with silver. 

Another queen, Eleanor of Castile, ended up in all sorts of places. Her bowels (intestines and stomach) were interred in Lincoln Cathedral, her heart was placed in Blackfriars Monastery, and the rest of her body was interred in Westminster Abbey.

The empty torso cavity was then stuffed with straw and herbs. I’ve seen mention of wax sometimes being poured into the cavity, but haven’t confirmed it. Perfumed salve containing preserving spices and salts were often rubbed onto the body. The body was then wrapped in cere cloth - waxed linen - and then coated with wax by the chandler. It was then wrapped in sheets of lead, forming a mummy-like bundle. This container was usually then set inside a coffin, but there’s at least one known instance (Kateryn Parr) of the bundle being buried by itself in the earth.

Perfumes and spices were often poured into the coffin; the exhumers of royal graves sometimes reported the body lying in unidentifiable fluids. In 1761, an apothecary sent a bill to the palace for the supplies for the funeral of the queen:

… for fine double cere cloth, with a large quantity of very rich perfumed aromatic Powders for embalming her late Majesty’s Royal Body, and a very large quantity of sweets to fill the coffin and urn [for the organs] with: a large quantity of Honey-water, and a very large quantity of Lavender-water and also a very large additional quantity of the same fine sweets. Honey and Lavender-waters to new fill the Coffin in the Royal Vault.

The embalming was now compete and the elaborate funeral ceremonies could begin.

Katharine’s body could not be left alone. The body would be set up in the chapel of the house or in the noble’s own chambers, surrounded by candles. Katharine’s ladies prayed round the clock beside the coffin.

Katharine’s wake was described thus by the French ambassador:

The next day, Friday, 26, was provided, in the chamber of presence, a hearse with twenty-four tapers, garnished with pensils and other decencies. Also, in the same chamber was provided an altar, for mass to be said, richly apparelled with black, garnished with the cross, images, censers, and other ornaments; and daily masses were said by her chaplains. The corpse was reverently conveyed from the place where she died, under a hearse covered with a rich pall of cloth of gold, and a cross set thereupon; lights were burning night and day upon the altar all divine service time. All ladies were in mourning habits, with white kerchiefs over their heads and shoulders, kneeling about the hearse all service time in lamentable wise, at mass forenoon and at dirige after.

Because the body itself had been bundled away, a wax or wood effigy was created to rest on top of the coffin, dressed in the deceased’s own clothing. Some effigies still survive at Westminster Abbey and some of them are startlingly life-like. Katharine’s was not preserved.

Katharine’s short will had made a few bequests to her servants. She had left her gowns to be used to make church vestments, and the fur trim from them to her daughter. She requested to be buried in the Chapel of the Observant Friars. Chapuys went to visit the king to see about her burial and whether the conditions of her will would be met.

On these points Cromwell replied to one of my servants, that as to the burial, it could not be done where she had desired, for there remained no convent of Observants in England; but as to the rest, everything would be done as regards the Princess and the servants as honourably and magnificently as I could demand. Next day I sent my man to the Court to Cromwell, to ascertain the whole will of the King on the subject. […] At the end he spoke to him more coolly than he had done the day before, adding the condition that the King wished first to see what the robes and furs were like, and that if the Princess wished to have what had been given her she must first show herself obedient to her father, and that I ought to urge her to be so.

[…] As to the burial, the King said the same as Cromwell, that the bequest of her robes to the Church was superfluous, considering the great abundance of ecclesiastical vestments in England, and that although the Queen’s will was not accomplished in this respect, something would be done in the abbey where she should be interred that would be more notable and worthy of her memory; that the abbey intended for her was one of the most honorable in all England. It is 17 miles from where she lived, and is called Pittesbery (Peterborough). As to the servants, it concerned nobody so much as himself to requife their services, as he had appointed them to her service. As to the Princess, it depended only on herself that she should have not merely all that her mother left her, but all that she could ask, provided she would be an obedient daughter.

Clothing in black was made for all of the participants in the funeral. Banners, palls, and other funerary items had to be crafted, as well. Funerals could be incredibly expensive for this reason. Queen Mary’s funeral cost nearly eight thousand pounds - millions of dollars in today’s terms.

Katharine’s hearse was then drawn to Peterborough Cathedral. Her funeral procession and service is described in the state papers:

First, 16 priests or clergymen in surplices went on horseback, without saying a word, having a gilded laten cross borne before them; after them several gentlemen, of whom there were only two of the house, et le demeurant estoient tous emprouvez, and after them followed the maître d’hotel and chamberlain, with their rods of office in their hands; and, to keep them in order, went by their sides 9 or 10 heralds, with mourning hoods and wearing their coats of arms; after them followed 50 servants of the aforesaid gentlemen, bearing torches and bâtons allumés, which lasted but a short time, and in the middle of them was drawn a wagon, upon which the body was drawn by six horses all covered with black cloth to the ground.

The said wagon was covered with black velvet, in the midst of which was a great silver cross; and within, as one looked upon the corpse, was stretched a cloth of gold frieze with a cross of crimson velvet, and before and behind the said wagon stood two gentlemen ushers with mourning hoods looking into the wagon, round which the said four banners were carried by four heralds and the standards with the representations by four gentlemen.

Then followed seven ladies, as chief mourners, upon hackneys, that of the first being harnessed with black velvet and the others with black cloth. After which ladies followed the wagon of the Queen’s gentlemen; and after them, on hackneys, came nine ladies, wives of knights. Then followed the wagon of the Queen’s chambermaids; then her maids to the number of 36, and in their wake followed certain servants on horseback.

The hearse rested in the cathedral for three days, surrounded by one thousand burning candles, before a final mass was said and the coffin interred in her tomb below the floor. Katharine of Aragon was laid to rest, and her soul was hopefully at peace.

Descriptions of the tomb Henry built for Katharine are somewhat vague, and it seems it was dismantled, piecemeal, over the years. Henry stated he did not want to do anything more than was “requisite and needful” for the tomb of a princess dowager - the title she had as his brother’s widow, so it was never very elaborate. Supposedly, he was once chided for the humble burial of Katharine and said that the cathedral itself was her tomb. It was one of the churches he left intact after the Dissolution, possibly because it was her burial location.

Try though he might, Henry could never erase Katharine from the hearts and minds of the English people. He’d hoped she would be forgotten, but even after her death, she was still revered.

There’s an old story that Katharine’s faithful friend, Maria de Salinas, was buried in the same tomb as Katharine, and the tomb was opened in 1777 to see if it was true. Only one body lay within. The Victorians - ever constant with their ghoulish curiosity, opened Katharine’s tomb again, and confirmed only one occupant.

One hundred years after she died, Katharine had a miracle attributed to her. In 1640, a man with a tumor growing on his forehead claimed to have dreamt of water dripping on her tomb. When he visited the church and saw water on the slab, he dipped his finger into it and was cured of the growth.

Her hearse seems to have have been left in place as it's described as being destroyed in 1643 during the English civil war because it had an altar in it.

During that period, the gilding on the tomb was stolen, and the black marble ended up being used for a floor of one of the dean’s summer houses. According to The Cathedral Church of Peterborough A Description Of Its Fabric And A Brief History Of The Episcopal See by W.D. Sweeting,

Queen Katherine of Arragon was buried in the north choir aisle, just outside the most eastern arch, in 1535 [actually 1536]. A hearse was placed near, probably between the two piers. Four years later this is described as “the inclosed place where the Lady Katherine lieth,” and there seems to have been a small altar within it. Some banners that adorned it remained in the cathedral till 1586. About the same time some persons were imprisoned for defacing the “monument,” and required to “reform the same.” The only monument, strictly so called, of which there is any record, was a low table monument, raised on two shallow steps, with simple quatrefoils, carved in squares set diamond-wise. Engravings of this shew it to have been an insignificant and mean erection. A few slabs of it were lately found buried beneath the floor, and they are now placed against the wall of the aisle. One of the prebendaries repaired this monument at his own cost, about 1725, and supplied a tiny brass plate with name and date, part of which remains in the floor. This monument was removed in 1792.

Afterward, Katharine’s grave remained mostly unadorned until Katharine Clayton, the wife of one of the cathedral canons, had the idea of making an appeal to English women named Catherine to help her restore Katharine’s resting place to something befitting a queen. An engraved marble slab was installed and a grille with the gilded words KATHARINE QUEEN OF ENGLAND was mounted above. 

Mary of Teck (consort of George V) ordered that the banners of a queen - the arms of England and Spain - be hung above, giving back Katharine’s due honors after 400 years.

The memorial plaque installed calls her:

A queen cherished by the English people for her loyalty, piety, courage and compassion.

 When Henry, Duke of Cornwall was born on January 1, 1511, England erupted in celebration.

He was the second child born to Henry and his young queen, Katharine of Aragon. The first had been a daughter, stillborn, who was delivered 33 weeks after the marriage. She was never given a name.

Almost a year later, Katharine was brought to bed and delivered the little prince. King Henry must have felt God was smiling down upon him. Katharine, too, for she had fulfilled the duty of a queen to give her husband and new homeland an heir to the throne. Here was the future King Henry IX, the Tudors’ shaky claim to the throne upheld by the noble blood of the House Trastámara, and Katharine’s own descent from John of Gaunt.

The public fountains ran with free wine for the populace, and bonfires were lit in celebration. The cannons blasted from the top of the Tower walls and churchbells rang for hours. It was a public holiday, and all of England joined in the party.

The “New Year’s Boy” as he was called, was baptized in a grand ceremony - one that his mother could not attend, because she had not been “churched” (ritually blessed) and allowed to re-enter public life. He was named Henry after his father and grandfather, and given the title Duke of Cornwall. The title of Prince of Wales was never officially given to him, but it would have been later in his life.

One of his godfathers was King Louis XII of France, who sent a gift of a salt cellar and cup containing almost a hundred ounces of gold. He gave to the child’s nurse, Elizabeth Poyntz, a gold chain worth £30 and £10 to the midwife who had delivered the child. Margaret of Austria - who would see to the education of a young Anne Boleyn in just a few years - was one of Prince Henry’s godmothers.

While his wife was still in seclusion after the birth, Henry made a pilgrimage to Our Lady of Walsingham to give thanks for the safe arrival of his prince. According to writer Henry Spellman, King Henry rode to Barsham, where he dismounted and walked the rest of the way to the shrine barefooted. There, he prostrated himself on the ground before the statue of the Virgin, and gave an offering of a valuable necklace. Later, this same shrine would be denounced, pillaged, and dismantled by the king during the Dissolution.

As soon as Katharine was “churched” and could resume life with the court, the prince’s birth was celebrated with a tournament, by far the most lavish that had been seen in England in living memory. Some scholars have said it was the third most expensive event of Henry’s reign thus far, after his father’s funeral and Henry and Katharine’s joint coronation. It wouldn’t be surpassed until the extravaganza of the Field of the Cloth of Gold. Sir Thomas Boleyn was one of the knights who rode on the second day of the tournament, but he’s not listed among those who were given prizes.

Henry jousted as “Sir Loyal Heart” in lists that were decorated to look like an enchanted forest. Katharine distributed the prizes to the valiant knights. It was was followed by a sumptuous banquet in Westminster Palace, which ended up getting a bit out of hand when the crowd swarmed the king and stripped his person of the jewels and gold stitched to his clothing. But Henry was in a jovial, permissive mood, as he always was when things went his way.

Henry began setting up his son’s separate household by appointing the dozens of servants appropriate to his princely status. It included forty men at arms for protection, and food tasters, to make sure that none of his nurse’s food was poisoned. His nurse, Elizabeth Poyntz was supervised by a Lady Mistress, and he had four “rockers” to keep his cradle moving.

“The names of divers persons which were daily waiters upon the Prince,” viz.:—Carver: Edw. Wylloughby. Sewer: Edm. Losell. Gentleman usher: Edm. Gray. Gentlemen waiters: Wm. Harrys, Nic. Wykes. Chaplains: Mr. William Underwood, Mr. Chr. Browne, Mr. Th. Pekesall, clerk of the Closet.Yeomen of the Chamber: George Sutton, yeoman usher, Wm. Lambert, Maurice Alyde, Wm. Bendish, Wm. Clerke, John Smythe. Grooms of the Chamber: John Cowper, Wm. Holyns, Edw. Forest, Ric. Braybroke.Countinghouse: John Waliston, gentleman. Bakehouse: John Downer, yeoman, one conduct. Pantry: Th. Blythe. Cellar: Th. Parker Buttery and Pitcherhouse: John Appulby and John Parre, grooms. Ewery and Chamber: Rob. Spurnell, groom, David ap John, yeoman. Kitchen: Wm. Blacnall, clerk of the Kitchen, Wm. Bolton, groom, Wm. Dully, groom, and a child. Larder, Boilinghouse and Scalding-house: Th. Skelton, groom, Rob. Lynton. Accatry: Th. Raudon. Poultry: Wm. Botell, yeoman. Scullery: John Barnabee, groom,—Fitton, page. Saucery: Wm. Larke, groom, Th. Salkyll. Hall: Wm. Benson.Porter: Simon Symmys, groom. Almonry (“Awmery”): John Hamlet, groom.Grooms of the King’s chamber: Ric. Chachemay, Wm. Wyndslowe. Clerk of the Works: Walter Foster (per mandatum Domini Camerarii).

But these latter appointments would end up lasting only a few days. On the 22nd of February came the terrible news that the New Year’s Boy had died. He had lived only 52 days.

Nothing survives in the records to tell us the cause of death. He seemed to be hale and hearty enough at birth - enough so that the baptism had been performed five days after birth, whereas sickly infants were baptized immediately. No mentions in the records are made of him being ill. His death seems to come from nowhere, sudden and shocking. Crib death, or respiratory infection (the Tudors had notoriously weak lungs) have been suggested. It’s likely we’ll never know. It was an era of high infant mortality, and the Tudor child-rearing practices didn’t help matters.

Prince Henry’s funeral was nearly as lavish as the tournament that celebrated his birth. His father paid £400 for the black cloth for the mourners’ clothing, and the covering of the hearse. Another 186 yards bedecked the three barges that carried the mourners downriver to the church, and 327 yards were used to drape the choir in Westminster Abbey. The candles that burned day and night by the hearse required 974 pounds of wax.

Sir Thomas Boleyn had ridden in the celebratory joust, and was now noted as one of the mourners who marched in the funeral procession. He would have been given a black suit of clothing - the fineness of its cloth suitable to his rank - as was tradition.

Prince Henry was buried in Westminster, on the north side of the sanctuary near the entrance to the shrine of St. Edward the Confessor. The grave, however, was never given a marker or monument. The general location of his grave is known. During excavations for the new High Altar in the 1860s, a small lead coffin of a child was discovered - it may have been the coffin of the prince.

It wasn’t unusual for the graves of infants to be unmarked in the Tudor era, and when they were, their monuments were usually very simple, like the markers on the graves of the infant children of the Boleyn family. The choice seems to have been up to the parents, and there was no societal pressure to mark the graves of small children. None of Katharine’s infants were given grave markers - perhaps it simply hurt her too much to think of it.

The queen was crushed with grief. Edward hall said of her:

Like a natural woman, [she] made much lamentation, howbeit by the king’s good persuasion and behavior, her sorrow was mitigated, but not shortly.

Katharine, always pious, intensified her religious devotion, reportedly spending hours kneeling on bare stone floors to pray. She fasted arduously, made offerings at shrines, and begged God to send her another child, but it was two years before she became pregnant again.

January 1, 1540.

Three years after Jane Seymour’s death, Henry VIII is about to meet his fourth wife, Anna von Kleefes (Anne of Cleves.) 

Henry’s usual matrimonial hunting grounds, his queen’s ladies in waiting, hadn’t stirred up anyone of interest. This time, Henry would marry a princess for an alliance to benefit England. The search began before Jane Seymour was even in the ground. This isn’t quite as cold-hearted as it sounds. Henry only had one living son, an infant. It was his duty as a king to re-marry and father more. But Henry was never really much about duty, and so the process would drag on for years.

It wasn’t easy to find a new bride for the scandalous king. Christina of Denmark is reported to have said of Henry “If I had two heads, one should be at the King of England’s disposal."  It’s probably apocryphal, but it shows the attitude of Europe at the time.

In most circumstances, royal parents wouldn’t care if their daughter didn’t want to marry their chosen bridegroom. Anna’s sister-in-law, Jeanne d'Albret, had been whipped by her parents when she refused to marry the Duke of Cleves, and had to be physically carried to the altar by the Constable of France when she refused to go.

But in this case, the crowned heads of Europe agreed with their daughters. Catholic monarchs didn’t want to ally with a king who had been excommunicated. Protestant monarchs were offended by Henry’s relentless persecution of Lutherans in his realm, and his insistence on keeping all of the Catholic elements of worship except for the authority of the Pope.

Compounding the difficulty was the fact that Henry needed his marriage to bring him a beneficial alliance that would help shift the balance of power in Europe in his favor. There weren’t many princesses that fit the bill.

Henry insisted that his wife had to be beautiful. He was troubled by having to rely on ambassadors, deputies, and others to describe the women and their attributes to him. When it came to selecting his bride, Henry said:

"I trust to no one,but myself. The thing touches me too near. I wish to see them and know them some time before deciding.”

It makes sense to modern readers, of course, but to people in the sixteenth century, Henry’s behavior was un-kingly and rather childish. Royal marriages were made for alliances between nations, and the attractiveness of the candidates wasn’t really a consideration. Certainly, Henry hadn’t worried whether or not his sister Mary Tudor Brandon would find the elderly French king attractive when Henry forced her to marry him. 

Portraits would be exchanged, but often that was after the marriage had been agreed upon. The princess would be married by proxy before she left her homeland for her new realm. It was the way things had been done for a thousand years in Europe, but Henry thought he should be an exception.

He suggested through his ambassador that the French should send their candidates to England for a visit to see if Henry found any of them suitable.

The French reacted to this bizarre suggestion with ridicule. They would not be trotting out princesses for Henry to inspect like hackneys he was considering buying. The ambassador made the sarcastic suggestion that Henry might want to “try” the women and select the one he found the sweetest. It’s recorded that Henry had the grace to blush when the French ambassador said this.

Cromwell urged Henry to accept Anna von Kleefes or Amalia, the sisters of a duke who ruled a small, but strategic, German country. Cleves was Reformist in its faith; one of Anna’s brother-in-laws was known as the “Champion of the Reformation.” Anna’s mother, however, had been a strict Catholic, and Anna still adhered to her faith. But she was willing to obey her husband in regards to religion.

Henry sent the court painter, Holbein, to paint portraits of the two princesses and men he trusted to report on their beauty and attributes. Holbein’s portrait of Anna shows a moderately attractive young woman with gentle features. He painted her head-on, which somewhat disguised her long nose. Ambassador Wotton, who had gone with Holbein, pronounced the finished portrait “a very lively [life-like] image.”

After viewing the two portraits, Henry picked Anna as his bride.

The ambassadors who met her said Anna was “… of middling beauty, and of very assured and resolute countenance.” Anna wasn’t beautiful, but she wasn’t ugly, either.

Anna was solemn and dutiful, the qualities that had so attracted Henry to Jane Seymour. By English standards, Anna wasn’t sophisticated or accomplished. Because of her sheltered German upbringing, she wasn’t conversant in the intricate poetic and literary metaphors used by the English court. She did not sing or play any musical instruments, which the Germans felt were “unbecoming” for a lady, and in her brother’s sober court, dancing was frowned upon. She could read and write, but only in German. She loved to play cards, and embroidered beautifully. But she was gracious and charming, and as it would later turn out, Anna had such a brilliant political mind, Henry wished he could put her on his council.

Anna also came from an extremely fertile family. Her grandfather was nicknamed der Kindermacher for the ninety-six illegitimate children he’d fathered along with his wife’s brood. Had Henry’s matrimonial adventures really been about getting heirs, Anna was the perfect wife.

The proxy marriage was performed and Anna was dispatched to England. She made her way across the sea and landed at Deal. From there, she set out on a slow, winding path for London, where she expected to meet her new husband. At every house she stayed in along the way, there were celebrations and feasts to greet the new queen. The courtiers she met were charmed by her. She was likeable and gracious. No one made any negative reports about her appearance at this time.

Henry had other plans for their first meeting. He was impatient to meet her and wanted to “nurture love” by getting to know her before she reached London. He decided to play one of the pranks of his youth, the games he used to play with Katharine of Aragon. In those long-ago days, he would dress up as a highwayman and invade Katharine’s chamber, demanding to dance with the queen. Katharine always pretended to be surprised when he took off his disguise.

Henry dressed himself in a “mottled,” or ragged, cloak and hood, and went to Rochester. He called aside her steward and announced he had come to meet his new wife. Henry may have been remembering the romantic stories of French and early English monarchs who had first checked out their brides while in disguise and then revealed themselves to them. The romantic outcome was that the princess was supposed to fall in love with the “stranger” because their hearts would recognize one another, even if their eyes were fooled.

Did anyone tell the king it might not be a good idea to “introduce” himself in such a way to a girl who came from a far away land that didn’t have the same courtly traditions, and hadn’t read the same romances he had? If they did, it didn’t deter him.

Anna was in her chamber, gazing out her window, watching a bear-baiting outside staged for her amusement. Henry entered and announced he had a gift for her from the king, words she probably didn’t understand. With that, he grabbed her into his arms and kissed her.

Anna was shocked at being manhandled by this obese, uncouth man dressed as a peasant. It’s not hard to imagine she had a look of disgust on her face as she recoiled. She turned away from him and stared out the window, likely unsettled and unsure of what to do.

It was probably the only time Henry had ever seen a look of repulsion aimed in his direction. He was surrounded at all times by trained courtiers who gazed at him in adoration and assured him he was still the most handsome prince in Christendom. Anna brutally shattered that illusion in a single moment. She did not swoon and fall instantly in love with him. She did not pretend coy delight. She showed him - stripped of courtly pretense or artifice - exactly what she thought of him, and it wasn’t flattering.

What must Anna have been thinking? It must have been bewildering and frightening to her. She was a royal princess who had just been assaulted in her new homeland, and no one was doing anything about it. Her servants hadn’t thrown out the stranger. Was this the kind of lack of respect she would have to learn to expect here?

Henry left the room and returned dressed in his kingly robes. Anna was deeply embarrassed, as Henry had probably expected (and frankly, intended.) But he extended a measure of graciousness to her.

And when the lords and knights saw his grace they did him reverence…. and then her grace humbled herself lowly to the king’s majesty, and his grace saluted [kissed] her again, and they talked together lovingly…

But the reports note that the petulant Henry did not give Anna the jewels and furs he’d brought as a New Year’s gift for his bride.

But behind the scenes, Henry was fuming. His pride had suffered a brutal blow, and as Henry usually did when hurt or angry, he deflected it on others. Anna was the one who was repulsive, not him!

 "I like her not! … She is nothing as well as she was spoken of.“

Henry had a litany of complaints about his new bride. She looked old. She smelled bad. Her clothes were terrible. He added darkly, ”I am not well handled.“ He began to blame those who had "deceived” him into marrying her, and as his courtiers usually did, they hastened to agree with him that Anna was hideous. However, disinterested parties such as the French diplomat, Charles de Marillac, described Anna as beaulté moyenne, - “medium beauty,“ which is better than he rated Katheryn Howard, whom Henry thought was a knock-out.

Henry tried to wriggle out of the marriage, scrambling to find reasons why it might be invalid. But nothing could be uncovered. All of her paperwork was in order. Henry whined:

"Is there no other remedy, but that I must needs, against my will, put my neck in the yoke?" 

Henry was deeply resentful when forced to do anything, but in this case, there was no escaping it. To annul the proxy marriage and eject Anna from England would be to alienate his new German allies, whom he needed desperately since the Emperor was now allied with the French. Another way would have to be found to rid himself of her.

On December 23, 1527, Pope Clement received the draft of a dispensation Henry VIII wanted him to grant. Though Henry was still married to Katharine of Aragon in the eyes of the church, he was seeking permission to wed another woman - provided he was able to dissolve his first marriage - and this dispensation was supposed to clear any impediments to that union.

Proposed bull of dispensation for Henry VIII., in case his marriage with Katharine, his brother’s widow, be pronounced unlawful, to marry another, even if she have contracted marriage with another man, provided it be not consummated, and even if she be of the second degree of consanguinity, or of the first degree of affinity, ex quocumque licito seu illicito coitu [from any licit or illicit intercourse]; in order to prevent uncertainty in the succession, which in past times has been the occasion of war.

This version, nor the one eventually approved by the pope, did not directly mention Anne, but it cleared away any possible legal objections to their marriage. The dispensation went through multiple drafts before a final one was submitted to the pope and approved in April.

… in the event of a declaration of nullity of such a marriage, to be dispensed to marry any other woman whatever, even though she has already contracted marriage with another, as long as she has not consummated it with carnal coupula, or even if she be related to you in the second or more remote degrees of consanguinity, or in the first degree of affinity arising from whatever licit or illicit intercourse, as long as she is not the widow of your aforesaid brother, and even if she be related to you by spiritual or legal kinship and the impediment of public righteousness or honesty be present.

Some scholars believe Henry was trying to frame the dispensation in such broadly general terms that it could apply to other women besides Anne Boleyn as part of his continuing efforts to disguise his relationship with her. At this point, Henry still maintained that he was just trying to ensure his marriage to Katharine was entirely valid, and Anne was simply a maiden of his court he was flirting with. Almost a year later, in November 1528, he addressed the people and said:

And as touching the queen, if it be adjudged by the law of God that she is my lawful wife, there was never thing more pleasant nor more acceptable to me in my life, both for the discharge and clearing of my conscience, and also for the good qualities and conditions which I know to be in her. For I assure you all, that beside her noble parentage of the which she is descended (as you well know), she is a woman of most gentleness, of most humility and buxomness, yea, and in all good qualities appertaining to nobility she is without comparison, as I, these twenty years almost, have had the true experiment; so that if I were to marry again, If the marriage might be good, I would surely choose her above all other women.

But it’s questionable as to whether anyone actually believed him. By this time, everyone knew of his desire to marry Anne and make her his queen.

The dispensation brings up several interesting points about Henry’s proposed union with Anne. The wording that dispenses any precontracts Anne may have had is a little confusing - perhaps intentionally so - leaving it vague how far the precontract actually went. One version suggests she had entered into an actual marriage that was never consummated, while another suggests it was a contract entered before the unnamed woman was of legal age. As a result scholars aren’t sure whether the dispensation referred to the negotiations to marry Anne to James Butler, or her aborted attempt to marry Henry Percy, which might be what the “public honesty” clause referred to.

Next, the dispensation discusses any problems arising from affinity, or blood relation. It allows Henry to marry a woman who is even within the second degree of consanguinity. Henry and Anne weren’t related by blood except by the eighth or ninth degree - seventh cousins, once removed. The dispensation was clearing the way for him to marry a woman who might be as closely related as his third cousin. Was their some confusion over whether they might share a great-great grandparent, or that her proposed betrothal to James Butler/Henry Percy put her within the forbidden degrees of relation? (Henry Percy was the king’s third cousin.) The dispensation may have been meant to cut off any arguments that Anne’s entanglement with these men created an issue.

The “licit or illicit intercourse” the dispensation referred to was from Henry’s affair with Mary Boleyn. Henry was trying to annul his marriage to Katharine based on the scriptural prohibition from marrying one’s brother’s widow. His affair with Mary Boleyn created - in the eyes of the chuch - the exact same incestual relationship. Cardinal Reginald Pole wrote a scathing letter to Henry pointing out this very fact.

Now what sort of person is it whom you have put in the place of your divorced wife? Is she not the sister of her whom first you violated? And for a long time after kept as your concubine? She certainly is. How is it, then, that you now tell us of the horror you have of illicit marriage? Are you ignorant of the law which certainly no less prohibits marriage with a sister of one with whom you have become one flesh, than with one with whom your brother was one flesh? If the one kind of marriage is detestable, so is the other. Were you ignorant of this law? Nay, you knew it better than others. How do I prove that? Because, at the very time you were rejecting your brother’s widow, you were doing your utmost to get leave from the pope to marry the sister of your former concubine.