Tudor? I Hardly Knew Her! : Queen Elizabeth I, part one
Maybe I’m just a girl on a mission but I’m ready to fly
So much of what we become depends on luck. Where we’re born, who our parents are, what events occur in our immediate environment, and what opportunities are available. Those random twists of fate often set them on separate courses even when circumstances are similar between two people — for instance, two siblings. Beyond all that, there is fate, circumstance, and luck; we all have that innate thing inside us. A person born into the ideal situation with luck can still fail in their chosen path, and someone born into an unlucky situation with everything stacked against them can succeed. This brings us to Queen Elizabeth I, a woman whose life could have gone in numerous ways. Still, because of that, something inside her — combined with luck and privilege — wound up just about as successfully as she could have wanted. This is not to say she didn’t face challenges along the way.
Her childhood was similar to that of her much older half-sister, Queen Mary I. Both were the redheaded, fair-skinned, temperamental daughters of King Henry VIII. Both were considered heirs to the throne until Henry got tired of their respective mothers. At this point, both girls were downgraded from princesses to ladies. Both wound up becoming queens and although Elizabeth had the luck of taking on the role at a younger age (meaning she lived longer in the role), something inside of them was indeed part of what set their legacies apart. And maybe this is where some crucial differences in their ostensibly similar childhoods may hold a clue to the women each would become.
Princess Elizabeth was born September 7, 1533, the first child of King Henry VIII and his second wife, Anne Boleyn. Famously, both Anne and Henry had really been counting on their firstborn to be a son. Birth announcements had already been prepared saying that a Prince had been born, which had to be hastily re-written to show that the new heir was a girl. She was named in honour of her two grandmothers, both of whom had been Elizabeths. She became heir to the throne upon her birth, but everyone considered her a placeholder until Anne and Henry could have a son. It wasn’t just that they didn’t want a daughter. The King and Queen required a son. A woman or girl had never inherited the throne of England before, and with Henry just the second in the Tudor dynasty, he did not want a son to take over from him because girls ain’t nothing but trouble, especially when you were living in a time and place when primogeniture was the thing.
Of course, infamously, Anne Boleyn never had a son, and Henry had her beheaded. Elizabeth was just under three years old when her mother was executed, and like Mary before her, Elizabeth went from being an adored Princess to a mostly just-tolerated Lady. When Henry’s third wife, Jane Seymour, gave birth to a son, Elizabeth was sent to live in her baby brother’s household as a guest of honour. As a child, Elizabeth was sweet and kind. She was given a better education than most young women of the time, becoming fluent in languages including Flemish, French, Italian, Spanish, Latin, and Greek. She was also instructed in religious education and followed her father's and brother’s new Protestant religion. One significant influence in the early part of her life was that of her third stepmother, Henry’s sixth wife, Kathryn Parr.
When Henry VIII died in 1547, Elizabeth (then twelve years old) was sent to live with Kathryn Parr. Now, Kathryn had sort of scandalously married almost right away to a man named Thomas Seymour, who was a terrible person, so prepare yourselves for this to get bad. Thomas was not only Kathryn’s new husband but also the uncle of Elizabeth’s brother, the nine-year-old King Edward. Elizabeth was living with her stepmother and her stepmother’s husband, who was also her step-uncle. Kathryn was well educated and loved nothing more than debating religious philosophy with other learned scholars, so Elizabeth (and her cousin, Lady Jane Grey) were coming of age surrounded by many intelligent, interesting people. And also Thomas Seymour.
Thomas was about forty years old and The Worst. It’s a matter of record that he was very handsy with his young sort-of-stepdaughter Elizabeth, doing things like tickling her and wrestling and just like things he should not have been doing. For example, on at least one occasion, he came into her bedroom while wearing a nightgown (he wore the nightgown, not sure what Elizabeth was wearing, but who cares because she was twelve years old) and spanking her. Kathryn, in a Stand By Your Man kind of way, didn’t seem bothered by this and, on some occasions, joined in the jolly tickling fun. Once, she held Elizabeth while Thomas cut her gown into a thousand pieces. Why was he doing this? Was Elizabeth wearing the dress while this happened? I PREFER NOT TO KNOW. Whatever any of this was all about — and some historians and biographers theorize that Thomas molested Elizabeth beyond tickling and “horseplay” in the sense that he may have raped or otherwise sexually assaulted her — it ended in May 1548 when Kathryn found Elizabeth and Thomas in “an embrace” and sent Elizabeth away.
But this was not the end of Thomas Seymour’s terrible terribleness! Kathryn died in childbirth in September 1548, and Thomas turned his gross attention back to his former sort-of-stepdaughter, Elizabeth. But this time, Elizabeth’s brother King Edward — who used to have Thomas as one of his advisors, so perhaps knew what he was like — was paying attention. Thomas intended to marry Elizabeth as a power play because of her family connections, but his past behaviour became a matter of public record. Thomas was arrested for scheming to marry Elizabeth. Elizabeth was questioned in the investigation into Thomas’s misdeeds but refused to speak out against him. Not because she loved or cared about him but perhaps because she wanted to protect her reputation. Stubbornness, it seemed, was one of the defining Tudor family traits. Thankfully for all of humanity, Thomas was found guilty and was put to death in March 1549.
Elizabeth had a few, in retrospect, quiet years between then and 1553, when Edward died young. The whole Jane Grey thing happened, followed by the entire Mary wresting control of the throne thing, and Elizabeth mostly stayed out of the way and did her best not to bring attention to herself. Elizabeth rode into town with Mary in a grand parade where Mary was declared Queen of England. Because Mary was Catholic, she insisted that everyone else should be too, so Elizabeth — at least outwardly — practiced the Catholic faith. But secretly, her true beliefs were Protestant, and everybody knew that. When Mary started to go off the rails vis-a-vis burning Protestants at the stake, more and more people began sort of eyeing Elizabeth as a potential replacement Queen with bonus Protestant beliefs. Mary caught wind of this and tried to nip this in the bud by throwing Elizabeth in jail where nobody could see her or think about how much of a better Queen she’d be.
Now, there is no evidence that Elizabeth had anything personally to do with any of these schemes or that she even knew about them. And if she had, we’ve already seen she was stubborn and close-lipped enough she’d never tell anyone. Elizabeth claimed to be innocent. But despite having zero proof, Mary threw Elizabeth in the Tower of London on suspicion of treason. Both sisters had advocates in high places, and ultimately, Mary was convinced to let Elizabeth go without putting her through a trial. But having Elizabeth — younger than Mary, more Protestant than Mary — hanging around was still dangerous to the Queen. So Elizabeth was sent to live in sort of house arrest at an estate in the country. In a foreshadowing of where this was headed, crowds cheered the redheaded young woman as she travelled out of town and to her new home.
Elizabeth returned to court in April 1555 when Mary was due to deliver her first child. Her role was to be a backup monarch in case Mary and the baby died, but of course, there was no baby. In the chaos and weirdness of that whole situation, Elizabeth just stuck around, and nobody asked her to leave. She was, yet again, heir to the throne, as it seemed now unlikely that her sister would have a baby at this point. And really, Elizabeth was the only choice of person to inherit from Mary, as the only other possibility was Mary, Queen of Scots, who was not only Catholic but also married to the French King. The question of succession was of the utmost importance for the fourth time in a decade because Queen Mary I had fallen ill and didn’t seem to be getting any better.
Queen Mary I’s husband, King Philip, was another of history’s worst husbands. He began making moves to marry Elizabeth before Mary was even dead. Elizabeth, for her part, was also making… to become Queen of England. Again, Mary wasn’t dead yet. But by the time Mary did die, Elizabeth was more than ready to take over. Oh, and you know Philip tried to arrange a marriage between them. Elizabeth did not even pause to consider this offer because she’d lived long enough in Tudor England to realize that there were a lot of gross, terrible men out there, and she knew she’d be better off single than married to that piece of sleaze.
And so, aged 25, Elizabeth became Queen Elizabeth I. There was yet another parade, and the people of London must have been either so excited or so over parades at this time from the revolving door of Queens. This one was special, though, because Elizabeth was super-popular… and Protestant. After five years of Protestants being burned by the previous Queen, the people of England were cautiously optimistic about this new monarch. Elizabeth spoke to the crowds, winning them over even more. On January 15, 1559, she was crowned and presented to the people as their new Queen. A joyous cacophony of drums, trumpets, organs, and bells rang out to celebrate her ascension to the role. And the thing is, she could have been any kind of Queen. Her reign could be short, long, troubled, or extraordinary. Nobody yet knew how this was all going to go. We, in hindsight, can see this all as hopeful omens for the long and prosperous reign she would enjoy.
But she had, of course, inherited the throne of a place still in a brutal civil war, surrounded by larger kingdoms that wanted to take over, and surrounded by scheming courtiers who would stop at nothing to gain more power. And perhaps the biggest question weighing over them was who she would marry.
Next week: The Virgin (?) Queen (!)
VULGAR HISTORY A LA CARTE is a feminist women’s history comedy newsletter. It is the companion publication to the Vulgar History podcast. Click here to hear the latest episode of the podcast.
Ann Foster is a writer and podcaster. She’s currently writing a nonfiction biography of Caroline of Brunswick. Don’t know who that is? You will soon! She’s represented by Amy Bishop-Wycisk at Trellis Literary Management.
Sources
It’s always amused me that Elizabeth was crowned by the deeply undistinguished Bishop of Carlisle, Owen Oglethorpe, because he was the most senior of Mary’s bishops who didn’t refuse on principle to participate in a semi-Protestant ceremony.