PMP2000 > Places > Charnwood History

FAMOUS PEOPLE

LADY JANE GREY:
Jane Grey is without doubt one of the most tragic figures in the history of CHARNWOOD, despite - or ultimately because of - being born into a life of privilege unimaginable to most people in the country. But rank had it's perils as well as privileges and the same society that gave Jane her wealth and status also brought about her death at the age of 16.

The function of young Tudor women of rank was clear - to marry well. '"Well" in this case meaning to a man of her parents' choice who would enhance the wealth and status of the family. It was essentially a business arrangement for the Tudor nobility. Love may come later but it was very much an "optional extra".

The life of the young JANE GREY seemed set to follow just this course. The "good" marriage would then be sealed as soon as possible by the production of a child. And not just a child - a boy. But pregnancy and especially the birth itself was extremely dangerous - and rank gave no guarantees of safety.

But if these dangers could be safely negotiated, a Tudor noblewoman could expect her later years to be filled with ease and comfort - plagues, pestilence's and fevers permitting, of course.

Such was the life that JANE GREY seemed to be born into in October 1537, either at BRADGATE HOUSE or GROBY MANOR. JANE was the eldest child of HENRY GREY, DUKE OF SUFFOLK AND THIRD MARQUIS OF DORSET and his wife FRANCES BRANDON. She was named in honour of the Queen, JANE SEYMOUR who had given birth to the future EDWARD VI earlier the same month. The birth of EDWARD was a momentous occasion. After three wives and years of trying, it seemed that HENRY VIII had finally secured the future of the Tudor dynasty by producing a male heir. But the new Prince was a sickly child, probably due to congenital syphilis inherited from HENRY VIII. This was to become a crucial factor in JANE's short life.

JANE did have very real connections to the Royal family. Her maternal grandfather, CHARLES BRANDON, DUKE OF SUFFOLK, had been the second husband of PRINCESS MARY, the youngest sister of HENRY VIII. On her father's side, she was the great-great granddaughter of SIR JOHN GREY and ELIZABETH WOODVILLE, the widow of EDWARD IV.

The young JANE lived at BRADGATE HOUSE until the age of nine, when she was sent to stay for two years with KATHERINE PARR, the widow of HENRY VIII and her husband ADMIRAL THOMAS SEYMOUR, brother of the late QUEEN JANE. SEYMOUR's brother, the DUKE OF SOMERSET, was a very powerful figure at this time, having been appointed LORD PROTECTOR of the young EDWARD VI. The Admiral was determined that he should be made LORD PROTECTOR instead of his brother and drew JANE GREY's father into a plot to bring this about and then marry JANE to the young King. But when KATHERINE PARR died, JANE's father removed her from the household - just in time, as it turned out. Very soon afterwards, the ambitious widower was executed for treason and JANE's father was very lucky not to have been implicated himself. But the family's thirst for power was not yet satisfied. When the DUKE OF SOMERSET also fell from power, the GREY cousin JOHN DUDLEY, DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND determined that he would seize power.

JANE, meanwhile, had returned to BRADGATE where she was becoming an accomplished scholar. Her studies were supervised by DR JOHN AYLMER, who was later to become Bishop of London and she studied Latin, Greek, Hebrew and Divinity. She had a great love of learning, especially as it gave her an escape from her strict - often harsh - parents. ROGER ASCHAM, tutor to QUEEN ELIZABETH, visited BRADGATE a number of times. In "THE SCHOLEMASTER" he writes of a conversation he had with JANE in which she told him:

"I am so sharply taunted, so cruelly treated yea, presently sometimes with pinches, nips, bobs, and other ways (which I will not name for the honour I bear them) so without measure misordered, that I think myself in hell till the time come that I must go to Mr Aylmer, who teacheth me so gently, so pleasantly, with such fair allurements to learning, that I think all the time nothing whiles I am with him. And when I am called from him, I fall on weeping: because whatsoever else I do but learning is full of grief, trouble, fear and whole misliking to me".

WAS JANE REALLY A QUEEN?
It must have been a great relief to JANE when, in 1551, she left BRADGATE to take her place at court. But peace of mind was short lived as now her cousin NORTHUMBERLAND began to put his plans for the young girl into action. These stemmed largely from the confusion over who would succeed EDWARD VI if, as seemed increasingly likely, he died without an heir of his own.

The princesses MARY and ELIZABETH had both been declared illegitimate by their father, HENRY VIII: MARY because he maintained he had never been legally married to her mother, KATHERINE OF ARAGON and ELIZABETH because of the supposed adultery of her mother, ANNE BOLEYN. HENRY had also disinherited the children of his eldest sister, MARGARET OF SCOTLAND. That just left his youngest sister's child, FRANCES BRANDON, DUCHESS OF SUFFOLK - JANE GREY's mother.

The practical upshot of all this was that JANE GREY was now seemingly second in line of succession, after her mother. In fact, the first seven in line were all women, including not only JANE's two sisters but also MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. And this in a country which had not had a Queen ruling in her own right since before the Norman Conquest.

But despite HENRY VIII's apparent wishes, he had never revoked a statute of 1536 which stated that, if EDWARD VI died without an heir, he would be succeeded first by PRINCESS MARY, then by PRINCESS ELIZABETH, then MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS and only then to JANE's mother. These two opposing versions of the succession would seem to cancel each other out, so it is really no surprise that every ambitious noble began to see a great opportunity to exploit the confusion to their own advantage.

There is also one additional complicating factor and that is the nature of succession itself. In the middle ages, there was indeed an "elective" element in the choosing of a new monarch. The person to inherit would actually be the one who had the support of the majority of the nobility. Nine times out of ten, this would be the eldest son of the dead monarch but he would not automatically succeed. It is rather like the appointment of a Prime Minister. This is the person who is deemed to have the confidence of the majority of members of the whole House of Commons. It is not automatically the leader of the party which has the most MPs.

However, it is usually accepted that by the time of the Tudors, PRIMOGENITURE was the way in which new monarchs were decided: the automatic succession of the eldest son or, if there are no sons, the eldest daughter. Hence the importance to the KIng of a male heir, as amply shown in the reign of HENRY VIII. The one thing which primogeniture precludes is the right of anyone - including the monarch - to designate who is to be the heir. That being the case, MARY was the legal heir of EDWARD VI despite anything anyone else said or tried to do. The moment EDWARD died, MARY would be Queen, even if she herself was unaware of the fact at the time: declaration, coronation or any other form of affirmation would be unnecessary. In 1936, EDWARD VIII was legally King despite never being crowned. This is the meaning of the phrase "THE KING IS DEAD, LONG LIVE THE KING". Or, in this case, Queen!

And whichever of these conflicting versions is accepted, it has to be said that JANE GREY was in the line of succession AFTER her mother. Whether or not the DUCHESS OF SUFFOLK could legally just "opt out" of the line of succession is debatable in itself. Logic would seem to dictate that only if she gained the throne herself could she then relinquish it in favour of JANE.

So it seems unavoidable that, however "romantic" it may be to call her "THE NINE DAY'S QUEEN", JANE GREY was never truly Queen of England for even one day. On the other hand, becoming monarch by right of conquest was hardly uncommon in England, or anywhere else. The founder of the Tudor dynasty, HENRY VII, had overcome a dubious claim to the throne by backing it up with force of arms. A cynical but accurate definition of a rightful heir is "the person who takes the throne - and keeps it". Had things turned out differently for JANE no-one would have questioned the legality of her claim if they wanted to keep their heads.

As SIR JOHN HARINGTON was to say some decades later in his fourth book of Epigrams: "Treason doth never prosper..... For if it prosper, none dare call it treason...".

NORTHUMBERLAND'S PLOT:
But none of this academic arguing meant a thing to JOHN DUDLEY, DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND. He was both enormously wealthy and extremely unpopular, and his position in the 1550s was looking very precarious. He knew that if the Catholic MARY came to the throne, he would lose, at best, his power and, at worst, his life. But if he upheld that MARY was illegitimate, then surely ELIZABETH was too, so how could he support her as Queen? He needed a controllable Protestant to succeed the by now very ill EDWARD and he found one: his own cousin, JANE GREY. He did recognise that it was in fact her mother who had the claim but he persuaded the Duchess to "decline" the throne in favour of JANE. It was through marriage that he determined to secure his cousin's path to the throne.

The complex and contradictory lines of succession would only come into play if EDWARD VI died childless, so NORTHUMBERLAND's initial plan was to marry JANE to him. However, this had to be quickly abandoned when it became clear that the sickly EDWARD would not live long enough to produce an heir.

Plan B was to ensure JANE became Queen herself with the NORTHUMBERLANDS in an unassailable position of influence over her. The path to this was to be JANE's marriage to NORTHUMBERLAND's 19 year old son - GUILDFORD DUDLEY. When told of this plan, JANE absolutely refused to marry her cousin. Neither her father or NORTHUMBERLAND would stand for this and the girl was thrashed into submission, the marriage taking place at NORTHUMBERLAND's town house on Whit Sunday, 1553. SUFFOLK and NORTHUMBERLAND were obviously determined to get their money's worth, as the one day saw three family weddings. As well as JANE marrying GUILDFORD DUDLEY, her 13 year old sister KATHERINE was wed to LORD HERBERT, heir of the EARL OF PEMBROKE, while NORTHUMBERLAND's daughter KATHERINE was married off to LORD HASTINGS, heir to LORD HUNTINGDON of ASHBY CASTLE. A case of hedging their bets, perhaps?

EDWARD VI was too ill to attend this triple wedding but it seems that PRINCESS MARY was one of the principal guests. It was a lavish affair, but all of the glittering clothes were in fact borrowed for the occasion.

After the wedding, JANE was told she must stay in London with her new husband, despite having previously been that promised she would be able to go home. Her new "family" insisted that she must be ready to go to the tower the moment EDWARD died and there be proclaimed Queen. This appears to be the first JANE had heard about her cousin's plans for her and she seems not to have taken it seriously, deciding it was an excuse to stop her going home to BRADGATE. She hated life with the ostentatious NORTHUMBERLANDs and apparently hated her new husband even more, becoming convinced they were trying to poison her. She did, indeed, become ill but this seems to have been some kind of nervous breakdown rather than a physical illness. She had frequent bouts of hysteria and was constantly hiding from her new husband.

Meanwhile, NORTHUMBERLAND had managed to persuade EDWARD to name JANE as his successor. But, primogeniture aside, without an Act of Parliament to back it up this meant nothing. Nevertheless, Letters Patent naming JANE as heir received the Great Seal on June 21st 1553, backed up by over a hundred signatures.

EDWARD VI finally died on July 6th, 1553. Rumours of ill omens immediately seemed to sweep the capital, none of which augured well for NORTHUMBERLAND and his young protŽgŽe. Some even claimed that the King had been poisoned by NORTHUMBERLAND. JANE was not told of the King's death straight away. NORTHUMBERLAND realised that for his plan to stand any chance of success, MARY had to be dealt with first. She was staying at Hunsden in Hertfordshire and, as soon as the King was dead, he sent MARY a letter saying that the King was ill and calling for her. Luckily for her, SIR NICHOLAS THROCKMORTON warned her that this was a trap and instead of going to London, MARY wrote to the Council reminding them of her own claim to the throne.

On July 9th, still unaware of the KIng's death, JANE was taken upriver to Sion House where she was astonished to be met by a crowd of nobles, including her own mother. Here, NORTHUMBERLAND announced EDWARD's death and proclaimed JANE Queen. The young girl was horrified and at first refused to play her part in her cousin's plans. As a witness at the time later wrote:

"She began to act her part of Royalty with many tears, plainly showing that she was forced by her friends and relations to this high but dangerous post".

But what could a sixteen year old girl - especially one who had already been as cruelly treated as JANE - do against such people? JANE also wrote her own account of the event:

"On hearing all this, I remained stunned and out of myself. I call on those present to bear witness, who saw me fall to the ground weeping piteously, and dolefully lamenting, not only mine insufficiency but the death of the King. I swooned indeed, and lay as dead, but when brought to myself I raised myself on my knees and prayed to God that if to succeed to the throne was indeed my duty and my right, that He would aid me to govern the realm to His glory. The following day, as everyone knows, I was conducted to the Tower".

JANE was proclaimed Queen by heralds in the London streets but the hoped for cheering and acclamation did not materialise. Entering the Tower through what was later to be called Traitors' Gate, JANE GREY was crowned Queen on July 10th 1553.

NORTHUMBERLAND must have thought he had won. Now JANE was Queen, it seemed a short step to make his son KING GUILDFORD. But JANE, his "puppet Queen" proved much more resolute than he had thought. She had no objection to making her hated husband a Duke, but King? Absolutely not! And outside the capital, things were rapidly starting to come unravelled. People were flocking to support MARY's claim to be Queen and armies began to form in case more persuasion was needed. Within two days, MARY had 30,000 troops to back up her claim. All NORTHUMBERLAND had was 600 soldiers and a handful of gunners.

But no battle ever took place. At NORWICH, MARY was proclaimed Queen, while NORTHUMBERLAND's forces steadily deserted him. As town after town declared for MARY, NORTHUMBERLAND fled to CAMBRIDGE and, rather unconvincingly, declared he was now a Catholic.

Back in London, there was an undignified scramble amongst JANE's erstwhile supporters to declare their allegiance to MARY. Even JANE's own father acclaimed her as his Queen from the top of Tower Hill. QUEEN MARY, with Princess ELIZABETH beside her, rode triumphantly into the capital to the sound of cheering and church bells.

JANE herself was found sitting on the throne in the Council Chamber. When SUFFOLK, her father, explained to her that she was no longer Queen, she quietly said: "Can I go home now?".

NORTHUMBERLAND was brought back from Cambridge and faced trial in Westminster Hall on August 18th. Only a public renunciation of his Protestantism saved him from the humiliation of the gallows to be beheaded instead. JANE's mother persuaded MARY to release her husband in exchange for a heavy fine but there is no record of either of her parents pleading for JANE to be released.

JANE herself, together with and GUILFORD DUDLEY were officially condemned to death. However, they were instead held prisoner in the Tower, where the new Queen treated them with considerable leniency. After all, JANE was her cousin, and by all appearances they had once been good friends. MARY probably well knew they had just been puppets in the ambitions of others. The fact they were not immediately executed implies that they would in all probability have been released after a few years, when MARY felt secure on her new throne. But, yet again, the actions of others dictated the fate of JANE GREY.

A few months later, JANE's father, the DUKE OF SUFFOLK, became involved in a conspiracy led by SIR THOMAS WYATT against MARY's planned marriage to the Catholic PHILIP II OF SPAIN. The plan was to rouse the people in revolt, remove MARY and put the Protestant ELIZABETH on the throne. But the plot was discovered and, despite ingenious attempts to escape, SUFFOLK was arrested in the grounds of his Manor at Astley.

This time, it was politically impossible for MARY to be lenient to either SUFFOLK or his rebellious family and JANE was told to prepare for execution. In a last letter to her father, whom even now she appeared to forgive, she said:

"To me there is nothing that can be more welcome, than from this vale of misery to aspire to that heavenly throne of all joy and pleasure with Christ our Saviour".

The night before her execution, she sent her sister Katherine her Greek New Testament with a touching letter:

"I have here sent you, good Katherine, a book, which although not outwardly trimmed with gold, yet inwardly it is of more worth than precious stones.... It shall win you more than you should have gained by the possession of your woeful father's lands... Rejoice in Christ, as I do: follow the steps of your master, Christ, and take up your cross... I shall be delivered of this corruption, and put on incorruption: for I am assured that I shall, for leaving this mortal life, gain an immortal life..... And if you will cleave unto Him, He will prolong your days to your comfort and to His glory: To the which glory God bring me now, and you hereafter, when it pleaseth HIm to call you. Fare you well good sister; put your trust in God, who only must help you. Amen! Your loving sister, Jane Dudley".

JANE GREY and GUILDFORD DUDLEY were both executed on February 12th, 1554. GUILDFORD died first, on Tower Hill, but JANE, as a royal princess, was granted the privilege of ending her life inside the Tower walls. As was the custom, she first made a speech to the people who had gathered to witness her death:

"Good people, I am come here to die and by a law I am condemned to the same. The fact, indeed, against the Queen's highness was unlawful, and the consenting thereunto by me; but touching the procurement and desire thereof by me or on my behalf, I do wash my hands thereof in innocence, before God, and the face of you, good Christian people, to bear witness that I die a true Christian woman, and that I look to be saved by none other means, but only by the mercy of God in the merits of the blood of his only son Jesus Christ, and I confess, when I did know the word of God I neglected the same, I loved myself and the world, and therefore this plague or punishment is happily and worthily happened unto me for my sins; and yet I thank God of his goodness that He hath thus given me a time and respite to repent. And now, good people, while I am alive, I pray you to assist me with your prayers".

She was just sixteen years old.

After the execution, no-one seemed to have thought what should happen to JANE's body. It was left on the scaffold for almost the whole day while permission was sought to bury her in the Chapel of St Peter-ad-Vincula. She was lain between the decapitated bodies of ANNE BOLEYN and KATHERINE HOWARD, without a service or funeral rites of any kind.

Years later, when the little coffin was opened for some reason, JANE's body crumbled to dust on exposure to the air. The dust was collected and put into an urn in the chancel of the church, where it has stayed ever since.

SUFFOLK's charmed life finally came to an end on the block shortly after his tragic daughter. His wife, FRANCES BRANDON, was allowed to live at BEAUMANOR, where she scandalised society by marrying her fomer eqerry ADRIAN STOKES with what was deemed "undue haste". On her death, STOKES continued to live at BEAUMANOR and eventually became an MP for Leicestershire.

But the sufferings of the GREY sisters had not come to an end even now. On hearing of MARY's triumph, the EARL OF PEMBROKE, petitioned the new Queen for an annulment of his son's marriage to KATHERINE GREY, which was granted. The shrewd old Earl had ensured that the couple had not been allowed to live together until it became clear which way the succession would go. Afterwards, KATHERINE was secretly married to EDWARD SEYMOUR, the EARL OF HERTFORD without the Queen's permission. For this insult, he was fined £15,000 and the couple was imprisoned in the Tower. The unfortunate KATHERINE died there in January 1567 after nine years incarceration.

Youngest sister MARY seemingly learned from the fate of her sisters and married "one whom she could love and none need fear". This was widower Martin Keys Esquire of Kent, Sergeant Porter to ELIZABETH I. But even such an apparently uncontroversial match was not to be. ELIZABETH I reportedly flew into a rage when she heard of the marriage and held MARY in custody in a succession of country houses. Only after her husband was dead was she allowed to live with her step-father ADRIAN STOKES and his second wife at BEAUMANOR. She died childless in April 1578.

From this evidence, it seems clear that neither QUEEN MARY nor QUEEN ELIZABETH could forget that the GREY sisters were still potential rivals to the succession and must not be permitted to have children. It was not until the accession of JAMES I, when what was left of the family was no further threat to the throne that they could finally consider themselves out of immediate danger.

LADY JANE GREY AND THE LAST WOLF:
There is a local legend that LADY JANE GREY helped to kill the last wolf ever seen in CHARNWOOD FOREST. After a visit to the BEAUMONT family of Gracedieu, young FRANCIS BEAUMONT was invited to spent a few days at BRADGATE. He and JANE were riding home ahead of the rest of the party when they heard a terrifying howl. Believing they had heard someone in trouble, they left the carriage and dismounted and went towards the sound. As they passed an outcrop of rock, a huge wolf sprang out with a small child in it's mouth. The beast dropped the child and sprang at them, whereupon FRANCIS drove his small knife into it's chest as hard as he could. Wounded and desperate, the wolf pushed him to the ground and tried to seize him by the throat. JANE bravely picked up a rock and hit the wolf on the head, then pushed a thick branch between it's jaws. This gave FRANCIS enough time to stab the wolf again, this time killing it instantly. The child was still alive and the couple returned it to it's grateful parents at a nearby cottage. No wolves were ever again seen in CHARNWOOD FOREST.

THE GHOST OF LADY JANE GREY:
The ghost LADY JANE GREY is said to haunt the ruins of her old home. Reports of screams emanating from the house in all probability come from the peacocks which roam the park but something special is said to happen each New Years Eve. On this night, a coach is said to approach BRADGATE HOUSE, pulled by black horses, with Lady Jane the sole passenger. Some reports say she and the horses are all headless. The coach disappears as it reaches NEWTOWN LINFORD church, only to reappear nine days later (the length of her "reign"). This second time, the coach carries on into the park and stops at the house, whereupon Lady Jane gets out and disappears into the ruins....