Queen Catherine Parr was, I thought, born in Kendal, my home town.
She was the 6th wife of Henry VIII and for most of my life I thought she
was a woman who had little choice in what happened to her or influence. In
those days women were considered property and marriages were made for political
reasons. On one of my visits back home I picked up a booklet in the parish
church called “Queen Katherine Parr’s Book of Prayers” and had it for a few years
occasionally reading a prayer from it. It was only recently that I thought to
look at her life and what it must have been like, what I found out really
suprised me.
Catherine
Parr; (1512 – 5 September 1548) was Queen of
England from 1543 until 1547, as the last of the six wives of King Henry
VIII, whom she married on 12 July 1543 aged 31 to Henry’s 52 years. She was the
first queen consort of Ireland and the fourth commoner Henry had taken as his
consort, and outlived him. She was also the most-married English queen, having
had four husbands.
Catherine enjoyed a close relationship with
Henry's three children and was personally involved in the education of
Elizabeth and Edward, both of whom became English monarchs. She was influential
in Henry's passing of the Third Succession Act in 1543 that restored both his
bastardised daughters, Mary and Elizabeth, to the line of succession to the
throne.
Catherine was appointed Regent from July to
September 1544 while Henry was on a
military campaign in France and in case lost his life, she was to rule as Regent until Edward came of age. On account of Catherine's Protestant symphasies, she provoked the enmity of powerful Catholic officials who sought to turn the King agains her - a warrant for her arrest was drawn up in 1546. However, she and the King soon reconciled. Her book Prayers or Meditations became the first book published by an English queen and by a woman under her own Name. She assumed the role of Elizabeth's Guardian following the King's death, and published a second book, The Lamentations of a Sinner. Six months after Henry's death, she married her fourth and ginal husband, Thomas Seymour, 1st Baron Seymour of Sudeley. The marriage was short-lived, as she died in September 1548, probably of complications of childbirth.
Catherine was born in
1512, probably in August. She was the oldest surviving child of Sir Thomas
Parr, lord of the manor of Kendal in Westmorland (now Cumbria), a descendant of
King Edward III, and of the former Maud Green, daughter and co-heiress of Sir
Thomas Green. The Parrs were a substantial northern family which included many
knights. Sir Thomas was Sheriff of Northamptonshire, Master of the Wards, and
Comptroller to King Henry VIII. Parr was also a close companion of the King.
Her mother was a close friend and attendant of Catherine of Aragon (Henry’s
first wife), and Catherine Parr was probably named after Queen Catherine, who
was her godmother.
It was once thought that Catherine Parr had
been born at Kendal Castle in Westmorland. However, at the time of her birth,
Kendal Castle was already in a bad condition, and by 1512 it had become
derelict. Historians however consider it was more likely she was born in
Blackfriars, London. Her father died when
she was young, and Catherine was close to her mother as she grew up. Maud
managed the children’s education and the family estates and must have left an
impression on her daughter of the greater role an independent woman could have
in society.
Catherine's initial education was similar to
other well-born women, but she developed a passion for learning which would
continue throughout her life. She was fluent in French, Latin, and Italian, and
began learning Spanish when she was Queen. As a child, Catherine could not
tolerate sewing and often said to her mother "my hands are ordained to
touch crowns and scepters, not spindles and needles".
In 1529, when she was seventeen, Catherine
married Sir Edward Borough, a grandson of Edward Burgh, 2nd Baron Burgh.
Catherine's first husband was in his twenties and may have been in poor health
he died in the spring of 1533.
In the summer of 1534, aged 22, Catherine
married John Neville, 3rd Baron Latimer, her father's second cousin and a
kinsman of Lady Strickland. With this marriage, Catherine became only the
second woman in the Parr family to marry into the peerage. The twice-widowed
Latimer was twice Catherine's age. She now had a home of her own, a husband
with a position and influence in the north, and a title.
Latimer was a
supporter of the Roman Catholic Church and had bitterly opposed the king's
first divorce, his subsequent marriage to Anne Boleyn, and the religious
consequences. In October 1536, during the Lincolnshire Rising, a mob of
rebellious Roman Catholics appeared before the Latimer’s home threatening
violence if Latimer did not join their efforts to reinstate the links between
England and Rome. Catherine watched as her husband was dragged away. Between
October 1536 and April 1537 Catherine lived alone in fear with her
step-children, struggling to survive. It is probable that, in these uncertain
times, Catherine's strong reaction against the rebellion strengthened her
adherence to the reformed Church of England. In January 1537, during the uprising
of the North, Catherine and her step-children were held hostage at Snape Castle
in Yorkshire. The rebels ransacked the house and sent word to Lord Latimer, who
was returning from London, that if he did not return immediately they would
kill his family. When Latimer returned to the castle, he somehow talked the
rebels into releasing his family and leaving.
Although no charges
were laid against him, Latimer's reputation, which reflected upon Catherine,
was tarnished for the rest of his life. Over the next seven years, the family
spent much of their time in the south. For several years, Latimer was
blackmailed by Cromwell and forced to do his bidding. After Cromwell's death in
1540, the Latimers reclaimed some dignity. In 1542 the family spent time in
London as Latimer attended Parliament. Catherine visited her brother William
and her sister Anne at court. It was here that Catherine became acquainted with her future fourth husband, Sir Thomas Seymour. The
atmosphere of the court was greatly different from that of the rural estates
she knew. There, Catherine could find the latest trends, not only in religious
matters, but in less weighty secular matters such as fashion and jewelry.
By the winter of 1542, Lord Latimer's health
had worsened. Catherine nursed her husband until his death in march1543. In his
will, the 31 year old Catherine was named as guardian of his daughter,
Margaret, and was put in charge of his affairs until his daughter's majority.
Latimer left Catherine the manor of Stowe and other properties. He also
bequeathed money for supporting his daughter, and in the case that his daughter
did not marry within five years, Catherine was to take £30 a year out of the
income to support her step-daughter. After an event filled 9 year marriage
Catherine was left a rich widow. It is likely that Catherine sincerely mourned
her husband; she kept a remembrance of him, his New Testament with his name
inscribed inside, until her death.
Using her late mother's friendship with Henry's
first queen, Catherine of Aragon, Catherine took the opportunity to renew her
own friendship with the former queen's daughter, Lady Mary. By 16 February
1543, Catherine had established herself as part of Mary's household, and it was
there that Catherine caught the attention of the King. Although she had begun a
romantic friendship with Sir Thomas Seymour, the brother of the late queen Jane
Seymour, she saw it as her duty to accept Henry's proposal over Seymour's.
Seymour was given a posting in Brussels to remove him from the king's court.
Catherine married Henry VIII on 12 July 1543 at
Hampton Court Palace, around four months after her husband’s death. She was the
first Queen of England also to be Queen of Ireland following Henry's adoption
of the title King of Ireland. Catherine and her new husband shared several
common ancestors making them multiple cousins. On becoming queen. Catherine was
partially responsible for reconciling Henry with his daughters from his first
two marriages, and also developed a good relationship with Henry's son Edward.
She was also a noted patron of the arts & music.
Henry went on his
last, unsuccessful, campaign to France from July to September 1544, leaving
Catherine as his regent. Because her regency council was composed of
sympathetic members, including her uncle, Thomas Cranmer (the Archbishop of
Canterbury) and Lord Hertford, Catherine obtained effective control and was
able to rule as she saw fit. She handled provision, finances and musters for
Henry's French campaign, signed five royal proclamations, and maintained
constant contact with her lieutenant in the northern Marches, Lord Shrewsbury,
over the complex and unstable situation with Scotland. It is thought that her
actions as regent, together with her strength of character and noted dignity,
and later religious convictions, greatly influenced her stepdaughter Lady
Elizabeth (the future Elizabeth I of England).
The Queen's religious
views were viewed with suspicion by Catholic and anti-Protestant officials such
as Stephen Gardiner (the Bishop of Winchester) and Lord Wriothesley (the Lord
Chancellor). Although she must have been brought up as a Catholic, given her
birth before the Protestant Reformation, she later became sympathetic to and
interested in the "New Faith". She came under suspicion that she was
actually a Protestant by the mid-1540s. This view is supported by the strong
reformed ideas that she revealed after Henry's death, when her second book, Lamentacions
of a synner (Lamentations of a Sinner), was published in late 1547. The
book promoted the Protestant concept of justification by faith alone, which the
Catholic Church deemed to be heresy. It is unlikely that she developed these
views in the short time between Henry's death and the publication of the book.
Her sympathy with Anne Askew, the Protestant martyr who fiercely opposed the Catholic belief of
transubstantiation, also suggests that she was more than merely sympathetic to
the new religion.
Katherine and her ladies were known to have had
banned books which was grounds for arrest and execution on charges of heresy. In
February, 1546, the King was told that a Protestant woman, Anne Askew, had
named the Queen as a protestant. The King ordered Anne Askew questioned again,
and she was savagely racked and tortured by Wriothesley, personally, in the
Tower. She would not, however, renounce her Protestant faith, nor implicate
anyone else. In June, she was sentenced to death and burned at the stake. Her
death was relatively quick compared to most—someone had paid the executioner to
hang a bag of gunpowder at her neck, so she could die of the explosion, instead
of waiting to die by suffocation or the boiling of one's own blood.
However, there was
enough other evidence against the Queen to issue a warrant for her arrest. The
warrant was accidentally dropped and someone loyal to the Queen saw it and then
quickly told her about it. This is a well-documented incident. After learning
of the arrest warrant, Katherine was said to be very ill, either as a ruse to
stall or from a genuine panic attack. Henry went to see her and chastised her
for her outspokenness about the reformed religion and his feeling that she was
forgetting her place by instructing him on such matters. Katherine’s response
in her defense was that she was only arguing with him on these issues so she
could be instructed by him, and to take his mind off other troubles. Playing to
Henry’s ego no doubt helped and Katherine was forgiven Shortly before he died,
Henry made provision for an allowance of £7,000 per year for Catherine to
support herself. He further ordered that after his death, Catherine, though a
queen dowager, should be given the respect of a queen of England, as if he were
still alive. Catherine retired from court after the coronation of her stepson,
Edward VI.
Following Henry's death, Catherine's old love,
Sir Thomas Seymour, returned to court. Catherine was quick to accept when
Seymour renewed his suit of marriage. Since only six months had passed since
the death of King Henry, Seymour knew that the Regency council would not agree
to a petition for the queen dowager to marry so soon. Sometime near the end of
May, Catherine and Seymour married in secret. King Edward VI and council were
not informed of the union for several months. When their union became public
knowledge, it caused a small scandal. The King and Lady Mary were very much
displeased by the union. After being censured and reprimanded by the council,
Seymour wrote to the Lady Mary asking her to intervene on his behalf. Mary
became furious at his forwardness and tasteless actions and refused to help. Mary
even went as far as asking her half-sister, Lady Elizabeth, not to interact
with Queen Catherine any further.
During this time,
Catherine began having altercations with Edward Seymour, her husband's brother.
Like Thomas, Edward was the King's uncle, and also was the Lord Protector and
the Duke of Somerset. A rivalry developed between Catherine and his wife, her
own former lady-in-waiting, the Duchess of Somerset, which became particularly
acute over the matter of Catherine's jewels. In November 1547, Catherine
published her second book, Lamentations of a Sinner. The book was a
success and widely praised. In early 1548, Catherine invited Lady Elizabeth and
her cousin, Lady Jane Grey, to stay in the couple's household at Sudeley Castle
in Gloucestershire. The dowager queen promised to provide education for both.
Queen Catherine's house came to be known as a respected place of learning for
young women.
In March 1548, at age 35, Catherine became
pregnant. This pregnancy was a surprise as Catherine had not conceived during
her first three marriages. During this time, Seymour began to take an interest
in Lady Elizabeth. Seymour had reputedly plotted to marry her before marrying
Catherine, and it was reported later that Catherine discovered the two in an embrace. Whatever actually happened, Elizabeth was sent away in
May 1548 to stay with Sir Anthony Denny's household at Cheshunt and never saw
her beloved stepmother again, although the two corresponded.
Catherine gave birth
to her only child — a daughter, Mary Seymour, named after Catherine's
stepdaughter Mary — on 30 August 1548, and died only six days later, on 5
September 1548, at Sudeley Castle in Gloucestershire, from what is thought to
be puerperal fever or puerperal sepsis, also called childbed fever.
Coincidentally, this was also the illness that killed Henry's third wife, Jane
Seymour. It was not uncommon, due to the lack of hygiene around childbirth.
Nevertheless, a theory exists that Catherine's husband, Sir Thomas Seymour, may
have poisoned her in order to carry out his plan to marry Lady Elizabeth Tudor.
Lord Thomas Seymour of Sudeley was beheaded for treason on 20 March 1549, and
Mary Seymour was taken to live with the Dowager Duchess of Suffolk, a close
friend of Catherine's.
Catherine's good sense, moral rectitude,
compassion, firm religious commitment, and strong sense of loyalty and devotion
have earned her many admirers among historians.
BOOK OF PRAYERS Her book of prayers was written in her own hand
on parchment and measured 60 x 40mm. It was approx 15mm thick. While
many of the prayers showed an attitude of complete subjection to God and the
belief that life on earth is full of sorrow and that to be with God would put
an end to such miseries there are some which hint at an understanding of what
it meant to be intimate with God.
that I maie flie up from these wordely myseries and reflect in Thee.
O when shalle I assende to Thee and see and feele how swete Thou art.”
“When shall I wholy gather myselfe in Thee so
perfectly that I shall not for Thy
love feele myselfe but Thee only above myselfe and above all wordly thinges that
Thous maiste vouchsafe to visite me in suche wise as Thou doest visit Thy most
faithfull lovers"
love feele myselfe but Thee only above myselfe and above all wordly thinges that
Thous maiste vouchsafe to visite me in suche wise as Thou doest visit Thy most
faithfull lovers"
By Moya Boardman, Prophet, W.A.A. UK Member
REFERENCES:
wikepedia
Queen
Katherine Parr’s Book of Prayers Tudorhistory.org
Katherine Parr: Complete
Works and Correspondence - compiled by Janel Mueller (excerpts from)
