Potter David. Henry VIII and Francis I

Подождите немного. Документ загружается.

40 chapter one

caution about whether the Constable’s policy could be destabilised.

A second meeting was scheduled at Abbeville, while on 21 February

Henry told Norfolk to nd out if Franco-Imperial reconciliation had

any chance. If not, he was to enter clearly into talks about an Anglo-

French alliance with the German Protestants, oering the remit-

tance of part of the pension.

Fortunately, despatches could be got to

Abbeville from London in 36 hours, so Norfolk was able to use this

when he met the French king again on the 23rd. He also presented the

new ambassador, John Wallop, a soldier, uent French speaker and

former ambassador to Francis much more likely to be well regarded

in France than his predecessor, Bonner.

e outcome of the mission

was mixed; Francis stressed he would not abandon the Emperor if he

kept his promises but Norfolk claimed to have le with the impression

that he was still Henry’s good friend. Moreover, he had made useful

contacts with Marguerite of Navarre and Mme d’Etampes which were

to be of lasting use in the coming faction struggles within France.

Norfolk and Wallop seem to have concluded that peace was likely for

the rest of the year – ‘we shall lyve in peax for this yere’ – but that

the Deputy of Calais ‘shuld put all thinges in reddynes, as though ye

shuld have warre.’

In fact, reports from Wyatt conrmed the likeli-

hood that no early agreement was possible on Milan and Marillac was

clear that the English fears of war had receded.

However, Wyatt was

also careful to emphasise that some in the Emperor’s entourage had

told him that that Charles and Francis would remain friends ‘in spyte

of the devill.’

Norfolk would not return to France except to lead one of Henry’s

armies in 1544 but his mission in some ways set the agenda for the next

two years. It showed that the Anglo-French relationship depended on

the Franco-Imperial relationship and that Henry could expect noth-

ing without exploiting the dierences between his fellow monarchs.

Norfolk, 17 Feb. 1540, L&P, XV, 223.

Henry, 22 Feb. 1540, St.P., VIII, 261 (L&P, XV, 233).

In a treatise on Anglo-French relations dated around 1533, Wallop is described

as ‘a singular man both in court and feild, and of whome the French kinge made so

great accompt that his Majestie allowed hym for a gentle man of his chamber.’ BL

Arundel 151, fo. 423r.

Norfolk, 23 Feb. 1540, St.P., VIII, 275 (L&P, XV, 253).

Wallop to Lisle, 27 Feb. 1540, SP3/8, fo. 47 (L&P, XV, 270).

Wyatt, L&P, XV, 320; Cromwell to Wallop, 12 March 1540 St.P., VIII, (L&P, XV,

332); Marillac, 3 Mar. 1540, 26 Mar 1540 Kaulek, 167, 173.

Wyatt, 14 March 1540, Muir, Letters of Sir omas Wyatt, p. 152 (L&P, XV, 344).

the road to war

e dri of Henry’s policy hardly changed as a result of Cromwell’s

execution. Bonner had been close to the minister but was protected

by Norfolk as well. Wallop, his successor, was also close to Norfolk,

as of course was Lord William Howard, who replaced him in January

1541, though that replacement and Wallop’s brief imprisonment were

signs of Henry’s growing suspiciousness.

Wallop’s task seems to have been to exploit the growing tensions in

the French court caused by Francis’s disappointment at the Emperor’s

delay in fullling his obligations over Milan. Here, his ability to cul-

tivate the women who had reason to hate Montmorency, Marguerite

of Navarre and Mme d’Etampes, was vital. Wallop’s extraordinary

tête-à-tête with the Queen of Navarre in April revealed that the king

‘now of late hathe geven eare merveylously well’ to Mme d’Etampes

and, though Marguerite was reluctant to act openly for fear of seem-

ing partial, she recommended secret negotiations through Longueval,

a favourite of the royal mistress.

Marguerite went on in further

exchanges to report her brother disturbed at news from the Emperor

and remarked that France and the Habsburgs were like the Guelfs and

Ghibellines; it was hardly surprising if agreement were dicult. Mme

d’Etampes characteristically requested horses from Henry and these

she duly received. Marguerite, though, was under pressure both over

the proposed marriage of her daughter to the duke of Cleves and over

her religious views. She claimed to have been slandered and assured

Wallop of her continuing regard for Henry.

It is fatal to regard her

as uncomplicatedly pro-English; she was far from that.

All the same,

there were moments when reconciliation with Henry suited her pur-

poses. In 1542, she reminded Paget that she had told Norfolk in 1540

that Montmorency had ‘wrought all the mischief he could against the

Cruser to Goghre, chancellor of Cleves, 30 March 1541: ‘car ledit duc a tou-

siours grandement aimé ledit Wollop et ont esté une main.’ (SAD, Julich-Berg II,

1940, fo. 211).

Wallop to Cromwell, 18 April 1540, St.P., VIII, p. 318 (L&P, XV, 543).

Wallop to Cromwell, 29 March 1540, St.P., VIII, 289 (L&P, XV, 418); s to s, 18

April St.P., VIII, 318 (XV, 543); Pandolfo de Stua to Cavalcanti, April 1540, L&P,

XV, 544; Wallop and Carne to Henry VIII, 23 July 1540, St.P., VIII, 400 (L&P, XV,

904). Wallop later said that he always kept the Queen of Navarre ‘in store’ for the

checking of information (1 Dec. 1540, St.P., VIII, 487, L&P, XVI, 306).

H.M. Vose, ‘Marguerite of Navarre: “at Righte English Woman”,’ Sixteenth-

Century Journal, XVI (1985), 315–334.

42 chapter one

Kinges Majestie your maister’ but that she and Mme d’Etampes were

now Henry’s ‘handmaydes.’

Marillac reported in mid-March 1540 that Henry really desired

amity with France and that opinion at court had turned against the

Emperor; but he deplored loose talk in French taverns about a coming

Franco-Imperial war. From France he was receiving instructions even

from Montmorency that Francis was inclined to Henry’s friendship.

A month later, Wyatt reported from the Netherlands that, as for the

Emperor’s relations with France, they were ‘as cold as tho the things

passid had bene but dremis.’

ough Marillac reported Cromwell as

‘on the point toppling’ (‘en branle de trébucher’) in April 1540, he had

recovered enough to be created earl of Essex and the Frenchman was

taken by surprise at his arrest and execution in June–July. is raises

the question of how far Cromwell’s foreign negotiations contributed

to his downfall. e project for an Anglo-Protestant alliance was partly

of his making, though he was not alone in promoting it; there were

good reasons for it in 1539. Gardiner certainly opposed the German

alliance as impracticable but Norfolk seems to have shown no seri-

ous dierences of strategy in foreign aairs before June 1540. Marillac

reported Cromwell and all the other ministers as eager to stress their

preference for a French alliance, while opinion at court, he thought,

had turned sharply against the Emperor.

Cromwell is oen assumed

to have been, by preference, a supporter of the Habsburg alliance but,

this being impossible, he was forced to fall back on the Germans. He

was widely held responsible in France for the stripping of the English

Church. Francis, in his comment on Wallop’s report of Cromwell’s

arrest was quick to report his pleasure at the fall of one:

Who alone has been the cause of all the suspicion and ill-will he has

conceived not only against his friends but also against his closest, most

loyal and best servants . . . My cousin the duke of Norfolk can very well

remember what I told him about it when he last visited me.

Paget to Henry VIII, 26 Feb.[1542], St.P., VIII, p. 660, no. 710.

Marillac, 12 March 1540, Kaulek, p. 169 (L&P, XV, 334); same to Mont, 23 April

1540, Kaulek, p. 177 (XV, 563); Wyatt to Cromwell. 12 April 1540, Muir, Letters of Sir

omas Wyatt, p. 166 (L&P, XV, 508) see also 18 April (XV, 543).

Gardiner to Cromwell, Feb. 1536, Muller, Letters . . . Stephen Gardiner, pp. 71–75.

Marillac to Mont, 10 April 1540, Ribier, I, 513 (L&P, XV, 486); Marillac to Mont, 8

May 1540, Kaulek, 181, (L&P, XV, 612).

Francis to Marillac, 15 June 1540, Kaulek, p. 191 (L&P, XV, 785): ‘qui seul a esté

cause de tous les suspections et malveillances qu’il a conçues non seullement contre

the road to war

Naturally, no hint of this conversation emerges from Norfolk’s des-

patches, though there is no reason to doubt it took place in some form.

e essence was hinted at by Cardinal Jean du Bellay in conversations

with Wallop. e cardinal suggested that Castillon, on his return from

England in 1539, had reported rumours that Cromwell would aim to

marry the Lady Mary.

is was preposterous but grist to the mill

of Cromwell’s enemies. e French clearly believed that Cromwell’s

death removed a road block to an Anglo-French understanding.

Marillac seemed to think, in his report of Cromwell’s execution on 29

July, that Norfolk now has ‘le principal maniement des aaires’ a term

which would be equivalent to the role Montmorency still exercised in

France. He also thought Norfolk sympathetic to France, a French view

conrmed by Chapuys a year later.

e role of Norfolk, though, is

not that clear. By October 1540, it had become established that ambas-

sadors should correspond with the King and the Council, rather than

with an individual chief minister as in France.

It is fairly clear that by the summer of 1540, Francis was anxious to

maintain friendship with England, buoyed up by Marillac’s reports that

Henry was similarly inclined. Not that such an experienced observer

was being naïf; he was quite clear that Henry was as abusive about

Francis to others as he was about the Emperor to him. Nevertheless, ‘he

never once made mention of either pensions or tribute, not any sign of

discontent about the fortication of Ardres;’ Henry did, though, drop

heavy hints that friends had been preferred recently who had not been

such straightforward allies as he had.

Marillac, though a hard-headed

diplomat, was also profoundly shocked at internal developments in

England: treason by words, the Act of Proclamations, weakness of

Parliament, all kinds of arbitrary condemnations and the despoliation

of the Church. Henry, he thought, had turned himself into an object of

ses amys, mais contre ses plus privez, loyaulx et meilleurs serviteurs . . . Et se pourra

très bien souvenir mon cousin le duc de Norfolk de ce que je luy en diz quant il vint

dernierement par devers moy.’

Abstract of letters of Wallop, 16 June 1540, BL Harl. 288, no. 47; BL Cotton,

Calig. E IV, fo. 42 (L&P, XV, 792); Wallop to Henry, 5 July 1540 St.P., VIII, 376

(L&P, XV, 842).

Marillac to Montmorency, 29 July 1540, Kaulek, p. 207 (L&P, XV, 926); Chapuys

to Mary of Hungary, 22 Feb. 1541, L&P, XVI, 554.

Pate, 4 Oct. 1540, St.P., VIII, 443 (L&P, XVI, 122).

Marillac to Montmorency, 6 July 1540, Kaulek, p. 198 (L&P, XIV, 848): ‘il ne

m’en feit oncques mention, n’y [sic] de pensions, ny de tribut, ny démonstration

d’estre mal content pour la fortication d’Ardres.’

44 chapter one

idolatry (‘une vraye statue pour ydolâtres’). With the executions of July

1540, the King was in a state of ‘déance et crainte,’ unable to trust any

one minister and at court his ministers struggled to undermine each

other and gain their own advantage. is was how England looked to

France at this time and had been foreseen by Montmorency.

Henry’s

unpredictability was to take its toll of his servants abroad; Bonner was

for while under a cloud, Wyatt was arrested in January 1541, Wallop

was arrested on his return from France at the same time (by a particu-

larly nasty entrapment worthy of Stalin) and Richard Pate, at the end

of his embassy to Charles V, simply absconded to Rome in justied

fear of arrest.

Such events easily fed into the two Kings’ preconcep-

tions about each other that we have seen already.

For his part, Montmorency was assuring the Imperial ambassador

in August that there would be no new alliance with England

but

the logic of the situation and his reduced favour forced him to alter

his tone towards the end of the year. By then he was dealing in a

more agreeable way with the English envoys, a fact complained of by

the Papal nuncio.

e reason for this is almost certainly that from

August 1540, the English government started to destabilise relations

with France, using time-honoured methods. e Statute of Strangers

inevitably caused oence but it was the continual insistence on the

extradition of an otherwise insignicant ‘traitor’ who called himself

‘Blancherose’ that gave the game away. ere was no obvious reason

why such eorts should have been commanded from Wallop in this

domain. e sending of Gardiner on embassy to the Emperor (the

purpose of which remained mysterious) was also a source of French

anxiety.

For their part, the French were quick to raise all their own griev-

ances about extradition and an old grudge, the Rochepot case, used

in the late 1530s especially to turn the temperature of Anglo-French

relations up and down.

Such eorts were still being prosecuted in

Marillac to Francis and Montmorency, 6 Aug. 1540, Kaulek, pp. 208–213 (L&P,

XV, 953–954).

Even in 1542, Henry Knyvet was under a cloud when he was recalled from the

Emperor’s court and lingered at Orléans on his return from Spain until he knew what

to expect (L&P, XVII, 441).

Saint-Vincent to Charles V, 10 August 1540, AN K 1485, no. 14.

Howard, St.P., VIII, p. 568, Ferrerio to Farnese, 13 July 1540, ANG, I, pp. 580–

584.

D. Potter, ‘International politics and naval jurisdiction in the sixteenth century:

the case of François de Montmorency,’ European Studies Review, 7 (1977), 1–27; idem,

the road to war

December 1540.

e other cause of conict was the response (much

delayed) to French refortication of Ardres on the border of the Calais

Pale early in the year. From September, a small guerrilla conict began

over a patch a land between Guînes and Ardres (the Cowswade)

which was certainly unleashed by the English (see chapter 3). So,

Gardiner’s grand embassy to the Emperor and reports of aggressive

English troop movements at Calais in December 1540 added an incen-

tive for Montmorency to be more agreeable.

e English accepted

French oers to negotiate about the border in November.

So, on

14 November at Fontainebleau took place the justly celebrated event,

copiously reported by Wallop, in which Francis proudly displayed the

panelling of his chamber and gallery, helping the English ambassador

up on a bench. Wallop thought that the French could hardly have been

displeased about Gardiner’s embassy, or ‘I should neither have been

holp up ne down the bench.’ Shortly aerwards, Francis was getting

Wallop to taste the pork and venison pies he was preparing to send

Henry for the festive season.

Inexorably, the terms of trade between

England and France began to shi during 1540. By perhaps no great

eorts of his own or by his councillors, Henry VIII, from having been

the pariah of Christendom, metamorphosed into a sought-aer ally.

A telling indicator of this was a letter of advice written by

Montmorency (aer all struggling to maintain his foothold in the

King’s condence)

at the end of December 1540. e ambassador in

Rome had relayed word of Anglo-Imperial marriage talks and Marillac

had reported a more militant attitude in England (though Norfolk and

‘e Constable’s brother: François de Montmorency, sieur de la Rochepot (c. 1496–

1551), Nottingham Medieval Studies, xlviii (2004), 141–197.

Blancherose: L&P, XVI, 37, 56, 57, 82, 174; Wallop to Henry, 24 Dec. 1540, St.P.,

VIII, 497, (L&P, XVI, 350). e identity of Blancherose as one ‘Dick Hosier’ is given

in Instructions to Lord William Howard, 1541, St.P., VIII, p. 513: a ‘comen murderer

remayneng there naming himself the Blaunche Rose, being his name in deade Dic

Hosier.’ On this case, see J.G. Bellamy, e Tudor Law of Treason (London, 1979),

ch. 3.

Monluc to Montmorency, 21 Dec. 1540, Ribier I, pp. 550–552.

Marillac to Francis, 16 Nov. 1540, Kaulek, p. 241 (L&P, XVI, 269); Francis to

Marillac, 24 Nov. 1540, Kaulek, p. 245 (L&P, XVI, 289).

Wallop to Henry VIII, 17 Nov. 1540, St.P., VIII, 479 (L&P, XVI, 276); 31 Dec.

1540, St.P., VIII, 507 (L&P, XVI, 368).

See D. Potter, ‘Politics and Faction at the Court of Francis I: the duchesse

d’Etampes, Montmorency and the Dauphin Henri,’ French History, July 2007, pp. 1–20;

idem, ‘Anne de Pisseleu, duchesse d’Etampes, maîtresse et conseillère de François Ier’

in C. Michon (ed.), Les conseillers de François Ier (Rennes, 2011), pp. 535–56.

46 chapter one

other ministers were protesting themselves friends of France). is evi-

dence indicated that Henry ‘chercheroit de se mouuoir contre vous.’

Added to which, Sire, the journey of the bishop of Winchester with such

a large train to the Emperor, without your ever being able to discover

the reason; considering also on the other hand what Marillac wrote

about the Emperor’s ambassador in England, the discussions that go on

there, the long-term preparations that are made there all give pause for

thought.

is gave added reason, in his view, to redouble eorts to strengthen

Ardres. is came at a time when a recent papal nuncio declared to

Jean de Monluc that Montmorency was the ‘principal’ of those who

favoured Henry at the French court, while the Constable told William

Howard that, though he had been known as an Imperialist in his

search for peace, he was more bound to Henry for the latter’s kindly

treatment on his Garter embassy in 1527; Howard even described him

as ‘chif setter fourth’ of Henry’s aairs at the French court (surely an

exaggeration).

What gave cause for optimism in France was the recurrence of what

seemed like murderous faction ghting in England, with so many

arrests in January 1541. is gave Marillac condence to assert that,

as long as the English fought each other they ‘will undertake nothing

against the King of France, but will seek his friendship more than ever’

‘and the principal ministers in England all protested their friendship

for France.

On the other hand, the recall of Wallop and his replace-

ment by Lord William Howard, Norfolk’s brother, did not bode

well for close relations. Marillac noted the trumping up of charges

and was beginning to wonder whether the acts of tyranny in the past

were not so much Cromwell’s doing as those of his master.

Howard

Marillac’s despatches of 22 December, Kaulek, pp. 249–251, Ribier, I, p. 552

(L&P, XVI, 343–344); Marillac to Montmorency, 31 Dec. 1540, Kaulek, p. 353 (L&P,

XVI, 375); Montmorency to Francis, 31 Dec. 1540, Ribier, I, p. 556 (L&P, XVI, 376):

‘Et joignant, Sire, là dessus l’allée de l’Euesque de Vincestre si bien accompagné deuers

ledit Empereur, sans que vous en ayez jamais peu sçauoir l’occasion; considerant aussi

d’autre part ce que ledit Marillac écrit de l’Ambassadeur d’iceluy Empereur qui est

audit Angleterre, les propos qui se tiennent-là, les prouisions de longue main qui s’y

font . . . il y a . . . . quelque chose à penser là-dessus.’ Jean de Monluc to Montmorency,

21 Dec. 1540, Ribier, I, pp. 548–550; Howard to Henry VIII, 10 Feb. 1541, St.P., VIII,

519 (L&P, XVI, 528); Howard, 18 March 1541, St.P., VIII, 542 (L&P, XVI, 633).

Marillac to Francis and Montmorency, 18 Jan. 1541, Kaulek, pp. 261–263 (at

263); 12 Feb. 1541, Kaulek, p. 267 (L&P, XVI, 533): ‘n’entreprendront rien contre le

roi de France, mais rechercheront son amitié plus que jamais.’

Marillac to Francis, 10 March 1541, Kaulek, p. 275 (L&P, XVI, 608): ‘il n’estoit

the road to war

was widely reported to be an agreeable youngish man of good will

but not one to conduct complex negotiations. It is as though Henry

were giving a signal that he would put Anglo-French negotiations on

hold. How true this is dicult to say. Norfolk had been pursuing his

brother’s appointment to the French court since the recall of Bonner

but, according to Chapuys, had been frustrated in this by Cromwell,

yet Wallop was hardly a Cromwellian.

By the spring of 1541, the tectonic plates of international relations

were beginning to shi. Charles was in Germany negotiating with the

princes, rumours proliferating of a marriage alliance between him and

the Lady Mary. Francis and his advisers were having to plan for war

and Henry VIII was becoming increasingly moody, dissatised with

his ministers and looking for a way out of a situation in which all he

could do was try to anticipate his fellow monarchs’ plans. It is not sur-

prising that Henry was heard to remark that he had been ‘made’ to put

to death the best servant he had ever had in Cromwell.

e factions

in the courts of England and France were both in ferment especially

in the light of what was thought to be impending war. Henry was

strengthening his border against the Scots, warning James V not to

dance to the French tune (‘danser au son des Françoys’) as was usual.

For his part, Francis insisted he would never consent to war by the

Scots as long as Henry was his ally (a rather double-edged remark at

best) and, indeed, his interests could not have been served by provok-

ing war with England at this juncture.

On the other hand, April-May

1541 was a moment of intense speculation about war both in England

and northern France.

du tout aucteur de si piteuse tragédye, ains qu’il jouet son roolle ainsi qu’on luy

recordoit.’

On Howard’s appointment see his credence and instructions, 18 Jan. 1541, St.P.,

VIII, 511 (L&P, XVI, 464), which suggest no major démarche (though tellingly to

bring up the Dick Hosier/Blancherose case when convenient), and comments by

Marillac, 12 Jan. 1541 (Kaulek, pp. 257–260, L&P, XVI, 459, 450); Chapuys to Mary

of Hungary, 8 Jan. 1541, L&P, XVI, 436.

Marillac to Montmorency, 3 March 1541, Kaulek, p. 274 (L&P, XVI, 590)

Rumours that Henry intended to put away his new wife and the ‘il regrette grande-

ment son Cramel’ (Cruser to Goghre, Blois, 30 March 1541, SAD, Julich-Berg II,

1940, fo. 211.

Instruction to Jean de Taix, 25 Mar. 1541, Kaulek, p. 282 (L&P, XVI, 650).

Francis to Marillac, 1 April 1541, Kaulek, p. 282 (L&P, XVI, 683).

In June, Henry Cornish, lieutenant of Jersey for the earl of Hertford, was report-

ing rumours of war there and the arrest of a Jersey ship at Brest (HMC MSS of the

Marquess of Bath, Seymour papers, [HMC, Bath MSS] IV, p. 79).

48 chapter one

Henry, Francis and the German Princes

During 1538 and 1539, as the Franco-Imperial rapprochement took

shape, a small troubled cloud began to develop on the borders of the

Netherlands. Charles d’Egmont, duke of Guelders, who had spent his

life struggling to maintain his rights against, rst, Maximilian and then

Charles V, died in June 1538. Charles had been a French ally for much

of his reign and had at one point (1534) recognised Francis I as his

feudal lord.

But he had nally reached agreements with the Emperor

(1528, 1536) which accepted Egmont’s rights. e trouble was that the

Habsburgs had inherited from Charles the Bold a claim to the duchy by

purchase and the duke died childless. For the Estates of Guelders, the

priority was the maintenance of their independence and in 1538 they

accepted their neighbour, William of Cleves (who had an hereditary

claim through his mother) as their duke.

William in turn inherited

his parents’ territories of Cleves-Julich-Berg in 1539 and looked set

to create a powerful entity between the Emperor’s patrimonial lands

and Germany. Both Henry VIII and Francis I were closely involved in

negotiations with the duke in the late 1530s and early 1540s, William

attempting as far as he could to maximise his negotiating strength with

the Emperor. Charles, for his part, was determined to vindicate his

right to Guelders and Overijssel and thus round o his Netherlands

territories.

e duchy of Cleves was not yet Lutheran but its Duke was an eras-

mian reformer and the territory had its own church order from 1532.

William, not yet formally a Protestant, was therefore in a good position

to exploit connections with the Schmalkaldic League in order to con-

tinue Charles d’Egmont’s policy of resisting the Emperor. One compli-

cation was that the Elector of Saxony was a rival for the succession to

his lands; this had to be settled.

He was a tempting ally for England

and France, even though these two powers were now increasingly sus-

G. Bers, Die Allianz, pp. 18–20. Agreement negotiated by Jacques Colin with

Charles, 14 Oct. 1534 conferring a pension and a company of 100 lances on him, in

return for which he promised to ‘servir bien et loyaument ledict seigneur Roy dore-

navant à perpetuité.’ (BnF, fr. 23037, fos. 33–37).

For an impenetrable account of the legal dispute sent by Wotton to Cromwell,

27 April 1540, St.P., VIII, p. 330 (L&P, XV, 581).

P. Heidrich, Der geldrische Erbfolgestreit 1537–1543 (Kassel, 1896), pp. 27–44,

49–50.

the road to war

picious of each other. Both monarchies had long-standing traditions of

alliance with Guelders going back to the 14th century.

Francis had in

fact sent the sieur de Beauvais to Cleves in 1538 to encourage the duke

to take up the Guelders succession, ‘being sure and certain that the

King of England his good brother and perpetual ally, since they are in

all things one, will not fail for his part to say the same.’

e Franco-

Imperial rapprochement was to a degree oset by the conclusion of

the (however shaky) Anglo-Cleves alliance on Cromwell’s initiative

and for a few weeks aer the marriage of Henry and Anne of Cleves

all seemed well. William saw his alliance with Henry as a support in

his negotiations with the Emperor and the German secular Electors.

Nevertheless, there were snags. William had not been willing to com-

mit himself in the marriage treaty to allow Henry to raise men in his

territory, partly because he still hoped to reach an agreement with the

Emperor. Nor was William’s brother-in-law, the Saxon Elector John

Frederick, convinced that Henry was a reliable ally for Protestants.

Henry’s representative with William, Nicholas Wotton, reported that

there was general contentment at Anne’s reception (!) though some

disappointment at the ineectiveness of Henry’s intercession for

the duke with the Emperor. is was compounded by the failure of

William’s visit to Brussels in the spring of 1540, when Wotton was at

rst not invited, to achieve an agreement.

By the summer of 1540

Cromwell was dead and Anne of Cleves rejected, though Henry con-

tinued to protest his willingness to be the Duke’s ‘most perfect friend’

and dispenser of advice, while making it clear that he could do nothing

for him unless he were more open about his plans. In any case, Henry

was mainly concerned to get the Duke’s consent to his annulment of

See G. Nijsten, In the Shadow of Burgundy: the court of Guelders in the late Mid-

dle Ages (Cambridge, 2004): Duke Reinald II had married Eleanor of Woodstock,

Edward III’s sister.

Instruction of Francis I to Etienne de Laigue, sr de Beauvais, 30 June 1538,

A. Hulshof, Oorkunden aangaande de betrikkingen der geldersche vorsten tot Frankrijk

(Arnhem, 1912) no. LXXX, pp. 185–187: ‘estant sceur et certain que le roy d’Angleterre

son bon frère et perpétuel allyé, pour n’estre eulx deux que une mesme chose, ne faul-

dra de sa part de faire dire le semblable.’

Heidrich, Der geldrische Erbfolgestreit, pp. 48–49; Wotton to Cromwell, 22 Feb.,

6 March 1540, St.P., VIII, pp. 269, 276 (L&P, XV, 242, 302). On Wotton’s negotiations

throughout, see B. Ficaro, ‘Nicholas Wotton, Dean and Diplomat’ (University of Kent

Ph.D. thesis, 1981), pp. 47–73.