Traitors of the Tower

Chapter Four Queen Katherine Howard (1542) - "Rose Without a Thorn"

Katherine Howard was one of the most tragic queens in history. Married young to the ill and obese Henry VIII, as his fifth wife, she was ill-fitted in nearly every way for her royal rank. She was to pay a high price for her failings.

The exact date of Katherine's birth is not known. It was between 1519 and 1525. Her father was a poor younger son of the noble Howard family. Her mother had died when Katherine was a child, and Katherine was brought up in Norfolk by her grandmother, the Duchess of Norfolk. The Duchess was guilty of neglect, and Katherine was badly taught and left to run wild.

Katherine was a small girl, slim and pretty, with brown hair. She had a kind heart and was easily led. She was very young when her music master, Henry Manox, tried to seduce her. He would later boast that he knew of a secret mole on her body and had felt her private parts. Before he had got any further, the Duchess walked in on the pair. Shocked, she beat them both, and put an end to their love play.

But she then seems to have left Katherine to do as she pleased. Katherine shared a bed-chamber with female servants and distant relatives. She saw, and took part in, the games with men that took place there. Before long, she fell in love with a cousin, Francis Dereham, and was soon sleeping naked with her lover.

The other women quickly worked out what all the "puffing and blowing" behind the bedcurtains meant. Some were quite shocked. Things got to the stage where the young couple were calling each other "husband" and "wife" in front of others. In Tudor times, this was taken as a contract between them, which was as binding as a marriage, and could only be set aside by the Church.

The Duchess was not aware of all these goings-on. Soon, Dereham went to Ireland to seek his fortune. He had vowed to come back and claim Katherine as his bride. But then the Duchess moved her household to London.

It was 1540, and Henry VIII had just married his fourth wife, the German Anne of Cleves; Henry was not attracted to his bride, and would not sleep with her. Instead, he had his advisers running round in circles trying to find a way to end the marriage.

Katherine Howard's uncle, Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk, was the leading Catholic peer at court. He and his friends were keen to see Anne removed. They did not want the King coming under the influence of the church reformers who had arranged her marriage. They wanted a Catholic queen.

Norfolk saw his niece, pretty Katherine Howard, waiting on Anne of Cleeves. It came to him that she would be the perfect wife for the King. This was not the first time that Norfolk had plotted to put a niece on the throne. He had been uncle to Anne Boleyn, but his hopes of greatness had been dashed when Anne was beheaded. But Katherine, the Duchess told him, was no Anne Boleyn: she was a good girl.

Norfolk did his best to make the King notice Katherine, and his efforts soon bore fruit. By April 1540, Henry VIII had fallen so much in love with her that he could not keep his hands off her. Backed by her family, Katherine led him on. Henry made her grants of land, and it seems she wanted to be queen. But she was no Anne Boleyn. She was much younger and far more empty-headed. She had no idea that her past would come back to haunt her.

As soon as Henry VIII had got rid of Anne of Cleves, he married Katherine. The wedding took place in July 1540 at the palace of Oatlands in Surrey. Then the royal couple spent ten days alone in private.

Henry was then forty-nine, very fat, and old for his years. But he was given a new lease of life by his young bride. He loaded her with gifts, petted her in public and showed all the signs of being in love with her. He could not do enough for her. In tribute to his love, she took the motto: "No other will than his."

Katherine enjoyed her new riches, the great palaces, the dancing, the fine gowns, the bright jewels and the sweet little lapdogs. Whether she was as pleased with her fat and ailing husband is not known. Rumours that Henry was impotent had been going round since Anne Boleyn's downfall, but they may not have been true. Katherine also had to put up with the stink of his leg ulcers.

Henry was happy in his marriage. He thought himself blessed. He believed he had found the wife of his dreams. He struck a gold medal on which Katherine was called his "rose without a thorn". He thanked God for sending him such a "perfect jewel". The whole realm was made to "do her honour".

Henry still hoped for an heir, and in April 1541, Katherine thought she was pregnant, but it seems she was not. It was as well, in view of what was to come.

Silly Katherine had taken some of the Duchess's servants into her household, those same servants who had seen her romping with Dereham. At least one seems to have got in by the threat of blackmail. Katherine even took Dereham on to work for her. Her love for him had cooled, though, and by the spring of 1541, she had begun a secret affair with Thomas Culpeper, her cousin. He was a member of the King's Privy Chamber, and much liked by Henry.

Taking risks with Culpeper was a stupid thing to do, given the fate of Anne Boleyn. But Katherine seems to have been heedless of the danger. Nor did she show much wisdom in falling for this young man, who had raped the wife of a park-keeper while his friends held her down. Then he had killed a man who had seen it all and vowed to report him. Culpeper had got away with it just because the King was so fond of him.

Lady Rochford was one of these who had served the Queen. She was the widow of Anne Boleyn's brother; it was she who had accused her husband and his sister of incest. Now she aided Katherine's affair with Culpeper, keeping watch when they met in secret.

When Henry took Katherine on a long journey to the north of England in the autumn of 1541, the lovers met as often as they could, even in a privy. Katherine would always "seek for the back doors and the back stairs herself". Once, when the King came to sleep with his wife, he was kept waiting outside her door while Lady Rochford got rid of Culpeper. Katherine was putting herself in grave danger.

Katherine's past was revealed when Mary Hall, one of the Duchess's servants, told Thomas Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury, about it. Cranmer was only too willing to bring down the Catholic Queen Katherine. He wrote a letter to the King, setting down what he had heard, and left it in the royal pew, so that Henry would find it when he went to Mass. Henry read it, but did not believe it could be true. He asked Cranmer to find out more.

When sound proof of Katherine's shameless deeds was shown to Henry, he broke down in public and called for a sword to kill her. Then he ordered her arrest, and that of Lady Rochford. Katherine was shut in her rooms at Hampton Court and told that it was "no more the time to dance". Legend has it that she broke free of her guards and ran to plead with Henry at the door of the Chapel Royal. It was said she knew that, if she could once more use her charms on him, he would forgive her. But she was dragged away, screaming, before she could reach him.

Henry left Hampton Court a broken and aged man. Katherine would never see him again. It was said that he looked "old and grey after the mishap of the Queen". He tried to soothe his grief by going hunting and eating rich food. He was now so fat that three men could fit into his clothes. A new law was passed making it treason for a woman to marry the King without first telling him if she had a past. One wit wrote, "Few, if any, ladies at court would aspire to such an honour."

Thomas Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury, questioned the Queen and her servants for many days. Katherine was in a crazed state, and at first denied it all, even that she had been as good as married to Dereham. Admitting that might have helped her, for it would have made her marriage to the King null and void. But the foolish girl thought that denying everything was safer.

In the end, she broke down and confessed what had taken place before her marriage. That was no crime, of course. But Dereham let slip that she had left him for Culpeper, and adultery was another matter. In a queen, it was high treason. Katherine would only admit that she had flirted with Culpeper, given him gifts and called him her "little sweet fool". Yes, she had sent him a letter ending with the words, "Yours as long as life endures", but she firmly denied she had ever slept with him. She accused Lady Rochford of spreading that rumour, but Lady Rochford would not admit it.

Culpeper was arrested. He said he had met the Queen in secret many times, but that they had not "passed beyond words". But when the council were told that they had met in the privy, they believed the worst.

Katherine was doomed. Her servants were sent away. Her jewels were given back to the King. She was sent to Syon Abbey by the Thames, where she was well looked after but made to live quietly and dress in sober clothes. Her rich gowns and jewels had been taken from her. The Howard family fell from favour, and many of its members were sent to prison. Dereham and Culpeper were tried and beheaded.

Katherine did not face trial. Instead, the House of Lords condemned her as a traitor, who must forfeit her life and goods. Three months after her arrest, the lords came for her. This was when she realised that the King really did mean to have her put to death and, in panic, she refused to go with them. But they forced her into the barge, and took her to the Tower. They passed under London Bridge, where the rotting heads of Dereham and Culpeper had been set on spikes.

In the Tower, Katherine could not stop weeping. Then she calmed down and asked if the block could be brought to her, so that she could practise how to behave nobly at her death, to uphold the honour of the great Howard family. She went to the scaffold on 13 February 1542, so weak with fear that she could hardly stand. She told the crowd that she deserved a hundred deaths. Then she knelt, and the axe took off her head with one blow. Wrapped in a black blanket, she was buried near her cousin, Anne Boleyn, in the Tower chapel.