But two months dead, nay not so much, not two ...
Must I remember? Why, she would hang on him
As if increase of appetite had grown
By what it fed on, and yet within a month ...
A little month or ere those shoes were old
With which she followed my poor father's body
Like Niobe all tears, why she, even she ...
Hamlet, I.2.138.
WHEN Colne Priory was suppressed in 1536, Henry VIII granted it, with
exceptional tact, to the direct descendant of the founder: John de Vere,
15th Earl of Oxford, whose ancestors had been buried in the chancel
of the Priory Church for over four hundred years. At the same time the
Earl bought the entire contents of the buildings (excluding the plate,
which was sold separately), as well as the corn, and the cattle in the
fields. 1 Indeed, apart from
the religious rites (admittedly a large exception), he seems to have
taken over the Priory as a going concern; and he may even have taken
over the monks too, for though they could hardly continue to live at
the Priory, there is a persistent legend that, after the dissolution,
they lived in an ancient manor house of the de Veres close by, known
as Hall Place. This house was in a dilapidated condition and had been
abandoned by the family, who had built a new Tudor mansion within the
precincts of the Priory. When the 15th Earl died, "at Colne",
in 1539, it was probably in this mansion, but sooner or later, either
he or his son, who succeeded him, must have converted the old Priory
into a new dwelling-house, no doubt incorporating their mansion. Apart
from the Church, the buildings cannot have been very large, since they
accommodated only twelve monks; but both earls were Protestants and
presumably would have had no qualms about converting the nave and aisles
of the Church into a Great Hall. The Chancel, however, was another matter.
It could still serve as a family chapel, but neither of them is likely
to have desecrated the tombs of his own ancestors: that was to come
later.
On 3rd August, 1562, John the 16th Earl died, leaving as his heir a
boy of twelve, who became a Royal Ward. The significance of this fact
has not always been fully appreciated, but to quote Professor Joel Hurstfield:
"If a tenant of the crown died, while holding land by so-called
knight-service, then his heir, if under age, became a ward of the
crown. He rarely stayed a royal ward except in name. Soon his guardianship
would be sold, sometimes to his mother, more often to a complete stranger.
With his guardianship would go his 'marriage'—the right to offer
him a bride whom he could rarely afford to refuse, for his refusal
meant that he must pay a crushing fine to his guardian. Meanwhile
his land would also have passed into wardship, either to his guardian
or to someone else, for them to snatch a quick profit until the ward
was old enough to reclaim his own. (Italics mine)". 2
It was a relic of feudalism which, having lost its original purpose,
had almost died a natural death, but was revived by Henry VII as a convenient
source of revenue. Bad enough at its best in its effect on the personal
lives of these unfortunate children, the system was obviously wide open
to abuse, and it was abused. As Sir Thomas Smith put it, by the
time a ward came of age, his inheritance, was often reduced to "woods
decayed, old houses, stock wasted, land ploughed to the bare".
3 This in addition to the fact
that, on coming of age, the heir had to go through the costly process
of suing for "livery"—that is, for the re-grant of his
own lands.
To safeguard his estate against the crippling effect of wardship, the
16th Earl of Oxford had executed a use, as it was called. By
a Deed of Covenant, 4 he conveyed
some of his lands (there was a statutory limit of two-thirds) in trust,
to various members of his family, but temporarily away from his principal
heir. The trustees were the Duke of Norfolk and Lord Robert Dudley—later
Earl of Leicester. It was, of course, a legal device for the evasion,
or partial evasion of wardship, but how far he got away with
it is another matter. At the same time he took the precaution of betrothing
his son himself to one or other, alternatively, of two sisters
of the Earl of Huntingdon, who were joint heiresses, but it is certain
that he did not get away with that.
On 3rd September, 1562, three days after his father's funeral, young
Edward, 17th Earl of Oxford, was packed off to London, or rather, Westminster,
where he became a member of the household of Sir William Cecil, Knight,
Secretary of State and Master of the Court of Wards and Liveries—the
future Lord Burghley. He, was not sold, but as one of a select
few, remained the Queen's ward, under the personal supervision of Cecil,
whose daughter in due course he married. This is well known, but no
one has really looked into the question of what became of his lands
at this time. It is generally taken for granted, that they were simply
administered for him (honestly or not) by Cecil, but this, emphatically,
was not the case. Let us take Colne Priory as an example.
Shortly after the funeral of Edward's father, certain "reparations"
were taken in hand at "Colne House in Essex", which turns
out to have been the old Priory under a new name. The account, which
is preserved at the Public Record Office, covers a period of just over
a year and consists of three pages, the third being a kind of post-script
under a new heading: "Reparations done more at Colne House by my
La baylye accounted for from March aforesaid unto Michaelmas following
(29th September 1563) as appeareth by sundry bills entered into a book
of charges". At the foot of this third and last page is the signature
of John Glascock Feodary of Essex (the local official of the Court of
Wards), and beneath his signature a note in Cecil's hand, dated 23 March
1564 anno 6 Eliza: "let this be allowed to the accountant upon
the rent which shall grow due to the Queen's Majesty from Michaelmas
last past. W. Cecil".
The printed Calendar of State Papers, Domestic provides a summary,
but, quite naturally, dispenses with the abbreviation in "my La
baylye", and tells us unequivocally that some of the repairs were
done by Lady Baylie—whoever she may have been. But this involves
a certain inattention to the text, where the very first item under this
heading reads: "First to a Thatcher for his work & for nails
for him as appeareth by Christmas book for the discharging of the
bayley". The mysterious Lady Baylie, then, did not even exist,
but my Lady's bailee did, and my Lady, herself, is referred to
in an entry of October, 1562, when a tiler and his man were paid "for
4 days' work in tiling at Colne before my Lady's coming thither".
In the circumstances, who should my Lady be but Margery Countess of
Oxford, whose husband was buried only a month or two before? 5
But let us return to the last page, where, among other
items in the account of reparations done by my Lady's bailee, one is
of special interest to us: "More to a glazier . . . whereof part
bestowed about the Chancel and part about the house ... and more to
dawbers for claying and splinting that and other houses". The chancel,
then, stood in need of repair, but it was evidently still worth repairing
and—what is more—it was repaired; so we know that it
was in good condition at Michaelmas, 1563. There is no mention of tombs
or monuments, but then, why should there be, unless they were restored?
This is an account, not an inventory; and so long as the effigies of
the de Veres had a roof over their heads there was probably no need
to restore them.
On this page of the account, and on this page only, Christmas's book
is constantly referred to, and it is presumably the same as the "book
of charges" mentioned in the heading. We learn more of Mr. Christmas
from a pathetic letter addressed to Cecil by the Countess of Oxford,
from "my poor house at Colne"; a letter which seems to have
escaped the notice of Oxford's biographer, B. M. Ward, and which so
far as I am aware has never been printed before:
"After my right hearty commendations, gentle master Secretary,
with like thanks always for your gentleness and fatherly friendship
towards my son; and therefore altogether unable anyways to recompense
you and my Lady your bedfellow, only remaineth my good will to pleasure
you or any of yours if ability served—and now less able than
ever I was without your present friendship. And only herein may your
friendship stand me in stead, and the rather by your means, to enjoy
certain rent Corn for the provision of my poor house, whereof I had
promise of divers of my late Lord's farmers, and thereupon hoped.
And of late, since my coming to house at this Michaelmas, there hath
been commandment given to all these farmers that pay corn that they
should not pay me any corn. And having but one farmer that payeth
me any corn, there hath been commandment given there to pay me no
more; which was very much, to bar me of my corn rent corn—and
not much neither, in the whole but 10 semes (horse-loads). But how
this terror cometh to the farmers of late I cannot tell, but the bruit
goeth of Mr. Robert Christmas' man, and certain I am he was with my
farmer and gave him commandment to pay no more (and, as the farmer
saith, in my Lord Robert's name) but, Sir, if it may be your pleasure
that I may have but part of such corn as was commanded to be delivered
to my late Lord and husband (whose soul God pardon) at his house at
Hedingham, or at Colne, where I now lie, it might do me such pleasure,
as without that help, I stand at this time cleanly destitute of any
provision of corn. And for that I could not conveniently tarry any
longer where I sojourned, for the great years both in the gentleman
and his wife, and perceiving some infection to draw near those parts,
I practised with the farmers beforehand and sent to them. They promised
to serve me of such corn as would very near suffice me. And now since
my coming to house hath bred such misliking and stowndness 6
among them that now stand I clean barren of any provision of any sort
of corn, and likely now without your present help to be no way saved;
whereof I most heartily pray you. And for that you do right well understand
(we hear) that to travel any way almost is not very pleasant and altogether
without surety—else would Mr. Tyrrell have travelled and have
waited upon you himself, who cannot well travel any way from this
place towards the Court without some great misliking of his access
into her Grace's presence, whereof we should both be very loth; and
lothest of all to adventure anything whereof there might well arise
just cause hereafter to repent us both. These things weighed, most
gentle master Secretary, I most humbly pray you so to consider of
them as my necessity requireth to be holpen of you, and pray you herewith
of some comfortable answer to be returned from you, and to that end
I have sent one to be attendant of purpose. And loth to be more tedious
I most heartily pray you impart my most hearty commendations to my
good La your bedfellow and to my son, with God's blessing and mine,
well to do to his life's end.
At my poor house at Colne this 11th October 1563 ...
M. Oxinford". 7
There can be little doubt that the "Mr. Tyrrell" of the letter
was Lady Oxford's second husband, Charles Tyrrell, whom she married
according to B. M. Ward, "shortly after the death of her first
husband". The precise date of the marriage is still unknown, but
from the tenor of the Countess's allusions to Tyrrell here, one would
not be surprised to learn that they were already married and that Cecil
was in the secret, if there was one.
"Lord Robert" is certainly Lord Robert Dudley, who as we
have seen, was one of the trustees of the late Earl's Deed of Covenant.
On 30th April 1563, Lady Oxford had written to Cecil:
"I gathered generally that complaints had been brought to my
Lord of Norfolk's grace and to my Lord Robert Dudley by sundry, That
the only let why my Lord's late will hath not been proved or exhibited
hath been only in me and through my delays . . . I confess that a
great trust hath been committed to me of those things which, in my
Lord's lifetime, were kept most secret from me. And since that time
the doubtful declaration of my Lord's debts hath so uncertainly fallen
out that . . . I had rather leave up the whole doings thereof to my
son (if by your good advice I may so deal honorably) than to venture
further, and uncertainly altogether, with the will ... And what my
further determination is touching the will, yet loth to determine
without your good advice, for that I mean the honour or gain (if any
be) might come wholly to my son, who is under your charge". 8
It would be interesting to know what advice, if any, Cecil gave her
and what her proposed abdication in favour of her thirteen-year-old
son would have meant in practice, but it is idle to speculate and we
must stick to the facts. Her son was indeed named as an executor, but
there were others besides herself, including her brother, Henry Golding,
as well as Mr. Robert Christmas; with the Duke of Norfolk and Lord Robert
Dudley as Supervisors. Anyway, shortly after this, the will was proved,
and the signatures of the executors included that of the Countess as
well as her son. 9 After the
usual preliminaries, the real business began:
"I commit my body to the earth from whence it came. And I will
that my sepulchre be made in the body of the church at Earls Colne
after such manner and in such place as by direction of mine executors
shall seem convenient, and therein my body to be laid in convenient
time after my decease out of this world".
By the church at Earls Colne he presumably meant, and would be understood
to mean, not the dissolved priory where his ancestor's were buried,
but the 14th century Parish Church close by, which his father had restored;
but here, at least, we have a clear statement, indeed a direction to
his executors, that he was to be buried at Earls Colne—not Castle
Hedingham. This falls short of proof that he actually was buried there,
but it is a point to be borne in mind when assessing the conflicting
claims of Earls Colne and Castle Hedingham, referred to in Part I of
the present article (Review
No. 23). After a bequest to charity, he goes on to say:
"I will that my house wherein I shall have and keep my household
at the time of my death by the clemency and permission of my most
gracious sovereign Lady the Queen's Majesty shall be maintained and
kept by mine executors after my death with and of my stocks of oxen,
bullocks, sheep, fowls, fish, malt, wheat and other like provision
of victual, grain and spice until the end of one month next after
my decease in as ample and large manner as I myself kept and maintained
the same during the month next before my death without dimunition
of any my household servants or any other which shall fortune to dwell
and remain in my said house at my death save such as voluntarily depart
out of the same. And I give and bequeath unto every of my servants
being in my wage the time of my decease his quarter's wage in which
I fortune to depart out of this transitory life".
There is a list of household servants and it is interesting to note
among them the name of Robert Christmas. But here, we must leave the
will, except to say that to his "loving and well-beloved wife"
the Earl left, besides plate and other I household goods, a life-interest
in several manors, but not Colne Priory, which was obviously destined
to go into wardship till the heir came of age. The lease was, in fact,
granted by the Queen in October 1563, if not before, to her favourite,
Lord Robert Dudley! My first source for this piece of information was
a letter, of 6th February 1566, from the Court of Wards to Robert Christmas
Gent, servant of the Earl of Leicester. It was a polite reminder
that the rent had not been paid:
"Whereas there is a yearly rent of £66 by the year due
to the Queen's Majesty out of the late priory of Colne within the
County of Essex parcel of the possessions of Edward now Earl of Oxon
the Queen's Majesty's ward: which priory amongst other of the possessions
aforesaid (Italics mine) is contained within a lease thereof granted
unto our very good Lord your master under the seal of the Queen's
Majesty's Court of Wards and Liveries. And forasmuch as the said rent
reserved is not comprised in the lease for lack of instructions given
upon the making thereof the same hath remained unpaid ever since the
death of the late Earl father of the said now Earl which is by the
space of three years ended at Michaelmas last past and amounting to
the sum of £198". 10
This throws much-needed light upon Lady Oxford's letter of 11th October
and explains, if it does not excuse, Lord Robert's peremptory action
in stopping her corn rent. It also provides a clue to the terror and
"stowndness" of the farmers and, in the process, throws a
fresh light on Lord Robert himself. Robert Christmas evidently went
with the house, but he, or perhaps his son, turns up later as a
servant of the 17th Earl of Oxford. But what of those other possessions
of the said now Earl which were also contained in the lease? At this
stage of my investigations I was badly in need of expert guidance and
my thanks are due to Professor Hurstfield for telling me where to begin
my search for the lease, but he could not give me a complete reference
number as he had not come across it himself. Very few of the actual
indentures had survived, he told me, but these were indexed and
I might be lucky. Otherwise it would mean a page by page hunt for a
copy through the original accounts of the Court of Wards over the period
in question. I was not lucky and the alternative was a long and laborious
task, but at last I found what I was looking for. Briefly: Lord Robert
Dudley was granted "all ... the lands ... and all and singular
there appertaining in the counties of Essex, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire,
late the inheritance of the Right Hon. John de Vere Earl of Oxford",
11 and since nearly all the
lands of the Earl of Oxford were in these three counties, we should
not be far wrong in saying that Dudley got the lot!
So it was not Cecil; not Charles Tyrrell; but Robert Dudley who succeeded
Edward's father (for the time being) as Lord of the Manors of Castle
Hedingham, Earls Colne etc. The spoils were divided: Tyrrell married
the late Earl's widow; Cecil obtained the custody of his son; but Dudley
got the lands. Details of the various manors follow and there is an
interesting account of Colne Priory:
"The late priory of Colney (an alternative form) . . . the rent
and the farm of the mansion there called Colney Priory or Colney House;
all the orchards, gardens, fishings, barns, stables, and all the meadows
and pastures appertaining to the priory, late belonging (to) late
in the occupation of the said Earl and now in the occupation of the
Lady Margery late wife of the said Earl".
This confirms one's impression that the Priory was, in fact, the home
of the 16th Earl at the time of his death and of his widow for some
time afterwards. The words late wife, however, instead of widow,
are significant and we may take it that the Lady Margery was by now
the wife of Charles Tyrrell Esquire, who is referred to in the lease
as Bailiff of Castle Hedingham. This copy of the lease is dated 22nd
October 1563, but we cannot be sure if that was the date of the original,
and in any case, we still do not know precisely when, or even where,
the marriage took place. It would be interesting to find out. We do
not know whether Lady Oxford stayed on at Colne House as Dudley's tenant,
and neither do we know whether Tyrrell retained his post as bailiff
of Castle Hedingham under Dudley; but they were both buried at Earls
Colne, the Countess in 1568, and Tyrrell in 1570.
In 1563, Lord Robert Dudley was only at the beginning of his amazing
career, but he had long been the Queen's favourite, was believed by
many to be her lover, and for the past three years almost universally
believed to have murdered his wife, Amy Robsart, in the hope of achieving
his ambition to marry the Queen and become King of England. "The
law was satisfied", writes Milton Waldman, "of the cause of
Amy's death, and the only more knowledge of any interest to him (Leicester)
or anyone else was its consequences. Few doubted what they would be
or that they would follow swiftly". It was—"a situation
to be twice repeated in her (Elizabeth's) Reign, once in real life and
laid in Scotland, and once in a play, the most famous of all plays,
laid in Denmark. There was on the face of it no good reason why the
tangle of the ambitious lover, the superfluous spouse and the opportune
death should, in the present instance as in the later ones, lead to
any other denouement than the re-marriage in haste and the bloody retribution".
12 In this instance, however,
the situation was to be prolonged indefinitely. There was no denouement,
only suspicion, fear, hatred, gossip and an unreliable book, first published
abroad, in English, in 1584, and now known as Leicester's
Commonwealth, a number of copies of which reached England before
it was suppressed, by authority of the Queen. No-one knows to this day
how much of it was true, or how many of his alleged murders, if any,
Leicester really committed; but we are not here concerned with historical
truth, only with Leicester's reputation among his contemporaries.
Of that, there can be no doubt, and it is enough for a play. What others
believed, "Shakespeare" may also have believed.
Oxfordians have always maintained that Hamlet is very largely
autobiographical—with Oxford in the title-role; Cecil as Polonius;
Cecil's daughter, Anne, as Ophelia; and Cecil's two sons, Thomas and
Robert, sharing the role of Laertes. The "o'er hasty marriage"
of Oxford's mother—a point which greatly impressed Freud—has
never been given due weight, but Lady Oxford never quite filled up the
role of Gertrude, and Tyrrell did not loom large enough for Claudius.
The transition from Lady Oxford to Queen Elizabeth as the prototype
of Gertrude was logical, since Oxford became her ward, and Cecil (Polonius)
was her chief minister. To that extent anyway, the Danish Court reflected
the English Court, but Claudius remained an enigma. The idea that apart
from the printed sources, the character was based on Leicester is not
entirely new and has been maintained, among Oxfordians, by Dorothy and
Charlton Ogburn. 13 Vis-a-vis
the Queen, Leicester (or his contemporary image) fits admirably, but
for most Oxfordians, if they thought of it at all, the difficulty was
to fit him into the family group. No-one by the wildest flight
of fancy, supposed that he had "usurped" the lands of the
Earl of Oxford. That is one more coincidence to be added to the rest.
Usurped would, of course, be too strong a word if Oxford had
been granted possession of all his father's lands on attaining his majority,
or soon afterwards, but he was always complaining that his lands were
withheld from him by the Queen. Historians are well aware of this, but
finding his complaints wearisome, seem to conclude that they were, therefore
unfounded, or anyway reprehensible.
Earls Colne Priory seems to be a case in point, for according to a
note of Cecil's, it was granted to him in May, 1588; 14
by which time he had attained the mature age of thirty-eight! Had Leicester
been in possession of it all those years—almost, that is, to the
day of his death—and was it in his time that it became a ruin?
At all events, in 1592, only four years after it was granted to him,
Oxford sold the estate to Richard Harlakenden, son of his steward Roger
Harlakenden, and by the time of Richard's death, ten years later, the
old Priory Church had been completely pulled down, except for the bell-tower
and the ruined quire.
As for the effigies of the de Veres, from a letter in the Cotton MSS.
at the British Museum we learn that the famous antiquary and collector,
Sir Robert Cotton (1571-1631) was interested in acquiring "those
monuments at Hemingham"—but from the context it is clear that
the monuments at Earls Colne were intended. The letter is addressed
to Cotton by his friend and fellow antiquary, John Barkham, who writes:
"It was not any forgetfulness of my promise, which was the cause
of my not sending unto you since my return into Essex, but only want
of opportunity, which now I gladly embrace by occasion of this bearer's
journey to London, whom I have desired to see you, and to acquaint
you with the full state of those monuments at Hemingham whereof you
desired me to inform you. I requested this bearer (being my minister,
and one acquainted with Mr. Harlakenden) to go to view the statues
and to know his mind for parting with them ... He desires only to
have some liking and leave from the Earl of Oxford, which I think
you can easily procure (for the Earl, I know, will not meddle with
them, his land there being made from him). But if yourself have not
so much interest in the Earl, as I think you have or easily may, I
suppose I know how to work it, by a friend of mine; for I would do
any service which might be any way acceptable to you; and when the
statues are to be conveyed, I will see it done myself, for the more
safe conveyance by water . . ." 15
Unfortunately, for lack of a date on the letter, we cannot tell which
Mr. Harlakenden or, and more important, which Earl of Oxford was referred
to; but Cotton was doomed to disappointment for, whatever the state
of the monuments at the time, most of them remained where they were
till long after his death.
By the time of Richard Harlakenden's grandson and namesake, a Colonel
in Cromwell's army, what remained of the Chancel was divided in two.
One half was full of "old monuments and other lumber" and
was known as the "monument room", while the other served as
a dormitory for Colonel Harlakenden's stable-boys. Legend has it that
the boys complained of sleepless nights, because if they did drop off
for a while, they were awakened regularly—at midnight according
to one version and two in the morning according to another—by the
sound of a great bell, which apparently struck one! The bell-tower was
still there, but we are not told whether the bells—there were five
of them—still existed; by this time they had probably been melted
down. Anyway, the boys were terrified, and Colonel Harlakenden, just
to show what nonsense it was, spent a night in the dormitory himself.
Secure in his scepticism, he slept soundly at first; but, of course—otherwise
there would be no, story—at the appointed time, he woke to the
sound of the bell, sprang out of bed and rushed madly from the building.
One hopes the boys got a good laugh out of it, but on that my sources
are silent. 16
Notes
1. Victoria County History: Essex, Vol. 2,
p. 104. back
2. The Queen's Wards (1958), p. 18. Cited by
Joel Hurstfield, The Queen's Wards, p. 121, from Lansdowne
MSS. back
3. (British Museum), 121, f.30. back
4. Public Record Office, C.54/626, No. 45. back
5. There are in fact two copies of the account, both
at P.R.O. (S.P. 15/12 and S.P. 12/31). They are almost identical, but
the latter gives the name of my lady's bailee: "petche". It
is endorsed: "A Double of a bill of Reparations which was signed
with Mr. Glascock's hand & delivered to the Earl of Oxinford for
Mr. Secretary to consider of and now lost". Also endorsed is the
regrettably vague date, October 1563. The young Earl had evidently been
on a visit to his mother and returned to Cecil House without the precious
document, which, however, turned up again later. back
6. I have found no other example of stowndness,
but stownd (a variation of stound) is defined in O.E.D.
as a state of stupefaction or amazement and an example is given
from Arthur Golding's translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses, 1567.
The word may not have been uncommon then, but it is worth noting that
Golding was Lady Oxford's half-brother. back
7. Lansdowne, 6, 34. back
8. Cited by B. M. Ward, The Seventeenth Earl of
Oxford, p. 21, from Lansdowne 6, 20. back
9. The Will, formerly at Somerset House, is now at
the Public Record Office, Probate 11, 46 (1563). The date of writing
was 28th July 1562—only six days before the Earl's death. back
10. P.R.O., S.P. 15/13. back
11. P.R.O., Wards 8, 13, f. 521. back
12. Elizabeth and Leicester (3rd Edition,
1945), p. 91. back
13. This Star of England, 1952. back
14. Murdin's Burghley State Papers, 788, from
Lansdowne, Notes of Queen Elizabeth's Reign by the Lord Treasurer
Burleigh, No. 747. back
15. Cotton MSS., Julius Caesar, 3, 15. back
16. The Essex Countryside, Vol. 12, No. 93,
October 1964. Also an anonymous brochure entitled Earls Colne.
back
Spelling and punctuation have been modernized and abbreviated words
written in full. back
