Tudor Times is the online repository for all things Tudor and Stewart (1485–1625)

On 11th October 1537, the Lincolnshire Rising, which had begun some 10 days before, collapsed. Faced by a royal army, gathered at Stamford, over half the rebels fled the field, having been promised the King’s Pardon. The leaders made the local gentry who had been coerced into joining them, swear that should the pardon not be honoured, they would lead them in the field again. Richard Cromwell, (Thomas Cromwell’s nephew) wrote to his uncle ‘My lord admiral is so earnest in the matter that I dare say he would eat them with salt. I never saw one triumph like unto him.’ Another group of men, ordered to muster at Ampthill, were dismissed. But the government had relaxed too soon – a far bigger and more dangerous threat was already massing in Yorkshire.

Picture of William FitzWilliam, 1st Earl of Southampton

On 10th October 1530, Thomas Grey, 2nd Marquess of Dorset, died. He was about 53. Dorset was the grandson of Queen Elizabeth Woodville by her first marriage, and thus half-nephew to Elizabeth of York. One of Dorset’s early tutors was Thomas Wolsey, later Cardinal, and many of the men associated with Wolsey, and later Thomas Cromwell were Dorset’s friends and associates. Dorset’s mother was one of the richest women in England – Baroness Harrington and Bonville in her own right.

She and Dorset quarrelled over his inheritance – she insisted on her right to manage the Dorset estates as widow of the first Marquess, even after her remarriage. Her son, angry at her second marriage to a man nearly twenty years younger than herself, tried to obtain control of it. Although an arbitration was made by Henry VII, mother and son continued to argue over money for the rest of her life. In an attempt to bring Dorset fully into the Tudor fold, he was married to Lady Margaret Beaufort’s half-niece, but had no children. By his second marriage, he was grandfather to the tragic Grey sisters – Ladies Jane, Katherine and Mary Grey.

Picture shows ruins of Dorset’s home, Bradgate, in Leicestershire

On 9th October 1514, the eighteen year old Mary, Princess of England, was married to the decidedly worn Louis XII of France. The marriage had been arranged as part of the peace treaty following the successful campaign that Henry had led into France the previous year, capturing the towns of Tournai and Therouanne, and achieving a victory at the Battle of the Spurs. Mary was reported to be very beautiful, and her new husband showed himself distinctly pleased with her physical charms. So much so, that his death three months later, was attributed to excessive exertions to keep his bride happy. Mary then defied convention to make a marriage that enraged her brother – more on that here.