Sunday, July 23, 2017

Lady Jane Becomes Queen for Nine Days (Final Part Three)

Lady Jane Becomes Queen for Nine Days (Final Part Three)
On the day July 10 1553

Khen Lim
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Lady Jane Grey, the Nine-Day Queen (Image source: Stuff You Missed in History Class)
In the previous Part Two, we witnessed the inevitable deaths of Lady Jane Grey, the Nine-Day Queen, her husband Guildford Dudley with both their fathers and quite a few more to come. Before that, we read of the folly of the Wyatt Rebellion that was the ultimate turning point in the fate of Jane.
Final part three concludes here.



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Lady Jane Grey's prayer book used prior to her execution (Image source: British Library)
Jane’s last message to Katherine
In her letter to her younger sister Lady Katherine Herbert composed in the blank leaves of the Greek New Testament, long-serving English officer of arms and author of ‘Portraits of Illustrious Personages of Great Britain’ (1823-34) Edmund Lodge recorded Jane’s writing:
“I have sent you, my dear sister Katherine, a book, which although it be not outwardly trimmed with gold or the curious embroidery of the artfullest needles, yet inwardly it is more worth than all the precious mines which the vast world can boast of. It is the book, my only best loved sister, of the law of the Lord. It is the testament and last will which He bequeathed unto us wretches and wretched sinners, which shall lead you to the path of eternal joy; and if you with a good mind read it, and with an earnest desire follow it, no doubt it shall bring you to an immortal and everlasting life.
“It will teach you to live and to die. It shall win you more and endow you with greater felicity than you should have gained by the possession of our woful [sic] father’s lands; for as if God had prospered him you should have inherited his honours and manors, so, if you apply diligently this book, seeking to direct your life according to the rule of the same, you shall be an inheritor of such riches as neither the covetous shall withdraw from you, neither the thief shall steal, neither yet the moths corrupt.
“Desire, with David, my dear sister, to understand the law of the Lord thy God. Live still to die, that you by death may purchase eternal life; and trust not that the tenderness of your age shall lengthen your life, for unto God, when He calleth, all hours, times and seasons, are alike, and blessed are they whose lamps are furnished when He cometh, for as soon will the Lord be glorified in the young as in the old.
“My good sister, once again more let me intreat thee to learn to die. Deny the world, defy the devil, and despise the flesh and delight yourself only in the Lord: Be penitent for your sins and yet despair not: Be strong in faith, yet presume not: and desire, with St Paul to be dissolved and to be with Christ, with whom even in death there is life. Be like the good servant, and even at midnight be waking, lest when death cometh, and stealeth upon you like a thief in the night, you be with the servants of darkness found sleeping; and lest for lack of oil you be found, like the five foolish virgins or like him that had not on the wedding garment and then you be cast into darkness or banished from the marriage.
“Rejoice in Christ, as I trust you do; and, seeing you have the name of a Christian, as near as you can follow the steps and be a true imitator of your master Christ Jesus, and take up your cross, lay your sins on His back and always embrace Him.
“Now, as touching my death, rejoice as I do, my dearest sister, that I shall be delivered of this corruption, and put on in corruption; for I am assured that I shall for losing a mortal life win one that is immortal, joyful and everlasting, to which I pray God grant you in His blessed hour and send you His all-saving grace to live in His fear and to die in the true Christian faith, from which in God’s Name I exhort you that you never swerve, neither for hope of life nor fear of death; for, if you will deny His truth to give length to a weary and corrupt breath, God Himself will deny you, and by vengeance make short what you by your soul’s loss would prolong; but if you will cleave to Him, He will stretch forth your days to an uncircumcised comfort, and to His own glory; to the which glory God bring me now and you hereafter when it shall please Him to call you.
“Farewell once again, my beloved sister, and put your only trust in God, who only must help you, Amen.
“Your loving sister, JANE DUDLEY.”

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The beheading of Henry Grey, Duke of Suffolk (Image source: Alamy)
The aftermath
On the day Jane was beheaded, so were many others. As many hanging gallows were set up as there were stakes to burn ‘heretics’ across London and other cities around England. Even so, there weren’t enough to execute those who participated in the doomed Wyatt Rebellion so much so that some were actually hanged under the doorways of their own homes.
But those who died at the hands of Mary I weren’t just the ones who partook of the Wyatt Rebellion. Under her (thankfully) short but murderous rule, the many thousands who embraced the Protestant faith were sent to their fiery deaths including women and children on charges of heresy. Very few lives were spared and those who survived did so only because they managed to escape England in the nick of time.
Jane’s father, the Duke of Suffolk, was put on trial five days after her execution. For a man who craved for as much political power as Northumberland, his execution couldn’t have come any faster for those who held him bitterly responsible for the death of not just his own eldest daughter but also the destruction of so many others whom he influenced to follow him.
Suffolk was beheaded on February 23.

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The marriage between Lady Jane Grey and Lord Guildford Dudley, May 21 1553 (Image source: Pinterest)
Jane’s legacy
Lady Jane Grey – often referred to as the Nine-Day Queen – the English noblewoman and de facto Queen of England and Ireland was laid to rest alongside her husband, Lord Guildford Dudley in the Chapel of Saint Peter ad Vincula located on the northern side of Tower Green within the Tower of London itself. 
Her mother, Frances Grey, remarried in March 1555 and eventually received full pardon from Queen Mary I. With her second husband, Adrian Stokes, once her Master of the Horse and chamberlain, they were allowed to live at Court with her remaining two surviving daughters, Mary and Katherine.
As the historian Albert Pollard put it, “the traitor-heroine of the Reformation” – in reference to Jane – was not even of our contemporary age of consent. At sixteen years old at the time of her death, she had so much more to live for but the fate that befell (her) denied her far too early. 
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Lady Jane Grey (Image source: study.com)
Following the seemingly endless waves of the notorious Marian persecutions, Jane became the signature Protestant martyr and for centuries on, that image burnished in the memory of those who endured. She was also a prominent feature in many editions of John Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs.’
The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography gave Jane the term ‘Protestant martyr’ while historian Eric Ives calls her ‘a Protestant icon.’ Foxes’ ‘Actes and Monuments’ published in 1563 at the peak of the golden Elizabethan era “presented Jane as primarily a figure in a national narrative about an elect nation possessed of a pure Protestant faith which had risen supreme over Catholic Europe.”
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Lady Jane Grey's signature as Queen of England (Image source: Laura Brennan)
Lady Jane’s reputation shot to stardom in popular culture, earning legendary status in many other ways. She was central to many romantic biographies and novels including theatrical works, paintings and motion pictures. 
In 1986, a Hollywood motion picture production budgeted at $8.6 million and directed by Trevor Nunn called ‘Lady Jane’ featured Helena Bonham Carter in the leading role with Patrick Stewart playing the part of Jane’s father.
In the last five-hundred years of royal English monarchical portraits, only that of Jane Grey remains unrepresented. Given that she ‘ruled’ for only nine days, opportunities to have her portrait done were few and far between. But apparently, one was said to be available sometime around 1590 but since no one knew anything about it nor seen it, the portrait can only be presumed lost.
For many years, a painting that hung in London’s National Portrait Gallery was thought to be of Jane but about twenty years ago, in 1996, it turned out embarrassingly to be that of Catherine Parr, Henry’s last wife and one, ironically, whose Protestant faith had an influential impact on none other than Jane. 
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Delaroche's The Execution of Lady Jane Grey, 1833 (Image source: Wikipedia)
Another one called ‘The Execution of Lady Jane Grey’ painted by Paul Delaroche in 1833 was obviously done centuries after her death. Though dramatic and impressive, it is said to lack historical-artistic authenticity.
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The Streatham Portrait (Image source: Wikipedia)
However it is believed that a ‘Streatham Portrait’ survived today that was painted some forty to fifty years after Jane’s death that is apparently the only known depiction of the Nine-Day Queen though none of this is without scepticism and criticisms. For example, historian David Starkey called it an “appallingly bad picture” while the National Portrait Gallery’s Tarnya Cooper referred to it as “a paint-by-number laboured copy.” Although such remarks sound a little aloof and patronising, perhaps there is some grain of truth to them.

Further reading sources:
-         Alford, Stephen (2002). Kingship and Politics in the Reign of Edward VI (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). Available at https://www.amazon.com/Kingship-Politics-Reign-Edward-VI/dp/0521660556  

-         Ascham, Roger [1515-1568] (1863) The Scholemaster (Aug 2016 ed.). (Wentworth Press). Available at https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=https://www.amazon.de/Scholemaster-Roger-Ascham/dp/B008LSP6LG&prev=search

-         Castelli, Jorge H. (nd) Wyatt Rebellion (1554) in Tudor Place website. Accessible online at http://www.tudorplace.com.ar/Documents/Wyatt%20Rebellion.htm
-         Cavendish, Richard (Jul 2003) Lady Jane Grey Proclaimed Queen: The Nine Days Queen was pronounced monarch on July 10th 1553 in History Today. Accessible online at http://www.historytoday.com/richard-cavendish/lady-jane-grey-proclaimed-queen
-         Chapman, Hester W. (1962): Lady Jane Grey: October 1537 – February 1554 (London: Jonathan Cape, First Edition). Available at https://www.amazon.com/Lady-Jane-Grey-October-February/dp/B0000CLL39

-         de Lisle, Leanda (Dec 2009) Debunking the Myth of Lady Jane Grey in The Economist 1843 The Economist Unwinds. Accessible online at https://www.1843magazine.com/content/leanda-de-lisle/lady-jane-grey
-         de Lisle, Leanda (Mar 2010). The Sisters Who Would Be Queen: The Tragedy of Mary, Katherine and Lady Jane Grey (Hammersmith, London: HarperPress). Available at https://www.amazon.co.uk/Sisters-Who-Would-Queen-Katherine/dp/0007219067
An MP3 audiobook version of the same title narrated by Wanda McCaddon and published by Tantor Media in October 2009 is available at https://www.amazon.com/Sisters-Who-Would-Queen-Katherine/dp/1400163668

Note: This version is available only in German
-         Edwards, J. Stephan (Feb 2006/May 2014) The Streatham Portrait in Some Grey Matter – Lady Jane Grey and Other Thoughtful Things (Palm Springs, CA). Accessible online at http://www.webcitation.org/6QhwomoKt?url=http://www.somegreymatter.com/streathamportrait.htm

-         Hanson, Marilee (Feb 2015) ‘Lady Jane Grey – Facts, Biography, Information & Portraits in English History. Accessible online at https://englishhistory.net/tudor/relative/lady-jane-grey/

-         Hoak, Dale (May 2014) Edward VI (1537-1553) in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004). Accessible online at http://www.oxforddnb.com/index/8/101008522/
Note: Subscription required
-         Ives, Eric (Oct 2011). Lady Jane Grey – A Tudor Mystery (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell, Reprint Edition). Available at https://www.amazon.co.uk/Lady-Jane-Grey-Tudor-Mystery/dp/1444350188  
-         ‘Lady Jane Grey 1537-1554’ in BBC History. Accessible online at http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/grey_lady_jane.shtml
-         Loades, David M. (Aug 1996). John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland 1504–1553 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, First Edition). Available at https://www.amazon.com/John-Dudley-Duke-Northumberland-1504-1553/dp/0198201931
-         Loades, David M. (Dec 1992) Two Tudor Conspiracies (Anacortes, WA: Headstart History Publishing, Second Revised Edition). Available at https://www.amazon.co.uk/Two-Tudor-Conspiracies-D-Loades/dp/1873041233  
-         Lodge, Edmund [1756-1839] (Jun 2013) Portraits of Illustrious Personages of Great Britain … with Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Their Lives and Actions, Volume 2 (Los Angeles, CA: HardPress Publishing). Available at https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/Books/Portraits-Illustrious-Personages-Britain-Biographical-Historical-Memoirs/1314332864
-         Mitchell, Rosemary A. (2007) The Nine Lives of the Nine Day’s Queen: From Religious Heroine to Romantic Victim in Felber, Lynette (Sept 2007) Clio’s Daughters: British Women Making History, 1790-1899 (Newark, DE: University of Delaware Press). Available at https://www.amazon.com/Clios-Daughters-British-History-1790-1899/dp/1611493196. Actual chapter accessible online at https://books.google.com.my/books?id=IKYgjpIcb0wC&pg=PA97&lpg=PA97&dq=rosemary+a+mitchell+the+nine+lives+of+the+nine+days+queen+from+religious+heroin+to+romantic+victim&source=bl&ots=6NVoZ9iksj&sig=hPywMb_MTLDNURtH2Nob-Va0yYA&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=rosemary%20a%20mitchell%20the%20nine%20lives%20of%20the%20nine%20days%20queen%20from%20religious%20heroin%20to%20romantic%20victim&f=false
-         Nichols, John Gough (Oct 1996) The Chronicle of Queen Jane and of Two Years of Queen Mary: And Especially of the Rebellion of Sir Thomas Wyat (Somerset, England: Llanerch Press; facism of 1850 ed edition). Available at https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/Books/Chronicle-Queen-Jane-Two-Years-Mary-Especially/1861430140  
-         Plowden, Alison (Sept 2004) Grey, Lady Jane (1534–1554), Noblewoman and Claimant to the English Throne in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004). Accessible online at http://www.oxforddnb.com/index/8/101008522/
Note: Subscription required 

-         Tytler, Patrick Fraser (1839) England Under the Reigns of Edward VI and Mary: With the Contemporary History of Europe, Volume 1 (London: Richard Bentley). Accessible online at https://books.google.com.my/books?id=414JAAAAIAAJ&pg=PR5&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=2#v=onepage&q&f=false. Also available as a PDF-format e-book at https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?tn=England+Under+Reigns+Edward+VI.+Mary   
-         Zarin, Cynthia (Oct 2007) Teen Queen: Looking for Lady Jane in The New Yorker. Accessible online at http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/10/15/teen-queen 
-         Zell, Michael, ed. (Nov 2000) Early Modern Kent 1540-1640 (5) (Kent History Project) (Suffolk, England: Boydell & Brewer, First Edition). Available at https://www.amazon.co.uk/Early-Modern-1540-1640-History-Project-x/dp/0851155855



















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