Margaret Tudor

“ Tudor was despatched to raise forces in Wales. Margaret, with the rest of her adherents, left Cerne Abbey after a stay of about ten days, marched to Exeter and thence, by Taunton, Glastonbury and Wells, to Bristol. Fresh levies joined and increased her forces as she advanced.
On April 16 King Edward heard that Queen Margaret had landed. He had returned to London two days before, after his victory at Barnet. On the 19th he went to Windsor and waited to collect men, celebrating the feast of St. George there on the 23rd. ”

“ Margaret Tudor, the queen mother, and Angus, favoured England. Beaton threw all his weight into the French scale, and it was chiefly due to him that the old league with France was maintained, and James wedded to Magdalen of France instead of to Mary of England. The 'greatest man both of lands and experience within this realm, and noted to be very crafty and dissimulating,' was the report of Beaton which the English ambassador sent home, and Wolsey, who well knew that all his schemes concerning Scotland were futile as long as Beaton was at large, laid many a crafty plot for getting hold of him. ”

“ Many foreign princes were talked of, and Elizabeth suggested her own favourite, the Earl of Leicester, but Mary settled the matter herself by falling in love with her own cousin, Henry Stewart, Lord Darnley. He was son of Lennox and Margaret Douglas, and was therefore the grandson of Margaret Tudor, and was received as first prince of the blood at the English court. Mary called a special council and announced to them her intended marriage. She then raised Darnley to the Earldom of Ross, and afterwards created him Duke of Albany. ”

“ From this double marriage issued two branches, both Stuarts, the elder of which, on the death of Elizabeth, succeeded to the Throne, in the person of James I., the younger remaining heirs-expectant in case James had no children. To this branch belonged the Lady Arabella, and the jealousy shown by the elder to the younger is the key to her melancholy history. By her second husband, Margaret Tudor had a daughter, who bore her name; Lady Margaret Douglas was remarkable even in early life for her ambitious and intriguing spirit ”

“ THE AUNT’S STORY “You know who the Douglases are?” began Miss Mehetabel, bracing herself up, with a look of pride.
12“Oh, yes; you have always given me to understand that they belonged to a very honorable race.”
“An honorable race, indeed! Why, child, they are the descendants of a queen—a Scottish queen! Lady Margaret Douglas was the daughter of Queen Margaret Tudor, and back to her we can trace our ancestry. Never forget it, child—never forget that you are descended in a direct line from the royalty of Scotland.” ”

“ An heir upon whom all must unite would save strife and it may be bloodshed.”
“That might well be,” said the king thoughtfully. Then Northumberland suggested boldly, though with some inward fear:—
“The sisters of your Majesty’s illustrious father, could you——” the duke hesitated.
“The granddaughter of Margaret Tudor is the Queen of Scots, the little maiden who refused my hand,” said the king with a faint smile, “but she is of the false faith. The granddaughter of Mary Tudor is my old playmate, the lady Jane Grey, or is she not now Lady Dudley, my lord? ”

“ From 1497 to 1503 Henry VII. was negotiating for the marriage of James to his daughter Margaret Tudor; the marriage was celebrated on August 8, 1503, and a century later the great grandson of Margaret, James VI. came to the English throne. But marriage does not make friendship. There had existed since 1491 a secret alliance by which Scotland was bound to defend France if attacked by England. Henry’s negotiations for the kidnapping of James were of April of the same year. Margaret, the young queen, after her marriage, was soon involved in bitter quarrels over her dowry with her own family ”

“ Their son was Richard duke of York who won the first battle of Saint Albans, and came near seizing the crown. His son Edward IV. did seize it. He married that charming widow Lady Grey daughter of Jaqueline of Luxembourg. (See Two Jaquelines.) The daughter of that marriage was Elizabeth Plantagenet who married Henry Tudor, Henry VII. It is there that Plantagenet becomes Tudor. Their daughter, Margaret Tudor married James Stuart, James IV. of Scotland, and it is there that Tudor becomes Stuart. ”

“ Once only do we see her, as a child of four, in the winter of 1499, playing in the great hall at Eltham, [4] when Lord Mountjoy brought Erasmus to see Prince Henry there. When she emerges into clearer light, she shows herself to be of little mental originality but of strong passions, and it will be interesting to describe, so far as is possible, the qualities she may have inherited from her father and her mother. Henry VIII., Queen Margaret of Scotland, Queen Mary of France, all had these violent qualities which are miscalled Tudor, for they really belong to the house of York. ”

“ Had I openly espoused your daughter, taunted by the English faction, a hundred ambitious nobles had felt themselves and their daughters insulted; had I obtained the consent of Parliament for such a marriage, then long ere the dispensation for our consanguinity arrived from Home, by poison or otherwise the subtle Tudor had swept our Margaret from his daughter's path ”

“ Although the Lady Margaret very often and imprudently asserted her prior right to the Throne over her cousins, the Ladies Katherine and Mary Grey, she does not seem to have given umbrage to Mary Tudor, and continued, until that queen’s death, to take precedence of all the great ladies of the court, her aunt, the Lady Frances, Duchess of Suffolk, and her cousin Margaret, Countess of Lennox, alone excepted. ”

“ The Tudors intermarried with the old royal family p. 74of North Wales, in whose pedigree occur the girl-names Gwenllian and Angharad.
Other Margaret; Sister to Edgar the Etheling, and wife to Malcolm. Her life and character are in contrast to the unhappy and unsatisfactory career of Margaret Tudor, whom I have here only treated as at once representing and uniting England, Scotland, and Wales.
LONDON BRIDGE
July 6: 1535
The midnight moaning stream
Draws down its glassy surface through the bridge
That o’er the current casts a tower’d ridge,
Dark sky-line forms fantastic as a dream ”

“ But the condition of a great heiress was far from agreeable in those days. It was the custom to give her to some great noble as his ward, and he then had the right to arrange for her marriage as he liked. When Margaret was nine years old, the king gave her as ward to the Duke of Suffolk, one of the most powerful men of the time, and he had her brought to court, and wished to marry her to his son. But the king, Henry VI., wanted her to marry his half-brother, Edmund Tudor, Earl of Richmond. ”

“ A few women have more directly to do with learning than those already mentioned. Occasionally in some great family Tudor traditions were maintained. Margaret, Countess of Cumberland (1560-1616) , for instance, held to the idea that maidens of noble houses must be nobly educated, and she induced the poet Daniel to live at Skipton Castle as tutor to Anne, her nine-year-old daughter. ”

“ He was advocate to Queen Margaret Tudor, wife of James IV of Scotland, and as such made his protest on 1 Sept. 1528 in parliament against any prejudice to her claim for debt against the Earl of Angus being occasioned by his forfeiture. He was one of the advocates appointed when first the College of Senators was instituted, and was admitted an ordinary lord on 7 Nov. ”

“ In the same (page 169) may be found a brief account of the capture, at Santa Catalina, of Mr. Rivers, Capt. Baulk, some seamen, a woman, and a girl; also (page 175) mention of the unsuccessful embassy of Mr. Collins; and (page 204) the Memorial to the Spanish Ambassador touching the delivery of the prisoners, one of whom is alluded to as Margaret, presumably Margaret Tudor.
The names of the two Spaniards, Señor de Colis and Don Pedro Melinza, each appear once in the Shaftesbury Papers (pages 25 and 443) : the latter individual was evidently a person of some consequence in San Augustin ”

“ A general rising followed in the west; Somerset, Dorset, Wiltshire, Cornwall, and Devonshive.' all contributed their quote to swell Margaret's little force. Margaret, who had advanced to Exeter, received there a large contingent from Devonshire and Cornwall. She then marched north-eastwards, through Glastonbury to Bath. Her object was either to cross the Severn and join Jasper Tudor in Wales, or to march northwards to her partisans in Cheshire and Lancashire, but she sent outposts far to the east, hoping to make Edward believe that her real object was to advance to London. ”

“ After Mary of Hungary's refusal, he left the Imperial Court in anger, and told Charles V. that he would take a French wife; [112] but Isabel of Navarre, Margaret of Montferrat, and the King of Poland's daughter, all eluded his efforts, and when he asked for Mary Tudor's hand, King Henry told him that he could not insult his good friend and cousin by offering him a bride born out of wedlock. ”

“ But the most formidable and unwearied enemy of Henry VII. was Margaret, the Dowager-Duchess of Burgundy. As the sister of Edward IV. and of Richard, no circumstance could induce her to tolerate Henry Tudor, in her eyes a low-born man, who had thrust the Yorkist line from the throne. To her Lord Lovel had fled, and to her also fled the Earl of Lincoln. To her the Irish party sent emissaries for aid; and she despatched 2,000 veteran German troops, under a brave and experienced general, Martin Schwarz, accompanied by the Earl of Lincoln. ”

“ I was over-hasty, my good Baulk; but I would not for the world have Mistress Tudor hear aught of those horrors. And times have changed greatly in an hundred years. But this inaction, this inaction! 'Tis terrible upon a man! ”

“ If she had not all the sterner virtues, nor a reasoned imagination, she had the kindest heart in the world and the most faithful, with a high courage to fight a losing game. Like Margaret of Savoy, she would have melted her most precious pearls to make a potion for her dying husband, and probably, as no doubt did Margaret, killed him by the heroic self-sacrifice. ”

“ Jasper Tudor escaped; but his father Owen Tudor, the second husband of Catherine of Valois, and ancestor of the Tudor line of sovereigns, was taken prisoner, and with Throgmorton and seven other captains, was beheaded at Hereford, in retaliation for those who had been similarly put to death after the battle of Wakefield. The news of this butchery reaching Margaret before the battle of St. Albans, instigated her to reply with the execution of Lord Bonville and Sir Thomas Kyriel, who had so much distinguished himself in France. ”

“ It dazzles the eyes to read. Florentine looms were busy, and the Italian merchants in England were doing a thriving trade. All these were to be made up in the Flemish fashion, and the Lady Margaret was asked to give her advice about the cutting of them and the style of the garments. [199]
Marriages were in the air, and gossip early said three would take place at Calais—Mary to the Prince, Margaret of Scotland to Maximilian, and Margaret of Austria to Lisle, whom, on February 1, Henry created Duke of Suffolk. ”

“ A wareness of herself she had always, to eschew everything that might dishonour any noble woman.... All England for her death have cause of weeping." [59]
Trinity College Chapel and St. John's Gateway.
Lady Margaret was of Plantagenet stock, being great-granddaughter to "old John of Gaunt, time honoured Lancaster," and one of the legitimatised family of the Beauforts. Her first husband was the Welsh Earl Edmund Tudor, the father of her only child, Henry of Richmond, who afterwards succeeded to the throne of England as Henry the Seventh. After his death she twice married again ”

“ Two days later the army left Tournay, where the soldiers had remained too long in idleness, contracting very heavy expenses, and Henry went to Lille to sign his sister's marriage treaty. There Margaret was determined that her entertainment should not be ruined by the rain, and held her tournament in a large 70 room raised above the ground many steps and paved with black stones like marble. The horses, to prevent their slipping and to deaden the noise of their hoofs, had their shoes covered with felt. ”

“ Margaret's joy can be easily read in the light of her later open pleasure in fine clothes, for when in Scotland, despoiled of all by the Duke of Albany, and too ill to move, she had the new gowns sent by her brother brought in to her room time and again, so that she might admire them. Mary had no cloth of gold. She had two gowns, one of russet velvet trimmed with ermine backs and furred within with miniver, and another of crimson velvet with tabard sleeves trimmed with the same ”

“ The next is the monument of Margaret, Countess of Richmond, mother of Henry VII., by Edmund Tudor, son of Owen ap Tudor, who married the widow of Henry V. of England, and daughter of Charles VI. of France. This lady was afterwards married to Humphrey Stafford, a younger son of Humphrey, [Pg 24] Duke of Buckingham, and lastly, to Thomas Lord Stanley, Earl of Derby; but by the two last had no children. The inscription mentions the charities of this excellent Princess; such as giving a salary to two monks of Westminster ”

“ The crux of the situation was Maximilian's attitude towards the Venetians, whose terms of peace he refused. Neither would he have aught to do with Pope or Aragon against France. Margaret, however, came to the rescue, for peace negotiations with Gueldres on the basis of the Duke's marriage with the Archduchess Isabeau, [70] sister to the Prince of Castile, had come to nothing, as they were meant to. She was still anxious for Henry's support in Flanders, and as the price he exacted was the alliance, she threw into that scale her influence with her father. ”