The Bad Seed

Princess Elizabeth and the Seymour Incident

Sheila Cavanagh

For Elizabeth Tudor, youth cannot have been easy. Always something of a disappointment because of her sex, Elizabeth careened between legitimacy and the precarious disgrace of bastardy, always with an uncertain place in the line of succession. Throughout each of the reigns falling between her birth and eventual accession to the throne, Elizabeth remained vulnerable to a seemingly infinite assortment of competing interests holding considerable influence over her personal and political fates. As a consequence, the status of her title, her household, and her future were continually subject to unpredictable and uncontrollable external forces. Determining whom she could trust and where she should ally herself undoubtedly consumed much of the young woman's attentions.

During this phase of her life, rumors about Elizabeth's behavior and opinions were rampant. The widespread uneasiness about the precarious state of the royal succession–which was enhanced by Edward VI's minority and by the female-dominated pool of candidates who might follow him to the throne–ensured that the most likely future monarchs would be subject to considerable scrutiny and speculation. Furthermore, Elizabeth's lineage and personal history were far from straightforward; therefore, it is not surprising that she would be watched closely and discussed widely. Since the Tudor princess's place in the succession fluctuated even during her father's lifetime, she would never have been able to presume unequivocally that it would be honored after his death. In this climate, there was little room for skepticism about her political intentions, her private allegiances, or her virtue. Consequently, as she matured, her life inevitably generated numerous narratives, based both upon perceived facts and upon speculation, as those in power–or wanting to be–kept a close watch on the politics of succession.

One of the most complex, and most telling, stories which circulated about the young princess concerned her relationship with Thomas Seymour, husband to her father's widow Catherine Parr and brother to the wife Henry married immediately after Elizabeth's mother was executed. The ill-fated Seymour engaged in suspiciously familiar activity with the princess during his wife's lifetime and reportedly sought Elizabeth as a marital partner after Parr's death. Rumors of Seymour's ambitions and transgressions in both these regards were widely circulated; even the young princess admitted to knowing of his marital quest in die testimony she offered after Lord Admiral Seymour's arrest. Here, she acknowledged that her governess, Katherine Ashley, had informed her of Seymour's purported intentions in this arena, and had also insinuated that Seymour saw Elizabeth as an attractive marriage possibility even before his marriage to Catherine Parr:

Kat. Aschlylye tolde me, after that my Lord Admiralde was maried to the Quene, that if my Lorde might haue his owne Wil, he wolde haue had me, afore the Quene. Than I asked her how she knewe that: Than she sayd, she knewe it wel inought, bothe by himselfe and by others. The Place, wher she said this, I haue forgotten, for she hathe spoken to me of him manye Times, and of the wiche I have forgotten divers Times.

Although Elizabeth knew that any hint of her own participation in marital discussions could create political turmoil for her, she did not attempt to hide her awareness of such talk after her servants testified. Presumably, the incidents were so well known that there was little to be gained by attempts at concealment.

Lord Admiral Thomas Seymour played the central role in these tales and in the scandal that accompanied them. For the most part, his execution represented the culmination of official concern about a number of his schemes and plots, including his apparently manipulative and personally ambitious relationships with Edward VI and with Lady Jane Grey. Here, Seymour again focused, at least in part, on marital possibilities and his own related gain, as he attempted to engineer a match between these two. Seymour's effrontery, as we know, ended in death, and Elizabeth's involvement with Seymour constituted only one aspect of the complex saga leading to the lord admiral's 1549 imprisonment and execution on accusations of treason. The charges which led the government, including Seymour's brother, the lord protector, to decide upon death, were many and varied. From the perspective of those seeking to stop Thomas Seymour's impetuous interference in political affairs, the domestic episode with Elizabeth was only one of many transgressions.

For Elizabeth, on the other hand, Seymour's risks, ambitions, and punishment presumably were secondary. From her perspective, official responses to the incident also demonstrated her vulnerability to stories linking her to transgressions previously attributed to her parents–most particularly to her mother. In addition, the episode bringing Seymour into questionable alignment with the princess underscores the overdetermined role played by narrative in the ongoing shaping of Elizabeth's existence and status. Reluctant depositions combined with plausible and exaggerated rumors kept the young princess in a precarious position, particularly since the stories told by members of Elizabeth's household were considered unreliable. Although she emerged unharmed and even managed to arrange the return of her implicated household staff, the potential danger to Elizabeth was very real. Despite Seymour's central role as target of the investigation, the intense questioning of the princess and her household suggests that Elizabeth's exoneration was not assumed. If complicity with Seymour could be proved, the princess's future might well have been compromised, particularly since the succession was often treated as though it were fluid, despite Henry VIII's instructions to the contrary. While there is no direct evidence to confirm a conspiracy against Elizabeth, the focus placed upon her and her household demonstrates diat the government felt sufficient concern to warrant a close investigation in this instance of the young woman's character, political beliefs, and...