At last her turn came, and just as she had finished her dinner, on the 2d of May, the Duke of Norfolk, with Cromwell and other lords of the council entered, while Sir William Kingston, lieutenant of the Tower, stood in the doorway.
Anne asked "why they had come?" They replied: "That they came by the king's command to conduct her to the Tower, there to abide during his highness' pleasure."
"If it be his majesty's pleasure I am ready to obey," she said, going with them to her barge without waiting to make the least change in her garments. Arriving at the Tower, she was placed in the apartment she had occupied on the night before her coronation. Her attendants were two enemies, who were particularly disagreeable to her—Lady Boleyn and Mrs. Cosyns. These two women never left her, night or day, for they slept on a pallet at the foot of her bed, and reported every word she uttered. They made all sorts of impertinent remarks to her, and kept constantly annoying her with questions by which they hoped to prove something against her.
The poor queen was so affected by her close imprisonment that at times she seemed to have lost her reason. She wrote a touching letter to the king, appealing to his mercy, but he took not the slightest notice of it, and just one week after she was sent to prison a charge of high treason was made by the grand jury of Westminster against Anne Boleyn, her brother, and four of her best friends.
The friends were condemned to death, as almost everybody was in Henry VIII.'s reign who was brought to trial for high treason, though sometimes they were not even tried at all.
Twenty-six "lords' triers," from the body of nobles in England were selected to try Lord Rochford, Anne's brother; and, although he defended himself with great spirit and eloquence, and many of the judges sided with him, he was found guilty.
After his removal, Anne, Queen of England, was called into court by an usher.
She appeared immediately, and took her stand "with the true dignity of a queen, courtesying to her judges without any sign of fear."
The charges were read, and she pleaded "Not guilty," but the trial was continued for a long time, and ended by a verdict of guilty. It was her uncle, the Duke of Norfolk, who presided at this trial, and he pronounced her sentence. She was condemned to be burnt or beheaded, at the king's pleasure. Anne Boleyn heard this dreadful doom without changing color, but when her stern kinsman had ended, she clasped her hands and raising her eyes to Heaven exclaimed: "O Father! O Creator! Thou who art the way the life, and the truth, knowest whether I have deserved this death."
She then turned to her judges and proclaimed her innocence of every charge made against her, closing her remarks with: "Think not I say this in the hope of prolonging my life. God has taught me how to die, and he will strengthen my faith. As for my brother and those others who are unjustly condemned, I would willingly suffer many deaths to deliver them; but since I see it so pleases the king I shall willingly accompany them to death, with this assurance, that I shall lead an endless life with them in peace." With a composed air, she rose, made a parting salutation to her judges, and left the court.