The Dudley, who with Empson, served Henry VII rather too eagerly in filling the coffers of the State, was sacrificed in the first year of Henry VIII to the resentment of the people. He left three sons, John, Andrew, and Jerome, plain Dudleys. The aspiring ambitions of the eldest were successful beyond his early hopes, and he had worked himself up through all the grades of nobility to the highest place, and greatest power in the land, by the first half of 1553.
The Dudleys were a united family, both through affection and common interests, and John helped his brother Andrew as much as he could, to add to his own strength in Edward’s reign. So plain Andrew Dudley was made Admiral of the Fleet of the North on 27th February 1546-7, and knighted shortly afterwards. He was also made Keeper of Westminster Palace, October 1560, Master of the Robes, and Captain of Guisnes. He did not share in the greater honours the Privy Councillors bestowed on each other on 11th October 1551, when his brother John, then Earl of Warwick, was made Duke of Northumberland. But in 1552-3 Sir Andrew Dudley was made Knight of the Garter, and it became evident that his elder brother meant to shower more honours on him should he himself be successful in his skilfully prepared coup d’état. An old Earl of Warwick had been surnamed “the Kingmaker”; this Dudley, Earl of Warwick and Duke of Northumberland, might have been surnamed the Queenmaker. By a curious coincidence, all the possible heirs to the throne at that time were women. Northumberland arranged to set aside the will of Henry VIII, in so far as it affected the succession of Mary and Elizabeth, on the ground that their father had determined their illegitimacy in Acts of Parliament which had never been repealed; he followed that will in excluding from succession the Scottish Queen, and he persuaded Edward VI to make a will for himself settling the crown on the heirs of his Aunt Mary, Duchess of Suffolk, younger sister of Henry VIII. Mary had left two daughters, Frances, now Duchess of Suffolk, and Ellinor, late Countess of Cumberland. It has never been explained how Northumberland managed to persuade the Duchess of Suffolk to allow herself to be passed over during her lifetime. But he arranged it somehow, that her eldest daughter, the Lady Jane Grey, should be the chosen heir to Edward’s throne. When he thought he had settled this, he married the Lady Jane to his eldest unmarried son, the Lord Guilford Dudley, and gave her two younger sisters to his friends. The story of the disasters brought thereby on all concerned is universally known.
But it is not so well known that Northumberland’s far-reaching vision had seen and settled with further possible royal successions, and he betrothed his brother Andrew to the sole daughter and heir of Ellinor, Countess of Cumberland. The bare fact is mentioned in the D.N.B., and in some other authorities (not in all). A hitherto unnoted suit has turned up at the Record Office among the uncalendared proceedings of the Court of Requests of Elizabeth, which provides much fuller tragi-romantical details. This is a suit instituted by Sir Robert Dudley, afterwards Earl of Leicester, to secure possession of all his uncle Andrew’s goods, as executor of his will. Ellinor, daughter of Mary, Duchess of Suffolk, had married Henry Clifford, 2nd Earl of Cumberland; and it says much for the power and influence of the Duke of Northumberland in 1553 that he should have made the noble Earl content to give his well-dowered daughter Margaret, great-granddaughter of Henry VII, to a middle-aged landless knight, a widower to boot. The fair young girl, if the D.N.B. is correct in the date of her birth (which it gives as 1540), would be but thirteen years old, though it seems from her examinations later, she was a year or two older. The inclination of the lady is nowhere referred to. It is barely possible there may have been some feelings of affection between the apparently incongruous pair. She may have
Loved him for the dangers he had passed,
And he loved her that she did pity them.
They were duly betrothed, and arrangements proceeded. The earliest preserved reference is in “A Warrant to Sir Andrew Dudley, as Master of the Wardrobe, to take for the Lady Margaret Clifford, daughter to the Earl of Cumberland, and to himself for their wedding apparel, sundry silks and jewels, 8th June, 7 Ed. VI, 1553, M. S. Reg. 18, cxxiv. f. 364.”
On 12th June of the same year a letter was dictated by the Privy Council in favour of Sir Andrew Dudley, concerning a marriage to be concluded “at the King’s request,” but the address is not given in the register. So by the middle of June 1553, Sir Andrew Dudley was gaily preparing for his wedding with the second cousin of the King, a girl who, by the new scheme of the succession, stood next in the line of inheritance of the throne after the Lady Jane Grey and her two sisters.
The Earl of Cumberland had shunned Court life since the death of his wife Ellinor, and had lived with his young daughter at Skipton Castle, in Craven, Yorkshire. He was loth to part with his daughter, even had Sir Andrew had a suitable home to which to take her. Therefore it had been arranged that the bride and bridegroom should reside with the Earl at Skipton, at least for a time. Sir Andrew sent rich gifts of jewels and clothing, collected all his best plate and furniture, and even borrowed some from his friends to adorn the suite of rooms they should dwell in. He seems to have had faithful and capable servants. Oswald Wilkinson, of the city of York, had been gentleman porter at Guisnes when Sir Andrew was in command there; he left when his master left, and followed him to Ireland, where he served him during the last year of Edward VI. And now Sir Andrew sent this trusty servant in charge with sixteen or seventeen others to convey his treasures north to his bride. Among other things there were:
Three cupboards furnished with plate, with a garnish of vessels silver gilt, a Venetian cup with a cover pounced, a salt with certain stones set therein, and one or two pieces of small plate which were thought to be all pure gold.... Also much goodly apparel, both for him and for her, three or more suits apiece, two of them of gold and silver tinsel, the rest of velvet and satin, with buttons and aglets of gold. As for money, none went with them, save a little purse of gold and silver strange coins, in value about £10.
Oswald Wilkinson and Alexander Harrison were present at the unpacking, and thought the things would be worth at least £3,000. Wilkinson made two copies of the inventory, with rough valuation, in the presence of Lady Margaret Clifford, Lady Conyers, Sir Ingram Clifford, James Banks and William Danby, gentleman servants to the Earl, and Mrs. Brograve, gentlewoman to Lady Margaret. Wilkinson signed one of the inventory-books, and gave it to the Lady Margaret, she signed the other, and gave it to him to keep till his master came. The Lady waited for her Lord in the Northern Tower, with the keys of the plate cupboards, the clothes chests, and the jewel coffers in her pocket, while the faithful henchman of her future husband kept the keys of the treasure chamber. They seem to have remained at Skipton nearly three weeks, during the first part of which time Sir Andrew was winding up his affairs, realizing his money, and preparing to follow his wedding gifts to his future home.