Mr. Thomas might have rendered further service to letters, instead of mixing himself up in conspiracies, had he received a favourable answer to an application which he made to Cecil, to be sent at the expense of the Government to Italy. A copy of his letter to Cecil, taken from the original at the Record Office, here follows:—
To the right honorable Sʳ William Cecill Knight one of the King’s Mag. twoo principall Secretaries.
Sʳ myne humble comᵉndacons remembered According to yoʳ pleasʳᵉ declared unto me at my departure I opened to my L of Pembroke the consideracon of the warde which you procured for yoʳ Sister wherein he is the best contented man that may be and made me this answer that though he wrote at his friends request yet he wrote unto his friende to be considered as it might be wᵗʰ yoʳ owne comoditie and none otherwise ffor if he had knowen so much before as I tolde him he wolde for nothing have troubled yᵒ wᵗʰ so unfriendly a request Assuring yoᵘ faithfully that I who have knowen him a good while never sawe him more bent to any man of yoʳ degree than I perceave he is unto yoᵘ and not without cause he thanketh yoᵘ hertily for yoʳ newes yoᵘ sent him And Sʳ whereas at my departure we talked of Venice considering the stirre of the worlde is nowe like to be very great those waies I coulde finde in myne hert to spende a yere or two there if I were sent I have not disclosed thus much to any man but to yoᵘ nor entende not to do. wherefore it may please yoᵘ to use it as yoᵘ shall thinke good Howe so ever it be yoʳ may be sure to commande me as the least in yoᵘ house. And so I humbly take my leave. ffrom Wilton the xiiijᵗʰ of August 1552.
Yoʳˢ assuredly to thuttermost
Willm Thomas.
From the following extracts from the indictment, and other records of his trial, taken from the Record Office, it will be seen that he did conspire against Queen Mary, and not only, as Ball supposes, against Gardiner.
Report of Deputy Keeper of the Public Records, iv, p. 248.
Pouch Nᵒ. xxx in the Record Office contains a file of 11 membranes, relating to the Trial and conviction of William Thomas for high treason. The Indictment found against him at Guildhall, dated 8 May, 1 Mary, 1554, charges that, he hearing of the proposed marriage between the Queen and Philip, Prince of Spain, had a discourse with one Nicholas Arnolde, late of London, Knight, as to the manner in which such marriage could be prevented or impeded, upon which the said William Thomas put various arguments against such marriage in writing, and afterwards, to wit 21 December, 1 Mary, at London, in the parish of Sᵗ Alban, in the ward of Cripplegate, the said William Thomas compassed and imagined the death of the Queen.
And afterwards, on the 22ᵈ December, in order to carry his wicked intentions into effect, he went into the house of the said Sir Nicholas, in the parish of Sᵗ. Bartholomew the Less, in the ward of Farringdon Without, and there had a traitorous discourse with the said Nicholas, to the following effect:—“Whether were it not a good ‘devise’ to have all these perils that we have talked of, taken away with very little bloodshed, that is to say, by killing of the Queen. I think John Fitzwilliams might be persuaded to do it, because he seems by his countenance to be so manly a man, that he will not refuse any peril that might come to his own person, to deliver his whole native country from so many and so great dangers, as be offered thereunto, if he might be made to understand them”; which words the said Sir Nicholas, afterwards, viz., 24 December, at London, in the parish of Sᵗ. Anne, in the ward of Aldersgate, repeated to James Croftes, Knight, one of the conspirators with Sir Thomas Wyatt, a traitor who had been attainted for levying war against the Queen, whereof the said James Croftes was also attainted.