Bess of Hardwick and Her Circle

by Maud Stepney Rawson

“Your mistress,

“E. Seyntlo.”

The “Aunt Lenecker” (more correctly known as Lynacre) was a Leake and sister of Lady St. Loe’s mother. She seems to have lived for some years with her niece, possibly since her first widowhood.

Nothing very exciting happened to the St. Loe couple in their short married life. When not at Court they paid visits, were entertained, or entertained their own visitors, as scraps of correspondence show. They must have had traffic already with the great family of Talbot—which, besides Sheffield Castle, owned so many large seats in Derby and Nottingham—and both of them naturally held intercourse with “Mr. Secretary Walsingham” and “Mr. Treasurer Cecil.”

When Sir William St. Loe died—tolerably soon, alas!—Bess Hardwick had gone far with her building, social and actual. Her third widowhood found her richer, bolder, better known at Court, and able to play her part in an ever-widening circle of the powerful and prosperous.

Such a lady would naturally make enemies. In 1567 she was slandered by Henry Jackson, an ex-scholar of Merton College, Oxford, the tutor of her children. Instantly the matter went to the Council, and the Council wrote in September to the Archbishop of Canterbury. “Lady St. Loo, widow, having retained as schoolmaster Henry Jackson ... is disturbed by scandalous reports raised against her family by him; you are to examine the matter thoroughly and speedily with the assistance of the Solicitor-General Mr. Oseley and Mr. Peter Osborne or other Ecclesiastical Commissioners, that the lady’s good name may be preserved; if he has unjustly defamed her he is to be severely punished,” runs the digest of the draft in the State MS. And immediately upon the conclusion of the examination the Queen herself intervenes on behalf of the lady “who has long served with credit in our Court,” and forthwith she commands the punishment of the wicked clerk: “extreme punishment, corporal or otherwise, openly or private, and that speedily.”

Besides the danger of slander there was the trap of intrigue. Up to the present Bess Hardwick had kept clear of mischief, but, native curiosity apart, she could not, as Lady of the Bedchamber, help being often the recipient of the secrets of her friends. The romantic love story of Lady Catherine Grey, who held a similar Court post to herself, brought her into a tight place. For the benefit of those who do not recall the tale it shall be set forth again here.

The Lady Catherine was the sister of Lady Jane Grey. By a curious combination of circumstances—the exclusion given by the will of Henry VIII to the posterity of Margaret of Scotland, the publication of the will of Edward VI, and the non-repeal of certain Acts of Parliament—it was judged that the right to the crown rested with the House of Suffolk. To this great house Lady Catherine was the heir. She was formally contracted in extreme youth to Lord Herbert, the son of the Earl of Pembroke. But the wise Earl, in dread of the acute complications which such a marriage might entail, arranged for a divorce. This probably affected the lady but little. She was young, she was attractive and romantic, she could meet cavaliers enough and to spare in the immediate circle of the Queen. But, as all the world knows, her Majesty, while she kept a dozen men languishing about her, was very loth to have any of her ladies wed. Love affairs must be very secret, lest the parties incurred her disfavour and the loss of benefits. As for Lady Catherine, her birth, as has been shown, rendered her a mark for all manner of suspicion. At Court she was the close companion of Lady Jane Seymour, daughter of the Duke of Somerset. This Lady Jane had a brother, no less than the Earl of Hertford. What more inevitable than a love affair between him and Catherine? There were sorrows enough in the background of her history, slavery enough—despite pageant and hunting and the comings and goings of great persons from foreign courts—to endure at the hands of the energetic, alert, excitable, witty, jealous royal mistress. Little by little the love story wove itself in the manner of every love tale. A community of interest, a series of assemblies which passed in array her Majesty’s ladies before the eyes of her gentlemen, little incidents which brought out the personalities of the two, mere propinquity, a look here and a word there, did their work. The two were soon secretly plighted, with the Lady Jane to share and shield their dear secret. Many anxious moments must have gone to their councils. To declare their troth would only be a signal for their instant separation. The same result would arise if they humbly asked the royal permission to be betrothed. To marry and fly would only savour of deep State conspiracy. To marry and bide quietly and then face the astonished and scandalous world with an air of “Indeed, and it is true. So part us you shall not. And, moreover, ’tis our affair. Wherefore, fling your mud elsewhere!” seemed the wisest way in the end, and also followed the line of least resistance.

One morning—surely as crisp and heartening a day as could be desired for such a purpose—the Queen’s Majesty went to Eltham in Kent to hunt. My Lady Jane and my Lady Catherine stayed behind. When all was quiet they left the Palace (Westminster) “by the stairs at the orchard” and strolled quietly “along the sands.” Those sands led to the Earl of Hertford’s house in “Chanon Row.” He was waiting for his lady; he did not even leave her to call the priest. That was the Lady Jane’s errand. There is something very delightful about this incident, and the steady chaperon’s part undertaken by the Earl’s sister. The priest came, the wedding took place. After the brief ceremony there could not be much dalliance or entertainment. It was not yet the time to give the secret to the world. The ladies must reach the Palace again before hue and cry could be raised. They did not go back by “the sands,” probably because the tide had risen. They went back by boat. The Earl did not accompany them. But he led his bride and his sister to the boat which waited for them at the foot of the water-stairs of his house. He assisted them in—it must have been very hard to let go the hand of the woman so newly pledged to him—and the shallop went quietly on its way and delivered its fair passengers at the Palace stairs without exciting comment. A little later the two ladies were demurely seated at dinner “in Master Comptroller’s chamber.” Probably neither of them played that evening much of a table part.

The bride was left to bear the onus of the affair. After a few stolen meetings the Earl went to France. And presently the world began to point and stare. The report grew, but no one seemed able to credit it. At the close of August, 1561, the Earl’s mother wrote to Cecil mentioning the rumour, denying all knowledge of it, and hoped that the wilfulness of her unruly child, Hertford, would not diminish the Queen’s favour. On the same date Sir Edward Warner, Lieutenant of the Tower, wrote to the Queen stating that he had questioned Lady Catherine as to her “love practices,” but she would confess nothing. It is said that Lady St. Loe burst into tears when Lady Catherine made confession to her. Probably the older woman knew what was in store for them both. The royal warrant to Sir Edward Warner not only required him to “examine the Lady Catherine very straightly how many hath been privy to love between her and the Lord of Hertford from the beginning,” but continues: “Ye shall also send to Alderman Lodge, secretly, for St. Low and shall put her in awe of divers matters confessed by the Lady Catherine; and so also deal with her that she may confess to you all her knowledge in the same matters. It is certain that there hath been great practices and purposes; and since the death of the Lady Jane[^[6]] she hath been most privy. And as ye shall see occasion, so ye may keep St. Low two or three nights, more or less, and let her be returned to Lodge’s or kept still with you, as ye shall think meet.”