Feeling in the city at Henry's marriage with Anne Boleyn, 1533.
Finding it hopeless to obtain the Pope's sanction to his divorce from Catherine, Henry at last lost all patience, and on the 25th January, 1533, was privately married to Anne Boleyn. The match was unpopular with the citizens, who took occasion of a sermon preached on Easter-day to show their dissatisfaction. According to Chapuys, the Spanish ambassador, who sent an account of the affair to the emperor, the greater part of the congregation got up and left the church when prayers were desired for the queen. When Henry heard of the insult thus offered to his new bride he was furious, and forthwith sent word to the mayor to see that no such manifestation should occur again. Thereupon, continues Chapuys, the mayor summoned the guilds to assemble in their various halls and commanded them to cease murmuring against the king's marriage on pain of incurring the royal displeasure, and to order their own journeymen and servants, "and, a still more difficult task, their own wives," to refrain from speaking disparagingly about the queen.[1169]
The queen's passage from the Tower to Westminster, 31 May, 1533.
It was perhaps on this account that the civic authorities excelled themselves in giving the queen a suitable reception as she passed from the Tower to Westminster on the 31st May. The Court of Aldermen directed (14 May) the wardens of the Haberdashers to prepare their barge as well as the "bachelers" barge for the occasion. Three pageants were to be set up, one in Leadenhall and the others at the[pg 389] Standard and the little Conduit in Cheapside. The Standard was to run with wine. A deputation was appointed to wait upon the king's council to learn its wishes, and enquiry was to be made of the Duke of Norfolk whether the clergy should take part in the day's proceedings, and whether the merchants of the Steelyard or other strangers should be allowed to erect pageants.[1170]
The City's gift of 1,000 marks.
The Court of Common Council had on the previous day (13 May) voted a gift of 1,000 marks to be presented to the queen at her coronation, and a further sum to be expended in the city "for the honor of the same."[1171] Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn were the only queens of king Henry VIII who were crowned, and on both occasions the citizens of London performed the customary services.[1172]
The Act of Succession, 1534.
In September (1533) Anne gave birth to a daughter, who afterwards ascended the throne as Queen Elizabeth. In the following spring (1534) parliament passed an Act of Succession, which not only declared Elizabeth (and not Mary, the king's daughter by Catherine of Aragon) heir to the crown, but required all subjects to take an oath acknowledging the succession. Commissioners were appointed to tender the oath to the citizens,[1173] and by the 20th April the "most part of the city was sworn to the[pg 390] "king and his legitimate issue by the queen's grace now had and hereafter to come."[1174] A fortnight later deeds under the common seals of the livery companies "concernyng the suretye state and succession" of the king were delivered to Henry in person at Greenwich by a deputation of aldermen.[1175]
Proceedings against those objecting to subscribe to the Act of Succession.
The oath, nevertheless, met with much opposition, more especially among the clergy and the religious orders. Elizabeth Barton, known as the "holy maid of Kent," and some of her followers, among them being Henry Gold, rector of the church of St. Mary Aldermary, were executed at Tyburn for daring to speak against the king's marriage.[1176] The friars proved extremely obstinate, and Henry sent commissioners to seek out and suppress all those friaries that refused to submit.