The Other Tudors (17 page)

T
homas Stukeley was born some time between 1523 and 1530, the third of five sons and six daughters of Sir Hugh Stukeley (or Stuckley) of Affeton, near Ilfracombe in Devon, and Jane, daughter of Sir Lewis Pollard, who married in 1520. The family lived in some splendour, according to the Devonshire Directory of 1850: ‘In the farmhouse called Affton Barton are some remains of the ancient castellated mansion, which was the seat of the Affeton family in the 13th and 14th centuries … This was one of the most splendid seats in the county, and had an extensive park …’
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Sir Hugh died in 1560 and was succeeded to the Affeton estate by his eldest son, Lewis, who married twice. He had at least three children by his first wife, Anne Hill, and two by his second, Janet Powlett.

Thomas was commonly believed to be the bastard son of Henry VIII and, like the King’s other sons, looked a good deal like him. The behaviour of Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I towards Thomas indicates that they also believed that he was the King’s son, especially since he created havoc and escaped without punishment: a spy, a double agent, a pirate, a bankrupt, a forger, a liar, a fraudster and, finally, a traitor, Thomas suffered no more than a few months in prison as a result. He lied to, and manipulated, all three sovereigns, yet his charm and their belief that he was Henry’s son arguably saved him from punishment again and again.

In 1547, Thomas was the King’s standard bearer in Boulogne; he would have had to be in his mid-to-late teens to hold such a post. This means his birth came about at some point during the period when the King was losing interest in Catherine of Aragon and pursuing Anne Boleyn; this was also the period when Henry had his affair with Mary Berkeley, the wife of Sir Thomas Perrot.

Sir Hugh Stukeley was a major figure in local politics and occasionally had the opportunity to entertain the King at his Devonshire home. He was also a wealthy man, related by marriage to most of the prominent West Country families. His father, Sir Thomas Stukeley, had been a body servant to the King in 1516, and Sir Hugh had contacts with the Court and King. Therefore, the relationship between his wife, Jane, and Henry VIII may have taken place at Affeton.

So notorious was Thomas’s life that it gave rise to a play,
The Battell of Alcazar, fought in Barbarie, between Sebastian King of Portugal, Abdelmelec King of Morocco, with the death of Captain Stukeley
, written by George Peele and published in 1594. It was later performed under the title
The Famous History of the Life and Death of Captain Thomas Stukeley
. The play may have been written to entertain, but it was about someone who had died in living memory. It may be that some of the incidents portrayed were based on known facts. From the play come the following lines, recited by Thomas as he lies dying in the closing moments:

If Sir Hugh was in London on business or attending the Court or Parliament, Lady Jane may have accompanied him, and thus Thomas could also have been conceived and born in the city.

James Fitzgerald, an Irish exile, met Thomas in Rome and seemed unable to decide his antecedents. He wrote of the man:

Thomas, following the custom of the day, would have left home at an early age to enter another household where he would be taught polite behaviour and given a good start in life. The Archbishop of Cashel reported that Thomas had served Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, Henry VIII’s brother-in-law, until the Duke’s death in 1545. Thomas had two relatives in the Suffolk household – Sir Hugh Paulet and Sir George Pollard (both of whom were related to the Stukeleys through marriage) – who would have been instrumental in gaining a place in the household for their nephew. If Thomas was believed to be the son of Henry VIII, the household of the King’s brother-in-law would be admirably suitable for the young Thomas. For a brief time, between 1545 and 1547 when he held his first recorded post, Thomas may also have been in the household of John Vesey, the Bishop of Exeter. The Bishop was a valued adviser to the King and spent most of his time either in London or at his home, Moor Hall, in Sutton Coldfield in Birmingham.
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Thomas’s first noted appearance was in the company of Edward Seymour, Earl of Hertford and Duke of Somerset, acting as the King’s standard bearer at Boulogne in 1550 and paid 6s 8d a day. When Boulogne was returned to the French, Edward Seymour came back to England with Thomas as part of his household. Thomas seems to have landed up in the service of one of the country’s most prominent nobles, the brother of Jane Seymour and uncle to the reigning Edward VI.

In April 1551, Thomas was at the French Court of Henri II. One of the Embassy to the Court, Sir John Mason, wrote from Amboise to the Council on 22 April 1551 concerning the presence of several of his party including ‘Mr Stucley’ who ‘had been made very much of ’ at the Court. Thomas came back to England, but when Edward Seymour lost power in October, he returned to Henri II. He seems to have made his mark as a soldier and was believed to have entered the French King’s service. When Thomas returned to England in September 1552, a letter was sent to Edward VI, apparently from Henri II:

Thomas’s return to London was not without incident. Edward VI’s journal recorded that Thomas, ‘declared how the French King, being wholly persuaded that he [Thomas] could not return again into England, because he came away without leave upon the apprehension of the Duke of Somerset his old master, declared to him his intent.’ Once Henri had made peace with Spain, this ‘intent’ was a plan to take Calais back, invade England somewhere near Falmouth on the south west coast, and support a Scottish invasion from the north, under the leadership of Francis, duc de Guise.
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According to Thomas, he had agreed to become a spy and had been encouraged to return to England to gather intelligence for the French.

So serious were the implications, the Head of the King’s Council, Sir John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, now took an interest. He wrote to his secretary, William Cecil (later Lord Burghley under Elizabeth I), ordering him to Court with all haste. On 19 September, Cecil took Thomas’s deposition, in which he claimed that he had returned from France to bring information about Henri II’s plot against England. The plan that Thomas reported was that, ‘First the Scots were to enter Northumberland in force. Then the Duke of Guise with one army would land at Dartmouth … while Henri himself with another army would land at Hellforth, so as to take Falmouth on the weak side, by land, not by water.’
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According to Stukeley, once there, Henri II planned to take Dartmouth and Falmouth as French territory and restore Catholicism in these provinces.

To Northumberland and Cecil, all this may have seemed too good to be true. It was. Thomas offered to return to France to carry on his intelligence work, claiming to have close contact with Henri II and with Anne, duc de Montmorency, Constable of France. While Cecil was keen that Thomas should return, Northumberland wrote to Sir William Pickering, the English Ambassador in Paris, telling him to ask the King if these stories of invasion were true. He added that this was ‘only to try Stucley’s truth.’

Pickering’s reply was as expected. He stated that Thomas had never mentioned any of this to him. For good measure, he added that Thomas had not had any contact with Henri II and had only once acted as an interpreter for Montmorency when he wished to question some English captives. Someone was telling lies.

Thomas was arrested and sent to the Tower. The French were told that it was for uttering slanders about the French King, ‘as other runagates [illegal exiles] do,’ hoping this would ‘make him [Henri II] suspect the English runagates that be there.’ Henri II certainly responded with caution, insisting he was innocent of any plot against England and his dear brother, Edward VI, and trusting that Thomas would be duly punished for his evil words. In the climate of the time, although it looked as if Thomas had fabricated his story, Northumberland still retained some uneasiness about the ‘plot’. Thomas, as becomes clear, could talk his way out of anything. If Edward VI believed Thomas was his half-brother, this would go some way to explaining why he was not immediately executed for his activities. In fact, in 1553, once the furore died down, Thomas was released. In debt, he went this time to Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy, with a letter of recommendation from Mary I. In October 1553, he went with the Duke to the Emperor’s Court in Brussels, attached to the English Embassy of Sir William Drury. In February 1554 Thomas wrote to Mary I himself:

Once again, Thomas had assumed the role of acting as an agent for the English Crown, authorised or not. The letter in question from Henri II, giving his opinion that Mary I should never marry Philip II of Spain, stated that there would be war between France and England by the end of the year. The letter went on to ask for information about the English ships that were to go to Spain to fetch Philip to his wedding so that they could be intercepted. Henri II finished by saying that he would offer support to any Englishmen who rose in revolt against the Spanish marriage. There was, indeed, a rebellion led by Sir Thomas Wyatt in 1554, which failed for general lack of support. Fortunately, Thomas Stukeley was abroad when it happened, although some of his cousins were involved.

In October 1554, Thomas wrote to Mary I again, from the Emperor’s camp at Hesdin. The letter was a masterpiece of persuasion. Thomas praised the Queen and her generosity. He claimed that her brother had agreed to pay his debts and that part of his trouble stemmed from his ill treatment at the hands of Northumberland, who Mary I loathed. The letter worked beautifully. Thomas returned to England and his appeal to Mary I earned him a respite. On 23 October a patent was issued to give ‘Thomas Stucley gentleman, son of Sir Hugh Stucley knight of Devonshire,’ security and freedom from arrest from November 1554 to April 1555. This gave him six months to settle his debts before he could be arrested.
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Once his temporary pardon ran out, Thomas seems to have been in trouble again. On 13 May 1555, a warrant was issued against him for circulating counterfeit money. However, this charge was never proved or even pursued. Neither is there any record of Thomas being arrested for debt.

At some point Thomas married Anne, granddaughter and sole heiress of Sir Thomas Curtis (or Curteis), a wealthy London alderman and merchant. The exact date of their marriage is not recorded, but in 1552 Henri II is said to have offered the bribe of an advantageous marriage when trying to persuade Thomas to act as his agent. A play performed in Spain in 1570 dealt with scenes from Thomas’s life in which he took part in Wyatt’s rebellion (which he actually missed), operated as a pirate (which he did) and married Anne Curtis.

Thomas’s next appearance was in 1557, once again in the service of the Duke of Savoy, as part of an English company under the leadership of the Earl of Pembroke; in 1557 Pembroke’s men took part in the Battle of San Quentin, where the French army of Henri II was defeated. At this point, Thomas seems to have been in favour with the Spanish and in November 1558 one of the Spanish admirals wrote to the Queen about Thomas:

This definitely looks like one of Thomas’s inventions in order to acquire money. He was certainly one of five, but two of his brothers were older than him, and both would have been in their mid-to-late twenties. Lewis, the eldest, was already married and the father of several children. Their father was very well off and, therefore, not likely to need financial assistance from his middle son in supporting the family, especially a son who was notorious as a debtor.

Thomas did gain one advantage through the approval of the Queen and the Spanish Court; in 1558 a warrant was issued from the Queen to Sir Francis Englefield, Master of the Wards, ordering that: