Part II of IV, The Very Merry Maids-of-Honor Class of 1591
“The talk in London is all of the Queen’s maids that were.
It is said that Mr. Vavasour is committed
for Mistress Southwell’s lameness in her leg, and that
Mr. Dudley is commanded from court for kissing Mistress Cavendish.”
- William Fowke, October 24, 1591, from St. James Palace
The mountain of morality sacrificed by Queen Elizabeth’s Maids-of-Honor upon the altar of romance and desire in 1591 is impressive. To do justice to all the liaisons and entanglements that these high-spirited maids tried (and failed) to keep under wraps, please recall that the Queen required the young women chosen for this small elite group to be, literally, maids (unmarried) and honorable (spotless virgins). They lived a fishbowl existence, subject to judgmental gossip and speculation about their youth, physical attractiveness and virtue, all necessary props to the Queen’s sagging façade. They were to remain unencumbered by lovers, husbands and children. With royal permission, they might marry an approved suitor. Marrying for love without the Queen’s permission had dire consequences; unmarried motherhood, worse. At best, Elizabethan contraceptives were unreliable.
Serving as Maids-of-Honor in 1591 were:
#1. Elizabeth Southwell
#2. Margaret Cavendish
#3. Frances Vavasour
#4. Catherine Leigh
#5. Elizabeth Vere
#6. Catherine Howard
#7. Elizabeth Trentham
Catherine Howard and Elizabeth Trentham had been in service the longest; Elizabeth Vere and Frances Vavasour were newcomers.
The year began with Maid #1, Elizabeth Southwell’s (b. 1563) dismissal as a Maid and from court. She had secretly fallen victim to the dark ringlets and charming promises whispered by Robert Devereaux, 2nd Earl of Essex. He was married at the time to Frances Walsingham, daughter of the Queen’s spy master. When Mistress Southwell kicked off the year of amoral revelry by delivering Essex a bastard son, Walter, in January, her pregnancy and absence from court were disguised as a “lameness in her leg”, a lame excuse if there ever were one.
Brave on the battlefield, Essex could not bring himself to do the honorable thing in the boudoir and admit he had fathered the lad. Instead, Thomas Vavasour threw himself valiantly into the Queen’s line of fire and falsely claimed that he was the father of Essex’s bastard. The Queen rewarded Thomas for his chivalry with imprisonment in the Tower. A prison term for a love affair? Sound a little harsh? Yes, but Standard Operating Procedure for her Majesty. While she released Thomas in time for her Accession Day tilt in November, the truth about Essex’s paternity and Thomas’ thankless sacrifice did not surface for four years. When it did, no one was happy, because her Majesty was not happy. Not happy at all.
Another courtier with a head full of those irresistible dark curls and winsome ways was Sir Robert Dudley (b. 1574), the bastard son of Douglass Sheffield and THE Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester (1532-1588) (whom we will call “Leicester” to avoid confusion). Leicester had promised to marry Douglass (or did he marry her? Another blog post due on that worthy secret!), but it was complicated because in 1574 he was simultaneously canoodling with Lettice Devereux (Essex’s mother) and the Queen. Busy guy, Leicester.
Young Robert Dudley had a busy year himself among the maids in 1591. It began innocently enough with a slap on the wrist when he was caught kissing Maid #2 Margaret Cavendish in the Presence Chamber. But it soon became apparent that, at the time, he also was following in his father’s iconic footsteps and cutting as wide a romantic swath through the other Maids as he could.
Only 17, young Robert relentlessly pursued Maid #3, Frances Vavasour, until he secured a betrothal to her with the Queen’s blessing, if they would wait a while. All perfectly proper and above board, until word leaked out in September that Frances had already married Thomas Sherley without the Queen’s permission. Obviously, Frances had been betrothed to two suitors simultaneously and the furious Queen banished her from court. Sherley’s stealth move to snag Frances and put a ring on her finger surprised just about everyone because he had also been two-timing it with Lord Cobham’s daughter, also named Frances, the twin sister of Robert Cecil’s wife. Really not clever, Thomas.
Cecil sent a scathing letter to Sherley’s father demanding that he “forthwith directly make it known by public act that for this . . . as well as for his willful perjuries and unnatural disobedience to yourself, you cannot digest it.” The elder Sherley replied: “I know not by what other open act I can show my dislike, having forbidden him my house and abandoned him from me and out of my sight.” Ouch.
Not to be outdone by Maid #3, Frances Vavasour, the well-kissed Maid #2, Margaret Cavendish, stepped back into the breach and promptly married the jilted young Robert Dudley without the Queen’s permission. Robert was banished from court for this transgression – but only, again, until that 1591 Accession Day joust in November. After Leicester’s death, it was difficult for the Queen to stay angry for long with any of his dark curly-haired sons.
Young Robert’s romantic intrigues did not end with scooping up Margaret Cavendish. He later convinced a different Elizabeth Southwell (b. 1584), his cousin and a niece to Maid #1, Elizabeth Southwell, to run away with him to France. That is a secret scandal worthy of a post all its own.
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