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were now forced to declare their belief in Mary’s legitimacy and deny their part in the coup.8 Many Englishmen believed that France had been set to invade in support of Northumberland. As Noailles reported, “You could not believe the foul and filthy words which this nation cries out every day against our own.”9 Henry II now feared that England might join the war on the emperor’s side and sought to emphasize Charles’s lack of support for Mary in the July crisis. “In all her own miseries, troubles and afflictions,” wrote the French ambassador, “as well as in those of the Queen her mother, the Emperor never came to their assistance, nor has he helped her now in her great need with a single man, ship or penny.”10

AS BELLS ACROSS the country rang out the news of her victory, Mary left Framlingham to begin her slow and triumphant progress toward London.11 Along the route and at her various stopping places, she received the homage of her subjects. At Ipswich she was met by the bailiffs of the town, who presented her with “eleven pounds sterling in gold,” and by some young boys, who gave her a golden heart inscribed with the words “The Heart of the People.”12 Having spent two days in Ipswich, Mary moved to Colchester, where she stayed at the home of Muriel Christmas, a former servant of her mother, Katherine, and then journeyed to her residence Beaulieu in Essex. There she was presented with a purse of crimson velvet from the City of London, filled with half sovereigns of gold, “which gift she highly and thankfully accepted, and caused the presenters to have great cheer in her house.”13 From Beaulieu she rode on to Wanstead, east of London, where she was joined by her sister, Elizabeth, who had ridden from the Strand to meet her, accompanied by countless gentlemen, knights, and ladies.14

Leaving Wanstead on the third, Mary began her journey into the city, stopping en route at Whitechapel at the house of one “Mr Bramston,” where she “changed her apparel.”15 As Wingfield described the occasion:

Now indeed her retinue reached its greatest size … nothing was left or neglected which might possibly be contrived to decorate the gates, roads and all places on the Queen’s route to wish her joy for her victory. Every crowd met her accompanied by children, and caused celebrations everywhere, so that the joy of that most wished for and happy triumphal procession might easily be observed, such were the magnificent preparations made by the wealthier sort and such was the anxiety among the ordinary folk to show their goodwill to their sovereign.16

CHAPTER 38

THE JOY OF THE PEOPLE

AT SEVEN IN THE EVENING OF AUGUST 3, 1553, MARY ENTERED the City of London, accompanied by gentlemen, squires, knights, and lords, the king’s trumpeters, heralds, and sergeants at arms with bows and javelins.

She was dressed in a gown of purple velvet, its sleeves embroidered in gold; beneath it she wore a kirtle of purple satin thickly set with large pearls, with a gold and jeweled chain around her neck and a dazzling headdress on her head. Her mount, a palfrey, was richly trapped with cloth of gold.1 As the imperial ambassadors reported, “her look, her manner, her gestures, her countenance were such that in no event could they be improved.”2 Behind her rode Sir Anthony Browne, “leaning on her horse, having the train of her highness’ gown hanging over his shoulder,” followed by her sister, Elizabeth, the Duchess of Norfolk, the Marchioness of Exeter, and a “flock of peeresses, gentlewomen and ladies-in-waiting, never before seen in such numbers.”3 It was a spectacular display of dynastic unity, of power and authority: the first formal appearance of England’s queen regnant. According to one estimate, some ten thousand people accompanied the new queen into the capital.

Mary was met at Aldgate by the lord mayor and aldermen of London. Kneeling before her, the lord mayor presented the scepter of her office as a “token of loyalty and homage” and welcomed her into the city. She returned the scepter to the lord mayor with words “so gently spoken and with so