Текст книги "A Dangerous Inheritance"
Автор книги: Alison Weir
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Kate turned her face away. Mattie had her hands to her mouth, weeping in horror; she must be feeling terrible, for it was she who had suggested that Kate send a letter to John. But she had not been responsible for its contents; as for Kate, she did not regret having sent it at all.
‘Sirs!’ she said, as the officers made to leave. ‘Can you tell me where that letter was found?’
‘On the body of the traitor Lincoln,’ the dark-haired man said.
He hadread her letter; he haddied with her words of love in his heart. It was all she wanted to know. She smiled faintly. ‘Thank you, Sir. I am content now.’ And she felt a welcoming sense of peace.
The officer looked at her curiously. William opened his mouth to castigate her again, but Mattie forestalled him. ‘Good Sirs, do you know of the fate of my husband, Guy Freeman? He was a big, tall man with a red face and fair hair. You would recognise him because he has a large wen on his cheek.’
The officers exchanged looks. ‘Wearing a tan leather jerkin and green hose?’
‘Yes!’ Mattie’s voice was eager.
‘Sorry, woman, but he’s dead. He was found lying wounded in the ravine they’re now calling the Bloody Gutter. He was another traitor, wearing Lincoln’s badge. They hanged him.’
Mattie screamed.
Katherine
August 1563. The Tower of London.
To write this is painful to me. My love is gone from me, forever, maybe, and it is as if a thousand distances lie between us.
I bore my child, little Thomas. God gives us His great paternal blessings once again, Ned wrote, delighted to learn he was the father of a second son.
I thought we had managed well, for none knew of my pregnancy until a servant blabbed of it. And then the word was out, and the Queen’s wrath erupted; I heard later that she’d turned the colour of a corpse when told the news. Poor Sir Edward, our kindly gaoler, to whom I shall always be indebted, and who had got two of his warders to stand godfather at the second baptism, found himself that very day summarily dismissed from his post and clapped in one of his own dungeons.
Sir Edward’s superior, Sir Robert Oxenbridge, the Constable of the Tower, took evident pleasure in telling me that Ned had been summoned immediately before the Court of Star Chamber at Westminster, charged with breaching his prison, deflowering a virgin of royal blood, and compounding that crime by defiling me a second time. They sentenced him to be fined – extortionately – and to remain in prison in the Tower during her Majesty’s pleasure.
The last sight I had of Ned was at Thomas’s baptism. I remember him cradling our new son in his arms and uttering fervent thanks to God for my safe delivery, with toddling Edward clinging to his knee. By the good offices of Sir Edward Warner, I had had my portrait painted for a locket, holding Edward in my arms, a miniature of my sweet lord about my neck. Ned admired it when we were in the chapel, and I snatched it off and covertly passed it to him as a keepsake before I watched him walk away under the stern guard of the Constable. We had not been permitted even a farewell kiss.
That was six months ago, and since then I have pined here alone in my prison, cowed into subjection under the harsh rule of Sir Robert Oxenbridge. Were it not for my precious babes, I think I would commit the great sin of killing myself.
And now, in the heat of summer, comes the plague. They are falling like flies in London, a frightened Mrs Ellen reports. The word is that people are dying at a rate of a thousand a week. The stink from the City, when the wind is in the wrong direction, is all-pervading, contaminating everything, and making me fearful for my little ones. The court, I learn, has removed to Windsor, where the Queen has had a gallows put up and threatens to hang anyone from the capital venturing thither.
I am terrified for my sons. While they remain here with me in the Tower, they risk becoming infected. I contemplate asking if Mrs Ellen can take them away to a safe place, just for now. But Sir Robert appears at my door.
‘Lady Katherine,’ he says, ‘I am commanded by the Queen, out of compassion for the sake of your health, and that of your children, to send you all under guard into the country. Lord Hertford is to be sent away too, to a different place of residence, and you shall have separate custodians. The infant may stay with you, and young Master Edward must go with his father.’
‘No!’ I cry in anguish. ‘No! I cannot live if I am parted from my child, or my sweet lord! I would rather die of plague.’
The Constable regards me disapprovingly. I know he thinks me a rash, foolish, even dangerous woman.
‘Calm yourself, my lady. These measures are for your own safety, and that of your children and Lord Hertford. And my lord is content to obey. He has asked me to give you this as a farewell token. I permit it as a special favour.’
It is a mourning ring, with a death’s-head intaglio. He wore it for his father, I recall. And now, turning it over in trembling hands, I see there are words freshly engraved on it, as with a sharp knife. It reads: While I live, yours.
Part Four
Greedy Death
ON THE FIRST day of July, in the year of grace 1487, Katherine, Countess of Huntingdon, daughter of Richard, sometime King of England, began her travail. Her infant, a son, was born dead, to the great grief of her husband, the Earl. Soon afterwards, the Lady Katherine herself gave up the ghost, and rendered her spirit to God most joyfully, uttering one last word, John. Upon hearing which, her lord was observed to groan woefully in grief. It was thought, by most of those kneeling by her bed, that she spoke of her brother, then far away in Calais.
After her death, a bundle of papers tied with ribbon was found among her effects by her maid, who hid it in an old muniment chest beneath the family documents. Only this maid, who took her secret with her to her grave, fifty years later, knew that her beloved mistress had died without ever finding out the truth about her father, King Richard. And that caused the maid to weep even more. For she alone was aware that death had prevented the Countess from obtaining the answer to a question that she believed would have settled the matter once and for all. And she alone had borne witness to her heartbroken mistress writing a few final words about her arrest – which had been kept secret, and would never be made public, out of respect for her widower – and then laying down her pen for ever. It is believed that the Countess’s papers were burned by Sir Owen Hopton in the reign of Elizabeth I.
The Countess was laid to rest in the parish church of St Cadoc in Raglan, without ceremony. The Earl, her widower, stood stony-faced throughout the funeral. He was not a well man, although he did not yet know it, for his disease was a silent one, and he was gathered to his forefathers just four years later. He was interred in Tintern Abbey, having chosen not to be laid beside his lady, whose name would soon largely be forgotten, for no monument was ever built to her memory.
Katherine
Then began my Calvary. Years under house arrest in a succession of remote places in the depths of East Anglia: Pirgo Park, Ingatestone Hall, Gosfield Hall … Always a prisoner, an unwelcome guest. Never allowed to speak to anyone but my guardians, and made to behave at all times as if I were still in the Tower.
I wrote several times to Mr Secretary, pleading to be reunited with my dear lord and my elder son, and begging him to intercede for me with the Queen’s Majesty. I recall the grovelling words I wrote, my abject plea for the obtaining of her most gracious pardon and favour towards me, which, with upstretched hands, and down-bent knees, from the bottom of my heart most humbly I craved.
There was no reply.
I lost my appetite and grew thin. I wished myself dead and buried.
Just once was I permitted to write to Ned. It must have rent his heart to read my brave words, reminding him of the stolen hours we lay with joyful hearts as sweet bedfellows in the Tower, and assuring him we would do so again, I was certain of it.
I wrote again to the Queen and Mr Secretary, appealing to them to relieve me from my continual agony. They ignored my pleas, and I was so crushed with disappointment that I took to my bed, coughing and feverish. I wept ceaselessly. I vomited and brought up foul phlegm, and my guardians trembled in case I had consumption. They feared I might die in their charge.
My cheeks grew pale, my cough more troublesome. My longing for my sweet lord and my son became a physical pain. I exchanged several secret letters with Ned, thanks to the ruses of my maids, receiving in return touching tokens of his devotion. But our separation was killing me.
My cough grew worse. I developed pains in my chest. Eating so little, I grew thinner. At night I began to sweat; by day, I was sunk in lassitude. And when, late in the year of Our Lord 1567, I was moved, still a prisoner, to this house, Cockfield Hall in Yoxford, Suffolk, I was in a very poor case indeed.
*
I am racked by another attack of coughing. In my mirror I see dull eyes, cheekbones high in a hectic face, hands near transparent, and a gown that is now much too big, hanging on bony shoulders.
I feel my strength ebbing. I am now spending more time in bed than in my chair. My appetite has gone completely. My gaoler’s wife, Lady Hopton, pays me anxious visits, asking after my health, while Sir Owen sends for the Queen’s own physicians to tend me. He will not let it be said that I died for lack of care in his house.
I look at little Tom and feel anguish at the thought of him being left alone and motherless. Please God, I pray, do not let me die! I am but twenty-seven years old, and I need to live for my children, and for my love. I am convinced the very sight of Ned could make me well. And my little Edward … My arms ache for Edward.
I have beseeched them to let him visit me. He is six now, and it is four long years since I saw him. But they say it is not possible. Does my sweet lord know how ill I am? Will I ever look on his face again? Just once is all I ask. Just a glimpse of him to take to Heaven with me. For I fear that is where I am bound, very soon. I keep recollecting what my sister wrote to me from the Tower: Trust not that the tenderness of your age shall lengthen your life, for, as soon as God will, go the young and the old.
What did I ever do to deserve such trials? I but did what countless women do – I fell in love and married. Yet I am still being punished for that, and I know in my bones that the Queen will never release me now.
This morning, when I cough, there is blood on my kerchief. I stare at it, disbelieving; here is my executioner. I sit up shaking, my heart pounding. Not me, oh Lord, please, not me!
I sit there nervously on the edge of the bed, feeling like I am dying anyway, awaiting – and dreading – the next spasm. When it comes, there is another bright red streak: not as much as before, but still alarming. In a panic, I call Lady Hopton and she sends again for the physician.
*
‘What is wrong with me?’ I ask the doctor.
‘It is phthisick,’ he says gravely. ‘A disorder of the lungs. I prescribe rest and pleasant pastimes. Take the air, read books, do a little embroidery or play cards.’
‘My lady will take no pastime,’ Lady Hopton says. She has insisted on standing by through every consultation, like a gaoler. What does she think I will do? Plot treason? I am a sick woman! All I want is to be well again. But I have no energy for anything. I can barely raise the pen to write this journal.
Dr Symonds is brisk. ‘Then give her asses’ milk and snails in shells to prolong life,’ he orders, and my lady nods. He has not reassured me. I dare not ply him with more questions, for fear of what he will answer, for he spoke of prolonging my life. I am not such a fool that I cannot understand the implications of those words.
January, in the year of grace 1568, comes in like a lamb. The parkland beyond my casement is still green, the bare trees unladen with snow. It is unseasonably mild.
I have been confined to my bed for three weeks now, too weak to get out of it. I am resigned now, ready and prepared for the inevitable end, and aware of the need to make a good death, to satisfy the world that I was a worthy and devout woman.
I feel my strength ebbing. My women watch around the bed through the night hours, as I ceaselessly recite psalms and prayers for the dying. I thank God I am going to Him with no malice in my heart. My last thoughts will be of my loved ones, Ned, Edward, and little Tom, who has crept beside me on the bed and snuggled into the crook of my arm, his face stained with tears. Young as he is, he is aware that something is badly wrong. Maybe someone has told him his mother is dying. He knows what death is.
Dawn breaks. I realise I have been praying all night.
‘Madam, be of good comfort,’ says Lady Hopton. ‘Your strength is a marvel to us all. With God’s help, you shall live and do well many years.’
‘No, no,’ I tell her, ‘there will be no more life for me in this world. But in the world to come, I hope to live for ever. For here, there is nothing but care and misery, and there is life everlasting.’
I summon up every vestige of energy to pray some more, to ease my passage. My maids enjoin me to sleep a little, but there is no point. Soon, I shall rest in that endless sleep from which there is no waking.
I start to feel myself slipping away.
‘Lord, be merciful unto me,’ I murmur, ‘for now I begin to faint.’
‘She is cold,’ someone says, and I feel the women rubbing my hands and feet.
‘My time has come,’ I murmur weakly. ‘It is not God’s will that I should live any longer, and His will be done, not mine.’ I kiss Tom’s sweet head, and someone carries him away. When next I see him it will be in Heaven.
I call for Sir Owen Hopton. I want him to be able to report to the Queen that I made an edifying end – and I have two final requests to make of him.
‘Good Madam, how are you?’ he asks, gazing down with pity on me.
‘I am going to God as fast as I can,’ I tell him. ‘I pray you all to bear witness that I die a good Christian. And I ask God and all the world forgiveness for my sins.’ I pause, breathless. ‘I beseech you, Sir Owen, to promise me this one thing: that you yourself, with your own mouth, will request the Queen’s Majesty that she forgive her displeasure towards me. I confess I have greatly offended her, but I take God to witness I never had the heart to think any evil against her. And I entreat her to be good to my children, whom I give wholly unto her Majesty; for in my life they have had few friends, and they shall have fewer when I am dead, except her Majesty be gracious to them.’
Sir Owen bows his head. ‘I will do it,’ he promises.
‘Another thing, Sir,’ I whisper. ‘I desire her Highness to be good unto my lord, for I know that my death will be heavy news to him; and I beg her Grace will be so good as to send him his liberty to comfort his sorrowful heart.’
Again, my custodian nods, a touch reluctantly this time.
I make a final effort. There is one last thing I can do for my love.
‘Sir Owen,’ I say, ‘I ask you to deliver from me certain tokens to my lord. Give me the casket wherein my wedding ring is.’
I take out the ring I had for my betrothal. The diamond is as glittering and unfathomable as it was on that day, eight years ago, when Ned first put it on my finger. ‘Good Sir Owen, send this to my lord. This is the ring that I received of him when I gave myself to him, and pledged him my troth.’
‘Was this your wedding ring?’ my custodian asks.
‘No. This was the ring of my assurance to my lord. This is my wedding ring.’ And I lay in his palm the five-hooped band. ‘Deliver this also to him, and pray him, even as I have been unto him a true and faithful wife, to be a loving and natural father to my children. And here is the third ring you must give him.’ I bring forth the death’s-head memento mori. ‘This shall be the last token unto my lord that ever I shall send him. It is the picture of myself.’
As I hand him the ring, I catch sight of my fingers. The nails have turned an ominous purple. My hour is upon me.
I turn my eyes to the door.
‘He is come,’ I say, and smile.
Afterwards
LADY KATHERINE GREY was first buried in Yoxford Church, with the Queen affording her a lavish funeral. She was mourned by many Protestants who had hoped to see her acknowledged Elizabeth’s heir. Elizabeth expressed formal sorrow at her passing, but the Spanish ambassador observed, ‘It is not believed that she feels it, as she was afraid of her.’
Ned outlived Katherine by fifty-three years. He did not remarry until 1596, his second bride being Frances Howard, daughter of Lord Howard of Effingham, the hero of the Armada. For years he fought to have his sons declared legitimate, but Queen Elizabeth remained obdurate. When she was dying in 1603, it was suggested that Katherine’s son Edward be named her successor. ‘I will have no rascal’s son to succeed me!’ she retorted.
Edward and Thomas, who were brought up to honour their mother’s memory, were finally declared legitimate the following year, by a statute of James I. In 1608, the priest who had married Katherine and Ned finally came out of hiding and testified to the legitimacy of their union. Edward, Viscount Beauchamp, died in 1612; his brother Thomas had passed away in 1600.
In 1611, Ned’s grandson, William Seymour, made another misalliance with a lady of royal blood when he married Lady Arbella Stuart, the granddaughter of Margaret Douglas, Lady Lennox. Seymour escaped to France, but Arbella was imprisoned in the Tower and died there. Ned was still alive then. He heard the news of their elopement in the very room in Hertford House where he had married Katherine. He died in 1621, aged eighty-two.
Under Charles I, William Seymour was restored to favour and created Duke of Somerset. He died in 1660. It was he who, on his father’s death, had Katherine’s remains moved to Salisbury Cathedral, where she was laid to rest with her husband in a great ‘Golden Tomb’ with effigies of herself and her ‘sweet lord Ned’, with their two sons kneeling at either side.
The Latin epitaph on the tomb describes Katherine and Ned as ‘Incomparable consorts, who experienced the vicissitudes of fortune, and at last rest together here in the same concord in which they lived their lives.’
Author’s Note
In telling this fictional version of the story of Lady Katherine Grey, I have adhered closely to the facts where they are known, although I have taken some dramatic licence. For example, Katherine’s stormy confrontation with Ned over his flirtation with Frances Mewtas was acted out in letters; here, I have shown it taking place face to face. Much here is quoted from contemporary documents, and the letters are genuine; although some passages in Katherine’s letters have been used out of context, the sentiments relate accurately to the narrative. Archaic language has been modified to blend in with a modern text, although I have made use of many contemporary sources and idioms.
The long-accepted view of the Suffolks as harsh parents has recently been challenged, but there is no credible explaining away of Lady Jane Grey’s own bitter testimony to that, as recorded first-hand by Roger Ascham, and at least one contemporary source records Jane being beaten and cursed when she resisted her betrothal to Guilford Dudley. New research undertaken by historian Nicola Tallis suggests that the traditional view of the Suffolks is correct. It is conceivable that a chastened Frances mellowed after Jane’s execution, as portrayed in this novel, and that Katherine and Mary never suffered the rigour and expectations that their parents imposed on Jane. I would question the theory that there has been a deliberate attempt down the centuries to blacken Frances’s character.
Hester Chapman put forward the theory that Katherine’s head was so turned when she saw her sister made queen that for ever after her ambitions were focused on wearing a crown. Chapman believes that this is the only theory that makes sense of Katherine’s behaviour, but I think she was a self-obsessed girl who let her heart rule her head. Her instincts were emotional rather than logical, and because of that, she ended up out of her depth, in deep trouble.
Katherine wasturned out of Pembroke’s house immediately after Mary I was proclaimed queen. I have done my best to make sense of her religious persuasions, and her dealings with the Spanish ambassadors.
Confusion surrounds the date of Frances’s second marriage, to Adrian Stokes, and the number of their children, yet an Inquisition Post Mortem of 1600 dealing with Frances’s estates gives the date as 9th March 1554, only weeks after Henry Grey’s execution, and records their only issue as a daughter, Elizabeth, who was born in July 1555 at Knebworth and died there in February 1556. This Inquisition is listed in Vol. 34 of the Calendar of State Papers: Domestic, Elizabeth I(www.british-history.ac.uk). (I am indebted to Nicola Tallis for this reference.) Various historians have questioned Frances remarrying so soon after the death of her first husband, citing a report of the Spanish ambassador, Simon Renard, who, in April 1555, mentioned a proposal that she marry a descendant of the House of York, Edward Courtenay, Earl of Devon, although he added that the Earl was unwilling. Courtenay’s biographer, Horatia Durant, suggests that the marriage to Stokes, made over a year before, had been a well-kept secret, which is likely. William Camden, Elizabeth I’s earliest biographer, wrote that Frances remarried ‘for her security’. As Dulcie Ashdown says, Frances would have been aware that, as a widow, she was ‘a tempting match for an ambitious nobleman who saw in her a means to future power’; being in line for the throne, her position was potentially dangerous, so she may have regarded a speedy second marriage to a man with no pretensions as the safest option.
As the law stood, Katherine was Elizabeth I’s heir, and many people supported her claim. I do not think she wanted to supplant Elizabeth, only to be acknowledged as her successor. To Elizabeth, though, she appeared a deadly rival whose very existence threatened her throne. If Elizabeth had had her way, Katherine would never have married. The Interludes in the book are there to show Elizabeth’s point of view; without them, she comes across as a cruel persecutor.
Some sources state that Katherine was demoted from Lady of the Bedchamber (the highest rank) to Lady of the Privy Chamber, others that it was from Lady of the Privy Chamber to Lady of the Presence Chamber, and some even claim she was demoted upwards from the Privy Chamber to the Bedchamber! It seems that she was actually downgraded from the Bedchamber to the Presence Chamber.
The course of Katherine’s courtship by Edward Seymour, and his sister’s role in it, was much as it is portrayed here, and the account of their wedding day – and ‘night’ – is based closely on their own depositions. Katherine’s love for Edward was the overriding passion of her life, and she remained staunchly faithful through every trial, until her death.
Katherine was unsure for a time whether she was pregnant or not with her first child, and when she knew she was, she took pains to conceal it for as long as possible. During this period, she did come to fear that Ned had abandoned her, which was when she began seriously to consider remarrying Lord Herbert. His furious rejection of her is well documented.
It was Lord Robert Dudley who revealed Katherine’s pregnancy to the Queen. There was no confrontation: Elizabeth ordered Katherine to be placed under arrest and taken to the Tower. Bess of Hardwick’s role in the affair – as Lady Saintlow (or St Loe) – is recounted in the depositions taken after Katherine’s arrest.
It is possible that William Cecil did take a broader view of Katherine’s marriage, and that he approved of her being named Elizabeth’s heir. He himself said, ‘I have been noted a favourer of my Lady Katherine’s title.’ However, as David Loades points out in The Cecils(The National Archives, 2007), Cecil did not declare for Katherine’s succession when the Queen was thought to be dying of smallpox in 1562. Instead, he seems to have ‘favoured an interim solution while further thought was taken’ – which suggests he had doubts, although certainly he desired to see the matter of the succession settled. His enquiries persuaded him that Katherine’s union with Hertford was no more than a love match – he called it ‘that troublesome, fond matter’ – and not part of a plot against Elizabeth, yet whatever his private feelings, he followed the Queen’s lead in punishing the couple.
Katherine’s prison in the upper chamber of the Bell Tower still exists. During the Second World War, Rudolf Hess was briefly imprisoned there, and a lavatory was installed for the convenience of another expected Nazi guest: Adolf Hitler. Katherine was later moved to rooms in the Lieutenant’s Lodging, where her infant and her eight servants could be accommodated. The list of decayed furnishings sent by Queen Elizabeth still survives.
Sir Edward Warner did prove a sympathetic gaoler. It was he who allowed Katherine and Edward Seymour to meet on two occasions, and when the Queen found out that Katherine’s second pregnancy had been the result, she had Warner dismissed from his post and imprisoned.
In Tudor times, many people referred to the White Tower, the keep of the Tower of London, as Caesar’s Tower, in the mistaken belief that Julius Caesar had built it.
It has long been thought that Katherine died of tuberculosis. The references to her suffering from heavy phlegm and being unable to eat may account for that. Recently, it has been suggested that her poor eating was symptomatic of anorexia, and that she literally starved herself to death. Certainly she was under immense stress for much of her life. The only telling symptom we have to go on is her nails turning purple just before she died. Commonly that indicates a lack of oxygen in the extremities, poor circulation, a respiratory or lung disorder, a cardiovascular problem and/or congestive heart failure. That might indicate tuberculosis, towards which malnutrition can be a major contributory factor. It is possible that Katherine caught it from Jane Seymour; she had been closely exposed to Jane for some time, as she would have needed to be to catch the disease, which is passed by droplet infection through sneezing or coughing. Sometimes the body’s immune system fails to destroy those bacteria, and latent tuberculosis becomes active years later. This is more likely to happen if the immune system becomes weakened by other problems, such as being undernourished and underweight, as Katherine was, and influenza and other infections can play their part; her phlegm may have been a symptom of that kind of illness. Therefore I have adhered to the traditional theory in this book. The account of Katherine’s death is closely based on fact.
Over the years, I have consulted numerous sources for the Tudor period, which inform my fiction, and the reader is referred to the bibliographies in my non-fiction books, Children of England: The Heirs of Henry VIIIand Elizabeth the Queen, for those. For this novel, however, I am indebted particularly to the following works:
Ashdown, Dulcie M.: Tudor Cousins: Rivals for the Throne(Stroud, 2000)
Borman, Tracy: Elizabeth’s Women(London, 2009)
Chapman, Hester W.: Two Tudor Portraits(Oxford, 1960)
Lisle, Leanda de: The Sisters Who Would Be Queen(London, 2008)
Lovell, Mary S.: Bess of Hardwick(London, 2005)
Plowden, Alison: Lady Jane Grey: Nine Days Queen(Stroud, 2003)
Somerset, Anne: Ladies in Waiting(London, 1984)
Stevenson, Joan: The Greys of Bradgate(Leicester, 1974)
While there are numerous sources for the life of Katherine Grey – although she never kept the journal mentioned in the story – we know very little about Katherine Plantagenet, who is mentioned in just four contemporary documents. The earliest reference to her is in her marriage covenant, dated 29th February 1484. In this, William Herbert covenanted with Richard III to take Dame Katherine Plantagenet to wife before Michaelmas (29th September), and to make her a jointure in lands of £200 per annum. The King undertook to bear the whole cost of the marriage and to settle lands and lordships valued at 1,000 marks (£666) yearly on them and the heirs male of their two bodies.
The couple were married by May 1484, when, at York, Richard III granted ‘William, Earl of Huntingdon and Katherine his wife’ the proceeds of various manors in Devon, Cornwall and Somerset.
In this period, couples could be married in childhood, and the Church permitted a girl to cohabit with her husband at the age of twelve. We do not know Katherine’s date of birth, but I have placed it in 1470, on the premise that she married at fourteen, an age at which many girls were married in those days. She cannot have been much older, as Richard III was only eighteen in 1470.
The last reference to Katherine in contemporary sources occurs on 8th March 1485, when a cash annuity of £152.10s.10d was granted by Richard III to his kinsman, ‘William, Earl of Huntingdon and Katherine his wife, until they should have grants to themselves and the heirs of their bodies of lordships etc. to the same value.’
Aside from these sources, I have reconstructed Katherine’s life largely through external evidence, inference and probability. Her mother was possibly Katherine Haute, wife of James Haute, who was the son of William Haute by Joan Wydeville, a cousin to the Queen. Richard, Duke of Gloucester, made a grant of an annual payment of 100s. from his East Anglian estates to one Katherine Haute before, or in, 1475. It is not known why he did so – unless it was for the support of his child. It may be significant that his daughter shared the same name as Katherine Haute, and that possibly she was named after St Catherine of Siena, one of Richard’s favourite saints, and the patron saint of young girls.
