Anne Cromwell

Thomas Cromwell's daughter

Child of Thomas Cromwell and Liz Wykys.

The story so far…

Week 2: At Austin Friars / Visitation

We learn of Cromwell’s daughters, Anne and Grace, through the letter Gregory sends his parents from Cambridge.

Week 3: An Occult History of Britain (Part 1)

Anne Cromwell is a tough little girl. She could eat a princess for breakfast. Like St Paul’s God, she is no respecter of persons, and her eyes, small and steady as her father’s, fall coldly on those who cross her; the family joke is, what London will be like when our Anne becomes Lord Mayor.

Later, in 1527, Cromwell tucks his daughters up in bed; their mother cold and dead in a room nearby. Anne’s job is to keep her little sister warm. “I may feel cold,” Anne says. She cries in silence.

In quarantine, she is writing her name over and over again in her copy book. “Anne Cromwell, Anne Cromwell …”

Week 4: An Occult History of Britain (Part 2)

Her mother has died, but this future Lord Mayor of London is as sharp as ever. She tells her uncle Morgan Williams that the wool traders of Antwerp will not welcome the proposed peace between England and France.

Anne would be better suited by a helmet than a cap, thinks her father, Thomas Cromwell. She wants to marry Rafe Sadler when she grows up and asks probing questions like: “Why do people marry?”. She thinks her sister Grace is slow, when really she is just young.

She wants to learn Greek, and why not? “Why should Thomas More’s daughter have the pre-eminence?” she tells her father. “She has such good words. And she uses them all.”

When the Sweat returns in 1529, she uses her good words in prayer. “She prays as if she’s going into battle.” It is a battle she loses. Her father lets her go to a place where she may know Greek, or may not need it. But where is that place? We were once sure it was Purgatory. We are not so sure now.

Week 5: Make or Mar / Three-Card Trick

Twelfth Night, 1530. “I wish Anne were here and promised to Rafe Sadler. If Anne were older. If Rafe were younger. If Anne were still alive.”

Week 7: Entirely Beloved Cromwell (Part 2)

“Anne Cromwell was proud of her working of numbers and boasted that she was learning Greek.” Her cousin Alice decides that Anne must endure more time in Purgatory for her sins.

Week 15: Supremacy

Midsummer, 1534. Rafe has married Helen Barre and Anne comes to Cromwell in a dream:

She holds up her left hand, sorrowful, to show him she wears no wedding ring. She twists up her long hair and wraps it around her neck like a noose.