George Cavendish

Wolsey's gentleman usher

George Cavendish (1497 – ), Cardinal Wolsey's gentleman usher.

The story so far…

Week 2: At Austin Friars / Visitation

1529, York Place. The fall of Wolsey. Cavendish has a role similar to a modern butler, in charge of all of the cardinal’s servants. He’s timid and easily shocked. But over the course of events, Cromwell makes a soldier of him in their long campaign to save their master Wolsey.

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

Cavendish shows a theatrical side to his personality, acting out the encounter between Wolsey and Harry Percy back in 1523. He remarks on Cromwell’s powers of memory, and Cromwell says it is a “method of remembering. I learned it in Italy.”

Week 5: Make or Mar / Three-Card Trick

All Hallows, 1529. George Cavendish finds Cromwell crying over a prayer book. He tells Cavendish that he is finished and all is lost.

Two days after Henry Tudor speaks to Thomas Cromwell, Cavendish hurtles through the courtyard at Esher Palace to tell the lawyer that the king has sent four cartloads of furnishings. “Come and see… was it by your suit?”

Week 6: Entirely Beloved Cromwell (Part 1)

George Cavendish tells Cromwell that the monks at Richmond are telling the cardinal about the delights of self-flagellation. ‘Oh, that settles it,’ he says, annoyed. ‘We have to get him on the road. He’d be better off in Yorkshire.’

Week 7: Entirely Beloved Cromwell (Part 2)

He comes to Austin Friars to tell Cromwell about the cardinal’s last days. “He cries as he talks. Sometimes, he dries his tears and moralises. But mostly, he cries.”

His tale is too long, too long for Cromwell to bear. He tells the whole story: of black blood and the sound of a plain coffin being knocked together. And the king at Hampton Court said: “I would not for twenty thousand pounds that the cardinal had died.”