Thomas Cromwell (1485 – ), lawyer and king’s councillor, chancellor of the exchequer, master of the jewel house, and clerk of the hanaper. Son of Walter Cromwell, married to Liz Wykys, father of Gregory, Anne and Grace.
“You are the man with the slow resting heartbeat, the calmest person in any room, the best man in a crisis. You are a robust, confident, centred man, and your confidence comes from the power you have in reserve: your Putney self, ready to be unleashed, like an invisible pit bull. No one knows where you have been, or who you know, or what you can do, and these areas of mystery, on which you cast no light, are the source of your power. When are you angry, which is rare, you are terrifying.”
Hilary Mantel, notes on characters
The story so far…
Week 1: Across the Narrow Sea / Paternity
In 1500, Thomas flees his violent father in search of his fortune abroad. By 1527 he is a secretary in the household of Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, Archbishop of York.
Week 2: At Austin Friars / Visitation
In 1527, Cromwell is with his wife, Liz, at Austin Friars. He has a new book from Germany and memories of how he turned around Liz’s father’s business, married her and held his first child, Gregory, in his hands.
In 1529, he is with the cardinal when the king dismisses him as Lord Chancellor and turns him out on the road. They go to the cardinal’s house near Putney, where Cromwell makes Wolsey comfortable while considering a future without him.
Week 3: An Occult History of Britain (Part 1)
“Who’s that? In the corner there?” It is Cromwell, Wolsey’s lawyer, in 1523. He’s watching Wolsey reprimand Sir Thomas Boleyn, “the coldest, smoothest man he has ever seen.” On leaving, Boleyn calls Cromwell the “butcher’s dog”.
That’s the night Cromwell tells Wolsey about Mary Boleyn and the king. But before he does this, his body betrays him. He flinches as Wolsey reaches out a hand and confides in his master that he once killed a man. A man who would have killed him.
Wolsey teaches Cromwell about the history of England and how to survive at court: work out what people wear beneath their clothes. And how to serve the king: “take him as he is, a pleasure-loving prince.”
We learn in these pages that Cromwell once handled a snake for a bet, and served in the armies of Cesare Borgia. He has picked up Machiavelli’s book on how to rule. He says it contains nothing new. Watching Wolsey work, we sense he admires the man but thinks he could do it better.
In 1527, the cardinal is away in Europe. Cromwell is careful to keep his family away from meeting with suspected heretics, like Little Bilney. But this means that no one can find him the day his wife dies from a sweating sickness. The household goes into mourning and quarantine.
Week 4: An Occult History of Britain (Part 2)
We learn more about Cromwell’s earlier life at the start of this section. At seven, he went to work in Lambert Palace with his uncle John, a cook for Archbishop John Morton. There he learned to count and proved himself good at remembering things. And it is here he meets the scholar Master Thomas More, reading a book full of words.
Cromwell visits his father a year after returning from Europe, and once he is married and a father himself. They bicker about the family name and the family fortune. There were rich Cromwells once, but Walter supposes “we pissed it away”.
Back in 1528, his sister-in-law Johane asks him what he does these days. “Our business,” he says, “is making people rich.” Johane and her family have moved into Austin Friars so that she can help look after the children. Anne wants to marry Rafe Sadler when she grows up, and although the idea is impossible, the thought pleases Cromwell.
Cromwell remembers the rainy night he brought Rafe Sadler into his household. “Teach him all you know”, said Rafe’s father. “Shall we see how far we get?” Cromwell asks Rafe portentously, as they ride through horizontal rain from Essex into London.
In 1528, the sweating sickness returns and Cromwell sends his daughters away.
He learns that two evangelical scholars have died in the cellars at Cardinal College, forgotten by Wolsey. His grief turns to anger. He asks his master to petition the king for the release of Thoms Bilney, and he makes Wolsey cry.
In Autumn 1528, he learns from Lady Carey, Anne’s sister, that the king’s mistress intends to become his wife and queen. Mary suggests another marriage, between herself and Cromwell. He tells it to no man, but Rafe Sadler.
The next year, a legatine court fails to resolve the king’s great matter. Cromwell knows it is over for Wolsey, and for himself. He goes home and writes his will:
To God his soul. To Rafe Sadler his books.
The sweat returns, and they don’t send the girls away. Anne dies first, and Grace afterwards, in his arms. Where are they now, and in what language do they speak? These matters of religion and faith are now as personal and as vital as skin and blood.
When the Duke of Norfolk comes for Wolsey’s palace and the Great Seal of England, he turns to the “butcher’s dog” and says: “Come and see me.”
Week 5: Make or Mar / Three-Card Trick
All Hallows, 1529, Esher Palance. The walls between the worlds grow thin, and Cromwell cries over Liz’s prayer book as his dead family turns the pages. George Cavendish sees him there by the window, crying, and realises how bad things are now. Cromwell tells him, “I’m finished”, and to save Wolsey, he must go to Parliament and speak for the cardinal. “Or they will kill him.”
Rafe Sadler gets Cromwell into Parliament, and Cromwell makes that visit to Norfolk. But he will not forsake Wolsey, he says. He sees the king, who will not talk of Wolsey. And he overhears a musician called Mark Smeaton spreading gossip that Anne is no maid. She has, everyone knows, slept with Thomas Wyatt.
Christmas 1529. “No year has brought such devastation.” Cromwell’s sister Kat is dead and so is Morgan Williams. Cromwell considers his daughters, who are dead, and his sons, who are living. He has more of them now, as Richard Williams will become Richard Cromwell. Cromwell holds no Epiphany feats because he knows no one will come. When the law students mock his lord cardinal, he has no choice but to leave. When he considers his “thick-fingered hands, scars and burn marks hidden in the palms” he wonders how he can convince anyone he is a gentleman. His sister’s medal is in the Thames, a part of him “that no living hand could take”.
In 1530, Cromwell finally has a proper interview with the king. “Your reputation is bad”, says Henry Tudor. “What would Your Majesty like me to be?” Cromwell does not back off, he does not concede he was wrong in opposing the king’s war. And his fortitude makes his monarch smile.
Wolsey says he should write Cromwell “a handbook” to serve the king. Each day, he, Cromwell, takes his instruction and rides to wherever Henry is. “He thinks of the king as a terrain into which he must advance, with no sea coast to supply him”.
When Norfolk comes after Cromwell, demanding that the cardinal go north, he threatens them with his teeth. It is alarming. But “Cromwell flesh is firm, dense and impermeable. The ducal finger just bounces off.”
Lenten supper, this Antonio Bonvisi, Spring 1530. “And what do you think, now you are a courtier?” asks Humphrey Monmouth.
There are smiles around the table. Because, of course, the idea is so ridiculous, the situation so temporary.
It is ridiculous to imagine someone like Cromwell so close to the king. “The king may raise up whom he will”, our lawyer reminds the room. Bonvisi: “Up to a point, Thomas.” It is in that room that Cromwell accuses More of bringing down the cardinal, of whispering in the king’s ear, and taking Wolsey’s chain of office.
Afterwards, he, Cromwell, and Bonvisi slip into Italian. He wants to know about Thomas Wyatt, who ran away on a diplomatic mission to Italy three years ago. Why the haste? Was it something to do with Lady Anne Boleyn?
That’s when Bonvisi tells him that the “cardinal is finished” and you soon as well, Master Cromwell, if you don’t watch your step. This evening has been a warning. “He will remember it”, he thinks, “if it proves fatal”. Bonvsis does not relent. Do not, he says, sit down with the Boleyns.
Week 6: Entirely Beloved Cromwell (Part 1)
The cardinal’s man goes to see Anne Boleyn, the lady bent on Wolsey’s destruction. She’s small and sharp and a force to be reckoned with. He makes the cardinal’s case, and she dismisses it and then dismisses him. Mary Boleyn hurries out to tell him that Anne is not pregnant because she’s the first to know. And there is another lady there with a pale face who seems exasperated with the lot of them.
As Cromwell prepares the cardinal to head north, there is an uncertainty about him. “Do you think I look like a murderer?” he asks his cook.
‘'Not like a murderer, no. But if you will forgive me, master, you always look like a man who knows how to cup up a carcase.’
In his memories, we learn of how he used to work in the Frescobaldi kitchen in Florence and how one day, they called him upstairs to the counting-house. He never went back to the kitchens, he never went back to war.
There’s a rage in him when Stephen Gardiner gets between him and the king. But he uses Thomas Howard to see Henry and ask for money to help the cardinal. Henry gives him a thousand pounds and tells him, “Every day, I miss the Cardinal of York.” Cromwell thanks him on his knees. “Dear God, Master Cromwell, you can talk, can’t you?”
The cardinal gives Cromwell a package, a ring or a seal. And when he kisses his master’s hand in farewell, he sees the turquoise ring is missing. Cromwell is not going with the cardinal. But what does this mean? Richard says '“His heart is leading him” and “it is time to let the cardinal go.” But at the same time, Cromwell cries in a courtyard recess and swears softly at life, and himself for giving way to its demands.
In Holy Week, Chapuy comes to tell him that the cardinal has no more credit with the emperor. He thinks Wolsey must avoid all foreign princes to save him from accusations of treason. Cromwell considers his memory system and how it makes him see people who are not there. But now he has begun to think of Johane in a way he should not.
He talks to a lonely and melancholic king. The king would like Cromwell to have a pedigree, a name he can understand. But the Putney boy will not fabricate one to please men who are better born. The king is impressed by Cromwell’s loyalty to the cardinal, but tonight he needs a distraction. So Cromwell tells him about monks and monasteries, and how undeserving they are of their wealth and reputation.
It’s a significant meeting. It is perhaps the moment when Cromwell is more than the cardinal’s man. He is now the king’s man also. And as summer comes round, Cromwell is making himself more useful, and helping Charles Brandon too.
At More’s house in Chelsea, Cromwell sizes up the carpet. He knows the trade, and More has bought poorly. There is a Holbein painting of the family on the wall, and Cromwell prefers it to the real thing. He pities Alice, More’s wife, and those who have to suffer More. Alice tells him that he should marry again, but he says, “No one will have me.” When Gardiner brings up the topic again on the boat, Cromwell is almost defensive: as though they know about Johane. He throws the question back on Gardiner, the churchman: “Oh, come on. Stephen. You must have women. Don’t you?” Chilly silence from Master Secretary.
Cromwell thinks: if and when the cardinal is returned to favour: “you’re all dead, Norfolk, Gardiner, More.”
Week 7: Entirely Beloved Cromwell (Part 2)
When he sees Anne, he thinks of her brother George and her father Thomas. They have got rich since the cardinal came down. He invites her to become his confidant, in not so many words. After all, they have interests in common and are both after their own advantage. She drops her head. Not tonight.
As Wolsey gets closer to his enthronement, he behaves more and more like a prince and not a cardinal. Cromwell is afraid of what this means. When Norfolk comes in frothing at the mouth, Cromwell hides his thoughts: “my lord would have made such an excellent king”.
Cromwell goes to see Anne. He asks Cramner why he never came to Cardinal College, and Cramner reminds him of the scholars dead in the fish cellar. Cromwell feels something like regret about turning down Mary Boleyn that one time, knowing that he would do it again. And a small suspicion crosses his mind that Jane Seymour left a vicious note in Anne’s bed: the king’s concubine sans tête.
Cromwell gets Cramner around to Austin Friars to pull the man’s story out of him. It is a very different story from his own. A loving father. A gentleman, who died when he was still a boy. The boy dreamed of Cambridge, while Cromwell dreamed of the world. Cramner asks him seriously whether it is true that he was “stolen by pirates”.
‘But the event never took place. Really. Pirates would have given me back.’
Talking to Cramner makes Cromwell feel rich. He has a family. “What has this man?” But Cromwell wants the cardinal back, “bottled rage and pain” in his breast. He talks of rumours that he “has been bought out”, men making “misunderstandings” between him and Wolsey. He would go and reassure Wolsey, but “there is no time.”
Cromwell in the butts with the king. He tells his king that he is “one of the others” who believe the king cannot act outside of law. It’s not the first time he has told Henry: no.
Cromwell is “increasingly where he shouldn’t be.” Like an audience of gentlemen of the court and the bedchamber, listening to Norfolk in a rage. Norfolk makes out that the king has no heirs. Cromwell reminds him of Mary. He says she can rule, with the right advisers and the right marriage. Norfolk tells the court a story of a servant who pulled the king out of a ditch. So, Cromwell thinks, a common man can save the king if needs must.
All Soul’s Day. “What have you been teaching them?” he asks Johane, because the children believe in the pope's powers and purgatory. While Richard denies the sacrament. Cromwell considers them “the survivors” of a battlefield, “his to direct”, who must learn “the defensive act of facing both ways.”
After news of the cardinal’s death, George Cavendish gives him the details. Cromwell think he “shall take it in hand” to avenge the cardinal, adding Harry Percy to his list for the arrest of Wolsey. Cromwell cannot bear to hear the story, although he does not cry. And when Cavendish says he wished Cromwell had been there, Cromwell says, “I too.” With George gone, he holds his fingers and thinks: “Henry I have your heart in my hand.” He opens the package from the cardinal and puts the turquoise ring on his finger: it fits as if it had been made for him.
Cromwell sits through the farce at Hampton Court, as four courtier devils drag Wolsey into hell. He makes sure to identify then men backstage. He walks the long walk home to Austin Friars, where he orders the cardinal’s arms to be painted over. “Leave a space,” he says.
Week 8: The Dead Complain of Their Burial / Arrange Your Face (Part 1)
In December 1530, Cromwell might expect arrest. The cardinal is dead, but he was charged with treason, and Cromwell was the cardinal’s man. When William Brereton comes in the night, it reminds him of when Liz dies. Children in their night-shifts, “forlorn and bewildered”. He placates them: “Go back to bed. The king wouldn’t order me to Greenwich to arrest me; it doesn’t happen that way.” But he doesn’t know how it happens. Not yet, anyway.
Cromwell thinks he sees the cardinal in the shadows, but it is Cranmer. The priest is telling Henry not to listen to his dreams. But Cromwell understands Henry and gives him a story he can believe; a story that flatters Henry’s sense of himself. Later, when Cranmer takes issue with Cromwell’s “vigorous invention”, Cromwell says:
‘Dr Cranmer, look at me. Believe me. I am sincere. I cannot help it if God has given me a sinner’s aspect. He must mean something by it.’
Later that day, Cromwell is sworn into the king’s council. “Give him a year or two, and we may all find ourselves superfluous,” says Thomas Boleyn. Cromwell seems to agree, looking at the ancient Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury. “I could do the job.” And, “Why can More never get a proper shave?” More hopes Cromwell will advise the king on what he “ought to do, not merely what he can do.” It seems unlikely.
1531. He has been busy passing legislation in Parliament, compelling the clergy to pay a fine. Sorry, “a benevolence.” For their allegiance to Rome.
“Wolsey was to me a father and a friend. That does not alter my feelings towards our Holy Mother the church.”
Queen Katherine: “The blacksmith makes his own tools.”
He is relieved to be away from the mother and the daughter, in the fresh air with Rafe, Gregory and Call-Me. He begins to tell a story. “He stops: what is this? I don't tell stories about myself.”
A story about making a new statue look old to sell to a cardinal. He and Cranmer have been up all night making their new precedents look old. Forgers and fakery.
“The question is, have you picked your prince? Because that is what you do, you choose him, and you know what he is… You give way to the king's requests. You open the way to his desires. That is what a courtier does.”
Brethren in the city, harassed by the Lord Chancellor, come to him for help. Cromwell can only do so much, but he is bullish about the prospect of More coming after him and his people:
Let him come near my people. I’ll drag him out of his court at Westminster and beat his head on the cobble till I knock into him some sense of the love of God and what it means.
Week 9: Arrange Your Face (Part 2)
It is spring, 1531. Thomas Cromwell is making it his business to be cheerful. He is on the king’s council and must look and act the part. At home, he decides to draw a line under his indiscretions with Johane Williamson, a married woman and sister to his late wife. They part amicably. “Thomas,” Mercy says, “when you’re cold and under a stone, you’ll talk yourself out of your grave.”
In the summer, Halley’s Comet is visible in the night sky. Austin Friars is busy. Theology in the garden, astronomy in his study. Petitioners visit hourly, and gentlemen send gifts of meat. Cromwell offers to help Thurston with the butchery. “Are our benefactors getting letters of thanks?”
Anne Boleyn is always with the king now. But her temper is no better. One of her enemies at court, Stephen Gardiner, has replaced Wolsey as Bishop of Winchester. She would prefer an ally as Master Secretary. Like Thomas Cromwell? “Too soon.” Little Bilney goes to the fire, and there are more burnings to come.
The king wants his two councillors, Cromwell and Gardiner, to settle their differences. But Cromwell thinks it will be better for Cromwell if they don’t. Later, Gardiner is sent on embassy to France, leaving him in charge in all but name.
Sir Henry Wyatt visits Austin Friars and tells the children stories of bad king Richard, a dungeon and a cat. He tells the one about the lion and his son, Thomas Wyatt. We meet him at the end of the year, drunk with his gentleman friends. “Say thank you to Master Cromwell… Who else would be up so early on a holiday, and with his purse open?”
When Cromwell dines with Anne Boleyn, he sees “she has made pets of the king’s friends.” A bigger set of fools you would go far to seek. They are all in love with Anne. “You don’t see it, do you?” says Henry Norris. They seem under some enchantment, like the one Chapuys would like him to break.
This is Cromwell in 1531. The courtier, the facilitator, the yes-man. So we end the chapter in 1497, when he was an unruly child with a self-made knife like an “evil tooth” ready to kill Cornishmen and a giant called Bolster. They hope the Cornish rebels will kill Walter too, but no such luck. The rebels are minced at Blackheath, and the giant is gone.
‘Dead till next time,’ his sister says.
Week 10: 'Alas, What Shall I Do For Love?' (Part 1)
It is early 1532, and Thomas Cromwell is moving against the clergy in Parliament. Stephen Gardiner feels obliged to lead the loyal opposition and it is Cromwell who saves Gardiner from losing his job as Master Secretary.
Cromwell is doing everyone’s job these days but has no office of his own. So, as Henry Wyatt suggested, he asks Anne Boleyn for a position in the Jewel House.
Thomas Wyatt comes to see Cromwell. He says he never slept with Anne Boleyn but thinks she has had other lovers. Cromwell says it suits him to take her at her own valuation: the queen-to-be is a virgin.
Thomas More comes to Austin Friars to threaten Cromwell. Cromwell remembers the burning of a Lollard he witnessed as a child.
In April, he becomes Keeper of the Jewel House. Hugh Latimer visits him and asks about James Bainham, awaiting execution. But Bainham must burn. Thomas Avery returns home with a book of mathematics by Luca Pacioli.
Cromwell bags two big fish in May: More resigns as Lord Chancellor. And Stephen Gardiner gets his house pinched by the king for Anne Boleyn, the queen-in-waiting. Cranmer writes from Nuremberg, with notes in the margin: he has a secret, he says.
The painter Hans Holbein is at Austin Friars. Holbein does not want to return home to the religious infighting in the Swiss cantons and cities. Cromwell assures him that he and the king have plenty of work for him.
But first a crisis: Harry Percy’s wife is petitioning for a divorce. He claims he is married to Anne Boleyn. The Boleyns and Howards call in Cromwell. They need a man like Wolsey to make Harry Percy go away. Cromwell steps up.
He meets with the earl and explains to him how the world works. And the next day the young earl swears on the Good Book that he was never married to Anne Boleyn. Later, at Austin Friars, Cromwell consults another case pending: a prophetess down in Kent speaking out against the king’s marriage.
“This girl, you know, she claims she can raise the dead.”
Week 11: 'Alas, What Shall I Do For Love?' (Part 2) / Early Mass
Summer, 1532. John Petyt has died. One less heretic, if you ask Sir Thomas More. One more martyr, if you speak to Humphrey Monmouth. The kingdom is fractious: congregations are heckling priests. Bards are writing ballads about Lady Anne: “The words are not repeatable in this company.”
Promotions are in order: Cromwell is now Clerk of the Hanaper and Anne is Marquess of Pembroke. Stephen Gardiner thinks she should settle for Marquess, and Charles Brandon says his wife won’t appear in the train of a harlot. So it’s Cromwell’s job to be peacemaker and king-pleaser as Anne edges throneward.
It is October, and we are going to Calais. It’s going to be the first international meeting of the kings of England and France since the Field of the Cloth of Gold. It must be bigger, better, and cost less. Demand the impossible, Master Cromwell.
At Canterbury, his grace the King has a run-in with the Holy Maid, Elizabeth Barton. The prophetess says he’ll be dethroned, stricken, and scorched within seven months of marrying Anne. Norfolk steps in and almost punches the nun. They sail for Calais, and Cromwell makes his glum king laugh. “It is welcome to his ears.”
Calais: Cromwell slips away to talk with alchemists and find a man called Giulio Camillo. He’s building something for the King of France, but Cromwell wants it for his master and for England. “The magister believes he would dislike the English climate,” they tell him. “And also, the whole island is covered with witches.”
The men leave the women behind at Calais to join the French court at Boulogne. There, Cromwell has a brief interview with King Francis. The Most Christian King can’t get his head around Cromwell or Anne. But he does give him a ruby in a glove. The dutiful servant passes it on to his monarch, who purchases it from his beloved councillor. “Two hours. Two kings.” He thinks. “What do you know, Walter?”
Singing and dancing. The French king spends too much time with Anne, so Cromwell makes Norfolk intervene. Norfolk dances: priceless stuff. Later, a Bible is needed and a door is unbolted. And outside, the other Boleyn girl is keeping her options open in the salty sea air. Cromwell thinks of another night in Cyprus and then another in Antwerp. The memories fold into one another and then again, into the night.
Early Mass, November, 1532. Cromwell is awoken from a bed of phantoms. The king has gone to Mass with his queen-to-be and comes out with a wife-that-is and a feather in his hat. A new era has begun.
Week 12: Anna Regina (Part 1)
At the start of 1533, Thomas Cromwell takes into Austin Friars Helen Barre, the wife or widow of a violent man who has left her with two children and no home. To his growing household, Cromwell also adds the Calais boy known as Christophe.
Before they left Calais, Cromwell inspected the library of Lord Berners. The governor of Calais is also Chancellor of the Exchequer. When he dies the following year, Cromwell is given the job. It’s his first real title.
Anne and Henry take their vows in secret at a chapel at Whitehall. Afterwards, Mary lets Cromwell know that she has let out Anne’s bodice. Her sister is pregnant. Cromwell passes on this secret to Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop Elect. Cranmer doesn’t reciprocate with his own secret, alluded to in a letter from Nuremberg.
Another secret is out in the world: Anne thinks she’s carrying the king’s heir. She is beaming with pleasure while mentally rounding up her enemies. Chapuy puts it plainly to Cromwell: Do you know how much you are staking on the body of one woman?
Anne has other plans. She wants to marry Mary Boleyn to Cromwell’s nephew, Richard. But the king overrules the match: he wants Mary for himself while her sister is carrying his heir. He calls Gregory “a very fine young man”, and Gregory almost dies of happiness.
At the Tower, Cromwell visits John Frith, a survivor from Wolsey’s fish cellar. He was locked up while Cromwell was in Calais and will be burned for books he cannot unwrite and beliefs he cannot unbelieve. Cromwell cannot save inflexible men.
The king sends him to see Katherine in secret. She will not recognise the court annulling their marriage, the new queen, or the archbishop. She denies correspondence with the king’s enemies. “I have brought England little good, but I would be loath to bring her any harm.”
Finally, Cromwell visits Thomas More at Chelsea. He must be convinced to attend the coronation, for his own sake. In his favour, he has written to the Holy Maid, Elizabeth Barton, advising her to cease to trouble the king with prophecies. While More’s daughter is out of the room fetching the letter, Cromwell does what he can to make More save Frith from the fire.
Frith. Katherine. More. For a persuasive man, Cromwell could do better. But at least his new robes have arrived. It is time for Cromwell to go into crimson.
Week 13: Anna Regina (Part 2)
June 1533. Anne Boleyn is crowned Queen of England. Four days of processions, ceremonies and feasting. And Thomas Cromwell is running everything, including the weather. He pays a visit to his neighbour Chapuys, a satirical procession for the ambassador who says he has failed his master and failed Katherine.
The coronation at Westminster Abbey allows Cromwell to survey the present and the future. He sees Anne’s enemies humbled and his enemies humiliated. And himself as the guardian of a prince of England, for twenty years to come.
He takes the king’s ring to Anne, a token of his love. But Anne is ungrateful because when will England love her? “When this creature is out of me,” she says. “Never,” says Lady Rochford, helpfully. In the wings, Mary Boleyn is tired and miserable. The king visits her nightly and all Cromwell can say is, “This will end. He will free you.”
In the gallery, the king and the French ambassadors are talking about Giulio Camillo’s theatre of memory. It sounds a little like witchcraft to the king of England. And besides, he doesn’t need a memory machine. He has Thomas Cromwell, who will replace Stephen Gardiner as his Master Secretary.
Meanwhile, the Archbishop of Canterbury summons his “chief friend,” Thomas Cromwell to reveal his marginal secret. In England, priests cannot marry. But Cranmer is hiding a pregnant German wife. “I hope for a daughter,” says Cranmer. “Jesus,” says Master Secretary. Cromwell installs Helen Barre as companion to Margarete. Rafe seems sad to see her go.
John Frith burns. The pope prepares to excomunicate the English king, meaning Henry will burn in hell for heresy. The prophetess Elizabeth Barton is brought in for questioning and rumours go around that Cromwell is keeping a woman in secret. And in August, Anne begins her confinement to deliver England its future king.
Week 14: Devil’s Spit / A Painter’s Eye
Autumn 1533. A princess of England is born. Cromwell is there when the king hears the news. For a moment, Henry is felled. But Cromwell’s other self, Thomas Cranmer, puts the king back on his feet. “It was like watching Lazarus get up,” says Thomas Cromwell.
Elizabeth Barton is brought to London for questioning. On her lips is the devil’s spit, and the prophecy that all heretics will be dead in six months. It is not quite treason. ‘I think new laws are needed,’ says Sir Richard Riche. ‘I have it in hand,’ says Thomas Cromwell.
Sunday supper at Austin Friars. A cosmopolitan table: statecraft and gossip. His niece Alice comes to see him: the Maid of Kent is close to breaking point. But so is Alice. Her mother has died and she wants to wed. Thomas Rotherham. Cromwell adds the boy’s name to his dead wife’s book of hours. Then crosses out another Thomas, Liz’s first husband. ‘I have got over Liz, he says to himself. Surely?’
Elizabeth Barton cracks. She confesses to being a fraud. Cromwell has them now: John Fisher, the Courtenays and the Poles. And “a fat haul of Franciscans.” Barton will do public penance while they decide what to do with the rest.
Jane Rochford comes to Cromwell. She offers friendship for information. Her husband, George Boleyn, wants her dead, she says. And the queen “craves novelty” beyond the stale bed of the King of England.
Cromwell counsels the king towards mercy and patience. Thomas More is adamant that he played no part in the affair. “Thomas. In the name of Christ, you know that.” He sounds rattled. But he will not recognise Henry as head of the church.
Anne Boleyn is pregnant again. This time, surely it will be a boy. They are breaking up the household of Lady Mary, the princess-that-was. She will go to Hatfield and serve the baby Elizabeth. Cromwell exerts his power and influence over the old families: telling Margaret Pole and Nicholas Carew what they must do.
1534, and Holbein’s portrait comes to Austin Friars. Everyone has an opinion and the real Thomas Cromwell learns that he is middle-aged, stout, and vain. The painter’s eye sees a man like a seawall with fingers that could wield a killing knife. I look like a murderer, Cromwell says.
Gregory says, ‘Did you not know?’
Week 15: Supremacy
1534. It’s a busy year for Parliament. It’s a busy year for Thomas Cromwell. A new law will give backing to the king’s marriage and require all England to swear an oath in its favour. But Anne doesn’t like the small print where it explains what happens if she dies.
Stephen Gardiner is back from France. But the king and Anne want him away from court, minding his flock. “Meanwhile we like Cromwell,” says the king. “Cromwell treats us well.” Cromwell is preparing a bill of attainder, charging with treason Elizabeth Barton and his co-conspirators. Anne makes him add Thomas More to the list alongside John Fisher. He visits Barton in the Tower.
The king sends Cromwell to Hatfield to review the arrangements of Elizabeth’s household. He takes Gregory, who says all the wrong things. And Cromwell speaks mildly to Mary, encouraging her to accept the world that is now. He explains to Gregory why their future still may depend on Mary Tudor.
Parliament will not let the king kill Thomas More. Norfolk, Audley, Cranmer and Cromwell get down on their knees and beg Henry to remove More’s name. It buys them some time to sit More down with the Act of Succession. He says he will be damned if he takes the oath, but he won’t say why. Cromwell loses his temper. Which feels like a victory for Sir Thomas More.
The next day, Cromwell is made Master Secretary. He returns to the city in Gardiner’s old barge with the Cromwell flag flying. Rafe picks this moment to tell him he has married Helen Barre. It is a terrible match for a boy born a gentleman. But Rafe can afford it. He will be Cromwell’s double at court and rise with him.
Thomas More’s family take the oath. Thomas More is sent to the Tower. Midsummer, the queen miscarries and “dragons stalk the streets, puffing out smoke and clattering their mechanical wings.”
Week 16: The Map of Christendom (Part 1)
Autumn, 1534. The king offers Cromwell the job of Lord Chancellor. It is Thomas Audley’s current title. Squawk squawk. And before him: Thomas More and Thomas Wolsey. But Cromwell eyes up a different job: Master of the Rolls.
It comes with a house in Chancery Lane, close to the Court and Parliament. Christophe goes with him to dust off the cobwebs. His move to the Rolls House makes him take stock of life: its growing magnificence veiling haunted hollows.
Ireland is in rebellion, and Cromwell serves a paranoid king with a gammy leg. He, Cromwell, visits More in the Tower. The prisoner must now swear an oath to the Act of Supremacy, recognising the king as head of the church. It’s just words, but More won’t budge.
Uproar in the Boleyn camp. Mary is pregnant, and Anne thinks it is the king’s. She is sent off to Kent, and Jane Seymour helps her pack.
Hans Holbein talks about the Queen of Sheba. Hans talks about Anselma. He knows who she is: Cromwell’s old flame in Antwerp. He could have her if he wants, Hans says. He, Cromwell, could have any woman in England.
Alice More comes to see him. She wants to plead the king’s mercy for her husband in the Tower. She talks about More’s piety and his hair shirt, but also her tenderness and desire to protect him.
New year, 1535. The king makes him his deputy in church affairs. It’s a new title: Vicegerent in Spirituals. It empowers him to visit, inspect and reform the monasteries. He is working harder than ever. Too hard. He falls ill. The Italian fever, he says. He is visited by the living and the dead. And then by the King of England himself, who calls him, “My dear Cromwell.”
When the king is gone, it is Johane who tells him the truth. “Henry,” she says, “is frightened of you.”
Week 17: The Map of Christendom (Part 2) / To Wolf Hall
The Duke of Norfolk visits Cromwell in his sickbed and goes away disappointed that the blacksmith’s boy is not yet dead. Chapuys puts his head around the corner: “My dear Thomas, you are always the only opponent.”
Death comes, and Death goes. “Knock him down and he will get up.” Cromwell returns to the land of the living to find everyone has cut their hair and Call-Me is still frightened of him.
April 1535. The Charterhouse monks refuse the oath and are tried for treason. They are hung, drawn and quartered. The king’s bastard Henry FitzRoy watches, to “learn the sights and sounds of slaughter.”
Thomas More is unmoved. He is preparing himself for death. But John Fisher will die first: the pope has made him a cardinal, and the king "swears he will send Fisher’s head across the sea to meet his hat.”
They put the oath to More one last time. Silence. They indict him for treason and take away his books. Left alone with Richard Riche, More lets slip that matters spiritual are rightfully determined “out of this realm.” “Hang him for a papist,” says Cromwell.
He visits More before the trial. The prisoner fears the manner of his death. He, Cromwell, says he would let him live, “to repent of your butcheries.”
The trial of Sir Thomas More. “It’s England against Rome, he says. The living against the dead.” The jury is fixed, Riche presents his evidence, and the judgement takes fifteen minutes. Afterwards, More breaks his silence and speaks his mind. He summons the dead. Take him out, says Norfolk. “It is finished.”
July, 1535. More to the scaffold, Cromwell to his garden. The rain abates and a map of England is laid before us. This summer, the court heads west. He, Cromwell, plots the route. There are some spare days in the itinerary and time to drop in on the Seymours. “Who says I never get a holiday?”
Early September. Five days. Wolf Hall.
Week 18: Falcons
Wiltshire, September, 1535. Cromwell is with the king as the court progresses through the home counties. The days are taken up with hunting and falconry, the evenings with entertainment, and the nights with the business of England.
This day, the king has lost his hat. In deference, everyone has gone bareheaded and is now sunburnt. Everyone except Master Secretary, who has the skin of a lily.
The king is with the Seymours of Wolf Hall. Old Sir John boasts that his daughters are “great hunters” but are not troubled by an education. They can dance, but don’t speak foreign tongues because “they’re not going anywhere.” Cromwell says his daughters were taught equal to his son Gregory.
Jane Seymour speaks of gossip and women’s secrets, and Francis Weston goads Cromwell, knowing the king protects him. Weston accuses him of bribing and threatening a guilty verdict out of Thomas More’s jury. The king falls asleep, and Jane wakes him.
Edward Seymour and Thomas Cromwell play chess, a rematch of their game in Calais. Seymour wants to talk about religion and affairs of state, and Cromwell is unusually candid. At chess, Cromwell wins again.
Upstairs, Rafe and Gregory are kicking Weston’s ghost and throwing him out the window. In their bed chamber, Gregory asks whether he will marry Jane Seymour. Alone, he, Cromwell, speaks to the trinity: to God, the cardinal, and Lady Rochford.
The next day, they cut short the chase, and Henry walks with Jane in the gardens of Wolf Hall. Cromwell observes them through glass. Afterwards, the king looks stunned. Early next morning, he sees Jane in her stiff finery, looking out into England.
Week 19: Crows (Part 1)
Autumn, 1535. Thomas Cromwell runs into Stephen Gardiner outside the king’s chamber. Gardiner has written a book defending the divinity of the king’s authority and supremacy as head of the church.
The court arrives at Winchester, and Anne’s bishops are concretated at the cathedral. Cromwell reflects on his souring relationship with Anne and his attempts to accommodate the men surrounding the king and queen.
The plague diverts the court to the Seymour house of Elvetham, where Cromwell arranges for Jane to be seen by the king. That night, Henry can’t sleep and summons Cromwell. The king asks him how he might free himself of his marriage to Anne.
This summer, Cromwell sent his inspectors to the kingdom’s monasteries. They are tasked with assessing the church's wealth and any good cause for the king to reclaim what is rightfully his. As he talks this over with his son Gregory, he reminds himself to visit Wolsey’s daughter Dorothea at Shaftesbury.
Back at Austin Friars, Cromwell visits the kitchens to get the London gossip from Thurston, the cook. The word on the street is that Anne is cuckolding the king. With whom? Thomas Wyatt, Henry Percy, and every gentleman of the privy chamber.
At Cromwell’s household council, discuss a turf war between George Boleyn and Nicholas Carew and Gardiner’s fresh appointment as ambassador to France. The empire is once again a threat to England, and Katherine of Aragon is dying.
Richard Riche says, “If she should die within the year, I wonder what world would be then?”