Dudley Rebellion
One of the most famous conspiracies that had been undertaken against Mary happened in December of 1555, when a man named Sir Henry Dudley decided to pit his wits against that of the queen. Sir Henry Dudley was related to John Dudley, who was the famed Duke of Northumberland. Dudley was the son of John Sutton de Dudley and he had one brother in Edmund Sutton.
Henry Dudley's mother was named Cecily and she was the daughter of Thomas Grey, who was known by his role as the Marquis of Forset. Grey, consequently, was related to the Duke of Suffolk and the famed Lady Jane Grey.
When the attempts were made to place Lady Jane Grey in the queen's throne, the Duke of Northumberland imparted great responsibility on Sir Henry. He deployed Sir Henry to King Henri II of France and gave him instructions to plead to the King for support in leading forces into England for this great cause.
In return for Henri II's support, Sir Henry said that there would be a forced surrender of both Calais and Guisnes, two very important military holdings. Not long after that, Dudley found himself in trouble when he was arrested for having property that belonged to the treasury, and under harsh questioning he soon revealed details of his mission.
Not long after that, there were many rumours abounding that Mary had the intention of crowning Felipe as King of England. This caused a lot of uproar within the country. Predictably, Sir Henry Dudley was at the forefront of this controversy. He helped them to realise that something had to be done.
His idea was simple, get rid of Queen Mary and Felipe, allowing Elizabeth to elevate to the throne. Dudley also had intentions of arranging a marriage of Elizabeth to Edward Courtenay, a man who was from the distinguished line of Edward IV.
After a lot of fundraising, there was an abundance of money to support the latest rebellion. Sir Henry Dudley had contacts at the Exchequer, from whom the funds were supposed to be appropriated. Dudley's plan was to smuggle this money across the border into France, where support for the cause was strong in Protestant circles. The money would purchase ships for use in the rebellion and mercenaries to man those ships. It was primarily Dudley's contacts in France that fuelled the rebellion.
In December of that year, Sir Henry made his way to Paris to personally seek the support of the King. Henri II had no interest in hearing his pleas though, as he had just signed a truce with Felipe. The King's promises for Dudley were vague at best. He provided no real support and gave no indication of a plan to provide future support.
The rally for support of this cause began to slow after a while. In the beginning, Dudley was able to motivate people to listen to him. After a few months, people began to fall off of the bandwagon, as the all-important members of the upper level gentry members did not exactly support the plot.
A few of the less important gentry members joined in Dudley's movement and a lot of the Queen's royal servants gave their support. All in all, it was not the outpouring of support that Sir Dudley has hoped for in the beginning.
There were plenty of other people who assisted in this famous rebellion. In addition to Dudley, who stirred up ill-feelings, a man named John Throckmorton was a contributor. Throckmorton was from Tortworth Gorseland. There were other folks from within this family to join up in the rebellion, as well. Some of those included were Sir Thomas Throckmorton and Nicholas Throckmorton of Coughton.
Records indicate that many other people were questioned harshly about their involvement following the incident. Among those were Lord Grey, Sir John Perrot, Francis Verney, Lord John Bray, and Anthony Kingston. Kingston was an important man given his role as the Queen's Comptroller and a parliament member for four different terms.
Some others were involved as well, including William Courtenay, who was the son of the first husband of Anthony Kingston's wife. Sir Reginald Bray was another who had involvement in this rebellion. He was known for his role as the advisor and minister to King Henry VIII and lived near Queen Elizabeth at the famed Hatfield Church.
Using the help of those few staunch supporters, Dudley started moving forward in January of 1555 with his conspiracy. They had prepared for this movement by hiding guns all over the country in very strategic locations. The Captain of Yarmouth Castle was one who helped to ensure that the harbour would be clear for those mercenaries who worked the invasion.
He also ensured that the embezzled funds continued to elude the Exchequer by hiding them in the water near the London Bridge. Leading up to the invasion, Dudley got in touch with Courtenay, who had been in Brussels. Courtenay was the man that was intended to marry Elizabeth, but Felipe caught wind of his activities and had a guardsman watch his movement in Brussels.
The plot was somewhat thwarted by the fact that many of Elizabeth's closest people knew what was going on. Though there was never any clear warning given to Elizabeth about the specifics of the insurrection, she was warned on many occasions to keep close quarters. In short, the throne knew something was amiss, but they did not know what it was.
A couple of months later in March, Sir Henry Dudley once again made his way to France. This time, his goal was to raise more manpower for his invasion that was set to enter at the Isle of Wight. From there, he made plans to march on London. Sir Anthony Kingston was placed in charge of the West and would also meet in London. The plan, as laid out by Kingston and Dudley, was to march through various spots in the city of London and set fire to those places.
Those fires would distract the royal supporters for long enough that Dudley could take royal monies from the Tower and the royal mint. A man named Richard Uvedale was put in charge of securing Yarmouth Castle and it was his important responsibility to give the Isle of Wight to the French as had been promised them.
For his part, John Throckmorton was given the task of enlisting the help of French aid. Though everything seemed to be working at a good pace, it was ultimately the apprehension of the French King Henri that would destroy the plan. Too many people were given huge responsibility in this mess, meaning that everything was thrown off schedule.
Eventually, word of the conspiracy made its way to the English ambassador to France. As was his job, this man sent word back to England that a conspiracy had been planned in France to eliminate Queen Mary from the throne. The ambassador made sure that the throne knew the significance of the situation, as he indicated that there were tons of supporters for this dangerous movement.
The plan really fell through when one of the small figures in the event lost his nerve and revealed the plot to Cardinal Pole. This man was Thomas White and he could not stand being a part of the rebellion for any longer. He had been assigned the role of stealing from the Exchequer and keeping hold of some of the cash.
The original plan had been to use a stolen key in order to gain access to the Exchequer's quarters, which was planned with the cooperation of a few important figures at that place. None of that could happen though, as the confession made it very difficult for the movement to survive for much longer. From there, all that was left was to round up the folks who had been mostly involved.
More than twenty arrests were made after the police got finished interrogating different parties related to the incident. The interrogations were said to be especially brutal, and many of them included extreme torture. Because of the torture, a lot of what had happened and most of the plot was confessed by the people who were arrested. The conspirators were jailed and many attempts were made by saddened wives as they tried to seek a way to get their husbands out of jail.
One of the most telling statistics from the conspiracy was the large number of people involved who had close connections to Queen Elizabeth. This was an indication of the large dissatisfaction with the Queen as many of her closest friends were involved. Some French men were involved as well, but they were recalled by King Henri prior to arraignment.
The fallout from this incident was substantial, as the Queen struggled to rationalise the incident and put it into context. She became troubled and paranoid for many years to come. From then on, she would conduct investigations each time she felt that something might be on the horizon.
The instigator of the event, Sir Henry Dudley, was able to escape jail as he hid out in France for most of the time. This was common for the conspirators, most of who were either jailed or fled to France. Elizabeth even pardoned some of her closest friends as lots of them went on to hold prominent roles in her office. Nicholas Throckmorton went on to serve in Parliament after being pardoned.
Original Authors: Coby DuBose
Edit Update Authors: M.A.Harris
Updated On: 15/05/2008
