A HISTORY OF BEDFORDSHIRE 



over to the king all his manors and lands, including Ampthill, by 

 an indenture dated 28 November 1508, Thomas Wolsey being one of the 

 witnesses."* Ampthill was one of the favourite hunting seats of Henry VIII. 

 He was there from 21 August to 3 September 1530, and again in September 

 1531,"" and in July 1532 he was accompanied by Anne Boleyn. The Bishop 

 of Bayonne, who was there for diplomatic purposes, describes how the king 

 placed him with Lady Anne to shoot the deer as they passed, and how Anne 

 gave him a hunting frock and hat, with a horn and a greyhound."' 



In sad contrast to this gay party was the sojourn of Catherine of Aragon 

 at Ampthill in the following year. On her final parting from the king in 1 53 1 

 she lived first in various houses in Hertfordshire, and later Ampthill was placed 

 by Henry at her disposal."^ Of her life there we know but little."' That she 

 was unhappy and bravely determined to make no surrender of her station as 

 queen and lawful wife, stands out clearly from the accounts of two interviews 

 with her. There is some record of the manner of her life a few months later 

 at Buckden and at Kimbolton ; and there her time was mainly given to 

 prayer and the offices of religion, and to needlework with her ladies in atten- 

 dance."' On 10 May 1533 Cranmer, who had recently been elevated to the See 

 of Canterbury (one might almost say ad hoc), opened his court at Dunstable to 

 adjudicate upon the king's claim to divorce, and the Bishops of London, 

 Winchester, Lincoln, and Bath and Wells sat with him. The priory had 

 been selected as it was within reach of Ampthill."" The queen was cited to 

 appear under the style of ' the Lady Catherine,' but she refused to accept any 

 decision save that of the pope, and made no appearance in person or by 

 representative ; ' there came no servant of hers in Dunstable but only such as 

 be brought in as witnesses ' to give evidence of her relations with Prince 

 Arthur. She was accordingly declared contumacious, and on 23 May sentence 

 was pronounced and formally recited in the Lady Chapel of the priory.'"^ 

 On 3 July Lord Mountjoy, who was her chamberlain, and four other 

 gentlemen of her household waited upon her at Ampthill to remonstrate 

 with her for using the title of queen. They found her lying upon a 

 pallet, as she had hurt her foot, and suffering from a bad cough. When 

 she heard herself addressed as ' Princess Dowager,' she at once took 

 exception to the title. She would not even by silence admit that she had 

 been other than the king's honourable wife for twenty-four years, though she 



"' Cat. And. D. A 13485. '" Extracts from Privy Purse Expenditure, Beds. N. and Q. i, 192. 



"» L. and P. Hen. Fill, v, 1 187. 



'" The time of her arrival there is uncertain. Froude, Hist. Engl. (1875), i, 454, infers that she had 

 ' entered on her sad tenancy as soon as the place had been evacuated by the gaudy hunting party of the pre- 

 ceding summer,' but she was at Hertford in November 1532 ; L. and P. Hen. Fill, w, 1520. 



^'^ M\%i SlilckhinA, Queens of Engl. (1851), ii, 539-40, attributes several of Catherine's letters to this 

 period, but the evidence of their date and place is not clear. 



™ Harpsfield, Pretended Divorce of Hen. Fill (Camd. Soc), 200. Of lace we hear nothing to support 

 the late tradition of a connexion between her residence at Ampthill and Bedfordshire lace-making. She had 

 come to England a girl of fifteen, and had lived here for more than a quarter of a century. Of connexion 

 between the methods or patterns of Spanish and Bedfordshire lace experts must be left to speak. Corroboration 

 is sought in the fact that the lace-makers used to keep St. Catherine's Day ; but this proves nothing, for few 

 saints were more popular in the Middle Ages than St. Catherine. She was the patroness of schoolgirls, as 

 St. Nicholas was of schoolboys, and the keeping of their days, as of those of St. Clement and the Holy 

 Innocents, was condemned hy Cranmer as a superstition ' heretofore used ' (Rock, Church of our Fathers [ed. 

 1904], iv, 255-6). For 'Catherning' on 25 November, see E. K. Chambers, Medieval Stage, i, 253. 



'°° The distance between the two places is 1 1 miles as the crow flies, not ' 6 miles,' as Froude carelessly 

 repeats from Hall, Chron. (1809), 796. 



™ L. and P. Hen. Fill, vi, 470, 495-6, 528 ; S.?. Hen. Fill, i, 395. 



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