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A Regime at Sea: The Navy and the 1553 Succession Crisis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 July 2014

J. D. Alsop
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Extract

The navy occupied a significant position in the 1553 succession crisis. However, assessments of its role hitherto have been hampered by conflicting contemporary observations and a paucity of information. Not all issues of consequence can be resolved, but important fresh evidence, particularly, extensive High Court of the Admiralty documentation for one of the royal ships dispatched by the Duke of Northumberland to the East Anglian coast following Edward VI's death, permits a reappraisal of the episode and its significance for the events of that year. The evidence confirms that the Northumberland regime experienced difficulty from the outset in its attempt to establish Lady Jane Grey on the throne, and it suggests that the regime's perceived strengths—in this instance the mid-Tudor navy—were all too frequently illusory.

Type
Research Article
Information
Albion , Volume 24 , Issue 4 , Winter 1992 , pp. 577 - 590
Copyright
Copyright © North American Conference on British Studies 1992

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References

1 The Accession of Queen Mary: Being the Contemporary Narrative of Antonio De Guaras, A Spanish Merchant Resident in London, ed. and trans. Garnett, R. (London, 1892), p. 93Google Scholar.

2 The account of the surveyor-general of naval victuals, 29 September 1552–1 January 1555: Public Record Office [P.R.O.], E 351/2356.

3 Ibid.; Glascow, T. Jr., “List of Ships in the Royal Navy From 1539 to 1588,” Mariner's Mirror 56 (1970): 299–307Google Scholar.

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7 Hair, P. E. H. and Alsop, J. D., English Seamen and Traders in Guinea, 1553–1565 (Lampeter, 1992)Google Scholar.

8 P.R.O., E 351/2356. This account was first used to illuminate the succession struggle in, Jack, S. M., “Northumberland, Queen Jane and the Financing of the 1553 Coup,” Parergon n.s. 6 (1988): 142CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Professor Jack states that the victualling evidence suggests that eleven ships were prepared during the crisis. Apparently, she arrived at this total by running together the lists of seven ships victualled in the period up to 6 July 1553 and the nine ships victualled in the period beginning on 6 July, thus producing a list of eleven different ships, without considering that the vessels were not necessarily victualled continuously throughout these periods and without observing that the preparation of the Primrose was underway independent of the political events.

9 P.R.O., E 351/2356; Glascow, “List of Ships.” In view of the evidence presented below, the ships were probably undermanned. When the Hart and Antelope put to sea under more settled conditions earlier in 1553 to pursue the pirate Strangeways they were almost ten percent under strength (P.R.O., E 351/2356).

10 P.R.O., Prob. 11/37, fos. 47–47v, 52v. Interestingly, at the conclusion of the Guinea voyage, the surviving crewmen of the Primrose submitted a wage claim for a longer period of service than the merchants were willing to accept. This may, in part, have been a consequence of a temporary diversion of the ship into the service of Northumberland's regime (P.R.O., HCA 13/9, fos. 172v–180v).

11 P.R.O., HCA 24/24/80; Calendar of State Papers, Spanish, ed. Bergenroth, G. A., et al., 15 vols. (London, 1862–1954), 12: 24–25Google Scholar; P.R.O., E 351/2195.

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13 P.R.O., Prob. 11/37, fo. 200v. There exists the possibility that the “Sir [sic] Thomas” Windham ordered to London on 25 July along with two Norfolk gentry was in fact Thomas's elder half-brother, Sir Edmund Windham. If so, that event bears no relation to the affair of the ships. For the belief that the individual in question was Sir Edmund, see Bindoff, S. T., The House of Commons, 1509–1558, 3 vols. (London, 1982), 2: 353, 3: 676Google Scholar.

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23 A.P.C., 4: 295.

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25 P.R.O., HCA 13/9, fos. 149–49v (William Conwey, master gunner), 150 (Thomas Parkar, gunner), 150v–51 (John Grene, gunner), 151–51v (John Hurlock, master), 152–52v (Thomas Lysse, gunner), 153–53v (James Malam, gunner), 153v–54 (Thomas Parkar), 154–54v (John Grene), 195v–96 (William Conwey), 197v–98 (William Harris, master gunner's mate), 198–99 (Brian West, position unidentified). The notional complement of the Greyhound was 120 men (Glascow, , “List of Ships,” p. 302Google Scholar).

26 The Diary of Henry Machyn, Citizen and Merchant-Taylor of London, From A.D. 1550 to A.D. 1563, ed. Nichols, J. G. (London, 1848), p. 35Google Scholar.

27 A.P.C., 4: 432. Grice was apparently not accepted into Mary's service and sworn immediately upon arrival. One witness testified that Grice was first imprisoned at Framlingham (fo. 198).

28 “Vita Mariae”, p. 297, note 46.

29 Ibid., pp. 252, 255, 295, note 19.

30 A.P.C., 4: 295.

31 Jack, , “Financing the Coup,” pp. 142–43Google Scholar and passim.

32 A.P.C., 4: 417–18.

33 Ibid., p. 383. The Greyhound was lost upon Rye bar in a storm during the French war of 1563 (P.R.O., E 351/2199).

34 This voyage gave rise to an unrelated lawsuit against Hurlock (P.R.O., HCA 13/9, fos. 177v–78, 196–97).

35 Calendar of the Patent Rolls Preserved in the Public Record Office, Elizabeth I, ed. Collingridge, J. H. and Wernham, R. B., 2 vols. (London, 1939–), 1: 27Google Scholar.

36 P.R.O., E 351/2359.

37 P.R.O., HCA 13/9, fos. 196, 198; Calendar of the Patent Rolls Preserved in the Public Record Office, Philip and Mary, 1553–58, ed. Giuseppi, M. S., 4 vols. (London, 1936–1939), 1Google Scholar: passim. The commander of the squadron, Richard Brooke, who swore his loyalty to Mary on the same day as Grice, did receive a pardon (ibid., p. 451).

38 Calendar of Patent Rolls, Elizabeth I, 2: 208Google Scholar.

39 P.R.O., HCA 13/9, fo. 149; The Report of the Royal Commission of 1552, ed. Richardson, W. C. (Morgantown, WVa., 1974), p. 123Google Scholar.

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41 Alsop, J. D., “From Muscovy to Guinea: English Seamen of the Mid-Sixteenth Century,” Terrae Incognitae 19 (1987): 60–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

42 Braddock, R. C., “The Character and Composition of the Duke of Northumberland's Army,” Albion 6 (1974): 342–56CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also, Tighe, W. J., “The Gentleman Pensioners, the Duke of Northumberland, and the Attempted Coup of July 1553,” Albion 19 (1987): 1–11CrossRefGoogle Scholar; R. C. Braddock, “The Duke of Northumberland's Army Reconsidered,” ibid., pp. 13–17.

43 Hasler, P. W., The House of Commons 1558–1603, 3 vols. (London, 1981), 2: 226Google Scholar. I am grateful to Dr. Diarmaid MacCulloch for providing information on the East Anglian connections of the Grice family.

44 Most recently in Jack, , “Financing the Coup,” pp. 137–48Google Scholar.

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