Margaret Tudor
 Margaret,
the first daughter of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York, was born at the
Palace of Westminster on the 28th of November 1489. She was christened
two days later in St. Margaret’s, Westminster. One of her godparents was
her grandmother, Margaret Beaufort, who was presumably also her
namesake. The royal children had their own household at Eltham. In
preparation for a future as a royal consort, Margaret was taught to play
the lute and clavichord and learned French and some Latin. She was also
skilled at archery.
From an early age, Margaret was part of Henry
VII’s negotiations for important marriages for his children and her
betrothal to James IV of Scotland was made official by a treaty in 1502
even though discussions had been underway since 1496. Part of the delay
was the wait for a papal dispensation because James’ great-grandmother
was Joan Beaufort, sister of John Beaufort, who was the
great-grandfather of Margaret Tudor. That made James IV and Margaret
Tudor fourth cousins, which was within the prohibited degree. Patrick
Hepburn, the Earl of Bothwell, acted as a proxy for James IV of Scotland
for his betrothal to Margaret Tudor at Richmond in January 1502 before
the couple was married in person.
Before Margaret left for
Scotland, her family suffered two terrible losses. In April 1502,
Margaret’s brother Arthur, eldest of the Tudor children, died in Ludlow
Castle on the border of England and Wales. Less than a year later,
Margaret’s mother, Elizabeth of York, died shortly after giving birth to
a daughter. The child, named Katherine, died shortly after her mother.
Margaret finally departed for Scotland from Richmond Palace on the
2nd of July, 1503. On they way she made a stop at her grandmother
Margaret Beaufort’s estate at Collyweston, and then continued on the way
north.
Richard Grafton describes Margaret's journey to Scotland
for her wedding:
"Thus this fair lady was conveyed with a great
company of lords, ladies, knights, esquires and gentlemen until she came
to Berwick and from there to a village called Lambton Kirk in Scotland
where the king with the flower of Scotland was ready to receive her, to
whom the earl of Northumberland according to his commission delivered
her."
And later he says:
"Then this lady was taken to the
town of Edinburgh, and there the day after King James IV in the presence
of all his nobility married the said princess, and feasted the English
lords, and showed them jousts and other pastimes, very honourably, after
the fashion of this rude country. When all things were done and finished
according to their commission the earl of Surrey with all the English
lords and ladies returned to their country, giving more praise to the
manhood than to the good manner and nature of Scotland."
The
wedding finally took place for real (after several proxy marriages) on 8
August, 1503 at Holyrood House in Edinburgh – Margaret was 13 and James
was 30. Margaret was officially crowned Queen in March 1504. The
Scottish poet William Dunbar (1460–1513) wrote several poems to Margaret
around this time, including “The Thistle and the Rose”, “To Princess
Margaret on her Arrival at Holyrood” and others after she was Queen (see
the poetry page).
Margaret was apparently homesick and not happy
in her early days in Scotland, as is evident in a letter [image and
transcript] she wrote to her father, Henry VII. (The two different
handwritings in the letter are because the top part was written by a
secretary and the bottom section section is in Margaret's own hand.)
Margaret’s first pregnancy was in 1506 and she gave birth to a son,
James, in February 1507 who lived about a year. Margaret next gave birth
to a daughter in July 1508 who only survived for a few hours. In 1509,
Margaret’s father died and her brother was now Henry VIII, the new king
of England. Early in that year Margaret became pregnant once again and
gave birth to another son, this one named Arthur, in October. However,
this child also died at a young age, only nine months old.
Margaret’s next child was born on April 11, 1512 at Linlithgow and named
James. This child, unlike all those before him, lived to adulthood and
at little over a year old he was to succeed his father as James V. The
Queen became pregnant yet again shortly afterwards and gave birth to
another daughter, who died a few hours later.
In the first few
years of Henry VIII’s reign, the relations with Scotland became
strained, and would eventually erupt into war. In 1513, Henry VIII went
to France to conduct military campaigns and made Queen Catherine of
Aragon regent the Earl of Surrey (who had conducted Margaret to
Scotland for her wedding) was in charge of the forces that had remained
in England. Surrey and the Queen took forces to the northern border,
waiting for the Scottish attack. Margaret was pregnant for what would be
the last time by James IV.
James began his march to the border in
August and actually crossed the border into England. The final battle in
this conflict would be on September 9th at
Flodden Field where James IV died in battle leaving his and
Margaret's infant son as King James V. The boy was crowned King on
September 21st and according to James IV’s will, Margaret was to act as
regent until James came of age as long as she did not remarry. At the
time of James IV’s death, Margaret was pregnant with the the late King’s
child. The baby, a boy named Alexander, was born in April 1514 and given
the title Duke of Ross.
Margaret did not help her case for
remaining regent by remarrying in August 1514. Her second husband was
the powerful Scottish lord
Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus. John Stuart, Duke of Albany (a
cousin to the king, and next in line to the throne after little
Alexander’s death), was invited by the Scottish lords to be Regent.
Albany had been living in France with his mother’s relatives and served
three French kings - Charles VIII, Louis XII and Francis I. Albany
arrived in Scotland in May 1515.
 |
Margaret Tudor and Archibald Douglas.
Detail from a painted family tree of James I and VI of England
and Scotland |
Despite being pregnant, Margaret
and her husband fled to England in September 1515 after her children by
James IV (James V and Alexander) had been taken from her, she was denied
the regency and she was not receiving her income from James' will or the
revenues from her lands in Scotland. Her brother arranged for her to be
lodged comfortably at Harbottle Castle in the north of England and it
was there that she gave birth to her daughter,
Margaret Douglas in October. Margaret
fell very ill after her daughter's birth and nearly died. Her younger
son by James IV, Alexander Duke of Ross, died in December of that year,
but Margaret was not immediately informed due to her bad health.
Margaret's husband returned to Scotland, but she journeyed south to
London, arriving in May 1516 where she was welcomed with festivities
that lasted for a month. Margaret stayed in England for about a year
before returning to Scotland under promise of safe conduct in June 1517.
The marriage of Margaret and Angus turned out to be disastrous.
While he was in Scotland and she was in England, Angus had taken a
mistress and was living off of Margaret's Scottish revenues. The next
few years were terrible for Margaret, with a horrible marriage, no
money, no power and very little contact with her son James.
In
1524 Margaret, in alliance with the Earl of Arran, overthrew Albany's
regency and her son was invested with his full royal authority. James V
was still only 12, so Margaret was finally able to guide her son's
government, but only for a short time since her husband, Angus, returned
from England and took control of the King and the government from 1525
to 1528.
In March 1527, Margaret was finally able to attain an
annulment of her marriage to Angus from Pope Clement VII and by the next
April she had married Henry Stewart(1), who had previously been her
treasurer. Margaret's second husband then arrested her third husband on
the grounds that he had married the Queen without approval. The
situation was improved when James V was able to proclaim his majority as
king (he was 16 at the time) and remove Angus and his family from power.
James created his new stepfather Lord Methven and the Scottish
parliament proclaimed Angus and his followers traitors. However, Angus
had escaped to England and remained there until after James V's death.
Margaret's relationship with her son was relatively good, although
she pushed for closer relations with England, where James preferred an
alliance with France. In this, James won out and was married to Princess
Madeleine, daughter of the King of France, in January 1537. The marriage
did not last long because Madeleine died in July and was buried at
Holyrood Abbey. After his first wife's death, James sought another bride
from France, this time taking Marie de Guise (eldest child of the
Claude, Duc de Guise) as a bride. By this same time, Margaret's own
marriage had followed a path similar to her second one when Methven took
a mistress and lived off his wife's money.
On October 18, 1541,
Margaret Tudor died in Methven Castle in Scotland, probably from a
stroke. Margaret was buried at the Carthusian Abbey of St. John’s in
Perth, Scotland. Although Margaret's heirs were left out of the
succession by Henry VIII and Edward VI, ultimately it would be
Margaret's great-grandson James VI who would become king after the death
of Elizabeth I.
Notes:
1. As part of the marriage settlement
he endowed his wife in the lands of Glenrinne, Balloch and Auchintorlies
in the Earldom of Lennox, the baronies of Cruckisfew, Inchinnan and
Craig of Nielston in the lordship of Darnley and the lands of Erere in
Perthshire.
Any contributions will be
gratefully accepted
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