On this day in 1536, three arrests were made in relation to the downfall of Queen Anne Boleyn.
Sir Henry Norris is Arrested
Sir Henry Norris, once one of Henry VIII’s most trusted men, had already been questioned the previous day by the King himself during their sudden departure from the May Day joust. Whatever was said during that journey from Greenwich to Westminster sealed Norris’s fate. On the morning of the 2nd of May, he was officially taken to the Tower under arrest.
Anne Boleyn Is Summoned
That same morning, Queen Anne Boleyn received a summons to appear before the King’s council. The meeting took place at Greenwich Palace, and was led by her uncle, the Duke of Norfolk. There, Anne was formally accused of adultery – not just with Mark Smeaton, who had already been arrested and confessed, but also with Norris, and a third man whose name was not yet revealed.
Anne denied the charges forcefully, insisting on her innocence. She later described being treated harshly, claiming some councillors barely listened while others scoffed. Norfolk, she said, simply shook his head in disapproval.1 Her arrest was ordered, and she was sent back to her chambers to await her fate.
The Queen is Taken to the Tower
By early afternoon, the tide on the Thames had turned – literally. At around 2pm, Anne was escorted from Greenwich to the Tower of London by barge. Accounts differ slightly on who accompanied her, but key figures likely included the Duke of Norfolk, Thomas Cromwell, and Sir William Kingston, the Constable of the Tower.
Anne arrived at the Tower around 5pm. Upon entering through the Byward Tower, she fell to her knees and pleaded her innocence, begging the lords with her to be kind and asking them to speak to the King on her behalf.2
She was then taken to the same royal apartments she had stayed in during her coronation just three years earlier, a bitter twist of fate. According to Kingston, she was overwhelmed with emotion, breaking into tears, then laughter, then prayer. She asked if she would be placed in a dungeon. When Kingston replied that she would be lodged in her former rooms, she replied: “It is too good for me… Jesu have mercy on me.”
In a letter to Cromwell, Kingston recorded a detailed account of Anne’s arrival at the Tower:
“On my lord of Norfolk and the King’s Council departing from the Tower, I went before the Queen into her lodging. She said unto me, “Mr. Kingston, shall I go into a dungeon?” I said, “No, Madam. You shall go into the lodging you lay in at your coronation.” “It is too good for me, she said; Jesu have mercy on me;” and kneeled down, weeping a good pace, and in the same sorrow fell into a great laughing, as she has done many times since.
She desired me to move the King’s highness that she might have the sacrament in the closet by her chamber, that she might pray for mercy, for I am as clear from the company of man as for sin as I am clear from you, and am the King’s true wedded wife. And then she said, Mr. Kingston, do you know where for I am here? and I said, Nay. And then she asked me, When saw you the King? and I said I saw him not since I saw [him in] the Tiltyard. And then, Mr. K., I pray you to tell me where my Lord my father is? And I told her I saw him afore dinner in the Court. O where is my sweet brother? I said I left him at York Place; and so I did.
I hear say, said she, that I should be accused with three men; and I can say no more but nay, without I should open my body. And there with opened her gown. O, Norris, hast thou accused me? Thou are in the Tower with me, and thou and I shall die together; and, Mark, thou art here to. O, my mother, thou wilt die with sorrow; and much lamented my lady of Worcester, for by cause that her child did not stir in her body. And my wife said, what should be the cause? And she said, for the sorrow she took for me. And then she said, Mr. Kyngston, shall I die without justice? And I said, the poorest subject the Kyng hath, hath justice. And there with she laughed.”3
After the initial shock of her arrest had soaked in, though still very raw, it is clear that Anne cared a great deal about her brother, her sweet brother. And that leads us to the third and final arrest of this most tragic day.
The Arrest of George Boleyn
Unknown to Anne at the time, her brother George had also been arrested that very afternoon. Taken from Whitehall Palace, he was brought to the Tower shortly before Anne.4 It’s not clear whether George had gone to Whitehall to seek an audience with the King or if he had simply walked into the trap laid for him, but either way, he was now imprisoned alongside his sister.
Initially, there was confusion over why George had been arrested at all.5 It wasn’t until later that the charge of incest was made public, a scandalous and shocking accusation that stunned even the most seasoned observers of court politics.
The Final Days Begin
By the end of the 2nd of May 1536, the Queen of England, her brother, and one of the King’s closest companions were locked inside the Tower. The wheels of Anne Boleyn’s downfall were now fully in motion, and there would be no turning back.
- Cavendish, George (1825) The Life of Cardinal Wolsey, Vol. II, p. 224. MS. Cotton Otho C. X. fol. 224b. ↩︎
- Wriothesley, Charles (1875) A chronicle of England during the reigns of the Tudors, from A.D. 1485 to 1559 Volume 1, p. 36. ↩︎
- Cavendish, p. 217-218. MS. Cotton Otho C. X. fol. 225. ↩︎
- Wriothesley, Charles (1875) A chronicle of England during the reigns of the Tudors, from A.D. 1485 to 1559 Volume 1, p. 36. ↩︎
- Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, Henry VIII, Volume 10 – January-June 1536, 784. ↩︎
