What was Derbyshire like during the Tudor period?

A king lay mutilated on the battlefield and a new dynasty would hold sway for nearly 120 years.

It was August 22 1485 and Richard III had lost life and throne at Bosworth, in Leicestershire. He’d later be dug up from beneath a council car park, some 527 years after his death in battle.

The man who defeated him, against all the odds, became the first Tudor monarch as the suspicious, parsimonious Henry VII (1457-1509), reigning from 1485 to 1509.

There has long been a worldwide fascination with the Tudors, but how did they – and the era they ruled in - impact Derbyshire?

The people of this time were understandably comforted that the civil war of 30 years’ duration, the Wars of the Roses (1455-85), was finally over and the nation return to a period of relative peace.

The Tudors, at least initially, brought stability. When the austere Henry VII died in 1509 with the country in a sound state financially there was, however, trouble ahead.

This came in the form of a mighty leviathan in the wings, a young man ready to raid the coffers built up with spreadsheet precision by his late father. We’re talking, of course, of his son, Henry VIII (1491-1547, reigned 1509-47).

Henry VIII is most famous for his six wives, being irascible, and becoming ‘hefty’ in later life – he was, interestingly, a fine figure of a man and a talented athlete in his youth.

There’s more significance to the second Tudor Henry than this though. His yearning for a son and hot temper led not only to the divorce or execution of four wives, but also the break with Rome – a decision of gargantuan proportions which is still felt today.

The monarch became head of the English church and the English Reformation and the brutal dissolution of the Monasteries began.

There are certainly a number of striking and romantic ruins around Derbyshire courtesy of Henry VIII and his Dissolution.

Dale (Stanley Park) Abbey, dissolved in 1538, is one such example. Much of its splendid stained glass ended up in Morley’s parish church of St Matthew (check out the chancel’s north windows).

Part of the Abbot's lodging at Darley Abbey has survived Photo: John McLinden, Flickr Darley Abbey, also dissolved in 1538, was not totally lost as the popular Abbey Pub, recently reopened, is a survivor, believed to have been part of the Abbot’s lodging.

Repton Priory was another 1538 dissolution, but these ruins, including the original arched gateway, were eventually incorporated into Repton School by its founder Sir John Port in 1556.

I like quirky stuff and Derbyshire-born Thomas Cockayne’s tomb at St Oswald’s, Ashbourne, fits the bill.

Cockayne (c.1469-1537) was knighted by Henry VIII at the Siege of Tournai (1513), fought at the Battle of the Spurs (also 1513) and was present at the famous Field of the Cloth of Gold in 1520 which has gone down in history; a lavish affair which saw Henry meet the French king, Francis I, in opulent splendour.

Cockayne’s tomb bears these words: ‘And did his house and name restore, Which others had decayed before’. Supposedly, this is believed to be the earliest rhyming epitaph in existence.

We should briefly mention two other Tudor monarchs, Henry VIII’s only legitimate surviving son, Edward VI (1537-53, reigned 1547-53), a keen Protestant, and eldest daughter, Mary I (1516-58, reigned 1553-58), an even keener Catholic.

The Hunting Tower at Chatsworth Photo: Jane Holland The year 1553 three monarchs with the death of Edward; the Protestants’ attempt to put the pliable Lady Jane Grey on the throne (the Nine Days’ Queen); and the accession of Mary.

I’m hurrying on through to the last Tudor monarch, Elizabeth I (1533-1603, reigned 1558-1603), ‘Gloriana’, the first great Elizabethan age.

1553 was also the year when Sir William Cavendish and his wife, the famed Bess of Hardwick, began building the ’new house’ at Chatsworth.

Sir William may have died in 1557 but the redoubtable Bess had the job finished in the 1560s and lived there with fourth husband, George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury.

Bess’s Chatsworth is not what you see today, however, as the house was rebuilt between c.1687-1708, leaving just Bess’s Hunting Tower in the woods.

In 1568 Talbot was granted custody of Mary, Queen of Scots who resided at Chatsworth on several occasions over 15 years between 1569 and 1584 during her lengthy house arrest.

Mary was also allowed to visit Buxton as a ‘cure’ for her rheumatism, paying frequent visits over the course of a decade (1573-84) and staying up to a month at a time, although her guard remained ever vigilant as she increasingly became a magnet for Catholic conspiracies aimed at ousting Elizabeth.

The old and the new at Hardwick Hall Photo: Jim Holden/English Heritage To find a more durable memorial of Bess’s, head for Hardwick Hall where the Old Hall, a ruined shell today, is where she was born in 1520.

After she’d been widowed a fourth time, Bess’s thirst for building is evidenced once more as she commenced work on the New Hall (c.1591-97) which is notable for its symmetry and windows.

One renowned ‘guest’ at Hardwick was Lady Arbella Stuart (1575-1615), considered a possible successor to Elizabeth, being descended from Henry VIII’s sister Mary.

Orphaned aged seven in 1582, Arbella spent much of her childhood at Hardwick as Bess’s ward.

Another of Derbyshire’s great houses is Haddon Hall with its grand Tudor hall and Elizabethan gardens, which became associated with the Manners family, the Dukes of Rutland, from the 1560s.

Once larger than Haddon was Wingfield Manor House, now ruined. Another possession of the Earls of Shrewsbury, Mary, Queen of Scots is again known to have visited here.

Other great Elizabethan houses included Padley Hall and Barlborough Hall.

We’re used to impressive Elizabethan houses constructed in the classic ‘E-shape’ but Barlborough Old Hall is one of the few remaining ‘H-shape’ manors in Britain, the quadrangular ‘H’ coming to the fore during the reigns of father and son, Henry VII and Henry VIII.

Padley Hall on the other hand, an Elizabethan great house but sad ruins today, casts light on the time’s religious strife.

The house was owned by the Fitzherbert family who were devout Catholics. Padley was raided in July 1588 with two Catholic priests, Nicholas Garlick and Robert Ludlum, extracted from their hiding places and later charged with high treason for being ordained Catholic priests operating in England.

They were both hanged, drawn and quartered in Derby and became known as the ‘Padley Martyrs’.

The Fitzherberts fared little better: John Fitzherbert, the owner in 1588, was imprisoned and died in 1590, whilst his older brother, Sir Thomas Fitzherbert, spent over 30 years in prison for his beliefs and died the following year.

The Spanish Armada crisis (1588) was the year after the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots.

The Babington Conspiracy was the final straw, a Catholic plot that sought to overthrow Elizabeth and replace her with the Scottish queen in exile.

Its gentrified leader was Anthony Babington (1561-86) who was born at Dethick Manor in the county. He’d suffer the horrendous traitor’s death of hanging, drawing and quartering.

We should give Ashbourne a shout out as its Church Street is reckoned by many to be the finest street in Derbyshire.

It wouldn’t be the same without its Elizabethan Grammar School. In fact, there was much new build going on in the Elizabethan period.

Take Wirksworth, where the old hospital dates from 1588, the year of Elizabeth’s Armada crisis, and Gell’s Bedehouses are even older (1584).

It was Mary, the Queen of Scots who maybe got the last laugh. With the Tudor dynasty expiring with the Virgin Queen, it was Mary’s son, James VI of Scotland, who headed south to assume duties as James I of England, ushering in the Stuart era.

Bess of Hardwick meanwhile outlived Elizabeth I but only by five years, dying in 1608 at a grand old age. Her tomb can be found in Derby’s cathedral.

CHRONOLOGY

1485 – Defeat and death of Richard III and start of the Tudor dynasty

1509 – Death of Henry VII and accession of his son, Henry VIII

1520 – Birth of Bess of Hardwick at the Old Hall at Hardwick

1537 – Death of Thomas Cockayne, who’s buried at St Oswald’s, Ashbourne

1538 – Dissolution of Dale Abbey, Darley Abbey and Repton Priory

1547 – Death of Henry VIII and accession of his only legitimate son, Edward VI

1553 – Death of the Protestant Edward VI and accession of the Catholic Mary I

1558 – Death of Mary I and accession of Elizabeth I

1569 – Mary, Queen of Scots pays the first of several house arrest visits to Chatsworth

c.1582 – Construction of the Hunting Tower at Chatsworth, a reminder of Bess’s ‘new house’