You may well have seen the latest news from “The Spanish Chronicle” regarding Queen Anne hiding her musician, Mark Smeaton, in her marmalade cupboard and then spending the night with him, but here at The Anne Boleyn Files we would just like to point out that there is absolutely no evidence to back up this tabloid nonsense.
You can read the full story in “Mark Smeaton with the Marmalade in the Cupboard” but we can now give you the truth about what really happened from an eye-witness, one of Queen Anne’s ladies, who spoke to our roving reporter, Sir Tim Ridgway:-
“Well, Sir, earlier today, the Queen, bless her heart, found the said musician standing in the round window in her chamber of presence and looking sad so she asked him why he was so sad and he replied that “it was no matter”. The Queen, who has a gentle heart and likes everyone to be most happy, persevered but he would not tell her and was quite abrupt with her, and her a queen and all! Anyway, Her Majesty became quite cross at this, him being a lowly musician and him mooning over her, and said “You may not look to have me speak to you as I should do to a noble man because you be an inferior person”. He have her a funny look and replied “No, no, a look sufficed me; and thus fare you well” and he sighed and left the room without even being dismissed. His behaviour, Sir, was that of a love-sick puppy and the Queen just does not need that kind of attention. She would never dream of compromising herself and that is why she reprimanded him so.”*
It is said that this kind of gutter press reporting is taken seriously by some people and we are worried that this report will damage the Queen and her reputation at a time when some at court seem to be rising against her. It is a worrying time here in London.
Long live Queen Anne Boleyn!
*This interview is obviously fiction but is based on the words of Anne Boleyn in the Tower to her attendant, Mrs Stonor (or Stoner), who reported back to Sir William Kingston who then sent the account to Cromwell. Mrs Stonor told Anne Boleyn that Mark Smeaton had been arrested, imprisoned in the Tower and put in chains and Anne:-
“sayd that was [because he was no gen]telman; bot he wase never in [my chamber but at Winchester, and there] she sent for hym to pl[ay on the virginals, for there my] logynge wa[s above the King’s] * * for I never spake with hym syns bot upon Saterday before Mayday; and then I fond hym standyng in the ronde wyndo in my chambre of presens. And I asked why he wase so sad, and he ansured and sayd it was now mater; and then she sayd, You may not loke to have me speke to you as I shuld do to a nobulle man by cause you be aninferor [pe]rson. No, no, madam, a loke sufficed me, and thus fare you welle.” LP x.798
Sources
- LP x.798. Letter from Sir William Kingston, Constable of the Tower of London, to Thomas Cromwell
- The Chronicle of King Henry VIII of England – ed. Hume, p57 – available online
