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The Brandon blood is dark with lies and treachery and as it flows through my heart, my vow is this: they will all pay.’
The Real Story of Anne Brandon – Friendships at the Tudor Court
In my books, I like to surround my heroines with friends and the Tudor protagonists are no different. It feels more realistic when my main historical character has a group of contemporaries with whom to share their adventures. When I begin each story, I make a list of people who could have the potential to be part of a gang of friends and see which fit in the most natural way. If the main character has sisters, these are included, but I also look at their cousins, other women of similar ages who were either prominent at court or who have links to my main character.
In The House of Echoes, my Tudor heroine is Anne Brandon, the daughter of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk. The duke, who was the best friend of Henry VIII, married several times but his most prestigious union was with Princess Mary Tudor, the youngest sister of Henry VIII and the Dowager Queen of France. As the stepdaughter of a princess, Anne Brandon was at the heart of the Tudor court which gave me a huge choice of potential friends.
Anne’s teenage years coincided with one of the most volatile periods of Henry VIII’s reign: the divorce from his first wife, Katherine of Aragon in order to marry Anne Boleyn. This is where my first potential friend popped up because Anne Brandon and Anne Boleyn knew each other, having spent several years together in Mechelen, the court of Margaret of Austria, Duchess of Savoy in the Netherlands.
Margaret was the daughter of Holy Roman Emperor, Maximilian I. Twice widowed, she was the Governor of Habsburg Netherlands and a very well-educated and influential woman. In 1514, Anne Brandon was seven years old when she was sent to Margaret’s prestigious court to learn the skills of a courtier. A year earlier, in the summer of 1513, Anne Boleyn the daughter of rising diplomat, Thomas Boleyn, had also been given a place at Mechelen.
Anne Boleyn was to remain in the Netherlands for nearly nine years, while Anne Brandon was summoned home after two years to live with her father, now the Duke of Suffolk and his new wife, Mary Tudor, in the laughter-filled home at Westhorpe Hall, Suffolk. Anne grew close to her new stepmother and enjoyed a happy childhood but with a father and stepmother at the heart of the court, it was not long before she was among the glamorous younger set. When Anne Boleyn returned to England in 1521, Anne Brandon would have been perfectly placed to watch as King Henry fell in love with the dark-haired beauty.
We look back with knowledge, we know how the story unfolded but for Anne Brandon this would have been a difficult, possibly dangerous time as allegiances shifted and the old world became the new. Her stepmother, Mary, Duchess of Suffolk had been sister-in-law to Katherine for the majority of her life and was loyal to her, while Charles Brandon, as Henry’s best friend had no choice but to help the king achieve his desire of marrying Anne Boleyn. I liked the idea of Anne Brandon having her own link to Anne Boleyn and providing the future queen with a place to share her woes.
I have also created a friendship between Anne Brandon and the daughter of another key figure in the Tudor court: Margaret – Meg – More, the eldest child of Sir Thomas More. There is no evidence to suggest the young women were friends but as their fathers were contemporaries and worked together for many years, I took the educated guess their daughter’s may have been friends, too.
Sir Thomas More and his first wife, Jane Colte had four children: Meg, Elizabeth, Cecily and John. From his second marriage to Alice Middleton, More had a stepdaughter, another Alice. Meg is best known for her unusually advanced education and her love of learning. During her lifetime she gained a reputation as one of the most learned women in England. In 1523, humanist scholar, Desiderius Erasmus dedicated his commentary on two hymns by Prudentius to Meg. In response she translated Erasmus’s treatise on the Lord’s Prayer from Latin to English for him.
In 1521 she married William Roper, a lawyer and a friend of her father. They had five children: Elizabeth, Mary, Thomas, Margaret and Anthony. There is also a tale saying after her father was executed, Meg removed his head from the spike on London Bridge and kept it until her own death when she passed it on to one of her daughters.
Other women included as Anne Brandon’s confidantes were cousins I found in her family tree. These were Elizabeth Puttenham, who married Thomas Oxenbridge, Emma Meverell who was a similar age to Anne and married Thomas Cradock. There was also Beatrice Cooke who married Sir Richard Ogle. Her link to Anne was different again, she was the stepdaughter of Margaret Pennington who was a lady-in-waiting to Katherine of Aragon and a friend of the Duchess of Suffolk and finally, there was Ellen Audley who married Thomas Guyban. Thomas was the great-grandson of Margaret Brandon who was Charles Brandon’s aunt.
Whether these women did know each other and were friends, I will never really know but I hope they approve of me borrowing their names for this story.
Alexandra Walsh
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About the Author
Alexandra Walsh is a bestselling author of the dual timeline women’s fiction. Her books range from the 15th and 16th centuries to the Victorian era and are inspired by the hidden voices of women that have been lost over the centuries. The Marquess House Saga offers an alternative view of the Tudor and early Stuart eras, while The Wind Chime and The Music Makers explore different aspects of Victorian society. Formerly, a journalist for over 25 years, writing for many national newspapers and magazines; Alexandra also worked in the TV and film industries as an associate producer, director, script writer and mentor for the MA Screen Writing course at the prestigious London Film School. She is a member of The Society of Authors and The Historical Writers Association. For updates and more information visit her website: www.alexandrawalsh.com and follow her on Facebook, Twitter @purplemermaid25 and Bluesky @purplemermaid25.bsky.social
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