Amy Robsart - Life

Life

Amy Robsart was born in Norfolk, the heiress of a substantial gentleman-farmer and grazier, Sir John Robsart of Syderstone, and his wife, Elizabeth Scott. Amy Robsart grew up at her mother's house, Stanfield Hall, and, like her future husband, in a firmly Protestant household. She received a good education and wrote in a fine hand. Three days before her 18th birthday she married Robert Dudley, a younger son of John Dudley, Earl of Warwick. Amy and Robert, who were of the same age, probably first met about ten months before their wedding. The wedding contract of May 1550 specified that Amy would inherit her father's estate only after both her parents' death, and after the marriage the young couple depended heavily on both their fathers' gifts, especially Robert's. It was a love-match, a "carnal marriage", as the wedding guest William Cecil later commented disapprovingly. The marriage was celebrated on 4 June 1550 at the royal palace of Sheen, with Edward VI in attendance.

The Earl of Warwick and future Duke of Northumberland was the most powerful man in England, leading the government of the young King Edward VI. The match, though by no means a prize, was acceptable to him as it strengthened his influence in Norfolk. The young couple dwelt mostly at court or with Amy's parents-in-law at Ely House; in the first half of 1553 they lived at Somerset House, Robert Dudley being keeper of this great Renaissance palace. In May 1553 Lady Jane Grey became Amy Dudley's sister-in-law, and after her rule of a fortnight as England's queen, Robert Dudley was sentenced to death and imprisoned in the Tower of London. He remained there from July 1553 till October 1554; from September 1553 Amy was allowed to visit "and there to tarry with" him at the Tower's Lieutenant's pleasure.

After his release Robert Dudley was, in the words of his brothers, "left with nothing to live by", and he and Amy were helped out financially by both their families. Their lifestyle had to remain modest, though, and Lord Robert (as he was known) was heaping up considerable debts. Sir John Robsart died in 1554; his wife followed him to the grave in the spring of 1557, which meant that the Dudleys could inherit the Robsart estate with the Queen's permission. Lady Amy's ancestral manor house of Syderstone had been uninhabitable for many decades, and the couple were now living in Throcking, Hertfordshire, at the house of William Hyde, when not in London. In August 1557 Robert Dudley went to fight for King Philip II, England's king consort, at the Battle of St. Quentin in France. From this time a business letter from Amy Dudley survives, settling some debts of her husband's in his absence, "although I forgot to move my lord thereof before his departing, he being sore troubled with weighty affairs, and I not being altogether in quiet for his sudden departing".

In the summer of 1558 Robert and Amy Dudley were looking for a suitable residence of their own in order to settle in Norfolk; nothing came of this, however, before the death of Queen Mary I in November 1558. Upon the accession of Elizabeth I Robert Dudley became Master of the Horse and his place was now at court at almost constant attendance on the Queen. Lady Amy spent the Christmas season in Lincolnshire. By April 1559 Queen Elizabeth was in love with Lord Robert, and several diplomats reported that some at court already speculated that the Queen would marry him, "in case his wife should die", as Lady Dudley was very ill in one of her breasts. Very soon court observers noted that Elizabeth never let Robert Dudley from her side. He visited his wife at Throcking for a couple of days at Easter 1559, and Amy Dudley came to London in May 1559 for about a month—with twelve horses hired for the occasion. At this time, on 6 June, the new Spanish ambassador de Quadra wrote that her health had improved, but that she was careful with her food. She also made a trip to Suffolk; by September she was residing in the house of Sir Richard Verney at Compton Verney in Warwickshire.

By the autumn of 1559 several foreign princes were vying for the Queen's hand; indignant at Elizabeth's little serious interest in their candidate, the Spanish ambassador de Quadra and his Imperial colleague were informing each other and their superiors that Lord Robert was sending his wife poison and that Elizabeth was only fooling them, "keeping Lord Robert's enemies and the country engaged with words until this wicked deed of killing his wife is consummated". Parts of the nobility also held Dudley responsible for Elizabeth's failure to marry, and plots to assassinate him abounded—the Imperial envoy eagerly wished them to succeed. In March 1560 de Quadra informed Philip II: "Lord Robert told somebody ... that if he live another year he will be in a very different position from now. ... They say that he thinks of divorcing his wife." Lady Amy never saw her husband again after her London visit in 1559. A projected trip of his to visit her and other family never materialized. Queen Elizabeth did not really allow her favourite a wife; according to a contemporary court chronicle, he "was commanded to say that he did nothing with her, when he came to her, as seldom he did".

From December 1559 Amy Dudley lived at Cumnor Place, near Abingdon in Berkshire (now Oxfordshire). The house, an altered 14th century monastic complex, was rented by a friend of the Dudleys and possible relative of Amy's, Sir Anthony Forster. He lived there with his wife and Mrs. Odingsells and Mrs. Owen, relations of the house's owner. Lady Dudley's chamber was a large, sumptuous upper story apartment, the best of the house, with a separate entrance and stair case leading up to it. At the house's rear there were a terrace garden, a pond, and a deer park. Amy Dudley received the proceeds of the Robsart estate directly into her hands and largely paid for her own household, which comprised about 10 servants. She regularly ordered dresses and finery as accounts and a letter from her of as late as 24 August 1560 show. She also received presents from her husband; in June 1560 he sent "a velvet hat embroidered with gold" and 10 pairs of velvet shoes.