We met Catherine Howard in Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light episode 5. Another niece of the Duke of Norfolk (Anne Boleyn was also a niece), it was clear that Norfolk was looking for a way to get back into the king’s good graces. What better way than with a young wife?
Of course, at the time, Henry VIII would marry Anne of Cleves. This was necessary for the safety of the country at the time, but after six months, Henry was able to annul the marriage. Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light ended with Cromwell’s execution and Henry’s marriage to Catherine Howard. What would happen to the young bride?
Catherine Howard was the fifth wife of Henry VIII in Wolf Hall
You will know the rhyme: Divorced, Beheaded, Died, Divorced, Beheaded, Outlived. Well, we’re onto wife number five for Henry VIII with Catherine Howard, which tells you quickly that she was executed.
Wait, why? Was she actually guilty of anything? This one is debatable, but we also need to keep in mind that she was just a teenager — and a pretty sheltered one at that.
Well, technically she may have been guilty. There is a possibility that she had an affair with Thomas Culpepper and that Lady Rochford (Anne Boleyn's sister-in-law, who through Anne and George Boleyn under the bus) covered for her. Yet, it wasn't actually the affair with Culpepper that led to her execution. Yes, Culpepper was also executed, but there was another man involved in all this: Francis Dereham.
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Catherine's life before Henry VIII caused her downfall
The Bill of Attainder that was put against Catherine that led to her being stripped of her title and deemed a traitor was linked to her relationship before King Henry VIII. She and Derehem were potentially unofficially betrothed. They would refer to each other as husband and wife, with the intention of marrying, even though there was no way the Howard family would have allowed for this.
Catherine and Dereham didn't have a relationship while Catherine was married to Henry. However, Dereham did manage to find a way into Catherine's list of courtiers, and he wasn't all that quiet about his past relationship with the queen. Henry was a jealous man, so he viewed this relationship as something that should have been disclosed to him.
The Bill of Attainder made it clear that if the Queen didn't disclose a previous relationship then she would be guilty of treason. This was backdated, making it clear that Catherine had to be found guilty.
Poor Catherine was a victim of the people around her. Should she have had an affair? No, but there isn't a lot of evidence to say she definitely did. We know what life in the Court of Henry VIII was like, and it is plausible that lies were told to take down another growing faction for others to rise up in power.
Remember that Catherine was just around 17 to 19 years old (marrying a 49-year-old man), and she was the fifth wife who would have known some of the details of what happened to queens before her — one of them being her cousin. There was nothing Catherine could have done to prevent that Bill of Attainder, and it led to her execution on Feb. 13, 1542, almost two years after the execution of Thomas Cromwell.
Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light is available to stream on PBS.org.
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