Thomas Wyatt the younger
Thomas Wyatt the younger (1521-11 April, 1554) was a rebel leader during the reign of Queen Mary I of England.He was born at Allington Castle, the only son of Sir Thomas Wyatt, a poet, by Elizabeth Brooke, daughter of Thomas Brooke, 3rd Lord Cobham. The Duke of Norfolk was his godfather. At the age of fifteen he became a squire at the court of King Henry VIII, and Joint Constable of Conisborough Castle. In the same year, his father was imprisoned after a feud with the king's brother-in-law, Charles Brandon, duke of Suffolk and on the false charge of being Anne Boleyn's lover. Anne Boleyn was beheaded on May 19th, and Thomas's aunt was one of the ladies-in-waiting who attended the ill-fated queen to the scaffold. His aunt, Lady Margaret Lee, was chief mourner at the queen's funeral. Thomas's father was later released, but re-imprisoned in 1541 and only released after the intervention of Queen Catherine Howard. Thomas himself married Jane Hawte, daughter and co-heiress of Sir William Hawte of Bishopsbourne, by whom he had several children.
He was brought up a Roman Catholic. However, he is said to have been turned into an enemy of the Spaniards by winessing the activities of the Spanish Inquisition while accompanying his father on a mission to Spain. On his father's death in 1542, he inherited Allington Castle and Boxley Abbey. He served in the war against France, and was knighted in 1547. During the reign of King Edward VI, he was arrested for breaking windows while drunk. They were tried before the Privy Council and were imprisoned in the Tower of London. On his release, Wyatt went to fight for the Habsburg emperor (who was also king of Spain), Charles V in Flanders, obtaining further valuable military experience.
In 1543 he took part in the siege of Landrecies, and in the following year was at the siege of Boulogne. Returning to Allington, he lived quietly until the uprising by the Duke of Northumberland, to put Lady Jane Grey on the throne. Escaping punishment by Queen Mary, he took no well further part in politics until Mary's plans to marry Philip II of Spain became known.
Wyatt later claimed to have been urged by Edward Courtenay, Earl of Devon, to join an uprising to prevent the marriage. Wyatt raised an army of four thousand in Kent, and marched on London in what became known as "Wyatt's rebellion". His forces were defeated by his godfather, the duke of Norfolk, who had been restored to royal favour under Queen Mary.
Thomas was found guilty of treason and beheaded at the Tower of London. After he was beheaded, his body was dismembered.
Wyatt's rebellion was thought by many to have been raised with the intention of putting Princess Elizabeth on the throne in her sister's place, and almost cost the princess her life. It was only through Elizabeth's dignity and composure that she managed to escape from the scandal unharmed, although she was spied upon and placed under house arrest for the rest of her sister's reign.
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He is known to have had a natural son, whose mother Elizabeth was a daughter of Sir Edward Darrell of Littlecote. In 1554 he joined with the conspirators who combined to prevent the marriage of Queen Mary with Philip the prince of Spain, afterwards King Philip II. A general movement was planned; but his fellow-conspirators were timid and inept, the rising was serious only in Kent, and Wyat became a formidable rebel mostly by accident. On January 22, 1554 he summoned a meeting of his friends at his castle of Allington, and the 25th was fixed for the rising.On the 26th Wyat occupied Rochester, and issued a proclamation to the county. The country people and local gentry collected, but at first the queen's supporters, led by Lord Abergavenny and Sir Robert Southwell, the sheriff, appeared to be able to suppress the rising with ease, gaining some successes against isolated bands of the insurgents. But the Spanish marriage was unpopular, and Kent was more affected by the preaching of the reformers than most of the country districts of England. Abergavenny and Southwell were deserted by their men, who either disbanded or went over to Wyat.
A detachment of the London train-bands sent against him by Queen Mary, under the command of the duke of Norfolk, followed their example. The rising now seemed so formidable that a deputation was sent to Wyat by the queen and council to ask for his terms. He insisted that the Tower should be surrendered to him, and the queen put under his charge. The insolence of these demands caused a reaction in London, where the reformers were strong and were at first in sympathy with him. When he reached Southwark on February 3 he found London Bridge occupied in force, and was unable to penetrate into the city. He was driven from Southwark by the threats of Sir John Brydges (or Bruges), afterwards Lord Chandos, who was prepared to fire on the suburb with the guns of the Tower.
Wyat now marched up the river to Kingston, where he crossed the Thames, and made his way to Ludgate with a part of his following. Some of his men were cut off. Others lost heart and deserted. His only hope was that a rising would take place, but the loyal forces kept order, and after a futile attempt to force the gate Wyat surrendered. He was brought to trial on the 15th of March, and could make no defence. Execution was for a time delayed, no doubt in the hope that in order to save his life he would say enough to compromise the queens sister Elizabeth, afterwards Queen Elizabeth, in whose interests the rising was supposed to have been made. But he would not confess enough to render her liable to a trial for treason. He was executed on the 11th of April, and on the scaffold expressly cleared the princess of all complicity in the rising. His estates were afterwards partly restored to his son, George, the father of the Sir Francis Wyat (d. 1644) who was governor of Virginia in 162126 and 1639 1642. A fragment of the castle of Allington is still inhabited as a farm-house, near Maidstone, on the bank of the Medway.
See James Anthony Froude, History of England.
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