Episode two of Wolf Hall season two sees Thomas Cromwell (Mark Rylance) dealing with yet another crisis in King Henry VIII’s court after the King’s beloved niece, Margaret, attempts to marry Lord Thomas Howard without Henry’s permission. The episode also explores a deeply personal topic for Cromwell as he meets Wolsey’s daughter, Dorothea. So, what really happened?
Henry VIII’s niece, Margaret, was the daughter of Henry’s sister, Margaret Tudor. As portrayed in Wolf Hall, historical records indicate that Henry and Margaret had a good relationship, with the King bestowing her with generous gifts – until her involvement with Lord Thomas Howard. In the show, Margaret claims that she and Thomas are promised to one another, but without Henry’s permission.
This is indeed historically accurate, as Henry was furious when he learned of their engagement without his consent.
This situation was particularly problematic, as with Henry’s daughters Mary and Elizabeth both declared illegitimate following the failure of his marriages to their mothers, Katherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn respectively, Margaret was next in the line of succession while Henry hoped for a son with his third wife, Jane Seymour.
As punishment, both Margaret and Thomas were sent to the Tower, and an Act of Attainder accused Thomas of aspiring to become the next King of England, sentencing him to death. The act also decreed that no member of the King’s family could marry without his permission.
While Thomas’s death sentence was not carried out, he remained imprisoned in the Tower. Meanwhile, Lady Margaret renounced their relationship, and their engagement was ended, as shown in the episode. After falling ill, Margaret was eventually moved from the Tower to Syon Abbey and was later released, returning to her uncle’s good graces by 1537.
Thomas, however, died in the Tower after contracting an illness. He was 26.
In a heartbreaking scene in episode two, Cromwell meets Thomas Wolsey’s illegitimate daughter, Dorothea, who had been placed in a nunnery following her father’s death. In the scene, Cromwell is devastated when Dorothea rejects his gifts and offers to find her a comfortable home outside of the nunnery – as well as his own hand in marriage.
Dorothea informs Cromwell that she knows he is a liar who betrayed her father, Wolsey, leaving Cromwell to realise that she could only have believed this by hearing it from her father. He is heartbroken to learn that Wolsey thought Cromwell had betrayed him before his death. But how much of this is true?
It is indeed true that Wolsey had an illegitimate daughter named Dorothy, who was adopted by John Clansey and later placed in Shaftesbury Abbey’s convent. However, there is no evidence that a meeting between Thomas and Dorothy ever occurred. When the abbey was dissolved, Dorothy did receive a pension from Cromwell.
