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00:00Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII's second wife.
00:04She was clever, spirited, and ambitious.
00:08She has this air of exoticism around her
00:10that attracts people's attention.
00:12And the king was obsessed with her for over 10 years.
00:16Henry is deeply in love with Anne.
00:19Then suddenly everything changed.
00:21In May 1536, England's most famous queen was arrested.
00:27Seventeen days later, she was beheaded at the Tower of London.
00:32One strike of the sword, head is clean off.
00:36But how on earth did she go from the love of Henry's life to this?
00:41I'm Jason Watkins,
00:42and I've always been fascinated by Anne Boleyn's story.
00:46The independence, the free spirit, and the intelligence
00:48were the very things that threatened the English court.
00:52And I'm Tracey Borman.
00:54As a Tudor historian, I want to uncover
00:56who was really behind Anne's downfall.
00:59I've never, ever seen this famous letter in the flesh.
01:03Now we're reopening the most tragic Tudor cold case of all.
01:08There's nothing that Anne can do to prevent what's about to unfold.
01:13Investigating the suspects, from Henry VIII himself
01:16to Anne's enemies at court.
01:19Anne Boleyn wanted to have his head off his shoulders.
01:22Even her own family.
01:25We'll delve into buried records.
01:28This is probably the most scandalous charge of all.
01:30So this is the queen and her brother.
01:32Wow.
01:32To reveal who would gain the most from her execution.
01:36You don't rise like Anne Boleyn without making enemies.
01:40And finally answer the biggest question of them all.
01:43Who ultimately betrayed Anne Boleyn?
01:57The Tower of London.
01:59A piece of murder, torture and executions!
02:03Yeah!
02:04Home to some of the darkest moments in our history.
02:07Traitors would enter this mighty fortress.
02:10Amongst them, Queen Anne Boleyn.
02:16I can think of no better place for us to open our investigation
02:19into the downfall of England's most famous queen.
02:22And I'm with my favourite historian.
02:25Well, it's nice to be back.
02:26It is very familiar, although I've not been under here very often.
02:29Isn't it nice that it's Queen Elizabeth II's arch?
02:31It is.
02:32And I'm going to show you something that I think is one of the best views in the whole of
02:37the tower.
02:38Okay.
02:38Oh, it's the mirror, is it, then?
02:40Ha-ha!
02:41Very good!
02:42It's even better than that, believe it or not.
02:44Yeah, I nearly fell over there because of that silly joke.
02:54I mean, it's quite something, isn't it?
02:57It's an amazing view, isn't it?
02:58Yeah.
02:58Yeah.
02:59Each time I look at it, there's something new and surprising about it.
03:03Yeah, yeah.
03:03White Tower looks magnificent.
03:05And over there, that's Tower Green.
03:07The home of executions.
03:09Yes.
03:09One of the main executions there was Anne Boleyn.
03:12She's undoubtedly the most talked about of the traitors who were executed at the tower.
03:17And you know so much about Anne Boleyn.
03:19It's interesting because with Anne Boleyn, there's a lot of mystery surrounding her fall.
03:25And that is a mystery that would be, it would be great to uncover, wouldn't it?
03:31When Anne was arrested just three years after marrying Henry VIII, she was accused of some shocking crimes.
03:38It was claimed she had affairs with five men, including her own brother, and that she had committed treason against
03:45her husband, the king.
03:48Today, many historians believe she was completely innocent.
03:53But if that's true, how did she end up being executed for crimes she did not commit?
03:58Did someone plot Anne's downfall?
04:01And if so, who?
04:05Henry's court.
04:06Henry's court.
04:06It's a cutthroat world.
04:08And even in families, there's betrayal and backstabbing.
04:12Blood isn't thicker than water.
04:14Well, maybe I should go and explore that.
04:16Where was she brought up?
04:17Well, you're lucky because it's a very beautiful place.
04:20Heaver Castle down in Kent.
04:22And you can find out all about Anne's upbringing there.
04:25Great.
04:25Well, I think I'll start there and I'll see you at a castle somewhere soon.
04:29No doubt.
04:30Have fun.
04:34If we're going to get to the bottom of who betrayed Anne Boleyn, I first need to understand the world
04:40she grew up in.
04:41So I'm beginning our investigation by going right back to the start of Anne's life.
04:46I've come to her childhood home at Heaver Castle.
04:52What a beautiful spot.
04:53It really is so peaceful.
04:55And this is where Anne Boleyn grew up.
04:58It really is.
05:00This is Anne Boleyn's playground.
05:02Dr. Owen Emerson is a curator at Heaver Castle.
05:05He knows all about Anne's childhood.
05:08So Anne would have resided here with her father, Thomas Boleyn, her mother, Lady Elizabeth Howard, and also her siblings.
05:16We find the Boleyns here, private, safe, quiet, and, you know, the ideal location to educate your children.
05:25Why go anywhere else?
05:26Shall we perhaps have a look inside?
05:28Let's.
05:32Anne's father, Sir Thomas Boleyn, wasn't short of money.
05:36He had more than 40 manners.
05:39And he wasn't short on influence either.
05:42As a diplomat, he negotiated deals across Europe for Henry VIII.
05:46We can actually see how close Thomas Boleyn is to the king in this document.
05:54So this is in 1509.
05:56And essentially, this is a group of key individuals who will be forming Henry's intimate circle.
06:04You might notice a name just here.
06:09Sir Thomas Boleyn.
06:11Yes, there we go, yeah.
06:12And this is kind of Henry's key club within his court.
06:17And Thomas is a member of this, a real friend, a mate, as it were.
06:22He really is.
06:23And I think you can see here that the Boleyns are sort of at the centre of court life.
06:29As well as her father, there was another important relative in Anne's life.
06:34The Duke of Norfolk, who is brother to Lady Elizabeth Howard, Anne's mother.
06:40He is one of the most powerful people at court.
06:43He's a great commander.
06:46And he likes to be the king's right-hand man.
06:50But unlike Anne's father, who loved his daughter, Norfolk was ruthless.
06:55And that kept him at the top of the royal court.
06:58He was a tough soldier and sharp politician.
07:01Not the kind of man I'd want to cross.
07:04So there's these two strong figures.
07:06You've got Thomas Boleyn, Anne's father, and her uncle, the Duke of Norfolk.
07:11So they're both family members at the heart of Henry VIII's court.
07:15So what is their ambition for Anne?
07:19I think we can safely say that Anne was destined to marry well.
07:25Daughters were, let's face it, commodities in the early modern period.
07:30Their marriage prospects were designed to build power relations.
07:36And so she is an extremely valuable asset in terms of the family's rise to the top.
07:45So what did they decide to do with her?
07:48Thomas Boleyn invests really quite heavily in her.
07:51She is afforded an extraordinary opportunity to travel where she is going to be educated among the royalty of Europe.
08:01Her father sent her to the royal courts of the Netherlands and France to receive an elite education.
08:09So clearly she's a very, very special girl.
08:13And they've got some very special plans for her.
08:16Absolutely.
08:17I think they are going to extraordinary lengths to invest in their daughter and to ensure that she has a
08:24good a future as possible.
08:26So it's rather wonderful to think that this diligent and loving parent, her father, sent her to the European courts
08:33to gain independence and intelligence and culture.
08:37And there's no notion that she's going to become a queen.
08:41He just wants the very best for her.
08:44The world is a Royster.
08:47But how on earth did this bright young girl, who had the best of starts in life, end up disgraced
08:54and beheaded?
09:04Tracy and I are investigating the fate of Henry VIII's doomed wife, Queen Anne Boleyn.
09:10I've been looking at Anne's childhood and her relationships with her powerful father, Thomas Boleyn, and her ambitious uncle, the
09:18Duke of Norfolk.
09:19We know when she was about 12 years old, Thomas sent Anne off to the Royal Courts of the Netherlands
09:24and France, where she was educated.
09:27After nearly a decade learning from the most powerful queens in Europe, she returned a confident and independent young woman.
09:35I want to know what her father and Norfolk had in store for her when she arrived back in England.
09:40She's now about 20.
09:41Can this period of her life give us any clues about who might have plotted her eventual downfall?
09:47I'm meeting historian Kate McCaffrey to learn more.
09:51So, Anne has had this amazing formative time in the course of Europe.
09:56What was ahead of her then? What was next?
09:58When she comes back to England, she's very much prepared for the next natural step in a young Tudor woman's
10:03life.
10:04Which is?
10:05Which is marriage. She was sent back to England for a specific reason, to marry a specific man.
10:11I mean, lucky chap, really.
10:12Lucky chap, indeed.
10:14Anne's father and uncle.
10:16wanted her to marry a man called James Butler, the son of an Irish nobleman.
10:22So, what was this James Butler like?
10:24Was he a young buck writing poetry and beautiful and attentive to all her needs?
10:29Well, wonderfully, we have a sketch of him that we still have today.
10:33It was done a little later in his life.
10:36So, that's not Henry VIII then?
10:37That's not Henry VIII.
10:39There's lots of similarities.
10:41Norfolk was determined that Anne marry James Butler.
10:45He wanted to unite the Boleyns with the rich, aristocratic Butler family.
10:49But after a year of planning, the wedding arrangements fell through.
10:53The marriage was off.
10:55Many historians believe this is proof that Anne herself had refused the betrothal.
11:00So, she's going against the wishes of her uncle and her father.
11:05Quite explicitly, particularly against the wishes of her uncle, she was quite radically defiant.
11:10Good for her.
11:11It puts that relationship definitely with her and her uncle on edge slightly.
11:14Yes.
11:15Because he's not used to people saying no to him.
11:18Anne had crossed her ruthless uncle.
11:21But how did her father Thomas react to all of this?
11:25What we know for certain is that Thomas soon arranged for Anne to take up a post at the royal
11:30court of Henry VIII.
11:32Anne would now be rubbing shoulders with the king.
11:36But what were Thomas' motives here?
11:38Did he want what was best for his daughter?
11:41Or was he thinking of himself?
11:44When Anne arrived at court, Henry was married to his first wife, Catherine of Aragon.
11:49But some people believe that Thomas hoped Henry would separate from Catherine
11:54and marry the captivating and much younger Anne.
12:00But I'm not so sure.
12:03I've arranged to see a very rare document,
12:05which I think might shed some light on Thomas' true feelings for his daughter.
12:11Wow, what an amazing place.
12:14This is the Parker Library at Cambridge University,
12:17a bank of historical treasures.
12:20I'm very excited because I'm here to see a rather special document.
12:25It's so rare and it's so important to the story of Anne Boleyn.
12:32I've spent years researching Anne Boleyn,
12:36but I've never ever seen this famous letter in the flesh before.
12:41It's one that she wrote to her father.
12:43This is the earliest surviving letter by Anne, written when she was a young girl.
12:50You can imagine her trying to impress her father with her command of French,
12:56with the neatness of her handwriting.
12:59But as well, she's expressing real love for her father here.
13:04And she talks about the strength of her love being so great that it could never diminish.
13:10I don't think I expected to be so touched by it.
13:13But what really gives me shivers down the spine is this very last line where Anne signs it.
13:20Your daughter, Anna du Boulin.
13:24In other words, Anne Boleyn.
13:26It's amazing to see the words of Anne Boleyn, this famous queen,
13:31when she was still so young, when she still had her whole life ahead of her.
13:35It's so special.
13:37But it's not only the words that are revealing.
13:45The fact Thomas kept this precious letter his whole life speaks volumes.
13:53What this says, in fact, is that they had a very close and a very affectionate bond.
14:00If Thomas really did love Anne, as this letter suggests,
14:05then why on earth would he push her towards the king,
14:08especially when Henry was still married to his first wife, Catherine?
14:12In fact, there is evidence that when Henry did eventually turn his attention to Anne,
14:18Thomas Boleyn was very worried.
14:21According to one account, he even tried to dissuade the king from pursuing his daughter.
14:27This suggests, in fact, that Thomas Boleyn wasn't this cold, calculating courtier.
14:33He was actually very affectionate towards his daughter.
14:37And if anything, he was trying to protect her.
14:41Despite Thomas's efforts to keep his daughter away from Henry,
14:45the king pursued her.
14:47He was besotted.
14:49And far from turning Henry down, Anne encouraged his flirtations.
14:54But she was a determined young woman.
14:57Despite his pleas, she refused to become his mistress.
15:01She was holding out for a bigger prize, to become queen.
15:06We're starting to get a picture of Anne's personality now.
15:10So she's well-educated, she's close to her father.
15:13And unlike most women at the English court, she's very confident and strong-willed.
15:18I find it extraordinary that she had the nerve to say no to Henry.
15:24She knew what she wanted, and she wasn't afraid to get it.
15:31So far, we've examined Anne's relationships with three powerful men.
15:37Her father Thomas, Uncle Norfolk, and Henry VIII.
15:41But there's another key suspect I'd like to examine.
15:45Around the time that Henry was pursuing her, Anne came into contact with a hugely influential member of the royal
15:53court.
15:55Ambitious, shrewd, and rising fast, Thomas Cromwell was the son of a Putney blacksmith who'd fought his way to the
16:03top.
16:03Now he was Henry's most trusted and dangerous advisor.
16:08But is there any evidence that Cromwell might have wanted to bring down Anne Boleyn?
16:13I've arranged to meet historian Elizabeth Norton.
16:17I'm hoping she might have some clues.
16:19So there's one rather big personality in Henry VIII's court who we haven't yet talked about.
16:26Thomas Cromwell. What can you tell me about him?
16:29So he is quite a character, probably even the most remarkable person at Henry's court.
16:35He seems to be a mercenary, spends some time in Italy, spends some time in the Netherlands.
16:41When he comes back to England, he sets himself off first as a merchant, then as a lawyer.
16:46So he's a self-made man, which is incredibly rare in the Tudor court.
16:50No, absolutely. I mean, you would never expect Cromwell to get anywhere near the royal court unless he's in the
16:54kitchens.
16:55And I think that's really part of his genius.
16:57So if you hire him as a lawyer, he's going to win your case for you.
17:02It's not long before Cromwell's ruthlessness is rewarded.
17:06He becomes indispensable to Henry VIII and takes the role of the king's fixer.
17:12So how on earth does he enter Anne Boleyn's orbit?
17:15Religion is a real point where they intersect.
17:19And Anne Boleyn is very keen on religious reform, but so too is Thomas Cromwell.
17:23Do they have anything else in common?
17:25They do. She's really interested in helping the poor.
17:28She gives very charitably.
17:29But we can see it in Cromwell too.
17:31He actually brings in one of the earliest poor relief laws, and that's quite revolutionary for the time.
17:37Anne seemed to have found an ally in Thomas Cromwell.
17:41While courtiers like the Duke of Norfolk were infuriated by this strong-willed young woman,
17:46Cromwell saw someone he could work with. Not only that, but she was Henry VIII's favourite.
17:52With Cromwell at her side, Anne's influence at court grew, but their partnership was risky.
17:59The pair of them, one a commoner and the other the daughter of a nobleman,
18:03were shaking up the old order and challenging the traditional nobility.
18:07No one felt that more than Norfolk.
18:10The major enemy is the Duke of Norfolk, Anne Boleyn's own uncle.
18:15Blood isn't thicker than water.
18:16Absolutely, not in this case.
18:18Quite soon they seem to be actively hostile, and I've got a great quote for you here.
18:22This is from Eustace Chapuis, who's the Imperial Ambassador.
18:26And he writes to the Duke of Norfolk that he had said that Anne would be considered the ruin of
18:31all her family.
18:32That's quite extreme.
18:34So he's clearly not very happy with her.
18:37Norfolk seemed to clash with Cromwell just as much as he did with Anne.
18:41So Norfolk is high-ranking, he's blue-blooded, very different to Cromwell in particular.
18:47Very much so. I mean, they come from such different backgrounds.
18:50Norfolk is the high aristocracy, and he very much looks down at Cromwell.
18:55It feels a little bit like a class war going on.
18:58But clearly, Anne and Cromwell, they're aligned, they're on the same side,
19:04and potentially an absolute dream partnership.
19:09Anne has the ideas, she has the Year of the King, but Cromwell gets the job done.
19:13He's a Mr Fixer.
19:14What a formidable double act.
19:16There's another clue that suggests Cromwell was on Anne's side.
19:21When Henry wanted to leave his first wife, Catherine of Aragon,
19:24it was Cromwell who made a separation happen.
19:27He supported Anne and wanted her to be the new queen.
19:31Henry had chased Anne for seven long years, but she always refused to be his mistress.
19:37She wanted a ring and a crown, and in January 1533, that's exactly what she got.
19:44Henry VIII finally married Anne Boleyn.
19:46She was Queen of England, and Henry had the woman he'd fought so hard for.
19:51With Anne now by Henry's side, it's time for Tracey and I to share what we've learnt about our key
19:57suspects.
19:58So what's clear by this point is that Thomas is very close to his daughter Anne.
20:04There's a lot of affection there. He seems to genuinely just want the best for her, want her to be
20:09happy.
20:09Which is unlike her uncle.
20:11Absolutely.
20:12Who sounds a bit of a mover and shake a bit of a schemer, and to manoeuvre himself even further
20:17into the court.
20:18Is that fair, do you think?
20:19I think absolutely. Norfolk does not have an easy relationship with Anne.
20:23Okay, so she's got one ally in her father and a potential enemy in her uncle.
20:26Exactly.
20:27So Cromwell, what was he thinking at this time? This is another one of her allies.
20:31He and Anne are very much allied. They're like-minded people.
20:36So he's part of Team Anne, if you like.
20:39But he's never a man to back the wrong horse.
20:42So if things start to go wrong, you get the feeling Cromwell's not exactly going to stand by Anne.
20:48Where is Henry himself in this scenario? How does he think about it?
20:51Yes, he's married this great love of his, but is that going to change things?
20:58Now that he's married to Anne, will he stay true?
21:01She's kind of got her ducks in a row, hasn't she?
21:03She's got her team, and she's married. And things are looking good.
21:08They're looking rosy at this point, but there is a very big catch.
21:12And that's that as Henry's new queen, Anne is expected to literally deliver.
21:18He needs a son, and that's all down to her.
21:21All eyes at court are on Anne.
21:23She's queen, she's powerful, but she's also dependent on Henry's favour.
21:28If he grows bored of her, who might already be planning her downfall?
21:32And if she doesn't deliver him a son, what happens then?
21:45We're investigating the tragic downfall of Queen Anne Boleyn,
21:49and trying to discover why she was executed for crimes most people believe she didn't commit.
21:56Who might have wanted her out of the way?
21:58I know that Anne had very strong ideas about religion and about helping the poor,
22:04but could these views have made her serious enemies?
22:08I've come to Romsey Abbey in Hampshire.
22:11I'm hoping historian Jonathan Healy can help me.
22:15Hi, Jonathan. Hi, lovely to see you.
22:17Nice to see you. Welcome to Romsey Abbey.
22:20What a spectacular place it is.
22:25So, Jonathan, Anne was clearly very passionate about social reform,
22:30and now she's queen.
22:31How much power does she have to actually do anything about it?
22:35Well, I mean, as queen, you've got the ear of the king,
22:37you've got real influence,
22:39you're right at the centre of the government in many, many ways.
22:42This sounds like a good thing to me.
22:44I mean, Anne wants to help the poor.
22:46Does that make her enemies?
22:47The big kind of flashpoint, really, is the dissolution of the monasteries.
22:53In 1536, Anne and Thomas Cromwell set about having England's monasteries closed down.
23:00Abbeys like Romsey had their lands and wealth seized by the crown.
23:04But Anne and Cromwell disagreed over what should be done with the money.
23:08Well, I think Cromwell probably thought, we're getting all this land,
23:11we're going to give it to the king and the king can do what he wants with it,
23:14whereas Anne had ideas about turning it to charitable uses.
23:17OK, so this puts Anne on a collision course, doesn't it,
23:21with the master of the dissolution, if you like, Thomas Cromwell.
23:26Anne and Cromwell's disagreement escalated into a bitter feud.
23:31Soon, these former allies became enemies.
23:33A letter written by the imperial ambassador, Eustace Chapuis,
23:38reveals how their alliance had fallen apart.
23:41He says that he had a meeting with Cromwell and Cromwell told him
23:44that he thought that Anne Boleyn wanted to have his head off his shoulders.
23:48So Cromwell's clearly feeling the fear of what's going to happen.
23:52So even at this point, it's spring 1536,
23:55she's still dangerous to men like Cromwell.
23:58Yeah, I mean, she's still the queen, right?
23:59As long as she maintains the affection of the king, she's incredibly dangerous.
24:04Until now, I thought Anne's uncle, the Duke of Norfolk,
24:07was her biggest enemy.
24:09But if Cromwell believed that Anne might have him beheaded,
24:13that could be a motive for him to start plotting against her.
24:17But Cromwell could never bring her down by himself.
24:20After all, Anne was still queen.
24:22As long as Henry was on her side, she was safe.
24:27So what I want to know is, was Anne still the apple of Henry's eye?
24:31And there's one person I can think of who'll be able to tell me.
24:35How are things going with Henry?
24:37We know she's pregnant at the time that she marries him.
24:40And she starts to lose her famously slender figure.
24:44And I think this makes Anne a bit insecure.
24:46She's worried that Henry and his famous wandering eye will kick in
24:52and she'll start to lose his interest.
24:53He can't stop himself, can he?
24:56Well, it turns out that she's quite right to be insecure.
25:00I have an account here.
25:02And he talks about how Anne was full of jealousy and not without cause.
25:07And she basically confronts Henry with her suspicions that he's having an affair.
25:12The king tells her she must shut her eyes and endure as more worthy persons have done.
25:19In other words, you know, my first wife didn't complain about it, so you shouldn't either.
25:24She just got on with it.
25:25Yeah.
25:25Shut up and have my baby.
25:27Absolutely.
25:28And to make matters worse, Anne failed to give Henry the one thing he demanded above all, a son.
25:35By early 1536, just three years after their wedding, their marriage was on the rocks.
25:42He sees Anne perhaps as this rather exotic bird, like a kind of bird of paradise.
25:48And once he's hunted her and owns her, he loses interest.
25:52Now he's married to her, it's like, oh, actually, she's not that special.
25:55I'm going to start looking for somebody else.
25:57Yes, that's such a lonely place to be, isn't it?
26:02Anne is finding herself increasingly isolated.
26:05And it feels a bit like time is running out for her.
26:11I'm starting to understand what a terrible situation Anne found herself in.
26:16She'd made an enemy of her one-time ally, Thomas Cromwell.
26:19And now her relationship with Henry was falling apart.
26:23But there's still a huge leap from that to facing charges of adultery, incest and treason.
26:29I know that Anne was arrested in May 1536.
26:32I wonder if the details of her arrest give a clue as to who might have set her up.
26:40I'm hoping that Dr. Nicola Tallis can help.
26:45Intriguingly, she's invited me to watch some real tennis.
26:50A forerunner of the game we know today.
26:57So, Nicola, why have you brought me here?
26:59Well, you'll be relieved to know we're not going to play tennis.
27:02Oh, good. I've got my shorts on, actually, but, yeah, never mind.
27:05Well, there we go.
27:07We've actually come here to a real tennis court.
27:12Because, according to legend, that Anne Boleyn was watching a tennis game when she was summoned before the Privy Council
27:20on the 2nd of May.
27:23So, what happened?
27:25Anne is at Greenwich Palace, one of the favoured residences of the Tudor court, and she is taken in broad
27:33daylight.
27:34Anne was hauled in front of the authorities, which included a familiar face.
27:40Someone who I know despised her.
27:43She is brought before the Privy Council, which is headed by her uncle.
27:48Good old Duke of Norfolk. He's covering himself in glory, isn't he?
27:51Do we know what he did, what he said, or...?
27:54So, when the charges against Anne were read out, Anne herself later recounted that her uncle Norfolk had gone tut,
28:02tut, tut.
28:03He was a piece of work, wasn't he?
28:05Oh, awful man.
28:06What were the charges?
28:08So, at this point, Anne is accused of adultery with three different men, which is incredibly shocking.
28:15The three men were all courtiers who were known to be in Anne's entourage.
28:19And if these accusations weren't damning enough, they didn't stop there.
28:23So, later on, it becomes clear that there are more than three people who are accused of adultery with Anne,
28:31one of whom is her own brother.
28:33Oh, right, okay. That's a trumped-up charge, isn't it?
28:37Exactly.
28:38So, treason and adultery are bad enough, but incest really hammers that point home, that this is a queen who
28:46has behaved in the utmost appalling terms.
28:50All these crimes, they all carry a particular penalty with them, don't they?
28:54They absolutely do, but the most serious of those charges is treason, and Anne would have been well aware that
29:03the consequences for treason, if found guilty, were death.
29:08Terrifying when you know you're heading that way and there's nothing you can do about it.
29:11Yeah, exactly. There's nothing that Anne can do to prevent what's about to unfold.
29:18She was taken from Greenwich to the tower by water, so this is a publicly humiliating spectacle for her.
29:27Do you think she was thinking, oh, can I get out of this? What do I do next?
29:30Yeah, I mean, I think she must have been thinking to herself, oh, my goodness, the tower is where people
29:37are taken when they're accused of terrible things, and they often meet terrible fates.
29:43The accusation that Anne had affairs with five men is shocking, but the claim that one of them was her
29:49own brother, George Boleyn, seems outrageous to me.
29:52And where's the evidence of these crimes, and who is it who's looking for them? Who's the motor? Who's the
29:58motor behind these accusations? And they're looking for evidence to bolster them.
30:03If we're going to work out who was really behind Anne's arrest, I need to know if there was any
30:09real evidence against her.
30:11So I'm meeting historian Gareth Russell to ask him about the most infamous charge.
30:17Hi, Gareth. Hi, Trissie.
30:19So, Gareth, of all the terrible charges against Anne Boleyn, the one I've always found most shocking is that of
30:26incest with her brother, George.
30:29Is there any evidence for this?
30:31It is the one that people seem to believe the least against Anne, but it's also the one they talk
30:36about the most.
30:37There's such little evidence for it.
30:40This account from the Spanish ambassador writes,
30:43A brother, as I say, was charged with having had connection with her, in this case a sexual connection.
30:50No proof of his guilt was produced, except that of his having once passed many hours in her company and
30:57other little follies.
30:59And so the only evidence, such as it was, is that Anne and George once spent quite a lot of
31:06time together. There was nothing else.
31:08They will pick a charge that is so morally grotesque and shocking that even if people are skeptical about it,
31:15they're worried about speaking out on behalf of the person accused of it in case it looks like they're defending
31:20the crime itself.
31:22That's actually very clever in a very dark way.
31:25Yeah, very diabolical way. But it works. It works in this case.
31:28So there's not really anything that would pass as evidence today.
31:35Intriguingly, at his trial, George claimed the evidence against him came from just one person.
31:40He says, on the evidence of this one woman, you are prepared to believe this great evil of me.
31:47And he doesn't say who that one woman was, but assumptions have been made that it was actually his own
31:54wife.
31:54Yes, it's one of the most notorious and potentially tragic details that come out of the trial.
32:00For centuries, people said it was George's wife, Lady Jane Rochford, who accused him and Anne of having an affair.
32:08It's been claimed that George and Jane had an unhappy marriage, and she was jealous of how close he was
32:14to Anne.
32:15So was Jane the person who betrayed Anne Boleyn?
32:18Gareth thinks a letter Jane wrote to George at the Tower gives us a clue.
32:23It seems that she has written into the Tower of London to check how George is, and also that she's
32:29agreed to George's request that she will go to King Henry and petition him on George's behalf.
32:35So actually, far from stitching up her husband and her sister-in-law, Jane's actually on their side. She's trying
32:42to save them.
32:43Lady Rochford is going down with the ship, not punching holes beneath the water line, I think is the way
32:47to look at her.
32:48It doesn't make sense to me that Jane would accuse Anne and George of having an affair, only then to
32:55petition the King to try to get him off the charges.
32:58I think Jane might have been a victim, but if she didn't do it, then who did set up Anne?
33:04The more we dig, the more it feels like the case against Anne just doesn't stack up. The evidence is
33:10flimsy, but the accusations keep coming.
33:12It feels like someone was determined to bring Anne down. Perhaps to find out who was really behind it, we
33:19need to look at what happened at her trial.
33:29So far in our hunt for Anne Boleyn's betrayer, we've seen her uncle Norfolk turning against her, Cromwell breaking away,
33:38and even Henry's affection completely fade.
33:41By 1536, Anne was looking totally alone.
33:45So what happened when she went on trial with such serious charges of incest and treason against her?
33:52Did her father Thomas step in to help her at all? And where was Henry in all this? Did he
33:57feel any remorse or did he just want her gone?
34:00I've come to the National Archives to meet Dr. Ewan Roger. He has some intriguing evidence that could bring us
34:07closer to the truth.
34:08So, Ewan, what exactly am I looking at here?
34:11So this is one of the records from the bag of secrets. So this is the Tudor equivalent of top
34:16secrets.
34:17It's trial records, which are some of the most important trial records in the country's history, to which only the
34:22top three legal officials in the country have the key.
34:24Of which I am one, obviously, because I'm about to look at it.
34:27Exactly. That's amazing. Gosh.
34:29This incredibly delicate document contains written records of Anne Boleyn's trial. It's almost 500 years old. This is first-hand
34:39evidence.
34:39So here we have some of the proceedings from the 16th century, as well as the original bags in which
34:47these records are kept.
34:48How extraordinary.
34:49It's a real kind of insight into being there on the day, I think.
34:52Yeah. So do we know who the judge was who ran the trial? Who was that?
34:58So this is actually the appointment here of Thomas, Duke of Norfolk, as the Lord High Steward, who oversees the
35:07trial.
35:07He's the judge?
35:08Yes.
35:09So Anne's uncle, someone who should be on her side, actually conducted the trial?
35:13Yes.
35:14So in this period, the king himself can't be kind of seen to be acting in judgment over treason trials.
35:22So he appoints a Lord High Steward for every major treason trial.
35:25Oh, well, that makes sense. He had absolutely no king had nothing to do with that, did he?
35:29Well, it's actually interesting you say that, because here we have the king's great seal.
35:34So this is the king's authorization of this process.
35:38That's his royal stamp of approval.
35:41So Anne's uncle, the Duke of Norfolk, is literally her judge.
35:45But what about her father, Thomas Boleyn?
35:47So Thomas Boleyn, is he involved in this in some way?
35:50So we don't find him in any of these records.
35:53Now, there is one kind of eyewitness account which describes him as being called to the jury to make Anne's
35:58grief more profound.
36:00But we don't see him in these records. He's not on that jury list as far as we know.
36:05But he is involved in the other trial for the men involved.
36:09We'll never know whether Anne Boleyn's own father, to what extent, he was present in this trial.
36:15But it would have been politically savvy for him to have stayed as clear of this trial as possible,
36:19because we're talking about treason here.
36:22What's unfolding feels less like a trial and more like theatre, a stage more than a court.
36:28And this is probably the most scandalous charge of all.
36:31So this is the Queen and her brother.
36:33Yes.
36:34So it talks about being in the private chambers of the Queen, violently and carnally knew her.
36:40This is George.
36:41Mm.
36:42With the Queen's tongue in the mouth of the said George.
36:45Wow.
36:45And the tongue of the said George in the mouth of the said Queen, with eyes wide open.
36:49Goodness, that is incredibly graphic, isn't it? It's almost pornographic.
36:53One of the key points here is that that is actually not legally important for her treason trial.
36:58Right.
36:59It's pure...
37:00Kind of salacious enjoyment of her predicament.
37:04It's not a fair trial.
37:05It's very much lined up to get a result.
37:08Despite the lack of any convincing evidence, Anne Boleyn was found guilty of adultery, incest and treason.
37:16Just four days later, she was led to a spot beside Tower Green where she met the executioner's sword.
37:24But her brutal fate still holds one burning question.
37:29Who's the puppet master behind this?
37:31Who's the overarching villain in this real tragedy, the terrible fate of Anne Boleyn?
37:37Who is the one who's controlling this?
37:44We've investigated the people closest to her.
37:48Her father, Thomas Boleyn, clearly loved his daughter.
37:51We've seen no evidence that he betrayed Anne.
37:55But her uncle, the ruthless Duke of Norfolk, is another matter.
37:59He despised Anne for her independence and her support for religious reforms.
38:05Norfolk certainly had the motive and may well have relished her downfall.
38:10Then there's Anne's sister-in-law, Lady Rochford.
38:13Was she really behind the incest charge between Anne and her brother George?
38:18The evidence seems to be gossip more than fact.
38:21And, of course, we can't ignore Henry.
38:24Frustrated at Anne's failure to give him a male heir, he'd grown tired of her and wanted her gone.
38:30But would the king really risk his own reputation by ordering her execution?
38:35There's one more name on our list of suspects.
38:39Thomas Cromwell.
38:40After Henry VIII, Cromwell was the most powerful man in England.
38:45Of all our suspects, he was the one with the means to take someone down in a public and spectacular
38:52way.
38:52We're not talking about just having someone quietly bumped off here.
38:56We're talking about bringing a Queen of England to trial, making her fight for her life and even having her
39:03executed.
39:05We know that Anne and Cromwell had fallen out over the dissolution of the monasteries.
39:11And we also know that Cromwell had spoken of his fear that Anne might have him executed.
39:17But I wonder if he had a deeper motive.
39:21Henry was unhappy with Anne.
39:23And if Cromwell ended the marriage, he'd win the king's gratitude.
39:27For him, staying in Henry's favour was everything.
39:31So could Cromwell, not the Duke of Norfolk, have been the man behind Anne's downfall?
39:38I've come back to see Elizabeth Norton to find out.
39:43Is there any evidence that Cromwell was involved in Anne's downfall?
39:48There is a great deal of evidence.
39:51He is able to build an alliance around him, so he contacts people who are disaffected with Anne Boleyn.
39:56So Cromwell knows that he's got these people who are supporting him.
40:00He then goes home so that he can go and plot against Anne.
40:04So he gets a leave of absence from court.
40:06He does. He's effectively saying, I'm too ill, I've got to go home.
40:09But actually we can see that he's getting the ball rolling.
40:11He's trying to build a case against her.
40:15By excusing himself from court,
40:17Cromwell is able to put all his time into gathering rumours about Anne
40:22that link her to the accused men.
40:24He sets out to turn idle gossip into evidence that will destroy her.
40:29We say there's no smoke without fire.
40:31In Anne Boleyn's case, there almost certainly isn't any fire.
40:34But there's certainly a lot of smoke and Cromwell is able to use this to his advantage.
40:39On the 30th of April, 1536, he actually invites Mark Smeaton,
40:43the musician in Anne's household, to dinner at his house.
40:46He arrives and he's immediately arrested, probably tortured.
40:50Certainly by the morning he's confessed to having an affair with Anne Boleyn.
40:53So we can see Cromwell's hand all the way through.
40:56And you can see his ruthlessness as well.
40:58He doesn't care who he brings down.
41:00In fact, the men who are accused of adultery with Anne Boleyn
41:03are members of the Boleyn faction.
41:05So he's trying to ensure that the Boleyns don't come back to attack him after Anne's fall.
41:10So it sounds like all of this is happening with bewildering speed.
41:14But I guess from Cromwell's point of view, it has to be.
41:17Because he knows how fickle Henry VIII is.
41:20He's always changing his mind.
41:21So if Cromwell doesn't act quickly, then it might be his neck, not hers.
41:25Anne must have rued the day she made an enemy of Thomas Cromwell
41:30because he was ruthless.
41:38It's time for Tracey and I to meet up and examine the evidence.
41:45Ultimately, Henry's the one in charge.
41:47He was the one who, above anybody else, could have saved Anne if he really wanted to.
41:52But, of course, he didn't because he's already moved on.
41:55He's betrothed to wife number three the day after Anne was executed.
41:59So we can't excuse Henry's part in this.
42:02Henry is led by his emotions.
42:04And I suppose if you're someone who's solid in control of their emotions like Cromwell,
42:09people like Henry are easy to play.
42:11You know, a quiet word in his ear, then he's easily led.
42:14He is very easily led, actually.
42:16And that's exactly what Cromwell does.
42:18He persuades him that Anne has been, you know, committing adultery.
42:21And whether or not Henry believes it, he sees the convenience of having her killed.
42:27Her childhood, her upbringing, and those visits to the European courts.
42:31It's almost like you're developing, you're encouraging, you're growing this incredibly intelligent, vibrant, strong person into a world that doesn't
42:41want them.
42:42Exactly.
42:43And I can't help feeling that a huge part of Anne's downfall was that she simply didn't fit the mould.
42:51Anne's defiance and ambition marked her as a threat.
42:55But ultimately, it was her failure to provide Henry with a male heir that would lead to her death.
43:03On the 19th of May, 1536, Anne was executed here at the Tower of London.
43:11And those trumped-up charges, ridiculous charges.
43:14It was character assassination as well.
43:17You know, it wasn't enough just to execute her for treason.
43:20They had to absolutely destroy her.
43:23And that's a good thing that we've done, perhaps, and historians have done,
43:26that it's actually to re-establish her strength of character.
43:30Yes.
43:30And her spirit.
43:31Exactly.
43:32It's been one of the most rewarding parts of this,
43:34is almost rescuing Anne from their story.
43:38She's always seen in the context of Henry and sometimes Cromwell.
43:42But here's an absolutely remarkable woman.
43:44Looking over there, thinking that that's one of the things about coming to the Tower, isn't it?
43:48That you can actually see the very spot where these amazing stories and these people lived.
43:55And tragically, where they died.
43:58Absolutely.
43:59It's a deeply, deeply tragic story in so many different ways.
44:03And you think of what might have been.
44:05But I suppose the silver lining is her daughter, Elizabeth,
44:09who would go on to be not just the greatest of Henry's heirs,
44:13the one he'd forgotten about, but she would be this great queen,
44:16but probably one of the greatest monarchs Britain has ever had.
44:19Yes.
44:20And you could say that actually that very male world of the court,
44:24having dismissed this female heir, went on to become one of the greatest monarchs.
44:30Yes. It's the perfect end to the story.
44:35A chilling thriller set in the world of daytime TV,
44:39starring Jill Halfpenny and Sally Lindsay.
44:41Brand new original drama, Number One Fan, starts Monday at 9.
44:45And there's so many more real secrets to be revealed inside the Tower of London,
44:49all seasons to stream now on 5.
44:52Next, Trauma Room 1.
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