Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester

Education and marriage

Robert Dudley was the fifth son of John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland, and his wife Jane, daughter of Sir Edward Guildford. His paternal grandfather, Edmund Dudley, had been an adviser to King Henry VII and was executed for treason in 1510 by King Henry VIII. John and Jane Dudley had 13 children in all and were known for their happy family life. Among the siblings' tutors figured John Dee, Thomas Wilson, and Roger Ascham.

Roger Ascham believed that Robert Dudley possessed a rare talent for languages and writing, including in Latin, regretting that his pupil had done himself harm by preferring mathematics. Robert learned the craft of the courtier at the courts of Henry VIII, and especially Edward VI, among whose companions he served.

In 1549, Robert Dudley participated in crushing Kett's Rebellion and probably first met Amy Robsart, whom he was to wed on 4 June 1550 in the presence of the young King Edward. She was of the same age as the bridegroom and the daughter and heiress of Sir John Robsart, a gentleman-farmer of Norfolk. It was a love-match, the young couple depending heavily on their fathers' gifts, especially Robert's. John Dudley, who since early 1550 effectively ruled England, was pleased to strengthen his influence in Norfolk by his son's marriage. Lord Robert, as he was styled as a duke's son, became an important local gentleman and served as a Member of Parliament for Norfolk in 1551–52, March 1553 and 1559. His court career went on in parallel.

Exploration and business

Robert Dudley was a pioneer of new industries; interested in many things from tapestries to mining, he was engaged in the first joint stock companies in English history. The Earl also concerned himself with relieving unemployment among the poor. On a personal level, he gave to poor people, petitioners, and prisons on a daily basis. Due to his interests in trade and exploration, as well as his debts, his contacts with the London city fathers were intense. He was an enthusiastic investor in the Muscovy Company and the Merchant Adventurers. English relations with Morocco were also handled by Leicester. This he did in the manner of his private business affairs, underpinned by a patriotic and missionary zeal (commercially, these relations were loss-making). He took much interest in the careers of John Hawkins and Francis Drake from early on, and was a principal backer of Drake's circumnavigation of the world. Robert and Ambrose Dudley were also the principal patrons of Martin Frobisher's 1576 search for the Northwest Passage. Later Leicester acquired his own ship, the Galleon Leicester, which he employed in a luckless expedition under Edward Fenton, but also under Drake. As much as profit, English seapower was on his mind, and accordingly, Leicester became a friend and leading supporter of Dom António, the exiled claimant to the Portuguese throne after 1580.

Marriage hopes and proposals

Elizabeth remained close to Dudley and he, with her blessing and on her prompting, pursued his suit for her hand in an atmosphere of diplomatic intrigue. His wife's and his father's shadows haunted his prospects. His efforts leading nowhere, in the spring of 1561 Dudley offered to leave England to seek military adventures abroad; Elizabeth would have none of that and everything remained as it was. In 1587, a man named Arthur claimed to have been born in 1561 as the illegitimate son of Robert Dudley and Queen Elizabeth I, but his claims could not be proven.

In October 1562, the Queen fell ill with smallpox and, believing her life to be in danger, she asked the Privy Council to make Robert Dudley Protector of the Realm and to give him a suitable title together with 20,000 pounds a year. There was universal relief when she recovered her health. Dudley was made a privy councillor. He was already deeply involved in foreign politics, including Scotland.

In 1563, Elizabeth suggested Dudley as a consort to the widowed Mary, Queen of Scots, the idea being to achieve firm amity between England and Scotland and diminish the influence of foreign powers. Elizabeth's preferred solution was that they should all live together at the English court, so that she would not have to forgo her favourite's company. Mary at first enquired if Elizabeth was serious, wanting above all to know her chances of inheriting the English crown. Elizabeth repeatedly declared that she was prepared to acknowledge Mary as her heir only on condition that she marry Robert Dudley. Mary's Protestant advisors warmed to the prospect of her marriage to Dudley, and in September 1564 he was created Earl of Leicester, a move designed to make him more acceptable to Mary. In January 1565, Thomas Randolph, the English ambassador to Scotland, was told by the Scottish queen that she would accept the proposal. To his amazement, Dudley was not to be moved to comply: But a man of that nature I never found any... he whom I go about to make as happy as ever was any, to put him in possession of a kingdom, to lay in his naked arms a most fair... lady... nothing regardeth the good that shall ensue unto him thereby... but so uncertainly dealeth that I know not where to find him. Dudley indeed had made it clear to the Scots at the beginning that he was not a candidate for Mary's hand and forthwith had behaved with passive resistance. He also worked in the interest of Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, Mary's eventual choice of husband. Elizabeth herself wavered as to declaring Mary her heir, until in March 1565 she decided she could not bring herself to it. Still, she finally told the Spanish ambassador that the proposal fell through because the Earl of Leicester refused to cooperate.

By 1564, Dudley had realised that his chances of becoming Elizabeth's consort were small. At the same time he could not "consider... without great repugnance", as he said, that she chose another husband. Confronted with other marriage projects, Elizabeth continued to say that she still would very much like to marry him. Dudley was seen as a serious candidate until the mid-1560s and later. To remove this threat to Habsburg and Valois suitors, between 1565 and 1578, four German and French princesses were mooted as brides for Leicester, as a consolation for giving up Elizabeth and his resistance to her foreign marriage projects. These he had sabotaged and would continue to sabotage. In 1566 Dudley formed the opinion that Elizabeth would never marry, recalling that she had always said so since she was eight years old; but he still was hopeful—she had also assured him he would be her choice in case she changed her mind (and married an Englishman).

For the first 30 years of Elizabeth's reign, until Leicester's death, he and Lord Burghley were the most powerful and important political figures, working intimately with the Queen. Robert Dudley was a conscientious privy councillor, and one of the most frequently attending.

In 1560 the diplomat Nicholas Throckmorton advocated vehemently against Dudley marrying the Queen, but Dudley won him over in 1562. Throckmorton henceforth became his political advisor and intimate. After Throckmorton's death in 1571, there quickly evolved a political alliance between the Earl of Leicester and Sir Francis Walsingham, soon to be Secretary of State. Together they worked for a militant Protestant foreign policy. There also existed a family relationship between them after Walsingham's daughter had married Philip Sidney, Leicester's favourite nephew. Leicester, after some initial jealousy, also became a good friend of Sir Christopher Hatton, himself one of Elizabeth's favourites.

Robert Dudley's relationship with William Cecil, Lord Burghley, was complicated. Traditionally they have been seen as enemies, and Cecil behind the scenes sabotaged Dudley's endeavours to obtain the Queen's hand. On the other hand, they were on friendly terms and had an efficient working relationship which never broke down. In 1572, the vacant post of Lord High Treasurer was offered to Leicester, who declined and proposed Burghley, stating that the latter was the much more suitable candidate. In later years, being at odds, Dudley felt like reminding Cecil of their "thirty years friendship".

On the whole, Cecil and Dudley were in concord about policies while disagreeing fundamentally about some issues, such as the Queen's marriage and some areas of foreign policy. Cecil favoured the suit of Francois, Duke of Anjou, in 1578–1581 for Elizabeth's hand, while Leicester was among its strongest opponents, even contemplating exile in letters to Burghley. The Anjou courtship, at the end of which Leicester and several dozen noblemen and gentlemen escorted the French prince to Antwerp, also touched the question of English intervention in the Netherlands to help the rebellious provinces. This debate stretched over a decade until 1585, with the Earl of Leicester as the foremost interventionist. Burghley was more cautious of military engagement while in a dilemma over his Protestant predilections.

Until about 1571/1572, Dudley supported Mary Stuart's succession rights to the English throne. He was also, from the early 1560s, on the best terms with the Protestant lords in Scotland, thereby supporting the English or, as he saw it, the Protestant interest. After Mary Stuart's flight into England (1568) Leicester was, unlike Cecil, in favour of restoring her as Scottish queen under English control, preferably with a Protestant English husband, such as the Duke of Norfolk. In 1577 Leicester had a personal meeting with Mary and listened to her complaints about her captivity. By the early 1580s Mary had come to fear Leicester's influence with James VI, her son, in whose privy chamber the English Earl had placed a spy. She spread stories about his supposed lust for the English throne, and when the Catholic anti-Leicester libel, Leicester's Commonwealth, was published in 1584 Dudley believed that Mary was involved in its conception.

The Bond of Association, which the Privy Council gave out in October 1584, may have originated in Dudley's ideas. Circulated in the country, the document's subscribers swore that, should Elizabeth be assassinated (as William the Silent had been a few months earlier), not only the killer but also the royal person who would benefit from this should be executed. Leicester's relations with James of Scotland grew closer when he gained the confidence of the King's favourite, Patrick, Master of Gray, in 1584–1585. His negotiations with the Master were the basis for the Treaty of Berwick, a defensive alliance between the two British states against European powers. In 1586 Walsingham uncovered the Babington Plot. Following the Ridolfi Plot (1571) and the Throckmorton Plot (1583), this was another scheme to assassinate Elizabeth in which Mary Stuart was involved. Following her conviction, Leicester, then in the Netherlands, vehemently urged her execution in his letters; he despaired of Elizabeth's security after so many plots.

Leicester having returned to England, in February 1587 Elizabeth signed Mary's death warrant, with the proviso that it be not carried out until she gave her approval. As there was no sign of her doing so, Burghley, Leicester, and a handful of other privy councillors decided to proceed with Mary's execution in the interest of the state. Leicester went to Bath and Bristol for his health; unlike the other privy councillors involved, he escaped Elizabeth's severe wrath on hearing the news of Mary's death.

Life at court

As "a male favourite to a virgin queen", Robert Dudley found himself in an unprecedented situation. His apartments at court were next to hers, and—perceived as knowing "the Queen and her nature best of any man"—his influence was matched by few. Another side of such privileges was Elizabeth's possessiveness and jealousy. His company was essential for her well-being and for many years he was hardly allowed to leave. Sir Christopher Hatton reported a growing emergency when the Earl was away for a few weeks in 1578: "This court wanteth your presence. Her majesty is unaccompanied and, I assure you, the chambers are almost empty."

On ceremonial occasions, Dudley often acted as an unofficial consort, sometimes in the Queen's stead. He largely assumed charge of court ceremonial and organised hundreds of small and large festivities. From 1587 he was Lord Steward, being responsible for the royal household's supply with food and other commodities. He displayed a strong sense for economising and reform in this function, which he had de facto occupied long before his official appointment. The sanitary situation in the palaces was a perennial problem, and a talk with Leicester about these issues inspired John Harington to construct a water closet. Leicester was a lifelong sportsman, hunting and jousting in the tiltyard, and an indefatigable tennis-player. He was also the Queen's regular dancing partner.