The Queen’s Agent: Francis Walsingham at the Court of Elizabeth I

The great debates in Elizabethan history tend to be circular. Their origins lie in the reign itself and subsequent historical revisions simply recycle old arguments. So it is with Sir Francis Walsingham. Mary Stuart herself made what John Cooper calls ‘the most striking allegation’ against Walsingham at her trial at Fotheringhay in October 1586. She accused him to his face of fabricating evidence ‘to bring her to her death’ and insinuated that ‘he had practised against her life and her son’s’.

On one level Mary had a point. Since 1572 Walsingham had made no secret of his conviction that Elizabeth I had made a major mistake in not prosecuting Mary for her part in the Ridolphi Plot, a conspiracy to depose Elizabeth with the aid of a Spanish invasion. In his reply Walsingham denied personal malice and declared he had done nothing unworthy of his office. Had one of the Babington Plotters, when planning to murder the queen, offered to act as a double agent he would have employed him, but none had and he had not done so. There is still no proof that he lied.

Mary’s trial and execution was the most notorious episode of Walsingham’s near 20-year career as secretary of state. That career was the subject of the three volumes of Conyers Read’s Mr Secretary Walsingham and the Policy of Queen Elizabeth. Published in 1926 and now a rare book, it was based on two decades of research and the footnotes alone are more valuable than much recent writing on Elizabethan history. It looms over any subsequent biography.

The Queen’s Agent shares the approach and tone of Stephen Alford’s recent Burghley. It is a synthesis of recent literature rather than an archival exploration or resolution of long-standing controversies. The style is lively and accessible. There is also much scene-setting – Tudor government, Ireland, Western Planting and Elizabethan Catholicism. Cooper intends them to illustrate the various facets of Walsingham’s life, but the man himself occasionally gets lost in the process. As with Burghley, there are omissions. The complex diplomacy over France and the Netherlands between 1575 and 1585 that Walsingham took so seriously is skimmed over in a chapter. Relations with Scotland in the same period are hardly mentioned at all and they are crucial to understanding Mary Stuart’s last years.

The ultimate challenge for any biographer of Walsingham is his relationship with Elizabeth I. Cooper’s conclusion is that his ‘plangent Puritanism aggravated the queen. But she knew that he was loyal ...’ A decade ago I would have agreed with him. But there is more to it than that. Walsingham was a Denny, a member of the social network that formed the core of Elizabeth’s household. His maternal uncle was that central figure in the court of the 1540s, Sir Anthony Denny, who also exerted a subtle behind-the-scenes influence over the princess until his death in 1549. Denny’s wife was the sister of Catherine Astley, probably the most important person in Elizabeth’s early life.

As a result the most difficult question about Walsingham is why it took until 1570 for Elizabeth to appoint him to office. One reason may be the debilitating kidney ailment – which Cooper plausibly suggests may have been a symptom of diabetes – that dogged him throughout his life. However the office was Elizabeth’s main diplomatic posting: ambassador in Paris. Thereafter his rise was meteoric, she appointed him secretary of state only three years later.

Not only did Elizabeth and Walsingham share a sardonic sense of humour, his ‘aggravating puritanism’ was not all it appears to be. Lord Burghley and the Earl of Leicester were the dedicatees of numerous sermons and religious works, Walsingham hardly any. Leicester and Walsingham’s brother in law Robert Beale took on Archbishop Whitgift openly in defence of Puritan ministers in the mid-1580s. Burghley made his unhappiness known. But Walsingham never raised his head above the parapet.

Simon Adams is Reader in History at the University of Strathclyde