England's Bloody Queens: Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots
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00:00Queen Elizabeth I, conqueror of the Spanish Armada,
00:06Tudor defender of the Protestant faith, the headstrong Virgin Queen who refuses to marry.
00:14But of all her challenges, her most gruelling battle is with another woman,
00:20her own cousin, Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots.
00:24I am a free princess in that I am not responsible to you or any other.
00:30Elizabeth will not face a more relentless threat to her crown or her life.
00:37With black ingratitude, she tries to kill me, who so often saved her life.
00:43Elizabeth never forgives Mary for the fact that she has laid claim to her throne.
00:47She never forgets it.
00:49So long as I live, there shall be no other queen in England but I.
00:55There is no other queen of England but I.
01:01Both claim the English throne, two queens on opposite sides of the greatest conflicts of their time,
01:08Protestant and Catholic, Tudor and Stuart, and that most ancient of rivalries, English and Scottish.
01:17When rude Scotland vomits up a poison, must fine England lick it up for a restorative.
01:27Their combat will last from 1561 to 1587, ending in one final fatal decision.
01:43And yet, in nearly three decades of obsession with each other, they will never actually meet.
01:52That explosive relationship is played out entirely through letters,
01:57written with an intimacy and passion that still burns through the paper.
02:03Beneath those elegant phrases swirls this dark, deadly current, which is going to drag one of the writers down.
02:13Here, for the first time on television, dramatized purely from the words of the two queens and their courtiers,
02:20is the fatal story of Elizabeth and Mary.
02:26No more tears. I will think upon revenge.
02:44Would that we, being two queens so near of kin,
02:48neighbours living in one isle, should be friends and live together like sisters,
02:54than by some strange means divide ourselves to the hurt of us both.
02:59I assure you, I be fully resolved to live with you in the knot of friendship, as we are in that of nature and blood.
03:06I am glad to hear of your goodwill towards us and good inclination to peace and friendship.
03:14God could not have blessed these two kingdoms with greater felicity than if one of us had been a king and married the other.
03:231561. Mary Stuart's arrival in Scotland has the two queens brimming over with goodwill.
03:32She is 18, Elizabeth 27.
03:36The fact that with Mary and Elizabeth we have two young women who are queens is extraordinary.
03:44This is not an era of female rulers, and now we have two of them, and their kingdoms border each other.
03:53As two young queens on one island, surrounded by a sea of male rulers, they seem to be drawn to one another.
04:02Yet their characters couldn't be more different.
04:07Elizabeth's godson, Sir John Harrington, said of her that when she smiled, it was like pure sunshine.
04:14But then he continued, he said, anon would come a storm and then thunderous weather would fall upon them all.
04:22At one point she actually broke one of her maid's fingers by slamming a candlestick down on it.
04:27She would smash things, she could say very unkind things.
04:33Elizabeth has survived prison and death threats to become queen only two years earlier.
04:39Mary has been Queen of Scots since she was six days old.
04:43She's been raised in the luxury of the French court.
04:47Mary loved life. She loved dancing, she loved hunting, she loved sewing, she loved people.
04:54She would have danced all night if she could.
04:58She'd been raised the pampered princess in France.
05:02She was very vulnerable, she was volatile.
05:05She was alluring, but she was impulsive and she was impatient.
05:09These were seen as quite dangerous qualities in a queen in the 16th century.
05:14If you're a man looking at this from the 21st century backwards, you think if you want a good date,
05:18you're going to choose Mary every time, you're never going to choose Elizabeth.
05:24Mary Stuart hasn't chosen to come to Scotland.
05:28The death of her husband, the King of France, just left her with no role in the French court.
05:34She's sort of unmoored when she arrives in Scotland.
05:38She's got these big, brash Scottish lords who are really not too sure about having this bonnie wee lassie as their queen.
05:47To Mary, Scotland must seem like Afghanistan,
05:51a mountainous country of feuding clans, warlords and religious fanatics.
05:56She's a Catholic, and many of them are fiercely Protestant.
06:02Her indifference is an insult to these men, and will prove to be a dangerous mistake.
06:10Instead, her ambition makes her look south, to England and Elizabeth's crown.
06:17She has to be forced back to Scotland, and when she's there, when she arrives,
06:23she nags on about being recognised as Elizabeth's successor.
06:30I am the nearest kinswoman she has, being both of us of one house and stock.
06:37As the great-granddaughter of Henry VII, Mary has a strong claim to be named Elizabeth's successor.
06:44So the English queen has every reason to be wary.
06:52If it became known who would succeed me, I would never think myself secure.
07:00Tensions between Catholics and Protestants are worsening across Europe.
07:05Many people fear that just the presence of Queen Mary could inflame the passions of English Catholics.
07:13One reason England had become Protestant was so that Henry VIII could marry Anne Boleyn, Elizabeth's mother.
07:24English Catholics had a settled hatred for Anne Boleyn.
07:27They always favoured Mary, Queen of Scots' claim over Elizabeth.
07:31They called her bastardised Elizabeth.
07:35In the eyes of Catholic Europe, Mary, the good Catholic that she is, is the rightful heir to the English throne.
07:45Catholic Europe could back Mary if she tried to seize the English throne,
07:49a threat that obsessed Elizabeth's chief minister, Lord Burley.
07:54The Queen of Scots is and always will be a dangerous person to your estate.
08:00She cannot forbear from her continual ardent desire to possess the crown of this realm.
08:07He thinks he's the man appointed almost by God to save Elizabeth from herself.
08:16Burley is constantly dripping poison in Elizabeth's ear about Mary.
08:21Not to be neglected, trusted, nor pardoned.
08:27He saw Mary almost as the Antichrist.
08:30There was no way he was going to allow that woman to get anywhere near the throne of England.
08:37Mary is aware of Burley's opposition.
08:41I know how near I am descended of the blood of England,
08:45and what devices have been attempted to destroy me.
08:49And what devices have been attempted to make me a stranger from it.
09:00Elizabeth uses elaborate tactics to avoid ever giving Mary a straight answer about the succession.
09:08In September 1564, Mary's envoy, Sir James Melville, is sent to speak to Elizabeth to pin her down.
09:17But she bombards him with strangely personal questions.
09:23What colour of hair is reputed best?
09:28Is my hair or your Queen's the best?
09:35Well, which of us is fairer?
09:38Your Majesty is the fairest Queen in England, and ours is the fairest Queen in Scotland.
09:44Your Majesty is the whiter, but our Queen is very lovely.
09:50And who is taller?
09:52My Queen is, Your Majesty.
09:55Then she is too high. I am neither too high nor too low.
10:03What Elizabeth does is intelligent and subtle.
10:06She simply does not want to have the conversation that Melville has travelled to her court to try and have with her.
10:12She refuses to do it.
10:14And what she does is she invokes femininity to simply evade this conversation.
10:19And he is climbing the walls with frustration.
10:27But then he goes back to Mary, and he's not fooled at all.
10:30He says, you cannot trust Elizabeth.
10:32There are nothing but jealousies and suspicion.
10:37But the two women hide their suspicions behind a charm offensive.
10:43We shall present to the world such friendship as has never been seen.
10:51They seem to compete in their declarations of love.
10:55Elizabeth sends Mary a diamond ring, but Mary goes on.
10:59Mary sends Elizabeth her portrait.
11:03It's a miniature portrait in heart-shaped diamond ring.
11:07And she sends it with Petrarchan, almost love lyrics.
11:11And it's this sort of sense that she's wooing Elizabeth.
11:14She wants to meet her.
11:17Mary's most comfortable writing in French.
11:22Elizabeth's most comfortable writing in English.
11:25Mary's most comfortable writing in French.
11:43Mary's obsession with being recognized as Elizabeth's heir to the English throne
11:48made her easy to manipulate.
11:51Elizabeth could deal with this.
11:54She's dealing with someone who wants what only Elizabeth can give.
11:57It's marvellous.
12:01But Elizabeth avoids actually meeting her cousin.
12:07Mary was renowned for her charisma, for her charm.
12:11It was said that anyone who came within ten feet of the Queen of Scots
12:14would fall in love with her.
12:16Now, I think Elizabeth had heard that, and she believed it, and she feared it.
12:21She didn't want to like Mary.
12:26Having failed to meet and charm Elizabeth,
12:29Mary tries a new scheme to strengthen her claim to the crown.
12:34Marriage.
12:35But Elizabeth is not about to let her cousin marry one of her powerful European rivals.
12:43I recommend some fit nobleman within the island.
12:48But I declare no child of France, Spain or Austria will be acceptable.
12:55And your right and title to the English crown will depend much on your marriage.
13:02The root problem is Elizabeth regards herself as the superior queen,
13:06and she regards Mary as a satellite queen,
13:09and no Scot, then or now, would accept that.
13:18Elizabeth isn't like other queens.
13:20She has little interest in marriage.
13:23That would mean handing power to a husband.
13:26No husband means no chance of an heir, no matter how much Burleigh badges her.
13:32God send our mistress a husband, and by him a son,
13:37that we may hope our posterity shall have a masculine succession.
13:42I am already bound unto a husband which is the kingdom of England.
13:47As many as are English are my children.
13:53If I am to disclose to you what I prefer, if I follow the inclination of my nature,
13:59I will tell you it is this, beggar woman and single,
14:04far rather than queen and married.
14:07I think the reason Elizabeth chose not to marry had an awful lot to do with
14:11the examples from which she had learned in childhood.
14:14So, of course, it's not a great role model,
14:16the fact that her mother, Anne Boleyn, is executed by her father,
14:20but I think it went further than that for Elizabeth.
14:23There have been a number of scandals surrounding her.
14:27At the age of just 13, the first major scandal erupted.
14:33Her stepfather, Thomas Seymour, came into Elizabeth's bedroom early in the morning
14:38and basically, you might say he sexually touched her.
14:44His wife, Catherine, was actually complicit in this,
14:47and there's one occasion described where she held Elizabeth down
14:51while her husband cut Elizabeth's gown into a hundred pieces.
14:57I've thought about this for over 30 years,
14:59and I now think that Elizabeth had probably pretty much decided
15:03that she never would marry.
15:05And I think the reason for this is simply those teenage experiences
15:09when she had seen how men could behave.
15:12The one exception is Lord Robert.
15:15Lord Robert did not marry Elizabeth.
15:17He did not marry Elizabeth.
15:19He did not marry Elizabeth.
15:21He did not marry Elizabeth.
15:23The one exception is Lord Robert, Lord Robert Dudley.
15:27And she was in love with him, there's absolutely no question
15:30that he was the only man she ever truly loved.
15:37My true opinion is that she will never marry.
15:41I know Her Majesty as well, or better than anyone else.
15:45We were friends before she was eight years old.
15:48She has always said she would never do so.
15:53But if by chance she should change her mind,
15:57I'm practically assured she would choose no-one else but me.
16:01She told me so herself quite openly on more than one occasion.
16:07But even love is just a pawn in the Queen's game.
16:11Elizabeth is willing to sacrifice Lord Robert.
16:14She knows he'll always be loyal to her.
16:20If I had ever wanted to take a husband,
16:22I would have married him myself.
16:24But being determined to end my life in virginity,
16:28I wish that my sister should marry him.
16:32Being matched with him would remove out of my mind
16:35all fear of usurpation before my death.
16:38He is so loving, trusty,
16:40that he would never suffer such a thing to be attempted.
16:46Mary is insulted by Elizabeth's suggestion
16:49that she should marry Lord Robert.
16:51She's not even a very high aristocrat.
16:54He's the son of a traitor,
16:56and he is Elizabeth's discarded suitor.
17:00Do you think it might stand with my honour to marry a subject?
17:07Being assured of me, you might let me marry where I best like.
17:13And Elizabeth has this sort of weird idea
17:16that they will have a sort of menage-a-trois at Elizabeth's court.
17:20Very strange.
17:21If the Queen, my sister, is pleased to live with me in household,
17:25I will gladly bear the charges of the family
17:28as shall one sister do for another.
17:30I do mind to use my own choice in marriage.
17:34I will no longer be fed with yea or nay
17:37and depend on uncertain dealings.
17:43The sisterly pretense is over.
17:46Mary decides on her own potential husband,
17:49an Englishman and a Catholic,
17:51her cousin, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley.
17:55Darnley's actually a really good bet for Mary.
17:58He's got royal blood,
17:59which strengthens her own claim to the English throne.
18:03Moreover, he represents something extremely unusual
18:06for elite women in the 16th century, and particularly queens.
18:09He's young, he's handsome, he's desirable.
18:13He is the lustiest and best-proportioned tall man
18:18that I have ever seen.
18:21Mary's desire scandalises her court.
18:24The gossip gets back to Elizabeth through her ambassador,
18:28Thomas Randolph.
18:31She is seized in love in more fervent passions
18:35than is comely for any mean personage.
18:38Some report she is bewitched.
18:42Shame is laid aside.
18:47Darnley is but a pawn,
18:49but he may well checkmate me if he is promoted.
18:53I think Elizabeth was very suspicious of Mary's motives
18:57when it came to Lord Darnley,
19:00because Darnley, too, had royal blood.
19:03In fact, he was one of the strongest claimants
19:06to the English throne,
19:08so she undoubtedly saw this as an aggressive move on Mary's part,
19:12that she was considering marriage to this man.
19:16A Catholic couple on the Scottish throne
19:19could attract the support of England's enemies, France and Spain.
19:24So Elizabeth simply puts any question of succession on hold.
19:29Elizabeth turns round and says that she will not name her successor
19:33until she decides whether she'll marry.
19:36Nothing shall be done until I shall be married,
19:40or shall notify my determination never to marry.
19:44This is heartbreaking for Mary.
19:46She feels played.
19:48All the letters, the gifts, the petitions,
19:51it feels completely wasted.
19:53It shall turn to your discredit more than my loss.
19:57I will not fail in any good offices towards you,
20:00but to rely or trust much from henceforth in you.
20:05I will not.
20:09She gets up, she goes out, she has a good cry,
20:12and then she goes to see Darnley.
20:16On July 29th, 1565,
20:19Mary marries Darnley without Elizabeth's permission.
20:25When she went ahead, quite rightly, and married Lord Darnley,
20:29Elizabeth was incandescent with rage.
20:33Mary can't see the problem.
20:35She thinks she's upheld her side of the bargain, effectively.
20:38She's married an Englishman, as Elizabeth had wanted.
20:41So what's the problem?
20:43You can never persuade me that I have failed you,
20:46but you have failed me.
20:48I have found your proceedings of late very strange.
20:53You forget yourself marvellously.
20:57The naming of your husband King
20:59shall not give him any authority to do anything.
21:03Her Majesty desires her good sister to meddle no further.
21:12Mary now has both a Catholic husband
21:15and a strong acclaim to the English throne.
21:19The Queen of Scots is delighted.
21:22Suddenly, probably for the first time,
21:25Mary really has the upper hand in this relationship.
21:29Madame Massa, I understand you are offended
21:34without just cause against the King, my husband and myself.
21:40Mary's marriage to Darnley doesn't just offend Elizabeth.
21:44The Scottish lords are horrified.
21:47Darnley, he was awful.
21:49The Protestant lords couldn't bear him.
21:52He may have had Scottish blood, he may even have Stuart blood,
21:55but to them he was this effete, bisexual, beardless Englishman.
22:01One contemporary even called him a great cock chick.
22:05And this is not the kind of guy that they want
22:08telling them what to do in Scotland.
22:10He's unfaithful to Mary, you know, from very, very early on.
22:13He's a terrible drug addict.
22:15He's a big whisky drinker.
22:17He goes into uncontrollable rages.
22:20I know for certain that Queen Mary repents her marriage
22:24and that she hates him.
22:26She is so much altered, her wits are not what they were,
22:29her beauty another.
22:31Her cheer and countenance changed.
22:34A woman more to be pitied than any I ever saw.
22:37Once he's married, that's it, he's king.
22:40He thinks that she should be a submissive queen.
22:43Then comes big news.
22:45Mary is pregnant.
22:47If it's a boy, he'll strengthen the Stuart claim to the English crown.
22:52But some wonder if Darnley is the father,
22:55or one of Mary's courtiers, David Rizzio.
22:59David Rizzio is an Italian musician, and he's Catholic,
23:04so of course he has to be Catholic,
23:06but he's also an Italian musician.
23:09He's an Italian musician, and he's Catholic,
23:12so of course he has to be a papal spy.
23:15He's everything that the Protestant lords can't bear.
23:18He seems to have inveigled himself into Mary's intimacies,
23:21into her familiarity.
23:25Jealous of the influence the Italian has over Mary,
23:28Darnley goes after him.
23:31There are practices in hand that David, with the consent of the king,
23:35shall have his throat cut within these ten days.
23:39The attack comes suddenly.
23:41Darnley and Lord Riven, a Scottish lord, came in.
23:45They tried to detach Mary from Rizzio, but she was shielding him.
23:49He hid behind her skirt.
23:51They dragged Rizzio away, and they stabbed him.
23:54It was like a cellblock shanking.
23:56He was stabbed 56 times, Mary recalled.
24:02With her friend lying in a pool of blood at her feet,
24:06Mary could take no more of Darnley.
24:13You have taken your last of me, and your farewell.
24:30No more tears.
24:33I will think upon revenge.
24:39She despises her husband now,
24:42and this makes her into a decisive, fearsome, strong ruler,
24:48the sort of queen that Elizabeth already is,
24:52and Mary now seizes the initiative.
24:57Fearing that Darnley would try to push her off the throne,
25:01Mary writes directly to Elizabeth, asking for support.
25:06Praying you remember your honour and our nearness of blood.
25:14The word of God commands that all princes
25:18should defend the just actions of other princes,
25:22as well as their own.
25:24For once, Elizabeth shows solidarity with her sister queen.
25:28She wears her portrait around her waist,
25:31and she seems genuinely sympathetic towards Mary at this time.
25:37Do you think the Queen of Scotland has been well treated?
25:41If it had been me, I would have taken her husband's dagger
25:44and stabbed him with it.
25:48What she doesn't know is that Burleigh had advised her
25:52and didn't bother to tell his own queen,
25:55because he knew that this would bring about turmoil in Scotland
25:59and this would help to destabilise Mary.
26:06But on June 19th, 1566,
26:09Mary Stuart does something Elizabeth will never do.
26:13She gives birth to a male heir, James.
26:17But Mary is still miserable, shackled to her husband.
26:23Unless I am quit of the king by one means or another,
26:26I can never have a good day for the rest of my life.
26:32I could wish to be dead.
26:38Elizabeth may despise Darnley,
26:41but she never sends a single letter to him.
26:44She may despise Darnley,
26:46but she never sends a single soldier to defend her cousin.
26:51Instead, Mary turns to another violent man.
26:55At the moment that Mary is at her most vulnerable,
26:58somebody steps forward, and in this case it's the Earl of Bothwell.
27:02Yes, he will help Mary, he will be her protector,
27:05but he wants something back. She doesn't know that yet.
27:08Bothwell, violently malicious, beyond measure.
27:12He's as malicious and dishonest as the devil.
27:19It isn't long before an explosion destroys Darnley's bedroom,
27:24as seen in illustrations from the time.
27:27Alone in the air with such fearmence that the whole lodging, walls and other,
27:32there is nothing remaining, no.
27:36Not a stone above another, but all carried away
27:41or dashed and drossed to the very ground.
27:46Mysteriously, Darnley's half-naked body,
27:49which had been left to rot in the fire,
27:53mysteriously, Darnley's half-naked body is found 60 paces from the house,
27:58strangled.
28:00Many Scots suspect that Mary and Bothwell are behind it.
28:06Killing a king is considered the worst crime in the Christian world.
28:10With public opinion turning against Mary,
28:13Elizabeth is losing patience with her cousin.
28:17She procured her husband's murder.
28:20Bothwell, the chief murderer, was protected by her.
28:27But Mary is adamant that she has nothing to do with it.
28:32I lament the tragedy of my husband's death more than any of my subjects can do.
28:38I had never knowledge, art, nor part thereof.
28:43For the love of God, madam, use such sincerity and prudence in this.
28:48In this case, that all the world may feel justified
28:51in believing you innocent of so enormous a crime,
28:54which, if you were not, would be good cause
28:57for degrading you from the rank of princes.
29:01All of Scotland cried out upon the foul murder of the king.
29:05Everybody suspected Botherwell.
29:08Now Bothwell calls in Mary's dead.
29:11He abducts her for 12 days, and some think he rapes her.
29:16And some think he rapes her to force her into marriage.
29:22I cannot dissemble that he has used me as I would have wished,
29:26or deserved, at his hand.
29:30There are people that have tried to defend Mary
29:33who have said that she was raped by Bothwell.
29:35I don't agree with that, actually, because the one thing
29:38that everyone knew Mary for was that she stood on her grandeur
29:41as a former queen of France.
29:43I don't believe that he had raped her,
29:45so I think that she was talked round.
29:50May 14th, 1567.
29:53Mary marries Bothwell in the middle of the night.
29:56They have so little support now.
29:59Only a few people attend.
30:02The news soon reaches Elizabeth.
30:09How could a worse choice be made for your honour
30:12to marry a subject who, besides other notorious lacks,
30:16public fame has charged with the murder of your late husband?
30:22Burleigh and the Scottish Lords use Darnley's assassination
30:26to accuse Mary and Bothwell of adultery and murder,
30:30declaring them morally unfit to rule.
30:35She feigned herself to be forcibly taken by him
30:39and then married this murderer.
30:41Giving him greater estates than ever she gave her own husband.
30:47She could now be completely rubbished
30:51as a woman of any status, any pretensions or rights to royalty.
30:59She's a whore, she's a murderess, she's an adulteress.
31:02What more do you want?
31:03Scots think their nation dishonoured,
31:05the queen shamed and country undone.
31:08She is now in utter contempt of her people
31:11and so far in doubt of them herself
31:13that without speedy redress, worse is to be feared.
31:18With the Scottish Lords gathering their armies against her,
31:22Mary realises she has no chance.
31:25She surrenders herself in order to save Bothwell.
31:29Perhaps she did love him after all.
31:32It basically ends with Bothwell offering to fight the Lords
31:36in single combat.
31:37At the last moment, Mary stops it.
31:39She wants to try and end the thing with non-violence,
31:42so she proposes that Bothwell be allowed to escape
31:46and not to return, and she will go with the Lords.
31:53Bothwell flees to Norway
31:55and Mary is paraded as a trophy through Edinburgh.
31:59She's brought back to Edinburgh as a captive,
32:03dressed in very ordinary clothes,
32:06not the great robes of a queen,
32:08with the Edinburgh mob howling at her.
32:12Burn her.
32:14Burn her.
32:16She is not worthy to live.
32:19Kill her.
32:21Drown her.
32:24Or so I'm told.
32:26Of course, Burleigh is, of course, just rubbing his hands with glee.
32:30Now Scotland is in chaos.
32:34But in England, Elizabeth is having none of it.
32:37First, she throws her support behind Mary.
32:40You have a good neighbour,
32:42a dear sister and a faithful friend.
32:47You shall not lack my friendship or power
32:50for the preservation of your honour in quietness.
32:54You don't rebel against an anointed queen.
32:57That's a red line for Elizabeth.
32:59So she's always going to support Mary
33:01against the laws who are undermining her sovereignty.
33:05Then Elizabeth threatens war against the Scottish lords.
33:10You have no warrant by God's or man's law
33:14to act as superiors, vindicators or judges over your prince,
33:19whatever disorders you gather against her.
33:22If you continue to keep her in prison
33:25or touch her life or person,
33:28I will not fail to revenge it to the uttermost.
33:34Rather than fight Elizabeth,
33:36the Scottish lords imprison Mary on an island in Loch Leven
33:40and force her to abdicate.
33:45They show her the documents.
33:47She reads it through. She doesn't want to sign it.
33:50They threaten to slit her throat.
33:53If I did not sign this letter,
33:56they would have taken me from Loch Leven
34:00and, as they were crossing the lake, would have thrown me into it.
34:06Or secretly conveyed me to some island in the middle of the sea,
34:11there to be left unknown for the remainder of my life.
34:16They advised me to sign,
34:19for if I did not...
34:24..they would cut my throat.
34:35You don't imprison a woman like that
34:37and expect her just to say,
34:40You don't imprison a woman like that
34:42and expect her just to, you know, keep her composure.
34:45So they just brutally wear her down.
34:48Of course, she also has to fear...
34:50She's fearing for her son, you know, what will happen to him.
34:54They do, of course, say that, well, he will be crowned king.
34:58Mary will never see her infant son, James, again,
35:02but she can ensure he'll be king.
35:05On July 24th, 1567, Mary signs the letter of abdication.
35:10She is now a queen without a country.
35:15Mary was in a pretty bad mental state.
35:19It's a reminder of the problem of Mary's character all along.
35:24She's not got that quality of toughness, of steel,
35:28that enables monarchs to rule in very difficult times.
35:34She panicked, hared off down to Galloway
35:39and fled to England.
35:44Her Majesty lost all courage and took so great fear
35:48that she never rested till she was in England,
35:51thinking herself of refuge there.
35:56Mary will never reach England.
36:00Mary will never return to Scotland.
36:03Her last hope is with Elizabeth, a woman she has never met.
36:10I am now completely forced out of my kingdom
36:15and driven to such straits that next to God...
36:22I have no hope but in you.
36:26She'd believed Elizabeth when she'd offered her support,
36:29when she'd expressed her love for her sister queen,
36:33and so she took her at her word
36:36and the result was disaster for Mary.
36:43Instead of a royal welcome, Mary runs straight into a trap.
36:48Burley has her immediately placed under house arrest.
36:52Burley makes sure that Mary's locked up straightaway
36:55and around her are put people whom he knows are loyal
36:59to the Protestant cause and to him.
37:02When rude Scotland vomits up a poison,
37:06must fine England lick it up for a restorative.
37:11From the moment Mary sets foot in England, he wants her dead.
37:16Mary tries to meet Elizabeth face-to-face
37:19so she can clear her name.
37:22If it please you that I come to you in private,
37:25I can tell you the truth against all their lies.
37:29When it is proposed yet again that Elizabeth and Mary meet,
37:34the English queen gives the excuse
37:37that she cannot meet her husband,
37:41The English queen gives the excuse
37:44that she cannot meet her cousin
37:47because Mary is still embroiled
37:50in the scandal of Lord Darnley's murder
37:53and until her name has been cleared once and for all,
37:57the English queen cannot be seen to meet her.
38:01If you find it strange not to see me,
38:04you will see that it would be malaise of me
38:07to receive you before your justification.
38:10Once honorably acquitted of this crime,
38:13I swear to you before God, among all worldly pleasures,
38:17meeting you will hold the first rank.
38:23Now that Mary is actually in England,
38:26Elizabeth isn't so friendly as Mary realizes.
38:33I see how things frame evil for me.
38:40I have many enemies about the queen, my good sister,
38:43who do all they can to keep me from her.
38:49She is reduced to making empty threats.
38:55I have made great wars in Scotland,
38:59and I pray God I make no trouble in other realms also.
39:06Have some consideration for me
39:09when you are always thinking of yourself.
39:12I assure you I will do nothing to hurt you,
39:16but rather honor and aid you.
39:19The question becomes what's to be done with her,
39:23and for this, of course, Burleigh needs some evidence.
39:30Burleigh's spies intercept encrypted letters
39:33from Mary's Catholic supporters
39:35but they are plotting to put her on the throne.
39:38Now Mary really is a potential threat.
39:41Now whether or not she is trying to get Elizabeth's throne,
39:44other people are trying to get it and put her on it.
39:49Mary denies any part of it.
39:52I never wrote anything concerning that matter to any creature,
39:56and if any such writings be, they are false and feigned,
39:59invented only by themselves to my dishonor and slander.
40:03I am no enchantress but your sister and natural cousin.
40:12But Mary's protests fall on deaf ears.
40:16The queens are caught up in a battle bigger than themselves.
40:20Catholics and Protestants are dying on both sides,
40:23in the Netherlands, in France,
40:25and what happens with Elizabeth and Mary
40:27is that privately morderate, though they may have been,
40:30they become polarised as figureheads of two sides
40:35in a more and more extreme conflict
40:38in which their particular conflict with one another
40:41has become emblematic.
40:44To Lord Burleigh, the Catholics are a clear and imminent danger.
40:50Their malice is bent against your person.
40:54They will never cease, as long as the Scottish Queen lives.
41:01Elizabeth refuses to be bounced into executing Mary, Queen of Scots.
41:06The evidence is not watertight,
41:08and also she has this abhorrence
41:11at the idea of executing an anointed queen.
41:16Can I put to death the bird
41:18that to escape the pursuit of the hawk
41:20has fled to my feet for protection?
41:24Honour and conscience forbid.
41:27Mary's held in castles all over England,
41:30but she never accepts being a prisoner.
41:33Since you have detained me forcibly,
41:35if you suspect that I desire my liberty, I cannot help it.
41:38I am a free princess,
41:40in that I am not responsible to you or any other.
41:47Months turn into years of confinement.
41:50Mary never tires of writing to Elizabeth,
41:53tens of thousands of words,
41:55demanding her freedom and pleading to meet.
41:59Each word scored into her embittered heart.
42:04I have written to you several times during the last year
42:09to lay before your consideration
42:12the unworthy treatment which I have received
42:16in this...
42:20captivity.
42:26In her more desperate moments in captivity,
42:29she becomes increasingly a prisoner of her own imagination
42:33within this claustrophobic world.
42:36Mary did start sending small gifts to Elizabeth
42:39to attract her attention.
42:41Elizabeth had a terribly sweet tooth,
42:43so Mary would send marzipan, she would send nuts.
42:47She also had a mirror on a chain.
42:52She also sent this to Elizabeth as a gift.
42:58She's trying to open up a line of communication
43:01so that maybe they can work this out,
43:04but Elizabeth just stonewalls them all.
43:11I beg you to relieve yourself of the charge which I am to you.
43:17But things only get worse for Mary.
43:20After 17 years in prison,
43:22she still hopes her son James, the King of Scotland,
43:25will negotiate her release.
43:29Elizabeth had the bright idea
43:31that Mary might go back to Scotland
43:34and rule jointly with James.
43:39Now, young James grew up to be a very effective king.
43:44James, who's now approaching adulthood,
43:50decides he's going to ditch his mum.
43:53The last thing he wanted was a discredited mother back,
43:57messing things up and getting in the way.
44:02Was there ever a sight so detestable and impious
44:06before God and man than an only child
44:09despoiling his mother of her crown and royal estate?
44:14There is no King of Scotland.
44:20Nor any Queen but me.
44:26What this does is it forces Mary to say,
44:29I've got to get out of here,
44:31and from this point she's willing to listen to even desperate plots.
44:37Having lost all hope of regaining his throne,
44:41having lost all hope of regaining her crown
44:44or convincing Elizabeth to help her,
44:46Mary becomes obsessed with getting Elizabeth's crown.
44:51I will not leave my prison save as Queen of England.
44:57Burleigh suspects Mary is plotting to have Elizabeth killed
45:01and trying to make England Catholic again.
45:05So he sends his spies out to get proof.
45:09Mary becomes this romanticised figurehead
45:12for a generation of young men
45:14educated in the Catholic colleges in France, in Rome and in the Netherlands
45:19who want to give their lives for their faith.
45:26It doesn't take long before a young man writes to Mary.
45:31Burleigh's trap is set.
45:34Anthony Babington is a young, not very bright,
45:38but enthusiastic Catholic gentleman with too much money
45:41and a lot of time on his hands.
45:47He writes to her and he says that he will help spring her
45:51from her imprisonment and at the same time,
45:54six gentlemen will do the deed.
45:57They will assassinate Elizabeth.
45:59There'll be six noble gentlemen, all my private friends,
46:02who, for the zeal they bear the Catholic cause
46:05and Your Majesty's service, will undertake the execution.
46:13Everyone's waiting. Burleigh's waiting.
46:16Babington's waiting for Mary's reply.
46:18And 12 days later, it comes.
46:22She basically damns herself in that letter.
46:25The affair's being thus prepared,
46:27and forces and readiness both without and within the realm.
46:31Then shall it be time to put the six gentlemen to work
46:35upon the accomplishing of their design.
46:39Babington's promising her ships and soldiers
46:42and there never were any. There were no ships, there were no soldiers,
46:45there were no loyal Catholics waiting to carry her
46:48to elegance and luxury.
46:51Burleigh's spies bring him a copy of Mary's letter.
46:54But would it be enough to condemn her to death?
46:58I hope that God, which hath given us the light
47:01to discover this great conspiracy,
47:04will also give assistance to put Mary to death.
47:07I hope that God, which has given us the light
47:10to discover this great conspiracy,
47:13will also give assistance to put Mary to death.
47:16I hope that God, which has given us the light
47:19will also give assistance to punish it.
47:23Any sympathy Elizabeth ever had for Mary is gone.
47:28Well, what do you think of your Queen of Scotland?
47:33With black ingratitude and treachery,
47:36she tries to kill me, who so often saved her life.
47:43Now, I am certain of her evil intent.
47:46It may be she will not have another opportunity to behave like this.
47:50Despite the proof, Elizabeth can't bring herself to condemn Mary.
47:55She felt guilty,
47:57she felt terrified that God would judge her on the last day
48:02for putting to death a divine right ruler,
48:05and, you know, she probably felt upset and annoyed
48:09that she had been boxed into this situation,
48:11that she never wanted to be in,
48:13that she had managed to avoid for most of her reign.
48:17Instead, she turns her rage on the young plotters.
48:23Babington and his associates were hanged on the gibbet,
48:27they were cut down while still alive,
48:30and they had their private parts chopped off in front of them,
48:33they were eviscerated, their entrails were burnt in front of them,
48:37and then they were executed, and then they were quartered.
48:40And what's really gruesome about this is that Elizabeth asks Burleigh
48:45if he could come up with something else,
48:47and Burleigh assures her that if it's done properly,
48:50i.e. if they're cut down soon enough
48:52so that they can witness their own evisceration,
48:55then it would be pain enough.
49:00On October 25th, 1586,
49:04Mary is pronounced guilty of conspiring to murder Elizabeth.
49:11I am quite ready and very happy to die,
49:15and to shed my blood for God Almighty, my Saviour, and my Creator.
49:22So the sentence was proclaimed,
49:24but even then Elizabeth wouldn't do anything.
49:27Why? She just wanted it all to go away.
49:31She didn't want to be the source of the execution of Mary,
49:36she didn't want to be the source of the execution of an anointed queen.
49:42If it had pleased God to have made us both milkmaids,
49:46with pails on our arms, so that the matter rested between us two,
49:50and that I knew she should still seek my destruction,
49:54yet could I not consent to her death?
49:58This is my own personal speculation, but I think she wanted Mary dead.
50:03She knew that Mary had to die,
50:05but when it came to it, she couldn't quite bring herself
50:10to believe that she was the person who was striking Mary's head off.
50:36To bounce Elizabeth into making this decision, she is told by Burleigh,
50:41and this, when I first discovered this in the archives,
50:44I could hardly believe it.
50:46She's told by Burleigh that the Spanish Armada
50:49had landed a year early in Wales.
50:51Burleigh invents a full-scale invasion to push her into signing.
50:56The Rome will be in great danger,
50:59principally the person of Your Majesty.
51:02Burleigh tells the queen to double her guards.
51:04Who knows what might happen?
51:08She calls for the warrant, and she signs.
51:13She signs it after they've been pressuring her
51:16and pressuring her to do it, and suddenly it's done.
51:21Burleigh quickly sends off the executions.
51:25But then, almost immediately,
51:28But then, almost immediately,
51:31Elizabeth acts as if she didn't know what she was signing.
51:35I was given a whole pile of papers by my secretary.
51:38He should have told me that top of the pile
51:41was the warrant for the execution of the Queen of Scots.
51:45So she blames everybody but herself.
51:48All the time she's trying to wash her hands of the blood of Mary,
51:53but they are covered in it.
51:58After 19 years of confinement,
52:01Mary is suddenly told that she will die the next morning
52:04at Fotheringay Castle, February 8th, 1587.
52:10I did not think the Queen, my sister, would have consented to my death.
52:17But seeing that your pleasure is so,
52:20death shall be to me most welcome.
52:24Do not accuse me of presumption
52:26if on the eve of leaving this world
52:29and preparing myself for a better one,
52:32I remind you that one day you will have to answer for your charge.
52:38Mary had decided that she would die a death that would always be remembered.
52:43She was going to go for a Catholic martyrdom.
52:47If she couldn't win in life, she would triumph in death.
52:52Mary may not have had much sense,
52:56but what she did have was great style.
52:59And right until the end, she kept that up.
53:07She's dressed in black.
53:09She's got a cross in one hand, a Latin prayer book in the other.
53:13There's a rosary around her.
53:15She's got a cross in one hand, a Latin prayer book in the other.
53:19There's a rosary around her wrist.
53:22I hope you shall make an end to all my troubles.
53:25She shows charity to her executioner.
53:28She consoles her weeping ladies.
53:35Under her outer garment, she's dressed in tawny, red, the colour of martyrdom.
53:40There's even gallows humour that you get.
53:43So she jokes with her executioner
53:45that she hasn't had such a servant undressing her before.
53:48Certainly not in front of the audience that she had there.
53:55I have never taken off my clothes before such a company.
54:07In manners to us, Dominic, amend your spirit and may him reign.
54:11In manners to us, Dominic, amend your spirit and may him reign.
54:14In manners to us, Dominic, amend your spirit and may him reign.
54:17In manners to us, Dominic, amend your spirit and may him reign.
54:20In manners to us, Dominic, amend your spirit and may him reign.
54:23In manners to us, Dominic, amend your spirit and may him reign.
54:36The first stroke goes right into the back of the neck.
54:39She continues praying into Thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit, in Latin.
54:47The second blow goes really nine tenths of the way but he finishes it off using the act
54:53as a meat cleaver.
54:56The headsman picks up the head as you do and say, God save the Queen, except that of course
55:01Mary was wearing a wig so the head rolls off the stage like a football.
55:05In a sense it's a terribly fitting kind of end because like so much of Mary Queen of
55:11Scots life it's theatrical and very good theatre at this time.
55:21In my end is my beginning.
55:25In my end is my beginning, that was so apt, she's been immortalised after her death in
55:31many ways as the ultimate doomed heroine, the E. E. Damsel in distress, also as a figure
55:38of Scots nationalism in a way against those beastly English and perhaps above all she
55:45is the ultimate Catholic martyr.
55:49We will never be sure what Elizabeth really felt for her cousin but Mary's execution marked
55:55her forever.
55:57This is something Elizabeth never got over, she always denied that she'd been responsible
56:01for Mary's death, she lied point blank to James that she was responsible, she blamed
56:06her counsellors.
56:08I would you know, though not felt, the extreme pain which overwhelms my mind for that miserable
56:17accident, far contrary to my meaning, I beseech you, God and many more know how innocent I
56:26am in this case.
56:31After 26 years of never having met Mary, Elizabeth now finds she's left it too late.
56:40History will have to decide who won their battle.
56:45It may seem that the winner is obvious, it is Elizabeth she has put to death Mary Queen
56:51of Scots, she's vanquished her rival in the end but arguably Mary has the last laugh because
56:59it's her son James who becomes King of England when Elizabeth dies without any children of
57:06her own, without anyone else to leave the throne to, she's forced to leave it to the
57:11son of her greatest rival.
57:16Mary's son James not only went on to rule both Scotland and England, he ensured that
57:22every subsequent British monarch would carry the blood of Mary Queen of Scots.
57:28She has shaped history as profoundly as she had affected Elizabeth.
57:34Elizabeth was haunted by Mary's ghost for the rest of her days, she could never quite
57:41get out of her head the guilt that she felt at putting Mary to death and it's said that
57:46on Elizabeth's own deathbed the name that she uttered last was that of the Queen of
57:53Scots.
57:57But that we, being two queens so near of kin, neighbours and living in one isle, should
58:07be friends and live together like sisters, than by strange means divide ourselves to
58:16the hurt of us both.
58:27And this programme was shown in memory of Dr Jenny Wormald.
58:57.