THE ENGLISH NAVY IN THE 1553 SUCCESSION CRISIS: EVENTS ABOARD THE «GREYHOUND»

Abstract

Une 1553, the young king of England, Edward VI, who was dying of tuberculosis, and his regent, John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland, hastily removed Mary Tudor, being Catholic, from the throne and appointed Lady Jane Grey, being protestant, as king's successor. Soon after Edward's death, Jane was proclaimed Queen. Mary did not accept this and called on her supporters to rebel against the Duke, who was trying to seize all power in the country. Her camp at Framlingham became a place of attraction for all forces dissatisied with the actions of Northumberland. These events were called in English history as the 1553 succession crisis. One of the central events of this crisis was the sending of a fleet against Mary to prevent her from escaping to the continent and to deprive her of possible foreign aid. However, the military squadron supported Mary. As contemporaries wrote, the transition of the fleet to the side of the legitimate Queen was one of the main reasons for her victory. The study of the leet's role in these events is quite relevant, since the participation of the Navy is still insuficiently studied. Historical sources that could tell about what happened are quite scarce, and those that have survived are very tendentious. All their authors were supporters of Mary Tudor. Most modern historians, including specialists in the history of the English Navy, do not mention the role of the military squadron in the defeat of the Duke of Northumberland. Those historians who recognize the contribution of the Navy to Mary's victory mostly rely on the evidence of contemporaries who claimed that the reason for the mutiny of ordinary seamen was their loyalty and natural love for the legitimate Queen. That is why the seamen raised a revolt against their captains serving the Duke, and forced them to go over to the side of Mary Tudor. This study is based on partially preserved materials of a trial that took place in 1555 and concerning the events 1553 succession crisis aboard Greyhound, one of the squadron's warships. Analysis of the court records allows the author for the first time to cast doubt on the stories of contemporaries of events, as well as the statements of modern historians based on these stories, that the reason for the insurrection of ordinary seamen against the captains was their natural love towards Mary Tudor.

Keywords

• «greyhound»