The Milk Woman's Daughter

By Angeline Hawkes-Craig

Chelsea, England, 1548, The home of Thomas and Catherine Seymour

Elizabeth was fifteen when her lifelong nightmare first began. Her father had died, her child brother made king, and the only person in the world that seemed interested in her well-being was a step-mother who remarried three months after King Henry's death. Elizabeth was grateful to have someone look after her and to live in someone's household with some semblance of family. What events unfolded here, however, she would regret and mourn for the rest of her life. It changed her and warped her ideals. If there were any room for improvement on the theory of love and marriage after the traumatic childhood and subsequent marriages of her father, the events that took place in Chelsea would wipe all hope for normalcy away for good.

Thomas Seymour had asked for her older sister Mary's hand in marriage and had been denied. He then asked for Elizabeth's, and was also denied. The last royal woman of marriageable status left for him to pursue had been Catharine Parr, the King's widow. She gladly accepted the proposal of the fit and handsome lady's man. Trouble shortly followed. Seymour would come into Elizabeth's room in the early hours of the morning and smack her bottom. He would arrive when she was scantily clad and tickle her. He was seen trying to kiss her...what no one saw were the times he forcibly and hastily raped her. The first time he forced himself upon her, Elizabeth was too shocked and ashamed to think much on it. The second time, she begged him to leave her alone. The third time, he resorted to force to have his way with her. And, so her molestation continued. Until the inevitable happened.

"Catherine. There is something I must confide to you. It is of a grave nature and I am shamed to have done such deeds, but I must tell you before the scandal hits your ears in full detail." Seymour said to Catharine softly, over breakfast.

Catherine looked up, eyebrows raised, "What scandal now, My Lord?"

Seymour cleared his throat. This wasn't going to be easy given his wife's advanced stage of pregnancy. It wouldn't be an easy thing to confess at all. "The Lady Elizabeth is with child."

Catherine went white. She dropped her knife and clutched her bosom. Her lips quivered as if to say something, but no words would come.

"I am the father." Seymour blurted out the rest of the sordid affair.

Catherine gasped. "You? The father?"

Seymour hung his head. "Aye. It is true."

Catherine stood up, her napkin falling to the floor, her knife clanging off of the table. "Where is the little whore? I'll wring the neck of that spawn of that witch Anne Boleyn, myself!" She grew red-faced and irrational.

"Sit down, woman. I am not finished." Thomas ordered.

"Oh, you're finished. Finished is exactly what you are Thomas Seymour! In my own house!" Catherine waved her arms about madly.

"Sit down now! Or would you have all of England know how I ravished the sister of the king and the daughter of Henry VIII?" Seymour had said the dreaded words. He had accepted the responsibility for his actions, but it did not make the pending doom any smoother.

Catherine sat down heavily in the nearest chair. "You raped her? You raped Elizabeth? She is only a child." Mother instinct and womanly jealousy collided with one another as Catherine tried to sort out the indecent images and feelings in her head.

"Why?" Catherine said at last to the silent Seymour who sat hunched and downtrodden in the chair before the breakfast table.

"I wanted her. I took her. She pleaded with me to leave her be, but I did not listen. My lust controlled me." Seymour said sadly.

"More like your lust for power controlled you. You only thought of her royalty, her line to the succession of the throne. If you were to beget a child upon her, cast me aside, and marry her, you could inherit the throne in the event that she would rise that far one day." Catherine pointed an accusatory finger in Seymour's direction.

"I do not know." He said sadly.

"I know. I've known all along. What of Elizabeth? Her life ruined now. Both of us to have babes by you, you filthy dog." Catherine hissed at him.

"I have a plan." Seymour said quietly.

"A plan?"

"There is another, woman," Seymour began slowly, the next revelation would spur Catherine's anger even more, "That has borne me a child. She is the milk woman."

"The milk woman? The milk woman has lain with you as well? Is there no one you have coupled with? What of the grooms? Do you take boys to your bed as well you monster?" Catherine yelled. "Quiet, woman! The whole household will hear!" Seymour said sternly.

"I hope they do!" Catherine yelled.

"What, so you can join me on the scaffold after you deliver your child? Elizabeth is a ward in your household. You allowed the sister of the king to be ravished by your own husband. That is what the courts will say. What say you to that, want that you should die along my side?" Thomas knit his brows together and said harshly.

Catherine frowned. "I would never have allowed such an atrocity. Not in my household or anywhere. I love Elizabeth as my own daughter."

"Then, for Elizabeth's sake, hear out my plan."

Catherine sat back in the cushions and sighed. "Out with it then."

Seymour pulled up a chair and began. "The milk woman has my son. She has agreed to take Elizabeth's child and raise it. I will provide for the child as I already do for the other one. She will not know the identity of the baby's mother. Only that she is sparing some poor girl a ruined life. She has a generous heart, and the fact that this baby is her own child's half sibling, is enough to let her open her heart and home to another of my bastards."

"That and the heavy purse that you hand her frequently, I am sure." Catherine spat quite venomously.

"Aye. The money helps, but she truly does love children and after the boy was born, the midwife had to remove her woman's organ. So, because of me, she can bear no more children. I am giving her a child, it is what she wants." Seymour sighed loudly.

"And what of Elizabeth?"

"Elizabeth will be told her child died during birth. The midwife is trustworthy. No one will know but you, the midwife, the milk woman, and I. Elizabeth can then resume her normal life without anyone ever having known." Seymour said matter of factly.

"How do you propose keeping her out of view for her time?" Catherine winced at the thought of a pregnant Elizabeth. Pregnant by her own husband.

"Sickness, headaches, enough ailments befall her to keep her secured away in her chambers after she is noticeable."

"And Kat? How will you hide it from her? She has been with her since infanthood, she will not leave now." Catherine found the hole in the plan.

Seymour leaned back quite rattled that he had not thought of Kat Ashley before now. She would have to be told. She could be relied upon. Kat would give her own life to protect that of Elizabeth's. "She will have to be told."

"So the plan widens. I do not think we will get away with this, My Lord." Catherine said angrily. "It is not such an easy thing to make a baby vanish when the mother is in line to the throne."

"We'll succeed. We must. All of our futures depend upon it." Seymour stood up. "I will go tell the milk woman that the plan is in motion."

"Does this milk woman have a name?" Catherine wondered aloud.

"Don't make the wound any deeper than it has to be, my wife. I have already wronged you more than once. Don't let my misdeeds haunt you even more." Seymour opened the heavy wood door and left the room. Catherine punched the cushion next to her in a fit of rage, and then burst out crying.

Richmond, England: March 23, 1603 Queen Elizabeth's Chambers

"Have they found her, Dr. Parry?" Elizabeth said weakly.

The chaplain drew closer to be able to hear all that the Queen was saying in her weakened state. She was asking about her daughter.

"Yes. She is on her way now." The chaplain smiled and tucked the lavishly embroidered sheet around the frail Queen's skeletal shoulders.

Elizabeth smiled a peaceful smile. She had been searching for years now. After the events that had taken place in her youth, she had vowed never to marry or have children. Never to place herself in a vulnerable position to a man again. But there was a part of her soul that was left open and wanting. She craved the baby that had died before it could cry. She longed to hold her own child in her arms and touch its soft brow with her own lips. This pain refused to go away. There had been miscarriages. She had been long involved with the Earl of Leicester, Robert Dudley, or Robin to her. They had many babies, but none of them survived long enough to be born alive. It would have complicated matters greatly in the event they had been born live, so maybe things were for the best. She never could get rid of the emptiness she had inside though, or the ache she felt in her heart and in her arms because there was no baby to nestle there.

That is when Kat, on her deathbed, finally told Elizabeth the truth. Her baby had not died at all. She had been born healthy and beautiful. Kat knew the name of the milk woman whom the baby had been given. She knew that Seymour had got a child on the dairywoman and so that her own baby had been raised with a half-brother. Family. Elizabeth was grateful for this small token on Seymour's part at least. He had not cast his bastard, her baby, on complete strangers. Her baby had been loved after all. But, not by her. She had never even been given a glimpse of her child's face...and the lack of that round, chubby visage haunted her still. Her baby was alive. After that, Robin had led a secret force of men to track down and find her missing baby, but there were many roadblocks. There had been two women by the same name in Chelsea, both milk women, both with a son. Then both original milk women married or re-married several times, leading to various name changes at each stage of the way. One milk woman managed to completely vanish on them for a period of years, until she resurfaced near the Scottish border with a new husband. One up and died on her. Finally, now, after all these years, they had found her daughter.

Her Robin was dead now. Most of the men who had originally searched for the missing child had gone to their graves still on the quest. But, now, finally, on her deathbed, the one remaining man who knew of her daughter's existence, Dr. Parry, her favorite chaplain, had located her daughter. There would be no babe to hold in her old, withered arms now though. Her baby girl was fifty-five years old and a grandmother herself. The very fact that they had found her daughter alive was a blessed miracle in itself. Having been raised with the peasant class, life expectancy was not long or hearty for such individuals. Elizabeth smiled to herself, but not every peasant has strong Tudor blood coursing through their veins.

The door opened to the room and a cold gust of wind blew in, chilling the room. A servant jumped from his perch on a stool and threw more logs onto the fire, causing an enormous burst of flames to rise up and roar, warming the room and bathing it in an orange glow.

A heavy bosomed woman waddled in, clad in a tan skirt and white blouse, white cap on her head of gray hair. She stopped in her tracks once the door closed behind her.

The chaplain waved her towards the bed. The woman slowly approached the dying Queen and then fell humbly onto her knees and bowed her head.

Elizabeth smiled. "No. No. Get up. Come closer. Let me look upon you."

The woman inched closer and was directed to a spot to stand by Dr. Parry.

"Ah. I can see your face now." Elizabeth said hoarsely, near a whisper.

"Aye, mum. I mean, Your majesty." She curtsied.

"Please." Elizabeth struggled. "Call me Elizabeth. It has been so long since I last heard my name."

The woman raised her eyebrows and turned questioningly to the chaplain, who smiled and nodded that it was permissible if the Queen wished it.

Elizabeth struggled to raise herself up.

"Now, don't go and tire yourself out now, mum. I mean, uh, Elizabeth." The woman reflexively, fluffed the pillows up around Elizabeth so she could half sit and half lay, tending to her like a sick relative.

"Thank you." Elizabeth smiled and laid back for a moment, gasping for breath.

"Maybe I should come back when you are stronger?" The woman asked, smiling.

"There won't be a time when I am stronger. I am dying." Elizabeth stared vacantly out into the room for a few moments.

"Certainly not." The woman choked on the words. "You look as fit as a fiddle to me."

Elizabeth laughed and coughed.

"What is your name?" The Queen asked after a bit.

"Anne." The woman answered.

Elizabeth smiled. Anne, after her mother. She wondered if Seymour had had a hand in that, or had that been purely coincidental. The milk woman never knew that Elizabeth was the baby's mother.

"Anne was my mother's name." Elizabeth said softly.

"Aye. It was now, wasn't it," Anne smiled and said warmly.

"Are you happy? Has your life been a happy one?" Elizabeth asked the stranger before her, asked her daughter before her, because she really wanted to know.

The woman's face lit up brightly. "Never a happier woman there has been in all of merry old England, mum!"

Elizabeth smiled and stifled a laugh. "How so?"

"Well, I don't measure my wealth in gold or treasures like you have in this fine palace here, but I have had a happy life. I had a mum and a brother that adored me, and I adored them. I was married for a goodly number of years to a loyal and honest man who never beat me or said an unkind word to me. Worshipped me like a queen, he did!" She laughed.

Elizabeth smiled and thought to herself, he should, she was a princess this peasant wife of his.

"And, children? Do you have children?" Elizabeth wanted to say so much more, but didn't know if the time was right.

"Aye! Six strapping sons! Three live here in London, one at the university, one is a barrister, and one married the daughter of a far wealthier man. The other three live in the village back home. Married, all with children. I am a happy grandmother. I live in the home of my youngest son, with he and his three children and his pretty little dumpling of a wife." Her exuberance was uplifting and Elizabeth had to restrain from smiling so much.

Elizabeth listened to her describe her grandchildren. Six sons! Six healthy, hearty sons. Like her father. Strapping and big, Tudor blood in the veins of all...all heirs to the Tudor throne! Her throne need not pass to a Scottish heir...six heirs stood waiting right here! Her throne could be secured for lifetimes to come. Her joy welled up inside of her, easing some of her pain.

Anne stopped and watched Elizabeth who was lying there smiling.

Elizabeth grew aware of the sudden silence. "Do go on. I'm not dead yet." She laughed.

Anne sighed. Visibly relieved. She didn't want to be responsible for talking the half-dead Queen into her grave.

"My oldest boy, don't see him very often. He is trying to move up in the world and it just isn't fitting for him to be seen with his old dairywoman of a mother like I am. So, I understand and stay away. He sends me money from time to time however, so I know he hasn't completely forgotten me." Anne smiled understandingly.

Elizabeth felt her face grow warm. How dare he! Not be seen with his mother! His mother was a Tudor princess, the Queen's own daughter! Not good enough to be seen with, the upstart! Elizabeth felt the anger welling up inside of her. Her temper had not decreased with her strength.

Anne looked at Elizabeth strangely now. Perhaps the Queen was too warm? She turned and suggested this to the chaplain at her side.

He crossed the floor and cracked a window letting in a trickle of fresh air. Elizabeth was too far-gone for it to matter much now even if the old doctors had advised against the cool night air.

Elizabeth studied Anne's face. Anne looked a lot like Elizabeth had at fifty-five. But, Anne had inherited the solid sturdiness her father possessed. She was a large, strong, big bosomed woman. Elizabeth had always been a willow reed, possessing her mother's graceful body. Anne seemed intelligent too. She had inherited the Tudor intelligence and passed it to her sons. It wasn't every day that peasant boys became barristers and university men. They were an obvious source of pride for their hard-working mother.

"What color was your hair, when you were young?" Elizabeth asked suddenly, curious.

"Red! My mother, god rest her bones, always said that I got my red hair from my real mother. That was all my father, Thomas Seymour, would tell her. You see, I was a bastard of Seymour's as was my brother." Anne was so candid with the Queen. Elizabeth felt like she had known Anne for all times. Anne did not seem to be in the least bit intimidated by the fact that she was here speaking with the Queen.

Elizabeth sucked in her breath. So, she had been told as much as the poor woman had known. No secrets there. That was good. And, red hair! Just like hers had been. Her red-haired baby girl.

"Your mother told you all of this?" Elizabeth said softly.

"Aye. My mum was a truthful woman. A good woman. Loved me like her very own. Never spoke ill of anyone, not even the wretched girl who cast me aside." Anne wiped at her teary eyes.

Elizabeth swallowed hard. She wanted to cry out, "I never cast you aside!" She never knew. She had been told her baby was dead. Oh, how her arms ached to hold that baby. The baby was standing in front of her now, a grown woman. A grandmother. A happy, free woman who had loved and lived her life how she wanted to, not having to harken to the wishes of others or serve the higher purpose of being royalty.

"Maybe your mother was sickly or too young to raise a baby?" Elizabeth wanted to soften the thoughts.

"Aye. My mother once told me she thought that my real mum may have been but a child herself when she borne me. She was always thankful to that girl or woman, whomever she might be, for my mum loved me with her whole heart and she loved the girl or woman who delivered me into this world so that my mum could love me." Anne smiled, apparently not bearing much ill will towards "her real mum." Elizabeth felt a little relieved and smiled.

Elizabeth coughed and wheezed.

"Perchance, I should come back another day, when Your Majesty feels stronger?" Anne asked Elizabeth again.

Elizabeth smiled. "Aye. That would be a wonderful thing to look forward to, Mistress Anne. I should sleep now."

Anne kissed Elizabeth's bony little hand and turned and went into the hall.

Outside, Dr. Parry asked if she needed her horse brought to the doors for her.

"Horse? No horse for me, sir. Can't afford a beast. I walked here for the Queen's sake." Anne looked down at her worn and dirty shoes. The chaplain hadn't noticed them in the darkened chamber of the Queen.

"I will send for the Queen's carriage then. Elizabeth would want you taken home safely after your loyalty in coming all this way especially on foot. You are a devoted subject, Mistress Anne." Dr. Parry smiled at her.

"Still don't know why the Queen would want to see a lowly milking woman like me." Anne laughed.

"She likes to talk with her subjects. She makes no difference be you milking woman or princess." The chaplain smiled and thought on the irony of his statement.

"It was nice to have been in her presence. She is a great Queen." Anne said teary eyed again.

"Aye, that she is. More than you'll ever know, Mistress Anne." Dr. Parry reached inside his pocket and procured a large purse of gold that the Queen had instructed he give to Anne earlier. "This is a gift from Queen Elizabeth. She also has arranged for you to move into a manor house in Chelsea. A gift to you and your family. Maybe now, those sons of yours can visit their mother without all the shame or reduction in status?" Dr. Parry asked, one eyebrow raised.

Anne gasped. "I, well, me, well, bless me soul!" She finally managed to exclaim. "Why, why does the Queen give such generous gifts to me? What have I done for her? Just a bit of a walk, that's all! Bless me." Anne kept uttering, shaken up, shocked at Elizabeth's generosity.

"The carriage is here, Mistress Anne. A man from London will be in Chelsea to give you the deed to the manor, and the keys. A monthly allowance has been granted to you for your lifetime, as a thank you for your unquestioning visit upon the dying Queen. You have made her happy with your loyalty." Dr. Parry smiled.

Anne blinked back tears of joy. "Long live the Queen!" She said sadly.

"Long live the Queen." Parry echoed Anne's sentiments. He would miss his queen deeply.

Anne left for the carriage. Dr. Parry opened the door to Elizabeth's chamber and crossed over to her massive bed.

Elizabeth stared at him with hollow eyes.

"Has she gone then?" Elizabeth asked.

"Aye. She has gone. I sent her home in your carriage. It seems the Mistress Anne walked all the way from Chelsea to Richmond at your bidding." Parry said astonished still.

"Walked? All that way? Just to see me?" Elizabeth smiled. So, her Anne had her walking strength. She truly was a sturdy Tudor.

"I also told her of the manor and monthly stipend you have arranged." Parry continued.

"Did she question it?"

"Yes. She was amazed at your generosity. You quite made her happy, My Queen." Parry smiled warmly and drew up a chair close to Elizabeth's side.

"Good. Good." Elizabeth said tiredly, weakly.

"I thought she looked like your father." Parry said abruptly.

Elizabeth smiled. "I thought the same thing. She was definitely Henry's grand-daugher."

"And your daughter." Parry said matter of factly. "Why didn't you tell her?"

Elizabeth sighed for a very long time and then coughed. She wheezed and gasped for breath. Then she smiled. "She has had a happy life, Parry. Loved and married the man she wanted. Has healthy sons who are doing what they want to without having to think of some grander scheme, or some foreign policy."

"You wanted to spare her?" Parry asked suddenly aware of the gift Elizabeth had given her only child.

Elizabeth sighed again. "All of my life there has been this scandal, or that danger. Never knowing if poison awaits me at table, or arrows await me on my barge. Whose dagger waits to finds its sheath in my heart? What plot is brewing, now, even as I lay dying in my bed, an old woman, tired and sick?"

Parry nodded, he understood.

"I gave my daughter life all of those many years ago. And today, I gave her life again. She could never be happy being Queen. What does she know of being Queen? No. Let her go. She is never to know. Let her be happy." Elizabeth wheezed.

"But six sons? Six sons could secure the Tudor line." Parry questioned her motives.

"Six sons could all end up with their heads on the block when James decides to claim the throne." Elizabeth said sternly and knowingly. "I will not kill my own grandsons. I will not rob my daughter of her children, like I was robbed of my child."

Parry knew Elizabeth was right. Tudor blood or no, there would be mass chaos if new rivals for the throne were introduced at so late a date. And with Elizabeth dead and out of the picture, who would know the truth save he, and he would be an easy head to chop.

"Promise me, Parry." Elizabeth was too weak to finish her request.

Parry nodded his head. "The knowledge of your daughter's existence dies with me, Your majesty."

Elizabeth smiled. "Thank you."

She sucked on her scrawny finger, and stared at him with hollow pools of watery eyes. A tear rolled down her wrinkled, aged, once beautiful and young, face. She looked at Parry and smiled. "I would have liked to have held my baby girl. Just once. Just once." Elizabeth's head lulled over to one side and she died, eyes closed, looking like she had been deep in sleep.

Dr. Parry began to pray for the deliverance of Elizabeth's soul into God's hands. The servant left the room and the bells began to toll.

"Long live King James!" Parry could hear the voices in the corridor say.

He covered Elizabeth's Queenly head, and placed her crown upon her bed.

"Farewell, My Queen. England will never know a stronger or more loving Queen than you, Queen Elizabeth." He knelt at the foot of her bed until the diplomats began filing in to pay their last respects. He crossed to the window and flung it open, cool air flowing in and cleansing the room of the odor of death.

Out of the window, in the dim light, he could see farther away, nearing the gate and exiting onto the road, the Queen's carriage taking Elizabeth's baby girl home to Chelsea once again.