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JANE BOLEYN

Jane Boleyn, Viscountess Rochford

c.1505-1542

Jane Boleyn was born in Norfolk into a wealthy political family. Jane was sent to the royal court as a teenager to join the household of Queen Catherine of Aragon, the wife of King Henry VIII of England. She accompanied the royal party to France in 1520 for the Field of Cloth of Gold.

Jane was considered attractive but we have no known images of her. She was one of the lead actresses and dancers in the 1552 court masquerade which included Anne Boleyn and Mary Boleyn. In 1524, Jane married George Boleyn (Anne Boleyn’s brother) and became Lady Rochford. George was described as attractive, talented and promiscuous. He has been portrayed in modern times as homosexual, but there is no evidence to support this. King Henry VIII gave the couple Grimston Manor, Norfolk for a wedding gift.

King Henry VIII fell in love with Anne Boleyn and the family had gained more influence and wealth which Jane also benefited from. Henry married Anne in 1533 and Jane and George were given Palace of Beaulieu as their chief residence which they decorated; they eventually sold it to the king who refurbished and expanded it.

Anne Boleyn fell out of favour because she didn’t give Henry VIII his much desired son. Jane was married to George for eleven years when he was arrested in 1536 for treason after being accused of having sex with his sister the queen and he was imprisoned in the Tower of London. George was beheaded on Tower Hill in 1536 and Anne Boleyn was executed two days later. After her husband was executed, Jane was absent from court for several months but returned to attend to Henry VIII’s new wife, Jane Seymour. Boleyn lived in the palace and had her own servants.

Jane Seymour died in 1537 and Henry VIII remarried Anne of Cleves for political reasons. In 1540, Anne of Cleves confided to Jane that she never had sex with the king and Jane learned that Anne of Cleves was naïve when it came to sexual intimacy. Henry VIII wasn’t attracted to Cleves and had his marriage with her annulled so he could marry her lady-in-waiting, the teenager, Catherine Howard.

Boleyn became the lady-in-waiting to Catherine Howard, Howard wasn’t a virgin when she married the king and started a relationship with Henry VIII’s friend and courtier, Thomas Culpeper. Boleyn was implicated in the couples’ affair as she was helping them to meet up in secret. The affair was discovered and Howard was arrested and Jane was interrogated. Jane suffered a nervous breakdown and in 1542 was pronounced insane. In 1542, mentally ill people were considered too unfit to stand trial, and nobody knew whether Janes ‘fits of frenzy’ was genuine or it was just her attempt to escape prosecution. Henry VIII was determined to have her punished, and changed the law which allowed the insane to be executed. She was found guilty for her involvement and was condemened to death.

Jane was executed on 13 February 1542, the same day as Catherine Howard. Howard was executed first, Jane was then escorted from her lodgings to the scaffold. On the scaffold she spoke and apologised for her many sins and then kneeled down. Boleyn was beheaded from a single blow of the axe. She was buried in the church of St Peter ad Vincula within the Tower of London, alongside the bodies of Catherine Howard, Anne Boleyn and George Boleyn.

Over 300 years later in 1876, Queen Victoria had renovations done to the church and Jane Boleyn and the other victims’ bodies was rediscovered. The Queen had the bodies exhumed and placed in individual coffins and had a plaque with their names affixed to each coffin and were given a proper reburial underneath the alter.