Elizabeth and Dorothy Cromwell: Interreginas

Keyser, Emelye

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-95197-9_15

Elizabeth and Dorothy Cromwell: Interreginas

Emelye Keyser⁸

Chapter
First Online: 21 July 2022

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Part of the book series: Queenship and Power ((QAP))

Abstract

Elizabeth and Dorothy Cromwell occupied unprecedented—and unpreceded—positions in the Anglo-Scottish hierarchy: they were leading women in a state that had temporarily thrown off its monarchy. Married to the heads of the experimental protectorate that presided over Britain for a decade, their roles were neither governmental nor ceremonial or sovereign. It was their challenge to craft a place for themselves and the domestic aspects of their husbands’ lives that could complement the regime’s new set of values and its international agenda. And it is this chapter’s challenge to excavate their little-recorded lives from early obscurity and later from the broadsides and closet dramas that derided them. The ensuing story is familiar: these women’s biographies resonate with those of political women across the globe by way of the gendered criticism that they endured, and the double standard that has ensnared their posthumous reputation.

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Notes

1.
“James VI to the Laird of Balfour, 10 February 1598,” in Mary Anne Everett Green, Lives of the Princesses of England, from the Norman Conquest, 6 vols (London, 1857), 6:88.
2.
Green, Lives of the Princesses of England, 6:88.
3.
Mark Noble, Memoirs of the Protectoral House of Cromwell, 3rd ed. (London, 1787), 1:123–124; “The Descendent of the Manor of Little Stambridge: The Family Bourchier,” Transactions of the Essex Archaeological Society, n.s., 2 (1884): 202–205.
4.
The Court and Kitchin of Elizabeth, Commonly called Joan Cromwel, the Wife of the Late Usurper, Truly Described and Represented, and Now made Publick for General Satisfaction (London, 1664), sig. B3r.
5.
“Oliver Cromwell and Elizabeth Bourchier,” Stambridge Parish Council, accessed 20 July 2020, https://stambridgepc.org.uk.
6.
David Horspool calls Oliver’s marriage to Elizabeth an astute financial decision. See: David Horspool, Oliver Cromwell: England’s Protector (London: Allen Lane, 2018), 15.
7.
John Morrill, “Cromwell, Oliver (1599–1658),” ODNB, doi: 10.1093/ref:odnb/6765; Peter Gaunt, “Cromwell [née Bourchier], Elizabeth,” ODNB, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/65778.
8.
Noble, Memoirs, 1:124.
9.
“Oliver Cromwell to Colonel Richard Norton, 3 April 1648,” in Wilbur Cortez Abbott, ed., The Writing and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell, 4 vols. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1937–1947), 1:591.
10.
“Elizabeth Cromwell to Oliver Cromwell, 27 December 1650,” in Original Letters and Papers of State, Addressed to Oliver Cromwell, ed. John Nickolls (London, 1743), 40.
11.
Diary of Samuel Pepys, ed. John Smith (London: Macmillan, 1905), 48.
12.
Oliver and Elizabeth’s children are, in order: Robert (1621–1639), Oliver (1623–1644), Richard (1626–1712), Henry (1628–1674), James (born and died 1632), Bridget (bap. 1624, d. 1662), Elizabeth (bap. 1629, d. 1658), Mary (bap. 1637, d. 1713), and Frances (bap. 1638, d. 1720). Gaunt, “Cromwell [née Bourchier], Elizabeth.”
13.
Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 1:40.
14.
Morrill, “Cromwell, Oliver.”
15.
Horspool, Oliver Cromwell, 16–17.
16.
Cromwell had some connection with the town, having briefly been a student at Sidney Sussex College in 1616–1617, but he took no degree.
17.
Horspool, Oliver Cromwell, 29
18.
Morrill, “Cromwell, Oliver.”
19.
Untitled medal, c.1650, cast lead medal, British Museum, London, M. 7369. For the later dating, see: Henry W. Henfrey, “On Some Medals and Seals of the Cromwell Family,” Journal of the British Archaeological Association 33 (1877): 380.
20.
For a comparison with later portraits of Elizabeth, see: Robert Walker, “Portrait of Elizabeth Cromwell, the Protectress,” c.1655, oil on canvas (The Cromwell Museum, Huntingdon), long-term private loan. For Henrietta Maria’s pearl necklace, see: studio of Anthony Van Dyck, “Henrietta Maria” (c.1633–1670), oil on canvas, 137.6 x 111.2 cm, Royal Collection Trust, RCIN 405874; Anthony Van Dyck, “Henrietta Maria von Frankreich” (c.1635), oil on canvas, 123.5 x 97 cm, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Gal.-Nr. 1034; or Daniel Mytens, “Charles I and Henrietta Maria” (c.1630–1632), oil on canvas, 95.6 x 175.3 cm, Royal Collection Trust, RCIN 405789.
21.
Noble, Memoirs, 2:427–429; Elizabeth Rothery, “John Maijor c. 1575–1629,” Southampton Local History Forum Journal 5 (Spring 1996): 22–27.
22.
“Oliver Cromwell to Colonel Richard Norton, 25 February 1647,” in Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 1:585.
23.
“Oliver Cromwell to Colonel Richard Norton, 3 April 1648,” in Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 1:591–592.
24.
“Oliver Cromwell to Richard Mayor, 26 February 1649,” in Abbott, Writings and Speeches, 2:21.
25.
“Oliver Cromwell to Richard Mayor, 14 March 1649,” in Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 2:29.
26.
“Home of Merdon Castle,” Home Farm Hursley Partnership, accessed 10 June 2020, https://www.homefarmhursley.com/index.php/portfolio-item/merdon-castle/. Dorothy and Richard’s children are as follows: Elizabeth (1650–1731), Anne (1651–1652), a son (born and died 1652), Mary (born and died 1654), a daughter (born and died 1655), Oliver (1656–1705), Dorothy (1657–1658), Anne (1659–1727), and a second Dorothy (1660–1681). Peter Gaunt, “Cromwell, Richard (1626-1712),” ODNB, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/6768.
27.
See, for example: “Oliver Cromwell to Richard Mayor, 13 November 1649,” or “Oliver Cromwell to Richard Mayor, 4 September 1650”, in Abbot, Writing and Speeches, 2:160, 330.
28.
“Oliver Cromwell to Dorothy Cromwell, 13 August 1649,” in Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 2:103.
29.
“Oliver Cromwell to Richard Mayor, 17 July 1650,” in Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 2:289.
30.
“Oliver Cromwell to Richard Mayor, 4 September 1650,” in Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 2:330.
31.
William Chapman, Notable Women of the Puritan Times (London, 1883), 184.
32.
James Scott, after William Fisk, “Cromwell’s family interceding for the life of King Charles the First,” mixed method engraving, 578 mm x 406 mm, National Portrait Gallery, London, NPG D32080. The original painting is held in a private collection.
33.
All three are in: Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 2:329, 404–405, 412.
34.
Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, of the Reign of Charles II, 1660–1661, ed. Mary Anne Everett Green (London, 1860), 392–393.
35.
Gaunt, “Cromwell [née Bourchier], Elizabeth.”
36.
Mercy was important to the conception of medieval queenship—see, for example: John Carmi Parsons, “The Queen’s Intercession in Thirteenth-Century England,” in Powers of the Weak: Studies on Medieval Women, ed. J. Carpenter and S.B. MacLean (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1995), 147–177. Sarah Duncan has argued that it continued to influence portrayals of Tudor queens. See: Sarah Duncan, “‘Most godly heart fraight with al mercie’: Queens’ Mercy during the Reigns of Mary I and Elizabeth I,” in Queens and Power in Medieval and Early Modern England, ed. Carole Levin and Robert Bucholz (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2009), 31–50.
37.
Andrew Marvell, “The First Anniversary of the Government under H.H. the Lord Protector,” in The Poems of Andrew Marvell, ed. Nigel Smith (Harlow: Pearson Longman, 2007), 288 (lines 45–46).
38.
Carole Pateman, The Sexual Contract (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988). See especially chapter 1, “Contracting In,” on Locke’s exclusion of women from social contract theory.
39.
Joan Kelly, “Early Feminist Theory and the Querelle des Femmes, 1400–1789,” Signs 8, no. 1 (1982): 8.
40.
Laura Lunger Knoppers, Politicizing Domesticity from Henrietta Maria to Milton’s Eve (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 5.
41.
James VI & I, The Trew Law of Free Monarchie, in King James VI and I: Political Writings, ed. Johann P. Sommerville (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 65.
42.
Knoppers, Politicizing Domesticity, esp. 25–27.
43.
Kelly, “Early Feminist Theory,” 21.
44.
Katharine Gillespie, “Elizabeth Cromwell’s Kitchen Court: Republicanism and the Consort,” Genders Online Journal 33 (2001): 22.
45.
Rachel Trubowitz, “Feminizing Vision: Andrew Marvell and Female Prophecy,” Women’s Studies 24, no. 1–2 (1994): 16.
46.
John Milton, Paradise Lost, ed. Gordon Teskey (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2005), 178 (book 8, line 42).
47.
Gaunt, “Cromwell [née Bourchier], Elizabeth.”
48.
“Oliver Cromwell to Elizabeth Cromwell, 12 April 1651,” in Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 2:405.
49.
“Oliver Cromwell to Elizabeth Cromwell, 4 September 1650,” in Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 2:329.
50.
“Oliver Cromwell to Elizabeth Cromwell, 3 May 1651,” in Abbott, Writing and Speeches, 2:412.
51.
“Elizabeth Cromwell to Oliver Cromwell, 27 December 1650,” in Nickolls, Original Letters, 40.
52.
Roy Sherwood, Oliver Cromwell: King In All But Name, 1653–1658 (Stroud: Sutton, 1997), 7, 20–21.
53.
Sherwood, King In All But Name, 26–42.
54.
The insult comes from The Court and Kitchin, 15. On the budget for the renovation, see: Antonia Fraser, Cromwell: Our Chief of Men (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1973), 458.
55.
Sherwood, King in All But Name, 36.
56.
Court and Kitchin, 15.
57.
Lucy Hutchinson, Memoirs of the Life of Colonel Hutchinson, ed. C.H. Firth (London, 1885), 201.
58.
The Cuckoo’s Nest at Westminster (London, 1648), 8. This is discussed in: Knoppers, Politicizing Domesticity, 115–116.
59.
The Case is Altered, or Dreadful news from Hell (London 1660), 7.
60.
The Court and Kitchin of Elizabeth, frontispiece.
61.
A New Bull-Baiting (London, 1649), 14. This is discussed in: Gillespie, “Cromwell’s Kitchen Court,” 23.
62.
The Court and Kitchin of Elizabeth, 33.
63.
Sherwood, King in All But Name, 96–99.
64.
Sherwood, King in All But Name, 112.
65.
Edward Holberton, “‘Soe Honny from the Lyon came’: The 1657 Wedding-Masques for the Protector’s Daughters,” The Seventeenth Century 20, no. 1 (2005): 97–112.
66.
“Elizabeth Cromwell” also creates “Be comlier with zeal,” a less flattering but more perfect anagram with no extra letters. The Tenth Worthy. Or, Several Anagrams in Latine, Welsh and English, upon the Name of that most highly Renowned WORTHY of Worthies, OLIVER Late LORD PROTECTOR. Together with some … Anagrams on his now HIGHNESS, and others of that most Noble and Puissant Family (London, 1658), one page.
67.
Gaunt, “Cromwell, Richard.”
68.
Gaunt, “Cromwell, Richard.”
69.
Gaunt, Cromwell [née Bourchier], Elizabeth.”
70.
Calendar of State Papers, 392–393.
71.
Gaunt, “Cromwell [née Bourchier], Elizabeth.”
72.
Walker, “Portrait of Elizabeth Cromwell, the Protectress.”
73.
Samira Ahmed, Simon Guerrier, and Thomas Guerrier, “The Fundamentalist Queen,” Sunday Feature, BBC 3 Radio, 7 December 2014.

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University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA
Emelye Keyser

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University Campus North Lincolnshire, England, UK
Aidan Norrie
University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
Carolyn Harris
University of Reading, Reading, UK
J. L. Laynesmith
York, UK
Danna R. Messer
University of Winchester, Winchester, UK
Elena Woodacre

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Keyser, E. (2022). Elizabeth and Dorothy Cromwell: Interreginas. In: Norrie, A., Harris, C., Laynesmith, J.L., Messer, D.R., Woodacre, E. (eds) Tudor and Stuart Consorts. Queenship and Power. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-95197-9_15

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-95197-9_15
Published: 21 July 2022
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-95196-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-95197-9
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