Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk
Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk, was born in 1443 at Stoke-by-Nayland, Suffolk, and he spent more than eight decades navigating the most dangerous game in England: royal favour. Four different kings sat on the throne during his lifetime. He served every one of them. That record of survival, across York, Lancaster, and Tudor alike, is not the story of a man without convictions. It is the story of a man who understood power better than almost anyone around him. He was the grandfather of two of Henry VIII's wives, and the great-grandfather of Queen Elizabeth I. He led English forces to one of the most decisive victories of his age at the Battle of Flodden in 1513. And he delivered the death sentence on a man whose daughter had married his own son, weeping openly as he spoke the words. What shaped a man capable of all that? The answers lie in a life that began in obscurity and ended with a funeral so lavish it reportedly cost over £1,300.
On the 14th of April 1471, Howard was severely wounded at the Battle of Barnet, fighting on the side of King Edward IV. He had already proven himself by taking sanctuary at Colchester when Edward fled to Holland the previous year, and he rejoined the royal forces as soon as the King returned. Those were not choices without risk. By 1473 he was appointed esquire of the body to the King, and on the 14th of January 1478 Edward IV knighted him at the wedding of the King's second son, the young Duke of York, to Lady Anne Mowbray. His early career was built entirely on personal loyalty, demonstrated in battle and rewarded in ceremony.
After Edward IV died on the 9th of April 1483, Howard and his father threw their support behind Richard III. Thomas bore the Sword of State at the coronation and served as steward at the coronation banquet. The new King responded with grants of land and an annuity of £1,000 for Thomas, while his father was elevated to Duke of Norfolk and Thomas himself to Earl of Surrey. Surrey was also invested with the Order of the Garter and sworn into the Privy Council. He and his father helped crush the Duke of Buckingham's rebellion in the autumn of 1483. When Richard III met his end at Bosworth in 1485, Surrey was wounded and captured, his father killed on the field.
Henry VII attainted Surrey in his first Parliament, stripped him of his lands, and locked him in the Tower of London. He stayed there three years. When the Earl of Lincoln rose in rebellion in 1487, Surrey was offered a chance to escape. He refused. That single decision may have done more for his career than any battle. Henry VII appears to have read it as a demonstration of loyalty rather than submissiveness, and in May 1489 he restored Surrey to his earldom, even though most of the confiscated lands remained withheld.
Surrey was then sent north to put down a rebellion in Yorkshire and remained in the region as the King's lieutenant until 1499, living with his family at Sheriff Hutton Castle. In 1496-7, during a Scottish incursion, he took his sons Thomas and Edward to the border with him, and knighted them both on the 30th of September 1497 at Ayton Castle, on the same day the treaty of Ayton was signed at a nearby church. By 1501 he was back on the Privy Council, and on the 16th of June of that year he was appointed Lord High Treasurer. Alongside Richard Foxe, Bishop of Winchester, and William Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury, he formed what one account called the King's "executive triumvirate". In 1503, Henry VII entrusted him with the task of conducting Margaret Tudor to Scotland for her marriage to King James IV. Margaret found Howard rude and overbearing on the journey and resented how he monopolised her new husband after the wedding.
Surrey expected to lead the English expedition into France in 1513. King Henry VIII departed for Calais on the 30th of June 1513 and left him behind. Then King James IV of Scotland launched an invasion across the border, and what had seemed like a slight turned into an opportunity of historic scale. Surrey, together with his sons Thomas and Edmund and a coalition of northern nobles, met the Scottish army near Branxton, Northumberland, on the 9th of September 1513. The battle is known as Flodden. The Scots may have lost as many as 10,000 men. King James IV himself was killed.
The victory transformed Surrey's position at court. On the 1st of February 1514, at the age of 71, he was elevated to the dukedom his father had lost at Bosworth, becoming the 2nd Duke of Norfolk. His son Thomas received the earldom of Surrey in his place. The Howard family arms were also augmented with a new element in honour of the victory: an inescutcheon bearing the lion of Scotland pierced through the mouth with an arrow, added permanently to the family's heraldic identity.
In 1514, Norfolk joined Thomas Wolsey and Richard Foxe in negotiating the marriage of Mary Tudor to King Louis XII of France, and personally escorted her to France for the wedding. On the 1st of May 1517, he led a private army of 1,300 retainers into London to suppress the riots now remembered as the Evil May Day uprising. In May 1521 he presided as Lord High Steward over the trial of Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham, who was the father of Norfolk's own daughter-in-law. According to the historian David M. Head, Norfolk pronounced the death sentence "with tears streaming down his face".
Those final active years illustrated the particular tension at the heart of his career: a man capable of deep personal feeling, repeatedly called on to act as an instrument of royal power against people he knew. By the spring of 1522 he was nearly 80 years old and his health was failing. He resigned as Lord Treasurer in favour of his son in December 1522, attended the opening of Parliament in April 1523, and then retired to his ducal castle at Framlingham in Suffolk. He died there on the 21st of May 1524.
The funeral held on the 22nd of June at Thetford Priory was described as spectacular and enormously expensive. The cost reportedly exceeded £1,300. Four hundred hooded men carried torches in the procession. The bier was surmounted by a hundred wax effigies and seven hundred candles. These were the trappings of a man recorded as the richest and most powerful peer in England at his death.
His two marriages extended the Howard reach across the next generation in ways he could not have anticipated. By Elizabeth Tilney, his first wife, he fathered Elizabeth Howard, who married Thomas Boleyn and became the mother of Queen Anne Boleyn. His son Lord Edmund Howard fathered Katherine Howard, Henry VIII's fifth queen. By his second wife, Agnes Tilney, he had William Howard, who became the 1st Baron Howard of Effingham. Through Anne Boleyn, Thomas Howard was great-grandfather to Queen Elizabeth I. After the dissolution of Thetford Priory, the Howard tombs were moved to the Church of St Michael the Archangel at Framlingham, the same castle where he had chosen to spend his last months.
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Common questions
Who was Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk?
Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk (1443-1524) was an English nobleman, soldier, and statesman who served four monarchs: Edward IV, Richard III, Henry VII, and Henry VIII. He commanded the English forces at the Battle of Flodden in 1513 and held the office of Lord High Treasurer.
What happened to Thomas Howard at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485?
At the Battle of Bosworth in 1485, Thomas Howard, then Earl of Surrey, was wounded and captured while fighting for Richard III. His father, John Howard, 1st Duke of Norfolk, was killed in the battle. Surrey was subsequently attainted, stripped of his lands, and imprisoned in the Tower of London for three years.
What was the Battle of Flodden and what role did Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk play?
The Battle of Flodden was fought on the 9th of September 1513 near Branxton, Northumberland, between English forces and a Scottish invasion led by King James IV. Thomas Howard, Earl of Surrey at the time, commanded the English army with the help of his sons Thomas and Edmund. The Scots may have lost as many as 10,000 men, and King James IV was killed.
How was Thomas Howard rewarded after the Battle of Flodden?
On the 1st of February 1514, Henry VIII elevated Thomas Howard to the 2nd Duke of Norfolk, restoring the title his father had lost at Bosworth. His son Thomas was made Earl of Surrey. The Howard family arms were also augmented with an inescutcheon bearing the lion of Scotland pierced through the mouth with an arrow.
How is Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk related to Queen Elizabeth I?
Thomas Howard was the great-grandfather of Queen Elizabeth I. His daughter Elizabeth Howard married Thomas Boleyn and became the mother of Queen Anne Boleyn, who was Henry VIII's second wife and mother of Elizabeth I.
Where was Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk buried?
Thomas Howard was buried at Thetford Priory on the 22nd of June 1524, following a funeral reported to have cost over £1,300 with a procession of 400 hooded men bearing torches. After the dissolution of Thetford Priory, the Howard tombs were moved to the Church of St Michael the Archangel at Framlingham, Suffolk.