Henry Norris (d.1536) [England Under the Tudors]

HENRY NORRIS (d. 1536), courtier, was second son of Sir Edward Norris or Norreys who took part in the Battle of Stoke in 1487, and was then knighted; by his wife Frideswide, daughter of Francis, Viscount Lovel. The eldest son, John Norris, was an esquire of the body to Henry VIII, and was afterwards usher of the outer chamber both to Henry VIII and Edward VI. He was afterwards promoted as 'a rank papist' to be chief usher of the privy chamber to Queen Mary.¹ He married Elizabeth, sister of Edmund, lord Braye; but dying, according to Dugdale, on 21 Oct. 1564, left no legitimate issue, and his property descended to his brother's son.

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Henry Norris came to court in youth, was appointed gentleman of the king's chamber, and was soon one of the most intimate friends of Henry VIII. The king made him many grants, and his influence at court grew rapidly. On 8 June 1515 he was made keeper of the park of Foley John, an office which had been held by his father. On 17 Feb. 1518 he became weigher at the common beam at Southampton, then the great mart of the Italian merchants; on 28 Jan. 1518-9 he was appointed bailiff of Ewelme. He was also keeper of the king's privy purse. In 1519 he received an annuity of fifty marks,² and he was at the Field of the Cloth of Gold in 1520. On 12 Sept. 1523 he received the keepership of Langley New Park, Buckinghamshire, and was made bailiff of Watlington. He early took the side against Wolsey, and was one of the main instruments in bringing about his fall. Wolsey certainly recommended him for promotion in the letter of 5 July 1528; but it may be assumed from the letter itself that this was rather done to secure Norris's favour for the writer himself than with the idea that Norris had any need of the cardinal's influence.³

Norris adhered closely to Anne Boleyn while she was gaining her position at court, and became one of her intimate friends and a leader of the faction that supported her proud pretensions to control the state. He had the sweating sickness in 1528, and on 25 Oct. 1529 gratified his enmity to Wolsey by being present when he resigned the great seal. On 24 Oct. he was the only attendant on Henry, when the king went with Anne and her mother to inspect Wolsey's property. He was the bearer of Henry's kind message to Wolsey at Putney about the same time, and seems to have been affected by Wolsey's fallen condition. In the same year he received a grant of £100 a year⁴ from the revenues of the see of Winchester, and was soon promoted to be groom of the stole. In 1531 he was made chamberlain of North Wales; in November 1532 he was again ill; in 1534 he was appointed constable of Beaumaris Castle; in 1535 he received various manors which Sir Thomas More had held. He was present at the execution of the Charterhouse monks on 4 May 1535, and Henry granted him the important constableship of Wallingford (29 Nov. 1536); and he was generally regarded as the king's agent in the promotion of the new marriage with Lady Jane Seymour.

In April 1536 Anne had some talk with Sir Francis Weston, who hinted to her that Norris loved her; she afterwards spoke to Norris about it, and jokingly said that he was waiting for dead men's shoes. He protested, and in the end she asked him to contradict any rumours he might hear about her conduct. But Norris had many enemies, and his alleged intimacy with Anne was carefully reported to Cromwell. On 1 May 1536 Norris took part in the tournament at Greenwich, and at the close Henry spoke to Norris, telling him that he was suspected of an intrigue with Anne, and urging him to confess. He was then arrested and taken to the Tower by Sir William Fitrwilliam. He was tried on 12 May in Westminster Hall. He pleaded not guilty, but was found guilty, and executed on 17 May. He was buried in the churchyard of the Tower.

There is little reason to think that he had behaved in any way improperly with the queen. Most of the jury seem to have been officials or open to suspicion of partiality. According to Naunton, Queen Elizabeth always honoured his memory, believing that he died 'in a noble cause and in the justification of her mother's innocence.' At the time of his arrest he was contemplating a second marriage with Margaret Shelton, and both his interest and his long experience as a courtier would doubtless have deterred him from encountering the danger certain to spring from a liaison with Anne Boleyn. His knowledge of Henry would also have taught him that his ruin and death must be the consequence of such desperate adventures. He married Mary, daughter of Thomas Fiennes, lord Dacre of the South. She died before 1530, and by her he had a son Henry, first baron Norris of Rycote. A son Edward, born in 1624, had died 16 July 1629. A daughter Mary married (1) Sir George Carew, and (2) Sir Arthur Champernowne.

1. Strype, Memorials, III. i. 100-1, and Annals, I. i. 8.
2. 50 Marks in 1519 was roughly equivalent in purchasing power to £18,400 in 2010.
Source: Measuring Worth.
3. State Papers, i. 809; Brewer, Hen. VIII, p.326; cf. Bapst, Deux Gentilshommes poétes de la cour de Henry VIII, p. 127.
4. £100 in 1529 was roughly equivalent in purchasing power to £48,100 in 2010.
Source: Measuring Worth.

Source:

Archbold, W. A. J. "Henry Norris."
The Dictionary of National Biography. Vol XIV. Sidney Lee, Ed.
New York: The Macmillan Co., 1909. 566-7.

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