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| 9 | <title>Primary Sources - Letter from Anne Boleyn to Cardinal Thomas Wolsey,
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| 10 | mid-summer 1528 </title>
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| 30 | <td valign="top" width="70%" height="610" bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
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| 31 | <p align="center"><b><FONT size=+1>Letter from Anne Boleyn to Cardinal Thomas Wolsey<br>
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| 32 | mid-summer 1528</FONT></b></p>
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| 33 | <p><FONT size=-1><b>Background<br></b>This letter was written in the summer of 1528, as
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| 34 | indicated by its reference to the sweating sickness. When a servant of
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| 35 | Anne's became infected at court, Henry VIII reluctantly sent her away to Hever
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| 36 | Castle. Most of his famous love letters to Anne were written during this
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| 37 | period of forced separation.</FONT></p>
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| 38 | <p><FONT size=-1>Anne did become ill, but
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| 39 | survived. She wrote this letter to Wolsey in thanks for the gift and
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| 40 | letter he sent her while she was ill. The great Cardinal and Anne have
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| 41 | often been placed at perpetual odds in history books, but in 1528 their
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| 42 | relationship was still amicable enough. Anne and Henry both believed the
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| 43 | Cardinal would be able to secure Henry's annulment from Katharine of Aragon;
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| 44 | when he eventually failed, both were disillusioned - and Henry's
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| 45 | disillusionment led him to arrest his old friend. Only Wolsey's natural
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| 46 | death saved him from certain execution.</FONT> </p>
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| 47 | <p><FONT size=-1>Wolsey was
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| 48 | pro-French and wanted to marry Henry VIII to a French princess when his first
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| 49 | marriage was annulled. He was discomfited by the rise of Anne Boleyn,
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| 50 | and her many relatives. Naturally enough, opposition to the Cardinal's
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| 51 | policies centered around the only other person who so completely dominated
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| 52 | Henry VIII's life - Anne herself. In the beginning, both Anne and Wolsey
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| 53 | realized they could not afford to offend each other. But just a year
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| 54 | after this letter was written, after the disastrous legatine hearing at
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| 55 | Blackfriars, Anne realized Wolsey could not secure the annulment. And
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| 56 | she suspected, quite correctly, that he had never intended for her to marry
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| 57 | Henry. </FONT></p>
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| 58 | <p><FONT size=-1>Wolsey had hoped the delays in securing the annulment would
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| 59 | outlast Henry's passion for Anne; he only later realized the annulment itself
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| 60 | would be impossible.</FONT> </p>
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| 61 | <hr>
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| 62 | <p>My lord, <BR>In my most humble wise that my poor heart can
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| 63 | think, I do thank your grace for your kind letter, and for your rich and
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| 64 | goodly present, the which I shall never be able to deserve without your
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| 65 | help, of which I have hitherto had so great plenty, that all the days of my
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| 66 | life I am most bound of all creatures, next the king's grace, to love and
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| 67 | serve your grace, of the which I beseech you never to doubt that ever I
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| 68 | shall vary from this thought, as long as any breath is in my body. And
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| 69 | as touching your grace's trouble with the sweat, I thank our Lord that them
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| 70 | I desired and prayed for are escaped; and that is the king's grace and you,
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| 71 | not doubting that God has preserved you both for great causes known alonely
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| 72 | of His high wisdom. And as for the coming of the legate, I desire that
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| 73 | much. And if it be God's pleasure, I pray him to send this matter
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| 74 | shortly to a good end; and then I trust, my lord, to recompense part of your
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| 75 | great pains. In the which I must require you, in the mean time, to
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| 76 | accept my goodwill in the stead of the power; the which must proceed partly
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| 77 | from you, as our Lord knoweth, whom I beseech to send you long life, with
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| 78 | continuance in honor. Written by the hand of her that is most bound to be
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| 79 | your humble and obedient servant, <BR>Anne Boleyn.</p>
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| 80 | <p> </p>
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| 81 |
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| 82 | <BLOCKQUOTE>
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| 83 | <P>
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| 84 | <HR width="100%">
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| 85 | </BLOCKQUOTE>
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| 86 | <p align="center"><FONT size=-1><A
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| 87 | href="letters.html">to Letters of the Six Wives
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| 88 | of Henry VIII</A></FONT></p>
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| 89 | <p align="center"><FONT size=-1><A href="primary.html">to
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| 90 | Primary Sources</A></FONT><BR><FONT size=-1><A
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| 91 | href="http://englishhistory.net/tudor.html">to Tudor England</A></FONT><BR><FONT size=-1>
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| 92 | <a href="monarchs/boleyn.html">to Anne
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| 93 | Boleyn website</a>
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| 94 | <a href="citizens/wolsey.html"><br>to Cardinal
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| 95 | Thomas Wolsey website</a></FONT></p>
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| 96 | </td>
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