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1st February 2018

This month I’m visiting one of Northamptonshire’s prettiest villages. Fotheringhay has a spectacularly beautiful church, thatched cottages and a historic inn, all set in beautiful countryside. It’s the perfect place for a winter walk, and hard to imagine that it has witnessed events of national importance, including the birth of a king, and an act of extreme violence sanctioned by one queen against another. February 8th marks the anniversary of the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, at Fotheringhay castle.

The tragic story of the life and death of Mary Stuart is one of contrasts. Born in 1542, she was crowned Queen of Scotland at nine months old. Aged five she moved to France and was betrothed to the French dauphin, François, marrying him aged fifteen. Her father-in-law Henri II said ‘the little Queen of Scots is the most perfect child I have ever seen’. Mary enjoyed her luxurious lifestyle at the French court, but her idyllic life ended aged seventeen, when her husband died and she was forced to return to Scotland, a place she had not seen since she was a tiny girl.

The rest of her life was filled with danger, suspicion and intrigue.

Her second husband Lord Darnley was murdered by the man who became her third husband after he had assaulted her. Although she and Bothwell were lovers, he later deserted her.

As a Roman Catholic her life was made impossible in Protestant Scotland. Mary was forced to abdicate her throne in favour of her baby son James, throwing herself on the mercy of her cousin, Queen Elizabeth. At the age of twenty five her freedom was effectively ended, as Elizabeth was highly suspicious of a young, beautiful and fertile Queen appealing to all the Roman Catholics wanting to see England return to the old faith.

Mary spent her remaining 20 years under house arrest, with Fotheringhay her final prison. Inevitably she was convicted of plotting to overthrow Elizabeth, and sentenced to death. Elizabeth was reluctant to sign Mary’s death warrant, but was persuaded by her council, including her Lord Chancellor, Sir Christopher Hatton, the Northamptonshire gentleman who built Holdenby House.

Mary’s fate was inevitable, and she faced death with great dignity. On 8th February 1587 she was beheaded in the Great Hall of Fotheringhay. All her clothing, the block and anything touched with her blood was immediately burned in the fireplace to deter relic hunters. Even her little bloodstained Skye terrier who had hidden beneath her robes was forcibly removed and washed. Mary’s body was embalmed but left unburied, apart from her entrails which were secretly buried somewhere in the castle.

Mary’s motto ‘In my end is my beginning’ proved prescient. Sixteen years later her cousin Elizabeth died, leaving Mary’s son, James as King of Great Britain and Ireland. Mary’s descendants include our own Queen Elizabeth.

And what of Fotheringhay? After Mary’s execution, the castle fell into disrepair, and was eventually demolished. All that remains is a conical hill with earthworks and a single lump of masonry visible. But Mary is not forgotten. This February marks the anniversary of her death, and many will visit Fotheringhay to explore, leave flowers by the castle remains and say a prayer in the magnificent Church of St Mary and All Saints. And perhaps also to raise a glass to the tragic Scottish Queen in the Falcon Inn.

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