In today's Claire Chats, Claire considers the primary source evidence for Thomas Seymour's behaviour with Elizabeth, the future Elizabeth I, between 1547 and 1549.
Primary Sources
You can read the confessions and statements of John Harington, Thomas Parry, Katherine Ashley and Elizabeth herself in A Collection of State Papers relating to Affairs In the Reigns of King Henry VIII, King Edward VI, Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth From the year 1542 to 1570 edited by Samuel Haynes at https://archive.org/stream/bub_gb_YitDAAAAcAAJ#page/n107/mode/2up from page 93 to 103.
Thomas Seymour's proposal to Elizabeth I and her reply are in Historia Overo Vita Di Elisabetta, Regina D'Inghilterra, Detta Per Sopranome la Comediante Politica by Gregorio Leti, although in Italian! See p. 169-172 at https://archive.org/stream/bub_gb_PIB4-zCWWJQC#page/n343/mode/2up.
Thomas Seymour's proposal to Mary is mentioned in 'Spain: February 1549', in a letter from Van der Delft to the Emperor in Calendar of State Papers, Spain, Volume 9, 1547-1549, ed. Martin A S Hume and Royall Tyler (London, 1912), pp. 335-347 - http://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-state-papers/spain/vol9/pp335-347.
Other Sources and Further Reading
- Furdell, Elizabeth Lane (2001) The Royal Doctors, 1485-1714: Medical Personnel at the Tudor and Stuart Courts, Boydell & Brewer.
- Norton, Elizabeth (2015) The Temptation Of Elizabeth Tudor, Head of Zeus.
- Haynes, Alan (1999) Sex in Elizabethan England, Sutton Publishing Ltd.
- Perry, Maria (1999) The Word of a Prince: A Life of Elizabeth I from Contemporary Documents, Boydell & Brewer.
- ed. Marcus, Leah (2000) Elizabeth I: Collected Works, University of Chicago Press.