A. F. Pollard: "Thomas Cranmer and the English Reformation, 1489-1556," ...

LATE 1532. GAME ON. HENRY HAS A PLAN. Cranmer is hustled home. “Warham is said to have foretold that Cranmer would step into his shoes,  but to the new archbishop himself the nomination came as a somewhat unpleasant surprise” (52). Cranmer, on our telling, may have had intel as did Warham. Henry was gaming things. Cranmer was back in England by Jan 1533. Anne was pregnant in Nov 1532. Henry pushes for a bull allowing Dr. Cranmer to become the ABC, while using the lever of the unexecuted power of Act of Annates (in Henry’s power which Clement understood) and Restraint of Appeals. It let Clement off the hook knowing the English would settle the problem without losing England and the cash. “The Pope and the Cardinals sighed, but after all it was better that they should go without some of their perquisites for Cranmer's bulls; it was better that sentence should be given by him against Catherine of Aragon than that the Roman curia should forfeit all the wealth it drew from England” (54). Cranmer is made the ABC on 30 Mar 1533 with a caveat to the oath. Cranmer petitions the King to hear the case on Catherine. Dunstable is held and Catherine is declared contumacious for not appearing. The case is settled 23 May 1533. Nullity affirmed yet the marriage to Anne is valid (date given by Cranmer as 25 Jan 1533, around St. Paul’s day). On 1 Jun 1533, Anne is crowned Queen at Westminster Abbey, but she is not in the best of health due to the obvious pregnancy, noted by attendees. Elizabeth 1 is born on 7 Sept 1533, a Sunday, 3-4 PM, and is baptized by Stokesley of London the following Wednesday with Cranmer as a godfather. Elizabeth will be the first Protestant Queen of the Reformed Church of England.