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Travel is people. You may go abroad to see the famous sites, but what you remember best are the people you meet. Among them, like unex-pected treasure, are a few memorable contacts that will make your travels unique, special, and delightful. "People" is devoted to some of those you may come in contact with during your Home At First travels.

— SECOND OF A SERIES —
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Anne Boleyn grew up a courtier, first in England, then as a teenaged attendant to Mary, Queen of France, who happened also to be sister to England’s King Henry VIII. She learned French,
       and became fond of French fashion.

PORTRAIT OF QUEEN ANNE BOLEYN
BY AN UNKNOWN ARTIST SEVERAL DECADES AFTER HER DEATH.
-

Anne returned to England at around 21 years old and became an attendant to Catherine of Aragon, wife of King Henry VIII. Anne became engaged to marry two different noblemen, but both engagements were called off, the second—to Henry Percy—was forbidden by none other than Henry VIII’s principal minister/advisor, Cardinal Wolsey, probably at the insistence of the king.

CARDINAL WOLSEY, CHANCELLOR OF ENGLAND,
PUT AN END TO THE ROMANCE BETWEEN ANNE BOLEYN
AND HENRY PERCY. WOLSEY'S FALL FROM POWER
OCCURRED WHEN HE DID NOT ARRANGE THE ANNULMENT
OF THE MARRIAGE BETWEEN KING HENRY VIII & QUEEN
CATHERINE OF ARAGON SO THE KING COULD MARRY ANNE.

Anne’s older sister Mary—also an attendant in Henry’s court—had an affair with the king. While married to another man, Mary bore a son that was assumed to be the king’s. She called the boy
Henry.
 

MARY BOLEYN, OLDER SISTER OF ANNE, WAS
A MISTRESS OF KING HENRY VIII BEFORE
HE KNEW ANNE. SHE BORE A SON, HENRY,
BELIEVED THE SON OF THE KING. THE BOY
WAS LATER KNIGHTED BY HIS COUSIN—AND
POSSIBLE HALF-SISTER—QUEEN ELIZABETH I.

In her late twenties Anne caught the eye of the king. Although Henry’s intentions were clear and not noble, Anne managed to deny the king’s advances, maintaining a principle of becoming his queen and not being his mistress. As a result, Henry VIII began examining the potential of ending his long marriage with Catherine of Aragon, an inquiry that led to annulment or divorce six years later. During these years, Henry was clearly smitten with Anne. At least 17 love letters from Henry written to Anne at this time still exist. They are archived in—of all places—the library at the Vatican!
-
ANNE BOLEYN WAITED SIX YEARS FOR HENRY TO BE FREE TO MARRY.
HER MARRIAGE LASTED BARELY 1,000 DAYS. BUT THEIR MARRIAGE CHANGED HISTORY. DRAWING OF ANNE ATTRIBUTED TO HANS HOLBEIN THE YOUNGER.
 

While Anne and Henry waited for a legal means to end his marriage with Catherine of Aragon, the king lavished her with gifts, including a noble title, Marquess of Pembroke. By the end of 1532 Henry had broken Anne’s will—she was pregnant with the king’s child. Not long into 1533 they secretly married, despite the king still being married to Catherine of Aragon. In Henry’s mind, however, Catherine could never have been his legitimate wife, because she had been his brother’s wife and the Old Testament of the Bible decrees that childlessness will result from such a union. At Henry’s urging, Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, annulled his marriage to Catherine. The Pope reacted by threatening Henry with excommunication. Henry, already aware of the stirrings of the Reformation, and perhaps covetous of the power and wealth of the Roman Church in Britain, created the Church of England with the monarch as titular head. The break with Rome now meant Henry and Anne were clear to marry.
 

ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY
THOMAS CRANMER GRANTED
HENRY VIII THE ANNULMENT
HE SOUGHT FROM CATHERINE
OF ARAGON, LEADING TO THE
CREATION OF THE PROTESTANT ANGLICAN CHURCH. CRANMER
WAS BURNED AT THE STAKE IN OXFORD AS A HERETIC DURING THE REIGN OF CATHOLIC QUEEN
 ('BLOODY') MARY I, DAUGHTER
 OF QUEEN CATHERINE OF ARAGON.
 

QUEEN ELIZABETH I,
DAUGHTER OF QUEEN
ANNE BOLEYN AND KING
HENRY VIII.-

That spring Anne—wearing a gold dress—sailed in a long procession from Greenwich upriver to the Tower of London. The Tower of London was then one of the fortified royal palaces where British monarchs lived. Here she was made ready for her coronation as Henry VIII’s second queen. On June 1 Anne was escorted to Westminster Abbey where Archbishop of Canterbury Cranmer crowned her Queen of England. She was already six months pregnant. All of England were hoping for a male heir. Indeed, three months later Henry’s great heir was born, but this future monarch was not male. Anne’s daughter would grow up to become Queen Elizabeth I and lead Britain during its first Golden Age.

Over the next 2½ years, Anne became pregnant twice more, but each time miscarried. Now in her thirties, Anne’s reproductive window was closing. She had also made powerful enemies in the court. And, Henry VIII had noticed a younger courtier, an attendant to Anne Boleyn named Jane Seymour. In the spring of 1536, Thomas Cromwell, a power-hungry protégée of the king, mounted a vicious case of treason against Anne Boleyn on alleged multiple extra-marital affairs with various nobles, including her brother, George, Lord Rochford. The Queen and several “co-conspirators” were arrested and imprisoned at the Tower of London. Anne Boleyn was incarcerated in the same quarters where she had prepared for her coronation only three years earlier. Trials took place, but the six defendants were not permitted a defense. Her brother was executed on Tower Hill, near the site of Tower Hill Underground Station. Two hundred and fifty yards to the south, the other five defendants

KING HENRY VIII. PORTRAIT
BY JOOS VAN CLEVE FROM
ABOUT 1535, DURING HIS MARRIAGE
TO QUEEN ANNE BOLEYN.

were beheaded at Tower Green inside the walls of the Tower of London. Before she died, Anne Boleyn reportedly said: “I heard say the executioner was very good, and I have a little neck.” She also said, “…God save the king and send him long to reign over you, for a gentler nor a more merciful prince was there never.”
          After her execution, the head and body of Anne Boleyn were interred in the Chapel of St. Peter ad Vincula inside the Tower. Visitors to the Tower of London may visit her gravesite. (For other locations associated with Anne Boleyn in and near London you can visit, see: the Tudors.)

Live like a Queen when you come to London.
Stay at HOME AT FIRST’s Apartments at St. Katharine’s Marina.
They’re all named after their famous neighbors at the
Tower of London next door: the wives of Henry VIII.
For example, see HOME AT FIRST's Anne Boleyn Apartment.
 

— END OF PART TWO —
WATCH FOR FUTURE INSTALLMENTS

WALTER
OMLIN-
STÖCKLI

           Walter Omlin fixed my boots twice. Fixed my suitcase once. So many years ago at his corner basement shop in Sachseln, I walked into Herr Omlin’s dark, musty workshop from the bright sunlight of a September day. When my eyes adjusted to the darkness I saw him squatting on a 3-legged milk stool like Gippetto, his tack hammer in his hand. The shop was full of 18th century torture devices for leather: gouges, hammers, anvils, shoe forms, punches, vises, clamps, stretchers. I had seen all these things only once before outside of a museum. My Pennsylvania Dutch grandfather served as