Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk (1473 – 25 August 1554) (Earl of Surrey from 1514), was a prominent Tudor politician. He was an uncle of two of the wives of King Henry VIII of England, namely Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, both of whom were beheaded, and played a major role in the machinations affecting these royal marriages. After falling from favour in 1546, he was stripped of the dukedom and imprisoned in the Tower of London, avoiding execution when King Henry VIII died on 28 January 1547. He was released on the
Thomas Wriothesley, 1st Earl of Southampton expansion of the Pensioners from 50 to 350 members was an expansion that signalled the resurgence of the conservative noble faction at court during the 1540s. Queen Catherine Howard's conviction and execution for adultery signalled that the political pendulum was swinging away from Norfolk once more. On 13 November 1542, Secretary Wriothesley was sent to announce the bad news to members of the Queen's Household at Hampton Court; all her chamber were dismissed and sent home. In 1542 it was said that Wriothesley governed almost everything in England. He sought to bring about an alliance between England and Spain in