KING OR ANTI-KING - The Mystery of Lambert Simmel

I don’t know who Lambert Simmel was. But I know he wasn’t who he said he was. The question is, was he who Henry Tudor said he was? And I truly doubt that, too.  As Gordon Smith has pointed out, his very name has a pantomime sound to it, “and a pantomime context.” As I just said, I have my doubts. Lambert Simmel claimed to be the Earl of Warwick and there is a possibility that, in fact, he was the Earl of Warwick. But, if that was true, then who the devil was Lambert Simmel?  At the core of that mystery is King Richard III, a bundle of mysteries all by himself.

Richard was the last of the legendary Plantagenet Kings of England. Legend says his ancestor Geoffrey often stuck the yellow flower of the ‘common broom’ in his helmet for identification; the Latin name for the plant being “planta genesta”. The Plantagenet dynasty produced Henry II who won the battle of  Agincourt,  Richard The Lion Heart who killed a lot of people and King John, the failure who was forced to sign the Magna Carta. They and their genes commanded England and large parts of France for 300 years.

But the Plantagenets came to an end on 22 August, 1485 when Richard III (above)), house of York, was killed on Bosworth field. He was the last English King who died fighting in battle, a death which puts the lie to William Shakespeare’s claim that he was a deformed limping hunchback. In fairness it must also be noted that Richard was probably responsible for the death of Edward IV, also a Plantagenet and the rightful king of England when Richard killed him.

Edward VI, the Prince of Wales, was only 12 years old when his father died on 9 April, 1483. But, of course, a twelve year old cannot rule a country, and the usual system was for the boy’s adult supporters to divide up the kingdom and run it into the ground until the boy was strong enough to throw them out. 

So the future Edward V’s adult guardians sought to reach a deal with the boy’s uncle, Richard, the Duke of Gloucester. Graciously, Richard invited all the other guardians over for a great dinner to booze it up and talk how they were going to carve up the kingdom while Edward grew.

Early the next morning, while they were all still hung over, Richard he had them arrested and later executed.

Richard also had Young Prince Edward locked up in the Tower of London, to be joined within weeks by his eleven year old brother, Richard, the Earl of Warwick. The two boys were seen playing together in the courtyard of the Tower of London during June and July of 1483 and then they simply faded away. Shortly there after Richard had himself crowned King, Richard III.

The assumption has always been that the Princes were murdered on Richard’s orders. And that would have been the smart thing for Richard to have done.  But the mystery of what became of the princes has kept an army of scribes and historians busy ever since, in the hope of explaining how, in God’s name, a greedy slug like Henry Tudor ever got to be the a king of England.

Unlike Richard, Henry Tudor was no warrior. Nor was he a lover. The only passion he ever displayed was for money.  He was a voracious, avaricious, bloodless money grubber. In fact, his personality is not far from the lead character in the play "Richard III", just without the hump.

He was the only child born to 13 year old Margaret Beaufort Tudor, two months after the boy’s father, Edmund Tudor, had died. Now, Edmund had been the King’s half brother. Margaret was the granddaughter of the third son of King Edward III with his third wife; in short Henry Tudor’s royal blood was so watered down that it resembled lemon aid, and he kept it at about the same temperature. 

But because Richard III had been so ruthless in eliminating any  competitors for his throne, his only competition left was his bloodless, passionless distant relative Henry Tudor; unless, of course, one of the missing princes still lived.

Having defeated and butchered Richard III at Boswell Field in August of 1485, the newly crowned Henry VII was given no time to rest on his purple cushions. He had to face down a York rebellion in the spring of 1486.

And then again, in March of 1487, yet another group of nobles crowned a rival King in Ireland, a 16 year old boy who claimed he was the Earl of Warwick, the younger of the two missing princes from the Tower. 

But was he? Most of the noble men who would have known Warwick from 1483, had long since been executed by either Richard III or Henry VII.  And it would have made sense that Warwick, as the younger of the princes, would have been less closely guarded than the direct heir to the throne.

So it might have been possible to sneak young Warwick out of the tower and spirit him to Ireland; maybe, possibly.  And how do you tell a King from a common man, except a King wears a crown. As a wise man once said, he must be The King because he ain't got shit all over him. Or maybe it was his manner. He acted like a king. And how does A King act? The only images most people saw of the king was his face imprinted on coins. So, before photography, unless you have your face on a coin, How do you prove you are The King of England?   

Besides, as historian A.F. Pollard pointed out,  “Immediately Henry gained the throne he accused Richard of cruelty and tyranny but strangely did not mention the murder of the little princes. Henry did not announce that the boys had been murdered until July 1486, nearly a year after Richard’s death. Could Henry Tudor have murdered them?”  Maybe, possibly. After all, once on the throne his life and his children's lives depended on securing his claim to being King.

It appears an Oxford priest, Richard Simon, found the son of a baker, maybe named Lambert Seimmel, who physically resembled the dead boy, Richard, the Duke of Warwick.  The bright lad was coached in the history and behavior of the boy last seen in July, 1483.  Richard Simon decided it would be best if the resurrected heir made his first public appearance away from London. Ireland was chosen because the nobility there - the Duke of Clarence, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and Thomas Fitzgerald, Duke of Kildare and the Lord Deputy of Ireland - were both eager to believe the fraud. If it was a fraud.  So they borrowed a crown from a statue in a Dublin Church and proclaimed the boy the rightful king. Another York die hard, Margaret of Burgundy, even paid for 2,000 German mercenaries to fight for the rebellion, when they invaded England.

On 16 June , 1487, some 20,000 men representing the houses of York and Lancaster fought yet another battle to decide the fate of England, this one near the village of  Stoke.  Henry Tudor was, of course, not on the field of battle.  But when it ended, half of the rebellions troops were captured and most of their leaders were dead and Henry Tudor was confirmed as Henry VII, King of England.  Henry Tudor begat a bloodline that produced among others, Henry VIII and his many wives, and Elizabeth I, the virgin queen.  But that future was mere hazy possibilities on the horizon on the morning after the Battle of Stoke.

Soon after the battle Henry VII was able to announce that the supposedly missing prince, Richard, the Earl of Warwick, had been captured. And he was not actually Warwick, but an imposter by the name of Lambert Simmel,  The imposter was graciously granted a full pardon by Henry because the boy had been a mere tool of the real conspirators.

Those ignoble and noble conspirators were all executed, and Henry seized their wealth and land. But Lambert Simmel was retained as a spit turner in the palace kitchen, and later a falconer. Henry VII now had living proof always close at hand that the princes were truly dead, at whomever's hand. And that he was now the legitimate King of England. And all he required for this to be true was that you believe that Lambert Simmel was the boy who had impersonated the Earl of Warwick. And that the real Warwick had been murdered by the humpbacked Richard III. But could Lambert Simmel have been the real prince?  Or could he have been somebody else?

“Lambert” is ancient German for “Bright land”. And “Simmel” seems to come from the Hebrew "Shim’on" meaning ‘listening’. Neither name was common in England or Ireland during the middle ages.   However, Gordon Smith, in his essay “Lambert Simmel and the King from Dublin” has pointed out that “the maiden name of Edward VII's mistress...was Elizabeth Lambert."

So it could be that Lambert Simmel was a code name for the real illegitimate child of Henry VII and his mistress. If so that would make the boy an imposter of an imposter, used by Henry Tudor to discredit the belief that he and not Richard Plantagenet had murdered a rightful King of England. Maybe. It could be.

If you read enough history you come the realization that the past is like a hallway in the Tower of London. It winds up and around, past cell after cell. There may be scratches on the wall in each room, or personal belongings left behind. But the only way to know what really happened in that cell is to have been there at the time. And to have been completely honest and without bias.  And how many people are capable of that? History is what we believe happened. It is always part fact, part opinion and part imagination. It is a story. It could be. It was possible. It probably happened that way. It might have happened that way. Or it might not have. In short, reading history is not for the faint of heart.

Lambert Simmel was clearly an imposter. But whose imposter was he? He died around 1525, and left no record of his own. And everything else is just a fascinating conjecture called "his story"

-30 -

THOMAS OVERBURY Death by Enema

I want to relate to you one of the most famous murder cases in English history. But the crime is not famous because of the weapon used. Nor is the case unusual because the victim and the killers were mostly wealthy and powerful. And there was no great mystery either, since the killers left their fingerprints...well, all over the crime scene. But what did raise this tawdry tale of sin and politics out of the common sewer and dropped it right onto the throne room was that from all indications one of the killers was sleeping with the King.

You see, when the virgin Queen Elizabeth died the early dark of 24  March,  1603, she figured it would be better for England if her crown went to the son of her worst enemy, Mary Queen of Scots. On the very afternoon of Elizabeth’s death, it was officially announced that James VI of Scotland would become James I of England. In fact, under Elizabeth’s orders, officials of the English court had been visiting Edinburgh for years, to smooth the transfer of power. It was probably the most noble thing Elizabeth I did for her people, something no other monarch of her age did. But it turns out, that was where the trouble all began.

Sir Thomas Overbury (above) was one of the court officials sent north to prepare James and his court for their new responsibilities. Now, Thomas was handsome, smart as a whip and as popular as canker sore. One of his competitors described him as “prone to over valuing himself and undervaluing others”, which was the polite Tudor way of calling him arrogant jerk. And in 1601, Thomas was in Edinburgh when he was introduced to a drop-dead handsome 23 year old servant lad named Robert Carr.

Now, Robert Carr (above) was not very a smart, but he was gorgeous, ambitious and he was willing – very willing. Enthralled, Thomas took the boy home with him as a sort of souvenir. And on 24 March, 1608, when Robert broke his well turned leg during a jousting tournament held in honor of King James, James noticed that leg. And again, it was love at first sight.

James (above) began his courtship of the lad by giving the convalescing Robert daily lessons in Latin (as opposed to Greek). He made the boy a Knight, then the Viscount of Rochester, and showered him with gifts of money and land, gave him a key to the royal bedchamber, made him the keeper of royal documents and, according the King’s own letters, they spent most nights together. At one point James sent a note, complaining that Robert was “withdrawing yourself from lying in my chamber, notwithstanding my many hundred times earnest soliciting you to the contrary.” By 1610 Robert was one of the King’s closest advisors.  In at least two subjects.

Of course Robert was not smart enough to advise the king about anything, But Thomas Overbury was. And Thomas didn't mind losing his boy toy if he could now whisper suggestions in Robert’s ear, who would pass them along to King James. So the combination of Robert’s good looks and Thomas’s brains made for the perfect intimate for King James. Of course, Thomas not only advised the king what was best for England, but what was best for Thomas was well. But as far as our little circle within the Court of James I, everybody was happy. Except maybe the queen.  There were only two things that could have gone wrong, and they both did. Thomas’ ego could not resist boasting to everyone that he was the brains behind Robert Carr’s success.  And, as one observer at the time noted, “Some one or other told James that it was commonly reported that, whilst Rochester ruled the King, Overbury ruled Rochester.”  That angered the King, who didn’t like Thomas much anyway. Nobody did, really.  And then the handsome boy toy Robert Carr fell in love – with a woman, of all people.

She was Francis Howard (above), the Countess of Essex. She was smart, gorgeous and treated sex as  a hobby.  Robert began a torrid love affair with Francis, and although neither her husband nor the King seemed to mind their dalliance, Thomas Overbury did.  He warned his one time boy toy Robert that she was “a filthy, base woman…noted for her injury and immodesty.”  And Thomas may have been right, because even the lady’s husband described Francis as “a stretched glove”, not exactly a compliment.  But when Robert and Frances started planning to divorce her husband so they could marry, Thomas Overbury went ape.  His ego could not abide the insult. He told Robert he would do everything he could to prevent the divorce. And when Robert told Francis about Thomas' threat, it was open war between Francis and Thomas. And here Francis discovered her real talent was not sex, it was revenge.

Her plot was simple and simply devious. She urged Robert Carr to urge King James to offer Thomas Overbury the post of ambassador to Russia. She also urged Robert to urge Thomas to turn down the offer.  Well, Thomas saw the offer as an attempt to get him out of the way and so, taking Robert’s advice, he turned the offer down. And, just as Francis had planned, the King was enraged by the rejection of his "gift". 

In April of 1613, noted a chronicler, “Sir Thomas Overbury is sent to the Tower for saying he could not and would not accept a foreign employment.”  Thomas was locked away in the dank rooms of the Tower prison for five months. And by the end of September, Thomas was dead. Just about everybody who knew Thomas figured his death was just a happy accident; but not everybody.

Sir Walter Raleigh (above) had been a political ally of the unpleasant and unloved Thomas Overbury. And Raleigh fumed while Francis Howard’s marriage was annulled just a week after Thomas had died.  And Raleigh steamed, when in November, the King made Robert Carr the Earl of Somerset, as a wedding present. And when Robert Carr and Francis took their vows the day after Christmas 1613, Sir Walter Raleigh was already hard at work, tracking down an obscure man we know only as William.

What made this William stand out was that although he was a lowly apprentice to an apothecary, he had suddenly left England for Holland. Where would a lowly commoner get money for such a trip? And why would such a man suddenly want to travel to a country where he could not speak the language?  Sir Walter eventually tracked down William in Holland and had him followed closely for over two years. And when William fell ill in the summer of 1615, Sir Walter Raleigh’s agents were on hand to obtain his deathbed confession of his part in killing Sir Thomas Overbury.

The apothecary, read William's confession, had advised William Carr that Sir Thomas was weak, and might be near death already. But, Carr and Francis were both impatient. They had been trying to murder Sir Thomas Overbury for months, but he refused to die from the poisons they kept feeding him. Finally Carr offered the apothecary £20, literally a small fortune in 1613, to administer a massive dose of arsenic directly into Sir Thomas's bloodstream  in the only way it could be administered without leaving a mark.   William swore on his deathbed that a bribed guard had first drugged Sir Thomas Overbury's  wine, When he had passed out, William and the guard rolled the defenseless  man over, while William had inserted the tube into the terminal junction of his digestive canal and released the clamp. By six the next morning Sir Thomas Overbury was dead.

That confession produced an investigation led by Sir Francis Bacon (above), part time playwright and the Royal Attorney General. The first victim to be tortured, er, I mean the first suspect to be questioned was the apothecary, James Franklin, who admitted to preparing seven concoctions to be used by his assistant William against Thomas Overbury; sulfuric and nitric acids, copper vitriol, mercury powder, arsenic powder (lapis cotitus), and then “great spiders and cantharides, otherwise known as Spanish Fly.

According to Franklin the list had been prepared by Mrs. Anne Turner (above), the widow of a London doctor, who made a living selling love potions and what were politely called inheritance powders to wealthy and want-to-be wealthy patrons.  Mrs. Turner admitted under “questioning” that she had been directed prepare the list and to deliver the finished poisons, one after the other, to Richard Weston, Thomas Overbury’s jailer.   In his turn under enhanced interrogation, Richard Weston admitted he had slipped the poisons, one after the other, into Thomas’ food and drink. However none of them had been effective. Evidently Thomas was unfortunate enough to possess an iron constitution. Everything he ate made him sick, but he refused to die. So, in the end, said Mrs. Turner, it was decided to speed him along with a coupe de grace, right up the coupe de shute, via the steady hand of William the late apothecary assistant. And the villain who requested this barrage of food born punishment, was the lady Francis Carr and her new husband,  the handsome Robert Carr.

Francis (above, another impression) was smart enough to confess her crime under the mere threat of torture. Her new husband, Robert Carr, remained convinced he had nothing to worry about. He was certain his “friend” King James would never allow him to be tortured, because he knew too much. But James had already moved on to a new young male friend, George Villiers, and was no longer interested in Robert.  And just in case Robert decided to blurt out some embarrassing truth at his trial, two men stood at either side of Robert while he testified, just in case it was necessary to muffle the mimbo - aka, the male bimbo.

The result of the trial was a foregone conclusion. Richard Weston was hanged. Mrs. Turner was hanged. Mr. Franklin was hanged. Even the Lieutenant of the Tower, Grevase Helwys, was hanged, although his only crime was that he couldn't figure out which of his betters were going to come out on top, and so kept his mouth shut.

The only two people who did not hang for the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury were the two who had conceived of and financed the whole thing; Robert Carr and Francis. They were both sentenced to death, but instead the King ordered Robert sent to the Tower for life, while Francis was confined in her home, which is where she would have been anyway because she was “with child”.  It seems Robert the homosexual boy toy was also fecid.  In January of 1622, Richard Carr was finally released on the condition that he and Francis leave London for ever. The rumor is that alone at last on their country estates the pair learned to loath each other. She died of uterine cancer in 1632, and he died in 1645 of old age and probably, terminal stupidity.

And thus ended one of the most amazing murder cases in English history, in which at least four people hanged, and two reputations were destroyed, because they helped to murder a man no body even liked. Oh, and because they were stupid enough to get caught at it.

- 30 -

THE MONSTERS OF LES MANS The Pepin Sisters

I admit the case of “The Two Maids”, Christine and Lea Papin,  fascinates me. Although there has never been any doubt as to the horrific nature of their crime, nor as to the guilt of the two women, there has never been a definitive explanation as to why the murders were committed.  Approaching now a century later the story still begins and ends with that central mystery - why?

On the evening of Thursday, 2 February, 1933, Monsieur Rene Lancine, a retired lawyer living outside of Le Mans, France (above), left work and arrived at a friend's home for a dinner party only to discover that his wife, Léonie and his daughter Genevieve had not arrived ahead of him.  He knew they were both looking forward to the dinner, so he anxiously returned to his own home to search for them. 

He arrived shortly after 6:30 to find all the doors of his home locked and the house dark- except for what looked like a single candle burning in the attic room where the families' two servant girls slept.  M. Lancine was concerned enough that he immediately went to the police station. Several officers accompanied M. Lancine home again, and one officer climbed over the back wall of the house and thus gained entrance. 

In a bedroom on the second floor were the battered and mutilated bodies of Madam and Mademoiselle Lancine,  wearing their coats and gloves as if about to go out.  The murder weapons were scattered about the landing, dropped from the hands which had wielded them; a kitchen knife, a hammer, and a heavy pewter pot.  But the bludgeoning had only been part of the assault. 

The eminent psychiatrist Jazues Lacan put it succinctly; “They tore out their eyes as Bacchantes castrate their victims.” One of the daughter’s eyes was found on the carpet. Both of Madam Lancine’s eyes were found in the folds of her scarf, still around her neck. 

And in the bare attic room the police discovered the two servant girls, Christine and Lea Papin, naked and huddled together in one bed. The police wrapped them in overcoats and brought them in for questioning. Already the press photographers were showing up. 

Both girls readily admitted to having committed the murders. But they failed to offer any explanation for the brutal slaughter.

The case was an immediate sensation and a cause celebre’ for every side of the moral and political debate in France - to the Paris tabloids the sisters were “The Monsters of Le Mans” and “Les Arracheuses d’Yeux” (The Eye Gougers), and the murders were “…the most terrifying and cruel murders ever committed.” 

Jean Genet, author of “Waiting for Godot” was inspired by the trial to write a play, “The Maids” in which he has Christine say, “Madame likes us like she likes her armchairs. And maybe not that much!” Simone de Beauvior commented, “…there are no doubt women who deducted the cost of a broken plate from their maid’s wages, who put on white gloves to find forgotten specks of dust on the furniture:…one must accuse their childhood orphanage, their serfdom, the whole hideous system set up by decent people for the production of madmen, assassins and monsters.” 

And before the victims had even been buried, the new science of psychology found dark undertones of incest and sexual abuse , making the removal of the victim’s eyes somehow significant. The case was a theatre d’ete (a summer theatre), or perhaps a sarriette (a summer treat), in much the same way that the murder of Sandra Levy and the O.J. Simpson trial were to be a half century later. But after 77 years the central mystery of the Papin sisters remains; Why?

There were originally three Papin sisters. When the eldest daughter, Emilia, was 9 years old she was raped by her drunken father.  The mother had divorced the beast, but still Emilia was sent to a nunnery and had little to no contact with her family again. The divorce dropped the family into bitter poverty. The mother hired out as a house maid, and the two younger sisters were sent to a Catholic orphanage. And when Lea and Christine were thought to be old enough (their early teens) they too became servants.   As often as possible the sisters worked together.  But after a few years they no longer spoke to their mother.
When the Papin sisters moved into the Lancine home. Christine was 24 and worked as the family cook while 20  year old Lea was responsible for cleaning and dusting the house. They had worked in several other homes around La Mans, and had good work records. And they worked for the Lancine family for seven years without trouble.

However Mademoiselle Lancine was known to be strict about cleanliness, and often ran one of her white gloves across surfaces to inspect Lea's (above) housework.  Lately the lady of the house had taken to beating Lea. Still, the only thing unusual about the afternoon of 2 February was a badly repaired electric iron which had blown a fuse. And it was this relative minor inconvenience which somehow precipitated the explosion of bloody violence. 

After their arrests, the sisters were separated. Christine (above left) began to wail and cry out for her sister. After several days they were allowed contact again, and Christine showered Lea with kisses. The doctors sent to examine the girls decided that Lea was a simpleton and that Christine was mentally and emotionally unstable. At one point Christine became so distraught at another separation that she tried to gouge her own eyes out and had to be restrained in a straight jacket. 

When their trial finally reached its climax in September of 1933 Christine was sentenced to the guillotine, but this was later commuted to life in prison. Being alone again in prison she went into a profound depression and stopped eating for long periods. Eventually she was transferred to an insane asylum, where in 1937 she died of “cahexia”, a diagnoses which basically meant that she simply gave up fighting to stay alive. 

Lea (above) was sentenced to ten years of hard labor, of which she served eight. After she was released, Lea was reunited with her mother and they moved south to Nantes, where Lea worked as a chamber maid at a hotel under an assumed name. She died in the year 2000.

It is a sad story, and I have not more than touched on the details here. It highlights a world now long gone, and the life of two bourgeoisie peasant girls, born into a universe that seems to have had little use for them until they achieved fame by doing something despicable. And the instant they did it no longer mattered who the Papin sisters really were. At that point they became merely characters in someone else’s passion play.

- 30 -