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Overview
rough wooing
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1544–8.
The birth of Mary, queen of Scots, in December 1542, only a week after her father's death, seemed an ideal opportunity to unite the thrones of England and Scotland. Prince Edward, Henry VIII's heir, was 5 years old and the English pressed for a marriage agreement. By the treaty of Greenwich in July 1543 Mary was to be betrothed before she was 10. When the Scottish Parliament in December 1543 rejected the treaty, Henry retorted with a punitive expedition led by Lord Hertford (Somerset), devastating the south‐east border—ironically dubbed the ‘rough wooing’. The Scottish reply, by the treaty of Haddington, was to accept a proposed marriage between Mary and the dauphin and she was taken to France in July 1548.
