Good topic Anyanka and certainly an intriquing one too.
Thomas Seymour is a bit of a riddle really. I don’t know why but I kind of get the impression that perhaps he was an unwanted child or at least didn’t fit what his father expected in a child.
Edward was all for taking the family’s status higher and higher which he acheived, via his sister, whereas Thomas wanted power, position and wealth but wasn’t prepared to do the work required to get it. His way of doing things was to beg borrow (and not give it back) or even try to steal it.
I don’t know exactly the situation between Edward and Thomas on how they got on, but I think their relationship was stilted and at times extremely hostile. Could this be down to the alleged situation between Catherine Filliol/Edward and his father? Perhaps Thomas was the one who discovered that their father and Catherine were having an affair and maybe enjoyed rubbing it in where Edward was concerned?
I have read somewhere, that when he approached little Eddy to find him a wife, little Eddy first proposed AOC, and then Mary, before finally allowing him to marry K.P. I do believe prior to that he asked the council for permission to marry Elizabeth, and they just told him to go away.
Elizabeth was his ultimate goal to getting supreme power, so by accepting eddy’s proposal of marriage to K.P he could at least keep Elizabeth near him. Did he actually rape Elizabeth? I think he tried and was perhaps caught before any real damage was done. The rumours that went about afterward ie supposed pregnancy had obvisously come from somewhere. I have heard a story of a midwife who was taken to attend a young girl in labour who kept her face covered at all times but the midwife said that the girl who she believed to be about 14 or 15 had a shock of red hair.
The midwife was paid handsomely for her services but was also warned that if she mentioned anything about what she had seen or heard she would be killed. The child was either stillborn or died shortly afterwards. A pretty story but I believe it was a fabrication perhaps circulated,by someone of the Dudley faction who were at the time locked in a power struggle with the Seymours. Or even more bizarrely by Thomas himself in order to divorce K.P and marry Elizabeth.
I believe in those days if a woman was raped and discovered to be with child it wasn’t unheard of for the woman to marry her rapist. This is something I believe Mary QOS used in her defence about her marriage with Bothwell so shortly after Darnley’s murder. I.e Bothwell had raped her and because of the dishonour and shame of her being raped she felt obliged to marry Bothwell to exsponge the sin that rape was.
Yes Thomas was a womaniser but it was more than just that with him, he was a power hungry womaniser and would sleep with any woman who could give him that power he so desperately craved,the ultimate power being Kingship.

Elizabeth’s not marry pledge was more to do with what happened with K.H, than Thomas Seymour, although I do believe whatever happened between Thomas and Elizabeth, reinforced Elizabeth’s determination against marriage. Elizabeth stated that marriage is death, and from what happened to K.H, K.P and Mary you can kind of see her point.
K.H was her father’s darling, clearly adored to the point of exclusion of everything else as soon as the honeymoon period was over, and K.H was expected to settle down and be the docile sit by the fire and have babies type of wife Henry wanted, things went wrong and ultimetly K.H paid the price.
Again with K.P she’d been married to 3 men 2 of which were of her parents choosing and she made the best of the situation as would be expected, once free she fell in love for the first time in her life,but Henry snapped her up for himself and once again she was in a situation where she simply had to make the best of it and shut her trap, again once she was free she took matters into her own hands and married Thomas, she was in love with him and thought that he felt the same, he did love K.P but he loved power more, Elizabeth to him was the key to power. So once again looking through Elizabeth’s eyes at the marriage between K.P and Thomas the Honeymoon period was over and poor K.P was left with a broken heart.
Mary fell passionately in love with Philip, he couldn’t stand her and only came to England when he needed money or men to fund his war with France. The result Mary not only lost England it’s last France terratory, but died a bitter and very unloved woman.
Was Elizabeth actually barren or did she choose to believe she was?
In those days medical science wasn’t as clued up as it is now.

Thank You Anyanka.

That’s my general opinion of Thomas Seymour too. A bit of a snake in the grass. I believe he started getting interested with Elizabeth, once she and Mary had been re instated in the line of succession. Rumour has it he tried to woo Mary, but was sent off with a thick ear, seems almost comical that Mary married someone who quite apart, couldn’t stand her, ended up costing the country thousands of pounds, in short Philip ripped Mary and England off. Thomas I’ve no doubt would have done the same thing if he had married either Mary or Elizabeth. His choice settled on Elizabeth because he thought that she would be docile enough to manipulate, therefore it must have come as a hell of a shock to him, that Elizabeth wasn’t the sort of girl to faint at his feet just because he looked at her. Her mental age far exceeded her cronological age, and she could see straight through him. Again I agree she was NOT pregnant when she left Sudley, Catherine had simply realised (taken off her Rose coloured Glasses) that Thomas was a menace to Elizabeth, and it was her duty as her (step) mother to protect her virtue, after all it was her hard work that had persuaded Henry to re instate both girls into the line of succession.
By the way if you ever get the chance visit Sudley Castle it’s a beautiful place.