Catherine Howard, only the second English queen to ever be executed for adultery and treason, was born to Edmund Howard and Joyce Culpeper Howard, probably in the second half of 1523. Soon after the death of her mother in 1528, her father married again and along with some of her siblings Catherine was sent to live in the care of her father's stepmother, Duchess Agnes Howard, in her enormous household at Chesworth House near Horsham. Though she was taught to read and write, the Duchess had no interest to provide methodical schooling for women and Catherine also not academically inclined. She seemed to have received little or no intellectual training, but under her grandmother's care she learned good manners, social graces, obedience and the basic art of household management, which were necessary to make her fit to be an ideal wife.

Nevertheless, within a short time Catherine developed physically and mentally. Although she was not of a scholarly mind, she was aware of her developing body and the effect it could have on the opposite sex. When she was 12 or 13 years old, Henry Manox, a music tutor, was employed to teach the young ladies under the care of the Duchess. During that time, Manox tried to seduce Catherine and the two became sexually involved, although subsequently, both of them denied having sexual intercourse. According to Catherine, she refused to surrender her virginity to the musician, although she did allow him to fondle and touch the secret parts of her body. She was aware that as a member of the proud and ambitious Howard family, marriage to an ordinary man like, Manox would have been unthinkable. However, although they both claimed the relationship was never consummated, there was certainly some kind of relationship there, as the Dowager Duchess scolded them and ordered that they were never to be left alone after she caught them together in a compromising situation.

After the end of her episode with Manox, Catherine's next romance was with Francis Dereham, a dashing and handsome young man and a member of Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk’s household, who was Catherine’s uncle. During that time, Catherine at the age of around 15 was sexually fully mature and she allowed Dereham in her bedroom at night. Probably, Dereham took it for granted that Catherine actually was his wife, as she had consented to his sexual advances. Even, they made no secret of their attachment to each other in public and often acted as though they were engaged. In fact, although Dereham was eager to make their marriage official, Catherine was unwilling to settle the issue for the first man who had bedded her. She discovered ways to prevent herself from being pregnant and was not prepared to become ugly, she intended to enjoy sex without assuming any responsibility.

In late 1539, Catherine’s uncle, the Duke of Norfolk, found an attractive position for her, when in anticipation of Henry's forthcoming marriage, she was appointed in the household of Henry VIII’s fourth wife Anne of Cleves. Like two of her predecessors, her ill-fated cousin Anne Boleyn and Henry’s beloved third wife Jane Seymour, the young and attractive Catherine soon caught Henry VIII’s attention as lady-in-waiting to the queen who preceded her. Her youth, prettiness, obvious sex appeal and vivacity were enchanting for the king who was growing older and fatter by the day and was stuck in a marriage that made him miserable. He bestowed gifts of land and expensive cloth upon Catherine and called her his rose without thorn.

During that time, Henry became exceedingly fat and the abscess on his leg was slowing him down and there were days when he could hardly walk, let alone ride. Physically repelled by Anne of Cleves and humiliated by his sexual failure with her, he found consolation from Catherine. Sexual pleasure, which had been impossible with Anne, was easy with her, as she made it easy for the king. She made Henry lost in pleasure and he attributed it all to love and his own recovered youth, never thought  how an unmarried young girl could attain such sexual skill.

Henry made it clear to his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves, that he was willing to accept an annulment of his marriage based on his inability to consummate the relationship. The marriage was annulled on 9th July 1540, on the grounds of non-consummation, as Anne of Cleves made a statement that confirmed Henry's account. As the king was apprehensive that she might stir up trouble for him if she was allowed to travel to Europe, Anne also agreed to his demand that she would not pass beyond the sea and would become the King's adopted good sister. Finally, the 49 year old king married the17 or 18 years old young Catherine at Hampton Court in August 1540.

After a relatively successful first few months as queen, Catherine made a blunder when Dereham arrived at the court in the summer of 1541 and persuaded the queen to grant him a position in her household. It is not impossible that Catherine agreed to provide him the position to keep him quiet about their past rather than to do a favour to an old friend. 

By that time, Catherine became involved in a secret relationship with Thomas Culpeper, a gentleman of the king’s privy chamber. Probably, Culpeper learned of Catherine’s sexual history before marriage and the ambitious and apparently unscrupulous courtier might have pressured the insecure queen to grant him special favours and attention in reward for maintaining silence about her affair with Dereham. Nevertheless, they met on a handful of occasions, beginning in April 1541 and then during the court’s progress to the north of England between June and October of that same year. Their secret meetings were allegedly arranged by one of Catherine's older ladies-in-waiting, Jane Boleyn, commonly known as Lady Rochford, who was the sister-in-law of Anne Boleyn, the second wife of Henry VIII. She allegedly watched for Catherine backstairs as Culpeper had made his escapes from the Queen's room.

When the Henry returned from north to Hampton Court, Archbishop Thomas Cranmer informed him that he believed the queen had been unfaithful. Cranmer was a staunch reformer, who wanted to take the opportunity of the situation to remove Catherine and the entire Roman Catholic Howard family from power. Unfortunately for Catherine, both Manox and Dereham admitted their past relationships with the queen. During a private interview with Cranmer, Catherine herself broke down, admitted that she had on many occasions gone to bed with Dereham and threw herself on the king’s mercy for suppressing her past before their marriage. However, there was no evidence to charge the queen with adultery, as both she and Dereham denied any intimacy since Katherine’s marriage to the king. At the most, she could legally be charged with bigamy and sent away from the Court in shame, until she was questioned about her relationship with Culpeper. Although Catherine maintained that she had never gone to bed with Culpeper, Jane Boleyn aka Lady Rochford claimed she had helped Catherine and Culpeper meet in secret because Catherine had ordered her to do that and she thought that the two of them had a sexual relationship. In addition to that, one of the Queen’s servants, named Margaret Morton, also testified that while at the Pontefract Castle in August 1541, Lady Rochford locked the room from inside after both Catherine and Culpeper went inside. However, there was no convincing and concrete evidence that proves without a doubt that she had a sexual relationship with Culpeper and  much of the evidence cited to prove her love for him, does not indicate that she was infatuated or romantically involved with Culpeper.

Culpeper and Dereham were indicted at Guildhall on 1 December 1541 for high treason and were executed at Tyburn on 10 December 1541. No block had been provided for Culpeper, who knelt on the ground by the gallows and was decapitated with one stroke of the axe. Dereham had to suffer the full horror of being hanged, castrated, disembowelled, beheaded and quartered. According to the prevailing custom, their heads were set up on pikes atop the London Bridge.

Catherine was stripped of her title as queen in November 1541 and imprisoned in the new Syon Abbey. On 10th February 1542, when the officials arrived at the Abbey of Syon to take Catherine to the Tower of London, she became hysterical and had to be dragged to the waiting barge. It was later reported that over the next couple of days she wept, cried and tormented herself miserably without ceasing. At seven o'clock on Monday, the 13th February 1542, when Catherine was taken to the Tower Green, she was reported to be so weak with crying that she could hardly stand or speak and had to be assisted on to the scaffold. She died with dignity and before the executioner severed her head in a single blow, she said she merited a hundred deaths and prayed for her husband. Jane Boleyn, known as Lady Rochford, who followed her queen to the block, was in frenzy at the sight of Catherine's blood-soaked remains being wrapped in a black blanket by her sobbing ladies. She placed her head on a block still wet and slippery with her mistress's blood, after making a speech where she called for the preservation of the King. Afterwards, she was buried in the Tower of London’s parish church, close to the body of Catherine.