Claim: Dekker, who wrote his first pamphlet in 1603, was not the only one to view the outbreak of plague as a divine consequence of Elizabeth's death and recalls the widespread lamentation at her death and includes in his work some of the epigrams written for her funeral at Whitehall.
Evidence: The Wonderfull Yeare is Thomas Dekker's first pamphlet, written and printed in 1603, the year of Queen Elizabeth's death, James I's accession, and an outbreak of the bubonic plague in England. Dekker was not the only one to view the outbreak of plague as a divine consequence of Elizabeth's death. He recalls the widespread lamentation at her death and includes in his work some of the epigrams written for her funeral at Whitehall.