EDWARD V. AND RICHARD III.
Edward V. Proclaimed--The Two Parties of the Queen and of
Gloucester--Struggle in the Council--Gloucester's Plans--The Earl
Rivers and his Friends imprisoned--Gloucester secures the King and
conducts him to London--Indignities to the young King--Execution
of Lord Hastings--A Base Sermon at St. Paul's Cross--Gloucester
pronounces the two young Princes illegitimate--The Farce at
the Guildhall--Gloucester seizes the Crown--Richard crowned
in London and again at York--Buckingham revolts against
him--Murder of the Two Princes--Henry of Richmond--Failure
of Buckingham's Rising--Buckingham beheaded--Richard's Title
confirmed by Parliament--Queen Dowager and her Daughters quit the
Sanctuary--Death of Richard's Son and Heir--Proposes to marry his
Niece, Elizabeth of York--Richmond lands at Milford Haven--His
Progress--The Troubles of Richard--The Battle of Bosworth--The
Fallen Tyrant--End of the Wars of the Roses.
By the death of Edward IV. England was destined once more to witness all
the inconveniences which attend the minority of a king. Edward V. was a
boy of only thirteen. His mother and her family had made themselves many
enemies and few friends by their undisguised ambition and cupidity. The
Greys and Woodvilles had been lifted above the heads of the greatest
members of the aristocracy, enriched with the estates, and clothed with
the honours of ancient houses. They had been posted round the throne as
if to keep aloof all other candidates for favour and promotion. At the
time of the death of Edward IV., Richard of Gloucester was in the North,
attending to his duties as commander against the army in the Scottish
marches. He immediately commenced his proceedings with that consummate
and hypocritical art of which he was a first-rate master. He at once
put his retinue into deep mourning, and marched to York attended by 600
knights and esquires. There he ordered the obsequies of the departed king
to be performed with all solemnity in the cathedral. He then summoned
the nobility and gentry of the country to take the oath of allegiance to
his nephew, Edward V., and he led the way by first taking it himself.
He wrote to the queen-mother to condole with her on her loss, and to
assure her of his zealous support of the rights of his beloved nephew.
He expressed his ardent desire for the close friendship of the queen,
of Earl Rivers, her brother, and of all her family. He announced his
intention of proceeding towards London to attend the coronation, and if
Elizabeth had not already known the man, she might have congratulated
herself on the enjoyment of so affectionate a brother-in-law, and so
brave and faithful a guardian of her son.
But there is every reason to believe that the same messenger who carried
these letters of condolence and professed friendship to the queen,
carried others of a different tone to a hostile section of her council.
The Lords Howard, Hastings, and Stanley, though personal friends of
the late king, and Hastings, the chosen confidant and associate of his
pleasures, were at heart bitter enemies of the queen's family. It was
only the authority of Edward which had maintained peace between them, and
now they showed an undisguised hostility to them at the council-board.
The Earl Rivers, the queen's brother, and the Marquis of Dorset, her
son by her former marriage, occupied the chief seats at that board, and
Edward was no stranger to their real sentiments. This knowledge had led
him, on perceiving his health failing, to bring these rivals together,
and to state to them how much it concerned his son's peace and security
that they should forget all past causes of difference, and unite for
that loyal purpose. This they promised, but only with the tongue. No
sooner was the king dead, than all the old animosity and jealousy showed
themselves in aggravated form.
Elizabeth now proposed that the young king should be brought up to town
in order to be crowned, and that he should be attended by a strong body
of soldiery for the safety of his person. At this, Hastings, who, in
common with three-fourths of the nobility, was jealous of the design of
the queen and her party to make themselves masters of the government
during the king's minority, no longer concealed his real feelings. Edward
had been kept on the borders of Wales, where the power of the Mortimers
and the Yorkists lay. It was believed that the object was to give a
preponderance to the royal family through the Welsh and the borderers;
and now to march up to London, attended by a Welsh army, appeared
a direct attempt to control the capital by these means. Hastings,
therefore, warmly demanded--"What need of an army? Who were the enemies
they had to dread? Was it the king's own uncle, Gloucester? Was it Lord
Stanley, or himself? Was this force meant by the Woodvilles to put an end
to all liberty in the council and the government, and thus to break the
very union the king, on his death-bed, had pledged them to?" Hastings
concluded his speech by hotly declaring that if the king was brought to
London by an army, he would quit the council and the kingdom.
Deterred by this open opposition, Elizabeth yielded, and reduced the
proposed guard to 2,000 cavalry. But she did it with deep and too
well-founded anxiety. She had had too much opportunity of studying the
character of Gloucester to trust him, and the event very soon justified
her conviction. Secret messages had, during this interval, been passing
between Gloucester and Hastings and the Duke of Buckingham, a weak
man, descended from Thomas of Woodstock, the youngest son of Edward
III. No doubt he had instructed them to defeat any measures of the
Woodville family, which could leave the king in their hands. The moment
was accurately calculated; and, accordingly, when the Lords Rivers and
Grey, on their way to London with the young king, arrived at Stony
Stratford, they found Gloucester had already reached Northampton, only
ten miles from them. Gloucester had increased his forces on the way to
a formidable body, and he was there joined by the Duke of Buckingham
with 500 horse. The Lords Rivers and Grey, on learning the presence of
Gloucester at Northampton, immediately rode over to him to welcome him
in the king's name, and to consult with him on the plan of their united
entrance into London. Gloucester received them with all the marks of
that friendship which he had written to avow. They were invited to dine
and spend the night, the Dukes of Gloucester and Buckingham promising
to ride with them in the morning to pay their respects to the king.
Morning appeared, and Gloucester and Buckingham set out with them in the
best of humours. They rode in pleasant converse till, arriving at the
entrance of Stony Stratford, Gloucester suddenly accused Rivers and Grey
of having estranged the affections of the king from him. They denied the
charge with as much vehemence as astonishment; but they were immediately
arrested and conducted to the rear. Gloucester and Buckingham rode on
to the king, where the two dukes humbly on their knees professed their
loyalty and attachment. This they proceeded to make manifest by arresting
also the king's faithful servants, Sir Thomas Vaughan and Sir Richard
Hawse. In spite of the poor young king's entreaties, he led him away with
him to Northampton, his relatives and friends, Rivers, Grey, Vaughan,
and Hawse, following in the rear as prisoners. These prisoners of State
were sent off by Gloucester, under a strong guard, to his castle of
Pontefract--that blood-stained fortress, the very entrance to which, in
bondage, was equivalent to a death-warrant.
At midnight following the very day of these transactions, being the 1st
of May, the appalling tidings reached the court that Gloucester, followed
by a large army, had seized the king, and sent prisoners the queen's
brother and son no one knew whither. Struck with consternation, and
deeply rueing her weakness in giving up her own plans of caution, the
queen, hastily seizing her younger son by the hand, and followed by her
daughters, rushed from the palace of Westminster to the Sanctuary, which
had protected her before; but not against a person so base and deadly
in his ruthless ambition as this her brother-in-law of Gloucester. She
knew the man, and she dreaded everything. Her eldest son, Dorset, who
was Keeper of the Tower, in his turn weakly abandoned that important
stronghold, and also fled to the Sanctuary. Rotherham, the Archbishop
of York and Chancellor of the realm, hastening thither, found the queen
seated on the rushes with which the floors at that time were strewn, an
image of abandonment and woe.
[Illustration: GREAT SEAL OF EDWARD V.]
Meanwhile, London was thrown into the utmost dismay and confusion. Many
of the nobles and citizens flew to arms, and some flocked to the queen at
Westminster, and others to Lord Hastings in London. Hastings continued to
assure them that there was no cause of alarm; that Gloucester was a true
man; and he was most likely the more ready to believe this himself from
his own dislike of the queen's family.
On the 4th of May Gloucester conducted his royal captive into the
capital. At Hornsey Park, the lord mayor and corporation, in scarlet, met
the royal procession, followed by 400 citizens, all in violet. The Duke
of Gloucester, habited, like his followers, in mourning, rode into the
city before the king, with his cap in hand, bowing low to the people, and
pointing out to their notice the king, who rode in a mantle of purple
velvet. Edward V. was first conducted to Ely Place, to the bishop's
palace; but he was soon removed to the Tower, on the motion of the Duke
of Buckingham, on pretence that it was the proper place in which to await
his coronation. That ceremony Elizabeth and her council had ordered to
take place this very day, but the crafty Gloucester prevented that by not
arriving in time. He took up his quarters in Crosby Place, Bishopsgate,
where one part of the council constantly sat, while another, but lesser
portion of it, assembled with Lord Hastings and others in the Tower.
The day of the coronation was then fixed for the 22nd of June, leaving
an interval of nearly seven weeks in which the schemes of Gloucester
might be perfected. The first object of this man had been to impress the
queen and her party with his friendly disposition, till he had secured
their persons; this being, in a great measure, effected, the next was
to persuade the public of his loyalty to his nephew. For this purpose
he conducted him with such state into the capital, and so assiduously
pointed him out as their king to the people. To have openly proclaimed
his designs upon the crown would have united all parties against him. He
averted that by his calling on all men to swear fealty to his nephew,
and by first swearing it himself. Having now procured full possession
of the king's person, the next step was to secure that of his younger
brother, without which his plans would all be vain. He was surrendered by
the queen, and also placed in the Tower.
[Illustration: EDWARD V.]
The victims were secured. Gloucester had feigned himself a kind relation
till he had got them into prison; now he yearned to put forth his claws
and devour them. But for this it required that the public should be duly
prepared. His followers, and especially his imbecile tool, Buckingham,
busily spread through town and country reports of the most terrible
plots on the part of the queen and her friends to destroy Gloucester,
Buckingham, and other great lords, in order that she and her family might
have the king, and through him, the whole government, in their power.
They exhibited quantities of arms, which they declared the queen's party
had secreted in order to destroy Gloucester and the other patriotic
lords, as they pleased to represent them. This did not fail to produce
its effect on the people without, and it was promptly followed up by a
picture of treason in the very council.
Lord Stanley, who was sincerely attached to Edward IV.'s family, had
often expressed his suspicions of what was going on at Crosby Hall; but
Hastings had replied, that he had a trusty agent there who informed him
of all that passed. But Hastings, who had been completely duped by
Gloucester, had been unconsciously playing into his hands, till his own
turn came. While he imagined that Richard was punishing the assumption
of the queen and her relations, the latter was preparing the bloody acts
of one of the most daring dramas of historic crime ever acted before the
world. Richard, no doubt, had thought Hastings ready to go the whole way
with him. At this crisis, however, he became aware that he was an honest
though misguided man, who would stand staunchly by his young sovereign,
and must therefore be removed. The tyrant was now beginning to feel
secure of his object, and prepared to seize it at whatever cost of crime
and infamy. Accordingly, on the 13th of June, says Sir Thomas More, he
came into the council about nine in the morning, "in a very merry humour.
After a little talking with them, he said to the Bishop of Ely, 'My lord,
you have very good strawberries in your garden in Holborn: I request
you let us have a mess of them.' 'Gladly, my lord,' quoth he; 'would to
God I had some better things as ready to your pleasure as that!' and
then, with all haste, he sent his servant for a mess of strawberries.
The protector set the lords fast in communing, and thereupon praying
them to spare him a little while, departed thence, and, soon after one
hour, between ten and eleven, he returned into the chamber amongst them
all, changed, with a wonderful sour, angry countenance, knitting his
brows, frowning and fretting, gnawing on his lips, and so sat him down
in his place. Soon after he asked, 'What those persons deserved who had
compassed and imagined his destruction.' Lord Hastings answered that they
deserved death, whoever they might be; and then Richard affirmed that
they were that sorceress, his brother's wife (meaning the queen), with
others with her; 'and,' said the protector, 'we shall see in what wise
that sorceress, and that other witch of her councils, Shore's wife, with
their affinity, have by their sorcery and witchcraft wasted my body.'
So saying, he plucked up his doublet sleeve to his elbow upon his left
arm, where the arm appeared to be withered and small, as it was never
other." He then included Hastings in the charge. The unfortunate man was
hurried out by the armed ruffians of the tyrant, and scarcely allowing
him time to confess to the first priest that came to hand, they made
use of a log which accidentally lay on the green at the door of the
chapel, and beheaded him at once. Lord Stanley, the Archbishop of York,
and the Bishop of Ely, were kept close prisoners in the Tower. Shortly
afterwards the queen's brother and son, Earl Rivers and Lord Grey, were
executed at Pontefract.
The united troops of Gloucester and Buckingham, to the amount of 20,000,
now held the metropolis in subjection; the terror of the protector's
deeds enchained it still more. On the following Sunday, June 22nd, the
day which had been fixed for the coronation, instead of that ceremony
taking place, a priest was found base enough--tyrants never fail of such
tools--to ascend St. Paul's Cross, and preach from this text, from the
Book of Wisdom, "Bastard slips shall not strike deep root."
This despicable man was one Dr. Shaw, brother of the Lord Mayor. He
drew a broad picture of the licentious life of Edward IV., and asserted
that his mode of destroying such ladies as he found unwilling to incur
dishonour was to promise them marriage, and occasionally to go through
a mock or real ceremony with them. He declared that Edward had thus, in
the commencement of his reign, really contracted a marriage with the
Lady Eleanor Butler, the widow of Lord Butler, of Sudeley, and daughter
of the Earl of Shrewsbury; that he afterwards contracted a private and
illegal marriage with Elizabeth Woodville, which, however it might be
real and legal in other respects, was altogether invalid and impossible,
from the fact that Edward was already married to Lady Butler. Hence he
contended that Elizabeth Woodville, though acknowledged by Parliament,
was, in reality, nothing more than a concubine; that she and the king had
been living in open and scandalous adultery; and that, of consequence,
the whole of their children were illegitimate, and the sons incapable of
wearing the crown.
But the preacher went further. Determined to destroy the claims of
the young Edward V. to the crown, he boldly asserted not only his
illegitimacy, but that of his father, Edward IV. This could only be done
at the expense of the honour of the proud Cicely, Duchess of York, the
mother of Gloucester, as well as of Edward. But the man who was wading
his way to the throne through the blood of his own nephews, and of the
best men in the country, was not likely to be stopped by the honour of
his mother. The son of Clarence was living, and in case of the deaths of
Edward's sons had a prior right to Gloucester. That right was at present
in abeyance, through Clarence's attainder, but would revive on reversion
of the attainder, and the possibility of this must be destroyed.
[Illustration: THE CROWN OF ENGLAND BEING OFFERED TO RICHARD, DUKE OF
GLOUCESTER, AT BAYNARD'S CASTLE, IN 1483.
FROM THE WALL PAINTING BY SIGISMUND GOETZE, IN THE ROYAL EXCHANGE.]
The preacher, therefore, stoutly maintained that both Edward IV. and
Clarence were the children of other men, not of the late Duke of York;
that it was notorious, and that their striking likeness to their reputed
fathers fully confirmed it. Gloucester, he contended, was alone the son
of the Duke of York; and this vile prostitutor of the pulpit exclaimed,
"Behold this excellent prince, the express image of his noble father--the
genuine descendant of the house of York; bearing no less in the virtues
of his mind than in the features of his countenance the character of the
gallant Richard!" At this moment Gloucester, by concert, was to have
passed, as if accidentally, through the audience to his place, and the
preacher exclaimed, "Behold the man entitled to your allegiance! He must
deliver you from the dominion of all intruders!--he alone can restore the
lost glory and honour of the nation!"
Here it was expected that the people would cry out "Long live King
Richard!" but they stared at one another in amazement, and the more
so that Gloucester did not appear at the nick of time, but after the
preacher's apostrophe was concluded; so that, when Gloucester did appear,
he was obliged to repeat his lesson, which threw such an air of ridicule
upon the whole, that Gloucester could not conceal his chagrin, and the
preacher--perceiving that the odium of the attempt, as it had failed,
would fall upon him--stole away home, and, it is said, never again
recovered his standing. Gloucester, of course, would be the first to
fling him by as a worthless tool, and he received that reward of public
contempt which it would be better for the world if it always measured out
to such vile subserviency.
But Gloucester was now fully prepared to complete his necessary amount
of crime for the attainment of the throne, and was not to be daunted by
one failure. The preacher, having broken the ice, he renewed his attempt
in another quarter--the council chamber of the city. The Lord Mayor--as
great a sycophant as his brother the preacher--lent himself, as he had
probably done before, to the scheme. On the next Tuesday, the 24th of
June, the Duke of Buckingham appeared upon the hustings at Guildhall, and
harangued the citizens. He called upon them to recollect the dissolute
life of the late king; his frequent violation of the sanctity of their
homes; the seduction of most respectable ladies; the extent of his
extortions of their money under the name of benevolences. In fact, he
repeated, in another form, the whole sermon of Shaw, and went through the
whole story of the marriage of Lady Butler, by the king, previous to that
with Lady Grey, of which he assured them Stillington, Bishop of Bath, was
a witness. Stillington, however, was never called to give such evidence.
He then asked whether they would have the illegitimate progeny of such
a man to rule over them. He assured them that he would never submit to
the rule of a bastard, and that both the aristocracy and the people of
the northern counties had sworn the same. But there, he observed, was
the Duke of Gloucester, a man calculated to rescue England from such a
stigma, and from all its losses--a man valiant, wise, patriotic, and
of true blood, the genuine descendant of the great Edward III. On this
the servants of Buckingham and Gloucester incited some of the meanest
apprentices to cry out, and there was a feeble voice raised of "God save
King Richard!" That was enough. Buckingham returned the people thanks
for their hearty assent, and invited them to attend him the next morning
to the duke's residence of Baynard's Castle, near Blackfriars Bridge, to
tender him the crown. After a show of refusal Gloucester accepted it.
Thus ended this scene, which Hume calls a ridiculous farce, but which
was, in fact, a most diabolical one, to be followed by as revolting a
tragedy. The next day this monster in human form went to Westminster
in state. There he entered the great hall, and seated himself on the
marble seat, with Lord Howard, afterwards Duke of Norfolk, on his right
hand, and the Duke of Suffolk on his left. He stated to the persons
present that he chose to commence his reign in that place, because the
administration of justice was the first duty of a king. Every one who
heard this must have felt that if there were any justice in him he could
not be there. It is clear that the spirit of the nation was with the poor
boy Edward, but there was no man who dared to lift up his voice for him.
The axe of Gloucester had already lopped off heads enough to render the
others dumb, and London was invested by his myrmidons. He was already
a dictator, and could do for a while what he pleased. He proclaimed
an amnesty to all offenders against him up to that hour, and he then
proceeded to St. Paul's, to return thanks to God. Thus, on the 26th of
June, 1483, successful villainy sat enthroned in the heart of London.
[Illustration: THE TOWER OF LONDON: BLOODY (A) AND WAKEFIELD (B) TOWERS.]
On the 6th of July, not a fortnight after his acceptance of the crown at
Baynard's Castle Richard was crowned with all splendour. The terror of
the blood-stained despot was all-potent, and was evidenced in the fact
that few of the peers or peeresses ventured to absent themselves. With
consummate tact Richard, the Yorkist usurper, appointed the heads of the
Lancastrian line to bear the most prominent part in the ceremony, next to
royalty itself. Buckingham bore his train, and the Countess of Richmond
bore that of his queen. Both these persons were descendants of John of
Gaunt, and the countess was the wife of that Lord Stanley who had been
wounded at the very council board by Richard's ruffian guards, at the
time of the seizure of Hastings. There can be little doubt but that it
was the intention of Gloucester to have thus got rid, as by accident,
of that respectable and powerful nobleman, who had great influence in
the north; but having failed in that, he now made a merit of liberating
him and his fellows, the Archbishop of York and the Bishop of Ely, from
the Tower. On Stanley he conferred the stewardship of the household, and
soon after made him Constable of England. Probably, it not only entered
the mind of Richard that it would be politic to secure the favour of
a nobleman so much esteemed in Cheshire and Lancashire, but that, by
ingratiating himself with the Countess of Richmond, the wife of Stanley,
and the mother of the young Earl of Richmond, who, during the reign of
Edward IV., had been a cause of anxiety, as a probable aspirant to the
throne, he might succeed in beguiling Richmond into his hands; and this
is the more probable because he was, at the very time, negotiating some
private matters with the Duke of Brittany, at whose court Richmond was.
[Illustration: GREAT SEAL OF RICHARD III.]
Besides the promotion of Stanley, the Lord Howard was made Earl Marshal
and Duke of Norfolk, his son was created Earl of Surrey, Lord Lovel was
made a viscount, and many others of the nobility now received higher
rank. The vast wealth which Edward IV. had left he distributed lavishly
amongst those who had done his work, and those whom he sought to win
over. The troops who had come from the north, and were seen with wonder
and ridicule by the Londoners from their mean and dirty appearance, and
called a rascal rabble, but who were ready at a word to do desperate
things, he amply rewarded, and sent home again, as soon as the coronation
was over.
This great display over, Richard called no Parliament, but merely
assembled the nobility before their returning to their respective
counties, and enjoined them to maintain the peace there, and to assist
his officers in putting down all offenders and disturbers. But he did
not satisfy himself with injunctions. He set out to make a wide circuit
through his kingdom, in order to awe all malcontents by his presence.
He proceeded by slow journeys to Oxford, Woodstock, Gloucester, and
Worcester. At Warwick he was joined by the queen; and as she was the
daughter of the late Earl of Warwick, she might be considered as
presiding in her ancestral home; and there, therefore, a considerable
court was held for the space of a week, the Spanish ambassadors and
members of the English nobility coming there. Thence the royal pair
advanced by Coventry, Leicester, Nottingham, and Pontefract to York. The
inhabitants of that stronghold of Lancastrian feeling had been warned to
receive the king "with every mark of joy;" and to conciliate the northern
population, Richard sent for the royal wardrobe from London, and once
more repeated the coronation in York, as if to intimate that he scarcely
felt himself sovereign till he had their sanction and homage.
But after all the crimes perpetrated by Richard, the public had been
terrified into silence, not into approval. No sooner was the south
relieved from his presence than it at once recovered breath and language.
As if the oppression of a nightmare were withdrawn, people began to utter
their true feelings. Some were for marching in thousands upon the Tower,
and forcibly liberating the innocent victims; others suggested that it
were wise to enable the daughters of Edward to escape to the Continent,
so that Richard should never be free from the fear of legitimate
claimants to the crown. All the foreign potentates had shrunk from
entering into alliance with so blood-stained a character, and would be
ready to cherish these princesses as a means of annoying or controlling
him.
But Richard had thought of all these things long before the public, and
had taken such measures to prevent them as would soon make the ears of
all England tingle at their discovery. On attempting to communicate with
Elizabeth and her daughters in the sanctuary, they found that asylum
invested by a strong body of soldiers under one John Nesfield, and that
there was no approaching the royal family. The only alternative was to
endeavour to liberate the young princes.
For this purpose private meetings were held in nearly all the counties
of the south and west. The nobility and gentry bound themselves by
oath to take arms and unite for the restoration of Edward V. In the
midst of these movements the agitators were agreeably astonished to
find themselves in possession of a most unexpected and powerful ally.
This was no other than the Duke of Buckingham, the man who had so
unscrupulously taken the lead in putting down all who were formidable
obstacles to Richard's plans, and in bringing London to declare for him.
The circumstances which produced this marvellous change have rather been
guessed at than ever satisfactorily known.
Buckingham was descended from Thomas, Duke of Gloucester, sixth son of
Edward III. His claims to the throne were far superior to those of the
Earl of Richmond, who was of an exactly parallel descent from John of
Gaunt, but with a flaw of illegitimacy through that prince's connection
with Catherine Swynford. Buckingham not only stood higher amongst the
princes of the Lancastrian blood than Richmond, but he was married to
the sister of Queen Elizabeth, and was thus closely connected with the
imprisoned prince. Yet he had at once supported the most unscrupulous of
the Yorkists, and helped more than any other man to dethrone his near
relative. If this were strange, his sudden conversion was stranger.
For his signal services to Richard he had received signal rewards.
The Earl of Gloucester, Buckingham's ancestor, had married one of the
daughters and co-heiresses of Humphrey Bohun, Earl of Hereford. Their
property, on the Yorkist family ascending the throne, had been seized by
it. Buckingham had probably made it his bargain for what he was to do
for Richard, that these estates should be restored to him. They were,
accordingly, restored, and beyond that he was made Constable of England,
Justiciary of Wales, and many other honours were heaped upon him. Why,
then, this sudden revolt? The real causes were most likely those which
have ever separated successful villains--distrust of each other, and the
desire of the principal to be rid of his too knowing and, therefore,
dangerous accessory. Buckingham was the confidant in many and terrible
State secrets. He knew why Hastings was suddenly hurried to his death,
and all the dark work by which the true prince had been thrust down to a
dungeon, and the false one set up.
He resolved, therefore, to reinstate Edward V.; and circular letters
were addressed to all those chiefs who were likely to unite in the
enterprise. In Kent, Essex, Sussex, Berkshire, Hants, Wilts, and
Devonshire, preparations were made for the purpose; and Buckingham was
about to move forward to put himself at their head, when the confederates
were thunderstruck with the news that the king and his brother had been
already murdered in the Tower.
The account which has been generally followed of this horrid event, is
that of Sir Thomas More. According to the learned chancellor, Richard,
while making his holiday progress through the country, was plotting the
death of the young princes in the Tower. From Gloucester he despatched
one of his pages to Sir Robert Brackenbury, the Governor of the Tower,
commanding him to get them quietly made away with. Sir Robert refused the
office of assassin. Richard, however, from Warwick sent Sir James Tyrell,
with orders to command the Tower for one night. This Tyrell had been
vice-Constable under Edward IV., and always employed by him to execute
illegal commissions, like Tristan, the tool of Louis XI. Tradition holds
that the Portcullis Tower was the one in which the young princes were
confined, and it is stated that they were under the constant surveillance
of four keepers, and waited on by a fellow called Black Will, or Will
Slaughter.
The murderer Richard is said to have roused Tyrell from his bed at
midnight, and sent him off; and Brackenbury, though he would not stain
his own hands with innocent blood, had to give the keys by the king's
command to the man who would. "Then," says Sir Thomas More, "Sir James
Tyrell desired that the princes should be murdered in bed, to the
execution whereof he appropriated Miles Forest, one of their keepers,
a fellow flesh-bred in murder, and to him he joined one John Dighton,
his own horse-keeper, a big, broad, square knave. The young king had
certainly a clear apprehension of his fate, for he was heard sighingly to
say, 'I would mine uncle would let me have my life, though he taketh my
crown.' After which time the prince never tied his points nor anything
attended to himself, but with that young babe his brother, lingered in
thought and heaviness, till the traitorous deed delivered them from their
wretchedness.
"All their other attendants being removed from them, and the harmless
children in bed, these men came into their chamber, and suddenly lapping
them in the clothes, smothered and stifled them till thoroughly dead.
Then laying out their bodies on the bed, they fetched Sir James to see
them, who caused the murderers to bury them at the stairfoot, deep in
the ground under a heap of stones. Then rode Sir James in great haste
to King Richard, and showed him the manner of the murder, who gave him
great thanks, but allowed not their bodies in so vile a corner, but would
have them buried in consecrated ground. Sir Robert Brackenbury's priest
then took them up, and where he buried them was never known, for he died
shortly afterwards. But when the news was brought to the unfortunate
mother, yet being in sanctuary, that her two sons were murdered, it
struck to her heart like the sharp dart of death; she was so suddenly
amazed that she swooned and fell to the ground, and there lay in great
agony, yet like to a dead corpse."
This dismal news, however, probably did not reach the unhappy queen till
some time after the perpetration of the murder, for the tyrant kept the
deed close till it suited his purpose to disclose it.
The whole of this circumstantial account has been called in question
by some modern historians, on the plea that the history of Richard
was written by men after his death, who invented half the crimes and
repulsive features of Richard to please the court of Henry VII. But
perhaps two more highly credible historians could not be found than
Sir Thomas More and the continuator of the Croyland Chronicle, the
latter of whom wrote immediately after the death of Richard; and every
circumstance known confirms their accounts. We shall see that the younger
of these princes was supposed to reappear in the reign of Henry VII. as
Perkin Warbeck. But, unfortunately for this story, the bodies of the
two murdered children were discovered buried in one coffin or box. This
occurred so late as 1674, when workmen were digging down the stairs which
led from the king's lodgings to the chapel in the Tower, where, about ten
feet deep, they came upon this chest containing the bones of two youths
"proportionable to the ages of the two brothers; namely, about thirteen
and eleven years."
What is more, all those said to be concerned in this diabolical deed
were afterwards specially patronised by Richard. Greene, the messenger,
was made receiver of the lordships of the Isle of Wight and Porchester
Castle; Tyrell and Brackenbury received numerous grants of lucrative
offices, money, and lands, as may be seen in Strype's notes to Bucke's
history, in Kennet. Dighton, one of the murderers, was made bailiff
for life of the manor of Aiton, in Staffordshire; and Forest dying in
possession of a lucrative post in Bernard Castle, his widow and son
received an annuity of five marks. Still, further, Sir Thomas More says,
"Very truth it is, and well known, that at such times as Sir James Tyrell
was in the Tower for treason against King Henry VII., both Dighton and
him were examined, and confessed the murder in manner above written."
Henry, in consequence, sought for the bodies, but at that time they could
not be found, the chaplain, the depositary of the secret, being dead.
When, in addition to this, it shall be seen that Richard was anxious
to marry Elizabeth of York, the sister of these young princes, and to
prevent Richmond from marrying her, nothing can be more conclusive of the
death of the boys as described--for, otherwise, the issue of Elizabeth
could not succeed rightfully to the throne. Moreover, Richard is himself
stated to have allowed the fact of the murder to come out, in order to
crush the rising of Buckingham and his confederates in their behalf.
Under all these circumstances, we conceive no event of history stands
more strongly authenticated.
It is said to have been in the midst of the gaieties of the coronation
at York that Richard received the news of Buckingham's movement, and of
the confederation of the southern counties. The circumstances were so
alarming that, notwithstanding the execration which he was conscious such
an avowal would bring down upon him, he permitted the account of the
princes' death to be published. One universal burst of horror, both from
friend and foe, went through the kingdom; and from that hour, instead of
saving him, the knowledge of that cruel deed repelled all hearts from him.
For the moment, the nobles, marching forward to rescue the young king,
were taken aback: the tyrant had anticipated them; the king they would
restore had perished. But the astute Bishop of Ely reminded them that
there was Henry of Richmond, descended from John of Gaunt, who might
marry Elizabeth of York, and thus, uniting the two rival houses, put
an end to the divisions of the nation. This uniting all parties would
annihilate the murderer. The idea was seized upon with avidity. Reginald
Bray, the steward to the Countess of Richmond, was instructed to open
the project to her, who immediately embraced it in favour of her son.
Dr. Lewis, a Welsh physician, who attended the queen-dowager in the
sanctuary, was made the bearer of the scheme to her. Elizabeth was well
prepared by the wrongs heaped upon her, the murder of her brother and
her three sons, and her own confinement and degradation, to forget her
opposition to the house of Lancaster. She fully agreed to the project, on
the condition of Richmond swearing to marry her daughter Elizabeth on his
arriving in England. She even borrowed a sum of money and sent it to him,
to aid his enterprise. A messenger was despatched to Henry in Brittany
to inform him of the agreement, and to hasten his arrival, the 18th of
October being fixed for the general rising in his favour.
[Illustration: THE PRINCES IN THE TOWER. (_See p._ 54.)
(_After the picture by Paul Delaroche._)]
But it was not to be supposed that all these arrangements could
escape the suspicious vigilance of Richard. He proceeded from York to
Lincolnshire as if he were only attending to the ordinary affairs of the
kingdom. But on the 11th of October--a week before the day appointed for
the rising of the confederates--he summoned all his adherents to meet him
at Leicester. Four days afterwards he proclaimed Buckingham a traitor,
and set a reward of £1,000, or of £100 a year in land, on his head. For
those of the Marquis of Dorset and of the two bishops he offered 1,000
marks, or 100 marks a year in land each; and for the head of any hostile
knight half that sum. He sent at the same time to London for the great
seal to authenticate these and similar acts.
On the day fixed, the rising, notwithstanding, took place. The Marquis
of Dorset proclaimed Henry VII. at Exeter; the Bishop Of Salisbury
proclaimed him in that city; the men of Kent at Maidstone; those of
Berkshire at Newbury, and the Duke of Buckingham raised his standard
at Brecon. Few revolutions ever opened with more favourable auspices.
But untoward events made wholly abortive this well-planned popular
attempt. The Duke of Richmond set sail from St. Malo on the 12th of
October for England, with a fleet of forty sail, carrying 5,000 men; but
tempestuous weather prevented him from reaching the coast of Devonshire
till the dispersion of his unfortunate allies. He therefore put back.
In the meantime Richard had joined his army at Leicester, and issued a
proclamation which reads nowadays like the ravings of a madman.
[Illustration: RICHARD III.]
To draw off the followers of the confederates, while he offered rewards
for the heads of their leaders, he granted free pardons to all who
would abandon them. And the elements at this moment fought for Richard.
Buckingham set out on his march to unite his forces to those of the other
leaders, but there fell such heavy and continuous rains during the whole
of his march from Brecon through the Forest of Dean to the Severn, that
the bridges were carried away, and all the fords rendered impassable.
Such rains and floods had not been known in the memory of man; and the
inundation of the Severn was long after remembered as _Buckingham's
Flood_.
The Welsh, struck with a superstitious dread from this circumstance, and
pressed by famine, dispersed, and Buckingham turned back to Weobly, the
seat of Lord Ferrers. The news of Buckingham's failure confounded all
the other confederates, and every man made the best of his way towards
a place of safety. Merton, Dorset, Courtenay the Bishop of Exeter, and
others, escaped to Flanders and Brittany. Weobly was closely watched,
on one side by Sir Humphrey Stafford, and on the other by the clan of
the Vaughans, who were promised the plunder of Brecon if they secured
the duke. Buckingham, in disguise, escaped from Weobly, and hid himself
near Shrewsbury, in the hut of a fellow of the name of Bannister, an old
servant of the duke's family. This wretch, to secure the reward, betrayed
his master to John Mitton, the sheriff of Shropshire, who conducted him
to Richard at Salisbury, who ordered his head to be instantly struck off
in the market-place. Amongst others who shared the same fate, Richard
had the satisfaction of thus silencing a witty rhymester, William
Collingbourne, who had dared to say that,
"The rat, the cat, and Lovel the dog,
Ruled all England under the hog."
That is, Ratcliffe, Catesby, and Lord Lovel; the hog being in allusion to
Richard's crest, the boar.
Richard, thus relieved, marched into Devonshire, where he put to
death, amongst others, Sir Thomas St. Leger, a knight who had married
the Duchess of Exeter, his own sister. He then traversed the southern
counties in triumph, and, arriving in London, he ventured to do what
hitherto he had not dared, that is, call a Parliament. This assembly,
prostrate at the feet of the prosperous despot, did whatever he proposed.
They pronounced him "the undoubted king of England, as well by right
of consanguinity and inheritance, as by lawful election, consecration,
and coronation;" and they entailed the crown on his issue; the Lords,
spiritual and temporal, binding themselves to uphold the succession of
his son, the Prince of Wales. They attainted his enemies by wholesale,
and beyond all precedent. One duke, one marquis, three earls, three
bishops, with a whole host of knights and gentlemen, were thus deprived
of honour, title, and estate; and their lands, forfeited to the Crown,
were bestowed by Richard liberally on his northern adherents, who were
thus planted in the south to act as spies on the southern nobles and
gentry. The Countess of Richmond, though attainted, was permitted to hold
her estates for life, or rather, they were thus conceded for that term to
her husband, Lord Stanley, to bind him to the usurper.
To avenge himself on the queen-dowager for her acceptance of the proposal
to bring over Henry of Richmond and unite him to her daughter, Richard
now deprived her and her daughters of all title, property, and honour. He
treated them, not as the legitimate wife and children of Edward IV., but
as what he had before proclaimed them. He had ordered the late murdered
king to be called officially "Edward the bastard, lately called Edward
V." The queen-dowager was styled "Elizabeth, late wife of Sir John Gray,"
and her daughters were treated and addressed as simple gentlewomen.
But the design of placing Henry of Richmond on the throne, Richard knew
well, though for the moment defeated, was not abandoned. At the last
festival of Christmas Henry had met the English exiles, to the number of
500, at Rhedon, in Brittany, and had there sworn to marry Elizabeth of
York as soon as he should subdue the usurper; and thereupon the exiles
had unanimously sworn to support him as their sovereign. Henry was, as
we have observed, descended on the father's side merely from Owen Tudor,
a yeoman of the royal guard, and Catherine, the widow of Henry V. On
the mother's side he was descended from Edward III. through John of
Gaunt, but from an illegitimate branch. The bar of illegitimacy, though
legally removed, would always have operated against his claim to the
crown; but, independent of this, there were still various princes and
princesses of Spain and Portugal, descendants of John of Gaunt, whose
titles to the English crown were much superior to his. Yet, from his very
infancy, there seems to have been a singular feeling that one day he
would mount the throne of this kingdom. Henry VI. is said to have laid
his hand on his head as a child, and declared that one day the crown
would sit there. Edward IV. had evinced a perpetual fear of him, and had
not only bargained for his secure detention at the court of Brittany,
but on one occasion he had bribed the Duke of Brittany to give him up on
the pretence of his intending to marry him to his eldest daughter--that
daughter, in fact, he was destined eventually to marry. The duke,
however, at the last moment, feeling a strong misgiving, had followed
Henry to St. Malo, and there stopped him from embarking. Richard, on
succeeding to the throne, had tried to purchase the surrender of Henry
from the Duke of Brittany. In short, Henry assured the historian,
Comines, that from the age of five years he had either been a captive or
a fugitive. With this long traditionary presentiment that he was to reign
in England attached to him, his marriage to Elizabeth of York would at
once obviate all scruples as to his complete title. He would come in on
the strength of her title, as William of Orange afterwards did on that of
his queen, Mary Stuart.
As the prospect of this event became more imminent--as Richard felt more
deeply that the heart of the nation was not with him, but that all men
were looking to this alliance as the hope of better times, he set himself
to defeat it. Though he had so lately robbed, degraded, and insulted
Queen Elizabeth and her family--though he had murdered her children and
usurped their throne, he now suddenly turned round, and fawned on them.
He began to smile most kindly on Elizabeth, and wished her to quit the
sanctuary and come to court--a court dyed in the blood of her sons and
brothers. He made her the most flattering promises; and, when they failed
to draw her forth, he followed them by the most deadly threats. Elizabeth
Woodville had never been found insensible to prospects of advantage for
herself and family; but to put herself into the power of so lawless
a butcher, and to unite her daughter with the son of the murderer of
her children, was by no means reconcilable to her feelings. She stood
out stoutly; but fear of worse consequences at length compelled her to
succumb, and a private contract was concluded. Richard, in the presence
of a number of the nobles and prelates, as well as of the Lord Mayor and
aldermen, swore that the lives of Elizabeth and her daughters should be
safe; that the mother should receive an annuity of 700 marks for life,
and each of the daughters lands to the value of 200 marks on their
marriage, which should be to none but gentlemen.
When this bitter draught was swallowed, she had to endure another not
the less sorrowful--that was, to appear at the court of the usurper,
and behold him sitting in the seat of her murdered son, and receiving
that homage which was his right. But this strange patron now smiled
sunnily upon her. She and her daughters were received with every mark of
distinction, and especially Elizabeth, the eldest, whom he was intending
to pluck from the hopes of Richmond, by wedding her to his own son. But
these views were suddenly destroyed by the death of this, Richard's only
legitimate, son. He died at Middleham, where Richard was often residing,
but was then with his queen absent at Nottingham. His death, which took
place about the 9th of April, had something so remarkable about it, that
Rous, the family chronicler, calls it "an unhappy death." Both Richard
and his queen were so overwhelmed by this unexpected blow, that the
continuator of the Croyland Chronicle says that they almost went mad.
It was indeed a fatal stroke. The son on whom Richard had built the
hopes of his family's succession, and for whom he killed his nephews,
was now gone, and he was left without an heir, and without any prospect
of one. It might be supposed that this event would raise the confidence
of the Richmond party; and Richard, appearing to entertain the same
idea, conceived the design of securing Richmond, and, no doubt, dealing
with him as effectually as he had done with all others who stood in his
way. For this purpose he opened secret communications with Francis, Duke
of Brittany. That prince, who had been so long the generous protector
of Richmond, was now in a feeble and failing state of health, and his
minister, Peter Landois, administered his affairs pretty much at his
own will. The interest of Landois was purchased by heavy sums, and he
agreed to deliver Richmond into the hands of Richard. But the sagacious
Morton, Bishop of Ely, gave him timely warning, and Richmond fled for
his life. He reached France with only five attendants, and went at once
to the French court at Angers, where he was cordially received by the
sister of Charles VIII., then acting as regent. He accompanied the French
court to Paris, where he again repeated his oath to marry Elizabeth of
York, in case of deposing the tyrant, and he was immediately hailed by
the students of Paris as King of England. He was promised assistance
by the princess regent for his enterprise, and while these things were
proceeding, Francis of Brittany, who had recovered his health, and was
made acquainted with the villainy of Landois, sent a messenger to offer
him aid in his design.
Thus Richard had driven his enemy into a more safe and formidable
position, instead of capturing him, and he taxed his subtle genius to
thwart this dangerous rival by other means. To prepare for any serious
attack from France, he put an end to a miserable state of plunder and
reprisal betwixt Scotland and his subjects. He concluded an armistice
with James of Scotland; and having since his son's death nominated John
Earl of Lincoln the son of his sister the Duchess of Suffolk heir to the
crown, he now contracted Anne de la Pole, the sister of the young earl,
to the eldest son of the King of Scotland.
But Richard had designs more profound than this. He determined, as
he could not marry Elizabeth of York to his son, he would snatch her
from Richmond by wedding her himself. True, he had already a wife;
but monarchs have frequently shown how soon such an obstacle to a
fresh alliance can be removed. Richard now held a magnificent court at
Westminster. There was a constant succession of balls, feastings, and
gaieties. In the midst of these no one was so conspicuous as Elizabeth of
York; and what very soon excited the attention and the speculations of
the court, she always appeared in precisely the same dress as the queen.
The poor queen, Anne of Warwick, who began with hating Richard most
cordially, and even disguised herself as a cookmaid to escape him,
since the death of her son, had never recovered from her melancholy
and depression. Probably, knowing the real character of her ruthless
Bluebeard, she foresaw what must take place, and was too weary of life to
care to retain it. Though she penetrated the designs of the king, these
never influenced her in her conduct to Elizabeth, to whom she was kind as
became an aunt. And now she fell ill, and Richard is said to have assured
Elizabeth that the queen would "die in February," and that she should
succeed her.
Anne of Warwick, the last queen of the Plantagenet line, did not die in
February, but she did not survive through March. Yet that event did not
in any degree contribute to Richard's marriage with Elizabeth. Whether we
are to suppose with Sir Thomas More, and others, that Elizabeth herself
manifested a steady repugnance to so abhorrent a union, or whether
Richard deemed her in greater security there, he sent her under close
guard to the castle of Sheriff-Hutton, in Yorkshire, and no sooner did
he permit it to be whispered that such a marriage was probable, than
the rumour was received with universal horror. No persons were more
resolutely opposed to it than Ratcliffe and Catesby, Richard's great
confidants in his crimes. They naturally dreaded the idea of Elizabeth,
the sister of the murdered princes and the representative of a family on
which they had heaped such injuries, becoming queen, and in a position
to wreak her vengeance upon them. But they also saw, quite as clearly,
the ruin which the king would certainly bring down upon himself by such
a measure, in which they must also be inevitably involved.
The instinct of self-preservation in these men led them to remind the
king that a marriage with his own niece would be regarded as incestuous,
would be reprobated by the clergy, and abhorred by the people; that
there was a general persuasion abroad that he had poisoned his wife, and
this union would convert that persuasion into absolute conviction; that
the men of the northern counties, on whom he chiefly depended, and who
adhered to him, more than for any other cause, through their attachment
to the late queen, as the daughter of the great Earl of Warwick, would be
totally lost, and nothing but ruin could await him.
This strong and undisguised feeling, displayed thus both in public and
private, drove Richard from this design. Just before Easter, he called
a meeting of the city authorities in the great hall of St John's,
Clerkenwell, and there declared that he had no such intention as that of
marrying his niece, and that the report was "false and scandalous in a
high degree." He also sent a letter to the citizens of York, dated the
11th of April, contradicting such slanderous tales, and commanding them
to apprehend and punish all who should be found guilty of propagating
them.
But the time was fast drawing near which must decide whether Richard or
Henry of Richmond should wear the crown. Richard was informed by his
agents on the Continent that Charles of France had permitted the Earl
of Richmond to raise an army in that country. They amounted to 3,000
men, consisting of English refugees and Norman adventurers. Richard
pretended to be delighted at the news, as confident that now he should
speedily annihilate his enemy. He was, however, so impoverished by his
lavish gifts and grants to secure the faith of his adherents, that he
was unprovided with the means of maintaining an army; neither had he
a fleet to intercept that of Henry. He dared not call a Parliament to
ask for supplies, for he had expended those granted by the only one he
had called. In that Parliament, to cast odium upon the memory of his
brother Edward, he had called on his subjects to remember his tyranny in
extorting benevolences; yet now he resorted to the very same thing; and
the people, in ridicule of his pretended denunciation of benevolences,
called them _malevolences_. By these arbitrary exactions he destroyed
the last trace of adhesion to his Government. On all sides he felt
coldness--on all sides he saw defection. The brave old Earl of Oxford,
John De Vere, who had been a prisoner twelve years in the prison of
Ham, in Picardy, was set at liberty by Sir James Blount, the governor
of the castle, and they fled together to Henry. Sir John Fortescue, the
Porter of Calais, followed their example, and numbers of young English
gentlemen, students of the University of Paris, flocked to his standard.
The same process was going on in England. Several sheriffs of counties
abandoned their charge, and hastened over to France; and numerous parties
put off from time to time from the coast. But no nobleman occasioned,
however, so much anxiety as Lord Stanley. His connection with Richmond,
having married his mother, made Richard always suspicious. He had
lavished favours upon him to attach him, and had made him steward of
the household to retain him under his eye. Stanley had always appeared
sincere in his service, but it was a sincerity that Richard could not
comprehend. This nobleman now demanded permission to visit his estates
in Cheshire and Lancashire, to raise forces for the king; but Richard so
little trusted him that he detained his son, Lord Strange, as a hostage
for his fidelity. We have already seen that Stanley had long secretly
pledged himself to Elizabeth of York in her cause, and only waited the
proper occasion to go over.
[Illustration: RICHARD III. AT THE BATTLE OF BOSWORTH. (_See p._ 63.)]
On the 1st of August, 1485, Henry of Richmond set sail from Harfleur,
with the united fleet of France and Brittany, and an army of 3,000 men,
on that memorable expedition which was to terminate the fatal wars of
the Roses, and introduce into England a new dynasty, and a new era of
civilisation. On the seventh of that month he landed at Milford Haven. He
himself and his uncle, Jasper Tudor, Earl of Pembroke, went on shore at
a place called Dale, while his army was disembarking. The Welsh accosted
the old earl with this significant welcome on his setting foot on his
native shore, "Welcome! for thou hast taken good care of _thy_ nephew!"
Having refreshed his forces, Henry marched on through Haverfordwest and
Pembroke to Cardigan. Everywhere he was received with manifest delight;
but his forces did not increase till he reached Cardigan, where Richard
Griffith and Richard Thomas, two Welsh gentlemen, joined his standard
with their friends. His old friend Sir Walter Herbert, who had been
expressly sent by Richard into that quarter with Rice ap Thomas to raise
the country in his behalf, though he did not join him, suffered him to
pass unmolested. Rice ap Thomas, on receiving a promise of the Government
of Wales, went over at once to Henry. When the army reached Newport Sir
Gilbert Talbot, with a decision of character in keeping with the account
of him by Brereton, came at the head of the tenantry of his nephew, the
Earl of Shrewsbury, 2,000 in number, and there, too, he was followed by
Sir John Savage. The invading force now amounted to more than 6,000 men.
Henry crossed the Severn at Shrewsbury. Richard now advanced to
Leicester, whence he issued despatches to all his subjects to join him
on the instant, accompanied by the most deadly menaces against all
defaulters. The Duke of Norfolk was there with the levies of the eastern
counties; the Earl of Northumberland with those from the north; Lord
Lovel commanded those from London; and Brackenbury those from Hampshire.
Stanley alone held aloof, and sent word, in reply to Richard's summons,
that he was ill in bed with the sweating sickness. Richard received this
ominous message with the utmost rage; and, as he had vowed that, on the
first symptom of disaffection on his part, he would cut off the head of
Lord Strange, his son, Strange made an instant attempt at flight. He was
brought back, and frankly confessed that he and his uncle, Sir William
Stanley, chamberlain of North Wales, had agreed to join the invaders;
but protested that his father knew nothing of their intention, but was
loyal, and his forces were already on the way to the royal camp. Richard
compelled him to write to his father, bidding him come up at once, or
that his son was a dead man.
On the 21st of August Richard rode forward from Leicester, and encamped
about two miles from Bosworth. He was mounted in the march on a
magnificent white courser, and clad in the same rich suit of burnished
steel which he wore at his victorious field of Tewkesbury. On his helmet
blazed a regal crown, which he had displayed there since he took up his
headquarters at Nottingham. His countenance is represented as stern and
frowning; his manner haughty, and as if putting on an air of bravado,
rather than of calm confidence; for, though his troops amounted to
30,000, and his cavalry was the finest in Europe, he well knew that there
was secret and wide-spread disaffection under all that martial show.
Were his followers true to him, the little army of Richmond would be
shivered in the first shock, and trodden under foot. But, perhaps, not
a man except the Duke of Norfolk was really stanch in his devotion; and
that night Norfolk's followers found pinned upon his tent this ominous
couplet:--
"Jocky of Norfolk, be not too bold,
For Dickon thy master is bought and sold."
That night Henry, who had reached Tamworth, marched to Atherstone. His
army did not amount to half that of Richard: yet all were earnest in the
cause, and the number of men of rank and character in it gave it a very
imposing air in the eyes of the soldiers. On the contrary, Richard's
soldiers, if we are to believe "Twelve Strange Prophecies"--still in
the British Museum--had been discouraged, not only by the warning to
John, or--as he was familiarly called--Jocky of Norfolk, but by the
following singular incident. As the king rode out of Leicester by the
south gate, at the head of his cavalry, a blind old man, well known as
a superannuated wheelwright, sat begging at the foot of the bridge. In
reply to the remarks of the soldiers as to the weather, the old man cried
out just as the king was at hand--"If the moon change again to-day, which
has changed once in the course of nature, King Richard will lose life
and crown." This was supposed to allude to Lord Percy, whose crest was a
crescent, and of whose faith Richard was sorely in doubt. When Richard
passed, his foot struck against a low post placed to defend the corner
of the bridge, and the beggar said, "His head will strike there as he
returns at night."
The night before the battle, Henry of Richmond had a secret meeting near
Atherstone with Lord Stanley, who assured him of his adherence, but
showed him how impossible it was that he could join him till Richard was
engaged in arraying the battle, or his son's life would immediately be
sacrificed. Stanley had 5,000 men, and engaged to appear for Richard till
the moment for battle, when his defection would do Henry the most signal
service.
On the evening of the 21st of August, the two armies lay encamped
near the little town of Bosworth, opposite to each other. Richard
is represented by the chroniclers as passing that night in the most
agonising state of restlessness and uncertainty. The deeply-rooted
disaffection of his troops destroyed his confidence, though his 30,000
were only opposed by Richmond's 6,000. He went through the camp examining
secretly the state of his outposts, and finding at one of them a sentinel
asleep, he stabbed him to the heart, saying, "I find him asleep, and I
leave him so." His own slumbers are said to have been broken, and the
chroniclers express his state by saying he "was most terribly pulled and
haled by devils."
But other agents than those thus troubling the tyrant's mind were active
throughout the camp. Many of his soldiers stole away to Richmond, and
probably some of these left the warning to Jocky of Norfolk. These
desertions produced dismay in Richard's ranks, and confidence in those of
his rival.
When morning broke, Richmond's little army was discovered already drawn
up. The van, consisting of archers, was led by the Earl of Oxford; the
right wing by Sir Gilbert Talbot; the left by Sir John Savage. In the
main body Henry posted himself, accompanied by the Earl of Pembroke.
Richard confronted the foe with his numerous lines, taking his place also
in the main body, opposite to Richmond, but giving the command of the van
to the Duke of Norfolk. Lord Stanley took his station on one wing, and
Sir William on the other, so that, thus disposed, they could flank either
their own side or the opposed one. The battle was begun by the archers
of both armies, and soon became furious. No sooner was this the case,
than the Stanleys, seizing the critical moment, wheeling round, joined
the enemy, and fell on Richard's flanks. This masterly manoeuvre struck
dismay through the lines of Richard; the men who stood their ground
appeared to fight without heart, and to be ready to fly. Richard, who saw
this, and beheld the Duke of Northumberland, sitting at the head of his
division, and never striking a single stroke, became transported with
fury. His only hope appeared to be to make a desperate assault on Henry's
van, and, if possible, to reach and kill him on the spot. With this
object he made three furious charges of cavalry; and, at the third, but
not before he had seen his chief companion, the Duke of Norfolk, slain,
he broke into the midst of Henry's main body, and, catching sight of
him, dashed forward, crying frantically, "Treason! treason! treason!" He
killed Sir William Brandon, Henry's standard-bearer, with his own hand;
struck Sir John Cheyney from his horse; and, springing forward on Henry,
aimed a desperate blow at him; but Sir William Stanley, breaking in at
that moment, surrounded Richard with his brave followers, who bore him to
the ground by their numbers, and slew him, as he continued to fight with
a bravery as heroic as his political career had been--in the words of
Hume--"dishonourable for his multiplied and detestable enormities." The
blood of Richard tinged a small brook which ran where he fell, and the
people are said to this day never to drink of its water.
The body of the fallen tyrant was speedily stripped of his valuable
armour and ornaments, and the soldier who laid hands upon the crown hid
it in a hawthorn bush. But strict quest being made after it, it was
soon discovered and carried to Lord Stanley, who placed it upon the
head of Henry, and the victor was immediately saluted by the general
acclamations of the army with "Long live King Henry!" and they sang
_Te Deum_, in grand chorus, on the bloody heath of Bosworth. From the
poetical circumstance of the hawthorn bush, the Tudors assumed as their
device a crown in a bush of fruited hawthorn. Lord Strange, the son of
Lord Stanley, being deserted by his guards, as soon as the defeat was
known, made his way to the field, and joined his father and the king at
the close of the battle.
King Henry VII. advanced from the decisive field of Bosworth, at the head
of his victorious troops, to Leicester, which he entered with the same
royal state that Richard had quitted it. The statements of the numbers
who fell on this field vary from 1,000 to 4,000, but of the leaders, the
Duke of Norfolk, and Lord Ferrars of Chartley, Sir Richard Ratcliffe, Sir
Robert Percy, and Sir Robert Brackenbury, fell with the king. On the side
of Henry fell no leaders of note.
Henry used his victory mildly; he shed no blood of the vanquished, except
that of the notorious Catesby, and two persons of the name of Brecher,
who were probably men of like character and crimes. Thus, in one day,
the world was relieved of the presence of Richard and of his two base
commissioners of murder, Catesby and Ratcliffe.
Richard's naked body, covered with mud and gore, was, according to the
local traditions of Leicester, flung carelessly across a horse, and thus
carried into that town; his head, say these historic memories, striking
against the very post which the blind beggar had said it should, and the
rude populace following it with shouts of mockery. The corpse was begged
by the nuns of the Grey Friars, to whom Richard had been a benefactor,
and was decently interred in their church.