of that dastardly act upon his son, the Earl of Rutland, which has
stamped his name with infamy, and has given significance to his
sobriquet of "Black-faced Clifford." The Duke of York had with him, in
Sandal Castle, his family, including the youthful Earl of Rutland.
Boy-like, he must needs go and see the battle, and nothing could
dissuade him. "I will go," said he, "and see my father kill the cruel
Queen; and when I am a man I will go and fight, and kill his enemies
too." "A battle is not a place, Lord Edmund," replied his tutor and
chaplain, Sir Robert Aspall, "for boys. A stray arrow might kill you."
"Think not, sir priest," replied the brave boy, "that a son of Richard
of York is afraid of an arrow! Stay under shelter of these walls, like
craven priest, if you will; I shall go and see the deeds of men who
are men!" Seeing that nothing could turn the boy from his purpose, his
tutor resolved to go with him to keep him out of harm's way, nothing
loth himself to witness the conflict of arms. When the battle was
over, and the vanquished flying, Sir Robert led his charge, away
towards Sandal. They had not proceeded far, when they encountered a
steel-clad warrior on horseback, with blood dropping from his sword.
Perceiving from his apparel that he was a youth of distinction, the
warrior dismounted, and, holding his horse by the reins, inquired who
he was. "Then," as Hall says, "the young gentleman, dismayed, had not
a word to speak, but kneeled on his knees, imploring mercy and
desiring grace, both with holding up his hands and making dolorous
countenance, for his speech was gone for fear. 'Save him,' said his
chaplain, 'for he is a Prince's son, and peradventure may do you good
hereafter.' With that word Lord Clifford marked him, and said, 'By
God's blood! thy father slew mine, and so will I do to thee and all
thy kin,' and with that word, struck the Earl to the heart with his
dagger, and bade the chaplain bear the Earl's mother and brother word
what he had done, and said, adding, 'By this act, Lord Clifford was
accompted a tyrant and no gentleman.'"
Not satisfied with this cowardly act of vindictiveness, Lord Clifford
resolved to carry his vengeful hatred on, by insulting the dead. He
returned to the field, now strewn with corpses, sought for, and found
that of the Duke of York, and cutting off his head, stuck it upon a
lance and carried it, as the most acceptable trophy, to the tent of
the Queen, who received it with ill-timed merriment and jest.
She made a paper crown and placed it on the head, with an
inscription--"This is he who would have been King of England," and
gave directions for it to be conveyed, along with that of Salisbury,
to York, and placed over one of the gates, adding, "Leave room for the
head of my Lord of Warwick, for it shall soon bear them company!"
Queen Margaret, flushed with her victory, marched towards London, but
met with the Earl of Warwick, in February, 1461, at St. Alban's, and
there defeated him, after which the poor captive King was released and
brought to his Queen in Lord Clifford's tent. But Edward, the quondam
Earl of March, now Duke of York, had come up and joined Warwick, who,
together, entered London and were welcomed by the citizens, who
favoured the house of York. Margaret, fearing to meet their united
forces, returned northward, her strongholds and most devoted friends
being in the northern counties, especially on the Scottish borders,
whither she was followed by Duke Edward. She had come to York, and lay
there with 60,000 men, when she heard that York and Warwick had
reached Pontefract with an army of 40,000 men. Anxious to prevent the
passage of the Aire by the enemy, she moved to Towton, some eight
miles off York, and there was fought the memorable and decisive battle
which placed the crown on the head of Edward IV. The Lancastrians had
seized Ferrybridge under Lord Fitzwalter, and Clifford, as courageous
as he was cruel, undertook to dislodge him, which he accomplished. But
Lord Falconbridge crossed the Aire three miles higher, at Castleford,
and attacked Clifford in the flank with a superior force. Clifford
fled towards the Queen's camp, and when he arrived at Dittingdale, two
miles off Towton, feeling thirsty after his exertions, he removed his
gorget and stooped to drink at a streamlet, when an arrow struck him
in the throat, and the murderer of Rutland and insulter of the dead
Richard of York fell to rise no more.
The Shepherd Lord.
For ever memorable in the annals of England will be Palm Sunday in the
year 1461, and equally so the little hamlet of Towton, by Tadcaster.
There and then was fought, in a blinding snowstorm, what Camden calls
"the English Pharsalia," the greatest battle hitherto fought on
English soil, where Englishman met Englishman, and kinsman kinsman, in
deadly conflict, and in which quarter was neither asked nor given. The
conflict lasted ten hours, and the pursuit of the fugitives was
continued until the middle of Monday. 60,000 Lancastrians were met by
40,000 Yorkists, and 36,000 corpses and dying men lay that Sunday
night on the snow of the fields, roads, and hillsides, whilst the
river and streamlets ran with torrents of blood, and the snow became
encrimsoned as it fell. The fight inclined in favour of the Red Rose,
under the command of the Duke of Somerset, although York and Warwick
performed prodigies of valour with their smaller forces, and the day
must have gone against the White Rose, when, towards evening, the
banner of the Mowbrays was seen approaching, and the Duke of Norfolk
came up with a body of fresh troops, who made a vigorous attack on the
Lancastrians, which at once turned the scale, and changed what seemed
to be a defeat into a decisive victory, which was virtually the
deposition of Henry VI., and the elevation of Edward IV. to the
throne--a transference of the crown from the House of Lancaster to
that of York.
The shades of evening were falling over the forest lands around
Skipton, some week or ten days after the battle. The surrounding hills
were covered with snow, and a fierce wind raged round the towers of
the castle, whilst the boughs of the trees crashed against each other,
and ever and anon a huge branch, reft from the parent stem, was flung
with fury to the earth.
Within the castle, in a room overlooking the courtyard, sat the Lady
Clifford, with her young children, two or three female attendants, and
the chaplain of the household. It was very unlike a modern
drawing-room, and, in these Sybarite days, would be looked upon as a
very comfortless apartment; yet was it a fair specimen of the
drawing-room of the period. Instead of Axminster or Aubusson carpets,
the floors were strewn with rushes; instead of oil paintings from the
hands of eminent masters, the walls were hung with tapestries of
Arras, more to cover the rough nakedness of the stonework and exclude
draughts than for æsthetic purposes; the furniture of the room
consisted of a table, two or three chairs, and a few stools of rough
carpentry, not in mahogany or rosewood, but of the native oak, hewn
out of the woodlands of the demesne. On the hearthstone blazed a fire
of wood, sputtering as the sleet fell into it down the wide open
chimney. There was no grate, fender, or fire-irons, but beside the
hearth lay a heap of fresh wood, to be thrown on the fire as required;
and when the embers required stirring, a stick from the heap was used
for that purpose.
Lady Clifford sat in silence, brooding in thought over her absent
husband, with an occasional heavy-drawn sigh; the children were
gambolling about the room in innocent unconsciousness of the perils
to which their father was exposed; the chaplain joined in their romps,
and amused them by telling them tales of Fairyland and the good deeds
of holy saints; and the handmaidens were sitting apart, plying their
distaffs and spinning-wheels, and indulging in the usual gossip of an
isolated castle and the surrounding village, but maintained it in an
undertone, so as not to disturb the meditations of their lady.
"What a fearful night it is," said Lady Clifford, as a terrific gust
of wind came roaring round the towers of the castle, seeming almost to
shake them to their foundations, stoutly as they were built. "It is
terrible even here, sitting as we are under the protection of these
strong walls; what must it be to those who are exposed to its fury,
camped, perchance, on some wild moor, and surrounded by enemies?"
At this moment a trumpet summons for admittance to the castle was
heard; and presently the seneschal entered the room, stating that a
knight was without the gate with tidings of great importance.
"Who is he?" asked Lady Clifford. "Do you know him?"
"Yes, my lady, he is Sir John de Barnoldswick, who accompanied my
lord, and I fear me he brings intelligence of evil import."
"Admit him instantly, and bring him hither."
The rattling of the chains of the drawbridge was heard, and the sound
of opening the ponderous castle gates, followed by the tramping of a
horse in the courtyard, and the heavy footsteps of a steel-clad
warrior on the stone stairs, and a tall, martial-looking figure, but
with melancholy gait and drooping head, entered the room and made a
profound obeisance to the lady of the castle, but without speaking a
word of salutation.
"Whence comest thou, Sir Knight, and what are thy tidings?" inquired
Lady Clifford, in tremulous accents.
"I come from the field of battle, lady, and my tidings are evil."
"Let us hear them; I am a soldier's wife, and ought not to shrink from
calamitous intelligence," she replied, although her nervous trembling
belied her utterance.
"Know, then, lady, that a great and disastrous battle has been fought
near Tadcaster, and the Lancastrian cause lost. I fought till the
last under the Clifford banner; saw many a brave fellow of the Vale of
Craven fall around me, and barely escaped to bring the news hither."
"And what of the King and the brave Queen Margaret?"
"Alas! I know not; they and the Prince of Wales were in York when the
battle was fought. All I know is that Somerset and the King's troops
were utterly defeated, and fled northward, with Warwick and the Duke
of York in hot pursuit."
"And what of my lord? Fled he too? He would never turn his back to the
foes of his King."
"He did not, lady; had he been present, the result might have been
different. He was not in the engagement."
"What mean you by 'not in the engagement'? Surely he, of all men,
would not stand aloof on such an occasion?"
"Alas! lady, I fear to tell you why."
"Speak, man! is he dead? or why was he absent?"
"It is too true, lady, that he can no longer fight in defence of his
King."
"Then he is dead!" cried Lady Clifford, in an agony of despair.
"He fell, my lady, on the eve of the battle, after a glorious act of
valour, by a random shot. Heaven rest his soul!"
"Heaven help my poor children!" cried Lady Clifford, and fell to the
floor in a swoon, the mother's instinctive love for her offspring
prevailing over her grief for her own loss. And truly, she had reason
to fear for them. Her husband, "Black-faced Clifford," as he was
called, had an inveterate hatred for the House of York; he had
murdered, in cold blood, the young Duke of Rutland, brother of Edward
of York; had cut off the head of Richard, Duke of York; and had caused
the Earl of Salisbury, father of Warwick, to be executed at
Pontefract; and it was tolerably certain that York, the future King,
and Warwick, his General, would seek to take vengeance on the children
of him who had committed those atrocities.
The Dukes of York and Warwick marched triumphantly to York, and were
submissively received by the authorities, and there they celebrated
the festival of Easter with great splendour. Hastings, Stafford, and
others had been made Knights-Bannerets on the field; Devon and Wilts
were decapitated by martial law, and their heads placed on the bar
gate of York, whence those of Richard of York and the Earl of
Salisbury, the fathers of York and Warwick, had been removed; and,
after settling affairs in the north, the victors marched to London,
and were welcomed by the citizens with loud demonstrations of joy, the
Londoners being staunch Yorkists.
Lady Clifford prepared to meet her untoward fate, and took measures
for the safety of her children. Her old friend, the venerable Prior of
Bolton, who had made himself acquainted with all that had taken place
since the battle of Towton, so far as could be learnt in that remote
spot, mounted his mule and rode over to the Castle. He was received
courteously and with dutiful reverence by Lady Clifford, and,
moreover, with joy, as she wished to consult him, above all others, as
to her future line of conduct.
"I am at a loss, holy father, to think what I can do. I suppose there
is no hope of retrieval on the part of Queen Margaret?"
"I am afraid not. The Queen is endeavouring to raise another army in
the north, but I fear with little chance of success."
"What, then, will be the effect upon the adherents of the House of
Lancaster? I suppose executions, attainders, and confiscations?"
"Precisely so; and Lord Clifford, one of the most bitter foes of the
House of York, will certainly be included in the first list, his title
extinguished, and his estates confiscated."
"And my poor children will thus lose all their inheritance; but it is
not that I dread this so much as the vengeance of the Duke--King now,
I presume--and of the Earl of Warwick. I fear me that even if their
lives are not sacrificed, they will be cast into dungeons, to languish
out their lives."
"Your apprehensions, my daughter, are, unfortunately, but too
well-founded, and we must consult on some measures for their safety.
You need not fear molestation until Edward has seated himself securely
on the throne, and will be safer within the walls of this castle than
elsewhere. But it will be wise to make provision for removal to some
secure retreat as soon as the Acts of Attainder have passed, and the
King begins to take vengeance on his foes, for then Skipton will pass
into other hands."
"I bethink me of such a place," said Lady Clifford. "Your council is
wise. I can go to the mansion of my father, Lord Vesci, on his
Londesborough estates, near Market Weighton, where it will be possible
to reside as far removed from the world as if out of the world. There
I could bring up my children, without notice, until the cloud had
passed over, or until a change in the wheel of fortune shall restore
the House of Lancaster to the throne."
After some further discussion, the Prior saw that this was the best
plan that could be adopted; and it was arranged that measures should
be taken for departure at any moment, when there should be indications
of the towers of Skipton becoming untenable, and, after a parting
benediction, the reverend Prior mounted his mule, and returned home.
King Edward lost no time in taking steps to paralyse effectually any
further efforts on the part of the adherents of the rival House. He
called together a Parliament, and one of the first measures laid
before it was an Act of Attainder against all the nobles and men of
rank who had appeared in arms against his legitimate claim to the
crown, which, now that he had been successful, was deemed treason. The
demesnes of John, Lord Clifford, extended for seventy miles, with an
interval of ten, from Skipton into the heart of Westmoreland, with
four castles--those of Brougham, Appleby, Brough, and Pendragon,
besides that of Skipton. The Westmoreland estates, with the tenure
Baronies of Vipont and Westmoreland, had been inherited by Robert de
Clifford, third baron, from his great-aunt, Isabella, daughter and
co-heiress of the last male heir of the family of De Vipont. By the
Act of Attainder all these fair lands and castles were reft away from
the family, the Barony of de Clifford was declared to be extinct for
ever, and all the estates, forests, moors, castles, tenements, mills,
and goods escheated to the Crown. In the fourth of the reign, the
castle, manor, and lordship of Skipton, and the manor of Morton were
granted in tail male to Sir Edward Stanley, but in the fifteenth year
were transferred to the King's brother, Richard, Duke of Gloucester,
to hold till death.
It is proverbial that bad news flies rapidly, and it was not long ere
news arrived at Skipton and Bolton of the Act of Attainder. The Prior
had come over to the castle to advise with Lady Clifford. "You must
take your departure at once," said he. "The agents of the usurper will
be here anon and take possession in the name of the King, and it is
not at all improbable that they will have instructions to remove your
children from your care, and immure them in some place of captivity,
if nothing worse befalls them, as the offspring of one of the most
determined enemies of the House of York."
"I have sent a confidential servant," she replied, "to Lord Vesci, my
father, who sends word back that preparation shall be made for my
reception at Londesborough."
"Nothing remains, then," said the Prior, "but to secure your jewels
and other portable articles of value, with such of the family papers
as you may deem it wise to preserve, and to set off on your journey,
with an escort sufficient for your protection, but not so large as to
attract undue notice."
Lady Clifford had left the castle in charge of the seneschal, to
deliver it into the King's hands, and rode forth on a palfrey,
disguised as a farmer's wife. She was accompanied by three or four
horsemen in similar disguise, with whom the children rode, and was
followed at some distance by some half-dozen servitors clad as
peasants, but bearing concealed weapons for the purpose of defence, if
needful, as it was probable that they might meet with disbanded
soldiers, who might not be over scrupulous in waylaying and robbing
chance travellers. The party, as far as possible, went along by-ways,
so as to escape observation, but these were sometimes so rough as to
compel them to take the more beaten high roads, and, passing by Otley,
Tadcaster, and York, arrived at Londesborough without any mishap or
adventure of consequence.
Londesborough is supposed to have been the Delgovitia of the Romans,
and was seated at the foot of the road from Eboracum, one branch going
to the ferry over the Humber at Brough, and the other across
Holderness to the seaport at Ravenspurn. It is presumed, also, that
the Saxon king, Eadwine, had a palace here, and that within its walls
he held his conference with Paulinus, which resulted in the demolition
of the temple of Woden at Goodmandingham, two miles distant. The De
Vescis had built a mansion here, and laid out a park with a noble
avenue of trees, a mile in length, in which Lady Clifford had played
when a child, Londesborough having been her birthplace. The estates
passed at the death of Henry de Bromflete, in 1466, to his daughter,
Margaret, and through her to the De Cliffords, in whose possession
they remained until the death, without issue male, of Henry V., and
last Earl of Cumberland, when they passed, by the marriage of his
daughter and heiress, to the Earl of Burlington, of the Boyle family.
The old mansion was taken down in 1819, and the park divided into
farms.
It was with a feeling of melancholy satisfaction that Lady Clifford
found herself in a species of security in her ancestral home, and she
longed to ramble at will about the park and village, as she had been
wont to do in bygone days, but it was not prudent to indulge in such
pleasures, her position necessitating the utmost seclusion of herself
and children from the outer world. About a month afterwards she sent a
messenger secretly to Skipton, to ascertain what had occurred there
since she left, and on his return learnt that the King's Commissioners
had visited the Castle and taken possession of it and the estates in
the name of the Crown; moreover, that they had made particular
inquiries after Lady Clifford and "the brats of the Butcher of
Wakefield," but were put off by being told by the domestics in charge
that they had left Skipton a month ago, and gone they knew not where,
but believed to some country across the sea. The Yorkists, however,
seem to have suspected that this was not the truth, and shortly
afterwards strangers of sinister aspect were observed to be lurking
about Londesborough. This excited great terror in the breast of Lady
Clifford, who saw clearly that her children were in great danger, and
she took prompt measures for their safety. She had three
children--Henry, the eldest, about seven years of age; Richard, the
younger son; and a daughter--Elizabeth, affianced to one of the
Plumptons of Plumpton. She soon decided on her plans. The maid who had
nursed her when a child, had married a shepherd on the estate, and
Henry was placed under her charge, to be brought up as her child, to
live as his foster-parents lived, and follow the occupation of tending
sheep on the hillsides, in which measure, he, being an intelligent
child, cheerfully acquiesced, assumed the shepherd's garb, and
attended to the duties of his new station without the slightest
murmur, his sole regret being the enforced absence from his mother.
Richard was sent in charge of a careful servant to Ravenspurn, and
thence carried across the sea to Flanders, whilst Elizabeth, who, it
was supposed, would not be molested, remained as the sole comfort and
solace of her mother. These measures were not taken a moment too soon,
for "a little after they were thus disposed of, the adverse party
examined their mother about them, who told them that she had ordered
them to be carried beyond sea to be bred up there; but whether they
were alive or not she could not tell, which answer satisfied them for
the present," and, after making strict search without effect, they
departed.
In 1466, Lord de Vesci died, and Lady Clifford, as his heiress,
succeeded to his estates, when a rumour reached Londesborough from the
Court that the King suspected that the children were in concealment
there, upon which Lady Clifford sent the shepherd, with his wife and
young Henry, to a farm in a remote and wild part of Cumberland, where
there were few inhabitants, and no roads upon which passengers would
travel, excepting from one sheep track to another. In this lonely
solitude, tending his sheep on the bleak hills, Henry grew up from
boyhood to youth, and from youth to manhood--a mere shepherd and
little more. His fare was that of an ordinary peasant--oaten or rye
bread, occasionally swine flesh, and water from the running brook. His
bed consisted of sheepskins on a heap of straw, and his shelter from
the inclemency of the weather a straw-thatched cottage. He associated
with the few scattered people of the district as one of themselves,
and joined the young men in the rude sports of the period. He grew up
without any education whatever, and knew neither how to read nor
write; yet he had a soul attuned to higher things, and when abroad at
night with his sheep would observe the constellations in the heavens,
and weave theories in his own mind relative to the origin, motions,
and uses of the glittering specks which studded the firmament over his
head, a study which he afterwards pursued with more intelligence, in
company with the Canons of Bolton at Barden Tower. Thus he lived until
his thirty-second year, thinking only to live and die a Cumberland
shepherd, and possibly to marry, and be the progenitor of a race of
peasants, who should have no reminiscences of the glories of Skipton,
or the martial deeds of their illustrious ancestors.
The political world of England, however, had not stood still in the
interval, mighty events had been taking place. Edward, the King, had
been gathered to his fathers, after the judicial murder of his
brother, the Duke of Clarence. His sons, Edward V. and the Duke of
York, were murdered by their uncle, Richard of Gloucester, who usurped
the throne. Henry, Earl of Richmond, with Lancastrian blood in his
veins, invaded England, and the battle of Bosworth was fought in the
year 1485, when the usurper Richard was slain, and Richmond ascended
the throne as King Henry VII.
The Yorkist dynasty having now come to an end, there remained no more
fear for the Cliffords. The shepherd was brought from the fells of
Cumberland to Londesborough. Soon after the Attainder was reversed,
the confiscated estates restored, and the Clifford banner again
floated in the breeze from the towers of Skipton. But the Shepherd
Lord felt not at home amid the splendours of his castle, and he fitted
up one of the keeper's lodges in Barden Forest for his residence,
where he lived in great simplicity, spending his days in hunting and
his nights in watching the stars, and studying astronomy with the
Canons of Bolton, with such rude instruments as were then to be
procured.
In 1513, when about sixty years of age, he received a summons to
attend the expedition into Scotland, with a contingent of men-at-arms,
and held a command at the battle of Flodden, where he displayed the
hereditary military skill and valour of the Cliffords.
"From Penigent to Pendle Hill,
From Linton to Long Addingham,
And all that Craven coasts did till,
They with the lusty Clifford came.
All Staincliffe Hundred went with him,
With striplings strong from Wharfedale,
And all that Hauton Hills did climb,
With Longstroth eke and Litton dale,
Whose milk-fed fellows, fleshly bred,
Well brown'd, with sounding bows upbend,
All such as Horton fells had fed,
On Clifford's banners did attend."
--_Ballad of Flodden Field._
He survived the battle ten years, died in 1523, at about the
seventieth year of his age, and was buried with his ancestors in the
church of Bolton.