Transcriber's Note: Italic text is denoted by _underscores_ and bold
text by =equal signs=.
[Illustration: PLUCKING THE ROSES.]
THE
WARS OF THE ROSES;
OR,
Stories of the Struggle of York and
Lancaster.
BY J. G. EDGAR,
AUTHOR OF "HISTORY FOR BOYS," "THE BOYHOOD OF GREAT MEN,"
"THE FOOTPRINTS OF FAMOUS MEN," ETC.
With Illustrations.
[Illustration]
NEW YORK:
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,
FRANKLIN SQUARE.
TO
MASTER DAVID M'DOWALL HANNAY,
This Book for Boys
IS, WITH EARNEST PRAYERS FOR HIS WELFARE, INSCRIBED
BY HIS GODFATHER,
THE AUTHOR.
PREFACE.
My object in writing this book for boys is to furnish them with a
narrative of the struggle between York and Lancaster--a struggle which
extended over thirty years, deluged England with blood, cost a hundred
thousand lives, emasculated the old nobility, and utterly destroyed the
house of Plantagenet.
It is generally admitted that no period in England's history is richer
in romantic incident than the three decades occupied by the Wars of the
Roses; but the contest is frequently described as having been without
interest in a political point of view. This idea seems erroneous.
That struggle of thirty years was no mere strife of chiefs, ambitious
of supremacy and unscrupulous as to means. Indeed, the circumstances
of the country were such that no hand would have been lifted against
sovereigns--whether reigning by Parliamentary or hereditary right--who
showed a due respect to ancient rights and liberties. But the tyranny
exercised, first by the ministers of the sixth Henry, and afterward
by those of the fourth Edward--one influenced by Margaret of Anjou,
the other by the Duchess of Bedford, both "foreign women"--was such
as could not be borne by Englishmen without a struggle; and evidence
exists that Richard Neville, in arming the people against these kings,
did so to prevent the establishment of that despotism which John
Hampden and Oliver Cromwell afterward fought to destroy.
With such impressions as to the origin of the war which, during the
fifteenth century, agitated England and perplexed Continental rulers,
I have, in the following pages, traced the course of events from the
plucking of the roses in the Temple Gardens to the destruction of
Richard the Third, and the coronation of Henry Tudor, on Bosworth
Field. And I venture to hope that a book written to attract English
boys of this generation to a remarkable epoch in the mediæval history
of their country will be received with favor, and read with interest,
by those for whose perusal it is more particularly intended.
J. G. E.
INTRODUCTION.
The Plantagenets.
About the middle of the ninth century a warrior named Tertullus, having
rendered signal services to the King of France, married Petronella,
the king's cousin, and had a son who flourished as Count of Anjou. The
descendants of Tertullus and Petronella rose rapidly, and exercised
much influence on French affairs. At length, in the twelfth century,
Geoffrey, Count of Anjou, surnamed Plantagenet, from wearing a sprig
of flowering broom instead of a feather, espoused Maude, daughter of
Henry Beauclerc, King of England; and Henry Plantagenet, their son,
succeeded, on the death of Stephen, to the English throne.
Having married Eleanor, heiress of Aquitaine, and extended his
continental empire from the Channel to the Pyrenees, Henry ranked as
the most potent of European princes. But, though enabled to render
great services to England, he was not an Englishman; and, indeed, it
was not till the death of John, at Swinehead, that the English had a
king who could be regarded as one of themselves. That king was Henry
the Third, born and educated in England, and sympathizing with the
traditions of the people over whom he reigned.
Unfortunately for Henry, he was surrounded by Continental kinsmen,
whose conduct caused such discontent that clergy, barons, citizens,
and people raised the cry of England for the English; and Simon de
Montfort, though foreign himself, undertook to head a movement against
foreigners. A barons' war was the consequence. Henry, defeated at
Lewes, became a prisoner in the hands of the oligarchy; and there was
some prospect of the crown passing from the house of Plantagenet to
that of Montfort.
At this crisis, however, Edward, eldest son of the king, escaped from
captivity, destroyed the oligarchy in the battle of Evesham, and
entered upon his great and glorious career. Space would fail us to
expatiate on the services which, when elevated to the throne as Edward
the First, that mighty prince rendered to England. Suffice it to say
that he gave peace, prosperity, and freedom to the people, formed
hostile races into one great nation, and rendered his memory immortal
by the laws which he instituted.[1]
For the country which the first Edward rendered prosperous and free,
the third Edward and his heroic son won glory in those wars which made
Englishmen, for a time, masters of France. Unhappily, the Black Prince
died before his father; and his only son, who succeeded when a boy
as Richard the Second, departed from right principles of government.
This excited serious discontent, and led the English people to that
violation of "the lineal succession of their monarchs" which caused the
Wars of the Roses.
Besides the Black Prince, the conqueror of Cressy had by his queen,
Philippa--the patroness of Froissart--several sons, among whom were
Lionel, Duke of Clarence; John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster; and Edmund
of Langley, Duke of York.[2] Lionel died early; but John of Gaunt
survived his father and eldest brother, and was suspected of having an
eye to the crown which his young nephew wore. No usurpation, however,
was attempted. But when John was in the grave, his son, Henry of
Bolingbroke, returning from an irksome exile, deposed Richard, and sent
him prisoner to Pontefract Castle, where he is understood to have been
murdered.
On the death of Richard, who was childless, Henry the Fourth, as son of
John of Gaunt, would have had hereditary right on his side, but that
Lionel of Clarence had left a daughter, Philippa, wife of Mortimer,
Earl of March, and ancestress of three successive earls. Of these,
Edmund, the last earl, was a boy when Henry of Bolingbroke usurped the
throne; and his sister, Anne Mortimer, was wife of Richard Plantagenet,
Earl of Cambridge, second son of Edmund of Langley, Duke of York. "This
was that princely branch," says Sandford, "by the ingrafting of which
into the stock of York, that tree brought forth not only White Roses,
but crowns and sceptres also."
Henry the Fourth regarded young March with jealousy, and had him
vigilantly guarded. But Henry the Fifth completely won the earl's
loyalty, and made him a most zealous adherent. March showed no ambition
to reign; and the nation, intoxicated with Agincourt and glory and
conquest, cared not an iota for his claims. At the time when the
hero-king expired at Vincennes and the Earl of March died in England
the dynastic dispute was scarcely remembered, and it would never, in
all probability, have been revived had the Lancastrian government not
become such as could not be submitted to without degradation. It was
when law and decency were defied, and when Englishmen were in danger of
being enslaved by a "foreign woman," that they remembered the true heir
of the Plantagenets and took up arms to vindicate his claims.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE MONK-MONARCH AND HIS MISLEADERS 17
II. THE DUKE OF YORK AND THE KING-MAKER 27
III. THE CAPTAIN OF KENT 35
IV. THE RIVAL DUKES 46
V. THE KING'S MALADY 53
VI. THE BATTLE OF ST. ALBANS 60
VII. THE QUEEN AND THE YORKIST CHIEFS 67
VIII. THE CITY AND THE COURT 76
IX. A YORKIST VICTORY AND A LANCASTRIAN REVENGE 80
X. THE BATTLE OF NORTHAMPTON 88
XI. YORK'S CLAIM TO THE CROWN 94
XII. THE QUEEN'S FLIGHT AND RETURN 99
XIII. THE ANJOUITE'S VENGEANCE 105
XIV. A PLANTAGENET AND THE TUDORS 118
XV. BEFORE TOWTON 125
XVI. TOWTON FIELD 131
XVII. THE QUEEN IN ADVERSITY 145
XVIII. THE WOODVILLES 160
XIX. THE LANCASTRIANS IN EXILE 174
XX. WARWICK AND THE WOODVILLES 190
XXI. DESPOTISM, DISCONTENT, AND DISORDER 203
XXII. THE SIEGE OF EXETER 218
XXIII. LOUIS THE CRAFTY 224
XXIV. "THE STOUT EARL" IN EXILE 232
XXV. THE EARL'S RETURN AND EDWARD'S FLIGHT 244
XXVI. THE EARL OF WORCESTER 253
XXVII. THE BANISHED KING 262
XXVIII. QUEEN MARGARET'S VOYAGE 276
XXIX. THE BATTLE OF BARNET 282
XXX. BEFORE TEWKESBURY 299
XXXI. THE FIELD OF TEWKESBURY 312
XXXII. THE VICTOR AND THE VANQUISHED 325
XXXIII. WARWICK'S VICE-ADMIRAL 337
XXXIV. ESCAPE OF THE TUDORS 347
XXXV. ADVENTURES OF JOHN DE VERE 353
XXXVI. A DUKE IN RAGS 362
XXXVII. LOUIS DE BRUGES AT WINDSOR 368
XXXVIII. THE TREATY OF PICQUIGNY 372
XXXIX. A DOMESTIC TRAGEDY 381
XL. KING EDWARD'S DEATH 390
XLI. THE DUKE OF GLOUCESTER 396
XLII. THE PROTECTOR AND THE PROTECTORATE 399
XLIII. THE USURPATION 415
XLIV. RICHARD'S CORONATION 420
XLV. THE PRINCES IN THE TOWER 423
XLVI. A MOCK KING-MAKER 427
XLVII. THE COMING MAN 432
XLVIII. FROM BRITTANY TO BOSWORTH 439
XLIX. RICHARD BEFORE BOSWORTH 444
L. BOSWORTH FIELD 451
LI. AFTER BOSWORTH 465
LII. THE UNION OF THE TWO ROSES 469
THE WARS OF THE ROSES.
CHAPTER I.
THE MONK-MONARCH AND HIS MISLEADERS.
On St. Nicholas's Day, in the year 1421, there was joy in the castle of
Windsor and rejoicing in the city of London. On that day Katherine de
Valois, youthful spouse of the fifth Henry, became mother of a prince
destined to wear the crown of the Plantagenets; and courtiers vied with
citizens in expressing gratification that a son had been born to the
conqueror of Agincourt--an heir to the kingdoms of England and France.
Henry of Windsor, whose birth was hailed with a degree of enthusiasm
which no similar event had excited in England, was doomed to
misfortune from his cradle. He was not quite nine months old when
Henry the Fifth departed this life at Vincennes; and he was still
an infant when Katherine de Valois forgot her hero-husband and all
dignity for the sake of a Welsh soldier with a handsome person and
an imaginary pedigree. The young king, however, was the beloved of a
thousand hearts. As son of a hero who had won imperishable glory for
England, the heir of Lancaster was regarded by Englishmen with sincere
affection; the legitimacy of his title even was unquestioned; and the
genius of his uncles, John, Duke of Bedford, and Humphrey, Duke of
Gloucester, under whose auspices the royal boy was crowned in London
and Paris, created a feeling of security seldom felt by kingdoms at the
beginning of long minorities.
For a time the aspect of affairs was cheering. At a critical period,
however, Bedford expired at Rouen; and ere long England was distracted
by a feud between Gloucester and that spurious son of John of Gaunt,
known in history as Cardinal Beaufort, and as chief of a house which
then enjoyed the dukedom of Somerset. Gloucester charged the cardinal
with contempt for the laws of the realm; and the cardinal avenged
himself by accusing Gloucester's duchess of endeavoring to destroy
the king by witchcraft, and banishing her to the Isle of Man. It soon
appeared that the rivalry between Duke Humphrey and his illegitimate
kinsman would involve the sovereign and people of England in serious
disasters.
Nature had not gifted Henry of Windsor with the capacity which
would have enabled a sovereign to reconcile such foes. Never had
the Confessor's crown been placed on so weak a head. Never had the
Conqueror's sceptre been grasped by so feeble a hand. The son of the
fifth Henry was more of a monk than a monarch, and in every respect
better qualified for the cloister than for courts and camps. In one
respect, however, the king's taste was not monastic. Notwithstanding
his monkish tendencies he did not relish the idea of celibacy; and the
rival chiefs, perceiving his anxiety to marry, cast their eyes over
Europe to discover a princess worthy of enacting the part of Queen of
England.
Gloucester was the first to take the business in hand. Guided at once
by motives of policy and patriotism, he proposed to unite his nephew to
a daughter of the Count of Armagnac; and he trusted, by an alliance,
to allure that powerful French noble to the English interest. The
king did not object to the Armagnac match. Before striking a bargain,
however, he felt a natural desire to know something of the appearance
of his future spouse; and with this view he employed a painter to
furnish portraits of the count's three daughters. Before the portraits
could be executed circumstances put an end to the negotiations. In
fact, the dauphin, as the English still called the seventh Charles of
France, having no reason to regard the proposed marriage with favor,
placed himself at the head of an army, seized upon the count and his
daughters, and carried them off as prisoners of state.
Meanwhile, Beaufort was not idle. Eager to mortify Gloucester and
increase his own influence, the aged cardinal was bent on uniting the
king to Margaret of Anjou, daughter of René of Provence, and niece of
the French monarch. René, indeed, though titular sovereign of Jerusalem
and the two Sicilies, was poor, and Margaret, albeit the Carlovingian
blood flowed in her veins, was portionless. But, though not favored
by fortune, the Provençal princess was richly endowed by nature; and,
young as she was, the unrivaled beauty and intellect of King René's
daughter had made her name familiar in France and famous in England.
Never was an intriguer more successful than Beaufort. While Gloucester
was negotiating with the Count of Armagnac, the cardinal, aware of
Margaret's charms, contrived to have a likeness of the princess
transmitted to the court of England; and the young king became so
enamored of the fair being whom the portrait represented that his
wish to espouse her could not decently be combated. Matrimonial
negotiations were therefore resolved on; and William de la Pole, Duke
of Suffolk, was sent as embassador to bring home the princess. René
drove a hard bargain. Before consenting to the marriage he insisted on
the restoration of Maine and Anjou, which were among the Continental
conquests that the English were in no humor to surrender. But Suffolk,
who was thinking more of his own interests than of his country's honor,
yielded without scruple; and the marriage of King René's daughter was
made the basis of a treaty which could not fail to prove unpopular. At
first, however, no complaint was uttered. Suffolk brought the royal
bride to England, and declared, in allusion to her poverty, that her
beauty and intellect were worth more than all the gold in the world.
One day in April, 1445, the marriage of Henry of Windsor and Margaret
of Anjou was solemnized at the Abbey of Tichfield--the bridegroom being
in his twenty-fourth, the bride in her sixteenth year. The religious
ceremony having been performed, the wedded pair were conducted to the
capital of their dominions, and the English, being then devotedly
loyal, were prepared to welcome the spouse of young Henry to London
with an enthusiasm which could hardly fail to intoxicate so young a
princess. The nobles, displaying all the pride and pomp of feudalism,
wore the queen's badge in honor of her arrival. At Greenwich,
Gloucester, as first prince of the blood, though known to have been
averse to the match, paid his respects, attended by five hundred men,
dressed in her livery. At Blackheath appeared the mayor, aldermen,
and sheriffs of London, arrayed in scarlet robes, and mounted on
horseback, to escort her through Southwark into the city. Passing
under triumphal arches to Westminster, she was crowned in the Abbey;
and that ceremony was the occasion of general rejoicing. The shows, the
pageants, the tournaments, the display of feudal banners by the nobles,
and loud applause of the populace might well have led the royal pair to
prognosticate a life of peace and happiness. Nobody, who witnessed the
universal joy, could have supposed that England was on the eve of the
bloodiest dynastic struggle recorded in her history.
In fact, the people of England, knowing nothing of the restitution
of Maine and Anjou, were at first delighted with their queen, and
enraptured with her beauty. Her appearance was such as could hardly
fail to please the eye and touch the heart. Imagine a princess in her
teens, singularly accomplished, with a fair complexion, soft, delicate
features, bright, expressive eyes, and golden hair flowing over ivory
shoulders; place a crown upon her head, which seemed to have been
formed to wear such a symbol of power; array her graceful figure in
robes of state, and a mantle of purple fastened with gold and gems; and
you will have before your mind's eye the bride of Henry of Windsor, as
on the day of her coronation she appeared among peers and prelates and
high-born dames in the Abbey of Westminster.
Unfortunately for Margaret of Anjou, her prudence and intelligence
were not equal to her wit and beauty. Ere two years passed the
popularity she enjoyed vanished into empty air; but she was a woman of
defiant courage, and far from taking any pains to regain the affections
of the people, she openly manifested her dislike of Gloucester, who
was their favorite and their idol. Indeed, the young queen never could
forgive the duke's opposition to her marriage; and she listened readily
to the counsels of Beaufort and Suffolk, who, in the spring of 1447,
resolved, at all hazards, to accomplish his ruin.
With this view, a parliament was summoned to meet at Bury St. Edmunds;
and Gloucester, suspecting no snare, rode thither, with a small
retinue, from the castle of Devizes. At first, nothing occurred to
raise his apprehension; but, in a few days, to his surprise, he
found himself arrested by the Constable of England, on the charge of
conspiracy to murder the king and seize the crown.
Gloucester was never brought to trial; and it was said that Suffolk
and the cardinal, finding that every body ridiculed the charge of
conspiracy, caused "The Good Duke" to be assassinated. Appearances
rather strengthened the popular suspicion. One evening, about the close
of February, Gloucester was in perfect health: next morning he was
found dead in bed. The indecent haste with which Suffolk seized upon
the duke's estates was commented on with severity; and Margaret of
Anjou shared the suspicion that had been excited.
The cardinal did not long survive the man who was believed to have been
his victim. Early in the month of April, Beaufort died in despair,
bitterly reproaching his riches, that they could not prolong his life;
and Suffolk, now without a rival, so conducted himself as to incur
the perfect hatred of the nation. The English people had a peculiar
aversion to favorites, and remembered that while weak sovereigns,
like the third Henry and the second Edward, had been ruined by such
creatures, great kings, like the first and third Edward, had done
excellently well without them. Suffolk was every day more and more
disliked; and in 1449 his unpopularity reached the highest point.
The position of Suffolk now became perilous. Impatient at their
Continental reverses, and exasperated at the loss of Rouen, the people
exhibited a degree of indignation that was overwhelming, and the duke,
after being attacked in both houses of Parliament, found himself
committed to the Tower. When brought to the bar of the Lords, Suffolk,
aware of his favor at court, threw himself on the mercy of the king;
and, every thing having been arranged, the lord chancellor, in Henry's
name, sentenced him to five years' banishment. The peers protested
against this proceeding as unconstitutional; and the populace were so
furious at the idea of the traitor escaping, that, on the day of his
liberation, they assembled in St. Giles's Fields to the number of two
thousand, with the intention of bringing him to justice. But Suffolk
evaded their vigilance, and, at Ipswich, embarked for the Continent.
On the 2d of May, 1450, however, as the banished duke was sailing
between Dover and Calais, he was stopped by an English man-of-war,
described as the Nicholas of the Tower, and ordered to come immediately
on board. As soon as Suffolk set foot on deck, the master of the
Nicholas exclaimed, "Welcome, traitor;" and, for two days, kept his
captive in suspense. On the third day, however, the duke was handed
into a cock-boat, in which appeared an executioner, an axe, and a
block; and the death's-man, having without delay cut off the head of
the disgraced minister, contemptuously cast the headless trunk on the
sand.
While England's sufferings, from disasters abroad and discord at home,
were thus avenged on the queen's favorite, the king was regarded with
pity and compassion. Henry, in fact, was looked upon as the victim of
fate; and a prophecy, supposed to have been uttered by his father, was
cited to account for all his misfortunes. The hero-king, according to
rumor, had, on hearing of his son's birth at Windsor, shaken his head,
and remarked prophetically, "I, Henry of Monmouth, have gained much in
my short reign; Henry of Windsor shall reign much longer, and lose all.
But GOD'S will be done."
Margaret of Anjou shared her favorite's unpopularity; and, when she
reached the age of twenty, the crown which had been placed on her head
amid so much applause became a crown of thorns. Exasperated at the loss
of their Continental conquests, Englishmen recalled to mind that she
was a kinswoman and protégée of the King of France; and when it was
known that, to secure her hand for their sovereign, Maine and Anjou
had been surrendered, sturdy patriots described her as the cause of a
humiliating peace, and, with bitter emphasis, denounced her as "The
Foreign Woman."
These men were not altogether unreasonable. In fact, the case proved
much worse for England than even they anticipated; and, ere long,
France was gratified with a thorough revenge on the foe by whom she
had been humbled to the dust, from having placed on the Plantagenets'
throne a princess capable, by pride and indiscretion, of rousing a
civil war that ruined the Plantagenets' monarchy.