A temporary reconciliation.
At length one of the earl's brothers, the youngest of the family, who was at that time Archbishop of York, interposed to effect a reconciliation. We have not space here to give a full account of the negotiations; but the result was, a sort of temporary peace was made, by which the earl again returned to court, and was restored apparently to his former position. But there was no cordial good-will between him and the king. Edward dreaded the earl's power, and hated the stern severity of his character, while the earl, by the commanding influencewhich he exerted in the realm, was continually thwarting both Edward and Elizabeth in their plans.
A new marriage scheme.Edward displeased.
Edward and Elizabeth had now been married some time, but they had no son, and, of course, no heir, for daughters in those days did not inherit the English crown. Of course, Clarence, Edward's second brother, was the next heir. This increased the jealousy which the two brothers felt toward each other, and tended very much to drive Clarence away from Edward, and to increase the intimacy between Clarence and Warwick. At length, in 1468, it was announced that a marriage was in contemplation between Clarence and Isabella, the Earl of Warwick's oldest daughter. Edward and Queen Elizabeth were very much displeased and very much alarmed when they heard of this plan. If carried into effect, it would bind Clarence and the Warwick influence together in indissoluble bonds, and make their power much more formidable than ever before. Every body would say when the marriage was concluded,
"Now, in case Edward should die, which event may happen at any time, the earl's daughter will be queen, and then the earl will have a greater influence than ever in the dispositionof offices and honors. It behooves us, therefore, to make friends with him in season, so as to secure his good-will in advance, before he comes into power."
He fails of preventing the marriage.The ceremony performed at Calais.
King Edward and his queen, seeing how much this match was likely at once to increase the earl's importance, did every thing in their power to prevent it. But they could not succeed. The earl was determined that Clarence and his daughter should be married. The opposition was, however, so strong at court that the marriage could not be celebrated at London; so the ceremony was performed at Calais, which city was at that time under the earl's special command. The king and queen remained at London, and made no attempt to conceal their vexation and chagrin.
1469-1470
Insurrections.The king goes to meet the rebels.
Edward's apprehension and anxiety in respect to the danger that Warwick might be concocting schemes to restore the Lancastrian line to the throne were greatly increased by the sudden breaking out of insurrections in the northern part of the island, while Warwick and Clarence were absent in Calais, on the occasion of Clarence's marriage to Isabella. The insurgents did not demand the restoration of the Lancastrian line, but only the removal of the queen's family and relations from the council. The king raised an armed force, and marched to the northward to meet the rebels. But his army was disaffected, and he could do nothing. They fled before the advancing army of insurgents, and Edward went with them to Nottingham Castle, where he shut himself up, and wrote urgently to Warwick and Clarence to come to his aid.
Rebellion suppressed.
Warwick made no haste to obey this command. After some delay, however, he left Calais in command of one of his lieutenants andrepaired to Nottingham, where he soon released the king from his dangerous situation. He quelled the rebellion too, but not until the insurgents had seized the father and one of the brothers of the queen, and cut off their heads.
In the mean time, the Lancastrians themselves, thinking that this was a favorable time for them, began to put themselves in motion. Warwick was the only person who was capable of meeting them and putting them down. This he did, taking the king with him in his train, in a condition more like that of a prisoner than a sovereign. At length, however, the rebellions were suppressed, and all parties returned to London.
A grand reconciliation.
There now took place what purported to be a grand reconciliation. Treaties were drawn up and signed between Warwick and Clarence on one side, and the king on the other, by which both parties bound themselves to forgive and forget all that had passed, and thenceforth to be good friends; but, notwithstanding all the solemn signings and sealings with which these covenants were secured, the actual condition of the parties in respect to each other remained entirely unchanged, and neither of the three felt a whit more confidence in the others after the execution of these treaties than before.
At last the secret distrust which they felt toward each other broke out openly. Warwick's brother, the Archbishop of York, made an entertainment at one of his manors for a party of guests, in which were included the king, the Duke of Clarence, and the Earl of Warwick. It was about three months after the treaties were signed that this entertainment was made, and the feast was intended to celebrate and cement the good understanding which it was now agreed was henceforth to prevail. The king arrived at the manor, and, while he was in his room making his toilet for the supper, which was all ready to be served, an attendant came to him and whispered in his ear,
"Your majesty is in danger. There is a band of armed men in ambush near the house."
The king frightened.
The king was greatly alarmed at hearing this. He immediately stole out of the house, mounted his horse, and, with two or three followers, rode away as fast as he could ride. He continued his journey all night, and in the morning arrived at Windsor Castle.
The quarrel renewed.New reconciliations.
Then followed new negotiations between Warwick and the king, with mutual reproaches, criminations, and recriminations without number. Edward insisted that treachery was intended at the house to which he had been invited,and that he had barely escaped, by his sudden flight, from falling into the snare. But Warwick and his friends denied this entirely, and attributed the flight of the king to a wholly unreasonable alarm, caused by his jealous and suspicious temper. At last Edward suffered himself to be reassured, and then came new treaties and a new reconciliation.
New rebellions.
This peace was made in the fall of 1469, and in the spring of 1470 a new insurrection broke out. The king believed that Warwick himself, and Clarence, were really at the bottom of these disturbances, but still he was forced to send them with bodies of troops to subdue the rebels; he, however, immediately raised a large army for himself, and proceeded to the seat of war. He reached the spot before Warwick and Clarence arrived there. He gave battle to the insurgents, and defeated them. He took a great many prisoners, and beheaded them. He found, or pretended to find, proof that Warwick and Clarence, instead of intending to fight the insurgents, had made their arrangements for joining them on the following day, and that he had been just in time to defeat their treachery. Whether he really found evidence of these intentions on the part of Warwick and Clarence or not, or whether he was flushed by the excitementof victory, and resolved to seize the occasion to cut loose at once and forever from the entanglement in which he had been bound, is somewhat uncertain. At all events, he now declared open war against Warwick and Clarence, and set off immediately on his march to meet them, at the head of a force much superior to theirs.
Warwick comes to open war with the king.
Warwick and Clarence marched and countermarched, and made many manœuvres to escape a battle, and during all this time their strength was rapidly diminishing. As long as they were nominally on the king's side, however really hostile to him, they had plenty of followers; but, now that they were in open war against him, their forces began to melt away. In this emergency, Warwick suddenly changed all his plans. He disbanded his army, and then taking all his family with him, including Clarence and Isabella, and accompanied by an inconsiderable number of faithful friends, he marched at the head of a small force which he retained as an escort to the sea-port of Dartmouth, and then embarked for Calais.
The vessels employed to transport the party formed quite a little fleet, so numerous were the servants and attendants that accompanied the fugitives. They embarked without delay onreaching the coast, as they were in haste to make the passage and arrive at Calais, for Isabella, Clarence's wife, was about to become a mother, and at Calais they thought that they should all be, as it were, at home.
It will be remembered that the Earl of Warwick was the governor of Calais, and that when he left it he had appointed a lieutenant to take command of it during his absence. Before his ship arrived off the port this lieutenant had received dispatches from Edward, which had been hurried to him by a special messenger, informing him that Warwick was in rebellion against his sovereign, and forbidding the lieutenant to allow him or his party to enter the town.
Warwick and his party not allowed to land at Calais.
Accordingly, when Warwick's fleet arrived off the port, they found the guns of the batteries pointed at them, and sentinels on the piers warning them not to attempt to land.
The party in great straits.
Warwick was thunderstruck. To be thus refused admission to his own fortress by his own lieutenant was something amazing, as well as outrageous. The earl was at first completely bewildered; but, on demanding an explanation, the lieutenant sent him word that the refusal to land was owing to the people of the town. They, he said, having learned that he and the king had come to open war, insistedthat the fortress should be reserved for their sovereign. Warwick then explained the situation that his daughter was in; but the lieutenant was firm. The determination of the people was so strong, he said, that he could not control it. Finally, the child was born on board the ship, as it lay at anchor off the port, and all the aid or comfort which the party could get from the shore consisted of two flagons of wine, which the lieutenant, with great hesitation and reluctance, allowed to be sent on board. The child was a son. His birth was an event of great importance, for he was, of course, as Clarence's son, a prince in the direct line of succession to the English crown.
They land at Harfleur.
At length, finding that he could not land at Calais, Warwick sailed away with his fleet along the coast of France till he reached the French port of Harfleur. Here his ships were admitted, and the whole party were allowed to land.
Strange compact between Warwick and Queen Margaret.
Then followed various intrigues, manœuvres, and arrangements, which we have not time here fully to unravel; but the end of all was, that in a few weeks after the Earl of Warwick's landing in France, he repaired to a castle where Margaret of Anjou and her son, the Prince of Wales, were residing, and there, in the course of a short time, he made arrangements to espouseher cause, and assist in restoring her husband to the English throne, on condition that her son, the Prince of Wales, should marry his second daughter Anne. It is said that Queen Margaret for a long time refused to consent to this arrangement. She was extremely unwilling that her son, the heir to the English crown, should take for a wife the daughter of the hated enemy to whom the downfall of her family, and all the terrible calamities which had befallen them, had been mainly owing. She was, however, at length induced to yield. Her ambition gained the victory over her hate, and she consented to the alliance on a solemn oath being taken by Warwick that thenceforth he would be on her side, and do all in his power to restore her family to the throne.
This arrangement was accordingly carried into effect, and thus the earl had one of his daughters married to the next heir to the English crown in the line of York, and the other to the next heir in the line of Lancaster. He had now only to choose to which dynasty he would secure the throne. Of course, the oath which he had taken, like other political oaths taken in those days, was only to be kept so long as he should deem it for his interest to keep it.
Attempt to entice Clarence away from Warwick.
He could not at once openly declare in favorof King Henry, for fear of alienating Clarence from him. But Clarence was soon drawn away. King Edward, when he heard of the marriage of Warwick's daughter with the Prince of Wales, immediately formed a plan for sending a messenger to negotiate with Clarence. He could not do this openly, for he knew very well that Warwick would not allow any avowed messenger from Edward to land; so he sent a lady. The lady was a particular friend of Isabella, Clarence's wife. She traveled privately by the way of Calais. On the way she said nothing about the object of her journey, but gave out simply that she was going to join her mistress, the Princess Isabella. On her arrival she managed the affair with great discretion. She easily obtained private interviews with Clarence, and represented to him that Warwick, now that his daughter was married to the heir on the Lancastrian side, would undoubtedly lay all his plans forthwith for putting that family on the throne, and that thus Clarence would lose all.
"And therefore," said she, "how much better it will be for you to leave him and return to your brother Edward, who is ready to forgive and forget all the past, and receive you again as his friend."
Clarence was convinced by these representations, and soon afterward, watching his opportunity, he made his way to England, and there espoused his brother's cause, and was received again into his service.
Edward does not fear.
In the mean time, tidings were continually coming to King Edward from his friends on the Continent, warning him of Warwick's plans, and bidding him to be upon his guard. But Edward had no fear. He said he wished that Warwick would come.
"All I ask of my friends on the other side of the Channel," said he, "is that, when he does come, they will not let him get away again before I catch him—as he did before."
The Duke of Burgundy.
Edward's great friend across the Channel was his brother-in-law, the Duke of Burgundy, the same who, when Count Charles, had married the Princess Margaret of York, as related in a former chapter. The Duke of Burgundy prepared and equipped a fleet, and had it all in readiness to intercept the earl in case he should attempt to sail for England.
Queen Margaret crosses the Channel.
In the mean time, Queen Margaret and the earl went on with their preparations. The King of France furnished them with men, arms, and money. When every thing was ready, the earl sent word to the north of England, to someof his friends and partisans there, to make a sort of false insurrection, in order to entice away Edward and his army from the capital. This plan succeeded. Edward heard of the rising, and, collecting all the troops which were at hand, he marched to the northward to put it down. Just at this time a sudden storm arose and dispersed the Duke of Burgundy's fleet. The earl then immediately put to sea, taking with him Margaret of Anjou and her son, the Prince of Wales, with his wife, the Earl of Warwick's daughter. The Prince of Wales was now about eighteen years old. The father, King Henry, Margaret's husband, was not joined with the party. He was all this time, as you will recollect, a prisoner in the Tower, where Warwick himself had shut him up when he deposed him in order to place Edward upon the throne.
All Europe looked on with astonishment at these proceedings, and watched the result with intense interest. Here was a man who, having, by a desperate and bloody war, deposed a king, and shut him up in prison, and compelled his queen and the prince his son, the heir, to fly from the country to save their lives, had now sought the exiles in their banishment, had married his own daughter to the prince, and was setting forth on an expedition for the purposeof liberating the father again, and restoring him to the throne.
Landing of the expedition.Reception of it.
The earl's fleet crossed the Channel safely, and landed on the coast of Devonshire, in the southwestern part of the island. The landing of the expedition was the signal for great numbers of the nobles and high families throughout the realm to prepare for changing sides; for it was the fact, throughout the whole course of these wars between the houses of York and Lancaster, that a large proportion of the nobility and gentry, and great numbers of other adventurers, who lived in various ways on the public, stood always ready at once to change sides whenever there was a prospect that another side was coming into power. Then there were, in such a case as this, great numbers who were secretly in favor of the Lancaster line, but who were prevented from manifesting their preference while the house of York was in full possession of power. All these persons were aroused and excited by the landing of Warwick. King Edward found that his calls upon his friends to rally to his standard were not promptly obeyed. His friends were beginning to feel some doubt whether it would be best to continue his friends. A certain preacher in London had the courage to pray in public forthe "king in the Tower," and the manner in which this allusion was received by the populace, and the excitement which it produced, showed how ready the city of London was to espouse Henry's cause.
Edward's friends and followers forsake him.
These, and other such indications, alarmed Edward very much. He turned to the southward again when he learned that Warwick had landed. Richard, who had, during all this period, adhered faithfully to Edward's cause, was with him, in command of a division of the army. As Warwick himself was rapidly advancing toward the north at this time, the two armies soon began to approach each other. As the time of trial drew nigh, Edward found that his friends and supporters were rapidly abandoning him. At length, one day, while he was at dinner, a messenger came in and told him that one of the leading officers of the army, with the whole division under his command, were waving their caps and cheering for "King Harry." He saw at once that all was lost, and he immediately prepared to fly.
Edward flies from the country.
He was not far from the eastern coast at this time, and there was a small vessel there under his orders, which had been employed in bringing provisions from the Thames to supply his army. There were also two Dutch vessels there.The king took possession of these vessels, with Richard, and the few other followers that went with him, and put at once to sea. Nobody knew where they were going.
Difficulties and dangers.
Very soon after they had put to sea they were attacked by pirates. They escaped only by running their vessel on shore on the coast of Finland. Here the king found himself in a state of almost absolute destitution, so that he had to pawn his clothing to satisfy the most urgent demands. At length, after meeting with various strange adventures, he found his way to the Hague, where he was, for the time, in comparative safety.
As soon as Warwick ascertained that Edward had fled, he turned toward London, with nothing now to impede his progress. He entered London in triumph. Clarence joined him, and entered London in his train; for Clarence, though he had gone to England with the intention of making common cause with his brother, had not been able yet to decide positively whether it would, on the whole, be for his interest to do so, and had, accordingly, kept himself in some degree uncommitted, and now he turned at once again to Warwick's side.
The queen—Elizabeth Woodville—with her mother Jacquetta, were residing at the Towerat this time, where they had King Henry in their keeping; for the Tower was an extended group of buildings, in which palace and prison were combined in one. As soon as the queen learned that Edward was defeated, and that Warwick and Clarence were coming in triumph to London, she took her mother and three of her daughters—Elizabeth, Mary, and Cecily—who were with her at that time, and also a lady attendant, and hurried down the Tower stairs to a barge which was always in waiting there. She embarked on board the barge, and ordered the men to row her up to Westminster.
His mother makes her escape to sanctuary.
Westminster is at the upper end of London, as the Tower is at the lower. On arriving at Westminster, the whole party fled for refuge to a sanctuary there. This sanctuary was a portion of the sacred precincts of a church, from which a refugee could not be taken, according to the ideas of those times, without committing the dreadful crime of sacrilege. A part of the building remained standing for three hundred years after this time, as represented in the opposite engraving. It was a gloomy old edifice, and it must have been a cheerless residence for princesses and a queen.
THE SANCTUARY.THE SANCTUARY.
Birth of Edward's son and heir.
In this sanctuary, the queen, away from her husband, and deprived of almost every comfort,gave birth to her first son. Some persons living near took compassion upon her forlorn and desolate condition, and rendered her such aid as was absolutely necessary, out of charity. The abbot of the monastery connected with the church sent in various conveniences, and a good woman named Mother Cobb, who lived near by, came in and acted as nurse for the mother and the child.
The child was baptized in the sanctuary a few days after he was born. He was named Edward, after his father. Of course, the birth of this son of King Edward cut off Clarence and his son from the succession on the York side. This little Edward was now the heir, and, about thirteen years after this, as we shall see in the sequel, he became King of England.
King Henry is fully restored to the throne.
As soon as the Earl of Warwick reached London, he proceeded at once to the Tower to release old King Henry from his confinement. He found the poor king in a wretched plight. His apartment was gloomy and comfortless, his clothing was ragged, and his person squalid and dirty. The earl brought him forth from his prison, and, after causing his personal wants to be properly attended to, clothed him once more in royal robes, and conveyed him in state through London to the palace in Westminster,and established him there nominally as King of England, though Warwick was to all intents and purposes the real king. A Parliament was called, and all necessary laws were passed to sanction and confirm the dynasty. Queen Margaret, who, however, had not yet arrived from the Continent, was restored to her former rank, and the young Prince of Wales, now about eighteen years old, was the object of universal interest throughout the kingdom, as now the unquestioned and only heir to the crown.
A.D. 1470-1471
Position of Richard.
It was in the month of October, 1470, that old King Henry and his family were restored to the throne. Clarence, as we have seen, being allied to Warwick by being married to his daughter, was induced to go over with him to the Lancastrian side; but Gloucester—that is, Richard—remained true to his own line, and followed the fortunes of his brother, in adverse as well as in prosperous times, with unchanging fidelity. He was now with Edward in the dominions of the Duke of Burgundy, who, you will recollect, married Margaret, Edward's sister, and who was now very naturally inclined to espouse Edward's cause.
The Duke of Burgundy.His cunning.
The Duke of Burgundy did not, however, dare to espouse Edward's cause too openly, for fear of the King of France, who took the side of Henry and Queen Margaret. He, however, did all in his power secretly to befriend him. Edward and Richard began immediately to form schemes for going back to England and recovering possession of the kingdom. TheDuke of Burgundy issued a public proclamation, in which it was forbidden that any of his subjects should join Edward, or that any expedition to promote his designs should be fitted out in any part of his dominions. This proclamation was for the sake of the King of France. At the same time that he issued these orders publicly, he secretly sent Edward a large sum of money, furnished him with a fleet of fifteen or twenty ships, and assisted him in collecting a force of twelve hundred men.
Secret communication with Clarence.Warwick's plans to secure Clarence.
While he was making these arrangements and preparations on the Continent, Edward and his friends had also opened a secret communication with Clarence in England. It would, of course, very much weaken the cause of Edward and Richard to have Clarence against them; so Margaret, the wife of the Duke of Burgundy, interested herself in endeavoring to win him back again to their side. She had herself great influence over him, and she was assisted in her efforts by their mother, the Lady Cecily, who was still living in the neighborhood of London, and who was greatly grieved at Clarence's having turned against his brothers. The tie which bound Clarence to the Earl of Warwick was, of course, derived chiefly from his being married to Warwick's daughter. Warwick, however,did not trust wholly to this. As soon as he had restored Henry to the throne, he contrived a cunning plan which he thought would tend to bind Clarence still more strongly to himself, and to alienate him completely from Edward. This plan was to induce the Parliament to confiscate all Edward's estates and confer them upon Clarence.
"Now," said Warwick to himself, when this measure had been accomplished, "Clarence will be sure to oppose Edward's return to England, for he knows very well that if he should return and be restored to the throne, he would, of course, take all these estates back again."
But, while Edward was forming his plans on the Continent for a fresh invasion of England, Margaret sent messengers to Clarence, and their persuasions, united to those of his mother, induced Clarence to change his mind. He was governed by no principle whatever in what he did, but only looked to see what would most speedily and most fully gratify his ambition and increase his wealth. So, when they argued that it would be much better for him to be on the side of his brothers, and assist in restoring his own branch of the family to the throne, than to continue his unnatural connection with Warwick and the house of Lancaster, he allowedhimself to be easily persuaded, and he promised that though, for the present, he should remain ostensibly a friend of Warwick, still, if Edward and Richard would raise an expedition and come to England, he would forsake Warwick and the Lancasters, and join them.
Edward and Richard sail for England.
Accordingly, in the spring, when the fleet and the forces were ready, Edward and Richard set sail from the Low Country to cross the Channel. It was early in March. They intended to proceed to the north of England and land there. They had a very stormy passage, and in the end the fleet was dispersed, and Edward and Richard with great difficulty succeeded in reaching the land. The two brothers were in different ships, and they landed in different places, a few miles apart from each other. Their situation was now extremely critical, for all England was in the power of Warwick and the Lancastrians, and Edward and Richard were almost entirely without men.
They, however, after a time, got together a small force, consisting chiefly of the troops who had come with them, and who had succeeded at last in making their way to the land. At the head of this force they advanced into the country toward the city of York. Edward gave out every where that he had not come with anyview of attempting to regain possession of the throne, but only to recover his own private and family estates, which had been unjustly confiscated, he said, and conferred upon his brother. He acquiesced entirely, he said, in the restoration of Henry to the throne, and acknowledged him as king, and solemnly declared that he would not do any thing to disturb the peace of the country.
Stratagems of war.
All this was treacherous and false; but Edward and Richard thought that they were not yet strong enough to announce openly their real designs, and, in the mean time, the uttering of any false declarations which they might deem it good policy to make was to be considered as a stratagem justified by usage, as one of the legitimate resources of war.
Reception of Edward at York.
So they went on, nobody opposing them. They reached, at length, the city of York. Here Edward met the mayor and aldermen of the city, and renewed his declaration, which he confirmed by a solemn oath, that he never would lay any claim to the throne of England, or do any thing to disturb King Henry in his possession of it. He cried out, in a loud voice, in the hearing of the people, "Long live King Henry, and Prince Edward his son!" He wore an ostrich feather, too, in his armor, which wasthe badge of Prince Edward. The people of York were satisfied with these protestations, and allowed him to proceed.
The roses.Public opinion.
His force was continually increasing as he advanced, and at length, on crossing the River Trent, he came to a part of the country where almost the whole population had been on the side of York during all the previous wars. He began now to throw off his disguise, and to avow more openly that his object was again to obtain possession of the throne for the house of York. His troops now began to exhibit the white rose, which for many generations had been the badge of the house of York, as the red rose had been that of Lancaster.[F]In a word, the country was every where aroused and excited by the idea that another revolution was impending, and all those whose ruling principle it was to be always with the party that was uppermost began to make preparations for coming over to Edward's side.
Warwick.Position of Clarence.His double dealing.
In the mean time, however, Warwick, alarmed, had come from the northward to London to meet the invaders at the head of a strong force.Clarence was in command of one great division of this force, and Warwick himself of the other. The two bodies of troops marched at some little distance from each other. Edward shaped his course so as to approach that commanded by Clarence. Warwick did all he could to prevent this, being, apparently, somewhat suspicious that Clarence was not fully to be relied on. But Edward succeeded, by dint of skillful manœuvring, in accomplishing his object, and thus he and Clarence came into the neighborhood of each other. The respective encampments were only three miles apart. It seems, however, that there were still some closing negotiations to be made before Clarence was fully prepared to take the momentous step that was now before him. Richard was the agent of these negotiations. He went back and forth between the two camps, conveying the proposals and counter-proposals from one party to the other, and doing all in his power to remove obstacles from the way, and to bring his brothers to an agreement. At last every thing was arranged. Clarence ordered his men to display the white rose upon their armor, and then, with trumpets sounding and banners flying, he marched forth to meet Edward, and to submit himself to his command.
Clarence goes over to Edward's side.
When the column which he led arrived near to Edward's camp, it halted, and Clarence himself, with a small body of attendants, advanced to meet his brother; Edward, at the same time, leaving his encampment, in company with Richard and several noblemen, came forward too. Thus Edward and Clarence met, as the old chronicle expresses it, "betwixt both hosts, where was right kind and loving language betwixt them two. And then, in like wise, spoke together the two Dukes of Clarence and Gloucester, and afterward the other noblemen that were there with them; whereof all the people that were there that loved them were right glad and joyous, and thanked God highly for that joyous meeting, unity and concord, hoping that thereby should grow unto them prosperous fortune in all that they should after that have to do."
Warwick was, of course, in a dreadful rage when he learned that Clarence had betrayed him and gone over to the enemy. He could do nothing, however, to repair the mischief, and he was altogether too weak to resist the two armies now combined against him; so he drew back, leaving the way clear, and Edward, at the head now of an overwhelming force, and accompanied by both his brothers, advanced directly to London.
Edward triumphant.
He was received at the capital with great favor. Whoever was uppermost for the time being was always received with favor in England in those days, both in the capital and throughout the country at large. It was said, however, that the interest in Edward's fortunes, and in the succession of his branch of the family to the throne, was greatly increased at this time by the birth of his son, which had taken place in the sanctuary, as related in the last chapter, soon after Queen Elizabeth sought refuge there, at the time of Edward's expulsion from the kingdom. Of course, the first thing which Edward did after making his public entry into London was to proceed to the sanctuary to rejoin his wife, and deliver her from her duress, and also to see his new-born son.
Henry again sent to the Tower.
Queen Margaret was out of the kingdom at this time, being on a visit to the Continent. She had her son, the Prince of Wales, with her; but Henry, the king, was in London. He, of course, fell into Edward's hands, and was immediately sent back a prisoner to the Tower.
Edward remained only a day or two in London, and then set off again, at the head of all his troops, to meet Warwick. He brought out King Henry from the Tower, and took him with the army as a prisoner.
Warwick refuses to yield.Preparations for a battle.
Warwick had now strengthened himself so far that he was prepared for battle. The two armies approached each other not many miles from London. Before commencing hostilities, Clarence wished for an opportunity to attempt a reconciliation; he, of course, felt a strong desire to make peace, if possible, for his situation, in case of battle, would be painful in the extreme—his brothers on one side, and his father-in-law on the other, and he himself compelled to fight against the cause which he had abandoned and betrayed. So he sent a messenger to the earl, offering to act as mediator between him and his brother, in hopes of finding some mode of arranging the quarrel; but the earl, instead of accepting the mediation, sent back only invectives and defiance.
"Go tell your master," he said to the messenger, "that Warwick is not the man to follow the example of faithlessness and treason which the false, perjured Clarence has set him. Unlike him, I stand true to my oath, and this quarrel can only be settled by the sword."
Of course, nothing now remained but to fight the battle, and a most desperate and bloody battle it was. It was fought upon a plain at a place called Barnet. It lasted from four in the morning till ten.
DEATH OF WARWICK ON THE FIELD OF BARNET.DEATH OF WARWICK ON THE FIELD OF BARNET.
Richard came forward in the fight in a very conspicuous and prominent manner. He was now about eighteen years of age, and this was the first serious battle in which he had been actually engaged. He evinced a great deal of heroism, and won great praise by the ardor in which he rushed into the thickest of the fight, and by the manner in which he conducted himself there. The squires who attended him were both killed, but Richard himself remained unhurt.
Edward victorious.Warwick slain.
In the end, Edward was victorious. The quarrel was thus decided by the sword, as Warwick had said, and decided, so far as the earl was concerned, terribly and irrevocably, for he himself was unhorsed upon the field, and slain. Many thousands of soldiers fell on each side, and great numbers of the leading nobles. The bodies were buried in one common trench, which was dug for the purpose on the plain, and a chapel was afterward erected over them, to mark and consecrate the spot.
King Henry.
It is said in respect to King Henry, who had been taken from the Tower and made to accompany the army to the field, that Edward placed him in the midst of the fight at Barnet, in the hope that he might in this way be slain, either by accident or design. This plan, however,if it were formed, did not succeed, for Henry escaped unharmed, and, after the battle, was taken back to London, and again conveyed through the gloomy streets of the lower city to his solitary prison in the Tower. The streets were filled, after he had passed, with groups of men of all ranks and stations, discussing the strange and mournful vicissitudes in the life of this hapless monarch, now for the second time cut off from all his friends, and immured hopelessly in a dismal dungeon.
STREET LEADING TO THE TOWER.STREET LEADING TO THE TOWER.
Margaret and the Prince of Wales.
On the very day of the battle of Barnet, Queen Margaret, who had hastened her return to England on hearing of Edward's invasion, landed at Plymouth, in the southwestern part of England. The young Prince of Wales, her son, was with her. When she heard the terrible tidings of the loss of the battle of Barnet and the death of Warwick, she was struck with consternation, and immediately fled to an abbey in the neighborhood of the place where she had landed, and took sanctuary there. She soon, however, recovered from this panic, and came forth again. She put herself, with her son, at the head of the French troops which she had brought with her, and collected also as many more as she could induce to join her, and then, marching slowly toward the northward,finally took a strong position on the River Severn, near the town of Tewkesbury. Tewkesbury is in the western part of England, near the frontiers of Wales.
Meeting of the armies.
Edward, having received intelligence of her movements, collected his forces also, and, accompanied by Clarence and Gloucester, went forth to meet her. The two armies met about three weeks after the battle of Barnet, in which Warwick was killed. All the flower of the English nobility were there, on one side or on the other.
Two boys to command.
Queen Margaret's son, the Prince of Wales, was now about eighteen years of age, and his mother placed him in command—nominally at the head of the army. Edward, on his side, assigned the same position to Richard, who was almost precisely of the same age with the Prince of Wales. Thus the great and terrible battle which ensued was fought, as it were, by two boys, cousins to each other, and neither of them out of their teens.
The killing of Lord Wenlock.
The operations were, however, really directed by older and more experienced men. The chief counselor on Margaret's side was the Duke of Somerset. Edward's army attempted, by means of certain evolutions, to entice the queen's army out of their camp. Somersetwished to go, and he commanded the men to follow. Some followed, but others remained behind. Among those that remained behind was a body of men under the command of a certain Lord Wenlock. Somerset was angry because they did not follow him, and he suspected, moreover, that Lord Wenlock was intending to betray the queen and go over to the other side; so he turned back in a rage, and, coming up to Lord Wenlock, struck him a dreadful blow upon his helmet with his battle-axe, and killed him on the spot.