CHAPTER VIII
ACCESSION OF RICHARD III
The Queen and her relations had acquired predominating influence in the counsels of Edward IV. Her brother Anthony was Earl Rivers, another brother Lionel was Bishop of Salisbury, her son Thomas Grey had been created Marquis of Dorset. Her sisters had been married to the Duke of Buckingham, the Earls of Kent, Arundel, Huntingdon and Lord Strange. Her brother-in-law, Edward Grey, had been made Viscount Lisle.
This Woodville faction had the design to monopolise all the powers of the state. The Woodvilles had received bribes from Louis XI., had caused the death of Clarence, and had shared his inheritance. They now looked to the minority of King Edward's son as an opportunity for still further gratifying their ambition. But they had never succeeded in alienating the affections of the King from his brother Richard.
At the time of the King's death his son Edward was residing at Ludlow in charge of his uncle Lord Rivers, his half brother Sir Richard Grey, his cousin Sir Richard Haute, Sir Thomas Vaughan and Dr. Alcock, Bishop of Worcester. The Marquis of Dorset, another half-brother of young Edward, was in possession of the Tower. The other chief councillors of the late King, including Bishops Rotherham and Morton, the Duke of Buckingham, Lords Hastings, Stanley and Howard, were in London. The Duke of Gloucester was far away in the marches of Scotland.
Richard appointed Protector
By his will King Edward IV. left the care of his son's person and the government of the kingdom during the minority to his brother Richard, without any colleague.[[1]] Richard Duke of Gloucester was a prince who had shown valour and generalship in the field, wisdom and ability in his civil administration. As a councillor he had upheld the honour of his country. He was beloved by the people of the north, and was deservedly popular throughout the land. He proceeded to York on hearing of his brother's death and attended the solemn obsequies in the minster. He then caused his nephew to be proclaimed, and began the journey to London, with 600 gentlemen of the north in attendance, all in deep mourning. He came to assume the responsibilities imposed upon him by his brother.
Very different was the conduct of the Woodvilles. They formed a conspiracy to set aside the late King's wishes, to exclude the Duke of Gloucester, and to retain by force the authority they had hitherto exercised through the Queen's influence. Rivers set out from Ludlow with 2,000 men, and a large supply of arms, on April 24.[[2]] Dorset seized the arms and treasure in the Tower, and fitted out a naval force to secure command of the Channel. Council Orders were issued in the names of Rivers—'Avunculus Regis,' and of Dorset—'Frater regis uterinus,' while that of the Duke of Gloucester was excluded. There can be no doubt of the treasonable designs of the Woodville faction, which are indeed proved by these overt acts; and which went the length of conspiring against Richard's life.[[3]]
Arrest of Rivers
The Duke of Buckingham hurried from London with 300 men, to warn Gloucester of his danger, and found him at Northampton on April 29, where he had expected to meet his nephew. They ascertained that Rivers had arrived that very morning with young Edward, and had pushed on to Stony Stratford, fourteen miles nearer London, to avoid a meeting between the boy and his uncle. This made his conduct still more suspicious. Rivers then, with Richard Grey and a portion of his force, returned to Northampton to give some plausible explanation to the two Dukes, while young Edward was to be hurried on to London. Gloucester acted with prompt decision. There was not a moment to lose. A Council was summoned, consisting of the nobles present, and it was resolved that Rivers and his fellow-conspirators should be arrested. The combined companies of Gloucester and Buckingham numbered 900 men. Rivers had a force of 2,000, but he had only brought a portion to Northampton, and his arrest, with his nephew Richard Grey, was effected without resistance. Gloucester then advanced rapidly to Stony Stratford, and was just in time. He found young Edward and his retinue on the point of starting for London. Vaughan and Haute were arrested; and the four prisoners were sent to Yorkshire to await their trials. Lord Rivers was taken to Sheriff Hutton, Grey to Middleham, Vaughan and Haute to Pomfret. Dr. Alcock was not suspected of complicity in the plot. He was a Yorkshireman and a staunch supporter of the White Rose. His subsequent conduct in welcoming King Richard at Oxford, accompanying him in his progress, and giving him the aid of his diplomatic services, proves that Bishop Alcock recognised the justice of that King's accession.[[4]]
The troops of Rivers, now without a leader, submitted to the Duke of Gloucester, who then resumed his journey, in company with his nephew. They reached London on May 4. As soon as the Queen Dowager heard that the plot was discovered, she went into sanctuary at Westminster[[5]] with her son Richard and five daughters. Here she was joined by her other son Dorset.
Young Edward took up his abode at the Bishop's Palace in St. Paul's Churchyard. Gloucester went to reside with his mother, the widowed Duchess of York, at Baynard's Castle. This edifice stood at the foot of St. Andrew's Hill, on the banks of the Thames, a little west of St. Paul's.[[6]] After the death of her noble husband at the battle of Wakefield, in 1460, the Duchess of York took little part in public affairs, although she survived for upwards of 33 years. A happy married life of 22 years was followed by a long and sorrowful widowhood. The wayward and lawless conduct of her eldest son with regard to his matrimonial affairs doubtless caused her constant anxiety, while the death of her son George by the hand of his brother added another pang to the widow's grief.
Richard, so far as appears, can have given his mother neither anxiety nor sorrow. Living happily at Middleham, married to his mother's grand-niece, and always gaining applause and approval whenever he took part in public affairs, he must have been the son from whom his mother derived most comfort. It was natural that, in this crisis of his fortunes, he should have sought counsel and support under that mother's roof, and we may fairly conclude that the subsequent proceedings, which led to Richard's assumption of the crown, had the sanction and approval of the Duchess of York.[[7]] The Duke of Gloucester had been recognised as Protector of the Realm before his arrival in London,[[8]] and on May 13 he summoned a Parliament to meet on the 25th of the following month. When the Duchess of Gloucester reached London on June 5, the Duke left Baynard's Castle, where he had resided with his mother for upwards of a month, and removed to Crosby Place[[9]] with his wife.
Bishop Stillington's revelation
Up to this time affairs had gone smoothly. On June 5 the Protector had given detailed orders for his nephew's coronation on the 22nd, and had even caused letters of summons to be issued for the attendance of forty esquires who were to receive the knighthood of the Bath on the occasion.[[10]] But now there came a change. Dr. Robert Stillington, Bishop of Bath and Wells, apparently on June 8, revealed to the Council the long-concealed fact that Edward IV. was contracted to the Lady Eleanor Butler, widow of a son of Lord Butler of Sudeley, and daughter of the first Earl of Shrewsbury, before he went through a secret marriage ceremony with the Lady Grey.[[11]]
Dr. Stillington thus becomes a very important personage in the history of King Richard's accession; and it will be well to learn all that can be gleaned of his life. He first saw the light in an old brick manor house, which still stands on the right bank of the Ouse at Acaster Selby (then within the parish of Stillingfleet), about nine miles south of York.
The family of Stillington had long been established here, renting land from the Abbot of Selby, when two sons, Thomas and Robert, were born to Thomas Stillington and his wife Catherine, daughter of John Halthorp. Thomas succeeded to the paternal estate, while Robert was destined for the priesthood. He was sent to Oxford, and eventually took the degree of Doctor of Law with great distinction. He was a Fellow of All Souls, and became Rector of St. Michael's, Ouse Bridge, and a Canon of York in 1448 and 1451. Stillington was ever loyal to the cause of the White Rose. At some time in or before 1463, he witnessed the marriage contract which united Edward IV. to the Lady Eleanor Butler; the King strictly charging him not to reveal it. When Edward subsequently went through the same ceremony with the Lady Grey, his mother the Duchess of York, who was in the secret, remonstrated, but without avail. Edward was self-willed and headstrong. The Lady Eleanor retired to a convent in Norwich, where she died on July 30, 1466, and was buried in the Church of the Carmelites.[[12]]
In 1466 Dr. Stillington became Bishop of Bath and Wells, and in the same year Edward IV. made him Keeper of the Privy Seal. On June 8, 1467, he was installed in the high office of Lord Chancellor, in succession to Archbishop Nevill. He delivered a very eloquent and statesmanlike speech at the opening of Parliament in May 1468, which made a deep impression. After holding the office of Chancellor, with dignity and credit, for six years, he resigned, owing to ill-health, in 1473. He was afterwards employed on an embassy to Brittany.
If the Queen Dowager and her relations had any knowledge of the first marriage, Bishop Stillington would be a source of anxiety and fear to them; while they could never be certain who else might know the secret besides the King's mother. We find that the Duke of Clarence was attainted on February 7, 1478, on a series of charges, most of them frivolous and none sufficiently grave to account for his death at the hands of his own brother. There must have been something behind. Mr. Gairdner has suggested that the execution of Clarence was due to his having discovered the secret.[[13]] Certainly that would satisfactorily account for it. The influence of the Woodvilles was paramount, and it would then be a necessity of their continuance in power that Clarence should cease to live. The character of Clarence made it impossible that a secret would be safe with him. His death was the only safe course for the Woodvilles. It is very significant that, at the very time of Clarence's attainder, Bishop Stillington was arrested and imprisoned[[14]] for 'uttering words prejudicial to the King and his State.' He was pardoned in the following June 1478. All this points clearly to the discovery of the first contract by Clarence, and to the utterance of some imprudent speech by the bishop, which was expiated by imprisonment followed by renewed promises of silence.
During the years following his imprisonment, Bishop Stillington appears to have devoted himself to the duties of his diocese. He always retained feelings of affection for the family at Acaster, and for the home of his childhood on the banks of the Ouse. Towards the close of his long and honourable career he founded a collegiate chapel on his brother's land at Acaster, dedicated to St. Andrew, for a provost and fellows, and for free education in grammar, music and writing. The grant was confirmed by King Richard III. in 1483. A fine collegiate church of brick, eighty-seven feet long and twenty-one broad, rose upon the banks of the Ouse, with twenty windows filled with stained glass. It was a memorial of the good bishop, and members of his family in later generations left in their wills that they wished to be buried at St. Andrew's college. The site is now marked by a few grassy mounds.[[15]]
Dr. Stillington was a good and pious bishop, an able statesman, and a most loyal and faithful adherent of the White Rose. His one fault was that he did not ensure his own destruction by proclaiming Edward's secret before that King's death. There was no urgent obligation to do so; but when the time arrived, he was bound to come forward, and he was probably urged by the Duchess of York to publish the truth. Richard had hitherto been ignorant of the early intrigues of his brother. He was only eleven and a half when the widow of Sir J. Grey was taken into favour, and the Butler contract was of a still earlier date.
The announcement must have fallen on Richard and the Council like a thunder clap. It was inevitable that the matter should be thoroughly sifted. There was a prolonged sitting of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal in the Council Chamber at Westminster, on June 9.[[16]] Bishop Stillington 'brought in instruments, authentic doctors, proctors, and notaries of the law, with depositions of divers witnesses.'[[17]] The majority of the Council must have seen at once that the illegitimate son of the late King could not succeed. Such a proceeding would inevitably be the precursor of innumerable troubles. The case was prepared to be laid before the Parliament which was summoned to meet on June 25.
There was, however, a small but powerful minority in the Council, led by Lord Hastings and Bishop Morton, to whom the prospect of losing the openings to their ambition offered by a minority was most distasteful. They commenced opposition[[18]] and began to meet apart, plotting against the Protector's government. This was soon followed by overt acts. Hitherto all orders and grants had been issued 'by the advice of our uncle, Richard Duke of Gloucester, Protector and Defender.' But on the 9th, and again on June 12, the conspirators issued orders without the Protector's name. They were preparing for open hostility. Hastings was intriguing with his former adversaries, the Woodvilles, both at Westminster and in Yorkshire. On June 10 the Duke of Gloucester became thoroughly alarmed. He despatched a letter to his faithful city of York, asking that troops might be sent up to protect and support him. It was delivered on the 15th. On the 11th a similar letter was sent to his cousin, Lord Nevill. Meanwhile, the Hastings faction was not idle. A supersedeas was secretly issued to the towns and counties, ordering the Parliament not to assemble.[[19]] It was received at York on June 21. This was done to delay or prevent the consideration of the question of illegitimacy, and of the evidence submitted by Bishop Stillington. Finally a plot was formed to seize the Protector and put him to death.[[20]]
Conspirators thwarted
The conspiracy was divulged to the Protector by Master William Catesby, who was in the confidence of Hastings. The danger was imminent. It was probably a question of hours. Richard acted with characteristic promptitude and vigour. On June 13 he proceeded in person to the Tower with a body of retainers, and arrested Lord Hastings at the council table on a charge of treason. The conspirators were caught, as it were, red-handed. A proclamation was then issued, giving the details of the plot, but unfortunately no copy remains. Hastings was condemned and executed on June 20, a week after his arrest.[[21]] The danger over, Richard mourned for the loss of his old companion in arms. 'Undoubtedly the Protector loved him well, and was loth to have lost him.'[[22]] A prominent feature in Richard's character was his generosity to the relations of his political opponents. In this respect the conduct which was habitual with him was almost unprecedented in his, and indeed in later times. In the case of Hastings, he at once restored the children in blood, and granted the forfeited estates to the widow. He also liberally rewarded the brother of Hastings for past services, and granted all his requests.
The conspirators in Yorkshire would probably have been pardoned, if they had not joined in this new treason with Hastings. But now an order was sent, through Sir Richard Ratcliffe, for a tribunal to assemble at Pomfret, to try Lord Rivers and his companions. The Earl of Northumberland was president of the court. They were found guilty. The accomplished Earl philosophically prepared for death. He had played for high stakes, had lost, and was ready to pay the penalty. He showed his confidence in the integrity and kindly feeling of the Duke of Gloucester by appointing him supervisor to the will which he made at Sheriff Hutton on June 23.[[23]] The trust was not misplaced. On the 25th, Rivers, Grey, Haute, and Vaughan were beheaded. Those arrested in London, with Hastings, were treated with unwise leniency. The treacherous Stanley was not only pardoned, but rewarded. Bishop Morton was merely taken into custody, and placed in charge of the Duke of Buckingham. Archbishop Rotherham, a weak tool in the hands of the others, after a brief detention, was allowed to return to his diocese.
Jane Shore, the mistress of Dorset, had been the medium of communication between Hastings and the Woodville faction. A penance was imposed upon her by the Church for her vicious life. But she was treated with considerate forbearance by Richard, whom she had tried to injure. He ordered her to be released, and consented, though reluctantly, to her marriage with his Solicitor-General.
The formidable coalition of the two malcontent parties was thus completely broken. The Woodvilles gave up all further resistance to the Protector's government. The Bishop of Salisbury, brother of the Queen-Dowager, and her brother-in-law, Viscount Lisle, came over to his side.[[24]] Elizabeth also, at the intercession of the Archbishop of Canterbury, sent her younger son Richard to join his brother Edward on June 16.[[25]] She herself remained in sanctuary with her daughters for a time, in order to make better terms.
Title to the crown
In spite of the supersedeas which was treacherously sent out by the conspirators to prevent the meeting of Parliament,[[26]] the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons had assembled in London on the day appointed, June 25, and formed what in later times would have been called a Convention Parliament. The proofs of the previous contract of Edward IV. with Lady Eleanor Butler were laid before this assembly by Bishop Stillington and his witnesses, and it was decided by the three Estates of the Realm that the illegitimate son could not succeed to the throne. Owing to the attainder of the Duke of Clarence, his children were not in the succession. The Duke of Gloucester was, therefore, the legal heir: and it was resolved that he should be called upon to accept the high office of King. A statement of the royal title, styled 'Titulus Regius,' was prepared, in which it was set forth that the children of Edward IV. by the Lady Grey were illegitimate owing to that King's previous contract with the Lady Eleanor Butler, that in consequence of the attainder of the Duke of Clarence, his two children were incapacitated; and that Richard, Duke of Gloucester, was the only true and rightful heir to the throne.
The children of Edward IV. being illegitimate, Richard was certainly the legal heir, because the children of Clarence were disabled by law. But their disability could be set aside at any time by a reversal of their father's attainder, or by the removal of any corruption in blood inherited in consequence of that attainder. Edward Earl of Warwick, son of George Duke of Clarence, was the rightful heir to the throne, when the children of Edward were proved to be illegitimate. He was born at Warwick Castle on February 21, 1475, and at this time his age was eight years and four months. But even if Richard had attempted to substitute this child for the son of the late King, it is very unlikely that the assembled notables would have consented. They dreaded, above all things, a long minority. When his own son died prematurely, King Richard showed his sense of the strong claim of his nephew by declaring young Warwick to be his heir.
It is alleged that on Sunday, June 22, 1483, an eminent preacher named Dr. Shaw had delivered a sermon at Paul's Cross, in which he explained the royal title to the people; and that a speech was made to the same effect, by the Duke of Buckingham, at the Guildhall on the 24th. This is not improbable.
On June 26,[[27]] the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons proceeded to Baynard's Castle with the Titulus Regius, to submit their resolution and to petition Richard to assume the crown. He consented. He was then aged thirty years and eight months. On the 27th he delivered the Great Seal to Dr. Russell, Bishop of Lincoln, a prelate celebrated for learning, piety, and wisdom.[[28]] On the 28th a letter was despatched to Lord Mountjoy at Calais, with instructions to acquaint the garrison of the new King's accession, and to secure their allegiance. Richard III. then organised his Council, and surrounded himself with able and upright advisers. There were only two false friends among them—the traitors Buckingham and Stanley.
[[1]] Bernard André, 23. Polydore Virgil, 530 (171, 173 Eng. trans.)
[[2]] Rous, 212. Croyland, 564.
[[3]] Rous says they had contrived the Duke's death, 213. Also the Croyland Monk, 565: 'Conspiratum est contra eos, quod ipsi contrivissent mortem ducis Protectoris Angliæ.'
[[4]] John Alcock was the son of a burgess of Hull, and was educated at the grammar school of Beverley. He graduated at Cambridge in 1461. He was Dean of St. Stephen's, Westminster, and one of the King's Council in 1470, and Bishop of Rochester in 1472. In 1476 he was translated to Worcester, and in 1483 was tutor to young Edward. He was at Oxford to welcome Richard III. after his coronation, and accompanied him on his progress to Warwick. In 1484 he was one of the Commissioners delegated to treat with the Scottish Ambassadors. In 1486 he was translated to Ely, where he built a tower of the Bishop's palace, and a beautiful chapel for his interment. His attachment to the house of York is shown by the ornaments in the vaulting of the basement of the tower, and in the chapel. The rebus on his name (two cocks with their feet on a globe) occurs alternately with the 'rose en soleil,' the badge of Edward IV. Bishop Alcock founded Jesus College at Cambridge. He died at Wisbeach in 1500.
[[5]] Croyland 565. Rous, 213.
[[6]] Baynard's Castle was so called from Baynard, one of the companions of the Conqueror, who had license to fortify his house on Thames bank within the city. It was fortified by his descendant in 1110 A.D. In 1428 it had become the property of the crown and, having been destroyed by fire, it was rebuilt by Humphrey Duke of Gloucester. On his attainder it again reverted to the crown, and was granted to Richard Duke of York. It was long the residence of his widow, and here both Edward IV. and Richard III. accepted the crown. Baynard's Castle was gutted in the Great Fire of 1666. It had long been rented by the Earls of Pembroke, but seems to have been in a ruinous condition. It was probably pulled down during the clearance operations after the fire.
[[7]] One letter has been preserved from Richard III. to his mother, after his accession. It is written in most affectionate terms, and shows deference to her wishes. After her last surviving son's death at Bosworth the Duchess retired from the world entirely, living at her castle of Berkhampstead, under the rules of one of the monastic orders. She died in 1493, and was buried by the side of her husband at Fotheringhay.
[[8]] Mr. Gairdner has pointed out that he was styled Protector in two documents upon the Patent Rolls, dated April 21 and May 2.
[[9]] Crosby Place, in Bishopsgate Street, was built by Alderman Sir John Crosby, who died in 1475. The Duke of Gloucester had a lease of it from Sir John's widow. It must have been a princely residence, and the hall is still one of the finest examples of Perpendicular domestic architecture of the fifteenth century.
[[10]] Rymer, vol. xii. p. 186; Anstis, Obs.; Sir Harris Nicolas, History of the Orders of Knighthood, iii. ix.; Ellis, Original Letters, 2nd series.
[[11]] Comines says that the contract was made by the Bishop of Bath and Wells, who told Comines that he afterwards married Edward and Lady Eleanor. The King charged him strictly not to reveal it. (Phil. de Comines, ii. 157.)
[[12]] Weever's Funeral Monuments.
[[13]] Gairdner's Richard III., p. 91.
[[14]] Rymer, xii. 66. In the papers of the Stonor family there is a letter from Elizabeth Stonor to her husband, dated March 6, 1478, in which she said that the Bishop of Bath had been brought into the Tower since her husband departed.
[[15]] All was destroyed and sold in the reign of Edward VI. (1552). But a view of the ruins, and of a monument of the founder of Acaster College, with a ground plot, is mentioned in Gough's Topography of Yorkshire, 1804, p. 469. Rents at the dissolution 27l. 13s. 4d. Worth 553l. 6s. 8d. Granted in 1552 to John Hulse and William Pendred.
The family of Stillington continued to flourish at Acaster and Kelfield, in the parish of Stillingfleet; greatly improving their estate by a marriage with the heiress of FitzHenry. In 1520 stained glass with the arms of Stillington impaling Bigod, was placed in one of the windows of Stillingfleet church. At that time Dr. Thomas Stillington was a man of great learning, and became Professor of Divinity at the University of Louvain. The Stillingtons continued to flourish at Kelfield Hall throughout the seventeenth century. The last male of the race was young in the days of Queen Anne. There is a portrait of him as a boy, in a classical costume, which was painted by Parmentier in 1708. It is now in the dining room at Moreby Hall. This Joseph Stillington of Kelfield died in 1742. His daughter Dorothy married William Peirse of Hutton Bonville.
[[16]] Stallworthe's letter to Sir W. Stonor. (Excerpt. Hist. p. 16.)
[[17]] Morton, in his account of a conversation with the Duke of Buckingham (Grafton, p. 126).
[[18]] Polydore Virgil, p. 540.
[[19]] Davies, York Records, p. 154. That this supersedeas was issued by the conspirators and not by the Protector's Council is proved by Dr. Russell having actually prepared a speech for the opening of Parliament on June 24. This speech has been preserved. The date of the supersedeas was probably before June 13.
[[20]] Rastell, p. 80,
[[21]] Stallworthe to Sir W. Stonor.
[[22]] Morton, p. 69, in Rastell. This is the evidence of a bitter enemy.
[[23]] The will is given in the Excerpta Historica, pp. 246-248. He also appointed William Catesby, another meritorious but shamefully maligned public servant, to be his executor.
[[24]] 'My Lord Lyle has come to my Lord Protector and waits on him.' Stallworthe's second letter (Excerpt. Hist. p. 16).
[[25]] Croyland, p. 566.
[[26]] Davies, York Records, p. 134.
[[27]] The date of Richard's accession is fixed by the Year Book. 'Les Reports des Cases.' See Davies, York Records, p. 157 n.
[[28]] 'A wise man and a good, and of much experience.'—Morton, in Rastell.