The vanguard of the two armies met at Ferrybridge, the passage of the river Aire. The Duke of Somerset was commander-in-chief of the royal army. The king, queen, and prince remained at York. Lord Clifford led the vanguard, and was opposed by Lord Fitzwalter on the part of the Yorkists. The battle at the bridge was furious; Fitzwalter was killed. Lord Falconbridge was instantly sent forward to replace him, and instead of opposing Clifford in front in his strong position, allowing the troops there to hold him in play, he himself crossed the Aire, some miles above Ferrybridge, and falling unexpectedly on the rear of Clifford, routed his force, and revenged the death of Fitzwalter by that of Clifford himself. The Yorkists poured over the bridge, took possession of the town, and advanced towards Towton. Meantime, Warwick, excited by the temporary repulse at the bridge under Fitzwalter, had called for his horse, stabbed him in sight of the whole army, and kissing the hilt of his bloody sword, swore that he would fight on foot, and share every fatigue and disadvantage with the common soldiers.
With minds inflamed to the utmost pitch of animosity, the two armies met on the morning of Palm Sunday, March 29th, in the fields betwixt the villages of Saxton and Towton, about ten miles south of York. Edward issued orders that no quarter should be given, no prisoners taken. The action began at nine o'clock in the morning, under circumstances most unfortunate for the Lancastrians. A snowstorm was blowing full in their faces; and Lord Falconbridge seized at once on this circumstance by an adroit stratagem. He ordered the archers to advance, discharge their arrows, and again retire out of the reach of those of the enemy. The Lancastrians, believing themselves within bow-shot of the enemy, whose arrows did great execution amongst them, returned the compliment without being able to see where their arrows reached for the snowflakes. The Yorkist archers were now out of their range, and they fell useless. Again the Yorkists advanced, and poured in a fresh flight with such effect that the Lancastrians, probably doubting of the success of their own arrows, rushed forward and came hand to hand with their opponents. It was now one terrible clash of swords, battle-axes, and spears, amid the thick-falling and blinding storm; and thus the two infuriated armies continued fighting desperately for nearly five hours. Towards evening the Lancastrians, disheartened by the fall of their principal commanders, broke and fled. They were pursued as far as Tadcaster with the fiercest impetuosity, and fearful slaughter. It was one of the bloodiest battles ever fought in Britain. According to a contemporary historian, those who were employed to number and bury the dead, declared them to be 38,000.
After celebrating the feast of Easter at York, Edward marched to Newcastle, and, leaving Warwick there to keep the north in order, returned to London on the 26th of June.
On reaching Scotland, Margaret placed Henry in a secure retreat at Kirkcudbright, and then hastened to Edinburgh, to try what could be done towards renewing the contest, which no dispersion of her friends and forces could ever teach her to relinquish. There she found a boy sovereign, a divided court, and a country which had suffered by factions almost as deadly as her own. James I., who had seemed to return to his kingdom after his long captivity under such auspicious circumstances—full of intelligence and plans for the improvement of his country, married to the woman of his affections, and courted by both England and France,—was soon murdered by the rude and lawless nobles whom he endeavoured to reduce to some degree of order and subordination. His son, James II., when arrived at years of maturity, endeavoured to recover from distracted England some of the places it had reft from Scotland formerly, but in besieging Roxburgh in 1460, he was killed by the bursting of a cannon. His son was at this time a child of only eight years old, and the kingdom was governed by a council of regency; but the care of the king's person was committed to the queen-mother, Mary of Guelders, who was ambitious of engrossing not only that duty, but the actual powers of the government. In this she was opposed by the powerful family of Douglas.
Margaret had no willing listeners amongst parties who were occupied with their own schemes and feuds. She had the difficult task of appealing to their various interests; and she found no one thing capable of fixing their attention till she hit on the idea of proposing the surrender of Berwick as the price of Scotland's assistance. That key of the northern frontiers of England, for the possession of which so much blood had been spilled from age to age, was an object the proposed recovery of which at once gave her the command of the ears of the whole court. In addition to this, she offered a marriage betwixt her son, Edward, Prince of Wales, and the eldest sister of the young King of Scotland. These treaties were carried into effect, and Berwick was put into the hands of the Scots on the 25th of April, 1461.
Edward, on his return to London, was crowned on the 29th of June. He then summoned a Parliament to meet at Westminster on the 6th of July, but an invasion appearing not improbable, he prorogued it till the 4th of November. The sword and the scaffold had already so thinned the nobility that only one duke, four earls, one viscount, and twenty-nine barons were summoned to this Parliament. The great battle of Towton, which had laid so many of them low, had rendered the rest very submissive. There was no longer any hesitating betwixt the two families, or seeking of those compromises which, in the end, only produced more discord. Whatever Edward dictated was accepted as law and constitution. Of course Henry IV. was declared to have been an arrant usurper; and his posterity were held incapable, not only of wearing the crown, but of enjoying any estate or dignity in any portion of the British dominions for ever. Henry VI., Margaret, Edward, called Prince of Wales, the Dukes of Somerset and Exeter, the Earls of Northumberland, Devonshire, and Pembroke, and a vast number of lords, knights, and gentlemen, were attainted. Edward IV. was proclaimed to be the only rightful king; and all those of the York party who had been declared traitors by the Lancaster party when it was uppermost, and expelled from honours and estates, were restored.
Meanwhile, nothing daunted, Margaret was exerting her ingenuity to rouse a party in Scotland. She pleaded to deaf ears. Her surrender of Berwick brought her no real assistance; and she now sent over Somerset to endeavour to obtain succour from France. All these efforts were equally vain. Charles VII. died in 1461, and his successor, Louis XI., was immovable. Somerset, her ambassador, returned completely unsuccessful. He and his attendants had, indeed, been arrested by Louis when they attempted to escape in the guise of merchants, for fear of the despicable king giving them up to Edward to propitiate his favour. It was only through the earnest intercession of the Count of Charolais, the son of the Duke of Burgundy, that they were liberated. Louis XI. was cousin-german to both Margaret and Henry VI.; but such relationships weigh nothing with selfish men, in comparison to their own immediate interests. While this unwelcome news was arriving, Margaret was rendered the more uneasy and unsafe by the appearance of Warwick at the court of Scotland, proposing a marriage betwixt the Scottish queen and the victorious Edward of England. Under these circumstances, neither Margaret nor Henry was safe. She resolved, therefore, to make one more effort with Louis of France, and a personal one. By means of a French merchant, who owed her some kindness for past benefit, she managed to get over to France, where she threw herself at the feet of Louis, who was at Chinon in Normandy. She was only able to reach his court by the assistance of the Duke of Brittany, who gave her 12,000 crowns.
Margaret agreed to surrender the rights of the crown in Calais, and that Henry should do the same. And what was to be the price of this sacrifice—this sacrifice of this proud stronghold of England, this sacrifice of her own honour, and this last remaining fragment of her good fame in Britain? The paltry sum of 20,000 livres! That was all she could squeeze from the miserable French king for this intensely desired object. True, he had it still to win, for it was not in the possession of Margaret or her husband; but the acknowledged purchase from the Lancastrian king would give him great weight in any attempts to compel the surrender, and if Henry did again recover his throne, Calais must be made over to him at once.
EDWARD IV.