At Hedgeley Moor he found Somerset with all the Lancastrian refugees barring the way. There had mustered all the survivors of the campaigns of 1461-2-3, Roos and Hungerford, and Tailboys Lord of Kyme, and the two traitors Ralph Grey and Ralph Percy. On April 15th their five thousand men fell on Montagu, whose forces were probably about equal. The shock was sharp but short; and when Ralph Percy, who led their van, was struck down, the Lancastrians dispersed. Percy, if the tale be true, refused to fly with the rest, and died crying, "I have saved the bird in my bosom," meaning his loyalty to Henry. He should have remembered his faith a year before, when he swore fealty to Edward at Durham.
Montagu was now able to reach Scotland unmolested. He brought the Scots Commissioners back to York, and a fifteen years' peace was safely concluded, the Scots promising to give no further shelter to the Lancastrians, and the English to disavow the Earls of Ross and Douglas whom they had armed against the Scotch regency. "An the Scots be true, the treaty may continue fifteen years," said the chronicler, "but it is hard to trust Scots: they be ever full of guile and deceit."
Somerset and his followers were now without hope. Their refuge in Scotland was cut off and their Northumbrian strongholds doomed to a speedy fall, for King Edward had been casting all the winter a train of great ordnance such as England had never seen before, and the pieces were already on their way north. Nevertheless the desperate adherents of Lancaster hardened their hearts, gathered their broken bands, and made one last desperate stand for the mastery of the North. On the Linhills, by the town of Hexham, they arrayed themselves against Montagu on May 13th. But when the Yorkists came in sight the hearts of the followers of Somerset failed them. All save five hundred melted away from their banners, and the small band that stayed to fight was broken, beaten, surrounded, and captured by Montagu's four thousand men with perfect ease.
The Lancastrian lords had fought their last field; one and all were slain or captured on the hill a mile outside Hexham town, where they had made their stand. Montagu marked his triumph by the most bloody executions that had been seen throughout the whole war. At Hexham, next day, he beheaded Somerset, Sir Edmond Fitzhugh, a moss-trooping captain called Black Jack, and three more. On the next day but one he slew at Newcastle Lord Roos, Lord Hungerford, and three others. Next day he moved south to his brother's ancestral seat of Middleham, and executed Sir Philip Wentworth and six squires. Finally, he conducted to York and beheaded there Sir Thomas Hussey and thirteen more, the remainder of the prisoners of rank who had come into his hands.
For these sweeping executions Warwick must take part of the blame. But there is this to be said in defence of Montagu's stern justice, that Somerset and three or four others of the victims were men who had claimed and abused Edward's pardon, and that Roos and several more had been spared at the surrender of Bamborough in 1462. The whole body had shown that they could never be trusted, even if they professed to submit to York; and the practical justification of their death lies in the fact that with their execution ceased all attempts to raise the North in favour of the house of Lancaster. Public opinion among the Yorkists had nothing but praise for Montagu. "Lo, so manly a man is this good Lord Montagu," wrote a London chronicler, "he spared not their malice, nor their falseness, nor their guile, nor their treason, but slew many, and took many, and let smite off their heads"!
Even before the battle of Hedgeley Moor King Edward had set out to reinforce Warwick and Montagu. The news of their victories reached him on the way, but he continued to advance, bringing with him the great train of artillery destined for the siege of the Northumbrian fortresses. This journey was important to King Edward in more ways than one. How he spent one day of it, May 1st, when he lay at Stony Stratford, we shall presently see. If Warwick had but known of his master's doings on that morning, we may doubt if he would have been so joyous over his brother's victories or so remorseless with his captured enemies.
The King came up to York in the end of May, "and kept his estate there solemnly in the palace, and there he created John Lord Montagu Earl of Northumberland," in memory of his good service during the last few months, handing over to him, together with the Percy title, the greater part of the great Percy estates—Alnwick and Warkworth and Langley and Prudhoe, and many more fiefs between Tyne and Tweed.
Warwick now advanced northward to complete the work which his brother had begun in the previous month, while the King remained behind in Yorkshire and occupied himself in the capture of Skipton Castle in Craven. On June 23rd the Earl appeared before Alnwick and summoned the place. The Lancastrians had lost their leaders at Hexham, there was no more fight in them, and they surrendered at once on promise of their lives. Dunstanburgh and Norham followed the example of Alnwick. Only Bamborough held out, for there Sir Ralph Grey had taken refuge. He knew that his treachery at Alnwick in the last year could never be pardoned, and utterly refused to surrender. With him was Sir Humphrey Neville, who had so nearly destroyed Montagu two months before.
We happen to have an account of the siege of Bamborough which is not without its interest. When the army appeared before the castle Warwick's herald summoned it in form—
Offering free pardon, grace, body, and livelihood to all, reserving two persons, Sir Ralph Grey and Sir Humphrey Neville. Then Sir Ralph clearly determined within himself to live or die within the place, though the herald charged him with all inconvenience and shedding of blood that might befall: saying in this wise: "My Lord ensureth you upon his honour to sustain this siege before you these seven years so that he win you: and if ye deliver not this jewel, which the King our dread Sovereign Lord hath greatly in favour, seeing it marches so nigh unto his enemies of Scotland, whole and unbroken with ordnance, and if ye suffer any great guns to be laid against it, it shall cost you a head for every gun shot, from the head of the chief man to the head of the least person within." But Sir Ralph departed from the herald, and put him in endeavour to make defence.