The engagement with the Spaniards related in this letter was looked upon as a victory by the English. The next year there was another naval battle in which after a running two days’ chase three out of five Genoese and Spanish ships were captured and brought into Calais, and Warwick became a naval hero to his countrymen.
On June 24, 1460, with Salisbury and March, Warwick landed at Sandwich, which Fauconberg had previously captured and held for the Duke of York. John Jernyngan, as we must now call him, was of course of the party. On July 2 they were in London, and on the 10th their army faced the army of the Red Rose in the meadows near Northampton.
The King’s position was well protected by the crude artillery of that day, but there was a heavy rain storm and the pieces could not be discharged. The Lord Grey of Ruthven turned traitor to the King and assisted the advance of the young Earl of March who soon opened the way for the Yorkists. Buckingham, Shrewsbury, Beaumont, Egremont and Sir William Lucy with three hundred other Lords, knights and squires were killed and Henry was captured and taken to London.
In 1461, John was present at the rout of the Yorkists at the second battle of St. Albans and escaped with difficulty. In March of the same year he also took part in the decisive battle of Towton where the hopes of Henry the sixth and his Queen found their grave. This was a fiercely fought field where the mallets of lead crushed many a skull. In the nick of time the troops of the Duke of Norfolk arrived and the Lancastrians broke and fled. John had been in the front of the fighting, towering above the heads of the other knights and esquires with the exception of the new King Edward IV who was a mighty man and handsome. The slaughter was terrible. “No Quarter!” was the order, and most of those captured were promptly beheaded.
After the pursuit was at an end John returned to Saxton where he found the King who said:
“Thou art a valiant soldier. Kneel!”
Then he smote John gently on the back with his sword and said:
“Rise, Sir John Jernyngan! The field is won. Go now to thy people in Norfolk.”
It may be imagined that this command of the King was promptly obeyed. When John arrived he discovered that the news of his new honor had preceded him. There were great rejoicings in which Blanche participated. To her he seemed a different man—older, more sedate, of greater knowledge, more to be admired and respected. She began to wonder what were his thoughts? and above all what he thought of her, but he gave at first no sign. In fact the slaughter after the battle had sobered him. It was borne in upon him that the King was cruel and that trouble must come. From boy he had become a man, accustomed to command and self-reliant. Like the moth near the flame Blanche was attracted and then repelled. She began to dream, and he figured in her dreams. She was a beautiful girl, much courted and a trifle spoiled, but John seemed to her stronger, handsomer and better than her other men friends. He never wavered in kindness but said little. She became bolder and he met her advances. Soon she found herself hopelessly in love.
In those days love was not alone the concern of the lovers. Fathers and mothers, often overlords, and even sometimes the King, must be consulted. When all these tedious matters had been arranged there was a great wedding at Warwick Castle, where Anne insisted the ceremony must be performed. The Bishop of Canterbury said mass and married the couple in the presence of the King, the Earl of Warwick and many of the nobility.