York, Edmund Plantagenet, First Duke.
Sixth son (but fourth who reached manhood) of Edward the Third and Philippa of Hainault Born at Langley, June 5th, 1341; baptised by Nicholas Abbot of Saint Albans; and committed to the care of Joan de Oxenford, Agnes de La Marche, and Margery de Wyght. He was brought up in the nursery palace at Chilterne, or Children’s Langley, Herts. On the 8th of February, 1362, ambassadors were appointed to contract marriage between Edmund and Margaret Duchess of Burgundy. The marriage was appointed to take place at Bruges, February 4th, 1365; but Pope Urban refused to grant a dispensation (urged by the King of France, who wanted the Princess for his son), and the negotiations came to nothing. Edmund was created Earl of Cambridge and Lord of Teviotdale, November 14th, 1362. In 1366 his name appears in the marriage treaty of his brother Lionel with Violante Visconti of Milan, which provided that Edmund should be substituted for Lionel if his brother died before the marriage. From 1369 to 1371 the Earl was on the Continent with his brothers, the Black Prince and the Duke of Lancaster. It was at Rochefort, near Bordeaux, about November, 1369, that Edmund first saw his future wife, the Infanta Isabel of Castilla; but he did not marry her until 1372. In 1374 he was Governor of Bretagne; Constable of Dover and Warden of the Cinque Ports, July 12th, 1376. At the coronation of Richard the Second, July 16th, 1377, Edmund was second of the homagers, and walked next but one after the King. In May, 1381, he sailed for Portugal, accompanied by his wife and eldest son. Little was done in respect of the errand on which he had gone—the furtherance of the Infanta’s claims to Castilla; and he came back, disappointed, in October, 1382. He was created Duke of York, at Hoselow Lodge, August 6th, 1385, “by cincture of sword and imposition of gold coronet on his head.” (Harl. Ms. 298, folio. 84, b.) A grant of 1000 pounds per annum was made to him on the 15th of November following. During the long struggle between the various members of the Royal Family, York always sided with Gloucester, except when Lancaster was present. In 1388 he was co-surety (with Gloucester, Derby, and others) for 5000 borrowed from the Londoners for Gloucester’s purposes. (Rot. Pat. 11 R. II, Part 2.) The King visited him at Langley, April 18th, 1389. About September, 1391, he and his brother of Lancaster concluded a truce with France. His first wife died, and he married the second, in 1393. (See subsequent articles.) He was created Regent of England, for the first time, September 29th, 1394, during the King’s first voyage to Ireland. King Richard relieved him of this charge by returning home about May 11th, 1395. His second regency was from August 6th, 1396, to about November 14th following. It was by the advice of Lancaster and York—but the latter was really the mere echo of the former,—that Gloucester was arrested, August, 1397. Some of his brother Gloucester’s lands were granted to York. After this, both York and Lancaster retired from Court to their own country homes. In 1399, on the death of Lancaster, York was created Steward of England pro tem, “until Henry Earl of Derby shall sue for the same.” (Rot. Pat. 22 R. II, Part 2.) In May, 1399, he was created Regent for the third and last time. About the 7th of July he met, and at once went over to, his rebellious and banished nephew, Henry of Lancaster. He was present at Henry the Fourth’s coronation, and remained a guest at Court for the rest of that year, where we find him several times during 1400. On November 25th, 1400, he made his will; and in 1401 he was received into the fraternity at Canterbury. His last recorded visit to Court was on the opening of Parliament, January 20th, 1402; and on the following first of August he died at Langley, aged 61. He was buried in the Church of the Friars Predicants, Langley. Edmund was unquestionably a weak man, both in character and abilities: indeed, Froissart goes so far as to hint that he was deficient in intellect. (Book four, chapter 73.) His being made Regent by no means disproves this; for the post was chiefly honorary, and his brother Lionel had filled it when only seven years old. For his wives see the later articles.
York, Edward Plantagenet, Second Duke.
Eldest son of Edmund Duke of York and Isabel of Castilla; born probably about New Year’s Day, 1373. He accompanied his parents to Portugal in May, 1382, and was formally affianced to the Infanta Beatriz; but her father subsequently broke off the engagement, by dispensation from the Pope, and married her to the rival King of Castilla. King Richard was deeply attached to him, or perhaps rather to the ideal being whom he believed him to be. He granted him the stewardship of Bury, January 22nd, 1390; created him Earl of Rutland, May 2nd, in the same year; gave him the reversion of the Constableship of the Tower, January 27th, 13925 employed him in embassy to France, February 26th, 1394, and again, July 1395; created him Constable of England, July-12th, 1397, and Duke of Aumerle, September 29th, 1397. A grant was made to him from the lands of Archbishop Arundel, September 27th; and his patent as Constable of the Tower was renewed, October 30th. In May, 1399, he went with the King to Ireland. When Lancaster’s rebellion broke out, Aumerle merely waited to make sure which was the winning side, and then went over to his cousin Henry without a thought of the Sovereign who had styled him “brother,” and had been the author of all his prosperity. In the midst of the tumult his patent as Constable of the Tower was once more renewed, August 31st. At the coronation of Henry the Fourth, Aumerle was one of the peers who held the canopy. He is named as one of those who requested the usurper to put the King to death. How he betrayed his friends at Maidenhead Bridge is recounted in the text. Henry the Fourth trusted Aumerle as he trusted few others, in a manner incomprehensible to any one acquainted with the character of either. On March 10th, 1400, he pardoned Aumerle’s debts; then he made him Lord Lieutenant of Ireland; and then Governor of Aquitaine. Edward became Duke of York by his father’s death, August 1st, 1402. The next escapade of this singular individual was to address to Queen Jeanne a series of verses, painfully laboured, of which the first is the least uncouth, and even that halts in the rhyme.
“Excellent Sovereign seemly to see,
Proved prudence peerless of price,
Bright blossom of benignity,
Of figure fairest, and freshest of days!”
It is evident that Nature never intended Edward for a poet. His next adventure was a futile endeavour to scale the wall of Eltham Palace, and seize the King; and the third was his share in Constance’s theft of the Mortimers. He and his sister were both arrested, and all his lands, goods, and chattels confiscated. He was sent to Pevensey Castle, and there placed in keeping of Sir John Stanley; but his imprisonment was not long, for on the fourth of November he was free and in London. Perhaps his experience was useful in curbing his plotting temper, for he kept very quiet after this, and we hear of him next engaged in a pious and orthodox manner, founding Fotheringay College. York did not sit on the bench at his brother’s trial; he had the grace to prefer a proxy in the person of Dorset. He made his will August 22nd, 1415, wherein he styled himself “of all sinners the most wicked;” desired to be buried at Fotheringay, and ordered that the expenses of his funeral should not exceed 100 pounds. His death took place at Agincourt, October 25th, 1415, in the manner described in the text; and his obsequies were celebrated at London on the 1st of December. He married Philippa, daughter and co-heir of John Lord Mohun of Dunster, and his wife Joan Burghersh, one of the most eminent Lollards of her day. Philippa was married (1) before March 6th, 1382 (Reg. Joh’is Ducis Lanc, folio 60, b), to Walter, Lord Fitzwalter; (2) between 1386 and 1393, to Sir John Golafre; (3) after 1397, to Edward Duke of York; and according to some authors (4) after 1415, to John Vescy. She died July 17th, 1431. (Inq. Post Mortem 10 H. VI, 45; Ph’ae. Ducissa Ebor.)
York, Isabel of Castilla, Duchess.
Third and youngest daughter of Don Pedro the First, surnamed The Cruel, and Maria Padilla, whose marriage is usually considered a fiction by modern writers, though Pedro himself solemnly affirmed it, and their daughters were treated as Princesses through life. Isabel was born at Morales or Tordesillas, in 1355. In 1365, when Don Pedro fled before his rebel brother, he was accompanied by his third wife, Juana, and his three daughters, Beatriz, Constanga, and Isabel. They fled from Sevilla to Bayonne, and did not return to Sevilla till 1368, after the victory of Navareta. After the loss of the battle of Montiel and the murder of their father, in 1369, the Princesses were hastily taken again by their guardians to Bayonne. Constancy was married to John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, at Rochefort, near Bordeaux, about November, 1369. Isabel remained with her sister, and accompanied her to England in 1371. In 1372—between January 1st and April 30th—she married Edmund Earl of Cambridge, the brother of her sister’s husband. It was at Hertford, March 1st, 1372, that John of Gaunt and Constanca assumed the titles of King and Queen of Leon and Castilla; and as sixteen months had then elapsed since their own marriage, the probability seems to be that this date marks the marriage of Isabel, and the consent of her bridegroom to the exclusive assumption of queenship by the elder sister. (The other and really eldest sister, Beatriz, had become a nun.) Isabel is alluded to as Edmund’s wife on April 30th, 1372. In May, 1381, she accompanied her husband to Portugal, on an expedition undertaken with the object of securing the recognition of herself and her sister as the true heirs of Castilla. The expedition failed; and Isabel returned to England with her husband in October, 1382.
Several pardons appear on the rolls, granted at the instance of Isabel. Doña Juana Fernandez, who appears in the story, was at first one of her damsels, but in 1377 became Mistress of the Household. Isabel became Duchess of York, August 6th, 1385. Her will was made December 6th, 1389. A grant of 100 pounds was given to her, October 3rd, 1390, to pay her debts; but notwithstanding this and further grants of money, she was still obliged to borrow 400 from her brother-in-law of Lancaster, January 25th, 1393. This was her last recorded act, for on the third of February she was dead. (Rot. Ex. Michs, 14 R. II; Compotus Soberti de Whitteby, 1392-3, folio 19; Rot. Pat. 16 R. II, Part 3.)—Much misconception exists as to the terms of her will. She is represented by some writers as having been driven to provide for her son Richard by the purchase of the King’s favour, having bequeathed all her goods to his Majesty on a species of compulsion. The fact is that she bequeathed to him her son and her goods together, requesting him to provide for the one from the proceeds of the other. She made the King simply trustee for her boy, his own godson. And how much King Richard gained or lost by the transaction is set down in plain figures: for the jewels, etcetera, bequeathed by Isabel sold for 666 pounds 13 shillings 4 pence—just two years’ income of the annuity paid for seven years (the rest of his reign) to Richard. (Rot. Ex, Michs, 17 R. II.) The monastic chroniclers speak of Isabel in terms of unqualified contempt—particularly Walsingham, who invariably vilifies a Lollard. And that she was a Lollard few can doubt who read her will with attention. Possibly the entire accusation brought against her in early life is a calumny; possibly it is a fact. Many women that were sinners have washed Christ’s feet with tears; and perhaps they will not be found the lowest in the kingdom of Heaven.