A Popular History of England, From the Earliest Times to the Reign of Queen Victoria; Vol. II

by François Guizot

Suddenly, towards the end of August, 1451, the Duke of York appeared at the court without giving a reason for having quitted Ireland, and after a short visit to the king, retired to his castle at Fotheringay. Henry VI. endeavoured to place in opposition to him the Duke of Somerset, the head of the younger branch of the House of Lancaster; but the duke was under suspicion, as a favourite of the queen, and too much ill feeling existed against him for the loss of Normandy for it to be possible to counterbalance the influence of the Duke of York. In the Parliament, which opened in November, the proposal was made in the House of Commons to declare the Duke of York heir to the throne, as the king had no children. The author of the proposal was sent to the Tower, and projects menacing to the liberty of the Duke of York began to circulate. He retired into Shropshire, where he assembled together some troops, while protesting his fidelity towards the king. Whilst an army was marching against him, he advanced upon London; the gates of that city were closed to him, and it was at Dartford, that he met the king. After some peaceful negotiations, York repaired alone to the royal tent, but was immediately arrested there. The Duke of Somerset wished for a summary trial and execution; but the king athwart the mists of his intellect had a horror of blood, so he sent the Duke of York to the Tower. He was soon released upon the rumour of the approach of his son, the Earl of March, at the head of an army. He promised to be faithful to the king, and he was left free to return to his castle at Wigmore. The Duke of Somerset remained at the head of the government.

A movement in favour of the English had manifested itself in Guienne. The brave Talbot was despatched thither, notwithstanding his eighty years, at the head of a small army of picked men. Bordeaux surrendered easily, and the red cross of England reappeared in the greater number of the southern towns, when King Charles VII. entered with his troops into the province. He had assembled together considerable forces, and was laying siege to Castillon, when Talbot resolved to relieve the town; he made the attack on the 30th of July, 1453, and was about to carry the position, when the Count of Ponthieu fell upon him with reinforcements; the English retreated, and Talbot was slain. The French army presented itself before Bordeaux; the garrison held out bravely during two months; hunger compelled it to capitulate, and on the 10th of October, the English soldiers, accompanied by a great number of citizens of the place, embarked for England. Guienne was henceforth French; and the last fragment of the inheritance of Eleanor of Aquitaine had slipped from her descendants.

The mental derangement of King Henry VI. continued to increase, and the Parliament had recalled the Duke of York to the council. A son had been born to Queen Margaret; she had from that circumstance, assumed more pride and a more fixed determination to govern at her pleasure. Meanwhile the Commons had obtained the impeachment of the Duke of Somerset, who had been sent to the Tower. The Parliament of 1454 was opened by the Duke of York as the lieutenant of the king. For some time past, efforts had in vain been made to ascertain the real state of King Henry; twelve peers, who contrived to be admitted to him on the occasion of the death of the chancellor, found him incapable of understanding a word or of replying to their questions. Upon their report, the Parliament nominated Richard of York Protector and defender of the throne of England, upon condition of resigning his dignity in favour of the Prince of Wales, as soon as the latter should attain his majority. York protested his loyalty, and furnished proof of it in the following year, when the king, having recovered his reason, reclaimed the royal power. The first use which he made of his recovered authority was to release the Duke of Somerset. The poor monarch endeavoured to reconcile the two rival Houses; but the Duke of York shortly afterwards affected to believe himself in danger, and again raised some troops. The king with Somerset marched against him; a battle began in the very streets of St. Alban's. The archers of the Duke of York were good marksmen: the Duke of Somerset, the Earl of Northumberland, Lord Clifford, fell beneath their arrows; and the king himself was wounded. York, seeking him after the victory, found him in bed, in the house of a tanner, and both repaired together to the church, the victor treating the vanquished king with respect. The Duke did not immediately take advantage of his success, but contented himself with appearing before the Parliament as the lieutenant of the king. The Commons, however, claimed for him the title of Protector, and imposed their will upon the Lords. With the moderation which had always characterized his political conduct, York contented himself with consigning to trustworthy hands some important offices, entrusting the custody of Calais to his brother-in-law and faithful friend, the Earl of Warwick; but he did not wreak revenge upon his enemies, and resigned the power to the king without objection at the beginning of 1456, when the monarch, again cured, wished to take back the authority. Soon, however, Queen Margaret everywhere replaced the friends of York by her favourites; the duke then retired to his estates, and the great men of his party did likewise, for the relatives of the noblemen slain at St. Alban's spoke aloud of vengeance.

Hopes were still entertained of arriving at some arrangement. In his moments of reason, the king was gentle, charitable, and humane; he endeavoured to re-establish peace around him. York and Warwick had again protested their fidelity towards him. Henry placed himself as arbitrator between the two parties, and decreed certain fines and reparations towards the families of the victims. The victors of St. Alban's accepted these conditions; the king, the queen, the Duke of York, and all the Yorkist and Lancastrian noblemen solemnly repaired to St. Paul's Cathedral; the Duke of York offered his hand to the queen. The Earl of Warwick however had remained at Calais.

Fresh quarrels soon brought about fresh insurrections. The two parties reciprocally felt too great a distrust ever to live in peace. In the month of September, 1459, the Earl of Salisbury, brother of Warwick, united his forces to those of the Duke of York, and, after a bloody combat in the environs of Drayton, in Shropshire, where the Lancastrians were defeated, the Earl of Warwick repaired to England with some troops which he had carefully gathered at Calais; but scarcely did his soldiers find themselves in front of the royal standard, when a loyal instinct carried them off into the ranks of the army of Henry VI. The strength of the Duke of York no longer allowed him to keep the field, and on the 20th of November the Parliament convoked by the queen at Coventry accused of high treason the whole families of the Duke of York and the Earl of Salisbury. Warwick retired to Calais, taking with him his brother. When the governor sent by Queen Margaret to supplant him appeared before the town, he was repulsed, and the troops that he had brought went over to Warwick. At the end of June, 1460, the earl reappeared in England; the eldest son of the Duke of York marched at his side. The battle of Northampton placed the poor king in the hands of his enemies, and the queen was compelled to fly with her son into Scotland. A mass of great Lancastrian noblemen had remained upon the field of battle. In opposition to the great warriors of the preceding centuries, Warwick, the real chief of the Yorkist party, had a maxim to spare the common people, but strike his enemies ruthlessly, taking for his victims the men of distinction. Thanks to this practice, imitated by his adversaries, all the great families of England found themselves decimated during the Wars of the Roses.

A new Parliament had been convoked at Westminster. The throne was empty in the House of Lords, when the Duke of York entered therein. He advanced at first resolutely, placed his hand upon the cloth of gold which covered the royal seat, then fell back without mounting it. He was resolved, however, to establish his rights. The Archbishop of Canterbury inquired of him whether he did not intend to pay a visit to the king, who was in the palace adjoining. "I know no one in this kingdom who should not pay me a visit first," replied the duke; and he established himself in the royal apartment, while Henry occupied that of the queen.

The peers had not responded to this indirect appeal, and on the 16th of October York despatched a message to them, formally laying claim to the crown. The Lords replied that they could not give an opinion without the advice and consent of the king. Now that he was separated from the queen, who had become more and more unpopular, public feeling began to be agitated in favour of Henry, who was regarded as a saint. But the Duke of York required an answer. When the peers repaired to the captive king, he reminded them that he had received, when quite a child, a crown which had been borne with honour by his father and his grandfather; that it had reposed for forty years upon his brow, and that those even who now wished to snatch it from him, had on several occasions sworn fidelity to him. To these substantial reasons were added attacks against the hereditary rights of the Duke of York, imprudent and puerile conduct which so greatly embarrassed the peers that they called to their aid the judges, then the sergeants of the House, who knew not how to give their advice. On the 23rd the Lords presented their objections, frivolous for the most part, with the exception of the oaths taken by all the peers to the House of Lancaster. A compromise was arrived at in the matter; Warwick and York used moderation, and the crown was assured to King Henry during his lifetime. After him it was to return to Richard, duke of York, and his descendants, to the exclusion of the son of Margaret of Anjou.

The negotiators of this curious treaty had reckoned without the queen. She had quitted Scotland, and was endeavouring to assemble all her partisans and defend the rights of her son. Already the hills and valleys bristled with lances. The Lancastrians were under the sons of the noblemen killed at St. Albans: the Duke of Somerset, the Earl of Northumberland and Lord Clifford were there, thirsting for revenge, notwithstanding all the treaties of pacification. The Duke of York commanded his troops in person; he was as bold upon the field of battle as he was hesitating and prudent in the council. On the 30th of December, 1460, he attacked the enemy at Wakefield, in Yorkshire, with inferior forces, and was completely defeated. He remained himself among the dead, and his friend, the Earl of Salisbury, who was made prisoner in the flight, was beheaded the same day at Pontefract. The little Earl of Rutland, second son of the duke, was flying with his tutor, when he was arrested upon Wakefield Bridge by Lord Clifford. The child speechless with terror, threw himself upon his knees. "It is the son of the Duke of York," cried the priest who accompanied him. "Thy father killed mine," said the fierce baron, "I will kill thee therefore, thee and thine." And plunging his dagger into the bosom of the young prince, he despatched the chaplain to carry to his mother the fearful news. England was not yet accustomed to these scenes of slaughter, and a long cry of horror arose in the country when the news of the death of Rutland was known, and when above the gates of York was seen the disfigured head of the duke, surmounted by a crown of paper. Margaret and her partisans had become intoxicated with the cup of revenge, without thinking of the terrible reprisals which awaited them. Already the young Earl of March, the eldest son of the Duke of York, had gained, on the 1st of February at Mortimer's Cross, near Wigmore, a bloody victory, where perished a great number of royalists. All the prisoners of mark, amongst whom was Owen Tudor, father-in-law of King Henry VI., were beheaded after the battle, as though to appease the shades of the Yorkists who had fallen at Wakefield.