The Girls' Book of Famous Queens

by Lydia Hoyt Farmer

At this time the Yorkists were defeated, but again they rallied and seized upon London.

The queen once more brought her sick husband to her harbor of Coventry; and, as he regained his strength, she rallied round the banner of the Red Rose many of the heirs of the valiant earls who had fallen at St. Albans, and she induced the king to leave Coventry, and encamp with his army near Sandifford. The Lancastrians and the Yorkists met in battle, July 9, 1460, near Northampton. In the conflict which lasted two hours, ten thousand Englishmen were slain, and King Henry was taken prisoner.

Queen Margaret was not herself in the battle, but was stationed with the young prince, Edward, her son, where she could view the field and communicate with her generals. Perceiving the disastrous result of the contest, Margaret fled with the young prince to a castle in North Wales.

Meanwhile, the Duke of York had taken King Henry to London as his prisoner, and there compelled him to sign an order, commanding Queen Margaret and the prince to return to London under penalty of high treason; and Henry was furthermore forced to acquiesce in an arrangement that he should wear the crown for his life, but that, upon his death, the Duke of York and his heirs should succeed to the right of the throne.

But Margaret was not thus to be ordered by the haughty Duke of York and his party against her royal will. When she received this summons, she was in Scotland, seeking aid from the Scotch king; and her brave answer was to march with a large army against York; and she drove him to his strong castle, where he intended to await the coming of his son Edward, with reinforcements. But Margaret surrounded his castle, and, by challenge and taunts, urged him to come forth to battle. The Duke of York, whose pride was at length stung by the defiant taunts of a woman, gave her battle, and in the contest he was killed.

One of the royalists afterwards cut off the head from the corpse of the Duke of York, and brought this bloody trophy to Queen Margaret, who at first beheld it with horror, and then laughingly said: “Put the traitor’s head on York gate, and take care that room be left for those of the earls of March and Warwick, which, forsooth, shall soon keep him company.”

Queen Margaret now pushed on towards London, flushed with her recent success, determined to rescue King Henry from the power of the Yorkists. The Earl of Warwick came out from the metropolis, bearing in his train the royal prisoner, and met the forces of Queen Margaret on the old battle-field of St. Albans. The Yorkists held the town, but the royalists penetrated the streets, and a hand-to-hand fight ensued. Warwick’s Londoners were no match for the brave Northmen who fought for Queen Margaret, and the Yorkists were forced to fly, leaving King Henry sitting in his tent. Here he was found by Queen Margaret and Prince Edward, and his brave queen and son embraced him with joy; and King Henry thereupon knighted the young Prince of Wales, and many valiant Lancastrians, for their valor. But Margaret’s triumphs did not long continue. St. Albans was won, but not London.

The victorious young warrior, Edward, Earl of March, eldest son of the late Duke of York, who now bore his father’s title, having conquered the Lancastrians in other contests while Margaret routed the Yorkists at St. Albans, now entered London with all the pomp of a triumphant king, and was received by the people with acclamations of delight; for Margaret had injudiciously allowed her Northern men to plunder the English, and had therefore incurred their hatred; so that now she was again forced to seek refuge in the North, while Edward of York was proclaimed king, as Edward IV. In a short time an army of sixty thousand men was raised in behalf of Margaret, and commanded by Henry Beaufort, who was now Duke of Somerset, and another intrepid noble, Lord Clifford, who had killed the youngest son of the Duke of York, and cut off the head from the dead body of the father, in the contest between the Lancastrians and Yorkists, when the Duke of York had been slain. By the advice of these nobles Margaret remained with her husband and son in the city of York; while the army of the Red Rose went forth to battle with the forces of the White Rose, under the banner of the young Edward of York.

The Lancastrians were defeated at Ferrybridge and Towton, and Queen Margaret then fled with King Henry and their son to Newcastle, and from thence to Alnwick Castle. As the Yorkists still approached, she retreated to Scotland. At length Margaret and her son went to France to seek aid from King Louis XI. Upon Margaret’s promising to offer Calais as security, King Louis lent her twenty thousand crowns, and permitted Brezé, of Normandy, to follow her with two thousand men.

With this little army Margaret returned to Scotland and rallied her Scotch adherents; and bringing King Henry into the field, who had previously been hiding at Harleck Castle, the brave, undaunted queen conquered the strong fortresses of Bamborough, Alnwick, and Dunstanburgh.