But her triumph was of short duration. Somerset soon after surrendered the castle of Bamborough to Warwick, on condition that he should receive a pension from King Edward; Suffolk and Exeter also swore homage to the throne of Edward. But notwithstanding these treacheries, Margaret still courageously struggled, and at length succeeded in winning back Somerset and Exeter to the banner of the Red Rose; but Somerset was, after all, a poor support, and in the contest which followed at Hexham his weak generalship caused a total rout of the Lancastrian army. Margaret fled with the young prince to the Scottish border, taking with her all the jewels and treasures she could secure; but these were all stolen from her by a band of banditti who attacked her small company of friends; and while the ruffians, with drawn swords, were fighting for the plunder, Margaret escaped with her son alone in the dense forest: here night closed over them. They had neither of them tasted food since early in the day. To add to her distress, poor Margaret did not know whether her husband was dead or alive, as they had fled from Hexham in different directions. Every tree in that dark forest seemed to the terrified queen’s fancies an armed foe, seeking the life of herself and child. Suddenly, as the moon broke through the obscuring clouds, she perceived a gigantic man advancing towards her. For a moment her heart stood still for very horror, but with the danger came also courage; and, filled with a sudden inspiration of sublime action, she advanced with calm majesty to the outlaw, leading her son by the hand, and with the manner of a queen whose right it was to command, and in tones thrilling with overpowering fervor, she presented her child, saying:—
“Here, my friend, save the son of your king! to your loyalty I intrust him. Take him, and conceal him from those who seek his life. Give him refuge in thine own hiding-place.”
The appeal of the brave queen was not in vain. The outlaw, who chanced to be a ruined Lancastrian, well remembered his much-loved queen. Right royally this knight of the forest received his honored guests; raising the poor tired little prince in his strong arms, he led the way to his hidden cave. Here the royal fugitives were refreshed and waited upon by the wife of the Lancastrian outlaw: this retreat has since been called “Queen Margaret’s Cave.” Here she was found three days after by Brezé and the Duke of Exeter and other friends; and learning from them that her husband was alive, she went with them to Scotland; then finding no safety there, sailed for France. Storms drove her into the dominions and power of her father’s old foe, the Duke of Burgundy. Although Margaret had declared in the days of her prosperity, that if she should ever get the Duke of Burgundy into her power, she would make the “axe pass between his head and shoulders,” nevertheless this family foe showed himself to be a true knight and worthy gentleman, for he not only received her but gave her hospitality; and though he would not listen to her entreaties in behalf of her husband, he gave her twelve thousand crowns, and bestowed many favors upon her companions in distress, and forwarded her in safety to her father’s duchy of Bar. Here for seven years Margaret, no longer a queen, except in name, resided with her son, the prince, in her father’s dominions, who, on account of the ruinous contests in which he and his son were engaged with Aragon, could offer her only an asylum. Her father René was little fitted by nature for the severe and ferocious times in which he lived. He was a poet, artist, and musician of rare talent, and his chansons are still sung by his native Provençals. At length, King Edward of England quarrelled with the Earl of Warwick, one of the strongest supporters of the Yorkists; and that nobleman came to France with others of his adherents to seek the aid of King Louis XI.
Margaret was summoned to the French court, and it was there arranged that she should pawn Calais to Louis XI., and that her son Edward, who was now a youth, should be married to the daughter of the Earl of Warwick, the Lady Anne Nelville. Thus Warwick espoused the cause of the Red Rose, and a new expedition was prepared for the invasion of England. Warwick was at first successful. King Edward fled; Henry VI. was released from his restraint in the Tower, where he had been held as a royal prisoner; but having been treated with kindness, and weary of conflict, he was not overjoyed at his restoration. Margaret prepared to go to England with her son, the Prince of Wales, and his young bride Anne. But furious storms again overtook her, and ere she landed at Weymouth, her fortune had again forsaken her. When the dreadful news reached her of the death of Warwick and recapture of King Henry, she fell in a swoon, and upon regaining consciousness, refused for a long time to be comforted. At length she was visited by Lancastrian nobles, who persuaded her to again unfurl the banner of the Red Rose.
At Tewkesbury the fatal battle was fought which laid the Red Rose in the dust. Upon this battle-field the last hope of the unfortunate queen perished forever. The brave young Prince of Wales was taken prisoner; and being brought into the presence of King Edward, the monarch, impressed with the noble bearing of the youth, inquired “how he durst so presumptuously enter his realms, with banners displayed against him?” to which the prince, with more courage than policy, boldly replied, “To recover my father’s crown and mine own inheritance.” Stung into sudden anger, King Edward struck the intrepid prince in the face with his gauntlet, which was the signal for the cruel men around him to pierce his brave young heart with their sharp daggers. The following day Queen Margaret was brought a prisoner to King Edward, by her old enemy, Sir William Stanley, who had just revealed the terrible fate of her son to the anguished mother, with brutal coldness and abruptness. Smarting under this awful blow, Margaret invoked terrible maledictions upon the head of King Edward; and this same enemy took very good care to repeat these rash words which had escaped the agonized heart of the distracted mother to his royal master, who was so exasperated that he at first determined to put her to death; but as no Plantagenet had shed the blood of woman, he feared to do this bloody deed, and ordered her to be imprisoned in the Tower of London. The same night upon which Margaret of Anjou was placed within its gloomy walls, her husband, whom she had not met for seven long years, was dragged from his cell in the same prison and put to death. At first the imprisonment of Margaret was very rigorous; but through the intercession of King Edward’s wife, Elizabeth of Woodville, who had been one of the ladies in waiting at Queen Margaret’s court, the poor heart-broken sufferer was released from such strict confinement; and at length her impoverished father came to her partial relief, and by sacrificing his inheritance of Provence, he succeeded in securing her release from imprisonment, she having signed a formal renunciation of all the rights her marriage in England had given her.
But this poor faded Red Rose had one more trial to bear. A dry leprosy now attacked the once beautiful Margaret of Anjou, and transformed the lovely “Marguerite,” whose beauty had been celebrated throughout the world, into a loathsome spectacle of horror. For nearly six years she endured a living death in the castles provided by her father for her retreat, until, in 1482, the welcome summons came. She was buried in the cathedral of Angers, and her only memorial was her portrait on glass in a window of the cathedral, which had been painted by her father twenty years before. Maria Louisa, the second wife of Napoleon I., possessed the breviary once owned by Margaret of Anjou: in it was written, “Vanite des vanites, tout la vanite!” Surely a fitting epitaph for the once beautiful, powerful, lovely Margaret of Anjou, queen of England; but alas! afterwards, the fallen, faded, hapless Red Rose of English history.
Among the warm partisans of the Lancastrian cause, was John Grey, afterwards Lord Ferrers, whose wife was the beautiful Elizabeth Woodville, maid of honor at the court of Queen Margaret.
Lord Ferrers lost his life in the War of the Roses; and his widow, the beautiful Lady Grey, afterwards married Edward, son of the renowned Duke of York, the champion of the White Rose.
By this marriage of the Roses, which occurred after Edward had become king of England, as Edward IV., this famous War of the Roses ended in a match of hearts.