[[2]] Stow's Chronicle, p. 412.
[[3]] An abbreviation of Warenne-gate. The Earls of Warenne and Surrey were Lords of Wakefield for more than two centuries.
[[4]] Of all the baseless fabrications of the Tudor chroniclers, Hall's story of the death of Edmund Earl of Rutland is the most absurd. Hall says that the prince was scarcely twelve years of age, that his tutor and schoolmaster, named Robert Apsall, secretly conveyed the little boy out of the field, that they were espied and taken by Lord Clifford, that the child knelt on his knees demanding mercy; that the schoolmaster made a speech; that Clifford gave a truculent reply; and that Clifford then struck the child to the heart with a dagger.
This fable rests on there being a child. If there was no child nothing of the sort happened.
The contemporary evidence is simply that after the battle Lord Clifford killed the Earl of Rutland on or near Wakefield Bridge. William of Worcester says:—'et in fugiendo post campum super pontem apud Wakefelde Dominus de Clyfforde occidit Dominum Edmondum comitem de Rutlande, filium Ducis Eborum.' William of Worcester also gives the birthdays of all the children of the Duke of York. Edmund was born at Rouen on May 17, 1443. He was in his eighteenth year, and not a child. It was George, born on October 21, 1449, in Ireland, who was in his twelfth year when the battle of Wakefield was fought; but he was left in London with his mother, as any child of that age was sure to have been. Even if the Duke had brought a child to Sandal, he would have been left in the castle, not taken into the thick of a desperate battle. Edmund was old enough to accompany his father, and doubtless acquitted himself manfully. These facts also relieve the gallant Clifford's name from a vile calumny. Holinshed and Shakespeare follow Hall, and all later historians have continued to repeat the absurd story without taking the trouble to ascertain Rutland's age at the time of the battle of Wakefield.
[[5]] The weight of authority is decisively against the Duke of York having been taken prisoner, and in favour of his having been killed in the battle. William of Worcester says: 'Ubi occubuerunt in campo Dux Eborum, Thomas Nevill,' &c. The Croyland chronicler, Fabyan, Polydore Virgil, Hall, and Stow concur. Hall says, 'He, manfully fighting, within half an hour was slain and dead.' But Whethamstede states that the Duke was taken prisoner and grossly insulted: that he was set upon an ant-hill, a crown of woven grass was put on his head, and that the soldiers bowed their heads before him, saying in derision: 'Hail, King without a kingdom!' Whethamstede adds, 'non aliter quam Judæi coram Domino.' But this John Bostock of Whethamstede was Abbot of St. Albans, and violently prejudiced against the Lancastrians for their marauding and pillaging in his neighbourhood. It is generally stated that Queen Margaret took part in the barbarities of her adherents. Stow, for instance, says that Lord Clifford cut off the Duke's head, put a paper crown on it, stuck it on a pole, and presented it to the Queen, who 'was not lying far from the field.' But there is clear proof that the Queen was actually in Scotland when the battle of Wakefield was fought. William of Worcester says: 'Dicto bello finito Regina Margareta venit ab Scotia Eboraco.' This is confirmed by the Croyland chronicler, who says, 'Inpartibus borealibus morabatur.' Margaret had nothing to do with the Lancastrian barbarities, except that she allowed the heads to remain on the gates of York. She was forced to tolerate the deeds of her savage adherents.
[[6]] See The Chapel of Edward III. on Wakefield Bridge, by N. Scatcherd (1843).