The Hollow Crown: The Wars of the Roses and the Rise of the Tudors (40 page)

1
Brut
, II 516

1
For the idea that England’s medieval population had begun to conceive of the historical coherence of the ‘Hundred Years War’ by the early fifteenth century, see W. M. Ormrod, ‘The Domestic Response
to the Hundred Years War’ in A. Curry and M. Hughes (eds),
Arms, Armies and Fortifications in the Hundred Years War
(Woodbridge, 1994), 83–5

2
C. D. Taylor, ‘Henry V, Flower of Chivalry’ in G. Dodd (ed.),
Henry V: New Interpretations
(York, 2013), 218. The Nine Worthies were Hector, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Joshua, David, Judas Maccabeus, King Arthur, Charlemagne and Godfrey of Bouillon, hero of the First Crusade.

3
Vita Henrici Quinti
, translated in J. Matusiak,
Henry V
(London, 2013), 3–4

4
For dating and provenance of the famous ‘Windsor’ portrait of Henry VI, see notes at
http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portraitConservation/mw03075/King-Henry-VI

5
See Griffiths,
Henry VI,
241

6
POPC IV 134

7
M. James (ed.),
Henry VI: A Reprint of John Blacman’s Memoir, with Translation and Notes
(Cambridge, 1919) (hereafter ‘Blacman’)

8
Ibid., 36–8

9
Harriss,
Cardinal Beaufort
, 251

10
Now catalogued in Stratford,
The Bedford Inventories

11
Brut
, II 573

12
Wolffe,
Henry VI
, 87–92; Watts,
Henry VI,
128–34

13
POPC V 88–9

14
John de Wavrin (ed.), and W. Hardy (trans.),
A Collection of the Chronicles and Ancient Histories of Great Britain, Now Called England
(London, 1864–87), III 178

15
Ibid.; Barker,
Conquest
, 121–2

16
H. Castor,
The King, the Crown and the Duchy of Lancaster: Public Authority and Private Power 1399–1461
(Oxford, 2000), 82–93

17
J. Gairdner (ed.),
The Paston Letters
(new edn, 6 vols, London, 1904), IV 75

1
The fullest modern account of Margaret’s coronation procession is in G. Kipling, ‘The London Pageants for Margaret of Anjou’ in
Medieval English Theatre
4 (1982); a more widely available summary
is in H. Maurer,
Margaret of Anjou: Queenship and Power in Late Medieval England
(Woodbridge, 2003), 17–22

2
Gregory’s Chronicle
, 154

3
Brut
, II 486

4
See above, p. 39

5
Maurer,
Margaret of Anjou
, 41

6
Ibid., 21

7
MacCracken,
Minor Poems of John Lydgate
, II 844–7

8
J. Rosenthal, ‘The Estates and Finances of Richard Duke of York (1411–1460)’ in
Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History
2 (1965), 118

9
For a full list of York’s manors, see ibid., appendix I 194–6

10
Commission transcribed from the original document in Bibliothèque nationale, Paris, in P. Johnson,
Duke Richard of York 1411–1460
(Oxford, 1988), 226

11
T. Pugh, ‘Richard Plantagenet (1411–60), Duke of York, as the King’s Lieutenant in France and Ireland’ in J. G. Rowe (ed.),
Aspects of Late Medieval Government and Society: Essays Presented to J. R. Lander
(Toronto, 1986), 122

12
C. Carpenter,
The Wars of the Roses: Politics and the Constitution in England
c.
1437–1509
(Cambridge, 1997), 98–103, offers a succinct articulation of arguments against York as an isolated and ambitious rival for the crown during the 1440s. See also Watts,
Henry VI
, 237– 8, especially nn. 137–40. A more ‘dynastic’ reading of the decade can be found in R. A. Griffiths, ‘The Sense of Dynasty in the Reign of Henry VI’ in C. Ross (ed.),
Patronage, Pedigree and Power in Later Medieval England
(Gloucester, 1979), passim but especially 23–5.

13
All this closely follows Griffiths, ibid., 20–1

14
Blacman, 29–30. Obviously, Blacman had an interest in talking up the king’s piety and chastity; nevertheless, his portrayal of a squeamish king who would swoon at the sight of naked flesh is both internally consistent and at one with our broader understanding of Henry VI’s character.

15
Maurer,
Margaret of Anjou
, 41

16
The jewel was a gift when Margaret was finally pregnant in 1453. J. Stevenson (ed.),
Letters and Papers Illustrative of the Wars of the English in France during the Reign of Henry the Sixth
(1861–4), II ii 208

17
Margaret’s role in the cession of Maine is discussed in Maurer,
Margaret
of Anjou
, 25–38; also see B. M. Cron, ‘The Duke of Suffolk, the Angevin Marriage, and the Ceding of Maine, 1445’ in
Journal of Medieval History
20 (1994), 77–99

18
Brut
, II 511

19
J. David (ed.),
An English Chronicle of the Reigns of Richard II, Henry IV, Henry V and Henry VI
(Camden Society v44, 1838), 116

20
Ibid., 62

21
Ibid.

22
Kingsford,
Chronicles of London
, 157

1
C. A. F. Meekings, ‘Thomas Kerver’s Case, 1444’, in
EHR
90 (1975), 330–46, from which the following narrative is taken.

2
Brut
, II 485

3
Quoted in Griffiths,
Henry VI
, 256

4
Indictment from King’s Bench, reprinted in
EHD
IV 264

5
PROME February 1449, item 22

6
‘Between 1437 and 1450 throughout the shires of England the personal influence of the king in the field of justice, law and order was at best a negative one.’ Wolffe,
Henry VI
, 116–17

7
See M. H. Keen and M. J. Daniel, ‘English Diplomacy and the Sack of Fougères in 1449’ in
History
59, 375–91

8
Griffiths,
Henry VI
, 521; Harriss,
Shaping the Nation
, 584; Barker,
Conquest
, 404

9
A simple cash conversion of £372,000 at 1450 prices would give us a rough figure of £202,000,000 in 2005 prices. But this does not quite do justice to the monstrous scale of Henry VI’s indebtedness, which according to the parliamentary figures was nearly 3,400% of his annual income and spiralling every year, regardless of the costs of war with France.

10
We would now call this the ‘structural deficit’. PROME November 1449, item 53

11
A crude modern conversion of Richard’s debts owed by the Crown would be £10 million. Again, this does no justice to the scale of the financial obligation.

12
In 1345 Edward III owed Italian merchants and bankers alone the
equivalent of £400,000 – perhaps £262,000,000 in 2005 prices. Cf. E. Russell, ‘The Societies of the Bardi and the Peruzzi and Their Dealings with Edward III’ in G. Unwin (ed.),
Finance and Trade under Edward III
(Manchester, 1918), 93–135

13
‘A Warning to King Henry’ in T. Wright,
Political Poems and Songs Relating to English History
(1859–61), II 229–31

14
PROME November 1449, item 15

15
Watts,
Henry VI,
244–5

16
PROME November 1449, appendix 1

17
Ibid., item 49

18
Ibid., items 50–2

19
Frammesley was executed after a trial before the court of King’s Bench. R. Virgoe, ‘The Death of William de la Pole, Duke of Suffolk’ in
Bulletin of the John Rylands Library
47 (1965), 491 n. 3

20
Paston Letters
, II 146–7;
Brut
, II 516; Virgoe, ‘Death of William de la Pole’, 494, 501

21
M. Bohna, ‘Armed Force and Civic Legitimacy in Jack Cade’s Revolt, 1450’ in
EHR
118 (2003), 573–4. For the course of Cade’s rebellion and discussions of its causes, see also Griffiths,
Henry VI
, 610–65, and I. Harvey,
Jack Cade’s Rebellion of 1450
(Oxford, 1991).

22
Magdalen College, Oxford, Charter Misc. 306, reprinted in Robbins (ed.),
Historical Poems
, 63, and with slight variation in C. L. Kingsford,
Historical Literature in the Fifteenth Century
(Oxford, 1913), 359

23
Stow published this in his
Annals
: it is partly reproduced and summarised in S. B. Chrimes and A. L. Brown,
Select Documents of English Constitutional History 1307–1485
(London, 1961), 290–1

24
Kingsford,
Chronicles of London
, 162

1
Bill of the duke of York, reprinted in R. A. Griffiths, ‘Duke Richard of York’s Intentions in 1450 and the Origins of the Wars of the Roses’ in
Journal of Medieval History
1 (1975). ‘Worschip’, i.e. worship, may be loosely likened to the modern concept of ‘respect’ – which was due to a man of great birth and status.

2
Griffiths believes, in ibid. and ‘Richard Duke of York and the
Royal Household in Wales in 1449–50’ in
Welsh History Review
8 ( 1976–7), that York did in fact disembark at Beaumaris. Cf. Johnson,
Duke Richard of York
, 78: ‘It is doubtful whether York managed a landing.’ York’s own bill to Henry VI states that his ‘proposid’ arrival was ‘stoppid and forebarred’. This – and the fact that York included this complaint in his bill at all – implies strongly that the attempt to prevent his initial landing at Beaumaris was successful.

3
‘John Piggot’s Memoranda’ in Kingsford,
English Historical Literature
, 372

4
HMC Eighth Report, 266–7, reprinted in modern English in
EHD
4, 265–7

5
Ibid.

6
Ibid., 371

7
Carpenter,
Wars of the Roses
, 102

8
For an argument in favour of York’s dynastic motivation see Griffiths, ‘The Sense of Dynasty in the Reign of Henry VI’. But York’s dynastic arguments in the context of the 1460s were made out of desperation (see pp. 182–3), in circumstances far removed from those of September 1450.

9
York’s first petition to Henry VI, printed in Griffiths, ‘Duke Richard of York’s Intentions’, 300

10
See Johnson,
Duke Richard of York
, 84–5

11
Ibid., 301–4

12
For a sympathetic view of Somerset’s conduct in France, see M. K. Jones, ‘York, Somerset and the Wars of the Roses’ in
EHR
104 (1989)

13
PROME November 1450, item 1

14
‘Bale’s Chronicle’ in R. Flenley (ed.),
Six Town Chronicles of England
(Oxford, 1911), 137

15
Kingsford,
Chronicles of London
, 162

16
York had attempted, without royal licence, to settle the Courtenay–Bonville dispute himself earlier in September 1451. For a full account of the dispute, see M. Cherry, ‘The Struggle for Power in Mid-Fifteenth-Century Devonshire’ in R. A. Griffiths (ed.),
Patronage, the Crown and the Provinces in Later Medieval England
(New Jersey, 1981).

17
‘Colleges: St Martin le Grand’ in W. Page (ed.),
A History of the County of London
(London, 1909), I 555–66

18
A. Kempe,
Historical Notices of St Martin-le-Grand
(London, 1825), 141

19
Paston Letters
, I 97–8

20
Ibid., 103–8

21
Kingsford,
Chronicles of London
, 163. Several more chronicles carry similar versions of this story. For a persuasive argument against believing this popular vignette, see Johnson,
Duke Richard of York
, 112.

22
Ibid., 101

1
‘Bale’s Chronicle’ in Flenley (ed.),
Six Town Chronicles
, 140; Kingsford,
Chronicles of London
, 163. In modern terms Henry’s illness might be characterised as a severe, catatonic episode of either depression or schizophrenia, but medical diagnosis is impossible and essentially futile at such a distance. For a recent discussion of Henry’s illness with reference to modern diagnostics, see N. Bark, ‘Did Schizophrenia Change the Course of English History?’ in
Medical Hypotheses
59 (2002), 416–21, although note that the author’s interpretation of the historical course of Henry’s reign prior to 1453 differs sharply from that presented here. For Henry’s illness in context of his times and his family history, see B. Clarke,
Mental Disorder in Earlier Britain
(Cardiff, 1975), passim but especially 176–206.

2
‘Bale’s Chronicle’, 140

3
The other godparents were Cardinal Archbishop Kemp of Canterbury and Anne duchess of Buckingham.

4
POPC VI 163–4

5
Council minutes transcribed in R. A. Griffiths, ‘The King’s Council and York’s First Protectorate’,
EHR
94 (1984)

6
Newsletter of John Stodeley in
Paston Letters
, I 295

7
For a full discussion see H. Castor,
She-Wolves: The Women Who Ruled England before Elizabeth
(London, 2010), 339–43

8
PROME March 1453, item 32

9
Watts,
Henry VI
, 310 n. 220

10
Stodeley in
Paston Letters
, I 299

11
Paston Letters
, III 13

12
PROME July 1455, item 18

13
Watts gives the Leicester meeting the pleasing title of a ‘pseudo-parliament’: Watts,
Henry
VI
, 314

14
C. J. Armstrong, ‘Politics and the Battle of St Albans 1455’ in
Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research
33 (1960), 13–14. This remains the authoritative account of the first battle of St Albans, and much of the account here follows its arguments.

15
Letter to the townsmen of Coventry, quoted in ibid., 12

16
Paston Letters
, III 25

17
For Clifford’s conduct, ibid. and M. Kekewich et al. (eds),
The Politics of Fifteenth-Century England – John Vale’s Book
(Stroud, 1996), 192

18
Paston Letters
, III 27

19
Blacman, 40

20
MS Gough London in Flenley (ed.),
Six Town Chronicles
, 158

21
‘Bale’s Chronicle’ in ibid., 142

22
Gregory’s Chronicle
, 198

23
CSP Milan, I 16–17