The Tudors for Dummies (AvaxHome Download) (7 page)

Starting a Dynasty: Henry VII In This Chapter

Warring over the throne

Starting afresh with the new king

Exploring politics, foreign policy and finances

Finding out what Henry was like

I n 1471 Henry Tudor was a 14-year-old boy living out of somebody else's

pockets in Brittany, then an independent duchy (dukedom) that wasn't

part of France. Fourteen years later Henry was king of England and the

founder of the most flamboyant family ever to sit on the English throne.

Becoming King

Despite his ancestry (see Chapter 1) Henry was the poor boy made good, the

adventurer who risked it all and won it all.

Escaping the fallout of

the Wars of the Roses

In the Middle Ages the government was only as strong as its king. Henry

VI of the House of Lancaster was weak, fond of writing poetry and giving

money to the Church and titles to his favourites. But he was the grandson of

Henry IV who, as Lord Bolingbroke, had grabbed the throne from Richard II

and had had the rightful king murdered in 1399. Someone else with a strong

claim to the throne was Richard, Duke of York, and he challenged the feeble

Henry VI's right to rule. This head-on clash between the houses of York and

Lancaster came to be known as the Wars of the Roses and began in 1455. 30 Part I: Encountering the Early Tudors

What's in a name?

If you go to the Houses of Parliament in London Lancaster has grabbed a red. The white rose

today you'll see the brilliant painting by AH was certainly a Yorkist badge but no evidence

Payne showing gorgeously dressed noblemen proves that the Lancastrians ever used a red

quarrelling in a garden. One of them (York) has one. The term Wars of the Roses was invented

grabbed a white rose from a bush as his symbol; in the 19th century.

Henry Tudor was born in Pembroke Castle, Wales on 28 January 1457, so

throughout his childhood he was living in an edgy atmosphere of civil war.

Many periods of quiet occurred during the Wars of the Roses and in some

areas nothing happened at all, but among the nobility the death rate in battle

was huge. At Towton in Yorkshire in 1461, 28,000 men were killed; it was the

bloodiest battle on English soil.

Because of the Yorkist victory at Towton, 4-year-old Henry was taken from

his mother, Margaret Beaufort, and `protected' by the Yorkist Lord Herbert.

In 1471 the Battle of Barnet was another Yorkist victory and the king, Edward

IV, now considered Henry a threat because he was the only surviving male

Lancastrian who might challenge his right to be king. Henry's uncle, Jasper

Tudor, took the 14-year-old away to Brittany for his own safety.

Hanging out in France

In Brittany Henry and his people lived for 13 years under the protection of

the local duke, Francis I. Obviously, Edward IV wasn't happy about this and

tried to get Francis to send the annoying boy back.

Brittany wasn't part of France then � notice in Figure 2-1 the frontier going

from St Malo in the north to Poitou in the south � but Edward hoped to work

on the more powerful French king to put pressure on Francis. By the terms of

the Treaty of Picquigny in 1475, Edward agreed to stop pushing his claims to

be king of France in exchange for Henry's return. Henry got as far as St Malo

with his armed guard, en route to England, when Francis changed his mind

and Henry was whisked away from Edward's ambassadors. Chapter 2: Starting a Dynasty: Henry VII 31

ENGLAND

N

CHANNEL ISLANDS

NORMANDY

St. M a l o

Morl ai x

B rest

MAINE

BRITTANY FRANCE

Re n n e s

ANJOU

Figure 2-1:

Brittany.

POITOU

I look in more detail at England's relations with France in the later section

`Pursuing peace and prosperity' and in Chapters 3, 7, 9 and 11, but when

Henry became king in 1485, he called himself `King of England and of France,

Prince of Wales and Lord of Ireland'. The only bit of France the English still

owned was Calais, and even that was lost under the Tudors. Even so, the title

`King of France' remained in the coronation ceremony wording until 1802

(when the British were still fighting the French, by the way!). 32 Part I: Encountering the Early Tudors

Henry the Welshman

Just how Welsh was Henry Tudor? If you've like that! After he was king, however, he cel-

seen Laurence Olivier's film Richard III you'll ebrated St David's Day (1 March), called his

remember a blond-wigged goodie-two-shoes eldest son after the `Welsh' King Arthur and

Stanley Baker with an over-the-top Welsh carried the red dragon, the ancient badge of

accent. Certainly, Henry spent his boyhood in Wales, at the Battle of Bosworth and on all

Wales, but we're sure he never sounded quite public occasions.

Securing the throne

Events in England came to a head in 1483�1485. Edward IV's death in April

1483 (some say he was poisoned, some say he caught a cold while fishing,

some say he had pleurisy or even diabetes � take your pick) meant that

England once again had a boy king, the 12-year-old Edward V. His uncle,

Richard of Gloucester, was supposed to protect the young king, but the

prince conveniently vanished (see the nearby sidebar `The princes in the

tower'), and the whole cycle of rivalry, mistrust and open warfare began

again, starting with Richard having himself proclaimed king (Richard III).

Within a month of his accession in June 1483, Richard was working on Louis

XI, king of France, to override the Duke of Brittany and get Henry Tudor sent

back to England. After all, Henry, the earl of Richmond, was a man now and a

serious threat to Richard's hold on the country.

Next time you're touring the north of England, notice how many pubs are

called the Blue Boar. These pubs were all once the White Boar, Richard's per-

sonal badge and a reminder of how popular he was in the North. In the South,

however, Richard was barely known and rumours about the princes wouldn't

go away.

Louis XI's death in August 1483 sidetracked the ongoing negotiations over

Henry, and anyway, Richard soon had his hands full elsewhere.

Bucking for the throne

The duke of Buckingham had been a staunch ally of Richard's before he

became king, but now he turned against him (this is so typical of the nobil-

ity's reckless behaviour in the Wars of the Roses). It may be that Buckingham

wanted the crown for himself (he had a vague hereditary claim to it), but in

the end Henry Tudor emerged as the main contender and the whole venture

was backed by the queen dowager, Elizabeth Woodville, mother of the miss-

ing Edward V. The deal was that Henry would marry Elizabeth's daughter, Chapter 2: Starting a Dynasty: Henry VII 33

Elizabeth of York, in exchange for the dowager's cash and troops to remove

Richard.

Buckingham raised an army in Wales, but appalling weather and floods on

the River Severn washed his men away and the duke was taken to Salisbury

and beheaded in the square (check the place out when you're there next) on

Richard's orders.

Angling for French support

Henry got �3,300 out of Duke Francis, which bought him 5,000 troops and 15

ships. When he got to England, however, he found his timing was off because

Buckingham was dead, and all he got from various discontented lords was a

vague promise to accept him as king.

Not to be outdone, Richard was carrying out his own tricky negotiations

with Duke Francis, who would clearly sell anybody for big enough bucks. But

Jasper Tudor got wind of the plot and helped Henry, now back in Brittany, to

get to the safety of France.

Guess what? The French had a boy king too. Charles VIII and a regency coun-

cil that governed in his name (see Chapter 7 for how all this works) kept

Henry dangling, making vague statements of goodwill and promising unspeci-

fied help. Talk was as cheap in the 15th century as it is today!

The princes in the Tower Whole books have been written on the most conclusive; the skeletons may have been the spectacular vanishing act of the Middle Ages. remains of the princes, but even so, no one What happened was that Edward V and his knows who killed them. 9-year-old brother Richard, the Duke of York,

History has been unkind to Richard, but it's all were taken for `safe keeping' to the Tower of

Shakespeare's fault. If you see the film or read London, the huge castle which protected the

the play, Shakespeare's Richard is deformed, city. They were seen playing happily on the

with a hunched back, a gammy leg and one battlements in the summer of 1483; then, they

shoulder higher than the other. Not only that, simply vanished.

he's a psychopath, a serial killer who bumps Rumours flew that the pair had been murdered, off (count them!) 11 people who stand between probably on the orders of their uncle Richard. him and the throne. No hard evidence against Two child skeletons were found in 1674 under a Richard as the murderer of the princes exists, staircase in the Tower and were buried as the but he certainly had a lot to gain from their princes in Westminster Abbey. Archaeological deaths. So, of course, did Henry Tudor . . . work carried out on the bones in 1933 wasn't 34 Part I: Encountering the Early Tudors

Killing a king: Bosworth Field, 1485

Henry's cause now picked up.

John de Vere, Earl of Oxford, a very experienced soldier, deserted

Richard for Henry in 1484.

Richard's son Edward died in 1484 and his wife Anne Neville a year later.

That meant that no Yorkist heirs to the throne existed, assuming the

princes were dead; Richard was the last of the Plantagenets, the family

that had ruled England for centuries.

Rhys ap Thomas, a powerful Welsh landowner, told Henry that the

whole of Wales would rise up on his behalf (this never quite happened).

By the end of July 1485 Henry had got together a ragbag army of 2,000 merce-

naries and perhaps 500 English exiles. On 1 August he sailed for Wales. After

landing at Milford Haven he marched to Haverfordwest. Then, at Newton (in

today's Powys) he was met by the army of Rhys ap Thomas, which doubled

the size of his force. From there he advanced to Stafford, collecting rebels as

he went. Then his scouts reported that Richard was at Lichfield.

Richard didn't know exactly where Henry would strike. He sent out a proc-

lamation on 21 June against `Henry Tydder and other rebels' and set up his

headquarters at Nottingham. As king, he could command the nobility to join

him under their obligations in the feudal system � the duke of Norfolk, the

earl of Northumberland and Francis, viscount Lovell, joined him with their

armies at Leicester.

The two sides met on the morning of 21 August on White Moor, below

the slope of Ambien Hill, in open countryside about two miles from the

Leicestershire town of Market Bosworth. At a glance, Richard's looked to be

the stronger side. Henry was only an average soldier, relying on de Vere and

his mercenaries, and Richard outnumbered Henry two-to-one. But the king

couldn't rely on the Stanleys, the earl of Derby and his brother, who seem to

have watched on the sidelines before defecting to Henry.

Wanting to end the battle quickly, Richard led his bodyguard in a headlong

charge to kill Henry. He hacked down his standard-bearer, but then Stanley's

men intervened and Richard was outnumbered, encircled and killed. The

legend that Richard's crown from his helmet was found in a bush on the field

and handed to Henry may be true. What's certainly true is that Richard's

body was slung over a horse ridden by his herald and was later displayed

naked on the banks of the River Stour in Leicester. Henry later paid �10 for a

suitable tomb for it.

Not only was Richard III the only English king to die in battle for a thousand

years, he's the only one without a grave. During the dissolution of the monas-

teries (see Chapter 6), Leicester Abbey was smashed up and the king's body

thrown into the river.

Making a Fresh Start

It was new broom time when Henry became king. He had to get used � and

quickly � to running a country that had been torn apart by on/off civil war for

the past 30 years. Yet he had never even lived in England and had spent half

his life in Brittany.

Reckoning Henry

The new king was 27, far more capable than most kings of England had been

and he had a natural flair for organisation. Today, he'd be a fat cat managing

director of a huge multinational, teeming with ideas to make money and gain

status. His first language was English, he was fluent in French and he could

get by in Latin.

Henry was clean-shaven, with long brown hair that got thinner as he got

older. Some of his teeth fell out in the last years of his life, giving an image

(a false one, as you'll see) of a tight-lipped old skinflint. He was careful, aloof

and naturally suspicious, but with an upbringing like his, who wouldn't be?

Air-brushing history: The Rous roll

John Rous was a chantry priest at Guy's Cliffe in his tune, calling Richard a `monster and tyrant,

Warwick. He was also a genealogist, unofficial born under a hostile star and perishing like

herald and a pretty good artist. While Richard Antichrist'. Then he started painting double

was king Rous painted his famous roll, show- roses all over the place and generally sucking

ing Richard and his family as thoroughly nice up to the Tudors.

people. As soon as he was dead, Rous changed 36 Part I: Encountering the Early Tudors

Reckoning England

Henry had only ever handled a small household before and now he had

a kingdom of 2.5 million people. In Chapter 1 we look at a snapshot of life

during the reign of the Tudors. Here's what the kingdom was like in 1485:

Most people lived and worked on the land in villages and hamlets.

Towns were small and scattered, run by the mayor and the merchant

guilds.

Trade mostly involved raw wool, woollen cloth and manufactured

articles.

Serfdom had virtually disappeared, so most men were free. They leased

their strips of land from the local landlord who was usually a knight or a

squire.

In country areas:

� Everyone used the common land to graze animals.

� People used the woodland for building-timber and fuel for fires.

� Arable fields were planted in a crop rotation cycle � wheat, oats,

barley, beans or peas. One third was left fallow (unplanted) to

allow the nutrients in the soil to replenish themselves. This system

had been going on for seven centuries.

The Church was all-powerful with monasteries, convents, abbeys and

chapels dotted all over the place.

The new king, of course, had little direct link with any of this. Henry's first job

was to underline his claim to the throne � God had chosen him because of his

victory at Bosworth, so he could play down his own shaky hereditary claim

and he didn't have to go cap-in-hand to Parliament.

Henry had to prioritise. He needed to:

Get himself proclaimed as king in London (he did this on 26 August and

entered the city in triumph on 3 September)

Get himself crowned

Choose advisers he could trust

Remove anybody he couldn't trust

Marry to make sure the Tudor line continued (see Henry VIII's ongoing

problems on that score in Chapter 5) Chapter 2: Starting a Dynasty: Henry VII 37

Law and order Any king must sort out his own power and that up with ideas for statutes (laws). All new office of his government quickly or chaos will occur. holders took a binding personal oath (swearing After Henry came to power he called as many by the saints) to serve the king faithfully. They justices of the peace as possible to a meeting needed constant reminders, but by and large at Blackfriars in London and told them to come the Tudors' servants were very loyal to them.

Removing everything to do with Richard . . .

By pre-dating his reign to the day before the Battle of Bosworth, Henry could

claim all those who'd supported Richard there were traitors. Henry exe-

cuted the ex-king's top men like William Catesby and had Richard's nephew

Edward, the earl of Warwick, thrown into the Tower. When he tried to escape

in 1499, Henry had Edward executed.

Henry was very keen on heraldry and deliberately chose the double rose (red

and white) to make the point that everything in the garden was lovely now

that York and Lancaster had kissed and made up. Richard's last supporter,

viscount Lovell, was killed at the Battle of Stoke in 1487 (see the later section

`Rousting the rebels').

Handing out the honours

Reconciliation was the name of the game. Just before his coronation, Henry

gave out new titles and quietly, without fuss, began the Tudor policy of giving

a career leg-up to new men of humble origin (see the later section `Choosing

the right men'). Whatever else happened, there must be no return of the

anarchy of the Roses.

Henry appointed experienced men who'd served Richard's elder brother

Edward IV � Thomas Rotheram got his old job back as archbishop of

Canterbury; and John Alcock, bishop of Worcester, became lord chancellor, a

position similar to today's prime minister.

Positioning Parliament

Later monarchs, especially the Stuarts (see British History for Dummies by

Sean Lang, published by Wiley), could learn a lot from the way Henry VII 38 Part I: Encountering the Early Tudors

ran his government. He got Parliament to choose a speaker (chairman) who

was actually his choice and to agree that he (Henry) was king by divine right

(God's will) and not by act of Parliament.

Here are some bits of business for 1485:

Parliament set aside �14,000 a year for the king's Household expendi-

ture. In time this grew and became the Civil List, which the present royal

family still live on.

Many people were restored to their legal rights, having lost land and

titles in the chaos of the Wars of the Roses.

The Act of Resumption returned a lot of land to the crown, increas-

ing Henry's income through rents almost overnight. The duchies of

Lancaster and Cornwall became Henry's.

Since that time, the prince of Wales has always been the duke of

Cornwall. The present prince of Wales, Charles, gets all his income from

rents from the county. To see where he gets the rest of his money from,

check out his Duchy Originals!

As his reign went on, Henry used Parliament less and less. The Wars of

the Roses had, of course, decimated the lords and the politicians in the

Commons still did as they were told. In a 24-year-reign Parliament sat for only

ten months.

It was Henry VIII's problems with the pope (see Chapters 5 and 6) that finally

brought Parliament back into the political limelight.

Breaking down Parliament

Parliament (from the French parler, to speak) The lower chamber (House of Commons) was

supposedly represented England. Actually, it made up of the knights of the shire � men who

didn't. The upper chamber (the House of Lords) owned less land and had the title of `Sir' � and

was made up of dukes, earls, viscounts, mar- the burgesses (or citizens) of the towns.

quises and barons � the people who owned

Nobody represented the ordinary man (com-

huge estates, had private armies and had been

mons is a very misleading word) and there

happily massacring each other for 30 years.

wasn't a woman in sight.