The Woodvilles: The Wars of the Roses and England's Most Infamous Family (14 page)

Elizabeth Woodville’s brother, Richard – the most obscure of the male Woodvilles – had not joined his brother Anthony in exile. He was evidently considered a low security risk, for he was issued a general pardon on 27 November 1470.
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The rest of Elizabeth’s siblings are unaccounted for during this period. Lionel Woodville, destined for the Church, was probably at his studies, while Edward may have accompanied his brother, Anthony, into exile.

Edward IV and his fellow exiles were not merely soaking up Burgundian culture during their stay abroad, but were laying plans to recover their kingdom. In his quest for ships, men, and money, he was aided by his brother-in-law Anthony, who as of 19 January 1471 was reported to be at Bruges bargaining for ships, although it was noted that he was unlikely to acquire very many due to Edward’s lack of funds. According to evidence cited by Peter Hammond, Anthony was probably staying with Joos de Bul, a wealthy nobleman.
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In March, the exiles returned to England. On 14 March, Edward IV, accompanied by Hastings and 500 men, landed at Ravenspur; Richard, Duke of Gloucester, and his 300 men landed about 4 miles away; and Rivers, with 200 men, landed about 14 miles from the king at Powle, which Peter Hammond identifies as Paull or Paghill.
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The next month, Anthony sent letters to Lynn ordering that three ships be fitted out for the king, to which the authorities agreed on the condition that they be held harmless against any act of war committed by the crews.
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Having made his way through England safely and reconciled with his brother, George, Duke of Clarence, Edward IV rode into London on 11 April. He first went to St Paul’s and then to the Bishop’s Palace, where he took Henry VI into custody. The next stop was Westminster, where he offered prayers of thanksgiving. Then he finally went to the queen, and comforted her:

    that had a long time abiden and sojourned at Westminster, assuring her person only by the great franchise of that holy place, in right great trouble, sorrow, and heaviness, which she sustained with all manner patience that belonged to any creature, and as constantly as hath been seen at any time any of so high estate to endure, in the which season nonetheless she had brought into this world, to the king’s greatest joy, a fair son, a prince, where with she presented him at his coming, to his heart’s singular comfort and gladness, and to all them that him truly loved and would serve.
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The family reunion was a brief one. On 13 April, leaving behind Elizabeth, her children, and his mother in the Tower for safekeeping, and taking with him the hapless Henry VI, Edward IV and his forces rode out of London.
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What follows is well known, but Anthony Woodville’s role in it is sometimes given short shrift. On Easter Sunday, 14 April, Edward’s forces met the Earl of Warwick and his men at Barnet, where Edward IV scored a victory and Warwick and his brother, John, Marquis of Montagu, were killed in battle. Anthony’s role in achieving this Yorkist victory is unrecorded, but Hammond suggests that he might have commanded the reserve.
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He certainly seems to have played an active part there, for in a newsletter, the merchant Gerhard von Wesel reported that ‘the duke of Gloucester and Lord Scales were severely wounded, but they had no harm from it, God be praised’.
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Margaret of Anjou, meanwhile, had crossed from France with her son, Edward. Despite her initial misgivings after hearing of the death of Warwick, she rallied and began raising troops herself, forcing Edward, who had returned to London in triumph the afternoon after the Battle of Barnet was fought, to take to the field once more.
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At Tewkesbury on 4 May, Edward again defeated a Lancastrian army, this time killing Edward of Lancaster and taking Margaret captive shortly thereafter.

Anthony Woodville had not accompanied the king to Tewkesbury, but remained in London, which soon came under attack by Thomas Neville, who as an illegitimate son of William Neville, Lord Fauconberg, was known reasonably enough as the Bastard of Fauconberg. As Hammond points out, if Fauconberg succeeded in entering London and gaining control of King Henry, who was once again in the Tower after his excursion to Barnet, Edward IV’s position might have been seriously threatened.
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As it was, however, the Londoners, under the leadership of Anthony and of Henry Bourchier, Earl of Essex, were ready for Fauconberg when he attacked on 12 May.
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He started off by burning a gate at the Southwark end of London Bridge, then set fire to some beerhouses – not the way to endear himself to the locals. Hammond suggests that this was merely a trial to test the city’s resistance. The next day, Fauconberg marched to Kingston, but did not cross the river, possibly because Anthony had sent bargeloads of men to prevent him or possibly because of promises that Rivers made him. On 14 May, however, Fauconberg arrived at St George’s Fields and began his attack in earnest.

Fauconberg targeted London Bridge (the only bridge there at the time), Aldgate, and Bishopgate. Encouraged by Essex and many knights, squires, gentleman, and yeoman, the citizens of London put up a fierce fight, which, the author of the
Arrival of King Edward IV
, the official account of the king’s victory, tells us, they might not have done if left on their own. At this point, Anthony stepped into the fray:

    And so, after continuing of much shot of guns and arrows a great while, upon both parties, the Earl Rivers, that was with the Queen, in the Tower of London, gathered unto him a fellowship right well chosen, and habiled, of four or five hundred men, and issued out at a postern upon them, and, even upon a point, came upon the Kentish men being about the assaulting of Aldgate, and mightily laid upon them with arrows, and upon them with hands, and so killed and took many of them, driving them from the same gate to the water side.
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The Crowland Chronicler also singled out Anthony for praise:

    [I]t was not God’s will that such a famous city, the capital indeed of the whole realm of England, should be given over to pillage by such great rogues. He gave stout hearts to the Londoners to enable them to stand firm on the day of battle. In this they were especially assisted by a sudden and unexpected sortie from the Tower of London by Anthony, Earl Rivers. As the enemy were making fierce assaults on the gate […] he fell upon their rear with his mounted troops and gave the Londoners the opportunity to open their gates and fight it out hand to hand with the enemy so that they manfully put each and every one of them to death or to flight.
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Anthony even rated a poetic tribute in ‘On the Recovery of the Throne by Edward IV’:

        The earl Rivers, that gentle knight,

        Blessed be the time that he borne was!

        By the power of God and his great might,

        Through his enemies that day did he pass.

        The mariners were killed, they cried ‘Alas!’

        God would the earl Rivers there should be;

        He purchased great love of the commons that season;

        Lovingly the citizens and he

        Pursued their enemies, it was but reason,

        And killed the people for their false treason …
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Essex, meanwhile, had led an attack on the rebels at Bishopsgate, while guns placed at the north end of the bridge prevented Fauconberg’s men from advancing further along the structure. At last, the rebels withdrew in defeat to Blackheath, leaving 700 dead according to the
Arrival
. Fauconberg remained at Blackheath until 18 May, when he rode to Sandwich. He eventually surrendered his ships to Richard, Duke of Gloucester, and received the king’s pardon, but by September 1471 he had got into trouble again and was executed.
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Edward IV rode into London in triumph on 21 May, bringing a captive Margaret of Anjou in his train. Having lost her only child and her freedom, she was hours from becoming a widow as well. That night, the
Arrival
dutifully and unconvincingly reported, the imprisoned Henry VI was so downcast at the recent turn of events that he died ‘of pure displeasure, and melancholy’.
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More likely than not, however, the king was helped to his death on orders of Edward IV. With no viable Lancastrian claimant to the throne left, or so it seemed in 1471, the peace-loving King Henry had ushered in a dozen years of quiet within England, though not precisely in the way that he would have wanted it.

As Edward IV settled back onto his throne for a second time, Anthony Woodville made a request: he wanted to fight the Saracens, probably in fulfilment of a vow. The proposal dismayed Edward, who could not understand why his brother-in-law would choose this busy time to demonstrate his piety. According to John Paston III, who was hoping for Anthony’s help in getting him a pardon, ‘The King is not best pleased with him for that he desireth to depart, in so much as the King hath said of him that when so ever he has most to do, then the Lord Scales will soonest ask leave to depart, and [knows] that it is most because of cowardice’.
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Just two months before Paston wrote his letter in July 1471, Anthony had been instrumental in saving London from the Bastard of Fauconberg, so the king’s accusation of cowardice seems misplaced. Perhaps it was pique at Anthony that led Edward on 18 July 1471 to appoint William, Lord Hastings, as Lieutenant of Calais instead of Anthony, who had held the position before the Lancastrian readeption.
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It was certainly an appointment that would have disastrous consequences for Anthony a dozen years later. Nonetheless, Anthony remained determined to join the Portuguese in their fight. By 15 September, the king had relented and given Anthony royal permission to depart for Portugal, rather to the amusement of Paston, who commented sarcastically before Christmas, ‘I ensure you he thinketh all the world goeth on their side [again]’. On 8 January, Paston II wrote that Rivers had taken ship on Christmas Eve for Portugal, but he was not certain of it.
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If Anthony did indeed go to Portugal, he did not stay long there, for in April 1472, he was off on yet another military adventure – aiding Francis, Duke of Brittany, against the French. Francis had asked Edward for 6,000 archers, but when Anthony landed in Brittany on 6 April, he had brought only thirty archers and a small entourage with him. By 20 June, however, Edward IV had given Anthony permission to bring 1,000 men at arms and archers with him to Brittany – at his own expense. This time there was no talk of cowardice. The French retreated in August. In the meantime, in July, Anthony entered into negotiations with Francis for an English attack on France. The result, the Treaty of Châteaugiron, was signed on 11 September 1472. Unfortunately, during their mission abroad, many of Anthony’s men died of the flux and other sicknesses, as John Paston II reported in November. Fittingly, in light of his later career, it was on this expedition to Brittany that Anthony’s younger brother, Edward, made his first recorded appearance as a member of Anthony’s entourage.
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