Henry VII

by S B Chrimes

  After Edward IV’s death, however, the restraints that had been put upon Henry and Jasper were removed.2 Duke Francis had little to fear from Richard III, and clearly hoped to use the valuable pawns he possessed to extract further advantages for himself. By the time Richard III had achieved his usurpation, incarcerated or otherwise disposed of his nephews Edward V and Richard, duke of York, he could very ill afford to allow Henry to roam freely and to form the nucleus of plots against him. For it was essentially the circumstances of Richard Ill’s usurpation that brought to Henry a totally unexpected change of prospects and a potential opportunity such as could never have arisen but for the premature death of Edward IV and the removal of his two sons. Richard III could not achieve the Crown himself without converting Henry of Richmond from being an obscure and hopeless exile into a potent rival to himself. Even so, the initiative came, not from Henry, who as yet was in no position to initiate anything very much, but from interested parties at home, who saw for the first time how the hitherto at best latent potentiality of Henry as a claimant to the Crown might be converted into reality.

  Richard III had scarcely been on the throne a month before he sought to establish friendly relations with Duke Francis. In July 1483 he sent his confidential agent Thomas Hutton, ‘a man of pregnant wit’, to Brittany ostensibly to negotiate with a view to settling in a conference the maritime disputes that had disturbed relations between the kingdom and the duchy. The formal instructions given to Hutton made no reference to the question of Henry’s position,3 but it is evident from the instructions that Francis issued to George de Mainbier on 26 August that the question was raised, even if perhaps somewhat obliquely. At any rate Francis called attention to Louis XI’s pressure upon him to hand over Henry to him; he had made great offers and even threatened war to achieve his purpose. This was indeed a bogey with which to try to frighten Richard III into meeting the duke’s demands, which were not modestly stated. Francis roundly declared that he must have military help to prevent Louis XI’s threats from being realized, otherwise he might be obliged to surrender Henry. He wanted four thousand archers to be supplied within a month of such a request, paid by Richard III for six months, and two or three thousand more within another month, at the duke’s expense, if required. If Richard III would agree, then Francis would be willing ‘to await the fortune of war’rather than deliver up Henry.1

  But Louis XI died on 30 August 1483, and any urgent threat from France died with him. Nor was Richard III in a position to contemplate military assistance to Brittany for any purpose. Before long he was under the necessity of using whatever forces he could procure for more immediate purposes at home.

  What exactly it was that moved Henry Stafford, second duke of Buckingham, to rebel against the man whom he had played so great a part in putting on the throne only a few months earlier is likely to remain conjectural. His recent dispute with Richard III over the Hereford inheritance, and Richard Ill’s wounding but suggestive taunt that he might next claim the usurped rights of the House of Lancaster, as reported by Polydore Vergil, are hardly likely in themselves to have provoked Buckingham to so extreme a course, though they may well have contributed to his resolve. Buckingham may conceivably have played a double game with Richard from the start, and set him up only with the intention of toppling him over as opportunity served. He may well have thought of himself as a possible successor to Richard III, at least for a time. Whether he himself conceived the idea of working for the succession of Henry of Richmond (as Polydore Vergil says), or whether the idea was planted in his head by others, remains unknowable. The part played by John Morton, bishop of Ely since 1478, who had aroused the suspicions of Richard III and been committed to Buckingham’s custody at Brecon Castle, remains speculative.2 Whatever Buckingham’s precise process of mind may have been, there can be little doubt that the chief spinner of plots so far as Henry’s future was concerned, was his own mother, Margaret Beaufort. But neither Buckingham’s intent nor Margaret’s schemes could have made much headway, unless it could at the least be plausibly rumoured that the princes in the Tower were already dead. No conspiracy to replace Richard III by Buckingham or Henry of Richmond could succeed if any chance remained of restoring either of the sons of Edward IV to what everyone believed to be their rightful place. The appropriate rumours were certainly forthcoming by early October, but whether or not these rumours were based upon fact it is impossible to say.1

  Although up to this point Henry himself had made no overt move to advance his pretensions - he was scarcely in a position to do so - it is hardly necessary to believe that he was unaware that his ancestors the Beauforts had been legitimated by act of parliament in the time of Richard II, whilst Buckingham did know of it.2 Whilst Henry himself may have been too young when in Wales to have acquainted himself with the matter, it is impossible to doubt that Jasper would have been fully informed of it and had had plenty of opportunity to pass on to his nephew all relevant information. But there is no reason at all to suppose that Henry at any time had any grounds for doubting the legitimacy of his mother’s family since 1397. Whether he was also aware of Henry IV’s insertion of the words excepta dignitate regali (the royal dignity excepted) in his confirmation of Richard II’s act of legitimation, is perhaps more doubtful, but his ignoring of it later on does not mean that he was unaware of it. If he did know of it, he may well have rejected the notion that such an exception could have any validity.

  At any rate, if the terms of Richard III’s act of attainder passed in his parliament are to be believed, Buckingham had got himself at some stage to the point of writing to Henry of Richmond inciting him to participate in a rebellion.3 The complicated web of intrigue that had been going on to make such an invitation possible is partially known to us.

  It would seem, if Vergil is to be believed, as he probably is in this matter, that the ladies concerned, Margaret Beaufort and Queen Elizabeth Woodville, were concocting a scheme before Buckingham had got so far as to focus on Henry of Richmond as the rival to Richard III. When Buckingham had won over Morton (if that is the correct phrase to use), the latter sent a message to Margaret to send down to Brecon her steward Reginald Bray (of whom we shall hear a great deal more later on) to confer with the duke. But in the meantime Margaret had laid the foundation of a plot. After the death of Edward IV’s children was known or believed to have occurred she contemplated the future and evidently perceived an altogether new prospect for her son Henry (whom she had not seen for some twelve years, and very little at all since he was about five years of age), and confided her ideas to her Welsh-born physician named Lewis, who happened very conveniently to be also physician to Queen Elizabeth, then still in sanctuary in Westminster Abbey, and who therefore could readily act as a go-between. Lewis was sent to the queen and disclosed a plot which he pretended at that stage was of his own devising. The scheme was that the Woodville interest should support Henry as rival claimant to the crown on the understanding that he would promise to marry one of Elizabeth’s daughters when he became king. Queen Elizabeth agreed with the project and sent Lewis to Margaret to tell her that she would procure all her friends to take Henry’s part if he would swear to marry her eldest daughter Elizabeth, or, if she should die, her second daughter Cecily. Margaret, thus sustained in her scheme, appointed Bray to be her chief agent in the business and entrusted him with the dangerous task of seeking recruits to the conspiracy. Within a few days he succeeded in gathering in and putting on oath a number of substantial gentlemen.1 Margaret herself took into her employment and confidence Christopher Urswick, ‘an honest, approved, and serviceable priest’ recommended by Lewis, and intended to send him with messages to Henry in Brittany. But before he could leave, she was apprised of Buckingham’s design, and at once stopped Urswick from leaving, and instead sent Hugh Conway to Henry with a ‘good great sum of money’ and an exhortation to arrange to go to Wales and participate in an insurrection. Richard Guildford also sent out Thomas Romney from Kent. Unless Henry had already rece
ived messages from Buckingham, the arrival of these emissaries must have brought to him the first definite information of the nucleus of a plot to put him on the throne instead of Richard III, and at once his prospects changed radically. He could now hasten to the duke of Brittany and invite his practical help in starting an expedition. Without the duke’s aid Henry’s chances of raising a force for invasion would have been forlorn indeed. But the duke, notwithstanding the pressure that Richard III had been putting upon him, readily agreed and promised help. Henry thereupon sent Conway and Romney back to England to give notice of his intention to come himself to warn his friends to await his arrival. In the meantime the organization of the conspiracy, in which Morton took the chief part, proceeded apace, and many likely supporters were alerted by secret messages. Perhaps the organization was none too efficient; the messages may not always have been kept as secret as they should have been; and the coordination of plans insufficiently strict. At any rate, Richard III got to know that Buckingham was up to something, and in the event a rising in Kent may have erupted prematurely.

  Richard III, to gain time and resources and better knowledge of the location of the danger, dissembled and sent a courteous letter to Buckingham, inviting him to come to court. The duke feigned illness and refrained from putting his head into the noose; a more threatening letter from Richard III was equally unavailing, and Buckingham pressed on with his plans. Important adherents of the cause showed their hands and raised up armed forces: Thomas, marquis of Dorset, Queen Elizabeth’s eldest son by her first marriage, in Berkshire; Edward Courtenay and Peter Courtenay, bishop of Exeter, in Devonshire; and Richard Guildford, with others, in Kent.

  Whether the risings in several different regions1 were insufficiently coordinated, or whether in the home counties the risings were more or less popular and spontaneous and induced by a feeling of anxiety on behalf of the princes in the Tower, or by a proposal to rescue Edward IV’s daughters from sanctuary and get them into safety abroad lest the princes should disappear altogether, or whether all the significant risings occurred on the same day, 18 October, as the later act of attainder against the chief rebels clearly stated,2 must remain uncertain. Certainly the act asserts that Buckingham was in treasonable communication with Henry and Jasper by 24 September, but also refers vaguely to such communications ‘many times before and after’.

  It is clear that when he was at Lincoln Richard III learnt of Buckingham’s intentions well before 12 October, as is shown beyond doubt by his letter1 to John Russell, bishop of Lincoln, the chancellor, requiring him in view of the latter’s ill-health to send him the Great Seal, with such of the staff of Chancery as might be thought necessary. But the chancellor did not act on this instruction until 11 a.m. on Thursday, 16 October, and Richard did not receive the seal until noon on Sunday, 19 October, in the ‘king’s chamber in the hospice of the Angel at Grantham’. The king retained the seal in his own custody until 26 November, when after using it for the sealing of writs, commissions, etc., he returned it to the chancellor in the Star Chamber at Westminster.2

  This delay of a week before Richard III got hold of the Great Seal may help to explain the slowness with which he took overt action to mobilize men and resources against the rebellions, and no doubt he was uncertain as to where he could strike most effectively.3 Apparently he decided to concentrate his own forces against Buckingham, and with that end in view marched towards Salisbury as a likely strategic centre. Even so, little seems to have emerged under the Great Seal until 23 October. On that day, whilst at Leicester, he ordered by word of mouth a commission of array to be issued to Francis, Viscount Lovel, the chamberlain, to resist Buckingham,4 and also sent a command to the sheriffs of a number of southern and western counties and the mayors of some towns therein to issue a proclamation denouncing the marquis of Dorset and a number of other persons who had risen to support Buckingham.5 The total omission from this proclamation of any reference to Henry of Richmond strongly suggests that at this date Richard III had no knowledge of the extent of the plot, unless the omission was deliberate policy made to avoid publicity for the threat from overseas.

  Other commissions to raise forces in Wales, Kent, Sussex, the western shires and Wiltshire were issued during the next few days and weeks.1 But no doubt Richard had taken other steps to frustrate Buckingham, whose rebellion, as it turned out, collapsed with little or no manifest fighting.2 On the Welsh side of Brecon, Sir Thomas Vaughan of Tretower had been alerted to watch the surrounding country and eventually captured Brecon Castle itself.3 Humphrey Stafford destroyed some of the bridges into England, and guarded the rest of the approaches. Buckingham, ‘a sore and hard-dealing man’,4 was far from popular among his Welsh tenants, who showed little desire to rise in support, and deserted him as soon as possible. Unfavourable weather and the flooding of the rivers which needed to be crossed to get into England, contributed to the fiasco. Buckingham at the crucial time was at Weobley in Herefordshire, the residence of Walter Devereux, Lord Ferrers, along with Morton and other advisers, and finding himself in a position of extreme difficulty, decided to flee and to go into hiding at once. His refuge with a servant of his, Humphrey Bannister, whom he trusted, proved to be short-lived;5 he was captured, taken to Salisbury, questioned, and beheaded in the market place on 2 November, without the meeting with Richard III which he ‘sorely desired’. What he wished to say to him we shall never know, but before long Henry had emerged from and returned to Brittany, where he was now or soon to be joined by a number of refugees, important recruits to his cause from thenceforward.1

  Henry’s blandishments of Francis, duke of Brittany, had evoked some aid from him, not perhaps very much, but sufficient if Vergil is to be believed, to enable him to set out on 10 October (the later attainder says 19 October), with five thousand men and fifteen ships.2 He was certainly given 10,000 golden crowns by the duke, at about this period.3 His expedition, however, proved to be a total failure. Adverse weather scattered his ships and drove some of them back to Normandy or Brittany. Henry’s own ship, and apparently only one other, tossed all night, arrived very early in the morning, in calmer weather, at the south coast; whether off Plymouth, as the act of attainder subsequently said, or off Poole, as Vergil had it, is unascertainable. Henry, in either case, it is said, seeing the shore guarded, forbade any landing until the remainder of his ships should come together, but sent a boat to investigate the soldiers on the shore. Notwithstanding their efforts at beguiling the boat’s crew, by trying to persuade them that they had come from the duke of Buckingham, who they said was on his way with an army, Richard III’s soldiers failed to entrap the invaders. Henry declined the invitation, and seeing none of his other ships, hoisted sail and returned to Normandy, where he waited three days on shore, and then decided to march with part of his followers on foot to Brittany. He sought permission from Charles VIII of France to traverse Normandy, and received not only permission, but messages of goodwill and money to defray his expenses. When he arrived in Brittany, he first heard the news that Buckingham was dead. This depressing information was soon offset by the more hopeful intelligence that the marquis of Dorset and a number of other fugitives had already reached Vannes waiting to join him. He then rightly believed that his cause, instead of being ruined, was now strengthened. He sent for the refugees to meet him at Rennes. They, relieved to learn that Henry had escaped Richard III’s clutches, hastened to join him. After rejoicings and prolonged deliberations, on Christmas day, 1483 they all met in the cathedral and ratified all agreements by plighting their troth. Henry then promised that as soon as he became king, he would marry Elizabeth, Edward IV’s eldest daughter; whereupon the assembled company swore homage to him as if he were king already. Henry lost no time in appealing once again to the duke of Brittany for more help and money, saying that what he had previously received had been spent on his recent expedition, and promising faithful repayment later on. The duke’s calculation of the chances enabled him to agree.1

  But for those who
had taken part in the abortive rising at home, there was to be less rejoicing. The writs of summons to Richard III’s first parliament had been issued about 25 September, to meet at Westminster on 6 November, but had been cancelled on the day Buckingham was beheaded, and fresh writs were issued on 9 December, to meet at Westminster on 23 January 1484. The postponement, necessitated by the occurrence of the rebellion, certainly served to give time inter alia for very lengthy bills of attainder to be prepared. The day of reckoning had come for those rebels who still survived.