by S B Chrimes
All that has been described so far are measures that the king took to provide for the due functioning of the principality, the adjacent Marches or borders, the Crown lordships, the doing of justice or the oversight thereof as behoved the king or prince whether of Welsh descent or not, and a willingness to see in the Yorkist precedents for a Prince’s Council an instrument that should be revived and strengthened. An awareness of the weakness and ineffectiveness of judicature, at least in the criminal sphere, within the marcher lordships, has also been manifested. But for anything that might be deemed a pro-Welsh policy in the more sentimental sense inspired by Henry’s ancestry and his upbringing in Wales, we must consider the several charters of privileges that Henry VII granted to certain communities in North Wales.
The effect of some at least of these charters was in part to exempt the inhabitants of the communities specified from the operation of portions of the ‘penal legislation’ against the Welsh which had been enacted by Henry IV a century or so earlier. The most important of these measures disabled Welsh people from acquiring certain property or status or offices in specified locations. Thus by an act of 1401 Welsh people were forbidden to purchase lands or tenements in the towns of Shrewsbury, Bridgenorth, Ludlow, Leominster, Hereford, Gloucester, Worcester, and other towns in the Marches; none was to be eligible to be a citizen or burgess in any city, borough, or merchant town, nor bear arms in any such.1 A further act of the same year extended the prohibition to the purchase of lands and acquisition of burgess status by Welsh people to England generally and English boroughs in Wales.2 By other acts made two years later, Welshmen were forbidden to hold castles or defensible houses ‘otherwise than was used in the time of Edward I, conqueror of Wales’, except by bishops and temporal lords.3 No Welshman was to be made a justice, chamberlain, chancellor, treasurer, sheriff, steward, constable of a castle, receiver, escheator, coroner, chief forester, nor keeper of records in any part of Wales, nor be of the council of any English lords, except bishops.4 Nor should an Englishman married to a Welshwoman have privileges in any English boroughs or bear office in Wales.5 No Englishman was to be convicted at the suit of a Welshman except by judgment of English justices or of English burgesses.6 A statute of 1447 confirmed all the statutes against the Welsh not already repealed.7 None in fact appears to have been repealed until 1624.8
The letters patent issued by Henry VII which purported to suspend the operation of some parts of these statutes in favour of the inhabitants of certain communities in North Wales were seven in number and all dated between 1504 and 1507, all that is to say were issued after the creation of the future Henry VIII as prince of Wales.
The earliest, dated 28 October 1504, appears to have been ignored by modern historians until very recently, and is known only in a confirmatory charter of the first year of Henry VIII.9 If this Inspeximus is to be believed Henry VII granted by his own mere notion and the advice of his council in 1504 that notwithstanding the legislation of the fourth year of Henry IV, the inhabitants of the counties of Caernarvon and Merioneth were to be allowed in future to acquire lands, tenements or any hereditaments in England and English boroughs in Wales in fee simple or fee tail or by any tenure, to hold any office if chosen in England or English boroughs and towns in Wales, and to become burgesses therein. The charter further abrogated the custom of gavelkind or ‘Welsh tenure’ (i.e. the equal partition of land among a man’s sons) and prescribed descent of land by English common law and abrogated a large number of customary financial and other exactions.
The next grant, dated 8 August 1505, gave to the tenants and inhabitants of the lordship of Bromfield and Yale in North Wales the power to acquire lands and tenements in fee in England and English boroughs in Wales and the office of sheriff and municipal offices therein, notwithstanding the act of the second year of Henry IV, and abrogated gavelkind and a variety of Welsh customary exactions.1 Very similar concessions were made on 20 July 1506 to the inhabitants of the lordships of Chirk and Chirkland in the Marches of Wales.2 On the same date similar licence was given to the inhabitants of the lordship of Denbigh and the commote (administrative district) of Cynmeirch.3
On 3 March 1507 a charter was granted to the inhabitants of Anglesey, Caernarvon, and Merioneth. Apart from the inclusion of Anglesey and the additional provision in favour of bondmen, it is difficult to see how the substance of this grant differed from that of 1504.4 Notwithstanding the acts of the second and fourth years of Henry IV, the king granted with the advice of his council that the inhabitants of the counties specified should have, use, and enjoy all their land and tenements, hold them in fee or otherwise, and might alienate them all without fine to him or molestation from anyone.
The most important fresh provision was that the king’s bondmen and those of the bishop of Bangor were granted a general emancipation and liberty, and should henceforth hold their lands by a free tenure, paying an annual rent in lieu of every service and custom; and should be free also from service as rhingyll (or beadle) and the dues hitherto payable to that officer. A variety of customary exactions were also abolished or reabolished. Some new concessions in the judicial sphere, however, were made. Any of the persons specified who were released on bail on condition of good behaviour or of keeping the peace should not be required to appear before the justice of North Wales more than once a year, immediately after Michaelmas; all the inhabitants should also be free to enquire or cause enquiry to be made in all cases which concerned Englishmen, just as Englishmen could regarding Welshmen.5
Also in 1507, on 2 July, came a confirmation of two charters granted to the inhabitants of Ceri and Cedewain by Richard, duke of York, in the twenty-fifth year of Henry VI releasing those of Ceri of certain financial exactions and emancipating the bondmen of Cedewain.1
In June 1508 licence was granted by advice of the council to the inhabitants of the lordship of Ruthin to hold lands and offices notwithstanding the act of the second year of Henry IV, and freed them from the custom of gavelkind and various financial exactions, and making the town of Ruthin a free borough.2
Of the regions brought within the scope of these concessions by Henry VII, Anglesey, Caernarvon, and Merioneth of course comprised the principality in North Wales. All the others were lordships that had come into the hands of the Crown. Bromfield, Yale, and Chirk fell into the king’s hands in consequence of the forfeiture of Sir William Stanley’s lands in 1495; Denbigh, Ceri, and Cedewain were part of the earldom of March. Ruthin was sold to the king by Richard, earl of Kent. All these lordships other than Ceri and Cedewain were contiguous with the principality and intervening between the three northern counties and Flint, and the grant of these concessions to this block of territory meant a grant to an area corresponding roughly to the ancient region of Gwynedd. No doubt if concessions were to be made it was logical to extend them, in part at any rate to the whole region. The reason for confirming similar concessions to Ceri and Cedewain, not contiguous with the principality in the north, is not apparent, except for the fact that Richard, duke of York, had previously made them. But why such concessions were not made to the principality in the south or to the numerous other Crown lordships (so far as we know) remains a matter of conjecture. How far Henry VII expected to get or did get money payments for these concessions is a matter needing closer investigation, and the answer to it is likely to be complicated.3
But how far were Henry’s grants (or licences) purporting to be made despite the statutes of Henry IV’s parliaments legally valid? It was received doctrine at this time that the king could by his letters patent grant exemption from the provisions of statutes, but he could not by any exercise of prerogative, repeal or revoke any statute.1 There could not therefore be any question of his abrogating these statutes in toto, even though he might perhaps exempt from their operation a large proportion of the people to whom the statutes were to apply. There was no doubt that acts of the English parliament applied to Wales.2
The validity of these licences might therefore be difficult
to uphold should any parties contest them, and the burgesses of the English walled towns (in particular Conway, Caernarvon, and Beaumaris) raised objections to the concessions which affected their interests. In response the King’s Council on 20 February 15093 issued ordinances ordering that the Welsh should not ‘use, occupy, exercise, nor enjoy any manner of liberties nor franchises within the principality of North Wales but such as they of old times have used, and occupied before any charters were granted to them’. Representatives of the parties were summoned to appear before the king at a date fixed, when the matter was to be discussed and finally determined according to law. But before the day arrived, Henry VII was dead and apparently no final decision was reached. Uncertainty as to the legal validity remained, however, to confuse the issues far into the Tudor period, though it may be supposed that the act of 1536 side-tracked the problem.
It is possible therefore that Henry VII may have over-reached himself in granting concessions by letters patent to these communities, at any rate so far as exemptions from statute law were concerned. But if it be a pro-Welsh policy to try to give to the Welsh of these regions the benefits of English land law and to permit them to take offices, and to abolish some archaic Welsh customary exactions, then it can be said that Henry VII did, within such limits, cherish such a policy. None the less, whatever his precise motives in this matter may have been, there is nothing to suggest that he was influenced in this attempt by any sentiments springing from his birth or ancestry. On the contrary, there is good reason to suppose that the policy was dictated by the economic and administrative enquiries and advice of the officials primarily concerned with the management of affairs in the principality of North Wales over a term of years preceding the grant of the earliest of the charters.1 But in any event, though he did get as far as the Crown lordships of Holt and Montgomery, he did not, so far as we know, ever visit the principality throughout his reign.2
(B) Ireland
The lordship of Ireland, which had been conferred by Henry II on his youngest son John in 1177 and which from John’s accession had been incorporated in the royal style, was an inheritance more nominal than real when Henry VII succeeded to it in 1485. The authority of the English king had seldom effectively extended beyond a region about sixty miles north and forty miles west of Dublin, called the Pale, even though his lieutenants had been able to exert some degree of influence over the Irish as distinct from the Anglo-Irish chiefs and magnates at different times. But the political circumstances of the thirty or forty years before 1485 had reduced that authority to a shadow. As it turned out, Henry VI’s appointment of Richard, duke of York, to be king’s lieutenant in Ireland in 1447 proved to be a source of grave embarrassment for many decades to the English Crown, both Lancastrian and Yorkist, especially the Lancastrian as resurrected by the Tudor.3
The circumstances and consequences of Richard, duke of York’s lieutenancy made Ireland the happy hunting ground for Yorkist plots and imposters when the Yorkist regime in England had run its course.4 Edward IV had been able to do little to subdue the ‘Home Rule’ lords of Ireland, and Richard III even less. Nothing had impeded the rise to dominance of the Fitzgerald earls of Kildare; from 1478, of Gerald, eighth earl, who remained throughout the reign of Henry VII the most powerful man in Ireland, whether in office or out of it, the man whom Henry himself could not subdue and therefore after years of contention in the long run found he could not do without as his lieutenant’s deputy. When Henry VII succeeded to the throne, the eighth earl of Kildare had been deputy continuously since 1479, at first to two boy princes successively, and then from 21 August 1484 to John de la Pole, earl of Lincoln. Not until 11 March 1486 did Henry VII appoint as Lincoln’s successor the nearest substitute for a royal prince that was available to him for the titular office, namely his veteran and ubiquitous uncle, Jasper, duke of Bedford.1
But about this time Kildare had already been in communication with the king and Henry had responded privately to his advances, through the intermediation of John Estrete.2 Only the king’s instructions to Estrete survive and these cannot be dated with certainty, but they probably belong to the year 1486, well before 1 August, by when the king required Kildare to come to him personally wherever he might be at that time.3 Kildare had petitioned to hold his office of deputy lieutenant for nine or ten years, to which the king replied that he would better arrange for Ireland to be brought into full obedience and prosperity if he were to have the advice of the earl, considering the long rule that he had borne and that no other man could better counsel the king. Henry therefore sent him letters of protection under the Signet and sign manual and requested him to come to England, bringing with him in writing a statement of the revenues of Ireland, whereupon his office of deputy would be granted as he desired.
But Kildare did not respond to these overtures and the absenteeism of Jasper Tudor left the deputy full scope and made possible the extraordinary events which included Kildare’s succumbing to the allurements of the ‘White Rose’, his embracing the cause of Lambert Simnel, his connivance at the latter’s coronation in Dublin as Edward VI, and his acceptance of the lieutenancy itself at the hands of the new ‘Yorkist’ king, in May to October 1487. The battle of Stoke on 11 June, however, put an end to this fantasy, and within a year Henry VII took steps to make his first direct intervention into Irish affairs by commissioning Sir Richard Edgecombe to go to Ireland to reassert the formal authority of the Crown.1
Map 5 Ireland
Edgecombe was empowered to give safe-conducts to those Irish wishing to go to England to treat on matters concerning the sound rule of peace in Ireland, to grant pardons to those wishing to submit themselves, to administer to them oaths of fealty and allegiance, and to imprison rebels and traitors. The form of the oaths to be taken were specifically set out in English in the letters patent,1 as follows.
I become feithful and true ligeman unto kyng Henry the vijth kyng of England and of Fraunce and lord of Irland of lif and lym and erthly worship and feyth and trouth. I shall beer unto by m as my soveraigne liege lord to lyve and dye agenst all maner creatours so god help me and his seyntes.
I shall from this day forthward duryng my lyf be true feithful and obeysaunt ligemen and subjet unto my soveraigne lord kyng Henry the vijth, kyng of England and of Fraunce and lord of Irland and to his heyres kynges and lords of the same, aswell in thynges concernyng the suertie and well of his most noble persone, his hygh estate preemynence, dignite and prerogative royall as in thynges concerning the well and defence of the realme of England and land of Irland. And yf I may be knowe at eny tyme hereafter any persone of what estate degree or condition he be ofthat woll presume to attempt eny thyng contrary to thes premisses or of eny of theym, I shall lette it after my power, and yf I may not let it I shall disclose it to such of the kynges councell which I knowe for certen woll showe it to the kyng withoute delay or feyntyse and the kynges councell and the councell of the said realme and land of Irland I shall not disclose in prejudice of the same so helpe me God and his seyntes.
Edgecombe, landing at Kinsale on 27 June, with at most perhaps five hundred men behind him, could not, of course, make much show of military force. But he had behind him also the force of recent events which even Kildare and other Anglo-Irish magnates could not ignore: his master’s victory at Stoke, the death of John, earl of Lincoln, and the capture and relegation to the royal kitchens of the erstwhile ‘King Edward VI’, Lambert Simnel. Kildare might snub the royal commissioner and keep him waiting in Dublin for some days before entering into negotiations, but negotiate he did; indeed he could do no other if he wanted to remain in the office of deputy lieutenant. There was room for manœuvre, for Henry VII apparently had instructed Edgecombe to extract bonds from Kildare and other pro-Yorkist lords by which their lands would be automatically forfeited if they should ever again rebel against him. This they refused to do and gave Edgecombe to understand that they would rather all become Irish, that is repudiate the English Crown. Edgecombe did not persist i
n face of this threat, all the more no doubt because of the news that James III of Scotland had been murdered on 11 June, an event likely to weaken Henry VII’s political position. But the taking of the oath of fealty and allegiance on 25 July by Kildare and the other spiritual and temporal lords substantially in the form prescribed meant that Henry VII could retain the well-nigh indispensable Kildare in office without loss of face. By 30 July Edgecombe was able to leave Ireland, his official mission accomplished. Kildare and the Irish ‘Home Rule’ lords had been obliged to admit publicly that they had a new king and a new lord of Ireland. The recognition of the fact was fundamental, but much or little might be made of it thereafter, according to the ebb and flow of political circumstance.1