History of the life and reign of Richard the Third. To which is added the story of Perkin Warbeck. From original documents

Preface

. FOR writing such a book as the present I have no other excuse to offer than that the subject is one which has interested me for very many years. It is a good quarter of a century since I first read Walpole's ' Historic Doubts ; ' and they certainly exercised upon me, in a very strong degree, the influence which I perceive they have had on many other minds. I began to doubt whether Richard III. was really a tyrant at all. I more than doubted that principal crime of which he is so generally reputed guilty ; and as for everything else laid to his charge, it was easy to show that the evidence was still more unsatisfactory. The slenderness and insufficiency of the original testimony could hardly be denied ; and if it were only admitted that the prejudices of Lancastrian writers might have perverted facts, which the policy of the Tudors would not have allowed other writers to state fairly, a very plausible case might have been estab-

PREFACE.

. VI lished for a more favourable reading of Richard's character. It was the opinion of the late Mr. Buckle that a certain skeptical tendency — a predisposition to doubt all commonly received opinions until they were found to stand the test of argument — was the first essential to the discovery of new truth. I must confess that my own experience does not verify this remark ; and whatever may be said for it as regards science, I can not but think the skeptical spirit a most fatal one in history. It is an easy thing to isolate particular facts and events, cross-examine to our own satisfaction the silent witnesses or first reporters of a celebrated crime, and appeal to the public for a verdict of ' not proven.' But, after all, we have only raised a question ; we have not advanced one step towards its solution.

We have succeeded in rendering a few things doubtful, which may have been too hastily assumed before. But if these doubts are to be of any value as the avenue to new truths, they must lead to a complete reconsideration of very many things besides the few dark passages at first isolated for investigation. They require, in the first place, that the history of one par ticular epoch should be rewritten ; in the second, that the new version of the story should exhibit a certain moral harmony with the facts both of subsequent times and of the times preceding. Until these two

PREFACE.

. VII conditions have been fulfilled, no attempt to set aside traditional views of history can ever be called suc cessful. The old traditional view of Richard III. has certainly not yet been set aside in a manner to satisfy the common sense of the world. Yet there has been no lack of ingenuity in pleading his cause, or of research in the pursuit of evidence. Original authorities have been carefully scrutinised ; words have been exactly weighed ; and plausible arguments have been used to show that for all that is said of him by ccntemporary writers he might have been a very different character from what he is supposed to have been. Only, the malign tradition itself is not well accounted for ; and we are not clearly shown that the story of Richard's life is more intelligible without it. On the contrary, I must record my impression that a minute study of the facts of Richard's life has tended more and more to convince me of the general fidelity of the portrait with which we have been made familiar by Shakespeare and Sir Thomas More.

I feel quite ashamed, at this day, to think how I mused over this subject long ago, wasting a great deal of time, ink and paper, in fruitless efforts to satisfy even my own mind that traditional black was real historical white, or at worst a kind of grey. At last I laid

PREFACE.

. aside my incomplete MS. and applied myself to other subjects, still of a kindred nature ; and the larger study of history in other periods convinced me that my method at starting had been altogether wrong. The attempt to discard tradition in the examination of original sources of history is, in fact, like the attempt to learn an unknown language without a teacher. We lose the benefit of a living interpreter, who may, indeed, misapprehend, to some extent, the author whom we wish to read ; but at least he would save us from innumerable mistakes if we followed his guidance in the first instance. Tradition, however, is, for the most part, an inter preter and nothing more. The cases are few in which it supplies anything very material in the way of facts ; and where it does, the information is always open to correction.

I have, therefore, in working out this subject always adhered to the plan of placing my chief reliance on contemporary information ; and, so far as I am aware, I have neglected nothing important that is either directly stated by original authorities and contemporary records, or that can be reasonably inferred from what they say. Whatever, then, be the merits or demerits of the present volume, I have at least aimed at treating the subject fully, and I think I may fairly say that the work is the result of mature thought and study.

PREFACE.

. IX The dissertation at the end on Perkin Warbeck was written some years ago and has already appeared in print as an article in the Contemporary Review ; but some new facts, for which I am indebted to the researches of Mr. James Weale, in the Low Countries, have caused me to add a few paragraphs. It will be seen that the documents now published for the first time give great additional force to my original argument. CONTENTS. PAGE Preface v

Chapter I

Richard's Career as Duke of Gloucester until the Death of Edward IV. . . . . . i II. Acts of Richard as Protector . . . -53 III. Termination of the Protectorship . . . . 96 IV. Murder of the Princes and Rebellion of the Duke of Buckingham 123 V. Richard's Government, his Parliament and his RELATIONS AVITH FOREIGN POAVERS . . . . 184 VI. Invasion of Richmond :— Defeat and Death of Richard . . 243 The Story of Perkin AVarbeck 333 ArPENDIX ILLUSTRATIONS. Portrait of Richard III Frontispiece Map of Bosavcrtii Field . . . . . To face p. Disputed character of Richard III. LIFE AND REIGN OF RICHARD III.

CHAPTER I. RICHARD'S CAREER AS DUKE OF GLOUCESTER UNTIL THE DEATH OF

EDWARD IV. Richard III. was one of the first of those dark characters in history whom it has been the effort of modern writers to present under an aspect not altogether so repulsive as that in which his name and deeds have been handed down to us. The apparent insufficiency of the testimony to most of his imputed crimes was first pointed out by Walpole in his 'Historic Doubts' ; and since that day there have not been wanting writers who have inclined to a more favourable view of his character. Nevertheless, the general opinion is unshaken. The scantiness of contemporary evidences and the prejudices of original authorities may be admitted as reasons for doubting isolated facts, but can hardly be expected to weaken the conviction — derived from Shakspeare and tradi tion as much as from anything else — that Richard B CH. I. LIFE OF RICHARD III. 2 was indeed cruel and unnatural beyond the ordinary measure even of those violent and ferocious times.

There is, besides, much in the undisputed facts of the case which, in the eye of common sense, favours greatly this impression. A reign of violence is naturally short-lived ; and the reigns of Edward V. and Richard III. are the shortest in English history. Taken together, their duration Avas less than two years and a half; and it is in vain to deny that Richard had long before lost the hearts of his sub jects — except upon the common supposition that they were never his to lose. Yet, historically considered, Richard III. is not a monster. He is the natural outgroAvth of monstrous and horrible times. He is the fitting termination of the rule of the House of York — the exemplification of an old, divinely attested saying, that they Avho take the sword shall perish by It. It is true Richard's father, the Duke of York, who first urged the claims of that House, was anything but an extreme man.

On the contrary, he protested by every loyal means against misgovernment, and exhausted every form of peace able remonstrance, before he finally advanced his title to the croAvn. But his moderation was not imitated by his sons. It was, indeed, very ill requited by his enemies when he fell into their hands at Wakefield ; and the lesson of vindictiveness set by the friends of Margaret of Anjou was not forgotten when the next turn of the Avheel gave the victory to Edward A.D. I452. HIS BIRTH. 3 Birth of Richard III. How could it be expected that the conqueror should treat his opponents with greater leniency than they had shown to his father ? Civil war had already blunted all sense of delicacy, and violence now be came a part almost of the established order of things. The House of York abused their triumph, became intolerant of rivals, and imbrued their hands in the blood of princes.

Hardened by degrees in acts of cruelty and perfidy, they grew faithless even to each other. Clarence rebelled against his brother Edward, and, though forgiven, was finally put to death by Edward's order. The court was split up into factions. The old nobility were jealous of the Queen and of her relations. It was a world which, as Edward foresaw before his death, was not likely to hold together very long after him. Such a world, in fact, almost invites a bold and unscrupulous man to take the rule and subdue it. Richard III. was born at Fotheringay, a castle belonging to his father, the Duke of York, on Monday, October 2, 1452.1 He was a military commander before he was nineteen, usurped the throne when he was thirty-one, and was killed at Bosworth at the age of thirty-three. Precocious, therefore, he certainly was, and accustomed from his early years to scenes of war and bloodshed.

How early he exhibited the fruits of their teaching in his own conduct is a question 1 Will. Wyrc. Annales, 477. B His family. rather difficult to answer. He left such a reputation behind him that even his birth was said to have pro claimed him a monster. He had been two years, we are told, in his mother's womb, and was born — or rather, like Macduff, was by a surgical operation separated from his mother's body — when he came into the world feet foremost, with teeth in his jaws, and with hair down to the shoulders.1 Such are the com bined reports of different writers ; and for effect they may as well be read together. It is more material, perhaps, to observe that he was the eleventh in a family of twelve, of whom the eleven were born in thirteen years, and the twelfth nearly three years after his birth.

A curious and painstaking collector of that age, by name William Worcester, has left us an exact record of the very day, hour, and place of the nativity of each of these children ; so that the ages of Richard and of all his brothers and sisters are tolerably certain.2 Certain enough, at least, for the historian's purpose ; for with all his accuracy, it must be remarked that there are one or two slight numerical errors in Worcester's account, although very trivial. The dates are, according to him, as follows : — I. Anne, Duchess of Exeter, born at Fotheringay on August io, 1439, between five and six o'clock on a Tuesday morning. But August 10, 1439, was a Monday, so perhaps the nth was intended. 1 Rous, 215. More. * See W. Wyrc. Annales, 460-477. A.D. I452. HIS FAMILY. 5 2. Henry, the eldest son, born at Hatfield on February 10, 1441, at five o'clock on a Friday morning. 3.

Edward, the second son (afterwards Edward IV.), born at Rouen at two A.M. on Monday, April 28, 1442. But April 28 that year was a Saturday. 4. Edmund, the third son, born at Rouen at seven p.m. on Monday, May 17, 1443. Perhaps an error for May 27, for May 17 was a Friday. 5. Elizabeth, the second daughter, born at Rouen at two A.M. on Tuesday morning, April 22, 1444. But April 22 was a Wednesday. 6. Margaret, third daughter, born at Fotheringay on Tuesday, May 3, 1446. 7. William, fourth son, born at Fotheringay July 7, 1447. 8. John, the fifth son, born at Neyet, near West minster, on November 7, 1448. 9. George, the sixth son, born in Ireland at noon on Tuesday, October 21, 1449. 10. Thomas, who died young, is omitted by Worcester. 11. Richard III., born at Fotheringay on Monday, October 2, 1452. 12.

Ursula, born at on St. Margaret's day, July 20, 145 S-1 But the reader will probably take a greater interest in a metrical, or at least a rhyming, account of the 1 See W. Wyrc. Annales, 460-477. family, which was written during the life of the Duke of York, while Richard was still an infant : — ' Sir, astir the tyme of longe bareynesse God first sent Anne, which signyfieth grace, In token that al her hertis hevynesse He, as for bareynesse, wold fro hem chace. Harry, Edward, and Edmonde, each in his place Succedid, and astir tweyn doughtris came, Elizabeth and Margarete, and aftirward William. John astir William nexte borne was, Which bothe be passid to Godis grace. George was next, and after Thomas Borne was, which sone astir did pace By the path of dethe to the hevenly place. Richard liveth yit ; but the last of alle Was Ursula, to Hym whom God list calle.' The honest rhymester goes on to tell us that Anne was married in her tender youth to the Duke of Exeter ; that Henry, the eldest son, was dead, and had left Edward, ' now Earl of March,' to suc ceed him ; who with his brother Edmund, Earl of Rutland, might both be counted ' fortunabil to right high mariage,' but that the other four were still in their pupillage.1 Thus of this family of twelve five had been lost when Richard was a child ; and it would seem that Richard himself was slender and sickly.

A modern historian, who devoted much thought and many years of study to the history of Richard III., found evidence 1 Vincent on Brooke, 622-3. A.D. I460. HIS FATHER. 7 His father's career. somewhere, as he believed, that Richard had serious illness as a child, but was not able to refer to the source of his information.1 Another writer suggests that the expression ' Richard liveth yet ' in the above verses rather favours this supposition ; which, perhaps, is plausible. But we have distinct testimony to the fact that in after life he was a small man of feeble bodily powers 2 — disadvantages which did not prevent him from exhibiting, not only great skill as a general, but great bravery on the field of battle. There is nothing important to tell about his early history until the death of his father, which occurred when he was eight years old.

During that period of his infancy the civil war had broken out. The Duke of York — having taken up arms in the first place, not to assert his own title to the crown, but simply to obtain just and reasonable government by the removal of a corrupt and incompetent minister ; having prevailed for a time and fruitlessly endeavoured to bind a weak minded king by pledges ; having at length, after repeated experience of ill-faith, claimed the crown as his own by inheritance, and submitted to a compro mise in Parliament by which it was settled that he should have it after King Henry's death — was com pelled by the opposite party once more to do battle for that very settlement which had been so painfully 1 Sharon Turner's ' History of England during the Middle Ages,' iii. 444, note 43 (Ed. 1830). 2 Rous, 218ch. I. LIFE OF RICHARD III.

Richard and his brother George sent to Utrecht. arrived at. This time hefought without success, and was killed at the battle of Wakefield, on December 30, 1460. The conquerors were ferocious in their vindic tiveness. After a mock coronation with a crown of twisted grass,1 they cut off the Duke of York's head, which Clifford, who also in cold blood killed his son the Duke of Rutland, had the savage gratification of presenting to Queen Margaret. When the Duke of York's widow heard of this crushing defeat, followed soon afterwards by the news that Queen Margaret and her followers were coming up to London, and had gained another victory over the Yorkists at St. Albans, she sent her two sons, George and Richard, across the sea to Utrecht for their security ; and there they remained a while under the protection of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy.* But the cloud passed away sooner than could have been anticipated.

Young Edward, inheriting his father's pretensions, came promptly up from the borders of Wales, where he won the battle of Mortimer's Cross against the Lancastrian party ; and on his approach to London he was received with joy by the citizens, who by no means liked what they had heard of the ravages of Margaret's northern followers. The Council in London named Edward King. The people in St. John's Field ratified their decision, and openly de clared with a loud ' No, No ' that Henry should reign 1 So Whethamstede (Rolls Ed.), i. 382. Hall says, of paper. 2 'Hearne's Fragment,' 284. Hall, 253. A.D. 1461-70. CREATED DUKE OF GLOUCESTER. 9 Richard created Duke of Gloucester. Dissensions in the House of York. over them no longer. Before a month had passed away Edward had fully vindicated his pretensions on the bloody field of Towton, in Yorkshire.

Henry and his queen were driven to take refuge in Scotland, and did not improve their chances of recovering the hearts of Englishmen by surrendering Berwick to the Scots. The new king's brothers then returned from Utrecht. The elder, George, was made Duke of Clarence ; the younger, Richard, Duke of Gloucester. Although even the elder was only twelve years old, high offices were conferred on both. Clarence was appointed Lieutenant of Ireland ; Gloucester was made admiral of the sea. Manors and lands in various counties were also bestowed on both of them in abundance. The House of York was now strongly seated upon the throne, and all three brothers lived for a while, so far as it appears, in harmony. But before many years were over differences began to display themselves. Edward's marriage with Eliza beth Woodville was unpopular.

The Earl of War wick seduced Clarence from his allegiance, but Richard remained faithful to his brother Edward. Clarence escaped secretly over sea, and married the Earl of Warwick's daughter at Calais ; then came into England with his father-in-law, and raised a rebellion. The insurgents beheaded Earl Rivers and Sir John Woodville, the father and brother of Ed ward's queen. Next year Henry VI. was restored, and Clarence was declared by Parliament next in the Richard adheres to his brother King Edward succession on the failure of the male issue of King Henry. Edward, meanwhile, had to seek refuge with his brother-in-law Charles, Duke of Burgundy. But with the help of Charles he returned to England at the end of a stormy winter, before Margaret of Anjou with the young Prince Edward ventured to leave France to rejoin her husband.

On his coming Clarence again changed sides, and was reconciled to his brother. Warwick was defeated and slain in the battle of Barnet, and a few days later Margaret and her son, having just landed on the south coast, received a final overthrow at the battle of Tewkes bury. These events are so well known to readers of English history that we need not enter into them more fully. It concerns us only to remark that Edward's confidence in his younger brother Richard remained unshaken, or rather was increased by the desertion of Clarence. Richard accompanied him into Norfolk on a progress just before the breaking out of Robin of Redesdale's rebellion.1 I presume that he also went with him against the rebels, though whether he shared his imprisonment that year, when the king fell for a time into Warwick's hands, there is no evidence to show.

He, however, returned to London afterwards in his company ; 2 and one of the latest acts of Edward before his sudden expulsion 1 ' Paston Letters,' ii. 357. 2 /*. 389. CONSTANT TO KING EDWARD. A.D. I471. 11 and fights for him at Barnet and Tewkesbury Slaughter of Edward Prince of Wales. was to make his brother Richard Warden of the West Marches against Scotland.1 Richard showed himself well worthy of this con fidence. He shared his brother's exile, and on his return, although only in the nineteenth year of his age, commanded Edward's vanguard at the battle of Barnet. The glory of that day's victory was largely due to him ; and when the scene of action shifted in a few days, he earned the same honour in the field of Tewkesbury. Here he displayed a capacity of generalship that could hardly have been expected in one so young.

For Somerset, who commanded the enemy's van, had taken up a strong position, and en trenched himself on high ground. The Duke of Gloucester attacked his trench, and after some fight ing recoiled ; on which Somerset, expecting to have been followed by Lord Wenlock, who commanded what was called ' the middle ward ' of that army, allowed himself to be lured into a pursuit. But Lord Wenlock did not follow, and after a time Gloucester and his men turned round and put the forces of Somerset to shameful rout ; in disgust and indigna tion at which the Duke of Somerset, after falling back, called Wenlock traitor and dashed his brains out. It is a tradition of later times that Gloucester tarnished the glory he had won that day by butcher ing in cold blood after the battle Edward, Prince of Wales, the son of Henry VI.

This Edward was a 1 Rymer, xi. 658. lad of eighteen, just one year younger than Gloucester himself ; but he had been associated with Lord Wen lock in the command of ' the middle ward ' of the enemy. The story may be doubted, as resting on very slender testimony, and that not strictly contemporary ; nevertheless, it cannot be safely pronounced apocryphal. Two of the earliest authorities, indeed, state that Edward was slain in the field ; ( and another well-informed historian of that age seems to say the same, though his words may be taken to mean either in the field or after the battle.2 Fabyan, a little later, is rather more minute. King Edward himself, he tells us, struck the young fellow with his gauntlet upon the face ; on which the king's servants followed up the blow and despatched him.

That it was a deliberate murder after the battle is certainly not inconceivable when we consider the con duct of the victors towards others of the vanquished party. Neither is such a view altogether inconsistent 1 Warkworth, 18. ' History ofthe Arrival of Edward IV.' &c, 30. (Published by Camden Society). 2 ' Interfectis de parte Reginæ, turn in campo, turn postea, ultricibus quorundam manibus, ipso principe Edwardo unigenito Regis Henrici victo duce Somersetiæ, Comiteque Devoniæ, ac aliis dominis omnibus et singulis memoratis.' Hist. Croyl. Contin., 555 (in Fell's 'Scrip tores'). These words, I think, naturally imply that the first-named person, at least, was slain in the field, and some others after the battle 'by the vindictive hands of certain persons.' It seems probable, how ever, that the writer, who was one of Edward's IV. 's Council, expressed himself ambiguously on purpose to shield the guilty.

This he evidently did in his allusion to the death of Henry VI. which we notice a little further on. a.d. 1471. slaughtf;r of prince edward. 13 with the statement of the two early authorities who say the prince was slain ' in the field.' One of these writers could not be expected to say more ; for he was an immediate follower of King Edward, and his narrative is in fact an official account of the events connected with Edward's restoration, which the king himself caused to be published in foreign countries. The other, who is a more independent authority, even lends some colour to the story by saying that the prince ' cried for succour to his brother-in-law, the Duke of Clarence.' To say the least, there is nothing here inconsistent with the view that he was butchered after he was in the power of the conquerors ; and the circumstantial account given by Fabyan has every appearance of probability.

Goaded by strong resentment of the wrongs done to his father and himself, Edward had already been guilty of more than one act of cruelty and bad faith. At one time he had been disposed to trust men too much ; now he was altogether unsparing and relent less. But if the murder of Prince Edward was in any degree attributable to his brother Richard, it was doubtless the first of a long catalogue of crimes, each of which rests by itself on slender testimony enough, though any one of them, being admitted, lends greater credit to the others. From this point of view, I must frankly own that it strikes me as not at all improbable that Richard was a murderer at nineteen. Whoever would investigate the morbid anatomy of guilt must find in the entrance to a career of crime some motive not altogether hateful that first led to its perpetration.

And here we have such a motive, clear and intelligible. A younger brother, who has earned a character for fidelity to the head of his house ; whose conduct, in this respect, has been the more gratifying from the tem porary defection of a senior ; who has learned, by his eldest brother's example, lessons of perfidious cruelty ; and who has good reason to believe that the enemy, if victorious, would be perfidious and cruel also — how should such a one be over-scrupulous ? It must have seemed to him only a service to his own family to lop off each dangerous branch of an unrelenting enemy — an act of self-defence, tending to peace and quietness — a thing needful for the tranquillity, not only of the House of York, but of the kingdom. And it is by no means improbable that others took the same view, and that for this very reason it was a crime at first condoned by the nation.

For this very reason would chroniclers overlook it, treat it as no crime at all, or conceal the name of the doer ; till, later on, he was remembered as the author or agent of things still more unnatural. Under any circum stances, however, there seems no good reason to doubt that the lad was really murdered ; and even if we could think Richard guiltless of the deed, the deed itself was a most unhappy part of his experience at the commencement of active life. Yet, after all, the whole responsibility for this par- A.D. 1471- SLAUGHTER OF PRINCE EDWARD. 15 ticular act was never attributed to Richard. Even the fuller details contained in Holinshed's Chronicle make Richard an accomplice in the act with others. It is possible that the circumstances of the case were preserved only by tradition, till the days of Polydore Vergil and of Hall the Chronicler ; but they are not on that account unworthy of credit.

According to Hall's account, the prince was taken prisoner in the engagement by Sir Richard Crosses, ' a wise man and a valiant knight' After the battle King Edward made proclamation that whoever brought the prince to him, alive or dead, should have 100/. a year settled on him for life, and that the prince's life should be spared. Trusting to the king's promise, Crosses brought his prisoner, a handsome youth, but with a somewhat feminine appearance : — ' Whom when King Edward had well regarded, he demanded of him how he durst so presumptuously enter into his realm with banner displayed ? The prince, being bold of stomach and of good courage, answered, saying : " To recover my father's kingdom and inheritance, from his father and grandfather to him, and from him after him to me lineally de scended."

At which words King Edward said nothing, but with his hand thrust him from him, or, as some say, struck him with his gauntlet ; whom, incontinent, they that stood about,— which were George Duke of Clarence, Richard Duke of Gloucester, Thomas Bad faith of King Edward towards the vanquished. Marquis Dorset, and William Lord Hastings — suddenly murdered.' ' If, then, this was Richard's first heinous crime, it was probably one in which he was only an accessory, or in which, if a principal actor, he received great en couragement from those about him. On the other hand, to suppose him altogether guiltless in this matter is a great violation of all reasonable prob ability. For however feeble may be the direct evidence of his complicity, it would be absurd to suppose that he either disapproved the act, or was greatly shocked at it.