The Wars of the Roses were the longest
period of civil war in English history 1455-
1499. They occurred following the final English defeat in the Hundred Years' War,
(1337-1453) and were a series of wars, minor clashes, and disorders between two
branches of the Plantagenet family, Lancaster and York. There were three periods
of sustained conflict: 1459-61, 1469-71, and 1483-87.
It all began with king Edward III. He
had seven sons, but it was the descendants of
three of them, Lionel Duke of Clarence 2nd surviving son; John Duke of Lancaster
3rd surviving son; and Edmund Duke of York 4th surviving son; which were to
change the course of history. Edward III was succeeded by his eldest son the ill
fated Richard II, who was deposed by Henry IV, who was the son of the Duke of
Lancaster. There was therefore a 'Lancastrian' king of England, as was his son the
victor of Agincourt Henry V and his son Henry VI.
Hostilities began under the rule of the
Lancastrian King Henry VI (1422-1461, who
became king at just 9 months old after the untimely death of his father Henry V
(1413-22). Until he was old enough to rule, England was run as a protectorate. He
was the youngest prince to succeed the throne of England and the only one to be
crowned twice as dual Monarch for England and France. He grew up under the
tutelage of Richard Beauchamp Earl of Warwick but proved to be a weak and
ineffectual king; he displayed a lack of apptitude for, or interest in, military and
perhaps, political matters, and prone to give credence to ill judged, unsuitable
advice and counsel. A continuation of poorly selected advisors and councillors
culminated in 1450 when Edmund Beaufort 2nd duke of Somerset became
principal councillor. Somerset had for the last few years prior, been deeply involved
losing every important town and province in France won by the much-lamented
Henry V, and by August 1450, all of Normandy had been lost, with some remnants
of Gascony only, remaining. A further 12 months saw even that gone, and only the
port of Calais remaining under the English crown. The country was brimming with
disaffected soldiery and nobility, and the resulting poverty of some of the fighting
classes led to a renewed stirring of 'Livery and Maintenance', the by then illegal
loyalties of lesser nobles and their tenants to their more powerful neighbours.
Obssessionally religious, he became known as the 'cleric-in-kings-clothing'. He had
a brief period of instability between 1453-54 which has been interpreted in modern
times as a bout of catatonic schizophrenia.
The country was starting to polarise.
In 1445, Henry married Margaret of Anjou, a
French noblewoman of keen ambition and impeccable heritage. She greatly
favoured the inept Somerset and his Beaufort family over more reliable men. One
such was Richard Duke of York who was descended from Edward III by Lionel
Duke of Clarence his 2nd son. York was not popular with the queen, he had a direct
bloodline to Edward III, which was at least as good as her husband's, and some
said, better. So rather than keep York onside, he was marginalised with the
Lieutenancy of Ireland. However, civil unrest in England, which resulted in the revolt
of Jack Cade and the men from Kent, fired York to action. What with all English
influence in France gone, and the threat of civil disorder, the country appeared to
be descending into a pit of chaos. York had however been excluded from the royal
council, and had no means of asserting any of his considerable power for the
country or king's benefit. The animosity between York and Somerset was palpable.
Both had huge wealth and power, and as the antagonism grew, so did the certainty
of civil war. By 1453, matters had come to a head, the king was disabled with
mental illness which lasted for 15 months, Somerset had been impeached, and
was locked up in the Tower of London, and the queen, who had been childless for 8
years, was then heavily pregnant. Parliament needed a regent to take control, and
with the prevailing circumstances, they decided to appoint York as Protector and
Defender of the Realm. By the end of 1454, the king had recovered his mental
faculties, and immediately set about undoing everything that York had done,
including restoring Somerset to full power and authority. The Duke of York retired in
indignation to his castle and estates at Wakefield and Sandal in Yorkshire. In the
middle of May 1455, York had gathered to his cause sufficient numbers of nobles
and men to attempt to resolve things by force of arms, and at the head of 3,000
men, began the march south, towards war.
The loss of English territories in France
and Henry's ineffectiveness to govern, led
Richard Duke of York (d.1460) to call for reforms. Inevitably this led to conflict
between the two sides, Lancaster and York. In 1459 a sustained conflict began,
and Henry was defeated and exiled. The Yorkists under Warwick the Kingmaker
returned triumphant in 1460 to promote the Duke of York's claim to the Crown. On
the 10th of October 1460 parliament passed an act of settlement which recognised
Richard, Duke of York as heir to Henry VI, thus excluding Henry's son Edmund,
Prince of Wales (Richard's claim to the throne was a legitimate one and had more
credence than Henry's). This didn't go down too well with the nobility and especially
with Henry's Queen, Margaret of Anjou. More politically astute than her feeble
minded husband, she already had a deep- seated hatred for York and Warwick and
had the support of some of the nobles. She summoned the Dukes of Exeter,
Somerset, Devon, Clifford, Roos, Greystoke and Latimer to join her with their
forces in the north of England. Thus began the most violent phase of the conflict,
which would end in 1461 at the battle of Towton.
After parliament declared for Richard
in October 1460, Margaret of Anjou had
raised a substantial army in the north. Concerned about such a concentration of
Lancastrian forces in Yorkshire Richard marched north with Lord Salisbury to
Sandal castle near Wakefield recruiting as he went. As to what happened at
Wakefield is something of a mystery, but on the 30th of December 1460 a large
Lancastrian force lured the Yorkists out of the castle (one suspects treachery) and
defeated them. Richard was killed during the battle and his 17-year-old son
Edmund Earl of Rutland was murdered by Lord Clifford on Chantry Bridge. Lord
Salisbury was taken prisoner and executed at Pontefract Castle the next day. The
heads of York, Rutland and Salisbury were to adorn the walls of Micklegate Bar in
York; the Duke's wearing a paper crown. After Wakefield the Lancastrian army
began to move south towards London, plundering and pillaging as they went.
York's nineteen-year-old son Edward Earl
of March had been celebrating
Christmas at Shrewsbury when he heard about the deaths of his father and brother.
He immediately moved to intercept the Lancastrian forces before they reached
London but was confronted by a Lancastrian Force under the command of the Earls
of Pembroke and Wiltshire at Mortimers Cross on the 2 February 1461, he won a
decisive victory and took prisoner Owen Tudor (the Grandfather of Henry VII, the
victor at Bosworth in 1485), who was executed the next day. After another battle at
St Albans and the fact that the citizens of London had closed the gates, the
Lancastrians moved back north, soon to be followed by the newly proclaimed
Edward IV at the head of a powerful army, which would meet an equally powerful
Lancastrian army on Towton Dale. So the scene was set for one of the bloodiest
episodes in English history.
England was at war with its self, or more
accurately, the English nobility was at war
with them selves. The so-called Wars of the Roses (a name not conjured up until
centuries later by Sir Walter Scott) were, in their simplest terms, conflicts between
two branches of the royal line. It is easiest to call them the houses of York and
Lancaster, not to be confused with either county shire of those names. The wars
spanned in all, 35 years, during of which there were fought as many battles as there
were years. It was during those battles that ancient family scores could be settled,
causing new outbursts of hatred and fury.
Although Edward of York had initially
been reluctant to proclaim himself king, his
heavy defeat at the second Battle of St. Albans convinced him that he needed to
take that final, irrevocable step of rebellion. No sooner had the dust settled on that
defeat than Edward was acclaimed king in London.
Meanwhile, instead of following up his
triumph at St. Albans with a decisive march
on the capital, Henry VI opted for caution and withdrew his men north. The actual
decision to pull back was probably Henry's, though he was easily led, particularly by
his strong- willed queen, Margaret of Anjou.
So the Lancastrians withdrew to their
power base in the north, probably destroying
as they did so their only real hope of a quick end to the conflict. Edward IV threw
caution aside, quickly raised a fresh army, and pushed north on his enemy's heels.
He caught up with them near the river Aire, where both armies spent the night on
the cold, snowy ground.
The Battle of Towton took place on March
29, 1461 at Towton, Yorkshire. It involved
the Yorkist army under Edward IV vs. Lancastrian forces led by the Duke of
Somerset on behalf of Henry VI and Queen MargaretThe Battle of Towton in the
Wars of the Roses was the bloodiest ever fought on British soil, with casualties
believed to have been in excess of 20,000 (perhaps as many as 30,000) men. The
battle took place on a snowy 29 March 1461 (Palm Sunday) on a plateau between
the villages of Towton and Saxton in Yorkshire (about 12 miles southwest of York
and about 2 miles south of Tadcaster).
Part of the reason so many died is perhaps
because in the parley before the battle
both sides agreed that no quarter would be given nor asked.
It is thought that 50,000, or perhaps
even 100,000 men fought, including 28 Lords
(almost half the peerage), mainly on the Lancastrian side. The numbers often given
are 42,000 for the Lancastrians and 36,000 for the Yorkists.
