King Louis Amboise. CHAP. 19. Of the continuance of the Duke of A.D. 1469. Clarence, Earl of Warwick, with their wives and train in France, it is very necessary somewhat here to manifest as it was (in) deed. Within short space of their coming into Normandy they hastened towards King Louis, the which as at that time lay at his castle of Amboise beside They meet Tours in Touraine : whither, when they were come, the XIth at King welcomed them with great feastings. And after that they had disclosed unto the King the cause of their departure out of England, and of their coming thither, anon they withdrew themselves to their lodgings. Then And are rewithin short space after came from Aviow Dame Mar- Queen Margaret,35 Daughter of King Regnier of Sicily, wife to Prince of King Harry the Sixth, and her Son Prince Edward with her: at whose coming was shortly a great Council betwixt them to know by what manner they should return into England. The which Council dissolved, the 'foresaid Duke of Clarence, and Earl of Warwick, returned into Normandy, the which was in the month of June in the year abovesaid. And so they abode there till it was the latter end of August next following. 35 Margaret was unfortunate an exile; and had seen all her hopes blossom but to wither: yet she was resentful, highminded, and resolute. Warwick had dethroned her, and she could neither forgive nor trust him, nor be hereafter governed by him. He required as the conditions of his alliance and support, a complete pardon; that her only son Edward should marry his second daughter Ann; and a puissant force to England, with her authority. Louis sent for Margaret to Angiers, and urged her to comply with Warwick's terms. But she surprised him by steadily objecting to the very first article. She said, that consistently with her own or her son's honour she might not, and could not, pardon the man who had been the greatest cause of the fall of King Henry and herself; and that from her own heart, she never could be conciled with garet and the Wales. A.D. 1470. CHAP. 20.-During this season of their being in France, Dame Charlotte of Savoy, wife to the French King Louis, was delivered of a son, in the 'foresaid castle of Amboise, the last day of June in the same year of our Lord 1470, to whom were Godfathers at the font, Charles of Bourbon Archbishop and Cardinal of Lyons, Edward Prince, beforesaid son to King Harry the Sixth; and the Duchess of Bourbon, Sister to the forenamed King Louis and the child was named Charles, and was King after his Father. At the which birth were made many great solemnities and triumphs throughout the Realm of France; whereupon the said Prince Edward married there Anne, youngest daughter of the Earl of Warwick: the which Anne was wedded to Richard Duke of Glouthe Earl of cester after, in the year of our Lord 1474, at Westminster, after the death of the same Prince Edward. Edward Prince of Wales marries Anne, daughter of Warwick. 36 CHAP. 21.-King Edward in this mean time was about London, to whom was brought tidings of the departing of the Duke of Clarence and the Earl of Warwick, and that how they passed by Wiltshire westward, had taken Anthony Lord Scales and John Lord Audley: the which two Lords they sent to the Castle of Warder, to be kept out of the way unto a time determinate, that they should have been put to execution: of the which inprisonment John Thorn- a gentleman of Dorsetshire, named John Thornhill, hearing, came the night following with a good company of and Audley. hardy fellows, and found the means to deliver these two Lords from captivity. Whereupon they were delivered to liberty. Then the King Edward, seeing these two, Duke and Earl, so departed so suddenly, he marvelled greatly and he, being in this anguish and trouble, had knowledge of a new rebellion in the North by the means hill liberates the Lords Scales 36 The Prince of Wales is said to | Europe. He was created Prince of have been one of the handsomest Wales, A.D. 1454. and most accomplished princes in Lord Fitz.. bellion. ford's flight of the Lord Fitzhugh: against whom he prepared a A.D. 1470. puissance of men, and went northward: of the which hugh's rewhen the foresaid Lord Fitzhugh was certified, he fled into Scotland (and in the same season the Earl of Ox- Lord Oxford took shipping, and sailed into Normandy to those into France. other Lords). Whereupon one Sir Geoffrey Gate, Knight, with the 'foresaid Clapham, had prepared at Southampton a company of their 'complices to have passed into France, to those Lords of Clarence and Warwick; but their purpose was soon disclosed. For the Earl of Worcester and the Lord Howard prevented them. In so much that many of them were taken, as Sir Geoffrey Gate, the which had his pardon Sir Geoffrey and afterwards went to sanctuary. Clapham was be- ed, and headed and divers others hanged, etc. Gate pardon Clapham beheaded. warned by CHAP. 22. Then the King seeing such commotions in the realm, and hearing nothing of the Marquis of Montague, whom he loved entirely, he rode northward and left the Queen, great with child, in the Tower of London. And as he was in the North Country, in the month of September, as he lay in his bed one named The King Alexander Carlisle, that was sarjeant of the minstrels, Al. Carlisle, Sept. 1470. came to him in great haste, and bade him arise for he had enemies coming for to take him, the which were within six or seven miles, of the which tidings the King greatly marvelled. And suddenly upon that came one Master Alexander Lee, a Priest 38 * * (The remainder of this curious Chronicle is wanting.) 37 "Lord Worcester ordered Clapham (a squire to Lord Warwick) and nineteen others, gentlemen and yeomen, to be impaled, and from the horror of the spectacle inspired, and the universal odium it attached to Worcester, it is to be feared that the unhappy men were still sensible to the agony of this infliction, though they ap * pear first to have been drawn, and 38 The lacunæ" in the MS. Cont. Hist. Stapleton's Edward was in the neighbourhood of Nottingham awaiting the assembling of his forces to disperse the rebels under Warwick and Clarence, when Carlisle, the chief of his minstrels, and Lee, the priest, apprized him of the treason of the Marquis of Montague, “whom the King loved entirely," who with 6000 men, in the King's immediate vicinity had just declared for King Henry. He had no alternative, therefore, but to fly, and accompanied by his brother Richard, the Earl Rivers, Lord Hastings and a few other faithful followers, took shiping at Bishop's Lynn in Norfolk, and landed at Alcmar, in Friezeland, without even sufficient money in his pocket to pay his passage. 66 During the year following England was a scene of fierce commotion; rebellion, fomented by the Earl of Warwick, spread on every side, till it drove the Yorkist monarch from his throne, and once more fixed the crown on the brow of Henry VI. The change was, however, transient: on the 14th March, 1471, Edward landed at Ravenspurn, the fields of Barnet and Tewkesbury were fought in succession, and in May Henry VI. died, leaving his rival in undisputed possession of the Kingdom." |