Plantagenet Rivalry and the Wars of the Roses

The Plantagenet struggles leading to the Wars of the Roses

Let him that is a true-born gentleman, And stands upon the honour of his birth, If he suppose that I have pleaded truth, From off this briar pluck a white rose with me.

Let him that is no coward nor no flatterer, But dare maintain the party of the truth, Pluck a red rose from off this thorn with me.

(From Henry VI Part 1, Act II, Scene 4)

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Feudalism gone wrong

The traditional feudal system had evolved since the Norman Conquest. It was rooted in a deal that involved the exchange of land and a livelihood within royal and noble estates for rent and service. It was the source from which an army could be drawn when it was required. In the late fourteenth century, relying on this system, Edward III had created duchies for his sons, including the Duchies of York and Lancaster. Administration was thereby devolved and from that devolution, new powerful families of rival Houses emerged. The feudal bond was mutual, so the ordinary classes of folk increasingly demanded protection in return for their part of the bargain. The duchies grew wealthy and grew in power to be able to raise powerful armies to protect their interests. This was all fine during the reign of Edward III, but the seeds of turmoil were sown for the following decades.

It might be argued that in a pre modern era, the tiered feudal system did at least provide some stability when it operated as it was intended. Then a corrupted form of feudalism started to emerge.

In the nineteenth century historians invented the term bastard feudalism to describe the form of feudalism that emerged after Edward III’s reign. In 1885, the historian Charles Plummer blamed bastard feudalism for the disorder and instability of the Wars of the Roses in the fifteenth century. Instability arose with multiple sources of claims to the throne arising when hopeless Kings like Richard II and Henry VI failed to perform as Kings. This led to struggles at the highest tier of feudal society as rival Houses sought control of the Crown, whilst in the middle tiers, the gentry of the middle classes began to think of themselves as the men of their lord rather than of the king. For the ordinary folk of England, life would only get complicated, and more difficult.

The period was satirically summarised in 1066 and All That by R J Sellar and Yeatman in 1931:

The Gone Medieval podcast on the Origins of the Wars of the Roses is quite a good introduction.

Genealogy of the Wars of the Roses

The complications of the Royal Dynasty lie at the heart of the Wars of the Roses. The red text in the genealogy below shows the passage of the Crown from the main Plantagenet line, to the alternating claims of the Houses of York and Lancaster, to the Tudors. The Neville family were integrated into the genealogical mix, as was Joan, the Fair Maid of Kent, and the Holland family, of Stuteville descendant and proprietor of the lands of Kirkbymoorside, and Farndale.

Edward III

1312 to 1377

Reigned 1327 to 1377

(1) Plantagenet

Married Philippa of Hainault

John Neville, 3^rd Baron Neville

1337 to 1388

Married Maud Percy and Elizabeth Latimer

Edward, The Black Prince

1330 to 1376

Married Joan of Kent, the Fair Maid, of Stuteville descent landholder of Kirkbymoorside and Farndale

Lionel of Antwerp, Duke of Clarence

1338 to 1368

Married Elizabeth de Burgh, 4^th Countess of Ulster

Edmund, 1^st Duke of York

1341 to 1402

Married Isabella of Castile and later Joan Holland

John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster

1340 to 1399

Married Blanche of Lancaster

Married Katherine Swynford

Ralph Neville, 1^st Earl of Westmorland

1364 to 1425

Married Margaret Stafford and then Joan Beaufort (daughter of John of Gaunt)

Richard II

1367 to 1400

Reigned 1377 to 1399

(2) Plantagenet

Married Anne of Bohemia and Isabella of Valois

Philippa Plantagenet, 5^th Countess of Ulster

Married Edmund Mortimer, 3^rd Earl of March

1355 to 1382

Richard of Conisburgh, 3^rd Earl of Cambridge

1385 to 1415

Married Anne Mortimer

Henry IV (Henry Bolingbroke)

1367 to 1413

Reigned 1399 to 1413

(3) Lancaster

Married Mary de Bohun and Joan of Navarre

Joan Beaufort

1377 to 1440

Married Robert Ferrers and then Ralph Neville

John Beaufort, 1^st Earl of Somerset

1373 to 1410

Married Margaret Holland

Richard Neville, 5^th Earl of Salisbury

1400 to 1460

Married Alice Montagu, 5^th Countess of Salisbury

Cecily Neville

1415 to 1495

Married Richard, Duke of York

Roger Mortimer, 4^th Earl of March

1374 to 1398

Richard Plantagenet, 3^rd Duke of York

1411 to 1460

Married Cecily Neville

Henry V

1386 to 1422

Reigned 1413 to 1422

(4) Lancaster

Married Catherine of Valois

Henry V married Catherine of Valois who later married Owen Tudor in 1428

John Beaufort, 1^st Duke of Somerset

1404 to 1444

Married Margaret Beauchamp

Richard Neville, 16^th Earl of Warwick The Kingmaker

1428 to 1471

Married Anne Beachamp, 16^th Countess of Warwick

Edmund Mortimer, 5th Earl of March

1391 to 1425

Potential claimant to the Crown in the 1399 Lancastrian coup

Mortimer’s claim was the basis of revolts against Henry IV and Henry V and was later taken up by the House of York in the Wars of the Roses, though Mortimer himself remained loyal to Henry V and Henry VI.

Anne Mortimer

1388 to 1411

Married Richard, Earl of Cambridge

Henry VI

1421 to 1471

Reigned 1422 to 1461

(5) Lancaster

Then 1470 to 1471

(7) Lancaster

Married Margaret of Anjou

Edmund Tudor, Earl of Richmond

1430 to 1456

Lady Margaret Beaufort

1443 to 1509

Married Edmund Tudor

Isabell Neville, Duchess of Clarence

1451 to 1476

Married George, Duke of Clarence

Anne Neville

1456 to 1485

Married Edward, Prince of Wales (Henry VI and Margaret of Anjou’s son, 1453 to 1471) and then Richard Duke of Gloucester, and when he became Richard III was Queen of England

Edward IV

 1442 to 1483

Reigned 1461 to 1470

(6) York

Then 1471 to 1483

Married Elizabeth Woodville

(8) York

Edmund Earl of Rutland

1443 to 1460

George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence

1449 to 1478

Married Isabel Neville

Richard III

1452 to 1485

Reigned 1483 to 1485

(10) York

Married Anne Neville

Henry VII

1457 to 1509

Reigned 1485 to 1509

(11) Tudor

Married Elizabeth of York

Edward V

1470 to 1483

Reigned 9 April to 25 June 1483

(9) York

A Prince in the Tower

Richard, Duke of York

1473 to 1483

A Prince in the Tower

Elizabeth of York

1466 to 1503

A princess banished to Sheriff Hutton who later married into the Tudors

Married Henry VII

Edward, Prince of Wales

1473 to 1484

Born at Middleham and whilst his burial is unknown, his effigy is in Sheriff Hutton Church

Henry VIII

1491 to 1547

Reigned 1509 to 1547

(12) Tudor

The Lancastrian Coup of 1399

Richard II, son of the Black Prince and Joan the Fair Maid, came to the throne in 1377 when he was a boy aged 10, destined to learn the wrong lessons of kingship amidst a stream of competing advisers led by the Lancastrian John of Gaunt, who didn’t have his best interests at heart. His mother Joan was a strong mentor but after she died in 1385 when he was still only 18, his reign became arbitrary, and beset with military failure.

In his feudal model for dynastic control, Edward III had established four separate houses of power in his four sons.

Richard II took the main Plantagenet line through his father the Black Prince who had died the year before Edward III had died. Richard II was still King as the fourteenth century came to a close.

Edward III’s second son Lionel, the Duke of Clarence had died in 1368 leaving a daughter, Philippa who had married Edmund Mortimer, the powerful Earl of March. Their son Roger Mortimer was born in 1374. There were difficult questions regarding the priority of succession through a daughter of a second son over the son of a later son. So the Mortimer interest in the succession was a tricky question, and one which would not go away.

At the end of the century, Edward III’s third son Edmund, Duke of York was fifty eight, with his young son Richard only 14, so at the point in time in the late fourteenth century, they were not a serious challenge to the established monarchy. So the Yorkist claim to the throne was dormant at this stage. They arguably had a better claim to the throne than the Lancastrians, but this was not the right time for them.

The son of Edward III’s fourth son, John of Gaunt, Henry Bolingbroke was three months younger than his cousin, Richard II. Henry contrasted with Richard with his Plantagenet credentials as a jouster, crusader and chivalric hero. The Lancastrians were the most realistic alternative when there were doubts about the direction of the current monarch.

The era of the Plantagenets was dominated by the glamour of chivalry and the glory seen in the causes against France, Scotland, Ireland and Wales. Success in the medieval Five Nations competitions was compulsory. Stability tended to follow alpha male dominance in those arenas.

Richard’s first challenge was the Peasant’s Revolt in 1381, when he was only 14. Richard initially met the rebels’ demands, but later tensions led to the death of Wat Tyler. Richard showed a degree of courage and determination, but the threat to his royal authority tended him towards more absolutist approach as his reign progressed.

In 1386 there was a real threat of French invasion and Richard sought an unprecedented level of taxation from Parliament to defend the realm. The Wonderful Parliament insisted on the deposition of Richard’s Chancellor, Michael de la Pole and Richard was forced to give in and to the setting up of a commission to control royal finances.

Richard came to rely on a small retinue of favourites, including Robert de Vere, Earl of Oxford; Sir Simon Burley, Richard’s tutor; and Michael de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk. A group of three Lords Appellant, Thomas Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester (Richard’s uncle); Richard FitzAlan, Earl of Arundel; and Thomas de Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick were joined by Henry Bolingbroke (Richard’s cousin) and Thomas de Mowbray, Earl of Nottingham and later Duke of Norfolk, in pursuing a legal case against Richard’s unpopular favourites. Richard was humiliated by the Merciless Parliament of 1388 when his former favourites were executed or banished.

Richard had reached a low ebb in his power.

After John of Gaunt returned from Spain in 1389, Richard gradually rebuilt his power, and continued to hold a grudge against the Lords Appellant. By 1397 he came to rule in a more absolutist fashion in a period known as the tyranny. Richard had Gloucester, Arundel and Warwick arrested and executed or imprisoned. This left the younger Lords Appellant, Henry Bolingbroke, the King’s cousin and Thomas de Mowbray, the King’s boyhood friend, feeling vulnerable. They soon fell out with each other and Bolingbroke accused Mowbray of treason. This became a cause celebre and initially the dispute was to be resolved in a trial by combat.

Richard’s jealousy of his cousin, Henry Bolingbroke, had led him to curb Lancastrian power, and in 1386 Richard II, who had no children himself, announced that his heir was to be Roger Mortimer. However Roger Mortimer was killed in Ireland in 1398 at the age of 24, leaving a seven year old son, Edmund Mortimer. It was at this time that Richard II adjudicated in the quarrel between Mowbray and Bolingbroke and exiled Bolingbroke and Mowbray. In William Shakespeare play Richard II, Act 1, Scene 3, Henry Bolingbroke mourned his sentence of exile. How long a time lies in one little word! Four lagging winters and four wanton springs End in a word; such is the breath of kings.

On 3 February 1399, Henry Bolingbroke’s father, John of Gaunt, died. Richard II clearly intended a Mortimer succession. Such was the breath of Kings.

Henry Bolingbroke’s return from exile and his seizure of the Crown in 1399 was a bold power grab, an invasion from France in a struggle for the Crown, unseen since the invasion of William the Conqueror in a succession dispute between Normans and Godwinsons. Henry Bolingbroke landed at Ravenspur near Hull, ostensibly to reclaim his lands and uphold the rules of succession. Richard II was soon captured and taken to Pontefract castle. This was within the geographical ambit of the Farndales of Doncaster, who had there home there at this time.

The Epiphany Rising was an attempt to seize Henry IV during a tournament, kill him, and restore Richard II to the throne, but it failed. The rebellion convinced Henry IV of the threat posed by Richard while deposed and imprisoned but still alive. Richard would come to his death by means unknown in Pontefract Castle by 17 February 1400.

In our Plantagenet past the smooth passage of the Crown to a legitimate heir was a prerequisite for the relative stability of ordinary folk, who had a better chance of getting on with their lives. The end of Richard II’s reign marked a dangerous new age when rival noble houses might challenge the Crown and raise armies to defend their competing claims. Richard had held the legitimate line of succession. Henry had stepped in, probably forced into a corner by Richard when he seized the Lancastrian lands and banished him, and Henry had been able to gather support to seize the Crown from an unpopular, absolutist King. Yet Henry’s power was shaky. Even if he were able to justify the seizing of the Crown from the legitimate Plantagenet line, the Mortimer succession arguably had a better claim. Henry relied on a new idea of the illegitimacy of female succession in his preference over the Mortimers, but the Plantagenet’s own claims to the French Crown in the Hundred Years War rested significantly on female succession.

This assault on the stability of the rules of succession which protected the nation from chaos, was a concern to the elite classes. Henry Bolingbroke’s seizure of the throne was precarious from the start. Uneasy lies the head that wears a Crown (Henry IV, Part II). However Richard had become too problematic as King, and by then was controlling the nation as a tyrant. The nobility therefore reluctantly supported Henry.

The main support for Henry came from the great northern family, the Percys.

The Percys and the Nevilles, the elite families of the lands of our Farndale ancestors, were rivals and key players in the nation’s story of the fifteenth century.

In order to cement support for his new dynasty, Henry IV was forced to make concessions, and at least impliedly to curb the heavy taxation which was a strong element of Richard II’s unpopularity, as well as to uphold property rights and respect the peoples’ will. He delivered his claim to the throne in London in English, to be understood by all. His claim had to be rooted in public support because his claim under the traditional rules of succession was open to challenge. That would prove a millstone for Henry IV, as a modern political party bound by its manifesto promises.

As Henry IV’s reign became increasingly threatened, particularly by the challenges of Owen Glyndwr and Gwilym ap Tudur in Wales and by the Earl of Douglas in Scotland, his rule was not easy, but his strength of character was sufficient to find a route to somehow keep things together and his iconic heroic son Henry V was then able to bind the nation together after his successes in France.

Richard Farndale fought in Richard II’s, Henry IV’s and Henry V’s campaigns.

Th next eight five years were to be tumultuous in English history.

Wars of the Roses 1455 to 1487

The Yorkist Coup of 1461

The fragility of the Plantagenet dynasty came to be exposed when Kings were unable to perform. Just as Richard II’s weakness provided the flashpoint for explosion, Henry VI’s reign was another disappointment, which gave rise to new opportunities.

This time it was the House of York who exposed the fragility of the Lancastrian dynasty, in the early stage of the wars of the Roses.

The mental instability of King Henry VI revived Richard, Duke of York's interest in a claim to the throne. Warfare began in 1455 with the Duke of York's capture of Henry at the First Battle of St Albans, upon which York was appointed Lord Protector by Parliament. Fighting resumed four years later when Yorkists led by Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, the Kingmaker, captured Henry again at the Battle of Northampton. After attempting to seize the throne, Richard of York was killed at the Battle of Wakefield, and his son Edward inherited his claim which Richard of York had negotiated with Henry IV, in the controversial Act of Accord. The Yorkists lost custody of Henry IV in 1461 after the Second Battle of St Albans, but defeated the Lancastrians at the Battle of Towton.

Edward IV was crowned in June 1461.

Coup and Counter-Coup of 1470 and 1471

In 1464, Edward married Elizabeth Woodville against the advice of Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, and reversed the Kingmaker’s policy of seeking closer ties with France.

Richard Neville switched sides to the Lancastrians against Edward in 1469, leading to Edward's imprisonment after Warwick's supporters defeated a Yorkist army at the Battle of Edgcote. Edward was allowed to resume his rule after Warwick failed to replace him with his brother George of Clarence.

However within a year, Warwick launched an invasion of England alongside Henry VI's wife Margaret of Anjou. Edward IV fled to Flanders, and Henry VI was restored as king in 1470.

Edward IV mounted a counter-invasion with aid from Burgundy a few months later, and killed Warwick at the Battle of Barnet. Henry was returned to prison, and his sole heir later killed by Edward at the Battle of Tewkesbury, followed by Henry's own death in the Tower of London, possibly on Edward's orders.

The 18-year-old Richard, Duke of Gloucester, played a crucial role in the revival of Yorkist fortunes and was in the thick of the fighting at the Battles of Barnet and Tewkesbury.

Shakespeare depicted his famous soliloquy as the Yorkists came to power again, Now is the winter of our discontent, Made glorious summer by this son of York, And all the clouds that loured upon our house, In the deep bosom of the ocean buried. Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths, Our bruisèd arms hung up for monuments, Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings, Our dreadful marches to delightful measures. Grim-visaged war hath smoothed his wrinkled front; And now, instead of mounting barbèd steeds To fright the souls of fearful adversaries, He capers nimbly in a lady’s chamber To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.

But Shakespeare did not paint Richard of Gloucester as a gallant soldier, but rather as a scheming hunchback who was already plotting his own power grab, though this was probably Tudor propaganda. The soliloquy continued But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks, Nor made to court an amorous looking glass; I, that am rudely stamped and want love’s majesty, To strut before a wanton ambling nymph; I, that am curtailed of this fair proportion, Cheated of feature by dissembling nature, Deformed, unfinished, sent before my time Into this breathing world scarce half made up, And that so lamely and unfashionable That dogs bark at me as I halt by them— Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace, Have no delight to pass away the time, Unless to see my shadow in the sun And descant on mine own deformity. And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover To entertain these fair well-spoken days, I am determinèd to prove a villain And hate the idle pleasures of these days. Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous, By drunken prophecies, libels, and dreams, To set my brother Clarence and the King In deadly hate, the one against the other; And if King Edward be as true and just As I am subtle, false, and treacherous, This day should Clarence closely be mewed up About a prophecy which says that “G” Of Edward’s heirs the murderer shall be. Dive, thoughts, down to my soul.

(William Shakespeare, Richard III, Act 1, Scene 1)

Edward ruled unopposed for the next twelve years, during which England enjoyed a period of relative peace. Upon his death in April 1483, he was succeeded by the twelve-year-old Edward V, who reigned for 78 days until being deposed by his uncle Richard III.

Richard III Takes Charge 1483

In March 1483, Edward IV fell ill during a fishing expedition and died. Upon his death, his son Edward, only 12 years old, became King Edward V. In a codicil to his will, written a few days before he died, Edward IV had named his brother Richard as Lord Protector.

Edward V had been living with his uncle Anthony Woodville, Earl Rivers, brother of the widowed Queen Elizabeth Woodville. The Woodvilles tried to use this advantage of control over the new young King to overthrow Richard as Lord Protector and retain control of the new King Edward V’s destiny themselves.

In York, Richard heard of his brother’s death and headed south calling on the Woodvilles to meet him with Edward at Northampton. Edward V also headed south with the Woodvilles in a long procession, but did not head for Northampton, but for London. However Richard took control and seized the Woodvilles, sending Earl Rivers to Pontefract Castle to be executed. In this chaotic situation, there was disquiet and rioting in London. At Sheriff Hutton Castle Anthony Woodville was imprisoned by Richard of Gloucester, and there he made his will before being removed to Pontefract for execution in 1483.

Richard then accompanied Edward V to the Tower of London, then a royal residence as much as it was a prison.

Shakespeare naturally depicted a scheming Richard, reassuring the princes Where it seems best unto your royal self. If I may counsel you, some day or two Your Highness shall repose you at the Tower, then where you please and shall be thought most fit for your best health and recreation (William Shakespeare, Richard III, Act 3, Scene 1).

The young King Edward V was to be prepared for his Coronation in May. Elizabeth Woodville took sanctuary in Westminster Abbey. Richard then announced a delay to the Coronation. In June Elizabeth was persuaded to allow her second son, Richard of Shrewsbury join her brother in the Tower of London.

The Canon of St Paul’s then declared that Edward IV had been betrothed to another women before he married Elizabeth Woodville, which made the marriage to Elizabeth void, and their offspring illegitimate.

The Coronation was called off. Richard III was crowned King on 6 July 1483. Richard gave his oath in English at his Coronation. It appears that he wanted the people to understand his oath as be promised to rule with justice and mercy and to protect the rights of people and church.

The Princes disappeared. If they were killed it is generally felt they would have died in about September 1483. There were subsequent Yorkist Pretender claims by Lambert Simbel in 1487 and Perkin Warbeck in 1490 who claimed to be the princes Edward and Richard respectively, bur Warbeck was certainly an imposter.

Richard has been made villein by the Tudor cause, who having seized the Crown from Richard III had reason to legitimise themselves. This depiction of Richard was led by Sir Thomas Moore during the reign of Henry VIII, the story later taken up by Shakespeare during Elizabeth I’s reign. Whether he really was the monster portrayed is a matter of strong debate, and Richard’s cause is still advanced by the Ricardian Society.

The case against Richard is that he had control of the princes, the ability to silence witnesses, the motive to kill them, and the events suggest that he usurped the Crown.

The case in his favour suggests that if Richard’s intention was to have usurped the throne he would more likely have displayed the bodies of the young children to prove they had died and secure the throne, claiming natural causes or blaming someone else. There were other suspects, including Margaret Beaufort, who sought the coronation of her son Henry Tudor.

Richard was still only thirty years old when he was crowned Richard III, and his past history, including his governance of northern England, do not suggest a villainous man

The Tudor Coup of 1485

In 1485 having fled to Paris after Buckingham’s failed rebellion against Richard III, Henry Tudor secured support from the French regent Anne of Beaujeu, who supplied troops for an invasion. On 22 August 1485, Richard III met the outnumbered forces of Henry Tudor at the Battle of Bosworth Field. Richard rode a white courser, an especially swift and strong horse. The size of Richard's army has been estimated at 8,000 and Henry's at 5,000, but exact numbers are not known, though the royal army is believed to have substantially outnumbered Henry's.

Thomas, Lord Stanley, was a close ally of Richard, but also Henry Tudor’s stepfather. He was a wily strategist and kept his intentions to himself. There were effectively three armies at the Battlefield of Bosworth. Richard sent a threatening message to Stanley demanding that he support Richard’s cause. However at the critical moment, Stanley came to the support of Henry Tudor.

On 22 August 1485, Richard III was defeated at the Battle of Bosworth. He was killed after losing his horse. His corpse was stripped, stabbed with blades and treated with disdain. He was taken to Leicester and hastily buried in a rough grave at Greyfriars. He lay there until his burial place in a Department of Social Sciences Car Park, under the letter “R” for “Reserved” (or “Richard” or “Rex” perhaps) was excavated and he was found and DNA tested.

Five Powerful Mums

The years of Plantagenet struggle have been traditionally depicted through a story of the male Kings. However there were five powerful women who may have been instrumental in how the story played out.

When Joan, the Fair Maid of Kent, heiress of the Stuteville lands, lost her Black Prince in 1376, and her father in law Edward III the following year, her nine year old son, Richard II relied on her Mum to steer him through the Coronation and beyond. She used all her guile to protect her somewhat hopeless son until she too died in 1385.

The Mumless Richard II was left with only scheming advisers, including the wily Lancastrian John of Gaunt, who nevertheless remained loyal to the Crown until he died on 3 February 1399. But left to fend for himself, Richard II finally lost his throne to John of Gaunt’s son Henry Bolingbroke on 30 September 1399. So started the dynasty of the House of Lancaster.

Ralph Neville had married Joan Beaufort, the daughter of the Lancastrian John of Gaunt by Gaunt’s third marriage to Katherine Swynford. Joan’s brother was John Beaufort, the first Earl of Somerset, great grandfather of Lady Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond and Derby who married Edmund Tudor, with whom they had Henry Tudor, the future Henry VII.

Ralph Neville and Joan Beaufort’s youngest daughter was Cecily Neville. Cecily married the Yorkist Richard Plantagenet, 3^rd Duke of York. Their sons were Edward VI, George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence and Richard of Gloucester, the future Richard III. When the Yorkists took the throne from the Lancastrians in 1461, Cecily, rather as Joan of Kent had done, was the Queen Mother who guided her son through the early challenges of monarchy.

The nemesis of Edward IV and his mother Cecily Nevile, was Margaret of Anjou, the wife of the ousted Lancastrian King Henry VI, who had been the real power behind the Lancastrian cause in previous challenges with the House of York, and during the period of the Yorkist Edward IV’s first reign. Margaret of Anjou was portrayed by the Wars of the Roses spinmaster, Cecily Neville’s nephew, Richard Neville the Younger, Earl of Warwick, known as the Kingmaker, as an apocalyptic woman at the head of a Viking like army, who threatened the folk of southern England. He promoted a probably unfair legend of Margaret of Anjou as evil. Cecily Neville’s Edward of York was a powerful, charismatic individual, easily contrasted to Margaret’s Henry VI and the Kingmaker promoted the Yorkist claim to the throne.

Edward IV secretly married Elizabeth Woodville in 1464, in much the same way as Joan of Kent had secretly married Thomas Holland and later the Black Prince, upsetting the plans of their mentors. Elizabeth Woodville was ambitious but in the early years Cecily Neville seems to have retained some influence over her monarch son. However when Edward IV died in 1483, trusting the protection of his son Edward V to his brother Richard III, the young prince Edward was with the Woodville family, and the Woodvilles made their move to control the minority rule of Edward V. Edward V and his young brother soon disappeared, the princes in the tower, and Elizabeth Woodville’s marriage to Edward IV was declared invalid. You can read the historical facts as might take your fancy, to decide whether Richard III was the evil king made out by Shakespeare or not. Cecily Neville continued to be on good terms with Richard’s new wife Lady Anne Neville, her own kin through her brother and nephew the Kingmaker.

Then from stage right came the return of another threat, the Beauforts, descendants of the Lancastrian John of Gaunt, who had married into the Tudors. Lady Margaret Beaufort supported her son, Henry Tudor, to seize the throne from Richard III who he defeated at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485 to become the first Tudor King Henry VII. In the following year, 1486, Henry VII would secure his legacy by marrying Elizabeth of York, the daughter of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville, the granddaughter of Richard of York and Cecily Neville.

Joan the Fair Maid of Kent was the power behind the reign of the hopeless Plantagenet Richard II, at least until she died in 1385.

Margaret of Anjou was the power behind the reign of the equally hopeless Lancastrian Henry VI, until outmanoeuvred by the Yorkist power grab in 1461, though with a short counter offensive in 1470

Cecily Neville was the mother and mentor of the Yorkist Kings Edward IV and Richard III.

Elizabeth Woodville was the wife of Edward IV, who attempted an unsuccessful power grab to protect her son Edward V against the designs of Richard III, but whose daughter, Elizabeth of York married the Tudor King Henry VII.

Lady Margaret Beaufort was the mother of the Tudor King Henry VII, who she helped to steer to his monarchy.

The blood of Lady Margaret Beaufort, Elizabeth Woodville and Cecily Neville was passed through Henry VII to all the English and British monarchs who followed.

If you would like to really understand the politics behind the Wars of the Roses, don’t be tempted to become too focused on the battles fought between the menfolk, but take note of the powerful women who really called the shots.

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Podcasts

In Our Time – The Wars of the Roses

Gone Medieval – Dynastic War - The Battle of Towton 1461 – Rise of the Beauforts - The Uncrowned Queen (Margaret Beaufort) – Endings

The Hollow Crown is a BBC series which comprises all the Henriad play.

Orson Welles’ Chimes at Midnight is a classic film which explores the relationship between Prince Hal and Falstaff.