2. King Edward IV

Pre-reading task: Why was the Earl of Warwick nicknamed ‘the kingmaker’?

In appearance, King Edward IV took after the Plantagenet forebears from whom he claimed his throne. At the time of his coronation on 28 June 1461, he was 19 years old, fair-haired and handsome, and he enjoyed immense popularity among his subjects. But those who hoped that the accession of Edward of York would mean an end to war in England were soon disappointed. Edward IV had many talents. He already proved, on his path to the throne that he was an able soldier, and once he matured he was to display considerable political skills. At first, however, he was deeply under the influence of his ambitious cousin Warwick, the 'Kingmaker', who helped him to win the crown, to assert his own authority. Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, was of semi-royal status, as a descendant of Edward III, and through several profitable marriage alliances in the Neville family he had become one of richest landowners In England. As the power behind the throne of young Edward IV it was he who virtually ran the kingdom and organised the suppression of remaining Lancastrian opposition, while the King pursued his favourite occupations of drinking and womanizing.

Edward IV's ungovernable passion for women - preferably sophisticated older women - was the cause of many of his troubles. It certainly led to his breach with Warwick, which came about in 1464. In the autumn of that year Warwick was negotiating an important peace treaty with France, which involved a diplomatic marriage al­liance between Edward and a princess of France. To the Kingmaker's outrage, matters had to be broken off when Edward revealed that he had been secretly married, several months earlier; to complete Warwick's discomfiture, the lady was a widow named Elizabeth Woodvtlle, whose family were ardent Lancastrians. As the Woodville clan began to fill King Edward's court, eager for advancement, Warwick's influence declined, and it soon became clear that Edward intended to think for himself in future. While Warwick continued to conduct his own negotiations with the King of France, Louis XI, Edward treated with a rival power, Burgundy; and when his sister, Margaret, married the Duke of Burgundy, after which the new brothers-in-law proposed a joint invasion of France, Warwick's displacement was complete.

The Kingmaker responded by seeking to make a new king. For this he had the ideal candidate in Edward's foolish, ambitious heir presumptive, his brother the Duke of Clarence. With Clarence as his pawn, Warwick rose against King Edward, backed by his friend and Edward's enemy, Louis XI of France. At first the rebellion succeeded; by July 1469 Edward was a prisoner in Warwick's hands.

Fortunately for the King, his popular support in the realm was so great that, instead of deposing him, Warwick was obliged to release him, to restore order in England. Before Warwick and Clarence could be suitably punished, the Kingmaker fled to France. There, encouraged by Louis XI, he made an ironic new alliance – he joined forces with Queen Margaret of Anjou, wife of the captive Lancastrian king, Henry VI. When Warwick returned to England to fight Edward again, in September 1470, it was on behalf of Henry VI, whom he had once helped to depose.

On this occasion, Warwick sealed the pathetic Henry's fate. For a time he was brought out of the Tower and made to act as king again, under Warwick's direction. But Edward, who had fled abroad, returned in the spring of 1471 with the support of the Duke of Burgundy and his own young brother, the trusty Richard of Gloucester. On 14 April, Easter Day, Edward won a great victory at the Battle of Barnet, in which Warwick was killed. When Queen Margaret landed with her son Edward, Henry VI's heir, there was a further bloody battle, at Tewkesbury; and again the skilful King Edward was victorious. Lancastrian opposition was crushed at Tewkesbury; when the battle was over. Henry VI's heir lay dead and the the old king was murdered in the Tower. Any future Lancastrian threat to the House of York now depended on a distant descendant of John of Gaunt, a 14-year-old boy named Henry Tudor, and for his safety he was spirited away to France.

For the rest of Edward IV's reign the crown remained secure, and the birth of the heir to the throne, also christened Edward, in 1470 seemed to ensure the Yorkist succession. King Edward emerged as a wise ruler and administrator; he set about reforming the Crown's finances, he built up trade, and he made successful efforts to keep down taxation. As well as putting down lawlessness on the English highways, he sought to curb the unruly Welsh, and he established a household for his son at Ludlow, where the infant Prince of Wales presided over the Principality in his name.

The French King Louis XI had proved himself Edward's enemy: now Edward retaliated, by intervening in French affairs. In the summer of 1475 he set sail for France at the head of a l0.000-strong invasion force Though he was let down by several allies including the Duke of Burgundy, Edward came out of the situation with credit: instead of fighting, he signed a truce with King Louis and agreed to withdraw in return for a large annual payment. Certain high-minded Englishmen, including the King's younger brother, Richard, Duke of Gloucester thought the settlement inglorious, but it benefited Edward's finances and thus his security.

Throughout the reign of Edward IV Richard of Gloucester served his brother loyally. The second brother, the Duke of Clarence, was a constant source of trouble however. When his dealings with Warwick the Kingmaker were at an end he involved himself in other dangerously ambitious projects, such as seeking to marry the great Duke of Burgundy's daughter; he seemed heedless of warnings, and finally action was taken to stop his plots for good. In February 1478 he was put to death; according to contemporary tradition, he was drowned in a butt of Malmsey wine. Certainly the killing had the King's consent.

Edward was himself fond of good wine and food, among other pleasures. He was genuinely cultured, possessing a considerable library of his own, and he encouraged the setting up of the first printing-press in England by William Caxton. But Edward IV’s greatest passion was women, and his last and most famous, love was the tradesman's wife Jane Shore.

Edward IV had many faults and vices including greed, promiscuity and idleness but he was in general a successful king. When he died of fever on 9 April 1483, he was succeeded by his 12-year-old son Prince Edward; and to act as Protector, he appointed his capable brother Richard, Duke of Gloucester.

(from “Kings and Queens of Great Britain” by Josephine Ross, L. 1982)

It was 1465. The Queen was penniless in France. The King was in the Tower. But the new King, Edward IV, was mysteriously reluctant to commit himself to his kingmaker's marriage plans for him. Richard Neville, the Earl of Warwick - of the Neville family who were more or less running the country at the time - was Edward's kingmaker, and he could see the political advantages of marrying the King to a French princess. He made all the diplomatic arrangements only to discover, belatedly, that his King was already married. Warwick was outraged. Edward had married Elizabeth Woodville, the widow of the Lancastrian, Lord Grey. And Edward was a Yorkist. Inevitably Warwick and Edward IV clashed.

In the summer of 1469 a rebellion broke out in the north. The contrived complaint was high taxes and favouritism. While this was going on, the marriage between Clarence (the King's brother) and Isabella (Warwick's daughter), which had been forbidden by the King, took place at Calais. Clarence and Warwick returned to England, and Royalists and rebels met at the Battle of Edgecote. The King, trying to rally his scattered forces, was captured. Warwick now had two Kings at his mercy: Henry VI was still a prisoner.

C+Warwick had struck with suddenness and, for a while, no one realized what had happened. As the truth became known, the Yorkist nobility viewed with astonishment and anger the detention of their brave, victorious sovereign, and the Lancastrians everywhere raised their heads in the hopes of profiting by the Yorkist feud. The King found it convenient to dissemble. He undertook to mend his ways, and after he had signed free pardons to all who had been in arms against him, he was liberated.

But within a few months, there was another rising, this one in Lincolnshire, This time the King survived and Warwick and Clarence, who were now exposed, left England. In France, Louis XI forced Warwick to negotiate with the exiled queen, Margaret of Anjou. She agreed to a marriage between her son. Prince Edward, and Warwick's daughter, Anne Neville. Their plan was that Margaret' son would one day be king and Warwick's daughter queen. But first they had to get rid of Edward and restore the imprisoned Henry VI to the throne.

Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, and the Duke of Clarence, the King's brother, landed at Dartmouth. Much of southern England welcomed Warwick who marched on London and freed Henry VI from the Tower, where he had been imprisoned for five years, and restored him to the throne. Edward IV fled the country.

But Warwick had made a serious mistake. He'd promised Clarence that he would be the next king. But a freed Henry, and the real chance of an heir, greatly lessened Clarence's chances. When Warwick had made Clarence this promise he'd deserted his brother, Edward IV, and now when Edward IV returned to fight Warwick, Clarence deserted Warwick, rejoined his brother, fought Warwick’s army, defeated it and that was the end of the kingmaker, Warwick. He was killed along with his brother, Lord Montague. As Warwick was dying, Queen Margaret was landing with her army and the young Prince of Wales at Weymouth. The two sides met at Tewksbury. Margaret's army was defeated. Out came the axe, off came the heads of the Prince of Wales and Margaret's supporter, Edmund, Duke of Somerset. Edward IV then returned to .London, dragged out the hapless King Henry and beheaded him. A fifteenth-century royal soap opera perhaps, but the Wars of the Roses were still not yet done.

C+Queen Elizabeth [Elizabeth Woodville] . . . had produced not only five daughters, but two fine boys who were growing up. In 1483 one was twelve and the other nine. The succession to the Crown seemed plain and secure. The King himself was only forty.... His main thought was set on securing the Crown to his son, the unfledged Edward V; but in April 1483 death came so suddenly upon him that he had no time to take the necessary precautions. After only ten days' illness, this strong King was cut down in his prime. A Protectorate was inevitable. Richard [of Gloucester, the King’s faithful brother] stood forth without compare and had been nominated by the late King himself.

(from “This Sceptred Isle” by Christopher Lee, L. 1990)