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Title: The Paston Letters, A.D. 1422-1509. Volume 1 (of 6)

Editor: James Gairdner

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Preface
Introduction
Appendix
Contents of this Volume

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No. . . 47. . . .

THE PASTON LETTERS

A.D. 1422-1509

Text of Title Page

Edinburgh: T. and A. Constable, Printers to His Majesty

1

PREFACE

P
UBLIC attention was first drawn to the Paston Letters in the year
on
1787, when there issued from the press two quarto volumes
with a very lengthy title, setting forth that the contents were
original letters written ‘by various persons of rank and consequence’
during the reigns of Henry VI., Edward IV., and Richard III. The
materials were derived from autographs in the possession of the Editor,
a Mr. Fenn, of East Dereham, in Norfolk, who was well enough known
in society as a gentleman of literary and antiquarian tastes, but who
had not at that time attained any great degree of celebrity. Horace
Walpole had described him, thirteen years before, as ‘a smatterer in
antiquity, but a very good sort of man.’ What the great literary magnate
afterwards thought of him we are not informed, but we know that he
took a lively interest in the Paston Letters the moment they were
published. He appears, indeed, to have given some assistance in the
progress of the work through the press. On its appearance he expressed
himself with characteristic enthusiasm:—‘The letters of Henry VI.’s
reign, etc., are come out, and to me make all other letters not worth
reading. I have gone through one volume, and cannot bear to be
writing when I am so eager to be reading. . . . There are letters from all
my acquaintance, Lord Rivers, Lord Hastings, the Earl of Warwick,
whom I remember still better than Mrs. Strawbridge, though she died
within these fifty years. What antiquary would be answering a letter
from a living countess, when he may read one from Eleanor Mowbray,
Duchess of Norfolk?’ 1.1

So wrote the great literary exquisite and virtuoso, the man whose 2
opinion in those days was life or death to a young author or a new
publication. And in spite of all that was artificial and affected in his
character,—in spite even of the affectation of pretending a snobbish
interest in ancient duchesses—Walpole was one of the fittest men of
as that day to appreciate such a publication. Miss Hannah More was less
of easily pleased, and she no doubt was the type of many other readers.
The letters, she declared, were quite barbarous in style, with none of
the elegance of their supposed contemporary Rowley. They might
perhaps be of some use to correct history, but as letters and fine
reading, nothing was to be said for them. 2.1 It was natural enough that
an age which took this view of the matter should have preferred the
forgeries of Chatterton to the most genuine productions of the fifteenth
century. The style of the Paston Letters, even if it had been the most
polished imaginable, of course could not have exhibited the polish of
the eighteenth century, unless a Chatterton had had some hand in their
composition.

n Yet the interest excited by the work was such that the editor had no
k. reason to complain of its reception. The Paston Letters were soon in
everybody’s hands. The work, indeed, appeared under royal patronage,
for Fenn had got leave beforehand to dedicate it to the King as ‘the
avowed patron’ of antiquarian knowledge. This alone had doubtless
some influence upon the sale; but the novel character of the publication
itself must have excited curiosity still more. A whole edition was
disposed of in a week, and a second edition called for, which, after
undergoing some little revision, with the assistance of Mr. George
Steevens, the Shakspearian editor, was published the same year.
Meanwhile, to gratify the curious, the original MS. letters were
deposited for a time in the Library of the Society of Antiquaries; but
the King having expressed a wish to see them, Fenn sent them to
Buckingham Palace, then called the Queen’s Palace, requesting that, if
they were thought worthy of a place in the Royal Collection, His
Majesty would be pleased to accept them. They were accordingly, it 3
would seem, added to the Royal Library; and as an acknowledgment of

the value of the gift, Fenn was summoned to Court, and received the
honour of knighthood.
But the two volumes hitherto published by Fenn contained only a small
selection out of a pretty considerable number of original letters of the
same period in his possession. The reception these two volumes had
met with now encouraged him to make a further selection, and he
announced with his second edition that another series of the Letters
was in preparation, which was to cover the same period as the first two
volumes, and to include also the reign of Henry VII. Accordingly a third
and fourth volume of the work were issued together in the year 1789,
containing the new letters down to the middle of Edward IV.’s reign. A
fifth and concluding volume, bringing the work down to the end of
Henry VII.’s reign, was left ready for publication at Sir John Fenn’s
death in 1794, and was published by his nephew, Mr. Serjeant Frere, in
1823.
Of the original MSS. of these letters and their descent Fenn gives but a
brief account in the preface to his first volume, which we will
. endeavour to supplement with additional facts to the best of our ability.
The letters, it will be seen, were for the most part written by or to
particular members of the family of Paston in Norfolk. Here and there,
it is true, are to be found among them State papers and other letters of
great interest, which must have come to the hands of the family
through some indirect channel; but the great majority are letters
distinctly addressed to persons of the name of Paston, and in the
possession of the Pastons they remained for several generations. In the
days of Charles II. the head of the family, Sir Robert Paston, was
created Earl of Yarmouth; but his son William, the second bearer of the
title, having got into debt and encumbered his inheritance, finally died
without male issue, so that his title became extinct. While living in
reduced circumstances, he appears to have parted with a portion of his
family papers, which were purchased by the great antiquary and
collector, Peter Le Neve, Norroy King of Arms. Le Neve was a 4
Norfolk man, possessed of considerable estates at Witchingham and
elsewhere in the county; and he made it a special object to collect MSS.
and records relating to Norfolk and Suffolk. Just before his death in

1729 he made a will, 4.1 by which he bequeathed his MSS. to the erudite
Dr. Tanner, afterwards Bishop of St. Asaph’s, and Thomas Martin of
Palgrave; but this bequest was subject to the condition that within a
year after his death they should ‘procure a good and safe repository in
the Cathedral Church of Norwich, or in some other good and public
building in the said city’ for their preservation, the object being to
make them at all times accessible to those who wished to consult them.
The condition, however, was not fulfilled, and the bequest would
naturally have become null; but ‘honest Tom Martin of Palgrave’ (to
give him the familiar name by which he himself desired to be known)
married the widow of his friend, and thus became possessed of his MSS.
by another title.
The Le Neve collection, however, contained only a portion of the
Paston family papers. On the death, in 1732, of the Earl of Yarmouth,
who outlived Le Neve by three years, some thirty or forty chests of
valuable letters and documents still remained at the family seat at
Oxnead. These treasures the Rev. Francis Blomefield was allowed to
examine three years later with a view to his county history, for which
purpose he boarded at Oxnead for a fortnight. 4.2 Of the results of a
general survey of the papers he writes, on the 13th May 1735, to Major
Weldon a number of interesting particulars, of which the following
may be quoted as bearing upon the subject before us:—‘There is
another box full of the pardons, grants, and old deeds, freedoms, etc.,
belonging to the Paston family only, which I laid by themselves, for
fear you should think them proper to be preserved with the family; they
don’t relate to any estates. . . . There are innumerable letters of good
consequence in history still lying among the loose papers, all which I
laid up in a corner of the room on a heap which contains several sacks5
full.’ 5.1 But Blomefield afterwards became the owner of a considerable
portion of these papers; for he not only wrote his initials on several of
them, and marked a good many others with a mark by which he was in
the habit of distinguishing original documents that he had examined
and noted, but he also made a present to a friend of one letter which
must certainly have once been in the Paston family archives. He
himself refers to his ownership of certain collections of documents in

the Preface to his History of Norfolk, where he informs the reader that
he has made distinct reference to the several authors and originals he
had made use of in all cases, ‘except’ (these are his words) ‘where the
originals are either in Mr. Le Neve’s or my own collections, which at
present I design to join to his, so that, being together, they may be
consulted at all times.’ Apparently honest Tom Martin was still
intending to carry out Le Neve’s design, and Blomefield purposed to
aid it further by adding his own collections to the Le Neve MSS. But
though Martin lived for nearly forty years after his marriage with Le
Neve’s widow, and always kept this design in view, he failed to carry it
out. His necessities compelled him to part with some of his treasures,
but these apparently were mainly books enriched with MS. notes, not
original ancient MSS., and even as he grew old he did not altogether
drop the project. He frequently formed resolutions that he would, next
year, arrange what remained, and make a selection for public use. But
at last, at the age of seventy-four, he suddenly died in his chair without
having given effect to his purpose.
Neither did his friend Blomefield, who died nine years before him, in
January 1762, succeed in giving effect to his good intention of uniting
his collections with the Le Neve MSS. For he died deeply in debt, and
by his will, made just before death, he directed all his personal
property to be sold in payment of his liabilities. His executors,
however, declined to act, and administration was granted to two
principal creditors. Of the Paston MSS. which were owned by him, a
few are now to be found in one of the volumes of the Douce Collection
in the Bodleian Library at Oxford. These, it would seem, were first 6
purchased by the noted antiquary John Ives, 6.1 who acquired a number
of Le Neve’s, Martin’s, and Blomefield’s MSS.; and after his library was
sold by auction in March 1777, they became part of the collections
relating to the counties of Oxford and Cambridge, which Gough, in his
British Topography (vol. ii. p. 5), informs us that he purchased at the
sale of Mr. Ives’ papers. To this same collection, probably, belonged
also a few of the scattered documents relating to the Paston family
which have been met with among the miscellaneous stores of the

Bodleian Library, for a knowledge of which I was indebted to the late
Mr. W. H. Turner of Oxford.
Martin’s executors seem to have done what they could to preserve the
integrity of his collections. A catalogue of his library was printed at
Lynn in 1771, in the hope that some purchaser would be found to take
the whole. Such a purchaser did present himself, but not in the interest
of the public. A certain Mr. John Worth, a chemist at Diss, bought both
the library and the other collections, as a speculation, for £630. The
printed books he immediately sold to a firm at Norwich, who disposed
of them by auction; the pictures and smaller curiosities he sold by
auction at Diss, and certain portions of the MSS. were sent, at different
times, to the London market. But before he had completed the sale of
all the collections, Mr. Worth died suddenly in December 1774. That
portion of the MSS. which contained the Paston Letters he had up to that
time reserved. Mr. Fenn immediately purchased them of his executors,
and they had been twelve years in his possession when he published
his first two volumes of selections from them.
So much for the early history of the MSS. Their subsequent fate is not a
little curious. On the 23rd May 1787, Fenn received his knighthood at
St. James’s, having then and there presented to the King three bound
volumes of MSS. which were the originals of his first two printed
volumes. 6.2 Yet, strange to say, these MSS. were afterwards lost sight of7
so completely that for a whole century nobody could tell what had
become of them. They were not in the Royal Library afterwards given
up to the British Museum; they were not to be found in any of the
Royal Palaces. The late Prince Consort, just before his death, caused a
careful search to be made for them, but it proved quite ineffectual.
Their hiding-place remained unknown even when I first republished
these Letters in the years 1872-75.
To this mystery succeeded another of the same kind. The originals of
the other three volumes were not presented to the king; but they, too,
disappeared, and remained for a long time equally undiscoverable.
Even Mr. Serjeant Frere, who edited the fifth volume from transcripts
left by Sir John Fenn after his death, declared that he had not been able

to find the originals of that volume any more than those of the others.
Strange to say, however, the originals of that volume were in his house
all the time, and were discovered by his son, Mr. Philip Frere, in the
year 1865, just after an ingenious littérateur had made the complete
disappearance of all the MSS. a ground for casting doubt on the
authenticity of the published letters. It is certainly a misfortune for
historical literature, or at all events was in those days, that the owners
of ancient MSS. commonly took so little pains to ascertain what it was
that they had got. Since then the proceedings of the Historical MSS.
Commission, which have brought to light vast stores of unsuspected
materials for history, have awakened much more interest in such
matters.
Thus three distinct portions of MSS. that had been carefully edited had
all been lost sight of and remained undiscoverable for a long series of
years. The originals of the first two volumes presented to the King
could not be found. The originals of volumes iii. and iv. could not be
found. The originals of volume v. could not be found. These last,
however, after a time, came to light, as we have seen, in 1865, having
been discovered in the house of the late Mr. Philip Frere at Dungate, in
Cambridgeshire; and with them were found a large number of
additional MSS., also belonging to the Paston Collection, among which8
was the original of one of the letters of volume iii. separated from all
its fellows, whose place of concealment remained still unknown.
This discovery, however, was important, and at once suggested to me
the possibility of producing a new edition of the Letters arranged in
true chronological order, and augmented by those hitherto unedited. It
suggested, moreover, that more of the originals might even yet be
discovered with a little further search, perhaps even in the same house.
But a further search at Dungate, though it brought to light a vast
quantity of papers of different ages, many of them very curious, did not
lead to the discovery of any other than the single document above
referred to belonging to any of the first four volumes. All that Mr.
Philip Frere could find belonging to the Paston Collection he sold to
the British Museum, and the rest he disposed of by auction.

The question then occurred: Since the originals of volumes iii. and iv.
had not been found at Dungate, might they be in the possession of the
head of the Frere family, the late Mr. George Frere of Roydon Hall,
near Diss, in Norfolk? This was suggested to me as probable by Mr.
Philip Frere, his cousin, and I wrote to him accordingly on the 3rd
December 1867. I received an answer from him dated on the 6th, that
he did not see how such MSS. should have found their way to Roydon,
but if they turned up at any time he would let me know. Unluckily he
seems to have dismissed the subject from his mind, and I received no
answer to further inquiries repeated at various intervals. At last it
appeared hopeless to wait longer and defer my edition of the Letters
indefinitely on the chance of finding more originals anywhere. So the
first volume of my edition went to press, and the second, and the third.
But just after I had printed off two Appendices to vol. iii., a friend of
Mr. George Frere’s called upon me at the Record Office, and informed
me that a number of original Paston letters had been discovered at
Roydon, which he had conveyed up to London. After some further
communication with Mr. Frere himself I was allowed to inspect them
at his son’s chambers in the Temple, when I found among them those 9
very originals of Fenn’s third and fourth volumes which eight years
before he could not believe were in his possession! Every one of them,
I think, was there with just two exceptions—the first a document
which, as already mentioned, was found at Dungate; the second a letter
(No. 52 in this edition) now preserved at Holland House, the existence
of which was made known to me before my second volume was issued
by a recent book of the Princess Marie Liechtenstein. 9.1
It was mortifying, I confess, not to have received earlier intelligence of
a fact that I had suspected all along. But it was better to have learned it
at the last moment than not till after my last volume was published. So,
having made two Appendices already to that volume, the only thing to
do was to add a third, in which the reader would find a brief note of the
discovery, with copies of some of the unpublished letters, and as full an
account of the others belonging to the same period as circumstances
would permit. Altogether there were no less than ninety-five new

original letters belonging to the period found at Roydon Hall, along
with the originals of Fenn’s third and fourth volumes.
In July 1888 these Roydon Hall MSS. were offered for sale at Christie’s.
They consisted then of 311 letters, mainly the originals of Fenn’s third
and fourth volumes, and of those described in my third Appendix. Of
the former set there were only four letters wanting, viz. the two in
volume iii. whose existence is accounted for elsewhere, and two in
volume iv. ‘which,’ the sale catalogue observes, ‘are noted by Fenn
himself as being no longer in his possession.’ As to the letters in my
Appendix the catalogue goes on to say:—
‘Of the ninety-five additional letters above mentioned (Gairdner,
992-1086) four are missing (Nos. 1016, 1029, 1077, 1085). On the
other hand, on collating the present collection with the printed
volumes, it was found to contain four others of which no record
exists either in Fenn’s or Mr. Gairdner’s edition, and which
consequently appear to have escaped the notice of the latter
gentleman while examining the treasures at Roydon Hall.’
‘The latter gentleman’ begs leave to say here that he never was at 10
Roydon Hall in his life, and was only allowed to examine such of the
‘treasures’ found there as were placed before him in the year 1875 in a
certain chamber in the Temple. A well-known bookseller purchased the
MSS. offered at Christie’s for 500 guineas, and some years later (in
1896), sold them to the British Museum. They are thus, at length,
available for general consultation. The number of missing originals,
however, is not quite as given in Christie’s sale catalogue. There are
four, not two, lacking of volume iv. On the other hand, only two letters
of the Appendix are wanting. 10.1
About fifteen years after the discovery at Roydon there came another
discovery elsewhere. On the 29th March 1890 it was announced in the
Athenæum that the missing originals of Fenn’s first and second
volumes—that is to say, the MSS. presented to King George III.—had
likewise come to light again. They were found at Orwell Park, in
Suffolk, in 1889, after the death of the late Colonel Tomline, and they
remain there in the possession of his cousin, Mr. E. G. Pretyman, M.P.,

now Secretary to the Admiralty, who kindly showed them to me at his
house soon after their discovery. They have come to him among family
papers and heirlooms of which, being only tenant for life, he is not free
to dispose until some doubts can be removed as to their past history;
and I accordingly forbear from saying more on this point except that
their place of deposit indicates that they may either have got mixed
with the private papers and books of Pitt, of which a large number are
in the Orwell library, or with those of his old tutor and secretary, Dr.
George Pretyman, better known as Bishop Tomline. Dr. Pretyman had
just been appointed Bishop of Lincoln when Fenn published his first
two volumes, and it was many years afterwards that he assumed the
name of Tomline. But whether these MSS. came to his hands or to Pitt’s,
or under what circumstances they were delivered to either, there is no11
evidence to show. Possibly the King’s illness in 1788 prevented their
being placed, or, it may be, replaced, in the Royal Library, where they
were intended to remain.
The edition of these Letters published by Mr. Arber in 1872-75 was in
three volumes. It was printed from stereotype plates, and has been
reissued more than once by the Messrs. Constable with corrections,
and latterly with an additional volume containing the Preface and
Introduction by themselves, and a Supplement giving the full text of
those newly-found letters of which the reader had to be content with a
bare catalogue in 1875. My original aim to have a complete collection
of all extant Paston Letters had been defeated; and there seemed
nothing for it but to let them remain even at the last in a general series,
an Appendix and a Supplement. The present publishers, however, by
arrangement with Messrs. Constable, were anxious to meet the wants
of scholars who desired to possess the letters, now that the collection
seems to be as complete as it is ever likely to be, in a single series, and
in a more luxurious form than that in which they have hitherto
appeared. I have accordingly rearranged the letters as desired—a task
not altogether without its difficulties when nice chronological
questions had to be weighed and the story of the Pastons in all its
details had for so many years ceased to occupy a foremost place in my
thoughts; and I trust that the unity of the series will now give

satisfaction. At the same time, the opportunity has not been lost of
rectifying such errors as have been brought to my notice, which could
not have been conveniently corrected in the stereotype editions.
Notwithstanding the recovery of the originals of the letters printed by
Fenn, it has not been thought necessary to edit these anew from the
MSS. Whether such a thing would be altogether practicable even now
may perhaps be a question; at all events it would have delayed the
work unduly. Fenn’s editing is, as I have shown in previous editions,
fairly satisfactory on the whole, and it is not to be supposed that a
comparison of all the printed letters with the original MSS. would lead
to results of very material consequence. A large number have been 12
compared already, and the comparison inspires the greatest confidence
in his care and accuracy. His misreadings are really very few, his
method of procedure having been such as to prevent their being either
many or serious; while as to his suppressions I have found no reason to
believe, from what examination I have been able to make, that any of
them were of very material importance.
It was not editorial carelessness on Fenn’s part which made a new
edition desirable in 1872. It was, first of all, the advance of historical
criticism since his day—or rather, perhaps, I should say, of the means
of verifying many things by the publication of historical sources and
the greater accessibility of historical records. And secondly, the
discovery of such a large number of unprinted documents belonging to
the Paston Collection made it possible to study that collection as a
whole, and fill up the outlines of information which they contained on
matters both public and private. On this subject I may be allowed
simply to quote what I said in 1872 in the preface to the first volume:
—
‘The errors in Fenn’s chronology are numerous, and so exceedingly
misleading that, indispensable as these Letters now are to the
historian, there is not a single historian who has made use of them
but has misdated some event or other, owing to their inaccurate
arrangement. Even writers who have been most on their guard in
some places have suffered themselves to be misled in others. This is

no reproach to the former Editor, whose work is indeed a perfect
model of care and accuracy for the days in which he lived; but
historical criticism has advanced since that time, and facilities
abound which did not then exist for comparing one set of documents
with another, and testing the accuracy of dates by public records. The
completion of Blomefield’s History of Norfolk, and the admirable
index added to that work of late years by Mr. Chadwick, have also
been of eminent service in verifying minute facts. Moreover, the
comprehensive study of the whole correspondence, with the
advantage of having a part already published to refer to, has enabled
me in many cases to see the exact bearing of particular letters, which
before seemed to have no certain place in the chronology, not only
upon public events, but upon the Private affairs of the Paston family.
...
y of
ext. ‘The care taken by Sir John Fenn to secure the accuracy of his text
can be proved by many tests. It might, indeed, be inferred from the 13
elaborate plan of editing that he adopted, exhibiting in every case two
transcripts of the same letter, the one to show the precise spelling and
punctuation of the original, the other to facilitate the perusal by
modern orthography. A work on which so much pains were
bestowed, and which was illustrated besides by numerous facsimiles
of the original handwritings, signatures, paper-marks, and seals of the
letters, was not likely to have been executed in a slovenly manner, in
so far as the text is concerned. But we are not left in this case to mere
presumptive evidence. The originals of the fifth volume have been
minutely examined by a committee of the Society of Antiquaries, and
compared all through with the printed text, and the general result of
this examination was that the errors are very few, and for the most
part trivial. Now, if this was the case with regard to that volume,
which it must be remembered was published after Fenn’s death from
transcripts prepared for the press, and had not the benefit of a final
revision of the proof-sheets by the editor, we have surely every
reason to suppose that the preceding volumes were at least not less
accurate.

‘At all events, any inaccuracies that may exist in them were certainly
not the result of negligence. I have been favoured by Mr. Almack, of
Melford, near Sudbury, in Suffolk, with the loan of several sheets of
MS. notes bequeathed to him by the late Mr. Dalton, of Bury St.
Edmunds, who transcribed a number of the original MSS. for Sir John
Fenn. These papers contain a host of minute queries and criticisms,
which were the result of a close examination of the first four
volumes, undertaken at Fenn’s request. Those on the first two
volumes are dated on the 3rd and 7th of May 1788, more than a year
after the book was published. But on vols. iii. and iv. there are two
separate sets of observations, the first of which were made on the
transcripts before they were sent to press, the other, like those on the
two first volumes, on the published letters. From an examination of
these criticisms, and also from the results of the examination of the
fifth volume by the committee of the Society of Antiquaries, 13.1 I
have been led to the opinion that the manner in which Sir John Fenn
prepared his materials for the press was as follows:— Two copies
enn were first made of every letter, the one in the exact spelling and
the
r punctuation of the original, the other in modern orthography. Both
on. these copies were taken direct from the original, and possibly in the
case of the first two volumes they were both made by Fenn himself.
In vols. iii. and iv., however, it is stated that many of the transcripts
were made by Mr. Dalton, while those of vol. v. were found to be
almost all in his handwriting when that volume was sent to press in
1823. 13.2 But this statement probably refers only to the copies in the14
antique spelling. Those in modern spelling I believe to have been
made for the most part, if not altogether, by Fenn himself. When
completed, the two copies were placed side by side, and given to Mr.
Dalton to take home with him. Mr. Dalton then made a close
comparison of the two versions, and pointed out every instance in
which he found the slightest disagreement between them, or where he
thought an explanation might be usefully bracketed into the modern
version. These comments in the case of vol. iii. are upwards of 400 in
number, and extend over eighteen closely written pages quarto. It is
clear that they one and all received the fullest consideration from Sir
John Fenn before the work was published. Every one of the

discrepancies pointed out between the two versions is rectified in the
printed volume, and there cannot be a doubt that in every such case
the original MS. was again referred to, to settle the disputed reading.
‘One or two illustrations of this may not be unacceptable to the
reader. The following are among the observations made by Mr.
es. Dalton on the transcripts of vol. iii. as prepared for press. In Letter
viii. was a passage in which occurred the words, “that had of your
father certain lands one seven years or eight years agone.” Mr.
Dalton’s experience as a transcriber appears to have suggested to him
that “one” was a very common misreading of the word “over” in
ancient MSS., and he accordingly suggested that word as making
better sense. His surmise turned out to be the true reading, and the
passage stands corrected accordingly in the printed volume. In Letter
xxiv. there was a discrepancy in the date between the transcript in
ancient spelling and the modern version. In the latter it was “the 4th
day of December,” whereas the former gave it as the 3rd. On
examination it appears that the modern version was found to be
correct, a Roman “iiij.” having been misread in the other as “iij.”
Thus we have very sufficient evidence that the modern copy could
not have been taken from the ancient, but was made independently
from the original MS. Another instance of the same thing occurs in the
beginning of Letter xli., where the words “to my power” had been
omitted in the literal transcript, but were found in the modern copy.
‘Mr. Dalton’s part in the work of transcription appears clearly in
several of his observations. One of the transcripts is frequently
referred to as “my copy”; and an observation made on Letter lxxxvi.
shows pretty clearly that the copy so referred to was the literal one.
At the bottom of that letter is the following brief postscript:
—“Utinam iste mundus malignus transiret et concupiscentia ejus”;
on which Mr. Dalton remarks as follows:—“I have added this on
your copy as supposing it an oversight, and hope it is properly
inserted.” Thus it appears that Mr. Dalton’s own transcript had the
words which were deficient in the other, and that, being tolerably 15
certain they existed in the original, he transferred them to the copy
made by Fenn. Now when it is considered that these words are

written in the original MS. with peculiarly crabbed contractions,
which had to be preserved in the literal version as exactly as they
could be represented in type, 15.1 it will, I think, appear evident that
Mr. Dalton could never have ventured to supply them in such a form
without the original before him. It is clear, therefore, that his copy
was the literal transcript, and that of Fenn the modern version.
‘Again, in Letter xxxi. of the same volume, on the second last line of
page 137, occur the words, “that he obey not the certiorari.” On this
passage occurs the following query—“The word for ‘obey’ seems
unintelligible. Have I not erred from the original in my copy?”
Another case will show how by this examination the errors of the
original transcripts were eliminated. In Letter xxxiv., at the bottom of
pp. 144-5, occurs the name of Will or William Staunton. It appears
this name was first transcribed as “Robert Fraunton” in the right or
modern version; on which Mr. Dalton remarks, “It is William in
orig.” (Mr. Dalton constantly speaks of the transcript in ancient
spelling as the “original” in these notes, though it is clear he had not
the real original before him at the time he made them). Strangely
enough, Mr. Dalton does not suspect the surname as well as the
Christian name, but it is clear that both were wrong, and that they
were set right in consequence of this query directing the editor’s
attention once more to the original MS.’
To this I may add some further evidences of Fenn’s editorial care and
accuracy. When the second volume of my first edition was published in
1874, my attention was called, as already mentioned, to the existence
at Holland House of the original of one of those letters 15.2 which I had
reprinted from Fenn. It was one of the letters in Fenn’s third volume,
and only one 15.3 other letter in that volume had then turned up.
I carefully compared both these papers with the documents as printed,
and in both, as I remarked in the Preface to vol. ii., the exact spelling
was given with the most scrupulous accuracy, so that there was
scarcely the most trivial variation between the originals and the printed
text. But a more careful estimate, alike of Fenn’s merits and of his 16
defects as an editor, became possible when, on the publication of the
third volume of the same edition, I was able, as I have already shown,

to announce at the last moment the result of a cursory inspection of the
originals of his third and fourth volumes. And what I said at that time
may be here transcribed:—
‘The recovery of these long-lost originals, although, unfortunately,
too late to be of the use it might have been in this edition, is
important in two ways: first, as affording an additional means of
testing Fenn’s accuracy as an editor; and secondly, as a means of
testing the soundness of some occasional inferences which the
present Editor was obliged to draw for himself in the absence of the
originals. More than one instance occurs in this work in which it will
be seen that I have ventured to eliminate from the text as spurious a
heading printed by Fenn as if it were a part of the document which it
precedes. Thus, in No. 19, 16.1 I pointed out that the title, in which
Judge Paston is called “Sir William Paston, knight,” could not
possibly be contemporaneous; and the document itself shows that
this opinion was well founded. It bears, indeed, a modern
endorsement in a handwriting of the last century much to the same
effect as Sir John Fenn’s heading; but this, of course, is no authority
at all. In the same way I showed that the title printed by Fenn, as a
heading to No. 191, 16.2 was utterly erroneous, and could not possibly
have existed in the original MS. This conclusion is also substantiated
by the document, which, I may add, bears in the margin the heading
“Copia,” showing that it was a transcript. The document itself being
an important State Paper, there were probably a number of copies
made at the time; but as no others have been preserved, it is only
known to us as one of the Paston Letters.
‘Another State Paper (No. 238), 16.3 of which a copy was likewise sent
to John Paston, has a heading which Sir John Fenn very curiously
misread. It is printed in this edition 16.4 as it stands in the first, Vadatur
J. P., meaning apparently “John Paston gives security, or stands
pledged.” But it turns out on examination that the reading of the
original is Tradatur J. P. (Let this be delivered to John Paston).
‘To return to No. 19, it will be seen that I was obliged to reprint from
Fenn in the preliminary note a few words which he had found written

on the back of the letter, of which it was difficult to make any perfect
sense, but which seemed to imply that the bill was delivered to 17
Parliament in the 13th year of Henry VI. I pointed out that there
seemed to be some error in this, as no Parliament actually met in the
13th year of Henry VI. The original endorsement, however, is
perfectly intelligible and consistent with facts, when once it has been
accurately deciphered. The handwriting, indeed, is very crabbed, and
for a considerable time I was puzzled; but the words are as follows:
—“Falsa billa Will’i Dallyng ad parliamentum tempore quo Henricus
Grey fuit vicecomes, ante annum terciodecimum Regis Henrici vjti.”
I find as a matter of fact that Henry Grey was sheriff (vicecomes) of
Norfolk, first in the 8th and 9th, and again in the 12th and 13th year
of Henry VI., and that Parliament sat in November and December of
the 12th year (1433); so that the date of the document is one year
earlier than that assigned to it.
‘Again, I ventured to question on internal evidence the authorship of
a letter (No. 910) 17.1 which Fenn had assigned to William Paston, the
uncle of Sir John Paston. At the end is the signature “Wyll’m
Paston,” with a reference in Fenn to a facsimile engraved in a
previous volume. But the evidence seemed to me very strong that the
William Paston who wrote this letter was not Sir John’s uncle, but his
brother. The inspection of the original letter itself has proved to me
that I was right. The signatures of the two Williams were not
altogether unlike each other; but the signature appended to this letter
is unquestionably that of the younger man, not of his uncle; while the
facsimile, to which Fenn erroneously refers the reader, is that of the
uncle’s signature taken from a different letter.
‘It may perhaps be conceived that if even these few errors could be
detected in Fenn’s work by one who had not yet an opportunity of
consulting the original MSS., a large number of others would be
discovered by a minute comparison of the printed volumes with the
letters themselves. This suspicion, however, is scarcely borne out by
the facts. I cannot profess to have made anything like an exhaustive
examination, but so far as I have compared these MSS. with the
printed text, I find no evidence of more than very occasional

inaccuracy, and, generally speaking, in matters very immaterial. On
the contrary, an inspection of these last recovered originals has
greatly confirmed the opinion, which the originals previously
discovered enabled me to form, of the scrupulous fidelity and care
with which the letters were first edited. For the most part, not only
the words, but the exact spelling of the MSS. is preserved, with merely
the most trifling variations. Sir John, indeed, was not a trained
archivist, and there are what may be called errors of system in his
mode of reading, such as, for instance, the omission of contractions
that may be held to represent a final e, or the rendering a final dash
by s instead of es. In such things the plan that he pursued was 18
obvious. But it is manifest that in other respects he is very accurate
indeed; for he had made so careful a study of these MSS. that he was
quite familiar with most of the ancient modes of handwriting, and, on
the whole, very seldom mistook a reading.
‘I may add, that this recent discovery enables me to vindicate his
accuracy in one place, even where it seemed before to be very
strangely at fault. At the end of Letter iii. of the fifth volume, 18.1
occurs in the original edition the following postscript:—“I warn you
keep this letter close, and lose it not; rather burn it.” On comparing
this letter with the original, the Committee of the Society of
Antiquaries, some years ago, were amazed to find that there was no
such postscript in the MS., and they were a good deal at a loss to
account for its insertion. It now appears, however, that this letter was
preserved in duplicate, for among the newly-recovered MSS. I
discovered a second copy, being a corrected draft, in Margaret
Paston’s own hand, at the end of which occurs the P.S. in question.
‘It must be acknowledged, however, that Fenn’s mode of editing was
not in all respects quite so satisfactory. Defects, of which no one
could reasonably have complained in his own day, are now a serious
drawback, especially where the original MSS. are no longer
accessible. Occasionally, as we have seen, he inserts a heading of his
own in the text of a document without any intimation that it is not in
the original; but this is so rare a matter that little need be said about
it. A more serious fault is, that in vols. iii. and iv. he has published

occasionally mere extracts from a letter as if it were the whole letter.
In vols. i. and ii. he avowedly left out passages of little interest, and
marked the places where they occurred with asterisks; but in the two
succeeding volumes he has not thought it necessary to be so
particular, and he has made the omissions sub silentio. For this
indeed no one can seriously blame him. The work itself, as he had
planned it, was only a selection of letters from a correspondence, and
a liberal use of asterisks would not have helped to make it more
interesting to the public. Occasionally he even inverts the order of his
extracts, printing a postscript, or part of a postscript, in the body of a
letter, and placing at the end some passage that occurs in the letter
itself, for no other reason apparently than that it might read better as
a whole.
‘Thus Letter 37 of this edition 18.2 (vol. iii., Letter vi., in Fenn) is only
a brief extract, the original being a very long letter, though the
subjects touched upon are not of very great interest. So also Letter
171 (Letter xxx. in Fenn’s third volume) 18.3 is a set of extracts. Letter
19
182 (vol. iii., Letter xxxix., in Fenn) 18.4 is the same; and the first part
of what is given as a postscript is not a postscript in the original, but
actually comes before the first printed paragraph.
‘In short, it was the aim of Sir John Fenn to reproduce with accuracy
the spelling and the style of the MSS. he had before him; but as for the
substance, to give only so much as he thought would be really
interesting. The letters themselves he regarded rather as specimens of
epistolary art in the fifteenth century than as a substantial
contribution to our knowledge of the times. To have given a complete
transcript of every letter, or even a résumé in his own words of all
that concerned lawsuits, leases, bailiffs’ accounts, and a number of
other matters of equally little interest, formed no part of his design;
but the task that he had really set himself he executed with admirable
fidelity. He grudged no labour or expense in tracing facsimiles of the
signatures, the seals, and the watermarks on the paper. All that could
serve to illustrate the manners of the period, either in the contents of
the letters, or in the handwritings, or the mode in which they were
folded, he esteemed most valuable; and for these things his edition

will continue still to be much prized. But as it was clearly impossible
in that day to think of printing the whole correspondence, and
determining precisely the chronology by an exhaustive study of
minutiæ, there seemed no good reason why he should not give two or
three paragraphs from a letter without feeling bound to specify that
they were merely extracts. Yet even these defects are not of frequent
occurrence. The omissions are by no means numerous, and the matter
they contain is generally unimportant in itself.’
I took advantage, however, at that time, of the recovery of so many of
the missing originals to make a cursory examination for the further
testing of Fenn’s editorial accuracy. Two or three letters I compared
carefully with the originals throughout, and in others I made special
reference to passages where doubts were naturally suggested, either
from the obscurity of the words or from any other cause as to the
correctness of the reading. The results of this examination I gave in an
Appendix at the end of the Introduction to the third volume in 1875,
and such errors as I was then able to detect are corrected in the present
edition.
Apart from such corrections, the letters are here reproduced as they are
printed in previous editions, only in a better order. Fenn’s text has been
followed, where no corrections have been found, in all the letters
printed by him except those of his fifth volume. The exact transcript
given on the left-hand pages of Fenn’s edition has been strictly adhered 20
to, except that contractions have been extended; and even in this
process we have always been guided by the interpretation given by
Fenn himself in his modern version on the right-hand pages. All the
other letters in this publication are edited from the original MSS., with a
very few exceptions in which these cannot be found. In some places,
indeed, where the contents of a letter are of very little interest, it has
been thought sufficient merely to give an abstract instead of a
transcript, placing the abstract in what is believed to be its true place in
the series chronologically. Abstracts are also given of documents that
are too lengthy and formal to be printed, and, in one case, of a letter
sold at a public sale, of which a transcript is not now procurable. In the
same manner, wherever I have found the slightest note or reference,

whether in Fenn’s footnotes or in Blomefield’s Norfolk—where a few
such references may be met with—to any letter that appears originally
to have belonged to the Paston correspondence, even though the
original be now inaccessible, and our information about the contents
the most scanty, the reader will find a notice of all that is known about
the missing document in the present publication.
I wish it were in my power to make the present edition better still. But
there have been always formidable obstacles to completeness during
the thirty years and more since I first took up the business of editing
the letters; and though many of these obstacles have been removed, my
energies are naturally not quite what they once were. The publishers,
however, have thought it time for a more satisfactory edition, and I
hope I have done my best. It remains to say a few words about the
original MSS. and the places in which they now exist.
Of those at Orwell Park I have already spoken. They are contained in
three half-bound volumes, and are the originals of the letters printed by
Fenn in his first and second volumes.
In the British Museum are contained, first of all, four volumes of the
‘Additional MSS.’ numbered 27,443 to 27,446, consisting of the
originals of volume v. of Fenn’s edition which was published after his
death, and a number of other letters first printed by me in the edition of
1872-75. The nine volumes which follow these, viz. ‘Additional MSS.21 ,’
27,447-27,455, contain also Paston letters but of a later date, and
papers relating to Sir John Fenn’s publication. There is also a separate
volume of ‘Paston letters’ in ‘Additional MS.’ 33,597; but these, too, are
mostly of later date, only eight being of the fifteenth century. Further,
there are the Roydon Hall MSS. (including with, I believe, only two
exceptions the originals of Fenn’s third and fourth volumes), which are
contained in the volumes ‘Additional,’ 34,888-9. And finally there are
two Paston letters (included in this edition) in ‘Additional MS.’ 35,251.
These are all that are in the British Museum. Besides these there are, as
above noticed, a few MSS. in a volume of the Douce Collection and the
other stray MSS. in the Bodleian Library at Oxford above referred to. At
Oxford, also, though not strictly belonging to the Paston family

correspondence, are a number of valuable papers, some of which are
included in this edition, having an important bearing on the fortunes of
the family. These are among the muniments contained in the tower of
Magdalene College. As the execution of Sir John Fastolf’s will
ultimately devolved upon Bishop Waynflete, who, instead of a college
at Caister, made provision for a foundation of seven priests and seven
poor scholars in Magdalene College, a number of papers relative to the
disputes between the executors and the arrangement between the
Bishop and John Paston’s sons have been preserved among the
documents of that college. My attention was first called to these many
years ago by Mr. Macray, through whom I obtained copies, in the first
place, of some entries from an old index of the deeds relating to
Norfolk and Suffolk, which had already been referred to by Chandler
in his Life of Bishop Waynflete. Afterwards Mr. Macray, who had for
some time been engaged in a catalogue of the whole collection, was
obliging enough to send me one or two abstracts of his own made from
the original documents even before he was able to refer me to his
report on the muniments of Magdalene College, printed in the Fourth
Report of the Historical MSS. Commission. It will be seen that I have
transcribed several interesting entries from this source.
22
Further, there are just a few Paston letters preserved in Pembroke
College, Cambridge.

What remains to be said is only the confession of personal obligations,
incurred mainly long ago in connection with this work. The lapse of
years since my first edition of these letters was issued, in 1872,
naturally reminds me of the loss of various friends who favoured and
assisted it in various ways. Among these were the late Colonel Chester,
Mr. H. C. Coote, Mr. Richard Almack of Melford, Mr. W. H. Turner of
Oxford, Mr. J. H. Gurney, Mr. Fitch, and Mr. L’Estrange of Norwich.
On the other hand, I am happy to reckon still among the living Dr.
Jessopp, Mr. Aldis Wright, Miss Toulmin Smith, and Mr. J. C. C.
Smith, now a retired official of the Probate Office at Somerset House,
who all gave me kindly help so long ago. And I have further to declare
my obligations to Mr. Walter Rye, a gentleman well known as the best

living authority on Norfolk topography and families, for most friendly
and useful assistance in the way of notes and suggestions towards later
editions. I have also quite recently received help (confessed elsewhere)
from the Rev. William Hudson of Eastbourne, and have further had my
attention called to significant documents in the Public Record Office
by some of my old friends and colleagues there.
But among the departed, there is one whom I have reserved for
mention by himself, not so much for any particular assistance given me
long ago in the preparation of this work as for the previous education
in historical study which I feel that I received from intercourse with
him. I had been years engaged in the public service, and always
thought that the records of the realm ought to be better utilised than
they were in those days for the purpose of historical research; but how
even Record clerks were to become well acquainted with them under
the conditions then existing it was difficult to see. For each of us had
his own little task assigned to him, and had really very little
opportunity, if ever so willing, to go beyond it. Nor was there too much
encouragement given under official regulations to anything like
historical training; for the Record Office, when first constituted, was 23
supposed to exist for the sake of litigants who wanted copies of
documents, rather than for that of historical students who wanted to
read them with other objects. Besides, people did not generally
imagine then that past history could be rewritten, except by able and
graphic pens which, perhaps, could put new life into old facts without a
very large amount of additional research. The idea that the country
contained vast stores of long-neglected letters capable of yielding up
copious new information to supplement and to correct the old story of
our national annals had hardly dawned upon anybody—least of all,
perhaps, on humble officials bound to furnish office copies of ‘fines’
and ‘recoveries’ and antiquated legal processes. Even the State Papers,
at that time, were kept apart from the Public Records, and could only
be consulted by special permission from a Secretary of State. No clerk,
either of the Record or State Paper Department, knew more than was
contained within his own particular province. But by the wise policy of
the late Lord Romilly these red-tape bands were ultimately broken; and

just at that time I had the rare privilege of being appointed to assist the
late Reverend John S. Brewer in one of the great works which his
Lordship set on foot to enable the British public to understand the
value of its own MSS. It was to this association with Mr. Brewer that I
feel I owe all my historical training, and I made some acknowledgment
of that debt in 1872 when I dedicated to him my first edition of this
work.

1.1 Walpole’s Letters (Cunningham’s ed.), ix. 92.
2.1 Roberts’s Memoirs of Hannah More, ii. 50.

4.1 See Appendix after Introduction, No. I.

4.2 Cursory Notices of the Reverend Francis Blomefield. By J.

Wilton Rix, Esq.
5.1 Norfolk Archæology, ii. 210, 211.

6.1 See Nichols’s Literary Anecdotes, iii. 199.

6.2 The following announcement appears in the Morning

Chronicle of the 24th May 1787: ‘Yesterday, John Fenn,
Esq., attended the levee at St. James’s, and had the honour of
presenting to His Majesty (bound in three volumes) the
original letters of which he had before presented a printed
copy; when His Majesty, as a mark of his gracious
acceptance, was pleased to confer on him the honour of
knighthood.’
9.1 Holland House. By Princess Marie Liechtenstein, vol. ii.

p. 198.
10.1 The missing letters of volume iv. are Nos. 24, 97, 99, and

105 (Nos. 551, 726, 735, and 758 of this edition). The last
never formed part of Fenn’s collection. I do not know of any
other noted by him as ‘no longer in his possession.’ The
letters missing of the Appendix are only Nos. 997 and 1019.
Of the four said to be missing in Christie’s catalogue, 1016 is
not a document at all, the number having been accidentally
skipped in the Inventory, and the other three are in the British

Museum. No. 1077, however, is inaccurately described in the
Appendix.
13.1 Archæol. vol. xli. p. 39.

13.2 See Advertisement in the beginning of the volume, p. vii.

15.1 The following is the exact form in which they stand in the

literal or left-hand version:—‘Utia’z iste mu’d maligus t’nsirt
& c’up’ia es.’
15.2 No. 38 in that edition, No. 52 in this.

15.3 It was Letter 1 in Fenn’s third volume, No. 18 in my first

edition, No. 24 in this.
16.1 No. 25 in present edition.

16.2 No. 230 in present edition.

16.3 No. 282 in present edition.

16.4 That is to say, in the edition published by Mr. Arber in

1875, when it was impossible to correct the text.
17.1 No. 1033 in present edition.

18.1 No. 787 of this edition.

18.2 No. 51 of present edition.

18.3 No. 205.

18.4 No. 221.

‘The care taken by Sir John
opening quotation mark missing

the tower of Magdalene College.
spelling unchanged

25

INTRODUCTION

The Paston Family

T
HE little village of Paston, in Norfolk, lies not far from the sea,
where the land descends gently behind the elevated ground of
Mundesley, and the line of the shore, proceeding eastward from
Cromer, begins to tend a little more towards the south. It is about
twenty miles north of Norwich. The country, though destitute of any
marked features, is not uninteresting. Southwards, where it is low and
flat, the ruins of Bromholm Priory attract attention. But, on the whole,
it is an out-of-the-way district, unapproachable by sea, for the coast is
dangerous, and offering few attractions to those who visit it by land.
Indeed, till quite recently, no railways had come near it, and the means
of access were not superabundant. Here, however, lived for several
centuries a family which took its surname from the place, and whose
private correspondence at one particular epoch sheds no inconsiderable
light on the annals of their country.
Of the early history of this family our notices are scanty and uncertain.
A Norman descent was claimed for them not only by the county
historian Blomefield but by the laborious herald, Francis Sandford,
author of a Genealogical History of the Kings of England, on the
evidence of documents which have been since dispersed. Sandford’s
genealogy of the Paston family was drawn up in the year 1674, just
after Sir Robert Paston had been raised to the peerage by the title of

Viscount Yarmouth, before he was promoted to the higher dignity of
earl. It still remains in MS.; but a pretty full account of it will be found
in the fourth volume of Norfolk Archæology. The story of the early 26
ancestors, however, does not concern us here. At the time the family
and their doings become best known to us, their social position was
merely that of small gentry. One of these, however, was a justice of the
Common Pleas in the reign of Henry VI., whose uprightness of conduct
caused him to be commonly spoken of by the name of the Good Judge.
He had a son, John, brought up to the law, who became executor to the
old soldier and statesman, Sir John Fastolf. This John Paston had a
considerable family, of whom the two eldest sons, strange to say, both
bore the same Christian name as their father. They were also both of
them soldiers, and each, in his time, attained the dignity of knighthood.
But of them and their father, and their grandfather the judge, we shall
have more to say presently. After them came Sir William Paston, a
lawyer, one of whose daughters, Eleanor, married Thomas Manners,
first Earl of Rutland. He had also two sons, of whom the first,
Erasmus, died before him. The second, whose name was Clement, was
perhaps the most illustrious of the whole line. Born at Paston Hall, in
the immediate neighbourhood of the sea, he had an early love for ships,
was admitted when young into the naval service of Henry VIII., and
became a great commander. In an engagement with the French he
captured their admiral, the Baron de St. Blankheare or Blankard, and
kept him prisoner at Caister, near Yarmouth, till he had paid 7000
crowns for his ransom, besides giving up a number of valuables
contained in his ship. Of this event Clement Paston preserved till his
death a curious memorial among his household utensils, and we read in
his will that he bequeathed to his nephew his ‘standing bowl called the
Baron St. Blankheare.’ He served also by land as well as by sea, and
was with the Protector Somerset in Scotland at the battle of Pinkie. In
Mary’s reign he is said to have been the person to whom the rebel Sir
Thomas Wyat surrendered. In his later years he was more peacefully
occupied in building a fine family seat at Oxnead. He lived till near the
close of the reign of Elizabeth, having earned golden opinions from
each of the sovereigns under whom he served. ‘Henry VIII.,’ we are
told, ‘called him his champion; the Duke of Somerset, Protector in 27

King Edward’s reign, called him his soldier; Queen Mary, her seaman;
and Queen Elizabeth, her father.’ 27.1
Clement Paston died childless, and was succeeded by his nephew,
another Sir William, whose name is well known in Norfolk as the
founder of North Walsham School, and whose effigy in armour is
visible in North Walsham Church, with a Latin epitaph recording acts
of munificence on his part, not only to the grammar-school, but also to
the cathedrals of Bath and Norwich, to Gonville and Caius College,
Cambridge, and to the poor at Yarmouth.
From Sir William the line descended through Christopher Paston (who,
on succeeding his father, was found to be an idiot, incapable of
managing his affairs), Sir Edmund and Sir William Paston, Baronet, to
Sir Robert Paston, who, in the reign of Charles II., was created, first
of Viscount and afterwards Earl of Yarmouth. He is described as a person
h. of good learning, and a traveller who brought home a number of
curiosities collected in foreign countries. Before he was raised to the
peerage he sat in Parliament for Castle Rising. It was he who, in the
year 1664, was bold enough to propose to the House of Commons the
unprecedented grant of two and a half millions to the king for a war
against the Dutch. 27.2 This act not unnaturally brought him into favour
with the Court, and paved the way for his advancement. Another
incident in his life is too remarkable to be passed over. On the 9th of
August 1676 he was waylaid while travelling in the night-time by a
band of ruffians, who shot five bullets into his coach, one of which
entered his body. The wound, however, was not mortal, and he lived
six years longer.
His relations with the Court were not altogether of good omen for his
family. We are told that he once entertained the king and queen, and
the king’s brother, James, Duke of York, with a number of the nobility,
at his family seat at Oxnead. His son, William, who became second
Earl of Yarmouth, married the Lady Charlotte Boyle, one of King
Charles’s natural daughters. This great alliance, and all the
magnificence it involved, was too much for his slender fortunes. Earl28
William was led into a profuse expenditure which involved him in

pecuniary difficulties. He soon deeply encumbered his inheritance; the
library and the curiosities collected by his accomplished father had to
be sold. The magnificent seat at Oxnead was allowed to fall into ruin;
and on the death of this second earl it was pulled down, and the
materials turned into money to satisfy his creditors. The family line
itself came to an end, for Earl William had survived all his male issue,
and the title became extinct.
From this brief summary of the family history we must now turn to a
more specific account of William Paston, the old judge in the days of
Henry VI., and of his children. Of them, and of their more immediate
s. ancestor Clement, we have a description drawn by an unfriendly hand
some time after the judge’s death; and as it is, notwithstanding its bias,
our sole authority for some facts which should engage our attention at
the outset, we cannot do better than quote the paper at length:—

‘A remembrance of the worshipful kin and ancestry of
Paston, born in Paston in Gemyngham Soken.
‘First, There was one Clement Paston dwelling in Paston, and he was
a good, plain husband (i.e. husbandman), and lived upon his land that
he had in Paston, and kept thereon a plough all times in the year, and
sometimes in barlysell two ploughs. The said Clement yede (i.e.
went) at one plough both winter and summer, and he rode to mill on
the bare horseback with his corn under him, and brought home meal
again under him, and also drove his cart with divers corns to
Wynterton to sell, as a good husband[man] ought to do. Also, he had
in Paston a five score or a six score acres of land at the most, and
much thereof bond land to Gemyngham Hall, with a little poor water-
mill running by a little river there, as it appeareth there of old time.
Other livelode nor manors had he none there, nor in none other place.
‘And he wedded Geoffrey of Somerton (whose true surname is
Goneld)’s sister, which was a bondwoman, to whom it is not
unknown (to the prior of Bromholm and Bakton also, as it is said) if
that men will inquire.

‘And as for Geoffrey Somerton, he was bond also, to whom, etc., he29
was both a pardoner and an attorney; and then was a good world, for
he gathered many pence and half-pence, and therewith he made a fair
chapel at Somerton, as it appeareth, etc.
‘Also, the said Clement had a son William, which that he set to
school, and often he borrowed money to find him to school; and after
that he yede (went) to court with the help of Geoffrey Somerton, his
uncle, and learned the law, and there begat he much good; and then
he was made a serjeant, and afterwards made a justice, and a right
cunning man in the law. And he purchased much land in Paston, and
also he purchased the moiety of the fifth part of the manor of Bakton,
called either Latymer’s, or Styward’s, or Huntingfield, which moiety
stretched into Paston; and so with it, and with another part of the said
five parts he hath seignory in Paston, but no manor place; and
thereby would John Paston, son to the said William, make himself a
lordship there, to the Duke (qu. Duchy?) of Lancaster’s great hurt.
‘And the said John would and hath untruly increased him by one
tenant, as where that the prior of Bromholm borrowed money of the
said William for to pay withal his dismes, the said William would not
lend it him unless the said prior would mortgage to the said William
one John Albon, the said prior’s bondsman, dwelling in Paston,
which was a stiff churl and a thrifty man, and would not obey him
unto the said William; and for that cause, and for evil will that the
said William had unto him, he desired him of the prior. And now after
the death of the said William, the said John Albon died; and now
John Paston, son to the said William, by force of the mortgage sent
for the son of the said John Albon to Norwich.’
The reader will probably be of opinion that several of the facts here
recorded are by no means so discreditable to the Pastons as the writer
certainly intended that they should appear. The object of the whole
paper is to cast a stigma on the family in general, as a crafty, money-
getting race who had risen above their natural rank and station. It is
insinuated that they were originally mere adscripti glebæ; that Clement
Paston was only a thrifty husbandman (note the original signification

of the word, ‘housebondman’), that he married a bondwoman, and
transmitted to his son and grandson lands held by a servile tenure; and
the writer further contends that they had no manorial rights in Paston,
although William Paston, the justice, had purchased land in the
neighbourhood, and his son John was endeavouring to ‘make himself a
lordship’ there to the prejudice of the rights of the Duchy of Lancaster.30
It is altogether a singular statement, very interesting in its bearing upon
the obscure question of the origin of copyholds, and the gradual
emancipation of villeins. Whether it be true or false is another
question; if true, it appears to discredit entirely the supposed Norman
ancestry of the Pastons; but the remarkable thing is that an imputation
of this kind could have been preferred against a family who, whatever
may have been their origin, had certainly long before obtained a
recognised position in the county.
It would appear, however, from the accuser’s own statement, that
Clement Paston, the father of the justice, was an industrious peasant,
who tilled his own land, and who set so high a value on a good
education that he borrowed money to keep his son at school. With the
help of his brother-in-law, he also sent the young man to London to
learn the law, a profession which in that day, as in the present, was
considered to afford an excellent education for a gentleman. 30.1 The
good education was not thrown away. William Paston rose in the
he profession and became one of its ornaments. He improved his fortunes
by marrying Agnes, daughter and heiress of Sir Edmund Berry of
Harlingbury Hall, in Hertfordshire. Some years before his father’s
death, Richard Courtenay, Bishop of Norwich, appointed him his
steward. In 1414 he was called in, along with two others, to mediate in
a dispute which had for some time prevailed in the city of Norwich, as
to the mode in which the mayors should be elected; and he had the
good fortune with his coadjutors to adjust the matter satisfactorily. 30.2
In 1421 he was made a serjeant, and in 1429 a judge of the Common
Pleas. 30.3 Before that time we find him acting as trustee for various
properties, as of the Appleyard family in Dunston, 30.4 of Sir Richard
Carbonel, 30.5 Sir Simon Felbrigg, 30.6 John Berney, 31.1 Sir John 31
Rothenhale, 31.2 Sir John Gyney of Dilham, 31.3 Lord Cobham, 31.4 and

Ralph Lord Cromwell. 31.5 He was also executor to Sir William
Calthorp. 31.6 The confidence reposed in him by so many different
persons is a remarkable testimony to the esteem in which he was held.
He was, moreover, appointed one of the king’s council for the duchy of
Lancaster, and on his elevation to the judicial bench the king gave him
a salary of 110 marks (£73, 6s. 8d.), with two robes more than the
ordinary allowance of the judges.
In addition to all this he is supposed to have been a knight, and is
called Sir William Paston in Fenn’s publication. But this dignity was
ight. never conferred upon him in his own day. There is, indeed, one paper
printed by Fenn from the MSS. which were for a long time missing that
speaks of him in the heading as ‘Sir William Paston, Knight’; but the
original MS. since recovered shows that the heading so printed is taken
from an endorsement of a more modern date. This was, indeed, a
confident surmise of mine at a time when the MS. was inaccessible; for
it was clear that William Paston never could have been knighted. His
name occurs over and over again on the patent rolls of Henry VI. He is
named in at least one commission of the peace every year to his death,
and in a good many other commissions besides, as justices invariably
were. He is named also in many of the other papers of the same
collection, simply as William Paston of Paston, Esquire; and even in
the body of the petition so inaccurately headed, he is simply styled
William Paston, one of the justices. Nor does there appear to be any
other foundation for the error than that single endorsement. He left a
name behind him of so great repute, that Fuller could not help giving
him a place among his ‘Worthies of England,’ although, as he remarks,
it did not fall strictly within the plan of his work to notice a lawyer
who was neither a chief justice nor an author.
32
Of his personal character we are entitled to form a favourable estimate,
r.
not only from the honourable name conferred on him as a judge, but
also from the evidences already alluded to of the general confidence
felt in his integrity. True it is that among these papers we have a
complaint against him for accepting fees and pensions when he was
justice, from various persons in the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk; 32.1
but this only proves, what we might have expected, that he had

enemies and cavillers as well as friends. Of the justice of the charges in
themselves we have no means of forming an independent judgment;
but in days when all England, and not least so the county of Norfolk,
was full of party spirit and contention, it was not likely that a man in
the position of William Paston should escape imputations of partiality
and one-sidedness. Before his elevation to the bench, he had already
suffered for doing his duty to more than one client. Having defended
the Prior of Norwich in an action brought against him by a certain
Walter Aslak, touching the advowson of the church of Sprouston, the
latter appears to have pursued him with unrelenting hatred. The county
of Norfolk was at the time ringing with the news of an outrage
committed by a band of unknown rioters at Wighton. On the last day of
the year 1423, one John Grys of Wighton had been entertaining
company, and was heated with ‘wassail,’ when he was suddenly
by attacked in his own house. He and his son and a servant were carried a
mile from home and led to a pair of gallows, where it was intended to
hang them; but as ropes were not at once to be had, they were
murdered in another fashion, and their bodies horribly mutilated before
death. 32.2 For nearly three years the murderers went unpunished, while
the country stood aghast at the crime. But while it was still recent, at a
county court holden at Norwich, Aslak caused a number of bills, partly
in rhyme, to be posted on the gates of Norwich priory, and of the Grey
Friars, and some of the city gates, distinctly threatening William Paston
with the fate of John Grys, and insinuating that even worse things were 33
in store for him.
Against open threats like these William Paston of course appealed to
the law; but law in those days was but a feeble protector. Aslak had the
powerful support of Sir Thomas Erpingham, by which he was enabled
not only to evade the execution of sentence passed against him, but
even to continue his persecution. He found means to deprive Paston of
the favour of the Duke of Norfolk, got bills introduced in Parliament to
his prejudice, and made it unsafe for him to stir abroad. The whole
country appears to have been disorganised by faction; quarrels at that
very time were rife in the king’s council-chamber itself, between
Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, the Protector, and Bishop Beaufort;

nor was anything so firmly established by authority but that hopes
might be entertained of setting it aside by favour.
William Paston had two other enemies at this time. ‘I pray the Holy
Trinity,’ he writes in one place, ‘deliver me of my three adversaries,
this cursed Bishop for Bromholm, Aslak for Sprouston, and Julian
Herberd for Thornham.’ The bishop whom he mentions with so much
vehemence, claimed to be a kinsman of his own, and named himself
John Paston, but William Paston denied the relationship, maintaining
rtes. that his true name was John Wortes. He appears to have been in the
first place a monk of Bromholm, the prior of which monastery having
brought an action against him as an apostate from his order, engaged
William Paston as his counsel in the prosecution. Wortes, however,
escaped abroad, and brought the matter before the spiritual jurisdiction
of the court of Rome, bringing actions against both the prior and
William Paston, the latter of whom he got condemned in a penalty of
£205. On this William Paston was advised by friends at Rome to come
at once to an arrangement with him; but he determined to contest the
validity of the sentence, the result of which appears to have been that
he was excommunicated. His adversary, meanwhile, found interest to
get himself appointed and consecrated Bishop of Cork; and though his
name does not appear in the ordinary lists of bishops of that see, the 34
Vatican archives show that he was provided to it on the 23rd May
1425. 34.1
As for Julian Herberd, William Paston’s third enemy, we have hitherto
known nothing of her but the name. It appears, however, by some
Chancery proceedings 34.2 recently discovered, that Julian Herberd was
a widow who considered herself to have been wronged by Paston as
regards her mother’s inheritance, of which he had kept her from the
full use for no less than forty years. Paston had, indeed, made her some
pecuniary offers which she did not think sufficient, and she had
attempted to pursue her rights against him at a Parliament at
Westminster, when he caused her to be imprisoned in the King’s
Bench. There, as she grievously complains, she lay a year, suffering
much and ‘nigh dead from cold, hunger, and thirst.’ The case was
apparently one of parliamentary privilege, which she had violated by

her attempted action, though she adds that he threatened to keep her in
prison for life if she would not release to him her right, and give him a
full acquittance. She also accuses him of having actually procured one
from her by coercion, and of having by false suggestion to the Lord
Chancellor caused her committal to the Fleet, where she was kept for a
whole year, ‘beaten, fettered, and stocked,’ that no man might know
where she was. At another time, also, she says he kept her three years
in the pit within Norwich Castle on starvation diet. The accusation
culminates in a charge which seems really inconceivable:—
‘Item, the said Paston did bring her out of the Round House into your
Palace and brought her afore your Chief Justice, and then the said
Paston commanded certain persons to bring her to prison to your
Bench, and bade at his peril certain persons to smite the brain out of
her head for suing of her right; and there being in grievous prison
during half year and more, fettered and chained, suffering cold,
hunger, thirst, in point of death, God and ye, gracious King, help her
to her right.’
35
What we are to think of all this, not having Paston’s reply, I cannot say.
Scanty and disconnected as are the notices we possess of William
Paston, we must not pass by without comment his letter to the vicar of
the abbot of Clugny, in behalf of Bromholm Priory. 35.1 It was not,
indeed, the only occasion 35.2 on which we find that he exerted himself
in behalf of this ancient monastery, within a mile of which, he tells us,
lm he was born. Bromholm Priory was, in fact, about that distance from
Paston Hall, as miles were reckoned then (though it is nearer two of
our statute miles), and must have been regarded with special interest by
the family. It was there that John Paston, the son of the judge, was
sumptuously buried in the reign of Edward IV. It was a monastery of
some celebrity. Though not, at least in its latter days, one of the most
wealthy religious houses, for it fell among the smaller monasteries at
the first parliamentary suppression of Henry VIII., its ruins still attest
that it was by no means insignificant. Situated by the sea-shore, with a
flat, unbroken country round about, they are conspicuous from a
distance both by sea and land. Among the numerous monasteries of

Norfolk, none but Walsingham was more visited by strangers, and
many of the pilgrims to Walsingham turned aside on their way
homeward to visit the Rood of Bromholm. For this was a very special
treasure brought from Constantinople two hundred years before, and
composed of a portion of the wood of the true Cross. Many were the
miracles recorded to have been wrought in the monastery since that
precious relic was set up; the blind had received their sight, the lame
had walked, and lepers had been cleansed; even the dead had been
restored to life. It was impossible that a native of Paston could be
uninterested in a place so renowned throughout all England.
Yet about this time the priory must have been less prosperous than it
had once been. Its government and constitution were in a transition
state. It was one of the twenty-eight monasteries in England which
belonged to the Cluniac order, and were originally subject to the
visitation of the Abbot of Clugny in France. Subjection to a foreign 36
head did not tend at any time to make them popular in this country, and
in the reign of Henry V. that connection was suddenly broken off. An
act was passed suppressing at once all the alien priories, or religious
houses that acknowledged foreign superiors. The priors of several of
the Cluniac monasteries took out new foundation charters, and attached
themselves to other orders. Those that continued signed deeds of
surrender, and their monasteries were taken into the king’s hands.
About nine or ten years later, however, it would seem that a vicar of
the Abbot of Clugny was allowed to visit England, and to him William
Paston made an appeal to profess in due form a number of virtuous
young men who had joined the priory in the interval.

ed by From the statement already quoted as to the history of the Paston
family, it appears that William Paston purchased a good deal of land in
Paston besides what had originally belonged to them. It was evidently
his intention to make a family residence, and transmit to his sons a
more absolute ownership in the land from which they derived their
name. Much of his father’s land in Paston had been copyhold
belonging to the manor of Gimingham Hall; but William Paston bought
‘a moiety of the fifth part’ of the adjacent manor of Bacton, with free
land extending into Paston. He thus established himself as undoubted

lord of the greater part of the soil, and must have felt a pardonable
pride in the improved position he thereby bequeathed to his
descendants. At Paston he apparently contemplated building a manor
house; for he made inquiry about getting stone from Yorkshire
conveyed by sea to Mundesley, where there was then a small
harbour 36.1 within two miles of Paston village. To carry out the
ys improvements he proposed to make there and on other parts of his
property, he obtained licence from the king a year before his death to
divert two public highways, the one at Paston and the other at Oxnead,
a little from their course. 36.2 The alterations do not appear to have been
of a nature that any one had a right to complain of. Full inquiry was
made beforehand by an inquisition ad quod damnum 37.1 whether they37
would be to the prejudice of neighbours. At Paston the extent of
roadway which he obtained leave to enclose was only thirty-two and a
half perches in length by one perch in breadth. It ran on the south side
of his mansion, and he agreed to make a new highway of the same
dimensions on the north side. The vicar of Paston seems to have been
the neighbour principally concerned in the course that the new
thoroughfare was to take, and all particulars had been arranged with
him a few months before William Paston died.
ton
utes But it would seem upon the judge’s death his great designs were for
some time interrupted. The family were looked upon by many as
urs. upstarts, and young John Paston, who was only four-and-twenty,
though bred to the law like his father, could not expect to possess the
same weight and influence with his neighbours. A claim was revived
by the lord of Gimingham Hall to a rent of eight shillings from one of
Paston’s tenants, which had never been demanded so long as the judge
was alive. The vicar of Paston pulled up the ‘doles’ which were set to
mark the new highway, and various other disturbances were committed
by the neighbours. It seems to have required all the energies not only
of John Paston upon the spot, but also of his brother Edmund, who was
in London at Clifford’s Inn, to secure the rights of the family;
insomuch that their mother, in writing to the latter of the opposition to
which they had been exposed, expresses a fear lest she should make
him weary of Paston. 37.2 And, indeed, if Edmund Paston was not weary

of the dispute, his mother herself had cause to be; for it not only lasted
years after this, but for some years after Edmund Paston was dead the
stopping of the king’s highway was a fruitful theme of remonstrance.
When Agnes Paston built a wall it was thrown down before it was half
completed; threats of heavy amercements were addressed to her in
church, and the men of Paston spoke of showing their displeasure
when they went in public procession on St. Mark’s day. 37.3
The Manor of Oxnead, which in later times became the principal seat38
of the family, was also among the possessions purchased by Judge
Paston. He bought it of William Clopton of Long Melford, and settled
it upon Agnes, his wife. But after his death her right to it was disputed.
It had formerly belonged to a family of the name of Hauteyn, and there
suddenly started up a claimant in the person of one John Hauteyn,
whose right to hold property of any kind was supposed to have been
. entirely annulled by the fact of his having entered the Order of
Carmelite Friars. It seems, however, he had succeeded in getting from
the Pope a dispensation to renounce the Order on the plea that he had
been forced into it against his will when he was under age, and being
thus restored by the ecclesiastical power to the condition of a layman,
he next appealed to the civil courts to get back his inheritance. This
danger must have been seen by William Paston before his death, and a
paper was drawn up (No. 46) to show that Hauteyn had been released
from his vows on false pretences. Nevertheless he pursued his claim at
law, and although he complained of the difficulty of getting counsel
(owing, as he himself intimated, to the respect in which the bar held
the memory of Judge Paston, and the fact that his son John was one of
their own members), he seems to have had hopes of succeeding
through the influence of the Duke of Suffolk. His suit, however, had
not been brought to a successful determination at the date of Suffolk’s
fall. It was still going on in the succeeding summer; but as we hear no
more of it after that, we may presume that the altered state of the
political world induced him to abandon it. According to Blomefield, he
and others of the Hauteyn family released their rights to Agnes Paston
‘about 1449’; but this date is certainly at least a year too early. 38.1

William Paston also purchased various other lands in the county of
Norfolk. 38.2 Among others, he purchased from Thomas Chaucer, a son39
of the famous poet, the manor of Gresham, 39.1 of which we shall have
something more to say a little later. We also find that in the fourth year
of Henry VI. he obtained, in conjunction with one Thomas Poye, a grant
of a market, fair and free-warren in his manor of Shipden which had
belonged to his father Clement before him. 39.2
The notices of John Paston begin when he was on the eve of marrying,
e. a few years before his father’s death. The match was evidently one that
was arranged by the parents, after the fashion of the times. The lady
was of a good family—daughter and heiress of John Mauteby, Esq. of
Mauteby in Norfolk. The friends on both sides must have been
satisfied that the union was a good one; for it had the one great merit
which was then considered everything—it was no disparagement to the
fortunes or the rank of either family. Beyond this hard business view,
indeed, might have been found better arguments to recommend it; but
English men and women in those days did not read novels, and had no
great notion of cultivating sentiment for its own sake. Agnes Paston
writes to her husband to intimate ‘the bringing home of the
gentlewoman from Reedham,’ according to the arrangement he had
made about it. It was, in her words, ‘the first acquaintance between
John Paston and the said gentlewoman’ (one would think Dame Agnes
must have learned from her husband to express herself with something
of the formality of a lawyer); and we are glad to find that the young
lady’s sense of propriety did not spoil her natural affability. ‘She made
him gentle cheer in gentle wise, and said he was verily your son; and
so I hope there shall need no great treaty between them.’ Finally the
judge is requested by his wife to buy a gown for his future daughter-in-
law, to which her mother would add a goodly fur. ‘The gown,’ says
Dame Agnes, ‘needeth for to be had; and of colour it would be a 40
goodly blue, or else a bright sanguine.’ 40.1
er of
‘The gentlewoman’ thus introduced to John Paston and the reader
proved to the former a most devoted wife during about six-and-twenty
years of married life. Her letters to her husband form no inconsiderable
portion of the correspondence in these volumes, and it is impossible to

peruse them without being convinced that the writer was a woman not
only of great force of character, but of truly affectionate nature. It is
true the ordinary style of these epistles is very different from that of
wives addressing their husbands nowadays. There are no conventional
expressions of tenderness—the conventionality of the age seems to
have required not tenderness but humility on the part of women
towards the head of a family; the subjects of the letters, too, are for the
most part matters of pure business; yet the genuine womanly nature is
seen bursting out whenever there is occasion to call it forth. Very early
in the correspondence we meet with a letter of hers (No. 47) which in
itself is pretty sufficient evidence that women, at least, were human in
the fifteenth century. Her husband was at the time in London just
beginning to recover from an illness which seems to have been
occasioned by some injury he had met with. His mother had vowed to
give an image of wax the weight of himself to Our Lady of
Walsingham on his recovery, and Margaret to go on a pilgrimage
thither, and also to St. Leonard’s at Norwich. That she did not
undertake a journey of a hundred miles to do more efficient service
was certainly not owing to any want of will on her part. The difficulties
of travelling in those days, and the care of a young child, sufficiently
account for her remaining in Norfolk; but apparently even these
considerations would not have deterred her from the journey had she
not been dissuaded from it by others. ‘If I might have had my will,’ she
writes, ‘I should have seen you ere this time. I would ye were at home,
if it were for your ease (and your sore might be as well looked to here
as it is there ye be), now liever than a gown, though it were of scarlet.’41
Could the sincerity of a woman’s wishes be more artlessly expressed?
Let not the reader suppose, however, that Margaret Paston’s
acknowledged love of a scarlet gown indicates anything like frivolity
of character or inordinate love of display. We have little reason to
believe from her correspondence that dress was a ruling passion. The
chief aim discernible in all she writes—the chief motive that
influenced everything she did—was simply the desire to give her
husband satisfaction. And her will to do him service was, in general,
only equalled by her ability. During term time, when John Paston was

in London, she was his agent at home. It was she who negotiated with
farmers, receiving overtures for leases and threats of lawsuits, and
reported to her husband everything that might affect his interests, with
the news of the country generally. Nor were threats always the worst
thing she had to encounter on his account. For even domestic life, in
those days, was not always exempt from violence; and there were at
least two occasions when Margaret had to endure, in her husband’s
absence, things that a woman ought to have been spared.
nor
am. One of these occasions we proceed to notice. The manor of Gresham,
which William Paston had purchased from the son of the poet Chaucer,
had been in the days of Edward II. the property of one Edmund Bacon,
who obtained from that king a licence to embattle the manor-house. It
descended from him to his two daughters, Margaret and Margery. The
former became the wife of Sir William de Kerdeston, and her rights
were inherited by a daughter named Maud, who married Sir John
Burghersh. 41.1 This moiety came to Thomas Chaucer by his marriage
with Maud Burghersh, the daughter of the Maud just mentioned. The
other became at first the property of Sir William Molynes, who married
Bacon’s second daughter Margery. But this Margery having survived
her husband, made a settlement of it by will, according to which the
reversion of it after the decease of one Philip Vache and of Elizabeth 42
his wife, was to be sold; and William, son of Robert Molynes, was to
have the first option of purchase. This William Molynes at first
declined to buy it, being apparently in want of funds; but he afterwards
got one Thomas Fauconer, a London merchant, to advance the
purchase-money, on an agreement that his son should marry
Fauconer’s daughter. The marriage, however, never took effect; the
Molynes family lost all claim upon the manor, and the same Thomas
Chaucer who acquired the other moiety by his wife, purchased this
moiety also, and conveyed both to William Paston. 42.1
The whole manor of Gresham thus descended to John Paston, as his
father’s heir. But a few years after his father’s death he was troubled in
the possession of it by Robert Hungerford, son of Lord Hungerford,
who, having married Eleanor Molynes, a descendant of the Sir William
Molynes above referred to, had been raised to the peerage as Lord

by Molynes,and laid claim to the whole inheritance of the Molynes
family. He was still but a young man, 42.2 heir-apparent to another
.
barony; and, with the prospect of a great inheritance both from his
father and from his mother, who was the daughter and sole heir of
William Lord Botraux, he certainly had little occasion to covet lands
that were not his own. Nevertheless he listened to the counsels of John
Heydon of Baconsthorpe, a lawyer who had been sheriff and also
recorder of Norwich, and whom the gentry of Norfolk looked upon
with anything but goodwill, regarding him as the ready tool of every
powerful oppressor. His chief patron, with whom his name was
constantly coupled, was Sir Thomas Tuddenham; and the two together,
especially during the unpopular ministry of the Duke of Suffolk,
exercised an ascendency in the county, of which we hear very
numerous complaints. Heydon persuaded Lord Molynes that he had a43
good claim to the manor of Gresham; and Lord Molynes, without more
ado, went in and took possession on the 17th of February 1448. 43.1
To recover his rights against a powerful young nobleman connected
with various wealthy and influential families required, as John Paston
knew, the exercise of great discretion. Instead of resorting at once to an
action at law, he made representations to Lord Molynes and his legal
advisers to show how indefensible was the title they had set up for him.
He secured some attention for his remonstrances by the intercession of
Waynflete, bishop of Winchester. 43.2 Conferences took place between
the counsel of both parties during the following summer, and the
weakness of Lord Molynes’ case was practically confessed by his
solicitors, who in the end told Paston to apply to his lordship
personally. Paston accordingly, at no small expense to himself, went
and waited upon him at Salisbury and elsewhere, but was continually
put off. At last, on the 6th of October, not, as I believe, the same year,
but the year following, he succeeded in doing to Lord Molynes to some
extent what Lord Molynes had already done to him. He took
possession of ‘a mansion within the said town,’ and occupied it
himself, having doubtless a sufficiency of servants to guard against any
sudden surprise. After this fashion he maintained his rights for a period
of over three months. The usual residence of Lord Molynes was in

Wiltshire, and his agents probably did not like the responsibility of
attempting to remove John Paston without express orders from their
master. But on the 28th of January 1450, while John Paston was away
in London on business, there came before the mansion at Gresham a
company of a thousand persons, sent to recover possession for Lord
Molynes. They were armed with cuirasses and brigandines, with guns,
bows, and arrows, and with every kind of offensive and defensive
armour. They had also mining instruments, long poles with hooks,
called cromes, used for pulling down houses, ladders, pickaxes, and
pans with fire burning in them. With these formidable implements they 44
beset the house, at that time occupied only by Margaret Paston and
twelve other persons; and having broken open the outer gates, they set
to work undermining the very chamber in which Margaret was.
Resistance under the circumstances was impossible. Margaret was
forcibly carried out. The house was then thoroughly rifled of all that it
contained—property estimated by John Paston at £200 44.1—the
doorposts were cut asunder, and the place was left little better than a
ruin. Further, that there might be no mistake about the spirit in which
the outrage was perpetrated, the rioters declared openly, that if they had
found John Paston, or his friend John Damme, who had aided him with
his counsel about these matters, neither of them should have escaped
alive. 44.2
John Paston drew up a petition for redress to Parliament, and another
to the Lord Chancellor; but it was some months before his case could
be attended to, for that year was one of confusion and disorder
unparalleled. It was that year, in fact, which may be said to have
witnessed the first outbreak of a long, intermittent civil war. History
d has not passed over in silence the troubles of 1450. The rebellion of
D.
Jack Cade, and the murder of two bishops in different parts of the
country, were facts which no historian could treat as wholly
insignificant. Many writers have even repeated the old slander, which
there seems no good reason to believe, that Jack Cade’s insurrection
was promoted by the intrigues of the Duke of York; but no one appears
to me to have realised the precise nature of the crisis that necessarily
followed the removal of the Duke of Suffolk. And as we have now

arrived at the point where the Paston Letters begin to have a most
direct bearing on English history, we must endeavour in a few words of
historical retrospect to make the matter as clear as possible.

27.1 Blomefield’s History of Norfolk, vi. 487, 488.
27.2 Clarendon’s Life, ii. 440.

30.1 ‘Here everything good and virtuous is to be learned; all

vice is discouraged and banished. So that knights, barons,
and the greatest nobility of the kingdom, often place their
children in those Inns of Court; not so much to make the law
their study, much less to live by the profession (having large
patrimonies of their own), but to form their manners, and to
preserve them from the contagion of vice.’—Fortescue de
Laudibus Legum Angliæ (ed. Amos), 185.
30.2 Blomefield’s Norfolk, iii. 126.

30.3 Dugdale’s Origines.

30.4 Blomefield, v. 56.

30.5 Ibid. ii. 257, 285; vii. 217.

30.6 Ibid. viii. 109.

31.1 Blomefield, x. 67.

31.2 See Letter 13.

31.3 Blomefield, vi. 353.

31.4 Ibid. x. 176.

31.5 Ibid. v. 27.

31.6 Ibid. vi. 517.

32.1 No. 25.

32.2 See No. 6. Compare J. Amundesham Annales, 16. In the

latter Grys’s Christian name is given as William, and the
outrage is said to have taken place on Christmas Day instead
of New Year’s Eve.
34.1 Nos. 10, 11, 12. Maziere Brady in his book on the

Episcopal Succession, vol. ii. p. 79, gives the following entry

from the archives of the Vatican:—
‘Die 10o kal. Junii 1425, provisum est ecclesiæ Corcagen.
in Hibernia, vacanti per mortem Milis (Milonis), de persona
Ven. Fratris Johannis Pasten, prioris conventualis Prioratus
Bromholm, Ordinis Cluniacensis .’—Vatican.
Also on Sept. 14, 1425, ‘Johannes Paston, Dei gratia
electus Korkagen, solvit personaliter 120 florenos auri,’ etc.
—Obligazioni.
34.2 Printed in Appendix to this introduction.

35.1 No. 20.

35.2 See No. 47, p. 56.

36.1 No. 7.

36.2 Patent 6th July, 21 Henry VI., p. 1, m. 10.

37.1 Inquis. a. q. d. (arranged with Inquisitions post-mortem),

21 Henry VI., No. 53.
37.2 Letter 62.

37.3 Nos. 194, 195, 196.

38.1 Nos. 63, 87, 93, 128; Blomefield, vi. 479.

38.2 It would appear that he had also an estate at Therfield, in

Hertfordshire, as shown by an inscription in the east window
of the north aisle of the parish church, in which were
portraits of himself and his wife underwritten with the words,
Orate pro animabus domini Willelmi Paston et Agnetis
uxoris ejus, benefactorum hujus ecclesiæ (Chauncey’s
Hertfordshire, 88).
39.1 Blomefield, viii. 127.

39.2 Patent Roll, 4 Henry VI., p. 2, m. 13; Blomefield, viii.

102. A further notice relating to Judge Paston has been given
me by Sir James Ramsay in the following memorandum:
—‘£432 for arrears of salary due to late William Paston, paid
to his executor, John Paston, from parva custuma of the port
of London. L.T.R. Enrolled Customs Account of Henry VI.
(entry 8 Nov. 37 Hen. VI.—Mich. 38 Hen. VI.)’ in Public

Record Office. So the arrears of the judge’s salary were only
paid in 1458, fourteen years after his death.
40.1 No. 34.

41.1 Inquisitions post-mortem, 27 Edw. III., No. 28, and 30

Edw. III., No. 42. Blomefield inaccurately makes Maud,
whom Sir John Burghersh married, the daughter of Edmond
Bacon instead of his granddaughter.—(Hist. of Norf. viii.
127.)
42.1 No. 16. Blomefield gives a somewhat different account,

founded doubtless on documents to which I have not had
access. He says that Margery, widow of Sir William
Molynes, settled her portion of the manor on one Thomas de
la Lynde, with the consent of her son Sir William Molynes,
who resigned all claim to it.
42.2 According to the inquisition taken on his father’s death

(Inq. p. m., 37 Hen. VI., No. 17), he was over thirty in June
1459. If we are to understand that he was then only in his
thirty-first year, he could not have been twenty when he first
dispossessed John Paston of Gresham. But ‘over thirty’ may
perhaps mean two or three years over.
43.1 No. 102.

43.2 No. 79.

44.1 A value probably equal to about £3000 of our money.

44.2 Nos. 102, 135.

Fratris Johannis Pasten ... Ordinis Cluniacensis.’
text reads ‘Fratis ... Chuniacensis’

Footnote 41.1: Inquisitions post-mortem, 27 Edw. III.,
comma after “III.” missing

The Duke of Suffolk

he As to the causes of Suffolk’s fall we are not left in ignorance. Not only
do we possess the full text of the long indictment drawn up against him 45
this year in Parliament, but a number of political ballads and satires, in
which he is continually spoken of by the name of Jack Napes, help us
to realise the feeling with which he was generally regarded. Of his real
merits as a statesman, it is hard to pronounce an opinion; for though,
obviously enough, his whole policy was a failure, he himself seems to
have been aware from the first that it was not likely to be popular. Two
great difficulties he had to contend with, each sufficient to give serious
anxiety to any minister whatever: the first being the utter weakness of
the king’s character; the second, the practical impossibility of
maintaining the English conquests in France. To secure both himself
and the nation against the uncertainties which might arise from the
vacillating counsels of one who seems hardly ever to have been able to
judge for himself in State affairs, he may have thought it politic to ally
the king with a woman of stronger will than his own. At all events, if
this was his intention, he certainly achieved it. The marriage of Henry
with Margaret of Anjou was his work; and from Margaret he
afterwards obtained a protection which he would certainly not have
received from her well-intentioned but feeble-minded husband.
g’s
e. This marriage undoubtedly recommended itself to Henry himself as a
great means of promoting peace with France. The pious, humane, and
Christian character of the king disposed him favourably towards all
pacific counsels, and gave him a high opinion of the statesman whose
policy most obviously had in view the termination of the disastrous
war between France and England. King René, the father of Margaret of
Anjou, was the brother of the French king’s consort; so it was
conceived that by his and Margaret’s intercession a permanent peace
might be obtained, honourable to both countries. For this end, Henry
was willing to relinquish his barren title to the kingdom of France, if he
could have been secured in the possession of those lands only, such as
Guienne and Normandy, which he held irrespective of that title. 45.1 He
was willing to relinquish even the duchies of Anjou and Maine, King46
René’s patrimony, though the latter had long been in the possession of
the English. It was of course out of the question that Henry should

continue to keep the father of his bride by force out of his own lands.
Suffolk therefore promised to give them up to the French king, for the
use of René and his brother, Charles of Anjou; so that instead of the
former giving his daughter a dower, England was called upon to part
with some of her conquests. But how would the English nation
reconcile itself to such a condition? Suffolk knew well he was treading
in a dangerous path, and took every possible precaution to secure
himself. He pleaded beforehand his own incompetency for the charge
that was committed to him. He urged that his familiarity with the Duke
of Orleans and other French prisoners lately detained in England
brought him under suspicion at home, and rendered him a less fitting
ambassador for arranging matters with France. Finally he obtained
from the King and Council an instrument under the Great Seal,
pardoning him beforehand any error of judgment he might possibly
commit in conducting so critical a negotiation. 46.1
His success, if judged by the immediate result, seemed to show that so
much diffidence was unnecessary. The people at large rejoiced in the
marriage of their king; the bride, if poor, was beautiful and attractive;
the negotiator received the thanks of Parliament, and there was not a
man in all the kingdom,—at least in all the legislature—durst wag his
tongue in censure. The Duke of Gloucester, his chief rival and
opponent in the senate, was the first to rise from his seat and
recommend Suffolk, for his services, to the favour of the Crown. 46.2 If47
he had really committed any mistakes, they were as yet unknown, or at
all events uncriticised. Even the cession of Maine and Anjou at this
time does not seem to have been spoken of.
Happy in the confidence of his sovereign, Suffolk was promoted to
more distinguished honour. From an earl he was raised to the dignity of
a marquis; from a marquisate, a few years later, to a dukedom. He had
already supplanted older statesmen with far greater advantages of birth
s and pre-eminence of rank. The two great rivals, Humphrey, Duke of
ncy. Gloucester, and Cardinal Beaufort, were both eclipsed, and both died,
within six weeks of each other, two years after the king’s marriage,
leaving Suffolk the only minister of mark. But his position was not
7. improved by this undisputed ascendency. The death of Humphrey,

Duke of Gloucester, aroused suspicions in the public mind that were
perhaps due merely to time and circumstance. Duke Humphrey, with
many defects in his character, had always been a popular favourite, and
just before his death he had been arrested on a charge of treason. That
he could not possibly have remained quiet under the new régime is a
fact that we might presume as a matter of course, but there is no clear
evidence that he was guilty of intrigue or conspiracy. The king, indeed,
appears to have thought he was so, but his opinions were formed by
those of Suffolk and the Queen; and both Suffolk and the Queen were
such enemies of Duke Humphrey, that they were vehemently suspected
of having procured his death. 47.1
Complaints against the minister now began to be made more openly,
and his conduct touching the surrender of Anjou and Maine was so
generally censured, that he petitioned the king that a day might be
appointed on which he should have an opportunity of clearing himself
before the Council. On the 25th of May 1447 his wish was granted,
and in the presence of a full Council, including the Duke of York, and
others who might have been expected to be no very favourable critics,48
he gave a detailed account of all that he had done. How far he made a
really favourable impression upon his hearers we do not know; but in
the end he was declared to have vindicated his integrity, and a
proclamation was issued forbidding the circulation of such slanders
against him in future, under penalty of the king’s displeasure. 48.1
The nature of the defence that he set up can only be a matter of
speculation; but it may be observed that as yet no formal delivery of
Anjou or Maine had really taken place at all. The former province,
though it had been before this overrun and laid waste by the English,
does not appear ever to have been permanently occupied by them.
Delivery of Anjou would therefore have been an idle form; all that was
required was that the English should forbear to invade it. But with
Maine the case was different. It had been for a long time in the hands
of the English, and pledges had certainly been given for its delivery by
Suffolk and by Henry himself in December 1445. 48.2 As yet, however,
nothing had been concluded by way of positive treaty. No definite
peace had been made with France. Difficulties had always started up in

the negotiations, and the ambassadors appointed on either side had
been unable to do more than prolong from time to time the existing
truce, leaving the matter in dispute to be adjusted at a personal
interview between the two kings, for which express provision was
made at the time of each new arrangement. But the personal interview
never took place. In August 1445 it was arranged for the following
summer. In January 1446 it was fixed to be before November. In
February 1447 it was again to be in the summer following. In July it
was settled to be before May 1448; but in October the time was again
lengthened further. 48.3 There can be little doubt that these perpetual
delays were due merely to hesitation on the part of England to carry
out a policy to which she was already pledged. Charles, of course,
could not allow them to go on for ever. In the treaty of July 1447, an
express provision was for the first time inserted, that the town and 49
castle of Le Mans, and other places within the county of Maine, should
be delivered up to the French. It seems also to have been privately
arranged that this should be done before the 1st of November; and that
the further treaty made at Bourges on the 15th of October should not be
published until the surrender was accomplished. 49.1 But the year 1447
had very nearly expired before even the first steps were taken to give
effect to this arrangement. At length, on the 30th of December, an
agreement was made by Matthew Gough, who had the keeping of Le
Mans, that the place should be surrendered by the 15th of January, on
receipt of letters patent from the King of France, for compensation to
be made to grantees of the English crown.
Even this arrangement, however, was not adhered to. Matthew Gough
still found reasons for refusing or delaying the surrender, although the
English Government protested the sincerity of its intentions. But
Le Charles now began to take the matter into his own hands. Count
D.
Dunois and others were sent to besiege the place, with a force raised
suddenly out of various towns; for France had been carefully maturing,
during those years of truce, a system of conscription which was now
becoming serviceable. At the first rumour of these musters the English
Government was alarmed, and Sir Thomas Hoo, Lord Hastings,
Henry’s Chancellor of France, wrote urgently to Pierre de Brézé,

seneschal of Poitou, who had been the chief negotiator of the existing
truce, deprecating the use of force against a town which it was the full
intention of his Government to yield up honourably. 49.2 Such protests,
however, availed nothing in the face of the obvious fact that the
surrender had not taken place at the time agreed on. The French
continued to muster forces. In great haste an embassy was despatched
from England, consisting of Adam de Moleyns, Bishop of Chichester,
and Sir Thomas Roos; but the conduct of the garrison itself rendered
further negotiation nugatory. By no means could they be induced, even
50
in obedience to their own king, to surrender the city peacefully. Dunois
and his army accordingly drew nearer. Three sharp skirmishes took
place before the siege could be formed; but at length the garrison were
fully closed in. All that they could now do was to make a composition
with the enemy; yet even this they would not have attempted of
themselves. The efforts of the English envoys, however, secured for the
besieged most favourable terms of surrender. Not only were they
permitted to march out with bag and baggage, but a sum of money was
delivered to each of the captains, by the French king’s orders; with
which, and a safe-conduct from Charles, they departed into
Normandy. 50.1
It was on Friday, the 15th of March 1448, the day on which the truce
between the two countries was to have expired, that the brave Matthew
Gough, along with his colleague, Fulk Eton, formally delivered up to
the French, not only the town and castle of Le Mans, but also the
nder. whole county of Maine except the lordship of Fresnay. Standing on the
outer bridge, they made a public protest before their soldiers, and
caused a notary to witness it by a formal document, that what they did
was only in obedience to their own king’s commands, and that the king
himself, in giving up possession of the county of Maine, by no means
parted with his sovereign rights therein; that he only gave up actual
possession in order that King René and his brother, Charles of Anjou,
might enjoy the fruits of their own lands, and in the hope that a firm
peace might be established between England and France. Four days
before this was done the truce had been prolonged for two years
more. 50.2

The reluctant cession of such a valuable province as Maine boded ill
for the security of the neighbouring duchy of Normandy. The
government of Normandy was at this time committed to Edmund
Beaufort, Marquis of Dorset, who had just been created Duke of
Somerset. His appointment to the post had been due rather to favour
than to merit. The Duke of York was then Regent of France, and had
given good proof of his competence to take charge of the entire 51
kingdom. But Somerset, who was head of the house of Beaufort, nearly
allied in blood to the Crown, and who had come into possession of
immense wealth by the death of his uncle, the Cardinal of Winchester,
had the ambition of an Englishman to show his talent for governing.
His influence with the king and Suffolk obtained for him the
government of Normandy; and that he might exercise it undisturbed,
York was recalled from France. The change was ill advised; for the
times demanded the best of generalship, and the utmost political
discretion. Somerset, though not without experience in war, had given
no evidence of the possession of such qualities; and they had been
notoriously wanting in his brother John, who was Duke of Somerset
before him, when his ambition, too, had been gratified by a command
in France. Duke John, we are told, absolutely refused to give any one
his confidence as to what he was going to do at any period of the
campaign. He used to say that if his shirt knew his plans he would burn
it; and so, with a great deal of manœuvring and mystery, he captured a
small place in Britanny called La Guerche, made a vain attempt to
reduce another fortress, and then returned to England. 51.1 It may have
been owing to public discontent at the small result of his great
preparations, that he was accused of treason on his return; when,
unable to endure so great a reproach, he was believed to have put an
end to his own life. 51.2
With a full recollection of the indiscretions of his brother John, the
King’s Council must have hesitated to confide to Duke Edmund such
an important trust as the government of Normandy. They must have
hesitated all the more, as the appointment of Somerset involved the
recall of the Duke of York. And we are told that their acts at the time
betrayed symptoms of such irresolution; insomuch that one day a new

governor of Normandy was proclaimed at Rouen, and the next his
commission was revoked and another named in his stead. 51.3 But at last
the influence of Somerset prevailed. He was not, however, permitted 52 to
go abroad without warning of the dangers against which he had to
provide. The veteran Sir John Fastolf drew up a paper for his guidance,
pointing out that it was now peculiarly important to strengthen the
fortifications on the new frontier, to protect the seaports, to preserve
free communication with England, and (what was quite as politic a
suggestion as any) to appoint a wise chancellor and a council for the
impartial administration of justice, so as to protect the inhabitants from
oppression. 52.1 From the comment made upon these suggestions, either
by Fastolf himself or by his secretary William Worcester, it would
seem that they were not acted upon; and to this cause he attributed the
disasters which soon followed in quick succession, and brought upon
the Duke of Somerset the indignation and contempt of a large number
of his countrymen. These feelings, probably, were not altogether just.
The duke had done good service before in France, and part of the
blame of what occurred may perhaps be attributed to divided
management—more especially to the unruly feelings of a number of
the English soldiers.
The garrison which had been compelled against its will to give up Le
Mans found it hard to obtain quarters in Normandy. It was doubtful
whether they were not labouring under their own king’s displeasure,
and the captains of fortified towns were afraid to take them in. At last
they took possession of Pontorson and St. James de Beuvron, two
towns situated near the confines of Britanny which had been laid waste
during the previous wars and had since been abandoned. They began to
victual and fortify themselves in these positions, to the alarm of their
neighbours, until the Duke of Britanny felt it necessary to complain to
the Duke of Somerset, requesting that they might be dislodged.
Somerset, in reply, promised to caution them not to do anything in
violation of the truce, but declined to bid them evacuate their positions.
Diplomatic intercourse went on between one side and the other, always
in the most courteous terms, but every day it was becoming more
apparent that all confidence was gone.

9. At last, in March 1449, the English justified the suspicions that had 53
long been entertained of them. A detachment of about 600 men, under
François de Surienne, popularly named L’Arragonois, a leader in the
pay of England, 53.1 who had, not long before, been knighted by Henry,
of crossed the frontier southwards into Britanny, took by assault the town
s. and castle of Fougères, and made dreadful havoc and slaughter among
the unsuspecting inhabitants. The place was full of wealthy merchants,
for it was the centre of a considerable woollen manufacture, and the
booty found in it was estimated at no less than two millions of gold. 53.2
Such a prize in legitimate warfare would undoubtedly have been well
worth the taking; but under the actual circumstances the deed was a
glaring, perfidious violation of the truce. Somerset had been only a few
days before protesting to the King of France that, even if all his towns
were open and undefended, they would be perfectly secure from any
assault by the English; 53.3 yet here was a town belonging to the Duke
of Britanny, a vassal of the King of France who had been expressly
included in the truce, assaulted and taken by fraud. Somerset
disavowed the deed, but refused to make restitution. He professed to
write to the king for instructions how to act; but he utterly destroyed
his flimsy pretence of neutrality by writing to the King of France,
desiring him not to give assistance to the Duke of Britanny. 53.4
The truth is that the expedition had been fully authorised, not only by
Somerset in Normandy, but by the king and the Duke of Suffolk in
England. It was suggested to L’Arragonois when he was in England by
Suffolk himself, who assured him that he would do the king a most
excellent service by taking a place of so much consequence. He was
further given to understand that he incurred no danger or
responsibility; for even if he were besieged by the Duke of Britanny,
ample succours would be despatched to relieve him. Unfortunately,
during the next few months, the English had too much to do to keep
their word, and L’Arragonois was compelled to surrender the place 54
again to the Duke of Britanny after a five weeks’ siege. Feeling himself
then absolved from every engagement to England, he next year sent
back the Order of the Garter to Henry, declaring himself from that time

a subject of his natural lord the King of Arragon, in whose country he
proposed to spend the remainder of his days. 54.1
Notwithstanding the richness of the booty won by the capture of
Fougères, the English ought to have been aware that they would have a
heavy price to pay for it. The alienation of a friend in the Duke of
Britanny evidently did not grieve them, although that in itself should
have been a matter of some concern; for the duke, though nearly
related to the French king, had studied to keep himself neutral hitherto.
To his and his father’s pacific policy it was owing that the commerce
of Britanny had prospered and Fougères itself become rich, while
neighbouring districts were exposed to the ravages of war. But the
resentment of the Duke of Britanny was not a cause of much
apprehension. The effect of the outrage upon the French people was a
much more serious matter, and this was felt immediately. The King of
France, when he heard the news, was at Montils by Tours on the point
of starting for Bourges. He immediately changed his purpose and
turned back to Chinon that he might be nearer Britanny. A secret treaty
was made between the king and the duke to aid each other on the
recommencement of hostilities with the English. A plot was also laid to
surprise the town of Pont-de-l’Arche on the Seine, just as Fougères had
the
been surprised by the English. It was completely successful, and Pont-
de-l’Arche was captured by stratagem early in the morning of the 16th
of May, by a body of adventurers professedly in the service of Brittany.
There could be no mistake about the significance of the retribution. To
the Duke of Britanny the capture of Pont-de-l’Arche was of no value,
except in the way of retaliation, for it was at a great distance from his
borders; while to France it was a most important gain if used with a
view to the recovery of Normandy. But France was quite as free to
disavow the deed as the English Government had been to disavow the55
taking of Fougères.
Charles had, in fact, gained, in a strategic point of view, quite as great
an advantage as the English had gained in point of material wealth. But
morally his advantage was greater still, for he showed himself
perfectly open to treat for the redress of outrages on both sides, and
was willing to put Pont-de-l’Arche again into the hands of the English

if they would have restored Fougères. All conferences, however, were
ineffectual, and the French followed up their advantage by taking
Gerberoy and Conches. In the south they also won from the English
two places in the neighbourhood of Bordeaux. 55.1 Still, Charles had not
yet declared war, and these things were avowedly no more than the
acts of desultory marauders. His ambassadors still demanded the
restitution of Fougères, which possibly the English might now have
been willing to accord if they could have had the French captures
restored to them, but that in the surrender of the place they would have
had to acknowledge Britanny as a feudal dependency of Charles. 55.2
Negotiations were accordingly broken off, and Charles having besides
received particulars of a breach of the truce with Scotland in the
preceding year, which even an English writer does not venture to
defend, 55.3 at length made a formal declaration of hostilities. 55.4
Never, it must be owned, did England incur the grave responsibilities
of war with a greater degree of foolhardiness. Somerset himself
seemed only now to have wakened up to the defenceless state of
Normandy. He had just sent over Lord Hastings and the Abbot of
Gloucester with a message to the English Parliament desiring 56
immediate aid. The French, he said, were daily reinforcing their
garrisons upon the frontier, and committing outrages against the truce.
General musters were proclaimed throughout the kingdom, and every
thirty men of the whole population were required to find a horseman
fully equipped for war. Meanwhile, the English garrisons in Normandy
were too feeble to resist attack. Not a single place was furnished with
sufficient artillery, and the fortifications, almost everywhere, had fallen
into such decay that even if filled with men and guns they could not
possibly be defended. Besides this, the whole province was in such
extreme poverty that it could no longer endure further imposts for the
charges of its own defence. 56.1
of
ch. No marvel, therefore, that the progress of the French arms was, from
this time, uninterrupted. On the 19th July the town of Verneuil was
taken by the aid of a miller who had been maltreated by some of the
garrison; and, some time afterwards, the castle also surrendered. In
August operations were carried on in several parts of the Duchy at

once. Towns near the sea and towns near the French frontier were
attacked at the same time; and Pont-Audemer, Lisieux, Mantes,
Vernon, and other places were recovered from the English. Then
followed in quick succession the capture of Essay, Fécamp, Harcourt,
Chambrois, Roche-Guyon, and Coutances. In October, Rouen, the
capital of the province, was invested. On the 19th the inhabitants with
one accord rose in arms against the English, who found it necessary to
retreat into the castle. In this stronghold Somerset himself was assailed
by the King of France, and, after a vain attempt to secure better terms,
agreed to surrender not only it but the fortresses of Arques, Caudebec,
and several other places, leaving the gallant Talbot, Earl of
Shrewsbury, as a hostage until they were delivered up. Meanwhile, the
Duke of Britanny overran Lower Normandy and recovered his own
Fougères after a siege of little more than a month. François
L’Arragonois, finding no hope of succours, surrendered the place and
afterwards went over to the French.
57
In short, before the end of the year, the English had lost nearly
everything in the North of France. The inhabitants everywhere
conspired to betray towns and garrisons, and every man not English-
born took part against the English. Even King René, Henry’s father-in-
law, assisted Charles at the siege of Rouen, and shared the honours of
his triumphal entry. At the end of the year 1449 the English held
nothing in Normandy except a few towns upon the sea-coast or a little
way inland—the chief of these being Honfleur, Bayeux, Caen, and
Cherbourg. The last-named fortress remained untaken till the 12th of
August in the following year. When it surrendered, the whole of
Normandy was finally lost.
The news of these reverses so rapidly following each other of course
produced in England the most profound dissatisfaction. The Parliament
to which Somerset had applied for aid had been removed after
Whitsunday to Winchester on account of the insalubrity of the air in
London and Westminster, and had been finally dissolved on the 16th of
July. A new Parliament was then called for a winter session to provide
for the defence of Normandy, when, in fact, it was too late. 57.1 By the
time it had assembled Rouen was already lost. The secret odium with

arity which the policy of Suffolk had been viewed for years past could now
lk. no longer be restrained. It was difficult to persuade the many that the
disgrace which had befallen the English arms was not due to treachery
as much as to incompetence. The cession of Maine and Anjou was
more loudly blamed than ever, and Suffolk was considered to have
negotiated the king’s marriage mainly with a view to his own
advantage. It was remembered how he had once imprudently boasted
that he possessed no less weight in the counsels of the King of France
than in those of his own sovereign; it was again murmured that he had
been the cause of Gloucester’s death. And notwithstanding the
protection of the Court, these feelings found expression in Parliament.
0. 58
At the beginning of the New Year, an incident occurred which served
of still further to precipitate his ruin. Adam de Moleyns, Bishop of
op Chichester, keeper of the Privy Seal, who, as we have seen, had been
er. sent over to France in the beginning of 1448, to arrange the peaceful
cession of Le Mans, was at this time sent to Portsmouth to pay the
wages of certain soldiers and sailors. He was a scholar as well as a
statesman, and corresponded occasionally with the celebrated Æneas
Sylvius, afterwards Pope Pius II. 58.1 But, like Suffolk, he was believed
to make his own advantage out of public affairs. He had the reputation
of being very covetous; the king’s treasury was ill supplied with
money, and he endeavoured to force the men to be satisfied with less
than their due. On this they broke out into open mutiny, cried out that
he was one of those who had sold Normandy, and thereupon put him to
death. 58.2 This was on the 9th day of January 1450. During the
altercation he let fall some words, probably in justification of his own
conduct, which were considered to reflect most seriously upon that of
the Duke of Suffolk, 58.3 and a cry arose for the duke’s impeachment in
Parliament.
It must certainly be acknowledged by any candid student of history
that the state of the English Constitution in early times did not admit of
true and impartial justice being done to an accused minister. So long as
a man in Suffolk’s position was upheld by the power of the Crown, it
was to the last degree dangerous to say anything against him; but when
the voice of complaint could no longer be restrained, the protection he

had before received ceased to be of any use to him. It became then
quite as dangerous to say anything in his favour as it had been formerly
to accuse him. The Crown could not make common cause with one
whose conduct was under suspicion; for the king could do no wrong,
and the minister must be the scapegoat. The party, therefore, which
would insist on any inquiry into the conduct of a minister, knew well
that they must succeed in getting him condemned, or be branded as
traitors themselves. Such proceedings accordingly began inevitably 59
with intrigue. Lord Cromwell was Suffolk’s enemy at the council-table,
and used his influence secretly with members of the House of
Commons, to get them to bring forward an impeachment in that
chamber. That he was a dangerous opponent Suffolk himself was very
well aware. A little before Christmas, William Tailboys, one of the
duke’s principal supporters, had set a number of armed men in wait for
him at the door of the Star Chamber, where the council met, and Lord
Cromwell narrowly escaped being killed. The attempt, however, failed,
and Tailboys was committed to the Tower; from which it would seem
that he must soon afterwards have been released. Cromwell then
brought an action against him in the Court of Exchequer to recover
damages for the assault, and was awarded £3000; on which Tailboys
was committed to the Sheriff of London’s prison; and this was all the
redress obtained by Cromwell till, by a special Act in the ensuing
Parliament, Tailboys was removed from that place of confinement, and
lodged in the Tower once more, for a period of twelve months. Owing
to the king’s protection he was not brought to trial. 59.1
An evil day, nevertheless, had arrived for the Duke of Suffolk, which
not all the influence of the king, nor the still greater influence of
Margaret of Anjou, who owed to him her proud position as Henry’s
consort, was able to avert. On the 22nd of January the duke presented a
petition to the king that he might be allowed to clear himself before
Parliament of the imputations which had been cast on him in
consequence of the dying words of Bishop Moleyns. He begged the
king to remember how his father had died in the service of King Henry
V. at Harfleur—how his elder brother had been with that king at
Agincourt—how two other brothers had fallen in the king’s own days

at Jargeau, when he himself was taken prisoner and had to pay £20,000
for his ransom—how his fourth brother had been a hostage for him in60
the enemies’ hands and died there. He also reminded the king that he
had borne arms for four-and-thirty years, had been thirty years a
Knight of the Garter, and had served in the wars abroad for seventeen
years at a time, without ever coming home. Since then he had been
fifteen years in England about the king’s person, and he prayed God
that if ever he died otherwise than in his bed, it might be in
maintaining the quarrel that he had been at all times true to Henry. 60.1
Four days after this a deputation from the Commons waited on the
Lord Chancellor, desiring that as Suffolk had confessed the prevalence
of injurious reports against him, he might be committed to custody.
This request was laid by the Chancellor before the king and council on
the following day, and the opinion of the judges being taken as to the
legality of the proposed arrest, he was allowed to remain at liberty until
a definite charge should be brought against him. Such a charge was
accordingly declared two days later by the Speaker, who did not
hesitate to tell the Lord Chancellor, in the name of the Commons, that
Suffolk was believed to be in league with the French king to promote
an invasion of England, and had fortified the castle of Wallingford with
a view of assisting the invaders. The duke, on this, was committed to
the Tower.

ed. On the 7th of February he was formally impeached by the Commons.
A copy of the articles of impeachment will be found in the Paston
Letters (No. 76). Nothing was said in them of the fortification of
Wallingford Castle, but a number of specific charges were made, many
of them authenticated by the exact day and place when the alleged
treasonable acts were committed, tending to show that in his
communications with the French he had been invariably opposed to the
interests of his own country. It was alleged that he had been bribed to
deliver Anjou and Maine, and that as long ago as the year 1440 he was
influenced by corrupt motives to promote the liberation of the Duke of
Orleans; that he had disclosed the secrets of the English council-
chamber to the French king’s ambassadors; that he had even given
information by which France had profited in the war, and that he had 61

rendered peace negotiations nugatory by letting the French know
beforehand the instructions given to the English envoys. Further, in the
midst of invasion and national disgrace, he had hoped to gratify his
own ambition. The king, who was still childless, was to be deposed;
and the duke had actually hoped to make his own son king in his place.
It seems that he had obtained some time before a grant of the wardship
of Margaret Beaufort, daughter of the late Duke of Somerset, who was
the nearest heir to the Crown in the Lancastrian line, and since his
arrest he had caused her to be married to his own son, Lord John De la
Pole. 61.1 Such was the foundation on which the worst charge rested.
A month passed before he was heard in his own defence. The
Commons impeached, but it was for the Lords to try him. Meanwhile,
another bill of indictment had been prepared by the malice of his
enemies, in which all the failures of his policy were visited upon him
as crimes, and attributed to the worst and most selfish motives. For his
own private gain, he had caused the Crown to be prodigal of grants to
other persons, till it was so impoverished that the wages of the
household were unpaid, and the royal manors left to fall into decay. He
had granted the earldom of Kendal, with large possessions both in
England and in Guienne, to a Gascon, who ultimately sided with the
French, but had happened to marry his niece. He had weakened the
king’s power in Guienne, alienated the Count of Armagnac, and caused
a band of English to attack the king’s German allies; he had disposed
of offices to unworthy persons without consulting the council, granted
important possessions in Normandy to the French king’s councillors,
given to the French queen £13,000 of the revenues of England,
appropriated and misapplied the king’s treasure and the subsidies
granted by Parliament for the keeping of the sea. These and some
minor charges formed the contents of the second bill of indictment. 61.2
62
He was brought from the Tower on the 9th day of March, and required
to make answer before the Lords to the contents of both bills. He
requested of the king that he might have copies, which were allowed
him; and that he might prepare his answer more at ease, he was
removed for a few days to a tower within the king’s palace at
nce. Westminster. On the 13th he was sent for to make his answer before

the king and lords. Kneeling before the throne, he replied to each of the
eight articles in the first bill separately. He denied their truth entirely,
and offered to prove them false in whatever manner the king would
direct. He declared it absurd to consider Margaret Beaufort as heir-
presumptive to the Crown, and used other arguments to show the
improbability of his designs on the succession. In all else he showed
that the other lords of the council were quite as much committed as he;
and as to the delivery of Anjou and Maine, he laid the responsibility
entirely upon the murdered Bishop of Chichester. 62.1
Next day, the Chief Justice, by the king’s command, asked the Lords
what advice they would give the king in the matter. It was a Saturday,
and the Lords deferred their answer till the following Monday; but on
the Monday nothing was done. On the Tuesday the king sent for all the
Lords then in London to attend him in his own palace, where they met
in an inner chamber. When they were assembled, Suffolk was sent for,
and kneeling down, was addressed briefly by the Lord Chancellor. He
was reminded that he had made answer to the first bill of the Commons
without claiming the right of being tried by the peers; and he was
asked if he had anything further to say upon the subject. He replied that
the accusations were too horrible to be further spoken of, and he hoped
he had sufficiently answered all that touched the king’s person, and the
state of his kingdom. Nevertheless, he submitted himself entirely to the
king, to do with him whatever he thought good. 62.2
On this an answer was returned to him in the king’s name by the Lord
Chancellor. A miserably weak and evasive answer it was, showing
clearly that the king desired to protect his favourite, but had not the 63
manliness to avow he thought him worthy of protection. The Lord
Chancellor was commissioned to say, that as to the very serious
charges contained in the first bill, the king regarded Suffolk as not
having been proved either guilty or innocent; but touching those
contained in the second bill, which amounted only to misprisions, as
Suffolk did not put himself upon his peerage, but submitted entirely to
the king, the latter had determined, without consulting the Lords, and
not in the way of judgment (for he was not sitting in tribunal), but
merely in virtue of the duke’s own submission, to bid him absent

himself from England for five years, from the first day of May
to ensuing. 63.1
. It is clear upon the face of the matter, that although the king was made
to take the sole responsibility of this decision, it was really a thing
arranged, and not arranged without difficulty, between the friends of
Suffolk and some of the leading members of the House of Lords.
Immediately after it was pronounced, Viscount Beaumont, who was
one of Suffolk’s principal allies, made a protest on behalf of the Lords,
that what the king had just done, he had done by his own authority,
without their advice and counsel. He accordingly besought the king
that their protest might be recorded in the rolls of Parliament, for their
protection, so that the case might not henceforth be made a precedent
in derogation of the privileges of the peerage. 63.2 Thus it was clearly
hoped on all sides a great crisis had been averted. Suffolk was got rid
of, but not condemned. A victim was given over to popular resentment,
but the rights of the Peers for the future were to be maintained. And
though the Crown lowered itself by an avowed dereliction of duty, it
was not severely censured for preferring expediency to justice.
On the following night the duke left Westminster for Suffolk. The
people of London were intensely excited, and about two thousand
persons sallied out to St. Giles’ hoping to intercept his departure, but
they succeeded only in capturing his horse and some of his servants,
whom they maltreated, as might have been expected. Even after this
the excitement was scarcely diminished. Seditious manifestoes were 64
thrown about in public and secretly posted on church doors. 64.1 The
duke had more than a month to prepare for leaving England, and seems
arks to have spent the time in the county of Suffolk. On Thursday the 30th
ders. of April he embarked at Ipswich for Flanders; but before going he
assembled the gentlemen of the county, and, taking the sacrament,
swore he was innocent of the sale of Normandy and of the other
treasons imputed to him. 64.2 He also wrote an interesting letter of
general admonitions for the use of his young son, at that time not eight
years old, whom he was not to see again for at least five years, and too
probably not at all. This letter, which is known to us only by a copy
preserved in the Paston correspondence (No. 117), can hardly fail to

awaken sympathy with the writer. As an evidence of unaffected piety
to God and sincere loyalty to his king, it will probably outweigh with
most readers all the aspersions cast by Parliament on the purity of his
intentions.
Two ships and a little pinnace conveyed him from the Suffolk coast
southwards till he stood off Dover, when he despatched the small
vessel with letters to certain persons in Calais to ascertain how he
should be received if he landed there. The pinnace was intercepted by
some ships which seem to have been lying in wait for his passage; and
when it was ascertained where the duke actually was, they immediately
bore down upon him. Foremost among the pursuers was a ship called
the Nicholas of the Tower, the master of which, on nearing Suffolk’s
vessel, sent out a boat to ask who they were. Suffolk made answer in
person, and said that he was going by the king’s command to Calais;
on which they told him he must speak with their master. They
accordingly conveyed him and two or three others in their boat to the
Nicholas. When he came on board the master saluted him with the
words, ‘Welcome, traitor!’ and sent to know if the shipmen meant to
take part with the duke, which they at once disowned all intention of
doing. The duke was then informed that he must die, but was allowed
the whole of the next day and night to confess himself and prepare for
the event. 64.3 On Monday the 2nd of May the rovers consummated their 65
design. In sight of all his men Suffolk was drawn out of the Nicholas
red into a boat in which an axe and block were prepared. One of the crew,
an Irish churl, then bade him lay down his head, telling him in cruel
mockery that he should be fairly dealt with and die upon a sword. A
rusty sword was brought out accordingly, and with nearly half a dozen
strokes the fellow clumsily cut off his head. He was then stripped of
his russet gown and velvet doublet. His body was brought to land and
thrown upon the sands at Dover; and his men were at the same time
allowed to disembark. 65.1
The source from which we learn most of these particulars is a letter of
William Lomner to John Paston written when the news was fresh. The
writer seems to have been quite overpowered by the tragic character of
the event, and declares he had so blurred the writing with tears that he

fears it would not be easy to decipher. Indications of genuine human
feeling like this are so rare in letters of an early date that we are in
danger of attributing to the men of those days a coldness and brutality
which were by no means so universal as we are apt to suppose. The
truth is that when men related facts they regarded their own feelings as
an impertinence having nothing whatever to do with the matter in
hand. 65.2 The art of letter-writing, besides, had not yet acquired the
freedom of later days. It was used, in the main, for business purposes
only. We shall meet, it is true, in this very correspondence, with one or
two early specimens of jesting epistles; but, on the whole, I suspect
paper was too valuable a commodity and writing too great a labour to
be wasted on things irrelevant.
But whatever feeling may have been excited by the news of Suffolk’s
murder in men like William Lomner, who possibly may have known 66
the duke personally, we may well believe that the nation at large was
neither afflicted nor very greatly shocked at the event. Even the prior
of Croyland, the head of a great religious community in Lincolnshire,
speaks of it as the just punishment of a traitor, and has not a word to
say in reprobation. 66.1 Mocking dirges were composed and spread
abroad, in which his partisans were represented as chanting his funeral
service, and a blessing was invoked on the heads of his murderers.
These were but the last of a host of satires in which the public
indignation had for months past found a vent. 66.2 Suffolk had been
represented on his imprisonment as a fox driven into his hole, who
must on no account be let out again. He had been rhymed at as the Ape
with his Clog who had tied Talbot our good dog, in allusion to the fact
of Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, having been given up as a hostage to the
French after the surrender of Rouen. 66.3 He had been reviled as an
upstart who had usurped the place of better men, and who
systematically thwarted and neutralised all that better men could do. If
any one wept for the fall of such a man, it was not on public grounds.
As a specimen of these political satires we cannot resist the temptation
to quote a short poem which must have been composed towards the
close of the year 1449, after the surrender of Rouen and before
Suffolk’s fall. It is far less personal than the others, being not so much

an invective against Suffolk as a wail over the loss of England’s great
men, and the decay of her fortunes. The leading statesmen and warriors
of that and the former age are here spoken of by their badges, which
the reader will find interpreted in the margin:—

‘The Root a is dead, the Swan b is gone, ab The Regent Bedford.
Humphrey, Duke of
The fiery Cresset c hath lost his light. Glo’ster.
Therefore England may make great c The last Duke of Exeter.

moan
Were not the help of God Almight’.
The Castle d is won where care begun, d Rouen Castle.
e The Duke of Somerset.
The Portè-cullis e is laid adown;
f The Cardinal Beaufort.
Yclosèd we have our Velvet Hat f
That covered us from many stormes brown.
The White Lion g is laid to sleep, g The Duke of Norfolk, 67
who had gone on
Thorough the envy of th’ Apè h Clog; pilgrimage to Rome in
And he is bounden that our door should 1447. (Dugdale.)
h The Duke of Suffolk.
keep;
That is Talbot, our good dog.
i Lord Fauconberg who
The Fisher i has lost his angle hook;
was taken prisoner by the
Get them again when it will be. French at the capture of
Our Millè-sail will not about,
k Pont-de-l’Arche.
k Robert, Lord
It hath so long gone empty.
Willoughby.
The Bear l is bound that was so wild, l The Earl of Warwick.
For he hath lost his Ragged Staff.
m The Duke of
The Carte-nathe m is spoke-less
Buckingham.
For the counsel that he gaf.
n Thomas Daniel. He and
The Lily n is both fair and green;
the two next are courtiers.
The Conduit o runneth not, I wean. o John Norris.
The Cornish Chough oft with his train p John Trevilian.
p
q The King.
Hath made our Eagle q blind.
r Earl of Arundel.
The White Hart r is put out of mind
Because he will not to them consent;
Therefore, the Commons saith, is both true and kind,
Both in Sussex and in Kent.
The Water Bouge s and the Wine Botell s Lord Bouchier.

With the Fetterlock’s t chain bene fast. t Prior of St. John’s.
u The Duke of Exeter.
The Wheat Ear u will them sustain
As long as he may endure and last.
w The Earl of Devonshire.
The Boar w is far into the West,
That should us help with shield and spear.
x The Duke of York, who
The Falcon x fleeth and hath no rest
had been sent into Ireland
Till he wit where to bigg his nest.’ to be out of the way.
Almost concurrently with the news of Suffolk’s murder came tidings,
mentioned by William Lomner in the very same letter, of another
disaster in France, more gloomy, if possible, than any that had occurred
f Sir before. A force under Sir Thomas Kiriel had been sent to the aid of the
. Duke of Somerset in Normandy after the loss of Rouen. It disembarked
at Cherbourg, and proceeding towards Caen, where the duke had now
taken up his position, besieged and took Valognes. They were now in
full communication with the garrisons of Caen and Bayeux, when they
were suddenly attacked at the village of Fourmigni, and routed with
great slaughter. Between three and four thousand Englishmen were left
dead upon the field; Kiriel himself was taken prisoner; even the brave
Matthew Gough (well known to Frenchmen of that day as Matago)
found it needful to fall back with his company of 1500 men for the 68
safeguard of Bayeux, which a month afterwards he was compelled
after all to give up to the enemy. 68.1
Meanwhile the Parliament, which had been prorogued over Easter, was
ordered to meet again at Leicester instead of Westminster. The reason
given for the change of place was still, as before, the unhealthiness of
the air about Westminster; and doubtless it was a very true reason. It is
possible, however, that the political atmosphere of London was quite as
oppressive to the Court as the physical atmosphere could be to the
Parliament. During their sitting at Leicester a much needed subsidy
was voted to the king, and an Act passed for the application of certain
revenues to the expenses of the Royal Household in order to stop the
exactions of purveyors. But they had hardly sat a month when the
session was suddenly put an end to from a cause which we proceed to
notice.

45.1 Stevenson’s Wars of the English in France, i. 132.
46.1 Rymer, xi. 53.

46.2 Rolls of Parl. v. 73. That Gloucester secretly disliked

Suffolk’s policy, and thought the peace with France too
dearly bought, is more than probable. At the reception of the
French ambassadors in 1445, we learn from their report that
Henry looked exceedingly pleased, especially when his uncle
the French king was mentioned. ‘And on his left hand were
my Lord of Gloucester, at whom he looked at the time, and
then he turned round to the right to the chancellor, and the
Earl of Suffolk, and the Cardinal of York, who were there,
smiling to them, and it was very obvious that he made some
signal. And it was afterwards mentioned by———— (blank
in orig.), that he pressed his Chancellor’s hand and said to
him in English, “I am very much rejoiced that some who are
present should hear these words. They are not at their
ease.”’—Stevenson’s Wars of the English in France, i. 110-
11.
47.1 An interesting and valuable account of the death of Duke

Humphrey, from original sources, will be found in The Hall
of Lawford Hall, pp. 104-13.
48.1 Rymer, xi. 173.

48.2 See Stevenson’s Wars of the English in France, ii. [639]

to [642].
48.3 Rymer, xi. 97, 108, 151, 182, 189, etc.

49.1 Stevenson’s Wars, ii. [714, 715].

49.2 Stevenson’s Wars, i. 198. See also a letter of the 18th Feb.

1448, of which an abstract is given in vol. ii. of the same
work, p. 576.
50.1 Chron. de Mat. de Coussy (in Buchon’s collection), p. 34.

50.2 Rymer, xi. 199, 204. Stevenson’s Wars, i. 207.

51.1 Basin, Histoire de Charles VII. etc. i. 150-1.

51.2 Hist. Croylandensis Continuatio in Fulman’s Scriptores,
p. 519.
51.3 Basin, i. 192.

52.1 Stevenson’s Wars, ii. [592].

53.1 Stevenson’s Wars, i. 473; ii. 573.

53.2 Stevenson’s Reductio Normanniæ, 406.

53.3 Ibid. 402.

53.4 Ibid. 406.

54.1 Stevenson’s Wars, i. 275, 278, etc.

55.1 Reductio Normanniæ, 251.

55.2 Ibid. 503.

55.3 ‘Eodem anno [26 Hen. VI.], Rex visitans boreales partes

Angliæ usque Donelmense monasterium, quasi omnes
domini et alii plebei illius patriæ in magna multitudine
quotidie ei in obviam ostendebant, quare, concilio habito,
minus formidabant interrumpere trugas inter ipsum et Regem
Scotiæ prius suis sigillis fidelitatis confirmatas; sed posterius
hujus trugarum interruptio vertebatur Anglicis multo magis
in dispendium quam honorem, quia recedente Rege Scoti
magnam partem Northumbriæ bina vice absque repulsu
destruxerunt, et juxta Carlele erant ex Anglicis capti et
interfecti ad numerum duorum millium; et sic tandem Rex
Angliæ cum ejus concilio pro saniori deliberatione cum
damnis ad pacem inclinare reducitur.’—Incerti Scriptoris
Chronicum (Ed. Giles), Hen. VI. p. 36.
55.4 Reductio Normanniæ, 254.

56.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 147.

57.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 143, 171. Even when the new Parliament

met at Westminster on the 6th November it was obliged to
adjourn to the City of London on account of the
unhealthiness of the air. We must remember that Westminster
was then little better than a flat muddy island, with a vast

extent of marshy land and stagnant pools between Pimlico
and the Thames.
58.1 Æneæ Sylvii Epp. 80, 186.

58.2 According to his friend, Æneas Sylvius, the mode of death

inflicted on him was decapitation. (Opera, 443.)
58.3 Rolls of Parl. v. 176.

59.1 W. Worc. Rolls of Parl. v. 200. I find by an entry in the

Controlment Roll, 30 Hen. VI., that on St. Bartholomew’s
Day, 1451, William Tailboys and nineteen other persons
belonging to South Kyme, in Lincolnshire, were outlawed at
the suit of Elizabeth, widow of John Saunderson, for the
murder of her husband.
60.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 176.

61.1 So it is stated in the impeachment. According to the

inquisition on Suffolk’s death, his son was born on the 27th
September 1442, and was therefore at this time only in his
eighth year.—Napier’s Historical Notices of Swyncombe and
Ewelme, 108.
61.2 Rolls of Parl. v. 179-182.

62.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 182.

62.2 Ibid.

63.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 183.

63.2 Ibid.

64.1 Rymer, xi. 268.

64.2 W. Worc. 468, 469.

64.3 English Chronicle, ed. Davies, p. 69.

65.1 Paston Letters, Nos. 120, 121.

65.2 Even the passage above referred to would probably be an

illustration of this if the original letter were examined. As we
have reprinted it from Fenn, it stands thus: ‘Right worshipful
Sir, I recommend me to you, and am right sorry of that I shall
say, and have so wesshe this little bill with sorrowful tears

that uneathes ye shall read it.’ The words in italics would
probably be found to be an interlineation in the original, for
though they stand at the beginning of the letter, they were
clearly written after it was penned, and the only reason why
they were inserted was to excuse the illegibility of the
writing.
66.1 Contin. of Croyland Chronicle, p. 525.

66.2 Wright’s Political Poems (in Rolls series), ii. 232.

66.3 Ibid. 222, 224.

68.1 Berry’s narrative in Stevenson’s Expulsion of the English

from Normandy, 336. Wars of the Engl. ii. [360]. Paston
Letters, No. 120.

Rebellion of Jack Cade
The murder of the Duke of Suffolk had not made things better than
they had been before. The ablest of the ministers, who had hitherto
guided the king’s counsels, was now removed, but his place was left
for a time altogether unsupplied. The men of Suffolk’s party, such as
Lord Say, Viscount Beaumont, and Thomas Daniel, still remained
about the king, and were nearly as unpopular as he had been. The
offices formerly held by Suffolk were divided among them and their
particular friends. 68.2 Even if the Court had desired to call in men of
greater weight, they were not then at hand. The Duke of Somerset was
in France, and the Duke of York in Ireland; so that some time must
have elapsed before either of them could have taken part in public
affairs at home. Meanwhile it was said that the resentment of the Court
for Suffolk’s murder would be visited upon the county of Kent; and the 69
county of Kent was of opinion that it suffered abuses enough already.
The exactions of the king’s officers, both in the way of taxation and
purveyance, were felt to be extortionate and capricious. The collectors
of the revenue were appointed by the knights of the shire, and these,
instead of being freely chosen by the people, were but the nominees of
a few great men who compelled their tenants to vote according to their

pleasure. There were, besides, grave cases of injustice in which people
were accused of treason, and kept in prison without trial, on the
information of persons about the Court who had influence to obtain
grants of their lands from the Crown.

n. Hence arose Jack Cade’s rebellion, a movement which we must not
permit ourselves to look upon as a vulgar outbreak of the rabble.
Whole districts of Kent, Surrey, and Sussex rose in arms, clamouring
for redress of grievances; and it is certain that the insurgents met with a
large amount of sympathy, even from those who did not actually take
part with them. 69.1 As their leader, they selected a man who called
himself Mortimer, and who, besides some experience in war, was
evidently possessed of no small talent for generalship. It afterwards
turned out that his real name was Cade, that he was a native of Ireland,
and that he had been living a year before in the household of Sir
Thomas Dacre in Sussex, when he was obliged to abjure the kingdom
for killing a woman who was with child. He then betook himself to
France and served in the French war against England. What induced
him to return does not appear, unless we may suppose, which is not
unlikely, that some misdemeanour when in the service of France made
the French soil fully as dangerous to him as the English. In England he
seems to have assumed the name of Aylmer, and passed himself off as70
a physician. He married a squire’s daughter, and dressed in scarlet; and
when the rebellion broke out in Kent he called himself John Mortimer,
a cousin of the Duke of York.
The first disturbances took place at Whitsuntide in the latter end of
May. In the second week of June 70.1 a considerable army from the
counties of Kent, Surrey, and Sussex encamped upon Blackheath. The
king, who, on receiving news of the rising, had dissolved the
parliament then sitting at Leicester, arrived in London on Saturday the
13th, and took up his quarters at the priory of St. John’s, near
Smithfield. He had with him 20,000 men under arms, but for some
reason or other did not set out against the rebels till the following
Thursday, the 18th. 70.1 They, meanwhile, had withdrawn in the night-
time, 70.2 and the king and his host occupied their position on
Blackheath. The royal forces, however, proceeded no further. Only a

detachment, under Sir Humphrey Stafford and his brother William, was
sent to pursue the insurgents. An encounter took place at Sevenoaks on
the 18th, 70.3 in which both the Staffords were killed. Their defeat
spread dismay and disaffection in the royal camp. The noblemen who
had accompanied the king to Blackheath could no longer keep their
men together, the latter protesting that unless justice were done on
certain traitors who had misled the king, they would go over to the
Captain of Kent. To satisfy them, Lord Say was arrested and sent to the
Tower; but even with this concession the king did not dare presume
upon their loyalty. He withdrew to Greenwich, and the whole of his
army dispersed. The king himself returned to London by water, and
made preparations during the next two or three days to remove to
Kenilworth. The mayor and commons of the city went to him to
beseech him to remain, offering to live and die with him, and pay half71
a year’s cost of his household. But all was to no purpose. The king had
not even the manliness of Richard II. at Smithfield, and he took his
departure to Kenilworth. 71.1
The city, thus deserted by its sovereign, knew not for a time what to do.
A party within the Common Council itself ventured to open
negotiations with the insurgents, and Alderman Cooke passed to and
fro under the safe-conduct of the Captain. 71.2 To many it may have
seemed doubtful loyalty to support the government of Lord Say and his
friends against an oppressed population. On the 1st day of July 71.3 the
insurgents entered Southwark. On the 2nd a Common Council was
called by the Lord Mayor to provide means for resisting their entry into
the city; but the majority voted for their free admission, and Alderman
Robert Horne, who was the leading speaker against them, was
ls committed to prison for his boldness. That same afternoon the so-
called Mortimer and his followers passed over London Bridge into the
city. The Captain, after passing the drawbridge, hewed the ropes
asunder with his sword. His first proceedings were marked by order
and discipline. He issued proclamations in the king’s name against
robbery and forced requisitions, but he rode through the different
streets as if to place the capital under military government; and when
he came to London Stone, he struck it with his sword, saying, ‘Now is

Mortimer lord of this city.’ Finally, he gave instructions to the Lord
Mayor about the order to be kept within his jurisdiction, and returned
for the night to his quarters in Southwark. On the following morning,
Friday the 3rd, he again entered the city, when he caused Lord Say to
be sent for from the Tower. That no resistance was made to this
demand by Lord Scales, who had the keeping of the fortress, may seem
strange. But there was a reason for it which most of the chroniclers do
not tell us. The king had been obliged to listen to the grievances of his72
‘Commons’ and to withdraw his protection from his favourites. He had
granted a commission ‘to certain lords and to the mayor and divers
justices, to inquire of all persons that were traitors, extortioners, or
oppressors of the king’s people.’ 72.1 Lord Say was accordingly formally
arraigned at a regular sessions at the Guildhall. But when the
unfortunate nobleman claimed the constitutional privilege of being
tried by his peers, the pretence of law was finally laid aside. A
company of the insurgents took him from the officers and hurried him
off to the Standard in Cheap, where, before he was half shriven, his
head was cut off and stuck upon a long pole. A son-in-law of his named
Crowmer, who was then very unpopular as sheriff of Kent, met with a
similar fate. He was beheaded in Cade’s presence at Mile End.
Barbarity now followed violence. The lifeless heads of Say and
Crowmer were carried through the streets, and made to kiss each other.
At the same time one Bailey was beheaded at Whitechapel on a charge
of necromancy, the real cause of his death being, as it was reported,
that he was an old acquaintance of Cade’s who might have revealed
something of his past history.
It may have been the expectation of inevitable exposure that induced
Cade now to relax discipline, and set an example of spoliation himself.
He entered and pillaged the house of Philip Malpas, an alderman
known as a friend of the Court, and therefore unpopular in the city.
Next day he dined at a house in the parish of St. Margaret Pattens, and
then robbed his host. At each of these acts of robbery the rabble were
sharers of the spoil. But, of course, such proceedings completely
alienated all who had anything to lose, and the mayor and aldermen
began to devise measures for expelling Cade and his followers from

the city. For this end they negotiated with Lord Scales and Matthew
Gough, who had then the keeping of the Tower.
For three days successively Cade had entered the city with his men,
and retired in the evening to Southwark. But on Sunday, the 5th of
July, he for some reason remained in Southwark all day. In the evening 73
the mayor and citizens, with a force under Matthew Gough, came and
occupied London Bridge to prevent the Kentish men again entering the
n city. The Captain called his men to arms, and attacked the citizens with
such impetuosity, that he drove them back from the Southwark end of
the bridge to the drawbridge in the centre. This the insurgents set on
fire, after inflicting great losses on the citizens, many of whom were
slain or drowned in defending it. Matthew Gough himself was among
those who perished. Still, the fight was obstinately contested, the
advantage being for the moment now with one party and now with the
other. It continued all through the night till nine on the following
morning; when at last the Kentish men began to give way, and a truce
was made for a certain number of hours.
A favourable opportunity now presented itself for mediation. Although
the king had retired to Kenilworth, he had left behind him in London
some leading members of his council, among whom were Cardinal
Kemp, Archbishop of York, 73.1 then Lord Chancellor, and Waynflete,
Bishop of Winchester. The former had taken refuge in the Tower, under
the protection of Lord Scales; and he called to him the latter, who lay
concealed at Holywell. 73.2 A conference was arranged between them
and the insurgents, and both the Cardinal and Bishop Waynflete 73.3
with some others crossed the river and met with Cade in St. Margaret’s
Church in Southwark. In the end matters were satisfactorily arranged,
and the bishop produced two general pardons prepared by the
Chancellor, the first for the Captain himself, and the second for his 74
followers. The offer was embraced with eagerness. The men were by
this time disgusted with their leader, and alarmed at the result of their
own acts. By thousands they accepted the amnesty and began to return
homewards. But Cade, who knew that his pardon would avail him little
when the history of his past life came to be investigated, wisely made
friends to himself after the fashion of the Unjust Steward. He broke

open the gaols of the King’s Bench and Marshalsea, and formed a new
company out of the liberated prisoners. 74.1 He then despatched to
Rochester a barge laden with the goods he had taken from Malpas and
others in London, and prepared to go thither himself by land. He and
his new following appear to have been still in Southwark on the 8th of
July, but to have passed through Dartford to Rochester on the 9th,
where they continued still in arms against the king on the 10th and
11th. 74.2 An attempt they made upon the castle of Queenborough was
resisted by Sir Roger Chamberlain, to whom a reward was given in the
following year in acknowledgment of his services. 74.3 Meanwhile a
proclamation was issued offering a reward of a thousand marks for
Cade’s apprehension, and ten marks for that of any of his followers;
‘for,’ says a contemporary chronicler, ‘it was openly known that his
name was not Mortimer; his name was John Cade; and therefore his
charter stood in no strength.’ 74.4
The feeble remains of the rebellion were already quarrelling about the
booty Cade had conveyed out of London. Their leader now took horse
and escaped in disguise towards the woody country about Lewes. He
was pursued by Alexander Iden, a gentleman who had just been
and appointed sheriff of Kent in place of the murdered Crowmer. Iden
overtook him in a garden at Heathfield, and made him prisoner, not
without a scuffle, in which Cade was mortally wounded, so that on
being conveyed to London he died on the way. It only remained to use 75
his carcass as a terror to evil-doers. His head was cut off and placed
upon London Bridge, with the face looking towards Kent. His body
was drawn through the streets of London, then quartered, and the
quarters sent to four different places very widely apart,—one of them
to Blackheath, one to Norwich, one to Salisbury, and one to
Gloucester. 75.1
If the dispersion of traitors’ limbs for exhibition in many places could
have effectually repressed disloyalty, the whole realm ought now to
have been at rest. The quarters of another Kentish rebel, who, under the
name of Bluebeard, had raised disturbances in the preceding February,
were at that moment undergoing public exhibition in London,
Norwich, and the Cinque Ports. Those of two others were about this

time despatched by the sheriffs of London to Chichester, Rochester,
Portsmouth, Colchester, Stamford, Coventry, Newbury, and
Winchester. The heads of all these wretches were set upon London
Bridge, which in the course of this miserable year bore no less than
twenty-three such horrid ornaments. 75.2

nces. But with all this, sedition was not put down, even in the county of
Kent; for I find by the evidence of authentic records that a new rising
took place in August at Feversham, under one William Parminter, who,
undeterred by the fate of Cade, gathered about him 400 men, and
called himself the second Captain of Kent. This affair is quite
unnoticed by historians, and all I know of it is derived from a pardon to
one of those engaged in it. 75.3 But even Parminter was not the last
‘Captain of Kent’ that made his appearance this year; for the very same
title was immediately afterwards assumed by one John Smyth, for
whose capture a reward of £40 was ordered to be paid to the Duke of
Somerset on the 3rd of October. 75.4 And the chroniclers, though they do
not mention these disturbances, tell us that such things were general
over all the kingdom. In Wiltshire, at the time that Cade was at 76
Blackheath, William Ayscough, Bishop of Salisbury, had one day said
mass at Edington, when he was dragged from the altar by a band of his
own tenants and murdered in his alb and stole at the top of a
neighbouring hill. He was the second bishop who had been murdered
that year by the populace. Another insurrection in the same county in
August is mentioned in a letter of James Gresham’s, the number of the
insurgents being reported at nine or ten thousand men. 76.1 These
instances may suffice as evidence of the widespread troubles of the
time.
Of the degree of private suffering and misery inflicted in particular
cases by these commotions we have a lively picture in Letter 126. At
the time when Cade and his followers were encamped upon
Blackheath, Sir John Fastolf, a noted warrior of the time, of whom we
shall have much to say hereafter, was residing at his house in
Southwark. He was a man who had not succeeded in standing well
with his contemporaries, and the fact may have contributed not a little
to the sensitiveness of a naturally irascible character. In one

engagement with the French 76.2 he was actually accused of cowardice,
a charge which he seems afterwards satisfactorily to have disproved.
For some years, however, he had given up soldiering and returned to
his native country, where he served the king in a different manner as a
member of his Privy Council. But in this capacity too he was
unpopular. His advice should have been valuable at least in reference
to the affairs of France; but it does not seem to have been taken. The
warnings and counsels which he gave with reference to the
maintenance of the English conquests in France he caused his
secretary, William Worcester, to put in writing for his justification; but
though his admonitions were neglected by those to whom they were
addressed, popular rumour held him partly accountable for the loss of
Normandy. Of this opinion some evidence was given in the course of
Cade’s insurrection.
As a member of the King’s Council Fastolf thought it right to send a 77
yn messenger to ascertain what were the demands of the insurgents. He
therefore commanded one John Payn, who was in his service, to take a
man with him and two of the best horses of his stable, and ride to
Blackheath. When he arrived there, Cade ordered him to be taken
prisoner. To save his master’s horses from being stolen, Payn gave
them to the attendant, who galloped away with them as fast as he
could, while he himself was brought before the Captain. Cade then
asked him what he had come for, and why he had caused his fellow to
run away with the horses. He answered that he had come to join some
brothers of his wife, and other companions who were among the
insurgents. On this some one called out to the Captain that he was a
man of Sir John Fastolf’s, and that the two horses were Sir John’s. The
Captain raised a cry of ‘Treason!’ and sent him through the camp with
a herald of the Duke of Exeter before him, in the duke’s coat-of-arms.
At four quarters of the field the herald proclaimed with an Oyez that
Payn had been sent as a spy upon them by the greatest traitor in
England or France, namely, by one Sir John Fastolf, who had
diminished all the garrisons of Normandy, Le Mans, and Maine, and
thereby caused the loss of all the king’s inheritance beyond sea. It was
added that Sir John had garrisoned his place with the old soldiers of

Normandy, to oppose the Commons when they came to Southwark;
and, as the emissary of such a traitor, Payn was informed that he
should lose his head.
He was brought to the Captain’s tent, where an axe and block were
produced. But fortunately he had friends among the host; and Robert
Poynings, Cade’s swordbearer and carver, who afterwards married
John Paston’s sister Elizabeth, declared plainly that there should die a
hundred or two others if Payn were put to death. He was therefore
allowed to live on taking an oath that he would go to Southwark and
arm himself, and return to join the Commons. He accordingly carried
to Fastolf a statement of their demands, advising him at the same time
to put away his old soldiers and withdraw himself into the Tower. The
old warrior felt that the advice was prudent; he left but two of his
servants in the place, and but for Payn the insurgents would have 78
burned it to the ground. The faithful dependant, however, had to pay
the full penalty of his master’s unpopularity. He seems to have
entertained the rioters for some time at his own cost. Afterwards the
Captain took from him some valuable clothes and armour, and sent
men to ransack his chamber of bonds, money, and other stores. The
insurgents also robbed his house in Kent, and threatened to hang his
wife and children. Finally, on the night of the battle on London Bridge,
Cade thrust him into the thickest of the combat, where he continued six
hours unable to extricate himself, and was dangerously wounded.
To have passed through all this was surely a severe enough trial; yet
after that commotion he had further trouble to endure. He was
impeached by the Bishop of Rochester, and thrown into the Marshalsea
by command of the queen. He was also threatened to be hanged,
drawn, and quartered, in order that he might accuse his master Fastolf
of treason; but in the end his friends succeeded in procuring for him a
charter of pardon. To earn this, however, as we find from the document
itself, he had to appear before the king in person, during a progress
which he made in Kent the year after the rebellion, and, amid a crowd
of other supplicants whose bodies were stripped naked down to their
legs, humbly to beg for mercy. 78.1

68.2 See No. 123. William Worcester says Lord Beauchamp
was made treasurer, and Lord Cromwell the king’s
chamberlain. Lord Beauchamp’s appointment is on the
Patent Rolls. See Calendarium Rot. Patent, p. 294.
69.1 The late Mr. Durrant Cooper, in an interesting paper read

before a meeting of the Kent Archæological Society,
examined the long list of names given on the Patent Roll of
28 Henry VI., and proved from them that the insurrection was
by no means of a very plebeian or disorderly character. ‘In
several hundreds,’ he says, ‘the constables duly, and as if
legally, summoned the men; and many parishes, particularly
Marden, Penshurst, Hawkhurst, Northfleet, Boughton-
Malherbe, Smarden, and Pluckley, furnished as many men as
could be found in our day fit for arms.’
70.1 These dates were given differently in previous issues of

this Introduction. For a rectification of the chronology of the
rebellion I am indebted to Kriehn’s English Rising in 1450,
pp. 125 and following.
70.2 According to No. 119 of our collection this retreat would

appear to have been on the 22nd June, but that date is
certainly an error.
70.3 The 18th June is given as the date of Sir Humphrey

Stafford’s death in Inquis. post mortem, 28 Henry VI. No. 7.
71.1 W. Worc.—Three Fifteenth Century Chronicles (edited by

me for the Camden Soc.), 67.—Chronicle in MS. Cott. Vitell.
A. xvi.
71.2 Holinshed, iii. 632.

71.3 I leave this part of the story as it was originally written,

though here, too, the chronology seems to require
rectification, especially from sources since published, for
which the reader may consult Kriehn’s work, p. 129.
72.1 MS. Vitellius A. xvi. fol. 107, quoted by Kriehn, p. 92.

73.1 Inaccurately called Archbishop of Canterbury by Fabyan
and others. He was not translated to Canterbury till 1452.
73.2 Hall’s Chronicle. Holy Well was a mineral spring to the

north of London, much frequented before the Reformation,
when it was stopped up as being considered a place of
superstitious resort. A century afterwards it was discovered
anew by a Mr. Sadler, from whom the locality is named to
this day Sadler’s Wells.
73.3 Some doubt seems to be thrown on Hall’s statement that

both prelates crossed the river, as earlier writers say the
Chancellor sent pardons under the Great Seal. William
Worcester, moreover, makes no mention of the cardinal, but
says that the Bishop of Winchester and others of the king’s
council spoke with the Captain of Kent. But the ‘Short
English Chronicle’ in the Three Fifteenth Century
Chronicles, edited by me for the Camden Society in 1880
(p. 68), does exactly the reverse, and omitting all reference to
the Bishop of Winchester, says: ‘And forthewithe went the
Chaunseler to the Capteyne and sessed him and gave him a
chartur and his men an other.’
74.1 Hall’s Chronicle.

74.2 See Act of Attainder, 29 Hen. VI. Rolls of Parl. vi. 224.

74.3 Devon’s Issue Rolls, 471. Davies’ English Chron. 67.

74.4 Three Fifteenth Century Chronicles, 68.

75.1 W. Worc. Fabyan. Davies’ English Chronicle (Camden

Soc.), 67. Ellis’ Letters, 2nd Series i. 115.
75.2 Ellis, ib. MS. Vitell. A. xvi.

75.3 See document in Appendix to this Introduction; also

Devon’s Issue Rolls, p. 472. It would seem as if the entry
there dated 5th August ought to have been 5th September, as
Parminter does not seem to have been taken even on the last
day of August.
75.4 Nicolas’s Proceedings of the Privy Council, vi. 101.

76.1 See No. 131.
76.2 The Battle of Patay.

78.1 See Appendix to Introduction.

Sidenote: Battle on London Bridge.
final . missing

The Dukes of York and Somerset
ke of Cade’s rebellion was attributed by the Court to the machinations of the
Duke of York. The disturbances that had prevailed for some months
previously seem to have been partly associated with his name. When
Adam de Moleyns, Bishop of Chichester, was murdered in the
beginning of the year, the malcontents talked of inviting York over
from Ireland to redress the wrongs of the people. The exclusion of 79
York and other lords of royal blood from the king’s councils was also
made an express ground of complaint by the Kentish insurgents. The
repetition of his name in the mouths of the disaffected was anything
but grateful to the party then in power. It was construed as being in
itself an evidence of his disloyalty. But the popular complaints as to his
treatment were both just and reasonable, for it was a matter that
concerned the public weal. The rank, wealth, and lineage of the Duke
of York, his connection with the blood-royal, his large possessions, and
finally his well-proved ability both as a general and an administrator—
all marked him out as one who ought to have been invited to take a
leading part in the government of the realm; but a faction about the
king had taken care to keep him as much as possible at a distance from
the Court. Moreover, it had maligned and aspersed him in his absence,
so that it would have been positively insecure for himself to allow the
charges to accumulate. A time had clearly come when it was no longer
his duty to obey the orders of others. His enemies were becoming more
and more unpopular every day, and the only hope of improving the
administration of affairs depended upon his taking the initiative.

ver He accordingly determined to avail himself of the privilege due to his
land. rank, and lay his requests at the foot of the throne. A little before
Michaelmas he came over from Ireland, collected 4000 of his retainers
upon the Welsh Marches, and with them proceeded to London. His
coming, although unsolicited by the king and without leave asked, was
nevertheless not altogether unexpected. Attempts were made to stop his
landing at Beaumaris, and bodies of men lay in wait for him in various
places to interrupt his progress. For this, however, he could not have
been unprepared. He knew well the hatred entertained towards him at
the Court, for he had experienced pretty much the same thing years
before in going to Ireland, as now in coming from it. Although he was
sent to that country in the king’s service, and as the king’s lieutenant,
there were persons commissioned to apprehend him at several points in
his journey thither; and now on his return similar efforts were made to 80
prevent his advance to London. As regards himself they were
altogether fruitless; but it is not improbable that they succeeded in
deterring many of his followers from joining him. William Tresham,
the Speaker of the last Parliament, having received a summons from
the duke to meet him, was waylaid and murdered in Northamptonshire
by a body of the retainers of Lord Grey of Ruthin. For two months the
murderers went at large. The sheriff of the county durst not arrest them,
and it was only on the meeting of Parliament that a special act was
passed for their punishment. 80.1
York, however, pursued his way, in spite of all opposition, to the royal
presence, and great was the dismay of those then about the king.
According to an act passed against him nine years later, his approach
was not unaccompanied by violence. He and his followers, it is said,
came in warlike array to Westminster Palace, and ‘beat down the
spears and walls’ in the king’s chamber. If so, we should infer that his
access to the king was opposed even at the last moment. But the
opposition was ineffectual, and the reception he met with from Henry
himself did not indicate that the king at all resented his conduct.
It must have been on his first interview with Henry that he presented a
petition and received a reply from him, which are printed in Holinshed
as follows:—

Richard, Duke of York: his letter to King Henry 80.2
Please it your Highness to conceive that since my departing out of
this your realm by your commandment, and being in your service in
your land of Ireland, I have been informed that divers language hath
been said of me to your most excellent estate which should sound to
my dishonour and reproach and charge of my person; howbeit that I
have been, and ever will be, your true liegeman and servant, and if
there be any man that will or dare say the contrary or charge me 81
otherwise, I beseech your rightwiseness to call him before your high
presence, and I will declare me for my discharge as a true knight
ought to do. And if I do not, as I doubt not but I shall, I beseech you
to punish me as the poorest man of your land. And if he be found
untrue in his suggestion and information, I beseech you of your
highness that he be punished after his desert in example of all other.
Please it your Excellency to know that as well before my departing
out of this your realm for to go into your land of Ireland in your full
noble service, as since, certain persons have lain in wait for to
hearken upon me, as Sir John Talbot, knight, at the castle of Holt, Sir
Thomas Stanley, knight, in Cheshire, Pulford at Chester, Elton at
Worcester, Brooke at Gloucester, and Richard, groom of your
chamber, at Beaumaris; which had in charge, as I am informed, to
take me, and put me into your castle of Conway, and to strike off the
head of Sir William Oldhall, knight, and to have put in prison Sir
William Devereux, knight, and Sir Edmund Malso (Mulso), knight,
withouten enlarging until the time that your Highness had appointed
their deliverance.
Item, at such time as I was purposed for to have arrived at your haven
of Beaumaris, for to have come to your noble presence to declare me
your true man and subject, as my duty is, my landing was stopped
and forebarred by Henry Norris, Thomas Norris, William Buckley,
William Grust, and Bartholomew Bould, your officers in North
Wales, that I should not land there, nor have victuals nor refreshing
for me and my fellowship, as I have written to your Excellency here
before; so far forth, that Henry Norris, deputy to the chamberlain of

North Wales, said unto me that he had in commandment that I should
in no wise have landing, refreshing, nor lodging, for men nor horse,
nor other thing that might turn to my worship or ease; putting the
blame upon Sir William Say, usher of your chamber, saying and
affirming that I am against your intent and [held] as a traitor, as I am
informed. And, moreover, certain letters were made and delivered
unto Chester, Shrewsbury, and to other places, for to let mine entry
into the same.
Item, above all wrongs and injuries above said, done unto me of
malice without any cause, I being in your land of Ireland in your
honourable service, certain commissions were made and directed
unto divers persons, which for the execution of the same sat in
certain places, and the juries impanelled and charged. Unto the which
juries certain persons laboured instantly to have me indicted of
treason, to the intent for to have undone me and mine issue, and
corrupted my blood, as it is openly published. Beseeching your
Majesty royal of your righteousness to do examine these matters, and
thereupon to do such justice in this behalf as the cause requireth; for82
mine intent is fully to pursue to your Highness for the conclusion of
these matters.

The Answer of King Henry to the Duke of York
Cousin, we have seen the bill that ye took us late, and also
understand the good humble obedience that ye in yourself show unto
us, as well in word as in deed; wherefore our intent is the more
hastily to ease you of such things as were in your said bill. Howbeit
that at our more leisure we might answer you to your said bill, yet we
let you wit that, for the causes aforesaid, we will declare you now our
intent in these matters. Sith it is that a long time among the people
hath been upon you many strange language, and in especial anon
after your [qu. their?] 82.1 disordinate and unlawful slaying of the
bishop of Chichester, 82.2 divers and many of the untrue shipmen and
other said, in their manner, words against our estate, making menace
to our own person by your sayings, that ye should be fetched with
many thousands, and ye should take upon you that which ye neither

ought, nor, as we doubt not, ye will not attempt; so far forth that it
was said to our person by divers, and especially, we remember, of
one Wasnes which had like words unto us. And also there were divers
of such false people that went on and had like language in divers of
our towns of our land, which by our subjects were taken and duly
executed. Wherefore we sent to divers of our courts and places to
hearken and to take heed if any such manner coming were, and if
there had been, for to resist it; but coming into our land our true
subject as ye did, our intent was not that ye, nor less of estate of our
subjects, nor none of your servants should not have been letted nor
warned, but in goodly wise received; howbeit that peradventure your
sudden coming, without certain warning, caused our servants to do as
they did, considering the causes abovesaid. And as to the indictment
that ye spoke of, we think verily and hold for certain, that there was
none such. And if ye may truly prove that any person was
thereabouts, the matter shall be demeaned as the case shall require, so
that he shall know it is to our great displeasure. Upon this, for the
easing of your heart in all such matters, we declare, repute and admit
you as our true and faithful subject, and as our faithful cousin.
83
So far, York had gained his object. The charges against him were
repudiated by the highest authority in the kingdom. But it was
impossible that the matter could rest there. His own interests and those
of the public alike compelled him to demand a full inquiry into the
machinations of his adversaries, and when admitted to freer intercourse
with Henry he was able to support this request by most inconvenient
arguments. Town and country now listened with eagerness for news of
a long looked-for crisis, while, as it seemed, the old régime was being
e of quietly laid aside at Westminster. ‘Sir, and it please,’ writes one
ment. newsmonger, William Wayte, the clerk of Justice Yelverton, ‘Sir, and it
please, I was in my lord of York’s house, and I heard much thing more
than my master writeth unto you of. I heard much thing in Fleet Street.
But, sir, my lord was with the king, and he visaged so the matter that
all the king’s household was and is afraid right sore. And my said lord
hath put a bill to the king and desired much thing which is much after
the Commons’ desire; and all is upon justice, and to put all those that

be indicted under arrest without surety or mainprise, and to be tried by
law as law will; insomuch that on Monday Sir William Oldhall was
with the king at Westminster more than two hours, and had of the king
good cheer.’ 83.1
Sir William Oldhall, a friend and companion-in-arms of the Duke of
York in France, had been summoned to the king’s councils more than
once before. 83.2 But the last occasion was eleven years before this, at a
time when it was doubtless felt to be necessary to obtain the sanction
beforehand of all parties in the State to the proposed negotiations for
peace at Calais. From that day till now we do not hear of him, and we
may presume that he was not invited to Court. By the Duke of York’s
letter just quoted, it would seem that courtiers had planned to have him
beheaded. But now the old exclusiveness was defeated. Men whose
patriotism and generalship, it was believed, would have averted the
loss of France, were at length allowed free access to their sovereign;
while men who were believed to have culpably misdirected the king, 84
and by their favouritism and partiality to have perverted the course of
justice throughout the kingdom, stood in fear of a strict inquiry being
made into their misdeeds. For such was the sole purport of the ‘bill,’ or
petition presented by the Duke of York as mentioned by William
Wayte, the exact text of which will be seen in No. 143. The king’s
answer to this is preserved in Holinshed as follows:—

The Answer of King Henry to the Duke of York
Cousin, as touching your bill last put up to us, we understand well
that ye, of good heart, counsel and advertise us to the setting up of
justice and to the speedy punishing of some persons indicted or
noised, offering your service to be ready at commandment in the
same; sith it is, that for many causes moving us to have determined in
our soul to stablish a sad and substantial Council, giving them more
ample authority and power than ever we did before this, in the which
we have appointed you to be one. But sith it is not accustomed, sure,
nor expedient, to take a conclusion and conduct by advice or counsel
of one person by himself, for the conservation (?) it is observed that
the greatest and the best, the rich and the poor, in liberty, virtue and

effect of their 84.1 voices be equal; we have therefore determined
within ourself to send for our Chancellor of England and for other
Lords of our Council, yea and all other, together within short time,
ripely to common of these and other our great matters. In the which
communication such conclusions, by the grace of God, shall be
taken, as shall sound to His pleasure, the weal of us and our land, as
well in these matters as in any other.
in
The time was favourable to men like John Paston, who had been
wronged by a powerful neighbour such as Lord Molynes, and had been
hitherto denied redress. There seemed also a hope of destroying, once
for all, the influence of Tuddenham and Heydon in the county of
Norfolk. It was proposed that on the Duke of York visiting Norfolk,
which he intended to do, the mayor and aldermen of Norwich should
ride to meet him, and that complaints should be preferred against the
party of Tuddenham and Heydon in the name of the whole city. ‘And
let that be done,’ adds William Wayte, ‘in the most lamentable wise; 85
for, Sir, but if (i.e. unless) my Lord hear some foul tales of them, and
some hideous noise and cry, by my faith they are else like to come to
grace.’ Owing to the influence of the Duke of York, a new Parliament
was summoned to meet in November, and John Paston was urged by
some friends to get himself returned as a member. But it was still more
strongly recommended that the Earl of Oxford should meet the duke,
apparently with the view of arranging the list of candidates—a
responsibility which the earl, for his part, seems to have declined. The
Duke of Norfolk met with the Duke of York at Bury St. Edmunds, and
these two dukes settled that matter between them. The Earl of Oxford
modestly contented himself with reporting their decision, and advising
that their wishes should be carried into effect. 85.1
The Parliament met on the 6th November, and Sir William Oldhall was
chosen Speaker. About the same time a commission of Oyer and
Terminer which had been issued as early as the first of August, 85.2
began its labours at Norwich, and the Earl of Oxford stayed away from
Parliament to attend it. Mr. Justice Yelverton was sent down from
Westminster to sit on that tribunal along with him. There seemed hope
at last of redress being had for the wrongs and violence that had

prevailed in the county of Norfolk; but the course of justice was not yet
an easy one. Great pressure had been put upon the king, even at the last
moment, that Yelverton should be countermanded, and Lord Molynes
had spoken of his own dispute with Paston in the king’s presence in a
manner that made the friends of the latter wish he had been then at
Westminster to see after his own interests. The Lords of the Council,
however, determined that Yelverton should keep his day for going into 86
Norfolk. When he arrived there, he had occasion to report that there
were many persons ill-disposed towards Tuddenham and Heydon, but
that it was most important they should be encouraged by a good sheriff
and under-sheriff being appointed, else there would be a total
miscarriage of justice. For the annual election of sheriffs had been
delayed this year, apparently owing to the state of parties. Until the
Duke of York arrived in London for the Parliament, his friends would
not allow them to be nominated; and the state of suspense and anxiety
occasioned by this delay is clearly shown in the letters written during
November. 86.1
The truth is, the Duke of York had not yet succeeded in establishing the
government upon anything like a firm or satisfactory basis. In times
like our own there is little difficulty in determining the responsibility of
ministers; but in the rough judgment of the ‘Commons’ of those days
an error in policy was nothing short of treason. Whoever took upon
him to guide the king’s counsels knew very well the danger of the task;
and York (if I understand his character aright) was anxious, until he
was driven desperate, never to assume more authority than he was
distinctly warranted in doing. He could not but remember that his
father had suffered death for conspiring to depose Henry V., and that
his own high birth and descent from Edward III. caused his acts to be
all the more jealously watched by those who sought to estrange him
from his sovereign. He therefore made it by no means his aim to
establish for himself a marked ascendency. He rather sought to show
his moderation. I find, indeed, that at this particular period he not only
removed two members of the Council, Lord Dudley and the Abbot of
St. Peter’s at Gloucester, but sent them prisoners to his own castle of
Ludlow. 86.2 This, however, he could hardly have done without

permission from the king, as it was the express object of his petition
above referred to, that persons accused of misconducting themselves in
high places should be committed for trial; and judging from the terms
of the king’s answer, I should say that it must have been done by the 87
authority of the new Council, which Henry therein declared it to be his
intention to constitute.
This new Council was probably what we should call in these days a
ke of coalition ministry. York’s great rival, the Duke of Somerset, had come
t. over from Normandy a little before York himself came over from
Ireland. On the 11th of September, while Cardinal Kemp, who was
then Lord Chancellor, was sitting at Rochester on a commission of
Oyer and Terminer to try the Kentish rebels, 87.1 he affixed the Great
Seal to a patent appointing Somerset Constable of England. 87.2 In that
capacity, as we have already seen, the duke arrested one of the new
Kentish leaders that started up after Cade’s rebellion had been quelled.
There is no doubt that he stood high in the king’s confidence, and that
he was particularly acceptable to Queen Margaret. He was,
nevertheless, one of the most unpopular men in England, on account of
his surrender of Caen and total loss of Normandy in the preceding
year; and as the Parliament was now called, among other reasons,
expressly to provide for the defence of the kingdom, and for speedy
succours being sent to preserve the king’s other dominions in
France, 87.3 it was impossible that his conduct should not be inquired
into. The short sitting of Parliament before Christmas was greatly
occupied by controversy between York and Somerset. 87.4 On the 1st of
December the latter was placed under arrest. His lodgings at the Black
Friars were broken into and pillaged by the populace, and he himself
was nearly killed, but was rescued from their violence by a barge of his
brother-in-law the Earl of Devon. Next day the Dukes of York and
Norfolk caused proclamation to be made through the city that no man
should commit robbery on pain of death, and a man was actually
beheaded in Cheap for disobeying this order. As a further
demonstration against lawlessness, the king and his lords, on Thursday
the 3rd December, rode through the city in armour, either side of the
way being kept by a line of armed citizens throughout the route of the88

procession. It was the most brilliant display of the kind the Londoners
of that day had ever seen. 88.1
The Duke of Somerset did not long remain in prison. Very soon after
Christmas the king made him captain of Calais, and gave him the
entire control of the royal household. 88.2 The Court was evidently bent
on the restoration of the old order of things, so far as it dared to do so.
The chief obstacle to this undoubtedly was the Parliament, which was,
on the whole, so favourable to the Duke of York, that one member,
Young of Bristol, had even ventured to move that he should be
declared heir to the crown. 88.3 Parliament, however, could be
prorogued; and, as Young found shortly afterwards, its members could
be committed to the Tower. The speech of the Lord Chancellor on the
meeting of Parliament had declared that it was summoned for three
important causes: first, to provide for the defence of the kingdom, and
especially the safeguard of the sea; secondly, for the speedy relief of
the king’s subjects in the south of France, and aid against the French;
thirdly, for pacifying the king’s subjects at home, and punishing the
disturbances which had lately been so frequent. But practically nothing
was done about any of these matters before Christmas. An act was
passed for the more speedy levying of a subsidy granted in the last
Parliament, and also an act of attainder against the murderers of
William Tresham. The Lord Chancellor then, in the king’s name and in
his presence, prorogued the Parliament till the 20th of January,
declaring that the matters touching the defence of the kingdom were
too great and difficult to be adequately discussed at that time. The
same excuse, however, was again used for further prorogations until
the 5th of May; and meanwhile fears began to be entertained in the
country that all that had been done hitherto for a more impartial
administration of justice was about to be upset. 88.4
1. 89
During the whole course of the succeeding year matters were in a very
unsettled condition. At the very opening of the year we hear complaints
that the sheriff, Jermyn, had not shown himself impartial, but was
endeavouring to suppress complaints against certain persons at the
coming sessions at Lynn. It was feared the king would pardon
Tuddenham and Heydon the payment of their dues to the Exchequer

for Suffolk; and if they did, payment of taxes would be generally
refused, as Blake, the Bishop of Swaffham, having gone up to London,
informed the Lord Chancellor himself. From London, too, men wrote
in a manner that was anything but encouraging. The government was
getting paralysed alike by debt and by indecision. ‘As for tidings here,’
writes John Bocking, ‘I certify you all is nought, or will be nought. The
king borroweth his expenses for Christmas. The King of Arragon, the
Duke of Milan, the Duke of Austria, the Duke of Burgundy, would be
assistant to us to make a conquest, and nothing is answered nor agreed
in manner save abiding the great deliberation that at the last shall spill
all together.’ Chief-Justice Fortescue had been for a week expecting
every night to be assaulted. 89.1 The only symptom of vigour at
headquarters was the despatch of a commission of Oyer and Terminer
into Kent, for the trial of those who had raised disturbances during the
preceding summer. As for the county of Norfolk, the only hope lay in a
strong clamour being raised against oppressors. Sir John Fastolf
showed himself anxious about the prosecution of certain indictments
against Heydon, and his servant Bocking, and Wayte, the servant of
Judge Yelverton, urged that strong representations should be made to
Lord Scales against showing any favour to that unpopular lawyer. 89.2
ham
don. By and by it was seen what good reason the friends of justice had for
their apprehensions. It had been arranged that Tuddenham and Heydon
90
should be indicted at a sitting of the commission of Oyer and Terminer
at Norwich in the ensuing spring. Rumours, however, began to prevail
in Norwich that they who had promoted this commission in the county
of Norfolk—the Earl of Oxford and Justice Yelverton, as well as John
Paston and John Damme—were to be indicted in Kent by way of
revenge. John Damme had before this caused Heydon to be indicted of
treason for taking down one of those hideous memorials of a savage
justice—the quarter of a man exposed in public. The man was
doubtless a political victim belonging to Heydon’s own party; but
Heydon was now looking to recover his influence, and he contrived to
get the charge of treason retorted against Damme. Symptoms were
observed in Norwich that the unpopular party were becoming bolder
again. ‘Heydon’s men,’ wrote James Gloys to John Paston, ‘brought his

own horse and his saddle through Aylesham on Monday, and they came
in at the Bishop’s Gates at Norwich, and came over Tombland and into
the Abbey; and sithen they said they should go to London for Heydon.
Item, some say that Heydon should be made a knight, and much other
language there is which causeth men to be afeard, weening that he
should have a rule again.’ 90.1
Full well might Sir John Fastolf and others apprehend that if Heydon
or Tuddenham appeared in answer to the indictment, it would be with
such a following at his back as would overawe the court. No
appearance was put in for them at all at several of the sessions of Oyer
and Terminer. One sitting was held at Norwich on the 2nd of March.
Another was held just after Easter on the 29th of April, and Justice
Prisot, not the most impartial of judges, was sent down to Norwich to
hold it. Strong complaints were put in against Tuddenham and Heydon
on the part of the city of Norwich, and also by the town of Swaffham,
by Sir John Fastolf, Sir Harry Inglos, John Paston, and many others;
but, as Fastolf’s chaplain afterwards informed his master, ‘the judges,
by their wilfulness, might not find in their heart to give not so much as
a beck nor a twinkling of their eye toward, but took it to derision, God
reform such partiality!’ The one-sidedness of Prisot, indeed, was such91
as to bring down upon him a rebuke from his colleague Yelverton. ‘Ah,
Sir Mayor and your brethren,’ said the former, ‘as to the process of
your complaints we will put them in continuance, but in all other we
will proceed.’ Yelverton felt bound to protest against such unfairness.
Yet even this was not the worst; for Prisot, seeing that, with all he
could do, the result of the proceedings at Norwich would scarcely be
satisfactory to Tuddenham and Heydon, took it upon him, apparently
by his own authority, to remove them to Walsingham, where they had
most supporters. And there, accordingly, another session was opened
on Tuesday the 4th of May. 91.1
It was, according to Sir Thomas Howys, ‘the most partial place of all
the shire.’ All the friends and allies of Tuddenham and Heydon, knights
and squires, and gentlemen who had always been devoted to their
pleasure, received due warning to attend. A body of 400 horse also
accompanied the accused, and not one of the numerous complainants

ventured to open his mouth except John Paston. Even he had received
a friendly message only two days before that he had better consider
well whether it was advisable to come himself, as there was ‘great
press of people and few friends’; and, moreover, the sheriff was ‘not so
whole’ as he had been. What this expression meant required but little
explanation. As Sheriff of Norfolk, John Jermyn was willing to do
Paston all the service in his power, but simple justice he did not dare to
do. 91.2
ton
d He had but too good an excuse for his timidity. Of John Paston’s
. complaint against Tuddenham and Heydon we hear no more; we can
easily imagine what became of it. But we know precisely what became
of an action brought by Paston at this sessions against his old adversary
Lord Molynes, for his forcible expulsion from Gresham in the
preceding year. John Paston, to be sure, was now peaceably reinstated
in the possession of that manor; 91.3 but he had the boldness to conceive
that undermining his wife’s chamber, turning her forcibly out of doors,
and then pillaging the whole mansion, were acts for which he might 92
fairly expect redress against both Lord Molynes and his agents. He had
accordingly procured two indictments to be framed, the first against his
lordship, and the second against his men. But before the case came on
at Walsingham, Sheriff Jermyn gave notice to Paston’s friends that he
had received a distinct injunction from the king to make up a panel to
acquit Lord Molynes. 92.1 Royal letters of such a tenor do not seem to
have been at all incompatible with the usages of Henry VI.’s reign. John
Paston himself said the document was one that could be procured for
six-and-eightpence.
There was no hope, therefore, of making Lord Molynes himself
responsible for the attack on Gresham. The only question was whether
the men who had done his bidding could not be made to suffer for it.
After the acquittal of their master, John Osbern reports a remarkable
conversation that he had with Sheriff Jermyn in which he did his best
to induce him to accept a bribe in Paston’s interest. The gift had been
left with the under sheriff for his acceptance. Jermyn declined to take
it until he had seen Paston himself, but Osbern was fully under the
impression that he would be glad to have it. Osbern, however, appealed

also to other arguments. ‘I remembered him,’ he tells Paston, ‘of his
promises made before to you at London, when he took his oath and
charge, and that ye were with him when he took his oath and other
divers times; and for those promises made by him to you at that time,
and other times at the Oyer and Terminer at Lynn, ye proposed you by
the trust that ye have in him to attempt and rear actions that should be
to the avail of him and of his office.’ The prospect of Paston being
valuable to him as a litigant had its weight with the sheriff, and he
promised to do him all the good in his power except in the action
against Lord Molynes’ men; for not only Lord Molynes himself but the
Duke of Norfolk had written to him to show them favour, and if they
were not acquitted he expected to incur both their displeasure and the
93
king’s. In vain did Osbern urge that Paston would find sufficient surety
to save the sheriff harmless. Jermyn said he could take no surety over
£100, and Lord Molynes was a great lord who could do him more
injury than that. 93.1
The diplomacy on either side seems to have been conducted with
considerable finesse. Jermyn declared that he had been offered twenty
nobles at Walsingham in behalf of the Lord Molynes, but that he had
never received a penny either from him or from any of Paston’s
adversaries. Osbern then offered if he would promise to be sincere
towards Paston, that the latter would give him a sum in hand, as much
as he could desire, or would place it in the hands of a middle man
whom Jermyn could trust. In the end, however, he was obliged to be
satisfied with Jermyn’s assuring him that if he found it lay within his
power to do anything for Paston, he would take his money with good
will. The negotiator’s impression was that he was fully pledged to get
Lord Molynes’ men acquitted, but that in all other actions he would be
found favourable to Paston. 93.2
ent.
About this time Parliament, which had now been prorogued for nearly
five months, met again at Westminster. The king’s necessities were
doubtless the all-sufficient cause why its meeting could no longer be
dispensed with. The Crown was already in debt to the sum of
£372,000, and was daily becoming more so. The expenses of the royal
household amounted to £24,000 a year, while the yearly revenue out of

which they should have been paid was only £5000. Nor was it by any
means advisable to remedy the matter by imposing fresh taxation; for
the people were so impoverished by the payment of subsidies, the
exactions of the king’s purveyors, and the general maladministration of
justice, that the experiment could hardly have been made with safety.
An act of resumption was the only expedient by which it seemed
possible to meet the difficulty; and all grants of crown lands made to
any persons since the first day of the reign were accordingly recalled
by statute. 93.3 In return for this the Commons preferred a petition to the
king that he would for ever remove from his presence and counsels a
number of persons to whom they alleged it was owing both that his 94
possessions had been diminished, and that the laws had not been
carried into execution. Foremost on the list was the Duke of Somerset;
and with him were named Alice, widow of the late Duke of Suffolk,
William Booth, Bishop of Chester (that is to say, of Coventry and
Lichfield), 94.1 Lord Dudley, Thomas Daniel, and twenty-five others. It
was petitioned that they should never again be permitted to come
within twelve miles of the royal presence, on pain of forfeiture of lands
and goods. But the days had not yet come when a petition against
ministers by the Commons was tantamount to their dismissal. The king
indeed felt it best on this occasion to yield somewhat; but he yielded
on no principle whatever. He declared in reply that he himself saw no
cause for their removal; but he was content to dismiss the most of them
for a year, during which period accusations brought against any of
them might be inquired into. Those who were Peers of the realm,
however, he refused to send away; and he insisted on retaining the
services of one or two others who had been accustomed continually to
wait upon him. 94.2
Parliament seems shortly after this to have been dissolved, and no
parliament met again till two years later. Of course the influence of
Somerset increased when both Lords and Commons were dismissed
into the country; and we perceive that by the end of the year Thomas
Daniel, one of the old unpopular adherents of the Duke of Suffolk,
who, nevertheless, had not always been acceptable to the Court, was
expecting to recover favour by means of Somerset. 94.3 He is

represented as having cultivated the Duke’s friendship for a quarter of
a year; so that we may conclude Somerset’s ascendency was at this
time unmistakable. With what degree of discretion he made use of it
there is little evidence to show. One advantage that Daniel hoped to
gain through his influence was the friendship of Tuddenham and
Heydon, by whose means, and by the good offices of Lord Scales, he95
expected to be allowed to re-enter the manor of Bradeston, of which he
had already dispossessed one Osbert Munford last year, but had
subsequently been dispossessed himself. The value of a disputed title
in any part of England probably depended very much upon who was
supreme at Court.
But high as Somerset stood in the king’s favour, the course of events
did not tend to make him more acceptable to the people. The loss of
Normandy, in the preceding year, was itself a thing not likely to be
readily forgotten; but the misfortunes of the English arms did not end
with the loss of Normandy. So great, indeed, was the despondency
occasioned by that event that, in the opinion of French writers, Calais
itself would not have been able to hold out if the French had
immediately proceeded to attack it. But Charles was afraid he might
have been deserted by the Duke of Burgundy, whose interests would
hardly have been promoted by the French king strengthening himself
in that quarter, and he declined to attempt it. 95.1 Relieved, however, of
the necessity of maintaining a large force in Normandy, he found new
occupation for his troops in completing the conquest of Guienne, of
which a beginning had already been made by the capture of Cognac
and of some places near Bayonne and the Pyrenees. In November 1450
the French laid siege to Bourg and Blaye on the Garonne, both of
which places capitulated in the spring of the following year. They were
the keys of the more important city of Bordeaux, which, now
perceiving that there was no hope of succour from England, was
obliged to follow their example. This was in June 1451. Two months
and afterwards Bayonne, too, was obliged to capitulate; and with it the
.
whole of Gascony and Guienne was as completely lost to the English
as Normandy had been in the preceding year. Calais was now all that
remained to them of their conquests and possessions in France; nor

were they without considerable apprehension that they might be
expelled from Calais too.
These disasters, which were but the natural sequel to the loss of 96
Normandy, only served to make more bitter the reflection how the
government of that duchy had been taken out of the able hands of the
Duke of York and given to the incompetent Somerset. The jealousy
with which the latter regarded his rival was heightened by the
consciousness of his own unpopularity. The Duke of York was living in
seclusion at his castle of Ludlow, but Somerset seems to have regarded
him with daily increasing apprehension. He was continually instilling
into the king distrust of York’s fidelity as a subject; until at last the
latter thought it expedient to make a public declaration of his loyalty.
o. He accordingly issued the following manifesto:—
2. Forasmuch as I, Richard Duke of York, am informed that the King,
my sovereign lord, is my heavy lord, greatly displeased with me, and
hath in me a distrust by sinister information of mine enemies,
adversaries, and evil-willers, where[as] God knoweth, from whom
nothing is hid, I am, and have been, and ever will be, his true
liegeman, and so have I before this, divers times, as well by mouth as
by writing, notified and declared to my said sovereign lord: And for
that this notice so comen unto me of the displeasure of my said
sovereign lord is to me so grievous, I have prayed the reverend father
in God, the Bishop of Hereford, 96.1 and my cousin the Earl of
Shrewsbury, to come hither and hear my declaration in this matter;
wherein I have said to them that I am true liegeman to the King my
sovereign lord, ever have been, and shall be to my dying day. And to
the very proof that it is so, I offer myself to swear that on the blessed
Sacrament, and receive it, the which I hope shall be my salvation at
the day of doom. And so for my special comfort and consolation I
have prayed the said lords to report and declare unto the King’s
highness my said offer; and to the end and intent that I will be ready
to do the same oath in presence of two or three lords, such as shall
please the King’s highness to send hither to accept it. In witness
whereof I have signed this schedule with my sign manual, and set
thereunto my signet of arms. Written in my castle of Ludlow, the 9th

of January, the 30th year of the reign of my sovereign lord, King
Henry the Sixth. 96.2
He appears to have waited nearly a month to learn the effect of this
remonstrance. Meanwhile reports came that the French were advancing
to lay siege to Calais. At such a juncture it was peculiarly intolerable
that the administration of affairs should still be intrusted to hands so 97
notoriously incompetent as those of Somerset; and York, as being the
only man who could stir in such a matter with effect, now made up his
mind to take active steps for Somerset’s removal. Nothing, however,
could be done for such an object without a considerable force of armed
men to support him. York accordingly issued the following address to
the burgesses of Shrewsbury:—
Right worshipful friends, I recommend me unto you; and I suppose it
is well known unto you, as well by experience as by common
language said and reported throughout all Christendom, what laud,
what worship, honour, and manhood, was ascribed of all nations unto
the people of this realm whilst the kingdom’s sovereign lord stood
possessed of his lordship in the realm of France and duchy of
Normandy; and what derogation, loss of merchandize, lesion of
honour, and villany, is said and reported generally unto the English
nation for loss of the same; namely (i.e. especially) unto the Duke of
Somerset, when he had the commandance and charge thereof: the
which loss hath caused and encouraged the King’s enemies for to
conquer and get Gascony and Guienne, and now daily they make
their advance for to lay siege unto Calais, and to other places in the
marches there, for to apply them to their obeisance, and so for to
come into the land with great puissance, to the final destruction
thereof, if they might prevail, and to put the land in their subjection,
which God defend. And on the other part it is to be supposed it is not
unknown to you how that, after my coming out of Ireland I, as the
King’s true liegeman and servant (and ever shall be to my life’s end)
and for my true acquittal, perceiving the inconvenience before
rehearsed, advised his Royal Majesty of certain articles concerning
the weal and safeguard, as well of his most royal person, as the
tranquillity and conservation of all this his realm: the which

advertisements, howbeit that it was thought that they were full
necessary, were laid apart, and to be of none effect, through the envy,
malice, and untruth of the said Duke of Somerset; which for my
truth, faith, and allegiance that I owe unto the King, and the good
will and favour that I have to all the realm, laboreth continually about
the King’s highness for my undoing, and to corrupt my blood, and to
disinherit me and my heirs, and such persons as be about me, without
any desert or cause done or attempted, on my part or theirs, I make
our Lord Judge. Wherefore, worshipful friends, to the intent that
every man shall know my purpose and desire for to declare me such
as I am, I signify unto you that, with the help and supportation of
Almighty God, and of Our Lady, and of all the Company of Heaven,
I, after long sufferance and delays, [though it is] not my will or intent
to displease my sovereign lord, seeing that the said Duke ever 98
prevaileth and ruleth about the King’s person, [and] that by this
means the land is likely to be destroyed, am fully concluded to
proceed in all haste against him with the help of my kinsmen and
friends; in such wise that it shall prove to promote ease, peace,
tranquillity, and safeguard of all this land: and more, keeping me
within the bounds of my liegeance, as it pertaineth to my duty,
praying and exhorting you to fortify, enforce, and assist me, and to
come to me with all diligence, wheresoever I shall be, or draw, with
as many goodly and likely men as ye may, to execute the intent
abovesaid. Written under my signet at my castle of Ludlow, the 3rd
day of February.
Furthermore I pray you that such strait appointment and ordinance be
made that the people which shall come in your fellowship, or be sent
unto me by your agreement, be demeaned in such wise by the way,
that they do no offence, nor robbery, nor oppression upon the people,
in lesion of justice. Written as above, etc.
Your good friend,
R. York. 98.1
To my right worshipful friends, the bailiffs, burgesses and commons of the good
town of Shrewsbury.

Having thus collected a sufficient body of followers, the duke began
his march to London. The Earl of Devonshire, Lord Cobham, and other
noblemen also collected people and joined him. 98.2 The king and
Somerset, however, being informed of his intentions, set out from the
capital to meet him, issuing, at the same time, an imperative summons
to Lord Cobham, and probably to the duke’s other adherents, to repair
immediately to the royal presence. 98.3 But the duke, who had no desire
to engage the king’s forces, turned aside and hoped to reach London
unmolested. He sent a herald before him to desire liberty for himself
and his allies to enter the city; but strict injunctions to the contrary had
been left by the king, and his request was refused. Disappointed in this
quarter, it was natural that he should look for greater sympathy in Kent,
where, doubtless, smouldered still the remains of past disaffection. He
accordingly crossed the Thames at Kingston Bridge, and proceeded 99
with his host to Dartford. The king’s army followed and pitched their
camp upon Blackheath. And so, on the 1st of March 1452, there lay,
within eight miles of each other, two formidable hosts, which any
further movement must apparently bring into collision.
To judge from one contemporary account, 99.1 the duke’s position must
have been a strong one. He had a body of ordnance in the field, with no
less than 3000 gunners. He himself had 8000 men in the centre of his
position; while the Earl of Devonshire lay to the south with another
detachment of 6000, and Lord Cobham by the river-side commanded
an equal force. Seven ships lay on the water filled with the baggage of
the troops. But the strength of the king’s army appears to have largely
exceeded these numbers; 99.2 and even if the duke had wished to
provoke a conflict, it was evidently more prudent to remain simply on
the defensive. He accordingly left the responsibility of further action to
those of the king’s party.
In this crisis the lords who were with the king took counsel together,
and determined, if possible, to labour for a compromise. 99.3 An
embassy was appointed to go to the Duke of York, and hear what he
had to say. It consisted of the wise and good prelate Waynflete, Bishop
of Winchester, and Bourchier, Bishop of Ely (afterwards Archbishop of
Canterbury), the Earls of Salisbury and Warwick, Lord Beauchamp,

Lord Sudeley, and some others. The answer made by York was, that no
ill was intended against either the king or any of his Council; that the
duke and his followers were lovers of the commonweal; but that it was
their intention to remove from the king certain evil-disposed persons,
through whose means the common people had been grievously
oppressed. Of these the Duke of Somerset was declared to be the chief;
and, indeed, his unpopularity was such that even those on the king’s100
side would seem to have seconded the Duke of York’s demand. After a
consultation the king consented that Somerset should be committed to
custody until he should make answer to such charges as York would
bring against him. 100.1
Nothing more seemed necessary to avert civil war. On a simple pledge
given by the king that Somerset should be placed in confinement, and
afterwards put on his trial, the Duke of York at once broke up his camp
and ordered his men home. He then repaired himself to the king’s tent
to express his loyalty. But no sooner had he arrived there than he found
d, he was deceived. The king, in violation of his promise, kept the Duke
of Somerset attending upon him as his chief adviser, and York was
virtually a prisoner. He was sent on to London in advance of the king,
in a kind of honourable custody, attended by two bishops, who
conducted him to his own residence; but what to do with him when he
got there was a difficulty. His enemies feared to send him to the Tower.
There were 10,000 men yet remaining in the Welsh Marches, who, on
such a rumour, would have come up to London; and it was not very
long before they were reported to be all under arms, and actually on the
march, with the duke’s young son at their head—Edward, Earl of
March, boy as he was, not yet quite ten years old. 100.2
York had distinctly accused the Duke of Somerset as a traitor. He was
now in Somerset’s power, but the latter did not dare to retort the charge
upon him. Yet if Somerset was not a traitor, the course pursued by York
was utterly indefensible. He had actually taken up arms against the
Crown, to remove by force the minister in whom the king had placed
his confidence. But unfortunately Somerset knew too well that if he
made this a ground of accusation against his rival, recrimination would
be sure to follow, and he himself would incur a weight of public odium

which might possibly lead to the same result as in the case of Suffolk.
The wisest and most politic course for himself was not to impeach the
Duke of York, but, if possible, to shut his mouth and let him go free.101
No accusation, therefore, was drawn up. An oath of allegiance, binding
ed to him over to keep the peace in time coming, was all that was required. It
ce. was on the 1st of March that York had repaired to the king’s tent and
found himself in his rival’s power. On the 10th he was brought to St.
Paul’s, and there publicly made oath as follows:—
I, Richard, Duke of York, confess and beknow that I am and ought to
be humble subject and liegeman to you, my sovereign Lord, King
Henry the Sixth, and owe therefore to bear you faith and truth as to
my sovereign lord, and shall do all the days unto my life’s end; and
shall not at any time will or assent, that anything be attempted or
done against your noble person, but wheresoever I shall have
knowledge of any such thing imagined or purposed I shall, with all
the speed and diligence possible to me, make that your Highness
shall have knowledge thereof, and even do all that shall be possible
to me to the withstanding thereof, to the utterest of my life. I shall not
in no wise any thing take upon me against your royal estate or the
obeisance that is due thereto, nor suffer any other man to do, as far
forth as it shall lie in my power to let it; and also I shall come at your
commandment, whensoever I shall be called by the same, in humble
and obeisant wise, but if [i.e. unless] I be letted by any sickness or
impotency of my person or by such other causes as shall be thought
reasonable to you, my sovereign lord. I shall never hereafter take
upon me to gather any routs, or make any assembly of your people,
without your commandment or licence, or in my lawful defence. In
the interpretation of which my lawful defence, and declaration
thereof, I shall report me at all times to your Highness, and, if the
case require, unto my peers: nor anything attempt by way of faite
against any of your subjects, of what estate, degree, or condition that
they be. But whensoever I find myself wronged or aggrieved, I shall
sue humbly for remedy to your Highness, and proceed after the
course of your laws, and in none other wise, saving in mine own
lawful defence in manner above said; and shall in all things

abovesaid and other have me unto your Highness as an humble and
true subject ought to have him to his Sovereign Lord.
All these things above said I promise truly to observe and keep, by
the Holy Evangelists contained in this book that I lay my hand upon,
and by the Holy Cross that I here touch, and by the blessed
Sacrament of our Lord’s body that I shall now with His mercy
receive. And over this I agree me and will that if I any time hereafter,
as with the grace of our Lord I never shall, anything attempt by way
of fear or otherwise against your royal majesty and obeisance that I
owe thereto, or anything I take upon me otherwise than is above 102
expressed, I from that time forth be unabled, [held and taken as an
untrue and openly forsworn man, and unable] 102.1 to all manner of
worship, estate, and degree, be it such as I now occupy, or any other
that might grow unto me in any wise.
And this I here have promised and sworn proceedeth of mine own
desire and free voluntee and by no constraining or coercion. In
witness of all the which things above written I, Richard, Duke of
York above named, subscribe me with mine own hand and seal, with
this mine own seal, &c. 102.2
With this guarantee for his future loyalty, the duke was permitted to
return into his own country.
Somerset might well be pleased that the matter should be settled thus;
for if the charges York brought, or at least was prepared to have
brought, against him were only one-half true (and some of them
certainly were true altogether), his administration of the Duchy of
Normandy was a mixture of indiscretion and dishonesty at which the
nation had good right to be indignant. We have already seen how in
concert with the Duke of Suffolk he had authorised a perfidious breach
of the truce with France in the capture of Fougères. We have also seen
how ill prepared he was for the consequences; how he discovered too
late the weakness of all the garrisons; how the French king recovered
town after town, and the English were finally expelled from Normandy
in less than a year and a half after the unjustifiable outrage. But if any
credit may be given to the further charges brought against him by the

Duke of York,—charges which agree only too well with the character
t.
attributed to him by the most impartial authorities 102.3—Somerset had
himself to blame in great measure for the defenceless condition of the
country committed to his protection. On his first going into Normandy 103
he had jobbed the offices under his control. For the sake of private
emolument he had removed a number of trusty and experienced
captains, filling their places with creatures of his own, or men who had
paid douceurs for their posts; and only on receipt of still greater bribes
would he consent to restore any of those that had been put out. He had,
however, actually reduced many garrisons, while he had taxed the
inhabitants of the Duchy beyond all reason for the means of defence.
His administration of justice, too, had been such as to excite the most
vehement dissatisfaction, and had made the whole native population
impatient of English government. He had, moreover, pocketed the
compensation given by France to the dispossessed Englishmen of
Anjou and Maine. Worse still, after all his maladministration and ill
success, he had prevailed on the king to make him captain of Calais,
which it seemed as if he was on the point of losing also in as careless
and culpable a manner as he had already lost Normandy.
Here, however, is the full text of the accusation, 103.1 as prepared by
York himself:—
Thies articles and pointes folowyng yeve, shewe and ministre I,
Richard Duc of York, youre true liegman and servaunt unto youre
highnesse, summarily purposyng and declaryng thaym ayeinst
Edmond Duc of Somerset for the grete welfare and the comen availle
and interesse of youre mageste Roiall and of this youre noble
roialme, aswell to bryng to knawlege and understondyng the meanes
and causes of the grete myscheves and inconvenientz which late
befe[l] unto this youre said noble roiame, as in losse of youre
lyvelode by yonde thee see and otherwyse in ponisshment of
deservitours and excuse of innocencie, and also in puttyng aside and
eschuyng of the grete and importable hurte and prejudice which ben
like, withouten that purviaunce be had of remedie, to succede in
shorte tyme. To the which articles and every of theym I, the seid Duc
of York, desire of youre egall and indifferent rightwesnesse that the

seid Edmond answere by his feith and trouth, the sacrement of his 104
othe thereuppon made, duly and truly as lawe and conscience
requireth; I also desiryng, for the veraly examinacion and knowlech
of trouth theruppon to be had, and for the grete and singuler weel of
this youre said Roiame, to be admytted to the prefe, and to yeve
evidence in the said articles that folowyn in such as he woll denye,
after the equite and consideracion of lawe in such case, and processe
had, and also of good feith and conscience justice thereafter to be don
and executid.
First, I article and declare that the seid Edmond Duc of Somersett
hath be meane, consenter, occasioner, cause and mediatour, both by
his inwarde knowlege and expresse consent, by counseill, and
worchyng thurghe diverse subtyle weyes and meanes, as by violent
presumpcion and otherwyse is knowen and understonde, and
furthermore also by his inordinate negligence, lacchesse and wilfull
rechelessnes and insaciate covetyse, of the losse and amission of
youre Duchie of Normandie, rejoissed and possessed at this tyme, for
the defence of his negligent kepyng and otherwyse before reherced,
by youre enemyes. Which may clerly by (sic) understonde by the
meanes and causes that folowen; of the which and for such one he is
openly called, reputed and had by the comen fame and voice. Of the
which oon cause is that the seid Duc of Somersett, at his first comyng
into Normandie, chaunged and putt out of theire occupacion and
youre service, withoute skyll, cause or reason, all the true and
feithfull officers, for the most partie, of all Normandie, and put in
such as hym liked for his owne singuler availe and covetyse, as it
apperith well, inasmoch as ther coude noon of theym that were so put
out be restored agayn withoute grete giftes and rewardes, which was
full unfittyng. And furthermore did put in prison many diverse and
notable persones of youre seid Duchie, withoute cause, justice or any
ordinarie processe made agayn theym or due examinacion, and by
that meane did grete extorcions and rered unlawfully grete sommes
undre colour of amendes and composicions, wherby the cuntre for
such wrong and faute of justice grucched sore agayn hym and his
governaunce and caused the people to arise in theire conseytes and to

take grete displeasir; and that was a grete occasion and cause of the
losse of youre said Duchie of Normandie.
Item, the seid Edmond Duc of Somerset was cause and consenter
voluntarie of the brekyng of the trues and pais for a tyme had
betwene youre highnes and youre uncle of Fraunce, which was well
understond at the taking of Fogiers in Britaigne by Sir Fraunceys
Larragonneys thurgh his avise, consentement, and counseile; and also
duryng the said trues made more strong and fortified diverse places
disopered by youre commaundement, as Morteyn and Seint Jakes de
Beveron, ageyn the appointement of the seid trues; uppon which
youre uncle did sommon hym to make a-seeth [satisfaction] and for
to disimpaire the seid fortifying and wrong don agayn the trues, and105
in asmoch as non aseeth by hym was don, nor [he] lefte not of his
seid fortifiyng, caused youre seid uncle to have, as he pretende, cause
to breke the said trues on his partie; which brekyng of trues was oon
of the verray cause of losse of Normandie. And thus he brake the
seide trues ayeinst his promysse and true feith made to youre
highnes, which was to kepe and entretyn the said trues, and so did
ayen the lawe in this behalve and youre statutes of the roiame.
Item, he put away and diminisshed diverse garnisons and other strong
places of youre seid Duchie of Normandie of soudiours and of men
of werre which were accustumed to abide uppon the suerte and
saufgarde of the same, howe be hit he had verrayly knowlege that
youre ennmyes were full determi[ned] for to ley seges to put the
same places in theire subjeccion, not paiyng duely nor contentyng
such soudiours as abode uppon the defences of the same places; he
reryng at that tyme in youre said Duchie as grete tailles and aides as
were in long tyme before duryng the werre; and that caused the
soudiours in diverse strong places for poverte, not havyng hors nor
harneys, and also the nombre diminisshed, to be of non poiaire to
make resistence, and that was a grete cause of the losse of
Normandie. The losse of which caused the perdicion of Gascoigne
and Guyen.

Item, the Duc of Somersett wold yeve noo counseile, aide ne helpe
unto the capitanis of diverse stronge places and garnisons which at
that tyme, constreyned by nede, desired of hym provision and relief
for abillement of werre to resiste the malice of theire enemyes daily
makyng fressh feetes of werre uppon theym; he gevyng theym noone
aide nor help, but lete theym contynue in theire malice, howe be it
that diverse places were lost before: and what tyme that the said
places were beseged and sent for help and socour unto hym he wold
graunte no maner of comforte, but suffred hem appoint and
compounde with here enemyes as well as they myght for theire ease
and suertee, makyng no maner of provision for the kepyng of the
places which remayned; insomuch that he made non ordinaunce nor
provision for the toun, castell, and places of Rouen, neither of men,
stuffe ne vitaile, the knowlage that he had of youre enemyes comyng
thereunto notwithstondyng, yevyng licence unto the Archiebisshopp,
chanons and burgeys of the same toun for to goo or sende to
compounde with youre enemyes for the deliveraunce of the same,
notwithstondyng that afore that tyme the enemyes which were entred
in to the same toun were worshiply put oute and betyn of by the Erle
of Shrowesbury and other notable persones, and withdrawen to
Pontlarge and Loviers, and at that tyme, they beyng so withdrawen,
licenced to appointe as it is aforeseid. Which was plainly ayeinst his
promys, feith and liegeaunce that he of right oweth unto you, and
ayeinst the tenure of the endentures made betwix youre highnes and 106
hym of the charge of that londe, the which licence, and it had not ben
don, the seid toun had abiden undre youre obeisaunce, the losse of
whiche was a verray ope . . . . 106.1 cause of the perdicion of
Normandie.
Item, the said Duc of Somersett, for to colour his defautes and wilfull
purp[o]s in the premisses, entred in to youre palaice of Rouen not
vitailed nor fo[rnisshed] 106.1 for defence, where he myght savely
absentid hym, and yeldid up the said Palaice and Castell, and
moreover other good tounes, castels and [fortresses], 106.1 as
Caudebek, and other diverse, as Tancarville, Moustervillers, Arques,
key of all Caulx, not beseged nor in perell of losse at that tyme, for

the enlargisshyn[g] and deliveraunce of hym, his childre and goodes;
which myght not, nor hath not, be done nor seen by lawe, resoun or
cronikel, or by cours or a . . . . . . any leftenant, all though that he had
be prisoner: Witnesse the Duc of Orliaunce, the Duc of Burbon, the
Duc of Alansum and other . . . . . . for whom was none delyvered, al
though they had many strong places of theire owen. And furthermore
fore the suertee of delyveraunce of . . . . . . tounes, castell and
forteresses which were wel furnysshed for to have resisted youre
enemyes, and to have biden within youre obeisaunce, delyvered in
ostage the Erle of Shrowesbury, that tyme Marescall of Fraunce, and
other notable persones which shuld have defended youre lande there
ayens the malice of youre enemyes; and in likewyse apointed to
delyver Honflu, which was in noo gret perell, ne had be that it was
retardyd by youre lettres and so by that fraudelent and inordinat
meane all was lost and yoldon up, as hereafter by more evident
declaracions it shalbe clerely [proved]. 106.2
Item, the said Duc of Somerset hath contrived and ymagined, helped
or consented to the grete and importable losse of Cales to be undre
the obeisaunce of the Duc of Burgoyn, as it apperith openly by
diverse skilles, evidencez, and resons; that is to sey, in asmuch as he
desired and made laboures, or at the lest toke uppon hym, for to be
capiten of the seid Toun of Cales, knowyng and understondyng well
the grete murmur and sclaunder which daily rennyth agayn hym for
the losse and sale, as it is surmyttid, of Normandie, to the grete
discoragyng of the soudiours of the said Toun; where as the comen
fame is that he will bylike sotill meanes contrive and ymagyn the
losse and amission of youre said Toun of Cales, like as he hath afore
causid the perdicion of youre Duchie of Normandie; which apperith
well, in asmoch as he hath desirid the terme of a monyth without
more, that, in case that the said Toun were besegid and not rescuyd
within the said monyth, that than he shuld stond discharged though107 it
were delyvered to youre enemyes; within which tyme it were
impossible, or at the lest full unlikly, that never myght be assembled
for the rescu therof, where as it may and hath be here-before kept
ayens the force of youre enemyes moche lenger tyme in grete

jupardy; which is so grete an hevynesse and trouble to youre said
soudiours, that by theire langage, demenyng and communicacion it
may be understond that they will not be so herty nor feithfull to the
welfare and defence of the said Toun as they shuld be in case they
had a captayn more agreable unto theym. And also this premisse
apperith well in asmoch as the comen voyce, langage, and fame is,
and also grete prefe and evidence shalbe made theruppon, that the
seid Duc of Somerset, in hope of mariage to be doon and had be twix
the Duc son of Burgoyn 107.1 and one of his doughters, had made a
promysse and behest to the said Duc of Burgoyne, or Duchesse by
his meane, concent and massangers, of the delyverey of the Toun of
Cales, to be done by such sotill meanes as shuld not be understond
neither of youre highenes nor of youre subgettz.
Item, the said Duc of Somerset is cause of grete hurte, robbery,
manslauter and other myscheves daily done and contynued in this
youre roialme, in asmoch as he resceyved and had at the delyverey of
xx m
Anjoy and Mayn iij. xij.(72,000) frankes or there aboutes, which
were graunted and ordeyned to the Englisshmen havyng theire
[there] lyvelode for theire recompense and asyth for the lyverey up of
theire seid lyvelode at the said delyveraunce, and wold not dispose
the same money nor departe therfrom, bot kepith it still to his owne
use and singuler availe, notwithstondyng that he was recompensid for
his lyvelode in that cuntrey in youre Duchie of Normandie of a more
value than the gift therof was worth, which causith the said
Englisshmen to be here in grete povertee; of which povertee no doute
commyth grete myscheve daily within your said roiame. And also in
so muche as many diverse soudiours of Normandye were not paied
theire wages, where he rerid grete and notable sommes of youre
Duchie of Normandie for ther agrement, which non paiement and
poverte causith also daily grete inconvenientz within this your lande.
Item, that these forsaid articles and poyntz be just and true it may
well appere by many grete presumpcions beside evident prefes that
shalbe made thereuppon with open and notarie fame and voice of the
people, and also inasmoch as the said Duc of Somerset hath be

double and untrue in many and diverse pointes, and in especiall that
he hath desirid a recompense of youre highnes for the counte of
Mayn for the delyverance therof, where it was specified in youre
lettres patentes of your graunte therof to hym made that ye shuld be 108
at your libertee to dispose it at your pleasere in case that ye for the
meane of the pease wold do make a lyverey thereof unto youre uncle
of Fraunce; and yit at the tyme of delyveraunce thereof he wold not
agree therto unto tyme that he were recompensid, as it is aforesaid, in
youre Duchie of Normandie to a more value than his said graunte
drue to.
Item, thees forsaid articles, everyche of theym and every parte of
theym, purposyth and ministre I, Richard, Duc of York, ayens the
said Duc of Somersett joyntly and severally not atteigne to a more
strate nor chargeable prefe than your lawe in such case and processe
will require; desiryng of youre highnesse and rightuous justice that in
asmoche as lawfully may ayenst hym be foundon or previd, that
jugement in that partie be had and executid unto youre highnes for
yours and youre roialmes prosperite and welfare, indende not elles
bot the salvacion and indempnite of youre most roiale persone, and
also alle youre feithfull subgettz, in which y reporte me to God and
all the word [world].
I imagine this paper must have been really handed in by York to the
lords of the king’s Council. It is preserved among the MSS. in the
Cottonian Library, a large number of which were undoubtedly at one
time part of the public records of the realm. But in any case we can
hardly doubt that Somerset understood quite sufficiently the grounds
on which he was so generally hated; nor is it by any means improbable
that the armed remonstrance of the Duke of York produced some real
effect, if only for a time. This at least we know, that only four days
after the oath taken by York at St. Paul’s, active and energetic measures
of began to be taken for the defence of Calais. Historians, as Sir Harris
Nicolas truly remarks, do not seem hitherto to have been aware of the
imminent danger in which even Calais at this time stood of being lost,
like the other English conquests, a full century before it was actually
recovered by the French. Rumours that Calais would be besieged

reached England in the beginning of May 1450, along with the news of
the Duke of Suffolk’s murder. 108.1 In August 1451 a reinforcement of
1150 men was sent thither in twelve vessels, under the Lords
Beauchamp and Sudeley. In the February following, as we have seen,
York wrote of the success of the French in Gascony having
emboldened them to lay siege to Calais again. And now, on the 14th109of
March, when Charles was advancing towards the last English
stronghold, with the most formidable army that had been seen for
years, and when men had begun to fear that he would be able not only
to gain possession of Calais with ease, but even to invade and ravage
England, steps were at last taken for the immediate formation of a
fleet.
A royal navy had undoubtedly existed for a long time before the days
of Henry VI., but it never amounted in itself to a very formidable force,
and in time of war recourse was always had to impressment on the
large scale. But the neglect of the sea was during this reign the constant
complaint of Englishmen. For want of an efficient fleet the mercantile
interest continually suffered, the fisheries could not safely be visited,
and even the dwellers at home were insecure. The fact was confessed
by the greatest eulogists of Henry VI., who had not a thought of
impugning his government. ‘Our enemies,’ says Capgrave in his
Illustrious Henries,—‘Our enemies laugh at us. They say, “Take off the
ship from your precious money, and stamp a sheep upon it to signify
your sheepish minds.” We who used to be conquerors of all nations are
now conquered by all. The men of old used to say that the sea was
England’s wall, and now our enemies have got upon the wall; what
think you they will do to the defenceless inhabitants? Because this
business has been neglected for so many years it now happens that
ships are scanty, and sailors also few, and such as we have unskilled for
want of exercise. May God take away our reproach and raise up a spirit
of bravery in our nation!’ 109.1
There were already available for the king’s service a certain number of
ships in the Thames, and at Winchelsea and Sandwich. The chief of
these vessels was called the Grace Dieu—a name which was perhaps
traditional, for it was handed down to Tudor times when, with the

king’s own Christian name prefixed, it was always given to the largest
of the fleet. 109.2 The Earl of Shrewsbury 110.1 was appointed to take the110
command of the whole army at sea, and efforts were made to augment
the squadron with as large a force as possible. On the 14th of March
1452 a commission was given to Lord Clifford, which was doubtless
one of a number given to various noblemen, to negotiate for this
purpose with shipowners, knights, and gentlemen in the district where
he commonly resided; and he was instructed to take the command of
all such vessels as he could raise, and bring them into the Downs to
join with Shrewsbury. The appeal to patriotism was not made in vain.
Many shipowners came forward, offering not only to lend but to
victual their own ships for the service. But full powers were also given
to arrest ships, shipmasters, and mariners, to make up a sufficient
number. To every man not furnished with victuals by the benevolence
of others, twelve pence a week was offered on the king’s behalf, with a
customary share in any booty that he might help to capture at sea.
Captains of ships were to have in addition a reward of ten marks, or
£10, at the discretion of Lord Clifford. Altogether we may presume that
the defensive measures taken at this time were sufficient, for we hear
no more during the next few years of any attempt to lay siege to Calais.

80.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 211-12.
80.2 The whole of this correspondence is attributed by

Holinshed and Stow to the year 1452; but it appears to me
clearly to belong to the year 1450, when the Duke had just
returned from Ireland. See Chronicle of London, 136; though
internal evidence alone will, I think, satisfy the careful
student.
82.1 I have no doubt this is a misreading of the contracted

form ‘yr’ which was intended for ‘their.’ To accuse York of
the murder of the Bishop of Chichester, and apparently as a
principal, not an accessory in that murder, when he was at
the time in Ireland, would have been absurd. Besides, the
tenor of the whole of this reply is to exculpate York of all
charges.

82.2 Misprinted ‘Chester’ in Holinshed.
83.1 See No. 142.

83.2 Nicolas’s Proceedings of the Privy Council, iv. 212, v.

108.
84.1 Misprinted ‘your’ in Holinshed.

85.1 Nos. 142, 145, 148, and 149. The influence of a powerful

nobleman on the elections was evidently quite a matter of
course. What use York made of it, or attempted to make of it,
cannot so easily be determined. Of the two candidates
proposed by him for the county of Norfolk, only one was
returned, the name of Sir Miles Stapleton being substituted
for that of Sir William Chamberlain (see vol. ii. p. 185 note
1). It appears from two of the above cited letters that
Stapleton was a favourite candidate with the Pastons and
their friends, and that he was urged to wait on the Duke of
York on his coming to Norwich.
85.2 See No. 119.

86.1 Nos. 151, 153, 154, 155, 156.

86.2 Stow’s Chronicle, p. 392.

87.1 See vol. ii. pp. 161-2.

87.2 Rymer, xi. 276.

87.3 Rolls of Parl. v. 210.

87.4 W. Worc.

88.1 MS. Cott. Vitell. A. xvi. Stow in his Chronicle dates this

procession a day later.
88.2 W. Worc.

88.3 The Chronicle of London (p. 137) says that ‘all the

Commons’ agreed to this proposition, and stood out for some
time against the Lords on the subject.
88.4 Rolls of Parl. v. 210-14.

89.1 In earlier issues of this Introduction was added: ‘probably

for no other reason than his high impartiality.’ Mr. Plummer,

I find, who knows him better, has not the same opinion of
Fortescue’s impartiality as a politician, but considers that he
was in danger just because he was so strong a Lancastrian.
See Introduction to The Governance of England, p. 50.
89.2 Nos. 167, 169-174.

90.1 Nos. 179 and 180.

91.1 Nos. 119, 185, 186, 192.

91.2 Nos. 189, 192.

91.3 No. 178.

92.1 No. 189.

93.1 No. 193.

93.2 Ibid.

93.3 Rolls of Parl. v. 217.

94.1 The modern see of Chester was separated from this

diocese in the time of Henry VIII.
94.2 Rolls of Parl. v. 216.

94.3 No. 206. Daniel had been out of favour at one time during

Suffolk’s ascendency. See No. 75, p. 86.
95.1 Basin, i. 247-48.

96.1 Reginald Butler or Boulers, whose appointment to the

see, dated 23rd December 1450, was no doubt due to the
Duke of York’s influence.
96.2 Stow’s Chronicle, p. 393.

98.1 Ellis’s Letters, First Series, i. 11-13.

98.2 English Chronicle (ed. Davies), 69.

98.3 Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 116. According

to Fabyan, the king and Somerset set out on the 16th of
February. The summons to Lord Cobham, though dated
Westminster, was issued on the 17th.
99.1 Cottonian Roll, ii. 23. See Appendix to this Introduction.

99.2 Rolls of Parl. v. 346. The statement in the Act of
Attainder passed against the Duke of York seven years
afterwards, that he was ‘of no power to withstand’ the king
on this occasion, is liable to suspicion, but it is confirmed by
the testimony of Whethamstede, 348.
99.3 ‘The Lords, both spiritual and temporal, took the matter in

hand.’ Three Fifteenth Century Chronicles (Camden Soc.),
69. So also Chronicle of London, 137.
100.1 Fabyan.

100.2 Fabyan. Three Fifteenth Century Chronicles, 69, and the

MS. Chronicle, Vitell. A. xvi.
102.1 These words are not in the copy in the Rolls of

Parliament, but they occur in that given in Holinshed’s
Chronicle.
102.2 Rolls of Parl. v. 346.

102.3 The character given of the Duke of Somerset by the

contemporary historian Basin is on the whole favourable,
and may be supposed to be impartial. He describes him as
handsome in person, gentle and urbane in manner, and well
inclined towards justice; but all these graces were marred by
an insatiable avarice which would not let him rest content
with the immense wealth he had inherited from Cardinal
Beaufort; and by continually coveting the riches of others he
brought ruin on himself. Basin, i. 193.
103.1 Printed in this Introduction for the first time from the

original in the Cottonian MS., Vesp. C. xiv. f. 40. The first
paragraph of this document is quoted by Stowe in his
Chronicle, p. 397, and the charges are referred by him to the
thirty-third year of the king’s reign, i.e. the latter part of A.D.
1454, which is certainly erroneous. The date which he
intended, indeed, was the latter part of the year 1453, when
the Duke of Somerset was arrested and sent to the Tower; but
this date also is quite impossible.
106.1 MS. mutilated.

106.2 A line seems here to be cut off in the MS. at the bottom of
the leaf.
107.1 Charles, afterwards Charles the Bold, son of Philip the

Good, who was at this time Duke of Burgundy.
108.1 Letter 121.

109.1 Capgrave de Illust. Henricis, 135.

109.2 The Henry Grace Dieu of Henry VIII.’s time is, however,

better known by its popular epithet of the Great Harry.
110.1 The Earl of Shrewsbury, as already mentioned, had been

given up to the French in 1449 as a hostage for the delivery
of certain towns in Normandy. It is said that he only
recovered his liberty on taking oath never to bear arms again
against the French, but that on visiting Rome in the year of
Jubilee, 1450, he obtained an absolution from this
engagement.—Æneæ Sylvii Opera, 441.

The gift had been left with the under sheriff
text unchanged: expected form “under-sheriff”

Amnesty at Home—Disaster Abroad
As to internal dissensions at home, it was quite in accordance with the
weakness of the king’s character to believe that he had now stilled the
chief elements of danger. His piety suggested to him to complete the
good work by a general political amnesty. The year 1450, as being the
concluding year of a half-century, had been celebrated as a jubilee at
Rome, during which a general indulgence and pardon were granted to
all who visited the Imperial City. There was also, according to 111
precedent, a bull issued at the close of the year to extend these benefits
still further. Taking his example from the great Spiritual Ruler, the
king, on Good Friday, the 7th of April 1452, offered publicly a general
pardon to all who had been guilty of acts of disloyalty to himself, and
who would apply to his Chancery for letters patent. 111.1 The offer was,

undoubtedly, both gracious and humane. It sprang from a genuine love
of peace on the king’s part, and probably went far to make the
government of Somerset endurable for some months longer. Amid the
confusion and troubles of the times, thousands must have felt that they
needed the royal clemency to protect them against the severity of the
laws. One hundred and forty-four persons, among whom was Thomas
Young of Bristol—he who had proposed in Parliament that York
should be proclaimed heir to the crown—obtained sealed pardons on
that very Good Friday. Some two or three thousand others laid claim to
the like indulgence, and had patents granted to them at a later date. 111.2
Only a very few persons were excepted on account of the enormity of
their offences.
One part of his kingdom, however, Henry himself did not expect to
pacify by such means only. The state of the county of Norfolk had been
so represented to him that he felt it necessary to send thither the Duke
of Norfolk. ‘Great riots, extortions, horrible wrongs and hurts,’ were
the subject of complaint, and nothing but an impartial inquiry would
give satisfaction. The duke on coming into the country issued a
proclamation, urging all who had any complaints to make to lay them
freely and fearlessly before him. But free and fearless evidence was not
likely to be had without a strong guarantee for the protection of 112
witnesses. Already the news of the duke’s coming had got wind, and
some of the dependants of Lord Scales, who had been amongst the
principal offenders, had given notice that any complaints against them
would be redressed in another fashion after the duke’s departure. In the
absence of the duke Lord Scales had been always hitherto the natural
ruler of the county, and it was under his protection that Sir Thomas
Tuddenham, Sir Miles Stapleton, John Heydon, and others had dared to
make themselves unpopular. Norfolk accordingly declared in the same
proclamation that he intended henceforth to vindicate for himself so
long as he lived the chief power and authority in the county which bore
his name, subject only to that of the king himself. And to give still
it to greater encouragement to the well-disposed, he announced that the
king himself would shortly visit the county, before whom all who
desired it should have their grievances redressed. 112.1

That the king actually visited Norfolk at this time I do not find from
any other evidence. A letter written on St. George’s Day says that he
had been expected at Norwich or Claxton for ten days past.
Encouraged by the duke’s proclamation, several gentlemen of the
county had drawn up a complaint against Charles Nowell, and were
nt waiting to know in what manner they should present it. This Charles
and a number of others appear to have been keeping the country east of
Norwich at the time in continual alarm and confusion. They held their
rendezvous at the house of one Robert Ledeham, from which they
would issue out in bands of six, or twelve, or sometimes thirty or more,
fully armed with bows and arrows, spears and bills, jacks and
sallets. 112.2 No place was sacred from their outrages. On Mid-Lent
Sunday they had attacked two servants of the Bishop of Norwich
inside the church at Burlingham, and would have killed them behind
the priest’s back while they were kneeling at the mass. On the 6th of
April they had endeavoured to break into the White Friars at Norwich
on pretence of wishing to hear evensong; but having publicly declared
in the town that they intended to get hold of certain citizens, either 113
alive or dead, the doors were shut against them. Happily, before they
accomplished their purpose the mayor and aldermen came to the spot.
A multitude of people had meanwhile assembled in the streets, and the
rioters, finding the odds considerably against them, quietly took their
departure. 113.1
ton
d at John Paston had a complaint of his own to make against these
wrongdoers. Charles Nowell himself, and five others, had attacked him
al. at the door of Norwich Cathedral. He had with him at the time two
servants, one of whom received a blow on the naked head with a
sword; and he himself was seized and had his arms held behind him,
while one of the company struck at him. But for a timely rescue his
death would seem to have been certain. On the very day on which this
occurred his wife’s uncle, Philip Berney, was waylaid by some of the
same fellowship, in the highway under Thorpe Wood. Berney was
riding, accompanied by a single servant, when their two horses first
were wounded by a discharge of arrows. They were then speedily
overtaken by their assailants, who broke a bow over Philip Berney’s

head, and took him prisoner, declaring him to be a traitor. To give a
further colour to their proceedings, they led him prisoner to the Bishop
of Norwich, demanding surety of him to keep the peace, and, when
they had obtained it, let him go. Philip Berney lived more than a year
after the adventure, but he never recovered from the effects of this
rough usage. 113.2
Outrages like these, it must be remembered, were not the work of
lawless brigands and recognised enemies of the whole community.
They were merely the effect of party spirit. The men who did them
were supported by noblemen and country gentlemen. One, by name
Roger Church, probably the most daring, and at the same time the most
subtle, of the gang, had got himself made bailiff of the hundred of
Blofield. 113.3 Charles Nowell was a friend of Thomas Daniel, who, after
being a year and a half out of favour, had recently recovered his
114
influence in Norfolk through the medium of the Duke of Somerset. 114.1
By this means he seems again to have obtained possession of the
manor of Bradeston, the right to which he had disputed in 1450,
apparently more by arms than by law, with Osbert Mountford, marshal
of Calais. Charles Nowell was appointed by Daniel bailiff of the
manor, with the slender but not insignificant salary of twopence a day;
and he and his fellows, Roger Church, Robert Ledeham, John Ratcliff,
and Robert Dalling, made it their chief business to maintain Daniel in
possession.
To put an end to such a state of matters as this, the Duke of Norfolk’s
coming must have been truly welcome. But if any man expected that
the power of duke or king could suddenly terminate the reign of
anarchy, and initiate an era of plain impartial justice, he must have
been a sanguine mortal. As one of the first effects of the duke’s
coming, some of the leading oppressors of the country were driven to a
course of chicanery instead of violence. Roger Church got himself
arrested by some of his own company, and was brought before the
duke as a promoter of sedition. He was accused of having taken part in
an unlawful assembly at Postwick, with the view of stirring up an
insurrection. He confessed the fact, and offered to turn king’s evidence
on his accomplices. He then named a number of thrifty husbandmen,

farmers, and gentlemen of the neighbourhood, alleging that about three
hundred persons were implicated in the intended rising. The truth, as it
presently turned out, and as Church himself afterwards confessed, was,
that the movement had been got up by himself, at the instigation of
Robert Ledeham, who promised to procure his pardon through the
influence of Daniel. By solicitations addressed to various unsteady
characters he had induced some to believe that an insurrection would
be well supported. A little company of fifteen men accordingly met
him under a wood at Postwick, and he told them he had discovered an
excellent name for their captain, who should be called John Amend-
All. But beyond this meeting and naming of the captain nothing seems
ever to have come of the project. 114.2
115
John Paston was certainly one of those mentioned by Church. The
chief persons accused were the friends of Osbert Mountford, and
Paston was one of them. But John Falgate, one of the deluded victims
who had been present at the meeting at Postwick, being subjected to
examination before the sheriff, exonerated Paston, and, while
acknowledging his own share in the conspiracy, pronounced the tale
told by Roger Church in his confession to be altogether an invention.
We need not be surprised to hear that after this a petition from the
county of Norfolk was sent up to the Lord Chancellor, praying that
Church should not be allowed the benefit of the general pardon,
offered upon Good Friday. 115.1 But Church persevered in his policy. He
appears to have been a reckless kind of adventurer. He probably
claimed the benefit of clergy, for we find him three months after his
arrest in the hands of officers of the Bishop of Norwich. His goods also
were seized for a debt that he owed the bishop. But in spite of the
contradictions given by other witnesses, in July he adhered to what he
had said in April, and instead of retracting his former accusations, said
he meant to impeach some one else whom he could not at that time
name,—a man who, he said, had more money in his purse than all of
those whom he had accused before. The coolness with which he
persisted in these statements gave an impression that he was even yet
relying upon powerful friends to support him. 115.2

The conclusion of the affair must be a matter of speculation, for we
hear nothing more of it. The political history of England, too, is, at this
point, almost a blank. We know from the Privy Council Proceedings
that there was some difficulty in the spring of 1452 in preserving
friendly relations with Scotland in consequence of some Border
outrages perpetrated by the Earl of Douglas. And this is absolutely all
the light we have on the domestic affairs of England for about a
twelvemonth after the Duke of York’s oath of allegiance at St. Paul’s.
I have found, however, by an examination of the dates of privy seals,116
. that in July the king began a progress into the west of England, which
is not altogether without significance. He reached Exeter on the 18th,
and from thence proceeded by Wells, Gloucester, Monmouth, and
Hereford to Ludlow, where he arrived on the 12th of August, and from
which he returned homewards by Kenilworth and Woodstock, arriving
at Eltham in the beginning of September. In October he made another
circuit northwards by St. Albans to Stamford, Peterborough, and
Cambridge. There can hardly be a doubt the object of these journeys
was mainly to conciliate those who had declared their opposition to the
Duke of Somerset, especially when we consider that the visit to
Ludlow must have been nothing less than a visit to the Duke of York.
York was now more than pardoned. He was honoured by his sovereign.
Financially, however, we may well suppose that the duke was not the
better of the royal visit. Perhaps also the state of the country did not
conduce to the prosperity of great landowners. At all events we find
that at the end of the year York was glad to pledge some pieces of
jewellery to Sir John Fastolf for a loan of £437, to be repaid next
Midsummer. 116.1 The transaction is in every way curious, as illustrating
the sort of dealings in money matters which were at that time by no
means uncommon among knights and noblemen. It is certainly highly
characteristic of such a knight as Sir John Fastolf, who, quite unlike the
Falstaff of the dramatist, instead of being always needy, was always
seeking to increase the wealth that he had amassed by long years of
thrift and frugality.
We have had occasion to mention the historic Fastolf before; and it is
time that we should now direct attention to the circumstances of his

private life and his connection with the Paston family. John Paston, as
the reader has already been informed, was ultimately his executor, and
to this circumstance may safely be attributed the preservation of so
many of his letters, most of which have certainly been handed down
with the papers of the Paston family. Nevertheless, up to the time at 117
which we have now arrived we do not find that he directly
corresponded with any of them. We can see, however, that he had a
high regard for John Paston’s advice in business, and sometimes sent
letters and documents of importance by him to his agent in Norfolk, Sir
Thomas Howes. 117.1 He seems to have been related in blood to John
Paston’s wife, 117.2 and he acknowledges Paston himself as his cousin in
his will. From the general tenor of most of his letters we should
certainly no more suspect him of being the old soldier that he actually
was than of being Shakespeare’s fat, disorderly knight. Every sentence
in them refers to lawsuits and title-deeds, extortions and injuries
received from others, forged processes affecting property, writs of one
kind or another to be issued against his adversaries, libels uttered
against himself, and matters of the like description. Altogether the
perusal is apt to give us an impression that Sir John would have made
an acute and able, though perhaps not very highminded, solicitor. If
ever his agent, Sir Thomas Howes, was, or seemed to be, a little remiss
in regard to some particular interest, he was sure to hear of it, and yet
woe to him if he did things on his own responsibility which turned out
afterwards to be a failure. 117.3 Sir John was not the man to pass over
lightly injuries done by inadvertence.
The familiarity shown by Fastolf with all the forms and processes of
the law is probably due not so much to the peculiarity of his personal
character as to the fact that a knowledge of legal technicalities was
much more widely diffused in that day than it is in ours. Even in the
days when Master Shallow first made himself ridiculous to a London
audience by claiming to be justice of the peace and coram, custalorum,
and ratolorum, there can hardly be a doubt that the knowledge of legal
terms and processes was not a thing so entirely professional as it is
now. But if we go back to an earlier time, the Paston letters afford 118
ample evidence that every man who had property to protect, if not

every well-educated woman also, was perfectly well versed in the
ordinary forms of legal processes. Sir John Fastolf had a great deal of
property to take care of, and consequently had much more occasion to
make use of legal phraseology than other people. Had it been otherwise
we should hardly have had any letters of his at all; for the only use of
writing to him, and probably to most other people in those days, was to
communicate on matters of business.
There are also parts of his correspondence from which we might
almost infer that Sir John was a merchant as well as a lawyer. His ships
were continually passing between London and Yarmouth, carrying on
the outward voyage building materials for his works at Caister, and
bringing home malt or other produce from the county of Norfolk. In
two of his letters we have references to his little ship The Blythe, 118.1
which, however, was only one of several; for, in the year 1443, he
obtained a licence from the Crown to keep no less than six vessels in
his service. These are described as of four different kinds: two being
what were called ‘playtes,’ a third a ‘cog-ship,’ a fourth a ‘farecoft,’
and the two others ‘balingers,’ for the carriage of goods and building
materials for the use of his household. These vessels were to be free
from all liability to arrest for the service of the king. 118.2
of
The object of these building operations was the erection of a stately
castle at Caister, not far from Yarmouth, the place of the old warrior’s
birth. As early as the reign of Henry V., it seems, he had obtained
licence to fortify a dwelling there, ‘so strong as himself could
devise’; 118.3 but his occupation in the French wars had suspended a
design which must have been a special object with him all through life.
The manor of Caister had come to him by natural descent from his
paternal ancestry; but even during his mother’s widowhood, when Sir
John was a young man of about six-and-twenty, we find that she gave 119
up her life tenure of it to vest it entirely in her son. 119.1 Since that day
he had been abroad with Henry V. at Agincourt and at the siege of
Rouen. He had afterwards served in France under the Regent Bedford,
—had taken several strong castles and one illustrious prisoner, 119.2—
had held the government of conquered districts, and had fought,
generally with success and glory, in almost every great battle of the

period. Nor had he been free, even on his return to England, to go at
once and spend the rest of his days on his paternal domains in Norfolk.
His counsels were needed by his sovereign. His experience abroad
must have qualified him to give important advice on many subjects of
vital interest touching both France and England, and we have evidence
that he was, at least occasionally, summoned to take part in the
proceedings of the Privy Council. But now, when he was upwards of
seventy years of age, the dream of his youth was going to be realised.
Masons and bricklayers were busy at Caister, 119.3 building up for him a
magnificent edifice, of which the ruins are at this day the most
interesting feature in the neighbourhood. Sadly imperfect ruins indeed
they are,—in some places even the foundations would seem to have
disappeared, or else the plan of the building is not very intelligible; but
a noble tower still rises to a height of ninety feet,—its top possessed by
jackdaws,—and a large extent of mouldered walls, pierced with
loopholes and surmounted by remains of battlements, enable the
imagination to realise what Caister Castle must have been when it was
finished over four hundred years ago. A detached fragment of these
ruins, too, goes by the name of the Bargehouse; and there, beneath a
low-browed arch still visible, tradition reports that Sir John Fastolf’s
barge or barges would issue out on their voyages or enter on their
return home.
According to Dawson Turner, the foundations of Caister Castle must
have enclosed a space of more than six acres of ground. 119.4 The
inventory of the furniture contained in it at Fastolf’s death 119.5
enumerates no less than six-and-twenty chambers, besides the public120
rooms, chapel, and offices. An edifice on such a scale must have been
some time in building:—many years, we should suppose, passed away
before it was completed. And we are not without evidence that such
was actually the case; for a chamber was set apart for the Lady
Milicent, Fastolf’s wife, who is believed to have died in 1446, and yet
the works were still going on in 1453. In this latter year we find that
John Paston was allowed to have some control of the building
operations, and that chambers were to be built for him and his wife.
Meanwhile it appears he had chosen an apartment in which to set up

his coffers and his counting-board for the time. Possibly when he was
able to visit Caister he may have acted as paymaster of the works. 120.1
The great castle, however, was now not far from completion; and
before the end of the following year Sir John Fastolf had removed from
London and taken up his residence at Caister, where, with the
exception of one single visit to the capital, he seems to have spent all
the remainder of his days.
We have said that very few notices are to be found of the internal
affairs of England in the year 1452, subsequent to the Duke of York
swearing allegiance at St. Paul’s. But just about that time, or not very
long after, the affairs of Guienne came once more to demand the
serious consideration of the Council. It is true that Guienne and
to Gascony were now no longer English possessions. Bayonne, the last
stronghold, had been given up in the preceding August, and, the
.
English forces being now expelled, all hope of recovering the lost
provinces might well have been abandoned, but that the inhabitants
were desirous to put themselves once more under the protection of the
King of England. The fact is that the Gascons, who had been three
centuries under English rule, did not at all relish the change of masters.
Under the crown of England they had enjoyed a liberty and freedom
from taxation which were unknown in the dominions of Charles VII.;
and on the surrender of Bordeaux and Bayonne, the French king had121
expressly promised to exempt them from a number of impositions
levied elsewhere. But for this promise, indeed, those cities would not
so readily have come to terms. 121.1 Unfortunately, it was not very long
before the ministers of Charles sought to evade its fulfilment. They
represented to the people that for their own protection, and not for the
benefit of the royal treasury, the imposition of a taille would enable the
king to set a sufficient guard upon the country, and that the money
would not in reality be taken from them, as it would all be spent within
the province. The English, it was to be feared, would not remain
patient under the loss, not only of the provinces themselves, but also of
a very valuable commerce that they had hitherto maintained with the
south of France; for Gascony supplied England with wine, and was a
large consumer of English wool. Hence there was every reason to fear

that some attempt would be made by the enemy to recover the lands
from which he had been expelled, and it was the interest of the
inhabitants themselves to provide an adequate force to ward off
invasion. 121.2
With arguments like these the French king’s officers went about among
the people endeavouring to compel them to forego a liberty which had
been secured to them under the Great Seal of France. In vain were
deputations sent from Bordeaux and Gascony beseeching the king to
be faithful to his promise. The petitioners were sent back with an
answer urging the people to submit to exactions which were required
for the defence of the country. The citizens of Bordeaux were greatly
discontented, and an embassy, headed by the Sieur de l’Esparre, was
sent over to the King of England to offer him the allegiance of the lost
provinces once more, on his sending a sufficient fleet and army to their
rescue. The proposal being laid before a meeting of the English
Council, was of course most readily agreed to; and it was arranged that
a fleet, under the command of the Earl of Shrewsbury, should sail for
the Garonne in October. On the 18th of that month the earl accordingly
embarked with a body of 4000 or 5000 soldiers. The French army
having withdrawn, he easily obtained possession of Bordeaux, and sent 122
its captain, Oliver de Coëtivy, a prisoner into England. Other towns
then readily opened their gates to the invaders, of which one of the
principal was Castillon in Perigord; and very soon, in spite of the
opposition of their French governors, the greater part of the lost
provinces had put themselves again under the protection of the
English. 122.1
The suddenness with which these things were done seems for a time to
have disconcerted the French king. Winter was now coming on, and
probably nothing effective could be done for some time, so Charles lay
maturing his plans in silence. As he surveyed the position at leisure, he
probably found that any further efforts of the invaders could be
checked with tolerable facility. France still retained possession of the
two little towns of Bourges and Blaye, which we have already
mentioned as being the keys of Bordeaux, and also of various other
strong places in which he had been careful to leave considerable

3. garrisons. It was therefore the beginning of June in the following year
before he took any active steps to expel the enemy from their
conquests. He then marched southwards from Lusignan, near Poitiers,
and laid siege to Chalais in Perigord, on the borders of Saintonge. In
the space of five days it was taken by assault. Out of a garrison of 160
men no less than half were cut to pieces. The other half took refuge in
a tower where they still held out for a time in the vain hope of
succours, till at last they were compelled to surrender unconditionally.
Of the prisoners taken, such as were of English birth were ransomed;
but as for those who were Gascons, as they had sworn fealty to Charles
and departed from their allegiance, they were all beheaded. After this,
one or two other ill-defended places fell into the hands of the French.
On the 14th July siege was laid to Castillon on the Dordogne, a
position which when won gave the French free navigation into the
Gironde. The besieging army was furnished with the most perfect
mechanism of war that the skill or science of that age could supply. It
had a train of artillery, with no less than 700 gunners, under the 123
conduct of two able engineers of Paris, the brothers Bureau. The place
was thoroughly closed in, when Shrewsbury, hearing of the danger in
which it stood, came with haste out of Bordeaux with a body of 800 or
1000 horse, followed shortly after by 4000 or 5000 foot. 123.1
At daybreak on the 17th, the earl came suddenly upon the besiegers,
and succeeded without difficulty in thoroughly defeating a body of
archers, who had been posted at an abbey outside the town. This
detachment being completely taken by surprise, was obliged to save
itself by flight, and after a little skirmishing, in which some 80 or 100
men were slain on both sides, the greater number of the Frenchmen
succeeded in gaining a park in which the main body of the besiegers
had entrenched themselves. Further pursuit being now unnecessary, the
English returned to the abbey, where they were able to refresh
themselves with a quantity of victuals which the French had left behind
them. ‘And because the said skirmish,’ writes the French chronicler De
Coussy, ‘had been begun and was done so early that as yet Talbot had
not heard mass, his chaplain prepared himself to sing it there; and for
this purpose the altar and ornaments were got ready.’ But this devout

intention the earl presently abandoned; for a cloud of dust was seen in
the distance, and it was reported to him that even the main body of the
French were rapidly retreating. Immediately the earl was again on
horseback, and as he left the abbey he was heard to say, ‘I will hear no
mass to-day till I have overthrown the company of Frenchmen in the
park before me.’ 123.2
Unfortunately, it turned out that the report of the retreat of the French
was utterly unfounded. The cloud of dust had been raised by a body of
horses which they had sent out of the camp to graze. The French army
remained in its position, with artillery drawn up, ready to meet the earl
on his advance. The English, nevertheless, came on with their usual
shout, ‘A Talbot! A Talbot! St. George!’ and while their foremost men
just succeeded for an instant in planting their standard on the barrier124
of
the French lines, they were mowed down behind by the formidable fire
of the French artillery. Against this all valour was fruitless; about 500
or 600 English lay dead in front; and the French, opening the barrier of
their park, rushed out and fought with their opponents hand to hand.
For a while the conflict was still maintained, with great valour on both
sides; but the superior numbers of the French, and the advantage they
had already gained by their artillery, left very little doubt about the
issue. After about 4000 Englishmen had been slain in the hand-to-hand
encounter, the remainder fled or were made prisoners. Some were able
to withdraw into the town and join themselves to the besieged garrison;
others fled through the woods and across the river, in which a number
nd of the fugitives were drowned. In the end the body of the veteran
Talbot was found dead upon the field, covered with wounds upon the
limbs, and a great gash across the face. 124.1
So fell the aged warrior, whose mere name had long been a terror to
England’s enemies. By the confession of a French historian, who
hardly seems to feel it a disgrace to his countrymen, the archers, when
they closed around him, distinctly refused to spare his life, so
vindictively eager were they to despatch him with a multitude of
wounds. 124.2 Yet it must be owned that in this action he courted his own
death, and risked the destruction of a gallant army. For though he was
led to the combat by a false report, he was certainly under no necessity

of engaging the enemy when he had discovered his mistake, and he
was strongly dissuaded from doing so by Thomas Everingham. 124.3 But
his own natural impetuosity, inflamed probably still more by the
unreasonable taunts of the men of Bordeaux, who, it seems, were
dissatisfied that no earlier attempt had been made to resist the advance
of the French king into Guienne, 124.4 induced him to stake everything
on the issue of a most desperate and unequal conflict.
With him there also died upon the field his eldest son, Lord Lisle, his
illegitimate son, Henry Talbot, Sir Edward Hull, and thirty other
knights of England. About double that number were taken prisoners,125
the most notable of whom was John Paston’s old persecutor, the Lord
Moleyns. 125.1 Never had the English arms experienced such a
disastrous overthrow.
The Gascons now gave up their cause as altogether hopeless. A fresh
army had lately marched into their country, and was laying siege to
several places at once towards the east of Bordeaux, so that it was
manifest that city would soon be shut in by the royal forces. Castillon
was no longer able to hold out. It surrendered on the second day after
Talbot’s death. About the same time Charles in person laid siege to
Cadillac, one of the most important places in the neighbourhood,
protected by a strong castle. The town was speedily carried by assault,
and a few weeks later the castle was also taken. Other places in like
manner came once more into the power of the French king. At Fronsac
an English garrison capitulated and was allowed to leave the country,
each soldier bearing in his hand a baton till he reached the seaside.
Very soon Bordeaux was the only place that held out; nor was the
defence even of this last stronghold very long protracted. Its surrender
was delayed for a time only in consequence of the severity of the
conditions on which Charles at first insisted; but a sickness which
began to ravage his camp at length inclined him to clemency. On the
17th of October the city submitted to Charles, the inhabitants engaging
to renew their oaths of allegiance, and the English having leave to
return in their own ships to England. To secure himself against their
future return, or any fresh rebellion of the citizens, Charles caused to
be built and garrisoned, at the expense of the latter, two strong towers,

which were still standing at the beginning of the last century. Thus was
Gascony finally lost to the Crown of England.
We must now return to the domestic affairs of the kingdom. Matters
had been hung up, as it were, in a state of unstable equilibrium ever
since Good Friday 1452. The political amnesty, proceeding, as it did,
from the king’s own heart, and removing every stain of disloyalty from
those who had laboured most to change his policy, helped, in all
probability, to keep up a precarious state of tranquillity much longer126
than it could otherwise have been preserved. The danger of Calais, too,
had passed away for the time, although it was always recurring at
intervals so long as Henry VI. was king. So that, perhaps, during the
latter part of the year 1452, the country was in as quiet a state as could
reasonably have been expected. At least, the absence of information to
3. the contrary may be our warrant for so believing. But the new year had
no sooner opened than evidences of disaffection began to be perceived.
On the 2nd of January Robert Poynings—the same who had taken a
s. leading part in Cade’s rebellion, and had, it will be remembered, saved
the life of one of Sir John Fastolf’s servants from the violence of the
insurgents—called together an assembly of people at Southwark, many
of whom were outlaws. What his object was we have no distinct
evidence to show. He had received the king’s general pardon for the
part he took in the movement under Cade; but he had been obliged to
enter into a recognisance of £2000, and find six sureties of £200 each,
for his good behaviour; so that he, of all men, had best cause to beware
of laying himself open to any new suspicion of disloyalty. Yet it
appears he not only did so by this meeting at Southwark, but that
immediately afterwards he confederated with one Thomas Bigg of
Lambeth, who had been one of Cade’s petty captains, and having met
with him and about thirty others at Westerham in Kent, tried to stir up a
new rising in the former seat of rebellion. From Kent he further
proceeded into Sussex, and sent letters to two persons who had been
indicted of treason, urging them to come and meet him at Southwark
on the last day of February; ‘at which time and place,’ says the
Parliament Roll, ‘the same Robert Poynings gave them money,
thanking them heartily of their good will and disposition that they were

of unto him in time past, praying them to continue their good will, and
to be ready and come to him at such time as he should give them
warning.’ 126.1 Altogether it would appear from the record of the charge
127
itself that nothing very serious came of this display of disaffection on
the part of Poynings; but it must at least be noted as a symptom of the
times.
ent.
Soon after this a Parliament was called. The Crown was in need of
money; but Somerset did not dare to convoke the legislature at
Westminster. It met in the refectory of the abbey of Reading on the 6th
of March. In the absence of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Cardinal
Kemp, who was Chancellor, the Bishop of Lincoln 127.1 opened the
proceedings by a speech on behalf of the king, declaring the causes of
their being summoned; which were merely stated to be, in general
terms, for the good government of the kingdom and for its outward
defence. The necessity of sending reinforcements into Gascony was
not mentioned, and apparently was not thought of; for up to this time
the success of Shrewsbury had been uninterrupted, and the French king
had not yet begun his southward march. The Commons elected one
Thomas Thorpe as their Speaker, and presented him to the king on the
8th. Within three weeks they voted a tenth and fifteenth, a subsidy of
tonnage and poundage, a subsidy on wools, hides, and woolfells, and a
capitation tax on aliens,—all these, except the tenth and fifteenth, to be
levied for the term of the king’s natural life. They also ordained that
every county, city, and town should be charged to raise its quota
towards the levying of a body of 20,000 archers within four months.
For these important services they received the thanks of the king,
communicated to them by the Chancellor, and were immediately
prorogued over Easter, to sit at Westminster on the 25th of April. 127.2
On their reassembling there, they proceeded to arrange the proportion
of the number of archers which should be raised in each county, and
the means by which they were to be levied. The Commons, however,
were relieved of the charge of providing 7000 men of the number
formerly agreed to, as 3000 were to be charged upon the Lords and
3000 more on Wales and the county palatine of Cheshire, while an
additional thousand was remitted by the king, probably as the just 128

proportion to be levied out of his own household. For the remaining
13,000, the quota of each county was then determined. But soon
afterwards it was found that the need of such a levy was not so urgent
as had at first been supposed, and the actual raising of the men was
respited for two years, provided that no emergency arose requiring
earlier need of their services. 128.1
The possibility of their being required in Gascony after the success of
the Earl of Shrewsbury in the preceding year, seems no more to have
occurred to the Government, than the thought of sending them to
Constantinople, where possibly, had the fact been known, they might at
this very time have done something to prevent that ancient city from
falling into the hands of the Turks. For it was in this very year, and
while these things occupied the attention of the English Parliament,
that the long decaying Eastern Empire was finally extinguished by the
fall of its metropolis.
After this, some new Acts were passed touching the pay of the garrison
at Calais, and for the making of jetties and other much-needed repairs
there. For these purposes large sums of money were required, and the
mode in which they were to be provided gives us a remarkable insight
into the state of the exchequer. To the Duke of Somerset, as Captain of
Calais, there was owing a sum of £21,648, 10s., for the wages of
himself and his suite since the date of his appointment; and on the
duke’s own petition, an Act was passed enabling him to be paid, not
immediately, but after his predecessor, Humphrey, Duke of
Buckingham, should have received all that was due to him in a like
capacity. 128.2 The pay of the officers of Calais, it would thus appear, but
that it seems to have been discharged by the Captain for the time being
out of his own resources, must at this time have been more than two
years in arrear. If such was the state of matters, we gain some light on
the causes which induced Somerset, after his loss of Normandy, to add
to his unpopularity by accepting a post of so much responsibility as the
Captainship of Calais. He was one of the few men in England whose
wealth was such that he could afford to wait for his money; and he was 129
too responsible for the rotten government which had led to such

financial results to give any other man a post in which he would
certainly have found cause of dissatisfaction.
It was necessary, however, to provide ready money for the repairs and
the wages of the garrison from this time, and it was accordingly
enacted that a half of the fifteenth and tenth already voted should be
immediately applied to the one object, and a certain proportion of the
subsidy on wools to the other. At the same time a new vote of half a
fifteenth and tenth additional was found necessary to meet the
extraordinary expenditure, and was granted on the 2nd of July. 129.1
This grant being announced by the Speaker to the king, who was then
sitting in Parliament, Henry thanked the Commons with his own
mouth, and then commissioned the chancellor, Cardinal Kemp, to
prorogue the assembly; alleging as his reasons the consideration due to
the zeal and attendance of the Commons, and the king’s own intention
of visiting different parts of his kingdom for the suppression of various
malpractices. ‘The king, also,’ he added, ‘understood that there were
divers petitions exhibited in the present Parliament to which no answer
had yet been returned, and which would require greater deliberation
and leisure than could now conveniently be afforded, seeing that the
autumn season was at hand, in which the Lords were at liberty to
devote themselves to hunting and sport, and the Commons to the
gathering in of their harvests.’ As these weighty matters, whatever they
were, required too much consideration to be disposed of before
harvest-time, we might perhaps have expected an earlier day to be
fixed for the reassembling of the legislature than that which was
actually then announced. Perhaps, also, we might have expected that as
the Parliament had returned to Westminster, it would have been
ordered to meet there again when it renewed its sittings. But the king,
or his counsellors, were of a different opinion; and the Parliament was
ordered to meet again on the 12th of November at Reading.
Long before that day came, calamities of no ordinary kind had 130
overtaken both king and nation. About the beginning of August, 130.1
news must have come to England of the defeat and death of the Earl of
Shrewsbury; and Somerset at last was quickened into action when it

was too late. Great preparations were made for sending an army into
Guienne, when Guienne was already all but entirely lost. It is true the
Government were aware of the danger in which Talbot stood for want
of succours, at least as early as the 14th of July; even then they were
endeavouring to raise money by way of loan, and to arrest ships and
sailors. But it is evident that they had slept too long in false security,
and when they were for the first time thoroughly awake to the danger,
the disaster was so near at hand that it could not possibly have been
averted. 130.2

111.1 Whethamstede, 317.
111.2 The names are all entered on the Pardon Roll of 30 and

31 Henry VI. Among the hosts of less interesting names, we
find that the Duke of York took out a pardon on the 3rd of
June; the Duke of Norfolk and the young Duke of Suffolk on
the 23rd of the same month; Thomas Percy, Lord Egremont,
on the 1st; Thomas Courtenay, Earl of Devon, on the 20th,
and Sir William Oldhall, who is called of Hunsdon, on the
26th. Ralph, Lord Cromwell, had one on the 22nd May, and
Robert Wynnyngton of Dartmouth (the writer of Letter 90)
on the 28th July. On the 12th July a joint pardon was given to
Sir Henry Percy, Lord Ponynges, and Eleanor, his wife,
kinswoman and heir of Sir Robert Ponynges. At later dates
we have also pardons to Henry, Viscount Bourchier, and Sir
John Talbot, son and heir of the Earl of Shrewsbury.
112.1 No. 210.

112.2 Coats of mail and helmets.

113.1 Nos. 211, 217, 241.

113.2 Nos. 212, 213, 227, 228, 241.

113.3 Nos. 214, 241.

114.1 No. 206.

114.2 Nos. 214, 217, 218, 219, 241.

115.1 The petition, I think, must have been effectual, for I did

not find Church’s name on the Pardon Roll, 30 and 31 Henry
VI.
115.2 Nos. 214, 216, 218.
116.1 No. 223.

117.1 Nos. 153, 159, 162, 186, 188, 203.

117.2 Note the passages in Margaret Paston’s letter (No. 222):
—‘Yet I suppose Sir John, if he were spoken to, would be
gladder to let his kinsmen have part than strangers.’ And
again:—‘Assay him in my name of such places as ye
suppose is most clear.’
117.3 No. 202.

118.1 Nos. 171, 173.

118.2 Rymer, xi. 44.

118.3 Dawson Turner’s Historical Sketch of Caister Castle,

p. 31. He does not state his authority.
119.1 See ‘Early Documents’ in vol. ii. p. 4.

119.2 The Duke of Alençon.

119.3 Nos. 224, 225.

119.4 Historical Sketch, p. 4.

119.5 No. 389.

120.1 Nos. 224, 225.

121.1 Basin, i. 251.

121.2 Ibid. 257.

122.1 Basin, i. 258-261. Leclerq (in Petitot’s Collection), 37-

38.
123.1 Basin, i. 261-4. Leclerq, 39-41. Matt. de Coussy, 121.

123.2 Basin, i. 264-5. De Coussy, 122.

124.1 De Coussy, 124.

124.2 Basin, i. 267-8.

124.3 Ibid. 265.

124.4 De Coussy, 122.

125.1 J. Chartier, 265; Berry, 469.

126.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 396. See also the pardon granted to him

five years later. Patent Roll, 36 Hen. VI. m. 12.
127.1 Called William, Bishop of Lincoln, on the Rolls of

Parliament, but his name was John Chedworth.

127.2 Rolls of Parl. v. 227-31.
128.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 231-3.

128.2 Ibid. v. 233.

129.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 234-6.

130.1 It appears not to have been known on the 4th of August.

Stevenson’s Wars, ii. 487-8.
130.2 Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 151-4, 155-7.

Stevenson’s Wars, ii. 481-92.

sent its captain, Oliver de Coëtivy
spelling unchanged: expected form “Olivier”

The King’s Prostration
Whether it was in any degree owing to this national calamity,—in
which case, the impression made by the event may well have been
deepened by the knowledge that it was attributed to the remissness of
Somerset,—or whether it was due entirely to physical or other causes
g quite unconnected with public affairs, in August the king fell ill at
Clarendon, and began to exhibit symptoms of mental
derangement. 130.3 Two months later an event occurred in which, under
other circumstances, he could not but have felt a lively interest. After
eight years of married life, the queen for the first time bore him a child.
It was a son and received the name of Edward; but for a long time
afterwards the father knew nothing of the event. So entirely were his
mental faculties in abeyance, that it was found impossible to
communicate to him the news. The affairs of his kingdom and those of
his family were for the time equally beyond his comprehension.
131
The failure of royalty to perform any of its functions, however weakly
they might have been performed before, was a crisis that had not
occurred till now. A heavier responsibility lay with Somerset and the
Council, who could not expect that acts done by their own authority
would meet with the same respect and recognition as those for which

they had been able to plead the direct sanction of their sovereign. And
now they had to deal with a factious world, in which feuds between
powerful families had already begun to kindle a dangerous
conflagration. In the month of August, probably of the year before this,
Lord Thomas Nevill, a son of the Earl of Salisbury, married a niece of
Lord Cromwell at Tattersall in Lincolnshire. After the wedding the earl
returned into Yorkshire, when, having reached the neighbourhood of
York, some disturbance arose between his retainers and those of Lord
Egremont, son of the Earl of Northumberland. 131.1 As to the cause of
the dispute we are left entirely ignorant; but it grew into a serious
quarrel between the Nevills and the Percys. The chief maintainers of
the feud were, on the one side, Sir John Nevill, a younger son of the
Earl of Salisbury, and on the other Lord Egremont. Both parties were
repeatedly summoned to lay their grievances before the Council; but
the most peremptory letters and mandates had hitherto been
ineffectual. Illegal gatherings of people on either side continued in
spite of every prohibition; and the whole north of England seems to
have been kept in continual disorder. 131.2
The case was not likely to be improved when the source of all legal
authority was paralysed. And yet so bad was the state of matters
before, that the king’s illness, instead of being an aggravation of the
evil, positively brought with it some perceptible relief. The Council
were no longer able to avoid calling in the aid of one whose capacity to
rule was as indisputable as his birth and rank. A Great Council was
summoned for the express purpose of promoting ‘rest and union
betwixt the lords of this land’; and according to the usage in such
cases, every peer of the realm had notice to attend. Gladly, no doubt,132
would Somerset have omitted to send such notice to his rival; and it
seems actually to have been the case that no summons was at first sent
to the Duke of York. But afterwards the error was rectified, and York
being duly summoned, came up to Westminster and took his seat at the
Council-table 132.1 on the 21st of November. Before taking part in the
proceedings, however, he addressed himself to the lords then
assembled, declaring how he had come up in obedience to a writ of
privy seal, and was ready to offer his best services to the king; but as a

previous order had been issued, by what authority he could not say, to
certain old councillors to forbear from attending the king’s councils in
future, he required that any such prohibition might be removed. This
was unanimously agreed to, and the government of England was at
once restored to a free and healthy condition. 132.2
The Duke of Somerset was not present at this meeting of the Council.
He doubtless saw too clearly the storm gathering against him. To his
former responsibility for the loss of Normandy was now added further
responsibility for the loss of Guienne. The accusations against him
were accordingly renewed; but they were taken up this time, not by
York but by the Duke of Norfolk. A set of articles of impeachment was
drawn up by the latter, to which Somerset made some reply, and was
t.
answered again by Norfolk. The accuser then pressed the matter
further, urging that the loss of Normandy and of Guienne should be
made a subject of criminal inquiry according to the laws of France; and
that other misdemeanours charged upon him should be investigated
according to the modes of procedure in England. Finally, lest his
petition should be refused by the Council, Norfolk desired that it might
be exemplified under the king’s Great Seal, protesting that he felt it
necessary, for his own credit, that what he had done in the matter
should be known as widely as possible. 132.3
133
In the end it was determined that the Duke of Somerset should be
arrested and committed to the Tower. This resolution was carried into
effect a little before Christmas, and the different lords retired during
the festive season to their own country quarters. But all who had given
their votes against Somerset knew well that they stood in considerable
danger. The battle that he had lost would have to be fought over again
with the queen, who now put in a claim to be intrusted with the entire
government of the kingdom. Every man of Somerset’s party got his
retainers in readiness, and while other lords were out of town, the
harbinger of the Duke of Somerset secured for his company all the
lodgings that were to be got in Thames Street, Mark Lane, St.
Katherine’s, and the neighbourhood of the Tower. The Duke of Norfolk
was warned by a faithful servant to beware of parties in ambush on his
way to London. Everything clearly showed that the faction which had

been dispossessed of power had sanguine hopes of reinstating
themselves at an early opportunity. 133.1
And this, it is probable, they might have done with the greatest
possible ease, were it not that the king’s loss of his faculties was so
complete and absolute that it was impossible, by any means whatever,
4. to obtain a semblance of acting upon his authority. About New Year’s
Day, when the new-born prince was conveyed to Windsor, the Duke of
Buckingham took the child in his arms and presented him to the king,
beseeching him to give him a father’s blessing. Henry returned no
g and answer. The duke remained some time with the child in the king’s
. presence, but could not extract from him the slightest sign of
intelligence. The queen then came in, and taking the infant in her arms,
presented him to his father, with the same request that the duke had
made before her. But all their efforts were in vain; the king continued
dumb, and showed not the slightest perception of what they were
doing, except that for one moment only he looked upon the babe, and
then cast down his eyes again. 133.2
There were no hopes, therefore, that the king himself would interfere
an in any way to protect his favourites in the Council. Every man felt it134
necessary to see to his own security. The Lord Chancellor himself,
Cardinal Kemp, ‘commanded all his servants to be ready, with bow and
arrows, sword and buckler, crossbows, and all other habiliments of
war, to await upon the safeguard of his person.’ The Duke of
Buckingham caused to be made ‘2000 bends with knots—to what
intent,’ said a cautious observer, ‘men may construe as their wits will
give them.’ Further from the court, of course, the old disturbances were
increased. ‘The Duke of Exeter, in his own person, hath been at
Tuxforth beside Doncaster, in the north country, and there the Lord
Egremont met him, and the two be sworn together, and the duke is
come home again.’ The Earl of Wiltshire and the Lord Bonvile made
proclamations in Somersetshire, offering sixpence a day to every man
that would serve them; and these two noblemen, along with the Lords
Beaumont, Poynings, Clifford, and Egremont, were preparing to come
up to London each with as strong a body of followers as he could
possibly muster. 134.1

The Duke of York and his friends on their side did the same; and it was
high time they should, otherwise the machinations of Somerset would
certainly have been their ruin. The latter had spies in every great
household, who reported to him everything that could be construed to
ke of the disadvantage of his opponents. Among York’s private enemies,
d moreover, was Thomas Thorpe, Speaker of the House of Commons,
who was also a Baron of the Exchequer. In the former capacity his
functions had been for some time suspended; for Parliament, which
had been prorogued to the 12th November at Reading, only met on that
day to be prorogued again to the 11th February, in consequence of the
mortality which prevailed in the town. Meanwhile, in Michaelmas
term, the Duke of York took an action of trespass against him in his
own Court of Exchequer, and a jury had awarded damages to the
amount of £1000. On this judgment was given that he should be
committed to the Fleet till the damages were paid, and in the Fleet the
135
Speaker accordingly remained till the next meeting of Parliament. 135.1
In his confinement he was now busily employed in drawing up a bill of
articles against the Duke of York, which doubtless, with the aid of a
little favour at Court, would have been highly serviceable to the cause
of Somerset. 135.2
The legal proceedings of which Thorpe was a victim appear doubtless
to have been connected with party politics. His son and heir, Roger
Thorpe, at the beginning of the reign of Henry VII. procured an Act of
Parliament in his favour, showing that both he and his father had
suffered injustice in the cause of the House of Lancaster, and that the
Duke of York’s action of trespass against his father was owing to his
having arrested, at the king’s command, ‘certain harness and other
habiliments of war of the said duke’s.’ 135.3 No doubt this must have
been the case, but was the king’s command constitutional? Or was it,
perhaps, only the command of Somerset given in the king’s name? An
agent had no right to obey an unconstitutional order.
About the 25th of January the Duke of York was expected in London,
accompanied by a select body of men of his household retinue. With
him came his son, the Earl of March, at this time not quite twelve years
old; to whom, nevertheless, a separate household had already been

assigned by his father, and consequently another company marched in
the name of the Earl of March. These, however, were sent forward a
little in advance. Along with the Duke of York there also came up, or
was expected to come, his powerful friend the Earl of Warwick, who,
besides the retinue by which he was attended, was to have a thousand
men awaiting his arrival in London. Even these noblemen and their
companies formed a most powerful confederacy. But there were two
other great personages besides who travelled with them on the same
road, whose sympathy and co-operation with York at this time no
reader would have conjectured. The king’s two half-brothers, the Earls
of Richmond and Pembroke, were expected to reach London in the
duke’s company; and they, too, had wisely taken with them a good
136
number of followers, for, notwithstanding their relation to the Crown,
it was thought not unlikely that they would be arrested on their
arrival. 136.1
In short, the continuance of the king’s infirmity had now rendered it
clear to every man that unless the Council were willing to comply with
the Queen’s demands, and yield up to her the uncontrolled
management of public affairs, the government of the kingdom must be
placed in the hands of the Duke of York. And yet some little time was
necessarily allowed to pass before any special powers could be
intrusted to him. Parliament was not to sit again till the 11th February,
and Reading was still the place where it was appointed to assemble.
The Earl of Worcester, who filled the office of Lord Treasurer, was
commissioned to go down to Reading, and cause it to adjourn from the
11th to the 14th of the month, to meet that day at Westminster.
Meanwhile a commission was granted to the Duke of York to act as the
king’s lieutenant on its reassembling. 136.2
ent
On the 14th, accordingly, the Houses met in the royal palace of
Westminster; but the Commons were without a Speaker, and another of
their members, by name Walter Rayle, was also undergoing
imprisonment, from what cause does not appear. The Commons,
therefore, before proceeding to business, demanded of the King and the
Lords Spiritual and Temporal, that their ancient privileges should be
respected, and their Speaker and the other member liberated. The case

was taken into consideration by the Peers on the following day, when it
was explained by the Duke of York’s counsel that the Speaker had a
few months before gone to the house of Robert Nevill, Bishop of
Durham, and there taken away certain goods and chattels belonging to
the duke against his will; that for this he had been prosecuted in the
Court of Exchequer, as it was a privilege of that court that its officers
in such cases should not be sued before any other tribunal; that a jury
had found him guilty of trespass, and awarded to the duke damages of
£1000 and £10 costs. Speaker Thorpe had accordingly been committed
to the Fleet for the fine due to the king. The proceedings against him
had not been taken during the sitting of Parliament, and it was urged137
that if he should be released by privilege of Parliament a great wrong
would be done to the duke. It was a delicate question of constitutional
law, and the Lords desired to have the opinion of the judges. But the
chief justices, after consultation with their brethren, answered, in the
name of the whole body, that it was beyond their province to determine
matters concerning the privilege of Parliament; ‘for this high court of
Parliament,’ they said, ‘is so high and mighty in his nature that it may
make law, and that that is law it may make no law; and the
determination and knowledge of the privilege belongeth to the Lords of
the Parliament, and not to the Justices.’ Nevertheless, as to the
accustomed mode of procedure in the lower courts, the Judges
remarked that in ordinary cases of arrest a prisoner was frequently
liberated on a writ of supersedeas to enable him to attend the
Parliament; but no general writ of supersedeas, to surcease all
processes, could be allowed; ‘for if there should be, it should seem that
this high court of Parliament, that ministereth all justice and equity,
should let the process of the common law, and so it should put the
party complainant without remedy, for so much as actions at the
common law be not determined in this high court of Parliament.’ 137.1
From this carefully considered reply it was clear to the Lords that they
were at least nowise bound to interfere in behalf of the imprisoned
Speaker, unless they considered the liberties of Parliament likely to be
prejudiced by the circumstances of his particular case. It was
accordingly decided that he should remain in prison, and that the

Commons should be directed to choose another Speaker. This they did
on the following day, and presented Sir Thomas Charleton to the Lord
Chancellor as their new representative; who being accepted by that
functionary in the name of the king, both Houses at once proceeded to
business. 137.2
A month later the Commons came before the Duke of York, as the
of king’s lieutenant, with two very urgent petitions. The first related to the
defence of Calais and the safeguard of the sea. Notwithstanding the 138
very liberal grants which had already been voted by this Parliament,
Calais was still in danger, and the sea was still very insufficiently
protected; insomuch that the Lord Chancellor had told the House of
Commons £40,000 would be required to obviate very serious perils.
The Commons were very naturally alarmed; a modern House of
Commons would have been indignant also. They had in the preceding
year voted no less than £9300 for Calais, partly for repairs and partly
for making jetties, besides all the sums voted for the pay of the
garrison and the tonnage and poundage dues, which ought to have been
applied to general purposes of defence. They therefore humbly
petitioned to be excused from making any further grants; ‘for they
cannot, may not, ne dare not make any mo grants, considered the great
poverty and penury that be among the Commons of this land, for
whom they be comen at this time; and that this their excuse might be
enacted in this high court of Parliament.’ The money already voted was
evidently conceived to be somewhere, and was considered to be quite
sufficient to do the work required; so the Commons were told in reply
by my Lord Chancellor the Cardinal, ‘that they should have good and
comfortable answer, without any great delay or tarrying.’ 138.1
il
. The second petition was that ‘a sad and wise Council’ might be
established, ‘of the right discreet and wise lords and other of this land,
to whom all people might have recourse for ministering justice, equity,
and righteousness; whereof they have no knowledge as yet.’ The Duke
of York was only the king’s lieutenant in Parliament. With the assent of
the Great Council he could prorogue or dissolve it and give the royal
assent to any of its acts. But the business of the nation imperatively
required that some smaller body of statesmen should be intrusted with

more general powers. Even before the king’s illness the constitution of
some such body had been promised to the Parliament at Reading as a
thing contemplated by the king himself; 138.2 and it was now more
necessary than ever. The only problem was how to confer upon it an
authority that could not be disputed.
139
But while the Lords are taking this point into consideration, we invite
the reader’s attention to a piece of private history.
A few years before the date at which we have now arrived, one
Thomas Denyes, a trusted servant of the Earl of Oxford, seems to have
caused his master some little inconvenience by falling in love with a
lady who resided in the neighbourhood of Norwich. We regret that we
cannot inform the reader who she was. All that we know is that her
Christian name was Agnes, which was at that time popularly corrupted
into Anneys and frequently confounded with Anne, and that she was an
acquaintance of John Paston’s. With John Paston, accordingly, the earl
thought it best to communicate, and in doing so earned for himself the
heartfelt gratitude of Denyes by one of those small but truly gracious
acts which reveal to us better than anything else the secret of the power
of the English aristocracy. The lady seems not to have given her
admirer any great encouragement in his suit. She had property of her
own worth 500 marks, and could have had a husband in Norfolk with
land of 100 marks value, which was more than Denyes could offer her.
But the Earl of Oxford requested John Paston to intercede with her in
behalf of her wooer, promising her that if the marriage took effect the
Earl would show himself liberal to them both. He further offered, if it
would be any satisfaction to her, to go himself into Norfolk and visit
her. 139.1
This intercession was effectual, and the lady became the wife of
Thomas Denyes. It was a triumph of love and ambition to a poor
dependant on a great earl. But with increase of wealth, as others have
found in all ages, Denyes experienced an increase of anxieties and of
business also. A suit in Chancery was commenced against him and his
wife by a gentleman of the name of Ingham, who considered himself to
have a claim on the lady’s property for a considerable sum of money.

Ingham’s son Walter was active in procuring the subpœna. But Denyes,
strong, as he believed, in a great lord’s favour, conceived a plan by
which he might either interrupt the suit or revenge it on the person of140
Walter Ingham. On the 11th of January 1454—just about the time the
queen and Buckingham were making those vain attempts to introduce
his child to the notice of the unhappy king—when, consequently, it was
still uncertain whether York or Somerset would have the rule, and
when lawless persons all over the country must have felt that there was
more than usual immunity for bad deeds to be hoped for,—Thomas
Denyes wrote a letter in the name of the Earl of Oxford to Walter
Ingham, requiring his presence at the earl’s mansion at Wivenhoe, in
Essex, on the 13th. This letter reached Ingham at Dunston, in Norfolk,
and he at once set out in obedience to the summons. But as he was
nearing his destination, on the 12th, he was waylaid by a party in
ambush hired by Denyes, who beat him so severely upon the head,
legs, and back that he was maimed for life, and compelled to go on
crutches for the rest of his days. Ingham complained of the outrage to
the Lord Chancellor, Cardinal Kemp, who sent a sergeant-at-arms to
arrest Denyes at Lincoln’s Inn; but he at first refused to obey the arrest.
Shortly afterwards, however, he was committed to the Fleet prison; and
Ingham, with the favour of the cardinal and the Earl of Oxford, who
utterly repudiated the act of his dependant, presented a petition to
Parliament that he should not be admitted to bail or mainprise until he
had been tried for the outrage and all actions between him and Ingham
had been fully discussed and settled. 140.1
The Earl of Oxford seems to have been thoroughly incensed, and not
without reason, against a servant who had so abused his trust. Cardinal
Kemp, as chancellor, was not less righteously indignant; and a bill was
actually passed through the House of Peers in accordance with the
prayer of Ingham’s petition. Yet it is difficult to understand why the
punishment of the wrong committed was not left to the operation of
ordinary criminal law. The case, perhaps, affected too seriously the
honour of a nobleman, and the discretion to be allowed to a retainer.
But whatever may have been the cause, poor Denyes now becomes
positively an object for compassion—all the more so because his chief 141

and feeling in the matter was not a selfish one. Besides imprisoning Denyes
in himself in the Fleet, the cardinal and the Earl of Oxford threw his wife
into the Counter, and afterwards sent her to Newgate, where she
suffered the discomforts of a gaol apart from her husband, although she
was then with child. ‘Which standeth too nigh mine heart,’ is the brief
expression in which he conveys his feelings to John Paston, while
apparently he was expecting to hear that his wife was either dead or
prematurely delivered; for the treatment she had met with brought on
the pains of labour long before the right time had come. Denyes,
however, made friends with the warden of the Fleet prison, who
contrived in some manner to make interest for her with her gaoler, so
that afterwards she was rather better treated, and at last admitted to
bail. 141.1
Poor Denyes was in dread of still further evils arising out of the case
when he wrote these facts to John Paston. The bill against him had
already passed through the Lords, and he was in fear that it might pass
through the Commons also, which we afterwards learn that it did
not. 141.2 His adversary, moreover, was bent upon revenge; ‘for Ingham,’
he said, ‘lieth, beside that, to take away my wife’s daughter out of
Westminster, 141.3 to make an end of my wife if he can, and also to arrest
my servants, that I dread that she nor I shall have no creature to attend
us ne help us; and such malice have I never heard of here before. And
it is told me that beside that they will despoil, if any good they can find
of mine in Norwich or Norfolk, and imprison my servants there.’ All
this he urgently implored Paston to prevent to the best of his ability.
And it must be said that John Paston, although he considered himself
little bound to Denyes, except in so far as he had promoted his
marriage at the Earl of Oxford’s solicitation, on this occasion stood his
friend. He wrote a letter to the earl urgently interceding for the
unhappy wife; and though it seems probable the letter that he first 142
wrote was not actually sent, we may fairly presume that he either
devised a second to the same effect, or used his influence otherwise to
the same end. Certain it is that he made some effort for which Denyes
was beyond measure grateful. 142.1

‘The cardinal is dead and the king is relieved.’ Such were the last
words of a postscript which Denyes appended to his first melancholy
letter, complaining of his own and his wife’s imprisonment. A rumour
apparently had been spread that the king’s health was beginning to
improve; for which, as we shall see, there was very little foundation.
But it was perfectly true that Cardinal Kemp, Archbishop of
Canterbury and Chancellor of England, was dead. Little as we know,
beyond a few broad facts of his career, whereby to judge his real
character and aims, it is certain that he was an accomplished statesman.
A follower originally of Cardinal Beaufort,—the man who of all others
could serve two masters, Rome and England, with the least degree of
repugnance, and of whom the best that can be said is, that he never
scrupled to betray the former in what appeared to be the interest of the
latter,—Kemp was, perhaps, as honest a specimen of the political
churchman as an essentially bad system could produce. The clergy,
however, were really needed as statesmen; few laymen had the ability,
learning, or education to enable them to do the essential work of the
nation; and Kemp was one who had gained for himself, by his own
talents, the highest position to which a subject could aspire in England,
not only in the realm but in the Church.
Thus, at a time when the functions of royalty itself were suspended, the
chancellor, the official keeper of the king’s conscience, was suddenly
taken away; and in him England also lost her primate, always one of
the most important members of the Council. The formation of a
governing Council was now more important than ever; but the most
pressing questions of all were the appointment of a new chancellor and
of a new archbishop. Who was to take upon himself to nominate either
the one or the other? The queen’s modest claim to be invested with the
143
functions of her husband had not been listened to by the Lords; but the
powers as yet conferred upon the Duke of York were only to represent
the king in Parliament.
It was upon the 19th of March that the Commons had pressed their
petition for the establishment of a Council. Cardinal Kemp died on the
on 22nd. On the 23rd the Lords appointed twelve of their number as a
to deputation, headed by Waynflete, Bishop of Winchester, to ride to

Windsor and endeavour, if possible, to lay the state of matters before
the king. Their instructions were drawn up in six articles, but only two
were to be communicated to the king if they found him unable to pay
attention to what was said. These two were a mere assurance of anxiety
to hear of his recovery, and that the Lords, under the presidency of the
duke as his lieutenant, were using their best discretion in the affairs of
the nation. If any response were made to these two articles, the
deputation was then to tell him of the death of Cardinal Kemp, and ask
to know his pleasure who should be the new archbishop and who
should be appointed chancellor. They were to say that for the security
of the Great Seals (there were at this time no less than three Great
Seals used in the Chancery) 143.1 the Lords had caused them to be
produced in Parliament, and after being seen by all the Lords they were
enclosed in a coffer sealed by a number of the Peers present, and then
laid up in the Treasury. Finally, they were to ask the king’s mind
touching the establishment of a Council, telling him how much it was
desired by the Commons, and suggesting the names of certain Lords
and persons whom it was thought desirable to appoint as Councillors.
All these matters, however, were to be communicated only to the king
in the strictest privacy. 143.2
The deputation returned two days after with a report of the total failure
of their mission. They had waited on the king at Windsor just after he
had dined, but could get from him no answer nor sign that he
g’s understood their message. The Bishop of Winchester then told the king
ty. that the Lords had not dined, and that after they had they would wait
on him again. After dinner accordingly they were again with him, and 144
tried all they could to elicit an answer; but the king was speechless.
They then proposed that he should go into another room, and he was
led between two men into his bedchamber. A third and last effort was
then made to rouse him by every expedient that could be imagined; and
when all else failed, a question was put to him which involved no more
than a simple yes or no. Was it his Highness’s pleasure that they should
wait on him any longer? A long pause was allowed in the hope that any
mere physical difficulty might be overcome. A faint nod, even a shake
of the head, would have been regarded with some degree of

satisfaction. But it was all in vain. ‘They could have no answer, word
ne sign; and therefore with sorrowful hearts, came their way.’ 144.1
It was now clear that the highest constitutional authority resided for the
time in the Lords Spiritual and Temporal. The reader, imbued with
modern notions of the power and prestige of the House of Commons,
may possibly think that their votes, too, should have been consulted in
the formation of a Government. Such a view, however, would be
radically erroneous. The influence which the House of Commons has
in later times acquired—an influence so great that, at times unhappily,
Acts are even passed by Peers against their own sense of right and
justice, in deference to the will of the Lower Chamber—is a thing not
directly recognised by the constitution, but only due to the control of
the national purse-strings. Strictly speaking, the House of Commons is
not a legislative body at all, but only an engine for voting supplies. The
Peers of the realm, in Parliament or out of Parliament, are, according to
the constitution, the sovereign’s privileged advisers. A king may, no
doubt, at any time call to him what other councillors he pleases, and
the prerogative of the Lords may lie dormant for a very long period of
time; but the Peers of the realm have, individually or in a body, a right
to tender their advice upon affairs of state, which belongs to no other
class in the community.
On the 27th of March, therefore—two days after the report of the 145
deputation that had seen the king at Windsor—the Lords took the first
step towards the establishment of order and government, by electing
ke of Richard, Duke of York, as Protector and Defender of the realm. The
title of Protector essentially implied an interim administrator during a
r.
period when the king, by legal or physical incapacity, was unable to
exercise his regal functions in person. A Protector’s tenure of power
was therefore always limited by the clause quamdiu Regi placeret. It
was terminable by the king himself the moment he found himself able
to resume the actual duties of royalty. Even a protectorship like that of
Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, instituted in consequence of the king
being an infant, was terminated before the royal child was eight years
old by the act of his coronation. The crowned and anointed infant
became a king indeed, and therefore no longer required the services of

a Protector; so from that day Duke Humphrey had ceased to wield any
authority except that of an ordinary member of the Council. But,
indeed, even during his protectorship, his powers were greatly
circumscribed; and it had been expressly decided by the Council that
he was not competent to perform an act of state without the consent of
a majority of the other Lords. Richard, therefore, knowing that his
powers would be limited, was most anxious that his responsibility
should be accurately defined, that no one might accuse him thereafter
of having exceeded the just limits of his authority. He delivered in a
paper containing certain articles, of which the first was as follows:—
‘Howbeit that I am not sufficient of myself, of wisdom, cunning, nor
ability, to take upon me that worthy name of Protector and Defender
of this land, nor the charge thereto appertaining, whereunto it hath
liked you, my Lords, to call, name, and desire me unworthy
thereunto;—under protestation, if I shall apply me to the performing
of your said desire, and at your instance take upon me, with your
supportation, the said name and charge, I desire and pray you that in
this present Parliament and by authority thereof it be enacted, that of
yourself and of your free and mere disposition, ye desire, name and
call me to the said name and charge, and that of any presumption of
myself, I take them not upon me, but only of the due and humble 146
obeisance that I owe to do unto the king, our most dread and
Sovereign Lord, and to you the Peerage of this land, in whom by the
occasion of the infirmity of our said Sovereign Lord, resteth the
exercise of his authority, whose noble commandments I am as ready
to perform and obey as any his liege man alive; and at such time as it
shall please our blessed Creator to restore his noble person to
healthful disposition, it shall like you so to declare and notify to his
good grace.’ 146.1
In reply to this, it was put on record that it was ‘thought by the Lords
that the said Duke desireth that of his great wisdom for his discharge.’
And they, too, for their own justification, resolved that an Act should
be made according to a precedent during the king’s minority, setting
forth that they themselves, from the sheer necessity of the case, had
been compelled to take upon themselves the power of nominating a

Protector. So jealous were the Lords of anything like an invasion of the
royal prerogative!
Further, the duke required that the Lords would aid him cordially in the
execution of his duties and would exactly define such powers and
liberties as they meant him to exercise; that they would arrange what
salary he should receive; and that all the Lords Spiritual and Temporal
belonging to the King’s Council would agree to act in the Councils of
the Protector. These matters being at length satisfactorily adjusted, the
duke was formally created Protector by patent on the 3rd of April. It
was, however, at the same time provided by another patent that the
office should devolve on the king’s son as soon as he came of age. 146.2
After this, five Lords were appointed to have the keeping of the sea
against the king’s enemies, and in addition to the subsidies already
voted by Parliament for that object, a loan, amounting in all to £1000,
was levied upon the different seaports. 146.3 This was but light taxation,
and was no doubt cheerfully submitted to. The good town of Bristol,
we know, did more than it was asked; for Sturmyn, the Mayor, fitted
out a stately vessel expressly for the war. 146.4 Evidently there were zeal
and patriotism in the country whenever there was a government that147
could make good use of them.
gain
r. And there was real need of that patriotism; for the French were again
threatening Calais. They also made a descent in great force on the isles
of Jersey and Guernsey, but were defeated by the valour and loyalty of
the inhabitants, who killed or took prisoners no less than five hundred
of their assailants. 147.1 A Council was called to meet at Westminster on
the 6th of May, to take measures for the defence of Calais, 147.2 the
result of which and of further deliberations on the subject was seen in
the appointment of the Duke of York as captain or governor of the
town, castle, and marches. This office was granted to him by patent on
the 18th of July, 147.3 but he only agreed to undertake it, as he had done
the Protectorship, subject to certain express conditions to which he
obtained the assent of the Lords in Parliament. Among these was one
stipulation touching his remuneration, in which he affirms that he had
served the king formerly at his own cost in the important offices he had
filled in France and in Ireland, so that owing to non-payment of his

salary, he had been obliged to sell part of his inheritance and pawn
plate and jewels which were still unredeemed. 147.4 A very different sort
of governor this from the avaricious Somerset!
Meanwhile other changes had been made in the administration. On the
2nd of April—the day before the duke’s appointment as Protector—the
Great Seal had been given to Richard Nevill, Earl of Salisbury, as
nces chancellor; and to prevent any renewal of disturbances in the North by
orth. the earl’s former opponent Lord Egremont, his father, the Earl of
Northumberland, was summoned before the Council. But before the
day came which was given him to make his appearance, news arrived
that Lord Egremont had already been making large assemblies and
issuing proclamations of rebellion, in concert with the Duke of Exeter.
To restore tranquillity, it was thought proper that the Duke of York 148
should go down into Yorkshire, where he no sooner made his
appearance than his presence seems to have put an end to all
disturbances. The Duke of Exeter disappeared from the scene and was
reported to have gone up secretly to London; but the adherents of Lord
Egremont continued to give some trouble in Westmoreland. Thither the
Duke of York accordingly received orders from the Council to proceed;
but he probably found it unnecessary, for on the 8th of June it is stated
that he intended remaining about York till after the 20th. Every
appearance of disturbance seems to have been quelled with ease; and a
number of the justices having been sent into Yorkshire for the
punishment of past offences, the Protector was able to return to
London in the beginning of July. 148.1
It was at this time that the two eldest sons of the Duke of York,
Edward, Earl of March, and Edmund, Earl of Rutland, who were of the
ages of twelve and eleven respectively, addressed the following
interesting letter to their father: 148.2—

‘To the ryght hiegh and myghty Prince, oure most
worschipfull and gretely redoubted lorde and fader,
the Duke of Yorke, Protector and Defensor of
Englonde.

‘Ryght hiegh and myghty Prince, oure most worschipfull and gretely
redoubted lorde and Fader, in as lowely wyse as any sonnes con or
may we recomaunde us un to youre good lordeschip. And plaese hit
youre hieghnesse to witte that we have receyved youre worschipful
lettres yesturday by your servaunt William Cleton, beryng date at
Yorke the xxix day of Maij, by the whiche William and by the
relacion of John Milewatier we conceyve your worschipfull and
victorious spede ageinest your enemyse, to ther grete shame, and to
us the most comfortable tydinges that we desired to here. Where of
we thonke Almyghty God of his yeftes, beseching Hym hertely to
geve yowe that grace and cotidian fortune here aftur to knowe your
enemyse and to have the victory of them. And yef hit plaese your
hieghnesse to knowe of oure wilfare, at the makyng of this lettre we
were in good helith of bodis, thonked be God; beseching your good
and graciouse Faderhode of youre daily blessing. And where ye
comaunde us by your said lettres to attende specialy to oure lernyng149
in our yong age that schulde cause us to growe to honour and
worschip in our olde age, Please hit youre hieghnesse to witte that we
have attended owre lernyng sith we come heder, and schall here
aftur; by the whiche we trust to God youre graciouse lordeschip and
good Fadurhode schall be plaesid. Also we beseche your good
lordeschip that hit may plaese yowe to sende us Harry Lovedeyne,
grome of your kechyn, whos service is to us ryght agreable; and we
will sende yow John Boyes to wayte on youre good
Lordeschip. Ryght hiegh and myghty Prince, our most worschipfull
and gretely redoubted lorde and Fader, We beseche Almyghty God
yeve yowe as good lyfe and longe as youre owne Princely hert con
best desire. Writen at your Castill of Lodelow the iij day of June.—
Youre humble sonnes, ‘E. Marche,
‘E. Rutlond.’
Soon after the duke had returned to London his presence was required
at a Great Council summoned for the 18th of July, to consider the
expediency of liberating on bail his great rival and personal enemy, the
ke of Duke of Somerset, who had been now seven months in prison. On this
t. point York had only one piece of advice to offer, which was, that as he

had been committed to custody upon suspicion of treason, the opinion
of the judges should be taken before he was released from
confinement. That he had remained so long without a trial was not
unnatural, considering the nature of the times. It was a bold step indeed
to try him at all, while there was a chance of the weak-minded king’s
recovery; but this step was certainly resolved on. The 28th of October
was the day appointed for his trial; and the Duke of Norfolk, who, as
we have seen, had been the first to move the capital charge against
him, was ordered by that day to be ready to produce his proofs.
Meanwhile the lords concurred that it was clearly inexpedient to let
him go, especially as the number of lords assembled was not so great
as it should have been on the occasion; and the opinion of the Duke of
York was not only agreed to, but at his request was put on record. 149.1
150
Six days later it was agreed at another meeting of the Council that the
Duke of York should return into the North with the Duke of Exeter in
his custody, whom he was to confine in the castle of Pomfret as a state
prisoner. 150.1
By these decisive steps the authority of the Duke of York was at length
secured on something like a stable footing. During the remainder of his
protectorate there could no longer be a doubt to whose hands power
was committed; and England, at last, had the blessing of real
government, able and vigorous, but at the same time moderate. The
resolutions of the Council soon became known to the public. ‘As for
tidings,’ wrote William Paston to his brother in Norfolk, ‘my lord of
York hath taken my lord of Exeter into his award. The Duke of
Somerset is still in prison, in worse case than he was.’ William Paston
wrote in haste, but these were two matters of public importance to be
mentioned before all private affairs whatever. 150.2 And yet the private
affairs of which he wrote in the same letter will not be without interest
stolf to the readers of this Introduction. William Paston now reported to his
brother that Sir John Fastolf was about to take his journey into Norfolk
within a few days, and proposed to take up his residence at Caister. His
going thither must have been regarded as an event not only in the
neighbourhood of Yarmouth but even in the city of Norwich. At all
events it was highly important to John Paston, whose advice the old

knight valued in many matters. ‘He saith,’ wrote William Paston to his
brother, ‘ye are the heartiest kinsman and friend that he knoweth. He
would have you at Mauteby 150.3 dwelling.’ This must have been written
in the latter part of July. Sir John did not actually go into Norfolk quite
so soon as he intended; but he appears to have been there by the
beginning of September. 150.4
There in his completed castle of Caister he had at length taken up his
abode, to spend the evening of his days in the place of his birth, and on
the inheritance of his ancestors. There during the next five years he
151
spent his time, counting over the items of a number of unsettled claims
he had against the crown, 151.1 and meditating also, it would seem, on
another account he had with Heaven. For the latter the foundation of a
college 151.2 or religious endowment, in which were to be maintained
‘seven priests and seven poor folk’ at Caister, might possibly liquidate
his debts. But in his transactions with his fellowmen he was certainly
for the most part a creditor, and by no means one of the most generous.
Instances will be found in his letters in abundance showing with what
vehemence (testy old soldier that he was!) he perpetually insisted on
what was due to himself;—how he desired to know the names of those
who would presume to resist his agent, Sir Thomas Howes—how they
should be requited ‘by Blackbeard or Whitebeard, that is to say, by
God or the Devil’; 151.3—how he noted that Sir John Buck had fished
his stanks and helped to break his dam; 151.4 how he had been informed
that at a dinner at Norwich certain gentlemen had used scornful
language about him, and desired to know who they were. 151.5 In this
perpetual self-assertion he seems neither to have been over-indulgent
towards adversaries nor even sufficiently considerate of friends and
dependants. ‘Cruel and vengeable he hath been ever,’ says his own
servant Henry Windsor, ‘and for the most part without pity and
mercy.’ 151.6 So also on the part of his faithful secretary, William
Worcester, we find a complaint of shabby treatment, apparently at this
very time when the household was removed to Caister. To a letter in
which John Paston had addressed him as ‘Master Worcester,’ the latter
replied with a request that he would ‘forget that name of mastership,’
for his position was by no means so greatly improved as to entitle him

to such respect. His salary was not increased by one farthing in
certainty—only ‘wages of household in common, entaunt come nows
plaira’—which apparently means, assured to him only during his
master’s pleasure. When he complained to his master of this, all the
152
satisfaction he obtained was that Sir John expressed a wish he had been
a priest, when he could have rewarded him with a living. 152.1
There are, indeed, in more than one of Worcester’s letters in this
collection symptoms of ill-concealed chagrin and disappointment. Nor
were such feelings unnatural in one who, probably out of regard for an
ill-appreciated hero, had devoted the best energies of his life to the
services of such a master as Fastolf. A native of Bristol, the son of one
er. William Worcester, who lived in St. James’s Bec in that town, he was
descended by the mother’s side from a wealthy family of Coventry,
and often called himself, instead of Worcester, by his mother’s maiden
name of Botoner. Born in the year 1415, he had entered the university
of Oxford in 1432, and been four years a student at Hart Hall, now
Balliol College; after which he had gone into Fastolf’s service. For
many years he had been steward of Sir John’s manor of Castle Combe
in Wiltshire, and MSS. still exist in his handwriting relating to the
holding of manorial courts there. 152.2 He had also been Fastolf’s
secretary in drawing up various statements regarding the wars in
France in vindication of his master’s policy. 152.3 He was a man of
literary tastes, who had already presented some compositions to his
patron. 152.4 Later in life he wrote a book of annals, which is an
important historical authority for the period. It seems to have been
about a year before his master’s death that he set himself assiduously
to learn French, under the tuition of a Lombard named Caroll Giles. 152.5
From this instructor he had purchased several books, and Henry
Windsor suspected he had run himself into debt in consequence. He
had fairly owned to Windsor ‘he would be as glad and as fain of a good
book of French or of poetry, as my master Fastolf would be to purchase
a fair manor.’ 152.6 But he had a special object in view in which a 153
knowledge of this language was important; for he had begun
translating, at Fastolf’s request, from a French version, Cicero’s
treatise de Senectute. This work appears to have been left on his hands

at Sir John Fastolf’s death, and on the 10th of August 1473 he
presented it to his patron’s old friend, Bishop Waynflete, at Esher. ‘Sed
nullum regardum recepi de episcopo’ (but I received no reward from
the bishop), is his melancholy comment on the occasion. 153.1 The work
was ultimately printed by Caxton in 1481. Worcester was an assiduous
collector of information on topics of every description, and a number
of his commonplace books remain at this day. But like many men of
letters after him, he found that industry of this sort may look in vain for
any reward beyond the satisfaction of gratified curiosity. 153.2
Along with the announcement that Sir John Fastolf was about to go
into Norfolk, William Paston informed his brother that the old knight’s
stepson, Stephen Scrope, would reside at Caister along with him. Of
this Stephen Scrope our Letters make not unfrequent mention; but the
leading facts of his history are obtained from other sources. He was the
son of Sir Stephen Scrope, by his wife Lady Milicent, who married
Fastolf after her husband’s death. At the time of this second marriage
of his mother, young Scrope was about ten or twelve years of age, and
being heir to a considerable property, his stepfather had the
management of his affairs during his minority. Bitterly did he complain
154
in after years of the manner in which Sir John had discharged the trust.
According to the unfeeling, mercenary fashion in which such matters
were then managed, Fastolf sold his wardship to Chief-Justice
Gascoigne for 500 marks; ‘through the which sale,’ wrote Scrope at a
later date, ‘I took sickness that kept me a thirteen or fourteen years
[en]suing; whereby I am disfigured in my person and shall be whilst I
live.’ Gascoigne held this wardship for three years, and by right of it
intended to marry Scrope to one of his own daughters; but as the young
lad’s friends thought the match unequal to his fortune, Fastolf bought
the wardship back again. 154.1 Stephen Scrope, however, when he grew
up, was not more grateful for the redemption than for the original sale
of his person. ‘He bought me and sold me as a beast’ (so he writes of
Sir John Fastolf), ‘against all right and law, to mine hurt more than
1000 marks.’ In consequence of the stinginess of his stepfather he was
obliged, on coming of age, to sell a manor which was part of his
inheritance and take service with Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester in

France; by whom, according to his own account, he had some hope of
obtaining restitution of the lordship of the Isle of Man, which had
belonged to his uncle the Earl of Wiltshire in the days of Richard II. But
Sir John Fastolf got him to give up his engagement with the duke and
serve with himself, which he did for several years, to the satisfaction of
both parties. Afterwards, however, on some dispute arising, Scrope
returned to England, when Sir John sent home word that he must pay
for his meat and drink. To do this he was driven to contract a marriage
which, by his own account, was not the most advantageous for himself;
and his stepfather, instead of showing him any compassion, brought an
action against him by which he was deprived of all the little property
that his wife had brought him. 154.2
Of this first wife of Stephen Scrope we know nothing, 154.3 except that 155
she died and left him a daughter some years before we find any
mention of him in the Paston correspondence. His necessities now
compelled him to resort to the same evil system of bargaining in flesh
and blood of which he had complained in his own case. ‘For very
need,’ he writes, ‘I was fain to sell a little daughter I have for much less
than I should have done by possibility,’—a considerable point in his
complaint being evidently the lowness of the price he got for his own
child. It seems that he disposed of her wardship to a knight 155.1 whose
name does not appear; but the terms of the contract became matter of
interest some time afterwards to John Paston and his mother, when
Scrope, who, besides being disfigured in person, was probably not far
from fifty years of age, made an offer for the hand of Paston’s sister
Elizabeth, a girl of about twenty. The proposed match did not take
effect; but it was for some time seriously entertained. Agnes Paston
writes that she found the young lady herself ‘never so willing to none
as she is to him, if it be so that his land stand clear.’ 155.2 The reader will
perhaps think from this expression that the young lady had been pretty
early taught the importance of considering worldly prospects; but there
were other motives which not improbably helped to influence her
judgment. ‘She was never in so great sorrow as she is now-a-days,’
wrote Elizabeth Clere to John Paston, as a reason for concluding the
matter at once with Scrope, if no more desirable suitor presented

himself. Her mother would not allow her to see any visitor, and was
suspicious even of her intercourse with the servants of her own house.
‘And she hath since Easter the most part been beaten once in the week
or twice, and sometimes twice in one day, and her head broken in two
or three places.’ 155.3 Such was the rough domestic discipline to which
even girls in those days were occasionally subjected!
156
Some years certainly elapsed after this before either Stephen Scrope
found a wife or Elizabeth Paston a husband. The former ultimately
married Joan, the daughter of Richard Bingham, judge of the King’s
Bench; the latter was married to Robert Poynings, whom we have
already had occasion to notice as an ally of Jack Cade in 1450, and a
ringleader in other movements a few years later. This second marriage
appears to have taken place about New Year’s Day 1459; 156.1 before
which time we find various other proposals for her hand besides that of
Scrope. 156.2 Among these it may be noted that Edmund, Lord Grey of
Hastings, wrote to her brother to say that he knew a gentleman with
property worth 300 marks (£200) a year to whom she might be
disposed of. No doubt, as in similar cases, this gentleman was a feudal
ward, whose own opinion was the very last that was consulted as to the
lady to whom he should be united. But it is time that we return to the
current of public affairs. 156.3

130.3 W. Worc. In an almanac of that time I find the following
note, which dates the beginning of the king’s illness on the
10th of August:—‘In nocte S. Laurentii Rex infirmatur et
continuavit usque ad Circumcisionem Anni 1455, in p. . . .’
(?) (a word unintelligible at the end). MS. Reg. 13, C. 1.
131.1 W. Worc.

131.2 Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 140-2, 147-9,

154-5.
132.1 Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 163-5.

132.2 Patent Roll, 32 Hen. VI. m. 20. See Appendix to this

Introduction.
132.3 No. 230.

133.1 No. 235.
133.2 Ibid.

134.1 No. 235.

135.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 238-9.

135.2 No. 235.

135.3 Rolls of Parl. vi. 295.

136.1 No. 235.

136.2 Rolls of Parl. v. 238-9.

137.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 239-40.

137.2 Ibid. 240.

138.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 240.

138.2 Ibid. 241.

139.1 Nos. 124, 240.

140.1 Nos. 238, 239.

141.1 No. 239.

141.2 No. 244.

141.3 Apparently Agnes Denyes had taken sanctuary at

Westminster before her imprisonment. The manner in which
Denyes here speaks of her daughter gives us reason to
believe that she was a widow before he married her.
142.1 Nos. 240, 245.

143.1 Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vol. vi. preface, pp.

clxxviii.-ix.
143.2 Rolls of Parl. 240-1.

144.1 Rolls of Parl. 241.

146.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 242.

146.2 Ibid. 243.

146.3 Rolls of Parl. 244-5.

146.4 No. 249.

147.1 No. 247.

147.2 Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 174.
147.3 Rymer, xi. 351. Carte’s Gascon and French Rolls.

147.4 Rolls of Parl. v. 252.

148.1 Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 178, 193-7.

Nos. 247, 249.
148.2 Printed from the original in MS. Cott., Vespasian F. xiii.

fol. 35.
149.1 Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 207.

150.1 Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 217, 218.

150.2 No. 254.

150.3 The manor of Mauteby, which came to John Paston by

his marriage, was only three miles distant from Caister.
150.4 No. 260.

151.1 Nos. 309, 310.

151.2 Nos. 340, 350, 351, 385, 386, 387.

151.3 No. 125.

151.4 Nos. 160, 161.

151.5 No. 272.

151.6 No. 332.

152.1 Nos. 258, 259.

152.2 Add. MS. 28,208, B.M.

152.3 Stevenson’s Wars, ii. [519], sq.

152.4 ‘Stellæ versificatæ pro anno 1440 ad instantiam J.

Fastolfe militis.’ MS. Laud., B. 23 (according to the old
pressmark).
152.5 Letter 370.

152.6 In previous editions it was here remarked:—‘This French

zeal appears to have excited the contempt of some of his
acquaintances—among others of Friar Brackley, who
nicknamed him Colinus Gallicus.’ The discovery of
additional letters, formerly published in a Supplement, but

now incorporated with the series, seems to show that this
was an error, or at all events very doubtful. It is clear from
Letter 404 that a certain ‘W. W.’ and Colinus Gallicus were
different persons (see vol. iii. p. 213, note 3), and the
references to ‘W. W.’ at p. 230 as the knight’s secretary and
one of his executors remove any doubt that we might
otherwise entertain that he was William Worcester. But a new
difficulty arises from that identification, that Friar Brackley
calls ‘W. W.’ an Irishman, which William Worcester was not;
and the references at p. 220 of the same volume would imply
that he was really an Irishman in nationality, and also a one-
eyed man of dark visage. Such may have been Worcester’s
personal appearance; but why was he called an Irishman?
It is with some hesitation that I hazard a new conjecture as
to the person nicknamed Colinus Gallicus; but on comparing
the different passages where that nickname occurs, I am
inclined to think it was meant for Judge Yelverton.
153.1 Itin. 368.

153.2 Tanner’s Bibliotheca. See also a notice of William

Worcester in Retrospective Review, Second Series, ii. 451-4.
154.1 No. 97.

154.2 Scrope’s History of the Manor of Castle Combe, pp. 264-

283. The MSS. formerly at Castle Combe, to which Mr.
Scrope refers in this work, have since been presented by him
and Mr. Lowndes, the present lord of the manor, to the
British Museum. One of them we have reprinted in No. 97.
154.3 She is not unlikely to have been the lady mentioned in

No. 97. ‘Fauconer’s daughter of London, that Sir Reynold
Cobham had wedded.’ This I find need not have been, as I
have stated in a footnote, the widow of Sir Reginald Cobham
of Sterborough, who died in 1446; for there was an earlier
Sir Reginald Cobham, whose widow Elizabeth was married
to William Clifford as early as 1438. (Inquisitions post
mortem, 16 Hen. VI. No. 31.) Thus there is the less difficulty

in attributing Letter 97 to a much earlier date than that
assigned to it by the endorsement.
155.1 Letter 94.

155.2 No. 93.

155.3 No. 94.

156.1 See No. 374.

156.2 Nos. 236, 250, 252.

156.3 We ought not to leave unnoticed one fact in the relations

of Scrope and Fastolf which is much more creditable to both
of them than the disputes above mentioned. In the year 1450,
Scrope translated from the French and dedicated to Sir John,
‘for his contemplation and solace,’ a work entitled Ditz de
Philosophius (Sayings of Philosophers), of which the
original MS. is now in the Harleian Collection, No. 2266.
That Fastolf was a real lover of literature, and encouraged
literary tastes in those about him, there can be no question.

began to exhibit symptoms of mental derangement
text reads “symptons”

on its reassembling.136.2
final . missing

The Strife of Parties
g’s At Christmas, to the great joy of the nation, the king began to recover
. from his sad illness. He woke up, as it were, from a long sleep. So
decidedly had he regained his faculties, that, first, on St. John’s Day
(27th December), he commanded his almoner to ride to Canterbury
with an offering, and his secretary to present another at the shrine of St.
Edward. On the following Monday, the 30th, the queen came to him
and brought with her the infant prince, for whom nearly twelve months
before she had in vain endeavoured to bespeak his notice. What
occurred at that touching interview we know from a letter of Edmund 157

Clere to John Paston, and it would be impossible to wish it recorded in
other words. ‘And then he asked what the Prince’s name was, and the
queen told him “Edward”; and then he held up his hands and thanked
God thereof. And he said he never knew till that time, nor wist what
was said to him, nor wist not where he had been whilst he hath been
sick, till now. And he asked who was godfathers, and the queen told
him; and he was well apaid. And she told him that the cardinal (Kemp)
was dead; and he said he knew never thereof till that time; and he said
one of the wisest lords in this land was dead.’ 157.1
5.
On the 7th of January, Bishop Waynflete and the Prior of St. John’s
were admitted to speak with him, and finding his discourse as clear and
coherent as they had ever known it, on coming out of the audience
chamber they wept for joy. 157.2
Joy was doubtless the prevailing sentiment among all ranks and classes
of people; but there was one to whom the news of the king’s recovery
must have afforded a delight and satisfaction beyond what any one else
—unless it were Queen Margaret—could possibly derive from it. The
Duke of Somerset had now lain in prison more than a year. The day
appointed for his trial had passed away and nothing had been done. It
certainly casts some suspicion upon the even-handed justice of the
Duke of York, that his adversary was thus denied a hearing; but the
fault may have been due, after all, to weakness more than malice. In
cases of treason, when once a trial was instituted against a leading
nobleman, a conviction was, in those days, an absolutely invariable
result; but this made it a thing all the more dangerous to attempt when
it was hopeless to expect the positive sanction of the king. The real
cause, however, why Somerset was not brought to trial can only be a
matter of conjecture. His continued confinement, however harsh, was,
according to the practice of those days, legal; nor was it till six weeks
after the king’s recovery that he was restored to liberty. A new day,
meanwhile, and not a very early one, was fixed for the hearing of
charges against him. On the morrow of All Souls—the 3rd of
November following—he was to appear before the Council. This was 158
determined on the 5th of February. Four lords undertook to give surety
in their own proper persons that he would make his appearance on the

day named; and orders were immediately issued to release him from
confinement. 158.1
On the 4th day of March, he presented himself at a Council held before
the king in his palace at Greenwich. The Duke of York was present,
with ten bishops and twenty temporal peers, among whom were the
Protector’s friend, the Earl of Salisbury, Lord Chancellor, the Earl of
Worcester, Treasurer of England, and the king’s half-brother, the Earl
of Pembroke. His accuser, the Duke of Norfolk, was absent, probably
not without a reason. In presence of the assembled lords, Somerset
then declared that he had been imprisoned without a cause and
confined in the Tower of London one whole year and more than ten
weeks over, and had only been liberated on bail on the 7th of February.
So, as he declared there was no charge made against him for which he
deserved to be confined, he besought the king that his sureties might be
discharged; offering, if any one would accuse him of anything contrary
to his allegiance, that he would be ready at all times to answer
t according to law and like a true knight. His protestations of loyalty
were at once accepted by the king, who thereupon declared that he
knew the duke to be his true and faithful liegeman, and wished it to be
understood that he so reputed him. After this, the mouths of all
adversaries were of course sealed up. The duke’s bail were discharged.
His character was cleared from every insinuation of disloyalty; and
whatever questions might remain between him and the Duke of York
were referred to the arbitration of eight other lords, whose judgment
both parties were bound over in recognisances of 20,000 marks, that
they would abide. 158.2
The significance of all this could not be doubtful. The king’s recovery
had put an end to the Duke of York’s power as Protector, and he was
determined to be guided once more by the counsels of the queen and
Somerset. On the 6th March, York was deprived of the government of 159
Calais which he had undertaken by indenture for seven years. 159.1 On
the 7th, the Great Seal was taken from the Earl of Salisbury and given
to Thomas Bourchier, Archbishop of Canterbury. These changes, or at
least the former, promised little good to the country; and in the
beginning of May we not only find that Calais stood again in imminent

danger of siege, 159.2 but that considerable fears were entertained of an
invasion of England. 159.3 But to the Duke of York they gave cause for
personal apprehension. Notwithstanding the specious appointment of a
tribunal to settle the controversy between him and Somerset, it was
utterly impossible for him to expect anything like an equitable
adjustment. A Council was called at Westminster in the old exclusive
spirit, neither York nor any of his friends being summoned to attend it.
A Great Council was then arranged to meet at Leicester long before the
day on which judgment was to be given by the arbitrators; and it was
feared both by York and his friends, the Earls of Salisbury and
Warwick, that if they ventured to appear there they would find
themselves entrapped. The ostensible ground of the calling of that
council was to provide for the surety of the king’s person; from which
it was fairly to be conjectured that a suspicion of treason was to be
insinuated against persons who were too deservedly popular to be
arrested in London with safety to the Government. 159.4
d his
ake York had by this time retired into the north, and uniting with Salisbury
and Warwick, it was determined by all three that the cause assigned for
the calling of the Council justified them in seeking the king’s presence
with a strong body of followers. On the 20th May they arrived at
Royston, and from thence addressed a letter to Archbishop Bourchier,
as Chancellor, in which they not only repudiated all intention of
disloyalty, but declared that, as the Council was summoned for the
surety of the king’s person, they had brought with them a company of 160
armed followers expressly for his protection. If any real danger was to
be apprehended they were come to do him service; but if their own
personal enemies were abusing their influence with the king to inspire
him with causeless distrust, they were determined to remove unjust
suspicions, and relied on their armed companies for protection to
themselves. Meanwhile they requested the archbishop’s intercession to
explain to Henry the true motives of their conduct. 160.1
Next day they marched on to Ware, and there penned an address to the
king himself, of which copies seem to have been diffused, either at the
time or very shortly afterwards, in justification of their proceedings.
One of these came to the hands of John Paston, and the reader may

consequently peruse the memorial for himself in Volume III. 160.2 In it, as
will be seen, York and his friends again made most urgent protest of
their good intent, and complained grievously of the unfair proceedings
of their enemies in excluding them from the royal presence and
poisoning the king’s mind with doubts of their allegiance. They
declared that they had no other intent in seeking the king’s presence
than to prove themselves his true liegemen by doing him all the service
in their power; and they referred him further to a copy of their letter to
the archbishop, which they thought it well to forward along with their
memorial, as they had not been informed that he had shown its
contents to the king.
In point of fact, neither the letter to the archbishop nor the memorial to
the king himself was allowed to come to Henry’s hands. The
archbishop, indeed, had done his duty, and on receipt of the letter to
himself had sent it on, with all haste, to Kilburn, where his messenger
overtook the king on his way northwards from London. But the man
was not admitted into the royal presence; for the Duke of Somerset and
his friends were determined the Yorkists should not be heard, that their
advance might wear as much as possible the aspect of a rebellion. York
and his allies accordingly marched on from Ware to St. Albans, where
they arrived at an early hour on the morning of the 22nd. Meanwhile
the king, who had left London the day before, accompanied by the 161
Dukes of Buckingham and Somerset, his half-brother, Jasper Tudor,
Earl of Pembroke, the Earls of Northumberland, Devonshire, Stafford,
Dorset, and Wiltshire, and a number of other lords, knights, and
gentlemen, amounting in all to upwards of 2000, arrived at the very
same place just before them, having rested at Watford the previous
night. Anticipating the approach of the Duke of York, the king and his
friends occupied the suburb of St. Peter’s, which lay on that side of the
town by which the duke must necessarily come. The duke accordingly,
and the Earls of Salisbury and Warwick, drew up their forces in the
Keyfield, outside the barriers of the town. From seven in the morning
till near ten o’clock the two hosts remained facing each other without a
blow being struck; during which time the duke and the two earls, still
endeavouring to obtain a peaceful interview with the king, petitioned

to have an answer to their memorial of the preceding day. They were
told in reply that it had not been received by the king, on which they
made new and more urgent representations. At first, it would seem,
they demanded access to the royal presence to declare and justify their
true intentions; but when this could not be obtained, they made a still
more obnoxious request. They insisted that certain persons whom they
would accuse of treason should be delivered into their hands,
reminding the king, as respectfully as the fact could be alluded to, that
past experience would not permit them to trust to a mere promise on
his part that a traitor should be kept in confinement. 161.1
For the answer made to this demand, and for the details of the battle
which ensued, we may as well refer the reader to the very curious
paper (No. 283) from which we have already derived most of the
above particulars. We are not here writing the history of the times, and
it may be sufficient for us to say that York and his friends were
St. completely victorious. The action lasted only half an hour. The Duke of
Somerset was slain, and with him the Earl of Northumberland, Lords
Clifford and Clinton, with about 400 persons of inferior rank, as the 162
numbers were at first reported. This, however, seems to have been an
over-estimate. 162.1 The king himself was wounded by an arrow in the
neck, and, after the engagement, was taken prisoner; while the Earl of
Wiltshire, and the Duke of York’s old enemy, Thorpe, fled
disgracefully. When all was over, the duke with the two earls came
humbly and knelt before the king, beseeching his forgiveness for what
they had done in his presence, and requesting him to acknowledge
them as his true liegemen, seeing that they had never intended to do
him personal injury. To this Henry at once agreed, and took them once
more into favour. 162.2
Thus again was effected ‘a change of ministry’—by sharper and more
violent means than had formerly been employed, but certainly by the
only means which had now become at all practicable. The government
of Somerset was distinctly unconstitutional. The deliberate and
systematic exclusion from the king’s councils of a leading peer of the
realm—of one who, by mere hereditary right, quite apart from natural
capacity and fitness, was entitled at any time to give his advice to

royalty, was a crime that could not be justified. For conduct very
similar the two Spencers had been banished by Parliament in the days
of Edward II.; and if it had been suffered now to remain unpunished,
there would not have existed the smallest check upon arbitrary
government and intolerable maladministration.
Such, we may be well assured, was the feeling of the city of London,
which on the day following the battle received the victors in triumph
with a general procession. 162.3 The Duke of York conducted the king to
the Bishop of London’s palace, and a council being assembled, writs
were sent out for a Parliament to meet on the 9th of July following. 162.4
Meanwhile the duke was made Constable of England, and Lord
Bourchier, Treasurer. The defence of Calais was committed to the Earl
of Warwick. 162.5 There was, however, no entire and sweeping change163
made in the officers of state. The Great Seal was allowed to continue in
the hands of Archbishop Bourchier.
It remained, however, for Parliament to ratify what had been done.
However justifiable in a moral point of view, the conduct of York and
his allies wore an aspect of violence towards the sovereign, which
made it necessary that its legality should be investigated by the highest
court in the realm. Inquiry was made both in Parliament and by the
king’s Council which of the lords about the king had been responsible
for provoking the collision. Angry and unpleasant feelings, as might be
expected, burst out in consequence. The Earl of Warwick accused Lord
Cromwell to the king, and when the latter attempted to vindicate
himself, swore that what he stated was untrue. So greatly was Lord
Cromwell intimidated, that the Earl of Shrewsbury, at his request, took
up his lodging at St. James’s, beside the Mews, for his protection. The
retainers of York, Warwick, and Salisbury went about fully armed, and
kept their lords’ barges on the river amply furnished with weapons.
Proclamations, however, were presently issued against bearing arms.
The Parliament, at last, laid the whole blame of the encounter upon the
deceased Duke of Somerset, and the courtiers Thorpe and Joseph; and
by an Act which received the royal assent, it was declared that the
Duke of York and his friends had acted the part of good and faithful
subjects. ‘To the which bill,’ said Henry Windsor in a letter to his

friends Bocking and Worcester, ‘many a man grudged full sore now it
is past’; but he requested them to burn a communication full of such
uncomfortable matter to comment upon as the quarrels and
heartburnings of lords. 163.1

entar But with whatever grudge it may have been that Parliament condoned
ns. the acts of the Yorkists, it seems not to have been without some degree
of pressure that the duke and his allies obtained a Parliament so much
after their own minds. Here, for instance, we have the Duchess of
Norfolk writing to John Paston, just before the election, that it was
thought necessary ‘that my lord have at this time in the Parliament
such persons as long unto him and be of his menial servants (!)’; on
which account she requests his vote and influence in favour of John 164
Howard and Sir Roger Chamberlain. 164.1 The application could scarcely
have been agreeable to the person to whom it was addressed; for it
seems that John Paston himself had on this occasion some thought of
coming forward as a candidate for Norfolk. Exception was taken to
John Howard, one of the duke’s nominees (who, about eight-and-
twenty years later, was created Duke of Norfolk himself, and was the
ancestor of the present ducal family), on the ground that he possessed
no lands within the county; 164.2 and at the nomination the names of
Berney, Grey, and Paston were received with great favour. 164.3 John
Jenney thought it ‘an evil precedent for the shire that a strange man
should be chosen, and no worship to my lord of York nor to my lord of
Norfolk to write for him; for if the gentlemen of the shire will suffer
such inconvenience, in good faith the shire shall not be called of such
worship as it hath been.’ So unpopular, in fact, was Howard’s
candidature that the Duke of Norfolk was half persuaded to give him
up, declaring, that since his return was objected to he would write to
the under-sheriff that the shire should have free election, provided they
did not choose Sir Thomas Tuddenham or any of the old adherents of
the Duke of Suffolk. And so, for a time it seemed as if free election
would be allowed. The under-sheriff even ventured to write to John
Paston that he meant to return his name and that of Master Grey;
‘nevertheless,’ he added significantly, ‘I have a master.’ Howard
appeared to be savage with disappointment. He was ‘as wode’ (i.e.

mad), wrote John Jenney, ‘as a wild bullock.’ But in the end it
appeared he had no need to be exasperated, for when the poll came to
be taken, he and the other nominee of the Duke of Norfolk were found
to have gained the day. 164.4
Besides the act of indemnity for the Duke of York and his partisans,
and a new oath of allegiance being sworn to by the Lords, little was
done at this meeting of the Parliament. On the 31st July it was
prorogued, to meet again upon the 12th November. But in the interval
another complication had arisen. The king, who seems to have suffered
in health from the severe shock that he must have received by the 165
battle of St. Albans, 165.1 had felt the necessity of retirement to recover
his composure, and had withdrawn before the meeting of Parliament to
Hertford; at which time the Duke of York, in order to be near him, took
up his quarters at the Friars at Ware. 165.2 He was well, or at all events
well enough to open Parliament in person on the 9th July; but shortly
afterwards he retired to Hertford again, where according to the dates of
g his Privy Seals, I find that he remained during August and September.
In the month of October following he was still there, and it was
reported that he had fallen sick of his old infirmity;—which proved to
be too true. 165.3
Altogether matters looked gloomy enough. Change of ministry by
force of arms, whatever might be said for it, was not a thing to win the
confidence either of king or people. There were prophecies bruited
about that another battle would take place before St. Andrew’s Day—
the greatest that had been since the battle of Shrewsbury in the days of
Henry IV. One Dr. Green ventured to predict it in detail. The scene of
the conflict was to be between the Bishop of Salisbury’s Inn and
Westminster Bars, and three bishops and four temporal lords were to
be among the slain. The Londoners were spared this excitement; but
from the country there came news of a party outrage committed by the
eldest son of the Earl of Devonshire, on a dependant of the Lord
nces Bonvile, and the West of England seems to have been disturbed for
est. some time afterwards. 165.4 From a local MS. chronicle cited by
Holinshed, it appears that a regular pitched battle took place between
the two noblemen on Clist Heath, about two miles from Exeter, in

which Lord Bonvile having gained the victory, entered triumphantly
into the city. A modern historian of Exeter, however, seems to have
read the MS. differently, and tells us that Lord Bonvile was driven into
the city by defeat. 165.5 However this may be, the Earl of Devonshire did
not allow the matter to rest. Accompanied by a large body of retainers166
—no less, it is stated, than 800 horse and 4000 foot—he attacked the
Dean and Canons of Exeter, made several of the latter prisoners, and
robbed the cathedral. 166.1
That one out of the number of those great lords who had been attached
to the government of the queen and the Duke of Somerset should thus
have abused his local influence, was pretty much what might have
been expected at such a juncture. But the effect was only to strengthen
the hands of York when Parliament met again in November. The
situation was now once more what it had been in the beginning of the
previous year. The day before Parliament met, the Duke of York
obtained a commission to act as the king’s lieutenant on its
assembling. 166.2 The warrant for the issuing of this commission was
signed by no less than thirty-nine Lords of the Council. The Houses
then met under the presidency of the duke. 166.3 The Commons sent a
deputation to the Upper House, to petition the Lords that they would
‘be good means to the King’s Highness’ for the appointment of some
person to undertake the defence of the realm and the repressing of
disorders. But for some days this request remained unanswered. The
appeal was renewed by the Commons a second time, and again a third
time, with an intimation that no other business would be attended to till
ain it was answered. On the second occasion the Lords named the Duke of
r. York Protector, but he desired that they would excuse him, and elect
some other. The Lords, however, declined to alter their choice, and the
duke at last agreed to accept the office, on certain specific conditions
which experience had taught him to make still more definite for his
own protection than those on which he had before insisted. Among
other things it was now agreed that the Protectorship should not again
be terminated by the mere fact of the king’s recovery; but that when
167
the king should be in a position to exercise his functions, the Protector

should be discharged of his office in Parliament by the advice of the
Lords Spiritual and Temporal. 167.1
On the 19th of November, accordingly, York was formally appointed
Protector for the second time. Three days afterwards, at Westminster,
the king, whose infirmity on this occasion could scarcely have
amounted to absolute loss of his faculties, committed the entire
government of the kingdom to his Council, merely desiring that they
would inform him of anything they might think fit to determine
touching the honour and surety of his person. 167.2 The business of the
nation was again placed on something like a stable and satisfactory
footing; and Parliament, after sitting till the 13th December, was
prorogued to the 14th January, in order that the Duke of York might go
down into the west for the repressing of those disorders of which we
have already spoken. 167.3
6.
Unluckily, things did not remain long in a condition so hopeful for the
restoration of order. Early in the following year the king recovered his
health, and notwithstanding the support of which he had been assured
in Parliament, York knew that his authority as Protector would be taken
from him. On the 9th of February, as we learn from a letter of John
Bocking, it had been anticipated that he would have received his
discharge in Parliament; but he was allowed to retain office for a
fortnight longer. On that day he and Warwick thought fit to come to the
Parliament with a company of 300 armed men, alleging that they stood
in danger of being waylaid upon the road. The pretence does not seem
to have been generally credited; and the practical result of this
demonstration was simply to prevent any other lords from going to the
Parliament at all. 167.4
The real question, however, which had to be considered was the kind
of government that should prevail when York was no more Protector.
The queen was again making anxious efforts to get the management of
affairs into her own hands; but the battle of St. Albans had deprived her
of her great ally the Duke of Somerset, and there was no one now to
fill his place. It is true he had left a son who was now Duke of 168
Somerset in his stead, and quite as much attached to her interests.

There were, moreover, the Duke of Buckingham and others who were
by no means friendly to the Duke of York. But no man possessed
anything like the degree of power, experience, and political ability to
enable the king to dispense entirely with the services of his present
Protector. The king himself, it was said, desired that he should be
named his Chief Councillor and Lieutenant, and that powers should be
conferred upon him by patent inferior only to those given him by the
Parliament. But this was not thought a likely settlement, and no one
really knew what was to be the new régime. The attention of the Lords
was occupied with ‘a great gleaming star’ which had just made its
appearance, and which really offered as much help to the solution of
the enigma as any appearances purely mundane and political. 168.1
At length on the 25th of February the Lords exonerated York from his
duties as Protector; soon after which, if not on the same day,
Parliament must have been dissolved. 168.2 An Act of Resumption,
ed. rendered necessary by the state of the revenue, was the principal fruit
of its deliberations. 168.3 The finances of the kingdom were placed, if not
in a sound, at least in a more hopeful condition than before; and
Parliament and the Protector were both dismissed, without, apparently,
the slightest provision being made for the future conduct of affairs.
Government, in fact, seems almost to have fallen into abeyance. There
is a most striking blank in the records of the Privy Council from the
end of January 1456 to the end of November 1457. That some councils
were held during this period we know from other evidences; 168.4 but
with the exception of one single occasion, when it was necessary to 169
issue a commission for the trial of insurgents in Kent, 169.1 there is not a
single record left to tell us what was done at them.
Yet the machine of state still moved, no one could tell exactly how.
Acts were done in the king’s name if not really and truly by the king,
and by the sheer necessity of the case York appears to have had the
ordering of all things. But his authority hung by a thread. His acts were
without the slightest legal validity except in so far as they might be
considered as having the sanction of the king; and in whatever way that
sanction may or may not have been expressed, there was no security
that it would not afterwards be withdrawn and disavowed.

And so indeed it happened at this time in a matter that concerned
deeply the honour of the whole country. The outbreak of civil war had
provoked the interference of an enemy of whom Englishmen were
always peculiarly intolerant. The Duke of Somerset slain at St. Albans
was uncle to James II., the reigning king of Scotland, who is said to
g of have resented his death on the ground of consanguinity. In less than six
weeks after the battle, ‘the King of Scots with the red face,’ as he is
called in a contemporary chronicle, laid siege to Berwick both by water
and land. But the Bishop of Durham, the Earl of Northumberland, and
other Lords of the Marches, took prompt measures for the relief of the
town, and soon assembled such a force as to compel James not only to
quit the siege but to leave all his ordnance and victuals behind him. 169.2
How matters stood between the two countries during the next ten
months we have no precise information; but it is clear that England,
although the injured party, could not have been anxious to turn the
occasion into one of open rupture. Peace still continued to be preserved
till, on the 10th of May 1456, James wrote to the King of England by
Lyon herald, declaring that the truce of 1453 was injurious to his
kingdom, and that unless more favourable conditions were conceded to
him he would have recourse to arms. 169.3 A message more calculated170 to
fire the spirit of the English nation it would have been impossible for
James to write; nevertheless, owing either to Henry’s love of peace, or
to his lack of advisers after his own mind, it was not till the 26th of
July that any answer was returned to it. On that day the Duke of York
obtained, or took, the liberty of replying in Henry’s name. To the
insolence of the King of Scots, he opposed all the haughtiness that
might have been expected from the most warlike of Henry’s ancestors.
Insisting to the fullest extent on those claims of feudal superiority
which England never had abandoned and Scotland never had
acknowledged, he told James that his conduct was mere insolence and
treason in a vassal against his lord; that it inspired not the slightest
dread but only contempt on the part of England; and that measures
would be speedily taken to punish his presumption. 170.1
A month later the Duke of York addressed a letter to James in his own
name, declaring that as he understood the Scotch king had entered

England, he purposed to go and meet him. He at the same time
reproached James with conduct unworthy of one who was ‘called a
mighty Prince and a courageous knight,’ in making daily forays and
suddenly retiring again. 170.2 The end of this expedition we do not know;
but we know that not long afterwards Henry changed his policy. The
letter written by the Duke of York in the king’s name was regularly
enrolled on the Scotch Roll among the records of Chancery; but to it
was prefixed a note on the king’s behalf, disclaiming responsibility for
its tenor, and attributing to the duke the usurpation of authority, and the
disturbance of all government since the time of Jack Cade’s
insurrection. 170.3
The glimpses of light which we have on the political situation during
this period are far from satisfactory. Repeated notice, however, is taken
in these letters of a fact which seems significant of general distrust and
mutual suspicion among the leading persons in the land. The king,
queen, and lords were all separated and kept carefully at a distance
from each other. Thus, while the king was at Sheen, the queen and her 171
infant prince were staying at Tutbury, the Duke of York at Sandal, and
the Earl of Warwick at Warwick. 171.1 Afterwards we find the queen
removed to Chester, while the Duke of Buckingham was at Writtle,
near Chelmsford in Essex. The only lord with the king at Sheen was
his half-brother the Earl of Pembroke. His other brother, the Earl of
Richmond, who died in the course of this year, was in Wales making
war upon some chieftain of the country whose name seems rather
ambiguous. ‘My Lord [of] York,’ it is said, ‘is at Sendall still, and
waiteth on the queen, and she on him.’ 171.2 The state of matters was
evidently such that it was apprehended serious outrages might break
out; and reports were even spread abroad of a battle in which Lord
Beaumont had been slain and the Earl of Warwick severely
wounded. 171.3
g and
The separation of the king and queen is especially remarkable. During
May and June they were more than a hundred miles apart; and in the
latter month the queen had increased the distance by removing from
Tutbury in Staffordshire to Chester. It was then that she was said to be
waiting on my Lord of York and he on her. The exact interpretation of

the position must be partly matter of conjecture, but I take it to be as
follows. The Duke of York, as we find stated only a few months later,
was in very good favour with the king but not with the queen; 171.4 and
we know from Fabyan that the latter was at this time doing all she
could to put an end to his authority. It appears to me that by her
influence the duke must have been ordered to withdraw from the
Court, and that to prevent his again seeking access to the king’s
presence, she pursued him into the north. At Tutbury 171.5 she would
block his way from Sandal up to London; and though for some reason
or other she removed further off to Chester, she still kept an anxious
watch upon the duke, and he did the same on her. Very probably her
removal did give him the opportunity she dreaded of moving
southwards; for he must have been with the king at Windsor on the 172
26th of July when he wrote in Henry’s name that answer to the King of
Scots of which we have already spoken.
However this may be, Margaret soon after had recourse to other means
to effect her object. In consequence of the Duke of York’s popularity in
London, it was expedient to remove the king some distance from the
capital. 172.1 He appears to have been staying at Windsor during July and
the beginning of August. In the middle of the latter month he took his
departure northwards. By the dates of his Privy Seals we find him to
have been at Wycombe on the 18th, at Kenilworth on the 24th, and at
Lichfield on the 29th. In September he moved about between
Lichfield, Coventry, and Leicester; but by the beginning of October the
Court seems to have settled itself at Coventry, where a council was
assembled on the 7th. 172.2 To this council the Duke of York and his
friends were regularly summoned, as well as the lords whom the queen
intended to honour; but even before it met, changes had begun to be
made in the principal officers of state. On the 5th, Viscount Bourchier,
the brother of the Archbishop of Canterbury, was dismissed from his
office of Lord Treasurer, and the Earl of Shrewsbury was appointed in
his room. On the 11th, the archbishop himself was called upon to
surrender the Great Seal, and Waynflete, Bishop of Winchester, was
made Chancellor in his stead. Laurence Booth, afterwards Bishop of
Durham, was made Lord Privy Seal.

The new appointments seem to have been on their own merits
unexceptionable,—that of Waynflete more especially. Whether the
superiority of the new men was such as to make it advisable to
supersede the old is another question, on which we would not attempt
to pronounce an opinion, either one way or other. One thing, however,
we may believe on the evidence of James Gresham, whose letters
frequently give us very interesting political intelligence: the changes
created dissatisfaction in some of the queen’s own friends, particularly
in the Duke of Buckingham, who was half-brother to two of the
discharged functionaries, the Archbishop of Canterbury and Viscount173
Bourchier. Either from this cause or from a mere English love of fair-
play, it would appear that Buckingham now supported the Duke of
York, who, it is said, though at this time he had some interviews with
the king and found Henry still as friendly as he could desire, would
certainly have been troubled at his departure if Buckingham had not
befriended him. About the Court there was a general atmosphere of
suspicion and distrust. On the 11th October, the very day on which
Waynflete was appointed Chancellor, an encounter took place between
the Duke of Somerset’s men and the watchmen of the city of Coventry,
in which two or three of the citizens were killed. And probably it
would have gone hard with the duke’s retainers, had not Buckingham
used his good offices here too as peacemaker; for the alarm-bell rang
and the citizens rose in arms. But by the interposition of Buckingham
the tumult was appeased. 173.1
7.
For about a twelvemonth from this time we find that the Court
continued generally at Coventry, 173.2 occasionally moving about to
Stafford, Coleshill, Chester, Shrewsbury, Kenilworth, Hereford, and
Leicester. 173.3 The queen evidently feared all the while to bring her
husband nearer London, lest he should fall once more under the power
of the Duke of York. Meanwhile the want of a vigorous ruler became
every day more apparent. Not only was Calais again in danger of
siege, 173.4 but the coast of Kent was attacked by enemies, and within
the kingdom a dangerous spirit of disaffection had shown itself in
various places. On the Patent Rolls we meet with numerous
commissions for keeping watch upon the coasts, 173.5 for arraying the

country against invasion, 173.6 and for assembling the posse comitatus in
various counties, against treasonable attempts to stir up the people. 173.7
During April the Court had removed to Hereford, 174.1 apparently in 174
consequence of some disturbances which had taken place in Wales
under Sir William Herbert. Its sojourn upon the Welsh borders had an
excellent effect, the burgesses and gentlemen about Hereford all
declaring themselves ready to take the king’s part unless a peace were
made. On the 1st of May it was reported in London that Herbert had
offered, on being granted his life and goods, to return to his allegiance
and appear before the king and lords at Leicester; so we may conclude
the insurrection did not last long after. 174.2
But though the personal influence of the king was doubtless great and
beneficial within his own immediate vicinity, it could do little for the
good order and protection of the country generally. Distrust,
exclusiveness, and a bankrupt exchequer were not likely to obtain for
the king willing and hearty service. Notwithstanding the commissions
issued to keep watch upon the coasts, the French managed to surprise
nch and plunder Sandwich. On Sunday, the 28th August, a large force
under the command of Pierre de Brézé, seneschal of Normandy, landed
h.
not far from the town, which they took and kept possession of during
the entire day. A number of the inhabitants, on the first alarm, retreated
on board some ships lying in the harbour, from whence they began
presently to shoot at the enemy. But de Brézé having warned them that
if they continued he would burn their ships, they found it prudent to
leave off. Having killed the bailiffs and principal officers, the
Frenchmen carried off a number of wealthy persons as prisoners, and
returned to their ships in the evening, laden with valuable spoils from
the town and neighbourhood. 174.3
The disaster must have been keenly felt; but if Englishmen had known
the whole truth, it would have been felt more keenly still. Our own old
historians were not aware of the fact, but an early French chronicler 175
who lived at the time assures us that the attack had been purposely
invited by Margaret of Anjou out of hatred to the Duke of York, in
order to make a diversion, while the Scots should ravage England! 175.1
It was well for her that the truth was not suspected.

157.1 No. 270.
157.2 Ibid.

158.1 Rymer, xi. 361.

158.2 Ibid. 362, 363.

159.1 Rymer, xi. 363.

159.2 Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 234-8.

159.3 On the Patent Roll, 33. Hen. VI. p. 19 d., is a commission

dated 5th May, for keeping watch on the coast of Kent
against invasion.
159.4 Rolls of Parl. v. 280-1.

160.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 280-1.

160.2 No. 282.

161.1 No. 283. Rolls of Parl. v. 281-2.

162.1 John Crane, writing from Lambeth on Whitsunday, three

days after the battle, says, ‘at most six score.’ No. 285.
Another authority says, ‘60 persons of gentlemen and other.’
English Chronicle, ed. Davies, p. 72.
162.2 Nos. 283, 284, 285.

162.3 No. 284.

162.4 No. 283.

162.5 No. 285.

163.1 No. 299.

164.1 No. 288.

164.2 Nos. 294, 295.

164.3 No. 291.

164.4 No. 295.

165.1 See Rymer, xi. 366.

165.2 No. 287.

165.3 No. 303.

165.4 No. 303. See also a brief account of the same affair in W.
Worcester’s Itinerary, p. 114.
165.5 Jenkins’s History of Exeter, p. 78.

166.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 285. It may be observed that the

bishopric was at this time vacant, and the dean, whose name
was John Hals, had received a papal provision to be the new
bishop, but was forced to relinquish it in favour of George
Nevill, son of the Earl of Salisbury, a young man of only
three-and-twenty years of age. Godwin de Præsulibus. Le
Neve’s Fasti. Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 265.
166.2 Rolls of Parl. v. 285.

166.3 Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 262.

167.1 Rolls of Parl. v. 285-7.

167.2 Ibid. v. 288-90.

167.3 Ibid. 321.

167.4 No. 322.

168.1 No. 322.

168.2 Rolls of Parl. v. 321.

168.3 Ibid. 300. A more sweeping bill for this purpose, which

was rejected by the Lords, states that the revenue was so
encumbered ‘that the charge of every sheriff in substance
exceedeth so far the receipt of the revenues thereof due and
leviable to you (i.e. the king), that no person of goodwill dare
take upon him to be sheriff in any shire, for the most party, in
this land.’ Ibid. 328. Additional illustrations of this fact will
be found in Nicolas’s Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 263-4,
272-3, and Preface lxxv-vi.
168.4 Nos. 334, 345, 348.

169.1 Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 287.

169.2 Three Fifteenth Century Chronicles, 70 (edited by me for

the Camden Society): Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 248-9.
169.3 Lambeth MS. 211, f. 146 b.

170.1 Lambeth MS. 211, f. 147. Rymer, xi. 383.
170.2 Lambeth MS. 211, f. 148. This letter is dated 24th August

1456.
170.3 Rymer, xi. 383.

171.1 Nos. 330, 331.

171.2 No. 334.

171.3 No. 331.

171.4 No. 348.

171.5 Tutbury was one of the possessions given to her for her

dower. Rolls of Parl. vi. 118.
172.1 Fabyan.

172.2 No. 345.

173.1 No. 348.

173.2 Accounts of the pageants shown before Queen Margaret

at Coventry are noticed as contained in the earliest Leet
Book of the City. See Historical MSS. Commission Report I.,
100.
173.3 Privy Seals in Public Record Office.

173.4 No. 356.

173.5 Patent Roll, 35 Hen. VI. p. 1 m. 16 d. (26 Nov.); m. 7 d.

(19 May).
173.6 Ibid. p. 2 m. 5 d. (29 Aug.).

173.7 Ibid. (18 July).

174.1 No. 356. There are Privy Seals dated at Hereford

between the 1st and the 23rd of April.
174.2 No. 356. By the 4th of May the king had left Hereford

and gone to Worcester, from which he proceeded to
Winchcombe on the 10th and Kenilworth on the 13th. (Privy
Seal dates.)
174.3 English Chronicle (Davies), 74. Three Fifteenth Century

Chronicles, 70, 71, 152-3. Contin. of Monstrelet, 70, 71.

175.1 De Coussy, 209.

Earl of Warwick severely wounded.171.3
text has superfluous close quote

Reconciliation and Civil War
At length, it would seem, the Court found it no longer possible to
remain at a distance from the metropolis. In October the king had
removed to Chertsey, 175.2 and soon after we find him presiding at a
Great Council, which had been summoned to meet in his palace at
Westminster in consequence of the urgent state of affairs. Though
attended not only by the Duke of York, but by a large number of the
principal lords on both sides, the meeting does not appear to have led
to any very satisfactory results. All that we know of its proceedings is
that some of them, at least, were of a stormy character,—one point on
which all parties were agreed being the exclusion from the council
chamber of Pecock, Bishop of Chichester, an ardent and honest-
minded prelate, who, having laboured hard to reconcile the Lollards to
the authority of the Church by arguments of common sense instead of
persecution, was at this time stigmatised as a heretic and sedition-
monger, and very soon after was deprived of his bishopric. It augured
little good for that union of parties which was now felt to be necessary
for the public weal, that the first act on which men generally could be
got to agree was the persecution of sense and reason. There were other
matters before the council on which they were unable to come to a
conclusion, and they broke up on the 29th November, with a resolution
to meet again on the 27th January; for which meeting summonses were
at once sent out, notifying that on that day not one of the lords would
be excused attendance. 175.3
176
It was, indeed, particularly important that this meeting should be a full
one, and that every lord should be compelled to take his share of the
responsibility for its decisions. The principal aim was expressly stated
to be a general reconciliation and adjustment of private

controversies 176.1—an object to which it was impossible to offer direct
opposition. But whether it was really distasteful to a number of the
peers, or obstacles started up in individual cases, there were certainly
several who had not arrived in town by the day appointed for the
8. meeting. The Earl of Salisbury’s excuse, dated at Sheriff Hutton on the
24th of January, 176.2 does not refer to this, for it appears certainly to be
of a different year. Fabyan says that he had already arrived in London
on the 15th January. He made his appearance there at the head of 400
horse, with eighty knights and squires in his company. The Duke of
York also came, though he arrived only on the 26th, ‘with his own
household only, to the number of 140 horse.’ But the Duke of Somerset
only arrived on the last day of the month with 200 horse; the Duke of
Exeter delayed his coming till the first week of February; and the Earl
of Warwick, who had to come from Calais, was detained by contrary
winds. Thus, although the king had come up to Westminster by the
time prefixed, a full Council could not be had for at least some days
after; and even on the 14th of February there was one absentee, the
Earl of Arundel, who had to be written to by letters of Privy Seal. 176.3

in But by the 14th Warwick had arrived in London with a body of 600
men, ‘all apparelled in red jackets, with white ragged staves.’ 176.4 The
town was now full of the retinues of the different noblemen, and the
mayor and sheriffs trembled for the peace of the city. A very special
watch was instituted. ‘The mayor,’ says Fabyan, ‘for so long as the
king and the lords lay thus in the city, had daily in harness 5000
citizens, and rode daily about the city and suburbs of the same, to see
that the king’s peace were kept; and nightly he provided for 3000 men
in harness to give attendance upon three aldermen, and they to keep 177 the
night-watch till 7 of the clock upon the morrow, till the day-watch were
assembled.’ If peace was to be the result of all this concourse, the
settlement evidently could not bear to be protracted. The Duke of York
and the Earls of Salisbury and Warwick had taken up their quarters
within the city itself; but the young lords whose fathers had been slain
at St. Albans—the Duke of Somerset, the Earl of Northumberland and
his brother, Lord Egremont, and the Lord Clifford—were believed to
be bent upon revenge, and the civic authorities refused them entrance

within their bounds. 177.1 Thus the lords within the town and those
without belonged to the two opposite parties respectively; and in
consequence of their mutual jealousies, conferences had to be arranged
between them in the morning at the Black Friars, and in the afternoon
at the White Friars, in Fleet Street. 177.2 The king, for his part, having
opened the proceedings with some very earnest exhortations addressed
to both parties, withdrew himself and retired to Berkhampstead. 177.3
The Duke of Somerset and others went to and fro to consult with him
during the deliberations. Meanwhile the necessity of some practical
arrangement for government must have been felt more urgent every
day. Sixty sail of Frenchmen were seen off the coast of Sussex; and
though Lord Falconbridge was at Southampton in command of some
vessels (probably on his own responsibility), there was a general
feeling of insecurity among the merchants and among dwellers by the
sea-coast. Botoner had heard privately from Calais that the French
meditated a descent upon Norfolk at Cromer and Blakeney. 177.4 And the
news shortly afterwards received from the district showed that his
information was not far wrong. 177.5
f
nt. At last it was agreed on both sides that old animosities should be laid
aside, and that some reparation should be made by the Yorkists to the
sons and widows of the lords who had fallen on the king’s side at St.
Albans. The exact amount of this reparation was left to the award of
Henry, who decided that it should consist of an endowment of £45 a
year to the Monastery of St. Albans, to be employed in masses for the 178
slain, and of certain money payments, or assignments out of moneys
due to them by the Crown, to be made by York, Warwick, and
Salisbury, to Eleanor, Duchess Dowager of Somerset and to her son,
Duke Henry, to Lord Clifford, and others, in lieu of all claims and
actions which the latter parties might have against the former. 178.1 With
what cordiality this arrangement was accepted on either side we do not
presume to say. Historians universally speak of it as a hollow concord,
unreal from the first. But it at least preserved the kingdom in
something like peace for about a twelvemonth. It was celebrated by a
great procession to St. Paul’s on Lady Day, which must have been an
imposing spectacle. The king marched in royal habit with the crown

upon his head, York and the queen followed, arm in arm, and the
principal rivals led the way, walking hand in hand. 178.2
ght.
The keeping of the sea was now intrusted to the Earl of Warwick, and
it was not long before he distinguished himself by an action which
probably relieved the English coasts for some time from any
immediate danger of being attacked by the enemy. On the morning of
Trinity Sunday word was brought to him at Calais of a fleet of 28
Spaniards, of which 16 were described as ‘great ships of forecastle.’
Immediately he manned such vessels as he had in readiness, and went
out to seek the enemy. The force at his command was only five ships of
forecastle, three carvels, and four pinnaces; but with these he did not
hesitate to come to an engagement. At four o’clock on Monday
morning the battle began, and it continued till ten, when the English
obtained a hard-won victory. ‘As men say,’ wrote one of the
combatants, ‘there was not so great a battle upon the sea this forty
winter; and forsooth, we were well and truly beat.’ Nevertheless, six of
the enemy’s ships were taken, and the rest were put to flight, not
without very considerable slaughter on either side. 178.3
9. 179
In the year following, the fire that had for some time smouldered, burst
once more into a flame. About Candlemas, according to Fabyan—but
an older authority says specifically on the 9th November preceding 179.1
—a fray occurred between one of the king’s servants and one of the
Earl of Warwick’s, as the earl, who had been attending the Council at
Westminster, was proceeding to his barge. The king’s servant being
wounded, the other made his escape; but a host of retainers attached to
the royal household rushed out upon the earl and his attendants, and
wounded several of them before they could embark. With hard rowing
they got beyond the power of their assailants and made their way into
the city; but the queen and her friends insisted on imputing the outrage
to the earl himself, and demanded his arrest. The earl found it politic to
retire to Warwick, and afterwards to his former post at Calais. On this
the queen and her council turned their machinations against his father,
the Earl of Salisbury, whom Lord Audley was commissioned to arrest
and bring prisoner to London. Audley accordingly took with him a
large body of men, and hearing that the earl was on his way from

Middleham in Yorkshire, journeying either towards Salisbury or
r London, he hastened to intercept him. The earl, however, had received
. notice of what was intended, and having gathered about him a
sufficient band of followers, defeated Lord Audley in a regular pitched
battle at Bloreheath in Staffordshire, where he attempted to stop his
way, on Sunday the 23rd of September. 179.2
The old elements of confusion were now again let loose. Commissions
to raise men were issued in the king’s name, and the Duke of York and
all his friends were denounced as a confederacy of traitors. They, for180
their parts, gathered together the men of the Marches in self-defence.
At Ludlow, the duke was joined by the Earl of Salisbury, and also by
g the Earl of Warwick, who had come over again from Calais. On the
other hand, the king himself entered into the strife in a way he had not
done hitherto. He not only took the field in person against the
rebellious lords, but exhibited a spirit in the endurance of fatigue and
discomfort which seems to have commanded general admiration. Even
at the time of Lord Audley’s overthrow, it would appear that he was
leading forward a reserve. For about a month he kept continually
camping out, never resting at night, except on Sundays, in the same
place he had occupied the night before, and sometimes, in spite of
cold, rough weather, bivouacking for two nights successively on the
bare field. After the battle of Bloreheath, he could only regard
Salisbury as an overt enemy of his crown. At the same time he
despatched heralds to the Duke of York and the Earl of Warwick, with
proclamations of free and perfect pardon to themselves and all but a
few of the leaders at Bloreheath, on condition of their submitting to
him within six days. 180.1
To Garter King of Arms, one of the messengers by whom these offers
were conveyed, the confederate lords made answer, and also delivered
a written reply to be conveyed to the king, declaring the perfect loyalty
of their intentions, which they would have been glad to prove in the
king’s presence if it had been only possible for them to go to him with
safety. They had already endeavoured to testify their unshaken fidelity
to Henry by an indenture drawn up and signed by them in Worcester
Cathedral. This instrument they had forwarded to the king by a

deputation of churchmen, headed by the prior of that cathedral, and
including among others Dr. William Lynwoode, 180.2 who administered
to them the sacrament on the occasion. Again, after Garter left, they
181
wrote from Ludlow on the 10th of October, protesting that their actions
had been misconstrued, and their tenants subjected to wrong and
violence, while they themselves lay under unjust suspicion. Their
enemies, they said, thirsted for the possession of their lands, and hoped
to obtain them by their influence with the king. For their own part they
had hitherto avoided a conflict, not from any fear of the power of their
enemies, but only for dread of God and of his Highness, and they
meant to persevere in this peaceful course, until driven by necessity to
self-defence. 181.1
These earnest, solemn, and repeated expressions of loyalty have
scarcely, I think, received from historians the attention to which they
are entitled. 181.2 Of their sincerity, of course, men may form different
opinions; but it is right to note that the confederate lords had done all
that was in their power by three several and distinct protests to induce
the king to think more favourably of their intentions. It is, moreover, to
be observed that they remained at this time in an attitude strictly
defensive. But the king and his forces still approaching, they drew
themselves up in battle array at Ludford, in the immediate vicinity of
the town of Ludlow. Here, as they were posted on Friday the 12th
October, it would almost seem that the lords were not without
apprehension of the defection of some of their followers. A report was
spread through the camp that the king was suddenly deceased,
witnesses were brought in who swore to the fact, and mass was said for
the repose of his soul. But that very evening, Henry, at the head of his
army, arrived within half a mile of their position. The state of the
country, flooded by recent rains, had alone prevented him from coming
upon them sooner. Before nightfall a few volleys of artillery were
discharged against the royal army, and a regular engagement was
expected next day. But, meanwhile, the royal proclamation of pardon
seems to have had its effect. One Andrew Trollope, who had come over
with the Earl of Warwick from Calais, withdrew at dead of night and182
carried over a considerable body of men to the service of the king, to

whom he communicated the secrets of the camp. The blow was
kists absolutely fatal. The lords at once abandoned all thought of further
resistance. Leaving their banners in the field, they withdrew at
midnight. York and his second son, Edmund, Earl of Rutland, fled into
Wales, from whence they sailed into Ireland. His eldest, Edward, Earl
of March, accompanied by the two other earls, Warwick and Salisbury,
and by Sir John Wenlock, made his way into Devonshire. There by the
friendly aid of one John Dynham, afterwards Lord Dynham, and Lord
High Treasurer to Henry VII., they bought a ship at Exmouth and sailed
to Guernsey. At last, on Friday the 2nd of November, they landed at
Calais, where they met with a most cordial reception from the
inhabitants. 182.1

. Then followed in November the Parliament of Coventry, and the
attainder of the Duke of York and all his party. The queen and her
friends at last had it all their own way, at least in England. It was
otherwise doubtless in Ireland, where the Duke of York remained for
nearly a twelvemonth after his flight from Ludlow. It was otherwise
too at Calais, where Warwick was all-powerful, and whither
discontented Yorkists began to flock from England. It was otherwise,
moreover, at sea, where the same Warwick still retained the command
of the fleet, and could not be dispossessed, except on parchment. On
parchment, however, he was presently superseded in both of his
important offices. The Duke of Exeter was intrusted with the keeping
of the sea, which even at the time of the great reconciliation of parties
he had been displeased that Warwick was allowed to retain. 182.2 The
young Duke of Somerset was appointed Captain of Calais, but was
unable to take possession of his post. Accompanied by Lord Roos and
Lord Audley, and fortified by the king’s letters-patent, he crossed the
sea, but was refused admittance into the town. Apparently he had put
off too long before going over, 183.1 and he found the three earls in 183
possession of the place before him; so that he was obliged to land at a
place called Scales’ Cliff and go to Guisnes. 183.2 But a worse
humiliation still awaited him on landing; for of the very sailors that had
brought him over, a number conveyed their ships into Calais harbour,
offered their services to the Earl of Warwick, and placed in his hands

as prisoners certain persons who had taken part against him. They were
shortly after beheaded in Calais. 183.3
It would seem, in short, that ever since his great naval victory in 1458,
Warwick was so highly popular with all the sailors of England, that it
was quite as hopeless for the Duke of Exeter to contest his supremacy
at sea as for Somerset to think of winning Calais out of his hands.
Friends still came flocking over from England to join the three earls at
0. Calais; and though in London in the February following nine men were
hanged, drawn, and beheaded for attempting to do so, 183.4 the cause of
the Yorkists remained as popular as ever. In vain were letters written to
foreign parts, ‘that no relief be ministered to the traitor who kept
Calais.’ 183.5 In vain the Duke of Somerset at Guisnes endeavoured to
contest his right to the government of that important town. All that
Somerset could do was to waste his strength in fruitless skirmishes,
until on St. George’s Day he suffered such a severe defeat and loss of
men at Newnham Bridge, that he was at length forced to abandon all
idea of dispossessing the Earl of Warwick. 183.6
Not only were the three earls secure in their position at Calais, but
there was every reason to believe that they had a large amount of
sympathy in Kent, and would meet with a very cordial reception
whenever they crossed the sea. To avert the danger of any such 184
attempt, and also, it would appear, with some design of reinforcing the
Duke of Somerset at Guisnes, Lord Rivers and his son Sir Anthony
Wydevile were sent to Sandwich about the beginning of the year, with
a body of 400 men. Besides the command of the town, they were
commissioned to take possession of certain ships which belonged to
vers the Earl of Warwick, and lay quietly at anchor in the harbour. 184.1 But
wich. the issue of their exploit was such as to provoke universal ridicule. ‘As
to tidings here,’ wrote Botoner from London to John Berney at Caister,
‘I send some offhand, written to you and others, how the Lord Rivers,
Sir Anthony his son, and others have won Calais by a feeble assault at
Sandwich made by John Denham, Esq., with the number of 800 men,
on Tuesday between four and five o’clock in the morning.’ 184.2

The exact mode in which Rivers and his son ‘won Calais’ seems to
have been described in a separate paper. The truth was that a small
force under the command of John Denham (or Dynham) was
despatched across the sea by Warwick, and landing at Sandwich during
the night, contrived not only to seize the ships in the harbour, but even
to surprise the earl and his son in their beds, and bring them over as
prisoners to the other side of the Channel. 184.3 The victors did not fail to
turn the incident to account by exhibiting as much contempt as
possible for their unfortunate prisoners. ‘My Lord Rivers,’ writes
William Paston, ‘was brought to Calais, and before the lords with eight
score torches, and there my lord of Salisbury rated him, calling him
knave’s son, that he should be so rude to call him and those other lords
traitors; for they should be found the king’s true liegemen when he
should be found a traitor. And my Lord of Warwick rated him and said
that his father was but a squire, and brought up with King Henry V.,
and since made himself by marriage, and also made a lord; and that it
was not his part to have such language of lords, being of the king’s
blood. And my Lord of March rated him in like wise. And Sir Anthony
was rated for his language of all the three lords in like wise.’ 185.1 It 185
must have been a curious reflection to the Earl of March when in after
years, as King Edward IV., he married the daughter of this same Lord
Rivers, that he had taken part in this vituperation of his future father-
in-law!
By and by it became sufficiently evident that unless he was
considerably reinforced, the Duke of Somerset could do no good at
Guisnes. Instead of attempting to maintain a footing beside Calais, the
queen’s Government would have enough to do to keep the rebels out of
England. The capture of Rivers had excited the most serious alarm, and
the landing of Warwick himself upon the eastern coast was looked
upon as not improbable. 185.2 A new force of 500 men was accordingly
sent to Sandwich under the command of one Osbert Mountford or
Mundeford, 185.3 an old officer of Calais. His instructions were to go
from Sandwich to Guisnes, either in aid of the Duke of Somerset, as
intimated in Worcester’s Annals, or, according to another contemporary
authority, 185.4 to bring him over to England. But while he waited for a

wind to sail, John Dynham again crossed the sea, attacked the force
under the command of Mundeford, and after a little skirmishing, in
which he himself was wounded, succeeded in carrying him off to
Calais, as he had before done Lord Rivers. Mundeford’s treatment,
however, was not so lenient as that of the more noble captive. On the
25th of June he was beheaded at the Tower of Rysebank, which stood
near the town, on the opposite side of the harbour. 185.5
Meanwhile the Earl of Warwick did not remain at Calais. He scoured
the seas with his fleet and sailed into Ireland. Sir Baldwin Fulford, a
knight of Devonshire, promised the king, on pain of losing his head, to
destroy Warwick’s fleet; but having exhausted the sum of 1000 marks 186
which was allowed him for his expenses, he returned home without
having attained his object. 186.1 On the 16th of March, Warwick having
met with the Duke of York in Ireland, the two noblemen entered the
harbour of Waterford with a fleet of six-and-twenty ships well manned;
and on the following day, being St. Patrick’s Day, they landed and were
ceremoniously received by the mayor and burgesses. 186.2 Warwick
seems to have remained in Ireland more than two months, concerting
with the Duke of York plans for future action. About Whitsunday,
which in this year fell on the 1st of June, his fleet was observed by the
Duke of Exeter off the coast of Cornwall, on its return to Calais.
Exeter’s squadron was superior in strength, and an engagement might
have been expected; but the duke was not sure that he could trust his
own sailors, and he allowed the earl to pass unmolested. 186.3
ate
About this time there arrived at Calais a papal nuncio, by name
Francesco Coppini, Bishop of Terni, returning from England to Rome.
He had been sent by the new pope, Pius II., the ablest that had for a
long time filled the pontifical chair, to urge Henry to send an
ambassador to a congress at Mantua, in which measures were to be
concerted for the union and defence of Christendom against the Turks.
This was in the beginning of the preceding year, 186.4 and, as he himself
states, he remained nearly a year and a half in England. 186.5 But the
incapacity of the king, and the dissensions that prevailed among the
lords, rendered his mission a total failure. Henry, indeed, who was
never wanting in reverence for the Holy See, named a certain number

of bishops and lords to go upon this mission, but they one and all
refused. He accordingly sent two priests of little name, with an
informal commission to excuse a greater embassy. England was thus
discredited at the papal court, and the nuncio, finding his mission
187
fruitless, at last crossed the sea to return home. At Calais, however, he
was persuaded by Warwick to remain. The earl himself was about to
return to England, and if the legate would come back in his company
he might use the influence of his sacred office to heal the wounds of a
divided kingdom. 187.1
The nuncio had doubtless seen enough of the deplorable condition of
England to be convinced that peace was impossible, so long as the
lords most fit to govern were banished and proclaimed rebels by the
queen and her favourites. 187.2 He was, moreover, furnished with
powers, by which—the main object of his mission being the union of
Christendom—he was authorised to make some efforts to compose the
dissensions of England. 187.3 But he certainly overstrained them, and
allowed himself to become a partisan. Flattered by the attentions
shown him by Warwick, he acceded to his suggestion, and when, on
the 26th of June, 187.4 the day after Mundeford was beheaded at Calais,
the confederate lords crossed the Channel, the nuncio was in their
company, bearing the standard of the Church. Archbishop Bourchier,
too, met them at Sandwich, where they landed, with a great multitude
of people; and with his cross borne before him, the Primate of England
conducted the three earls and their followers, who increased in number
as they went along, until they reached the capital. After a very brief
opposition on the part of some of the citizens, the city opened its gates
to them. They entered London on the 2nd of July. 187.5
s of
Before they crossed the sea, the three earls had sent over a set of
k, articles addressed to the archbishop and the commons of England in
the name of themselves and the Duke of York, declaring how they had
y.
sued in vain to be admitted to the king’s presence to set forth certain188
matters that concerned the common weal of all the land. Foremost
among these was the oppression of the Church, a charge based,
seemingly, on facts with which we are unacquainted, and which, if
known, might shed a clearer light upon the conduct of the legate and

Archbishop Bourchier. Secondly, they complained of the crying evil
that the king had given away to favourites all the revenues of his
crown, so that his household was supported by acts of rapine and
extortion on the part of his purveyors. Thirdly, the laws were
administered with great partiality, and justice was not to be obtained.
Grievous taxes, moreover, were levied upon the commons, while the
destroyers of the land were living upon the patrimony of the crown.
And now a heavier charge than ever was imposed upon the inhabitants;
for the king, borrowing an idea from the new system of military
service in France, had commanded every township to furnish at its own
cost a certain number of men for the royal army; ‘which imposition
and talliage,’ wrote the lords in this manifesto, ‘if it be continued to
their heirs and successors, will be the heaviest charge and worst
example that ever grew in England, and the foresaid subjects and the
said heirs and successors in such bondage as their ancestors were never
charged with.’ 188.1
Besides these evils, the infatuated policy into which the king had been
led by his ill-advisers, threatened to lose Ireland and Calais to the
crown, as France had been lost already; for in the former country
letters had been sent under the Privy Seal to the chieftains who had
hitherto resisted the king’s authority, actually encouraging them to
attempt the conquest of the land, while in regard to Calais the king had
been induced to write letters to his enemies not to show that town any
favour, and thus had given them the greatest possible inducement to 189
attempt its capture. Meanwhile the Earls of Shrewsbury and Wiltshire
and Viscount Beaumont, who directed everything, kept the king
himself, in some things, from the exercise of his own free will, and had
caused him to assemble the Parliament of Coventry for the express
purpose of ruining the Duke of York and his friends, whose domains
they had everywhere pillaged and taken to their own use. 189.1
It was impossible, in the nature of things, that evils such as these could
be allowed to continue long, and the day of reckoning was now at
hand. Of the great events that followed, it will be sufficient here to note
le of the sequence in the briefest possible words. On the 10th July the king
mpton was taken prisoner at the battle of Northampton, and was brought to

London by the confederate lords. The government, of course, came
thus entirely into their hands. Young George Nevill, Bishop of Exeter,
was made Chancellor of England, Lord Bourchier was appointed Lord
Treasurer, and a Parliament was summoned to meet at Westminster for
the purpose of reversing the attainders passed in the Parliament of
Coventry. Of the elections for this Parliament we have some interesting
notices in Letter 415, from which we may see how the new turn in
affairs had affected the politics of the county of Norfolk. From the first
it was feared that after the three earls had got the king into their hands,
the old intriguers, Tuddenham and Heydon, would be busy to secure
favour, or at all events indulgence, from the party now in the
ascendant. But letters-missive were obtained from the three earls,
directed to all mayors and other officers in Norfolk, commanding in
the king’s name that no one should do them injury, and intimating that
the earls did not mean to show them any favour if any person proposed
to sue them at law. 189.2 Heydon, however, did not choose to remain in
Norfolk. He was presently heard of from Berkshire, for which county
he had found interest to get himself returned in the new Parliament.
ton
John Paston also was returned to this Parliament as one of the
ent. representatives of his own county of Norfolk. His sympathies were 190
entirely with the new state of things. And his friend and correspondent,
Friar Brackley, who felt with him that the wellbeing of the whole land
depended entirely on the Earl of Warwick, sent him exhortations out of
Scripture to encourage him in the performance of his political
duties. 190.1 But what would be the effect of the coming over from
Ireland of the Duke of York, who had by this time landed at Chester,
and would now take the chief direction of affairs? 190.2 Perhaps the chief
fear was that he would be too indulgent to political antagonists.
Moreover, the Dowager Duchess of Suffolk had contrived to marry her
son to one of York’s daughters, and it was apprehended her influence
would be considerable. ‘The Lady of Suffolk,’ wrote Friar Brackley to
Paston, ‘hath sent up her son and his wife to my Lord of York to ask
grace for a sheriff the next year, Stapleton, Boleyn, or Tyrell, qui absit!
God send you Poynings, W. Paston, W. Rokewood, or Arblaster. Ye

have much to do, Jesus speed you! Ye have many good prayers, what
of the convent, city, and country.’ 190.3
Such was the state of hope, fear, and expectation which the new turn of
affairs awakened in some, and particularly in the friends of John
Paston. The next great move in the political game perhaps exceeded
the anticipations even of Friar Brackley. Yet though the step was
es undoubtedly a bold one, never, perhaps, was a high course of action
wn.
more strongly suggested by the results of past experience. After ten
miserable years of fluctuating policy, the attainted Yorkists were now
for the fourth time in possession of power; but who could tell that they
would not be a fourth time set aside and proclaimed as traitors? For yet
a fourth time since the fall of Suffolk, England might be subjected to
the odious rule of favourites under a well-intentioned king, whose
word was not to be relied on. To the commonweal the prospect was
serious enough; to the Duke of York and his friends it was absolute and
hopeless ruin. But York had now determined what to do. On the 10th of
October, the third day of the Parliament, he came to Westminster with
a body of 500 armed men, and took up quarters for himself within the
royal palace. On the 16th he entered the House of Lords, and having191
sat down in the king’s throne, he delivered to the Lord Chancellor a
writing in which he distinctly claimed that he, and not Henry, was by
inheritance rightful king of England. 191.1
The reader is of course aware of the fact on which this claim was
based, namely, that York, through the female line, was descended from
Lionel, Duke of Clarence, third son of Edward III., while King Henry,
his father, and his grandfather had all derived their rights from John of
Gaunt, who was Lionel’s younger brother. Henry IV. indeed was an
undoubted usurper; but to set aside his family after they had been in
possession of the throne for three generations must have seemed a very
questionable proceeding. Very few of the lords at first appeared to
regard it with favour. The greater number stayed away from the
House. 191.2 But the duke’s counsel insisting upon an answer, the House
represented the matter to the king, desiring to know what he could
allege in opposition to the claim of York. The king, however, left the
lords to inquire into it themselves; and as it was one of the gravest

questions of law, the lords consulted the justices. But the justices
declined the responsibility of advising in a matter of so high a nature.
They were the king’s justices, and could not be of counsel where the
king himself was a party. The king’s serjeants and attorney were then
applied to, but were equally unwilling to commit themselves; so that
the lords themselves brought forward and discussed of their own
accord a number of objections to the Duke of York’s claim. At length it
was declared as the opinion of the whole body of the peers that his title
could not be defeated, but a compromise was suggested and mutually
agreed to that the king should be allowed to retain his crown for life,
the succession reverting to the duke and his heirs immediately after
Henry’s death. 191.3
So the matter was settled by a great and solemn act of state. But even a
parliamentary settlement, produced by a display of armed force, will
scarcely command the respect that it ought to do if there is armed force 192
to overthrow it. The king himself, it is true, appears to have been
treated with respect, and with no more abridgment of personal liberty
than was natural to the situation. 192.1 Nor could it be said that the peers
were insensible of the responsibility they incurred in a grave
constitutional crisis. But respect for constitutional safeguards had been
severely shaken, and no securities now could bridle the spirit of
faction: suspicion also of itself produced new dangers. The Duke of
York, after all the willingness he had shown in Parliament to accept a
compromise, seems to have been accused of violating the settlement as
soon as it was made; for on that very night on which it was arranged
(31st October), we are told by a contemporary writer that ‘the king
removed unto London against his will to the bishop’s palace, and the
Duke of York came unto him that same night by torchlight and took
upon him as king, and said in many places that “This is ours by
right.”’ 192.2 Perhaps the facts looked worse than they were really; for it
had been agreed in Parliament, though not formally expressed in the
Accord, that the duke should be once more Protector and have the
actual government. 192.3 But it is not surprising that Margaret and her
friends would recognise nothing of what had been done in Parliament.
Since the battle of Northampton she had been separated from her

husband. She fled with her son first into Cheshire, afterwards into
Wales, to Harlech Castle, and then to Denbigh, which Jasper Tudor,
Earl of Pembroke, had just won for the House of Lancaster. 192.4 Her
flight had been attended with difficulties, especially near Malpas,
where she was robbed by a servant of her own, who met her and put
her in fear of the lives of herself and her child. 192.5 In Wales she was
joined by the Duke of Exeter, who was with her in October. 192.6 From
thence she sailed to Scotland, where the enemies of the Duke of York 193
were specially welcome. For James II., profiting, as might be expected,
by the dissensions of England, a month after the battle of
Northampton, had laid siege to Roxburgh, where he was killed by the
bursting of a cannon. Margaret, with her son, arrived at Dumfries in
January 1461, and met his widow, Mary of Gueldres, at Lincluden
Abbey. 193.1 Meanwhile her adherents in the North of England held a
council at York, and the Earl of Northumberland, with Lords Clifford,
Dacres, and Nevill, ravaged the lands of the duke and of the Earl of
Salisbury. The duke on this dissolved Parliament after obtaining from it
powers to put down the rebellion, 193.2 and marched northwards with the
Earl of Salisbury. A few days before Christmas they reached the duke’s
castle of Sandal, where they kept the festival, the enemy being not far
off at Pomfret. 193.3 On the 30th December was fought the disastrous
le of battle of Wakefield, when the Yorkists were defeated, the duke and the
ld. Earl of Salisbury being slain in the field, and the duke’s son, the Earl of
Rutland, ruthlessly murdered by Lord Clifford after the battle.
The story of poor young Rutland’s butchery is graphically described by
an historian of the succeeding age who, though perhaps with some
inaccuracies of detail as to fact, is a witness to the strong impression
left by this beginning of barbarities. The account of it given by Hall,
the chronicler, is as follows:—
‘While this battle was in fighting, a priest called Sir Robert Aspall,
chaplain and schoolmaster to the young Earl of Rutland, second son
to the above-named Duke of York, scarce of the age of twelve years
[he was really in his eighteenth year], a fair gentleman and a maiden-
like person, perceiving that flight was more safeguard than tarrying,
both for him and his master, secretly conveyed the Earl out of the

field by the Lord Clifford’s band towards the town. But or he could
enter into a house, he was by the said Lord Clifford espied, followed,
and taken, and, by reason of his apparel, demanded what he was. The
young gentleman, dismayed, had not a word to speak, but kneeled on
his knees, imploring mercy and desiring grace, both with holding up 194
his hands and making dolorous countenance, for his speech was gone
for fear. “Save him,” said his chaplain, “for he is a prince’s son, and
peradventure may do you good hereafter.” With that word, the Lord
Clifford marked him and said—“By God’s blood, thy father slew
mine; and so will I do thee and all thy kin”; and with that word stack
the Earl to the heart with his dagger, and bade his chaplain bear the
Earl’s mother word what he had done and said.’
Another illustration which the chronicler goes on to give of Clifford’s
bloodthirsty spirit may be true in fact, but is certainly wrong as regards
time. For he represents Queen Margaret as ‘not far from the field’
when the battle had been fought, and says that Clifford having caused
the duke’s head to be cut off and crowned in derision with a paper
crown, presented the ghastly object to her upon a pole with the words:
—‘Madam, your war is done; here is your king’s ransom.’ Margaret, as
we have seen, was really in Scotland at the time, where she negotiated
an alliance with the Scots, to whom she agreed to deliver up Berwick
for aid to her husband’s cause. But soon afterwards she came to York,
where, at a council of war, she and her adherents determined to march
on London. So it may have been a fact that Clifford presented to her
the head of York upon a pole with the words recorded. But never was
prophecy more unhappy; for instead of the war being ended, or the
king being ransomed, there cannot be a doubt these deeds of
wickedness imparted a new ferocity to the strife and hastened on the
termination of Henry’s imbecile, unhappy reign. Within little more
than two months after the battle of Wakefield the son of the murdered
Duke of York was proclaimed king in London, by the title of Edward
IV., and at the end of the third month the bloody victory of Towton
almost destroyed, for a long time, the hopes of the House of Lancaster.
From that day Henry led a wretched existence, now as an exile, now as
a prisoner, for eleven unhappy years, saving only a few months’

interval, during which he was made king again by the Earl of Warwick,
without the reality of power, and finally fell a victim, as was generally
believed, to political assassination. As for Margaret, she survived her
husband, but she also survived her son, and the cause for which she 195
had fought with so much pertinacity was lost to her for ever.
And now we must halt in our political survey. Henceforth, though
public affairs must still require attention, we shall scarcely require to
follow them with quite so great minuteness. We here take leave, for the
most part, of matters, both public and private, contained in the Letters
during the reign of Henry VI. But one event which affected greatly the
domestic history of the Pastons in the succeeding reign, must be
mentioned before we go further. It was not long after the
commencement of those later troubles—more precisely, it was on the
5th November 1459, six weeks after the battle of Bloreheath, and little
more than three after the dispersion of the Yorkists at Ludlow—that the
aged Sir John Fastolf breathed his last, within the walls of that castle
which it had been his pride to rear and to occupy in the place of his
Sir birth. By his will, of which, as will be seen, no less than three different
tolf. instruments were drawn up, he bequeathed to John Paston and his
chaplain, Sir Thomas Howes, all his lands in the counties of Norfolk
and Suffolk, for the purpose of founding that college or religious
community at Caister, on the erection of which he had bestowed
latterly so much thought. The manner in which this bequest affected
the fortunes of the Paston family has now to be considered.

175.2 Privy Seal dates.
175.3 Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 290-1.

176.1 Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 293.

176.2 No. 361.

176.3 No. 364. Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 293.

176.4 Chronicle in MS. Cott., Vitell. A. xvi.

177.1 English Chronicle (ed. Davies), p. 77. Hall.

177.2 Letter 366.

177.3 Whethamstede, 417-18. Letter 365.

177.4 Letter 365.

177.5 Letter 366.

178.1 Whethamstede, 422 sq. Engl. Chron. (Davies), 77, 78.

178.2 Hall.

178.3 Letter 369. Compare Fabyan. Whethamstede, who writes

with some confusion in this part of his narrative, speaks of a
great naval victory won by Warwick on St. Alban’s Day, the
22nd June 1459, over a fleet of Genoese and Spanish vessels,
in which booty was taken to the value of £10,000, and
upwards of a thousand prisoners, for whom it was difficult to
find room in all the prisons of Calais. It is not impossible that
this may have been a different action, which took place on
the very day, month, and year to which Whethamstede refers
it; but the silence of other authorities about a second naval
victory would lead us to suppose he is simply wrong in the
matter of date. It must be observed that Whethamstede
immediately goes on to speak of the Legate Coppini’s arrival
in England, which took place in June 1460, as having
happened circa idem tempus, and as if it had been in the

same month of June, only a few days earlier. This shows
great inaccuracy.
179.1 Engl. Chron. (Davies), 78.

179.2 Fabyan, Engl. Chron. (Davies), 80. Parl. Rolls, v. 348.

180.1 Rolls of Parl. vi. 348.

180.2 Not, as Stow supposes, the author of the book on the

Constitutions of the Church of England, but probably a
nephew or other relation of his. The William Lynwoode who
wrote upon the Church Constitutions was Bishop of St.
David’s, and died in 1446.
181.1 Engl. Chron. (Davies), 81, 82.

181.2 The Act of Attainder against the Yorkists most untruly

says, ‘they took no consideration’ of Garter’s message. See
Rolls of Parliament above cited.
182.1 Rolls of Parl. vi. 348-9. Whethamstede, 459-62; Fabyan.

182.2 W. Worc., 479.

183.1 He received his appointment on the 9th October, three

days before the dispersion of the Yorkists at Ludlow (Rymer,
xi. 436), and, according to one authority (Engl. Chron., ed.
Davies, 84), he went over in the same month; but as all agree
that Warwick was there before him, it was more probably in
the beginning of November.
183.2 Chronicle in MS. Cott., Vitell. A. xvi.

183.3 Fabyan.

183.4 W. Worc., 478; Three Fifteenth Century Chronicles, 73.

One of them was named Roger Nevile, a lawyer of the
Temple, and probably a relation of the Earl of Warwick.
183.5 Speed.

183.6 W. Worc.

184.1 Engl. Chron. (Davies), 84, 85; Three Fifteenth Century

Chronicles, 72.
184.2 Letter 399.

184.3 W. Worc. Engl. Chron. (Davies), 85.
185.1 Letter 400.

185.2 See Appendix to Introduction.

185.3 The writer of Letter 378. He was a connection of the

Paston family, having married Elizabeth, daughter of John
Berney, Esq., another of whose daughters, Margaret, was the
mother of Margaret Paston (Blomefield, ii. 182). He had
been much engaged in the king’s service in France, and had
been treasurer of Normandy before it was lost—a fact which
may account for his writing French in preference to English.
See Stevenson’s Wars of the English in France, index.
185.4 Engl. Chron. (Davies), 85.

185.5 W. Worc., 479; Fabyan; Stow, 406-7.

186.1 English Chron. (Davies), 85.

186.2 Lambeth MS. 632, f. 255.

186.3 Chron. (Davies), 85; W. Worc.

186.4 His commission from the Pope is dated 7th January

1458[9]—Rymer, xi. 419.
186.5 Brown’s Venetian Calendar, i. p. 91.

187.1 Gobellinus, 161.

187.2 The Yorkists apparently were not sparing of insinuations

against the queen. It had been rumoured, according to
Fabyan, that the Prince of Wales was not really the king’s
son; but the worst that was insinuated was that he was a
changeling. But Warwick himself, according to Gobellinus,
described the situation to the nuncio as follows:—‘Rex
noster stupidus est, et mente captus; regitur, non regit; apud
uxorem et qui regis thalamum fœdant, imperium est.’
187.3 See the Pope’s letter to him in Theiner, 423-4.

187.4 ‘The lords crossed the sea on Thursday,’ writes Coppini

from London on the 4th July.—Brown’s Venetian Calendar,
i. 90.

187.5 Engl. Chron. (Davies), 94.
188.1 It appears by Letter 377 that privy seals were issued in

1459 addressed on the back to certain persons, requiring
them to be with the king at Leicester on the 10th of May,
each with a body of men sufficiently armed, and with
provision for their own expenses for two months. One of
these privy seals, signed by the king himself, was addressed
specially to John Paston’s eldest son, John, who at this time
could not have been more than nineteen years of age. On its
arrival, his mother consulted with neighbours whether it was
indispensable to obey such an injunction, and on their
opinion that it was, wrote to her husband for instructions.
189.1 The articles will be found in Holinshed, iii. 652-3; and in

Davies’s Chronicle, 86-90.
189.2 No. 410.

190.1 Letter 415.

190.2 Letter 419.

190.3 Letter 415.

191.1 W. Worc., 483; Fabyan; Rolls of Parl. v. 375.

191.2 W. Worc., 484.

191.3 Rolls of Parl. v. 375-9.

192.1 Though he was taken prisoner at the battle of

Northampton, and had ever since been in the power of the
victors, he does not appear to have been placed under any
kind of restraint. In October, before the Parliament met, he
was spending the time in hunting at Greenwich and Eltham.
—No. 419.
192.2 Collections of a London Citizen, 208 (Camden Society).

192.3 English Chronicle (Davies), 106; Fabyan; Hall, 249.

192.4 Privy Council Proceedings, vi. 303.

192.5 Collections of a London Citizen, 209.

192.6 No. 419.