Wars of the Roses: Battle of Towton

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By the somnolent banks of the Dordogne on a hot day in July 1453, England’s septuagenarian paladin, John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, his son and several thousand soldiers died at Castillon in the last battle of the Hundred Years’ War. Times had changed since English archers had routed the French at Crécy, Poitiers and Agincourt — now belching cannons and French professionals swept the English invaders from the field. The echoes of that gunfire proved to be an overture for a series of troubles that would plunge England into internecine strife for the next 30 years.

The seeds of the discord that William Shakespeare would later give its romantic if inaccurate name, the Wars of the Roses, could be traced to the overthrow in 1402 of Richard II by Henry Bolingbroke, Duke of Lancaster and self-proclaimed King Henry IV. The usurper’s son, Henry V, was a ruthless, dynamic ruler who won undying fame at Agincourt in 1415 and had the French crown all but within his grasp when he suddenly succumbed to dysentery in 1422. His son, Henry VI, was a pious, decent man who was prone to spells of mental instability, ill-suited to the rigors of campaign or the intrigues of a succession of opportunistic court favorites. A predatory and fractious regency council ruled on Henry’s behalf until 1436, by which time the war in France degenerated from an English triumph to a doomed rear-guard action.

Disloyalties and private feuds pervaded England at that time, as the dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk openly warred against each other, Devon fought Wiltshire, and the Percies clashed with the Nevilles. In 1450 popular unrest exploded in Kent as rioters, led by Jack Cade, plundered their way to London and the government crumbled. Richard, Duke of York, descended from the disinherited line of the Plantagenets, had to be recalled from Ireland to help deal with this state of near anarchy. Endowed with vast estates though usually in debt, York was embittered by the government’s failure to repay 30,000 pounds sterling that he had spent in France. Now, seeing his opportunity, he confronted the king’s forces at Blackheath, but a truce was reached that postponed an outbreak of war for the time being.

In August 1453, however, Henry seemed to lose his tenuous grip on reality. The barons backed Richard of York to rule as the incapacitated king’s regent. But Henry’s queen, Margaret of Anjou, along with Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, whom many suspected was her paramour, squabbled for the reins of power until York imprisoned Somerset in the Tower of London.

Early in 1455, Henry recovered his wits, and one of his first acts was to free Somerset from the Tower. A disappointed York, his father-in-law, Richard Neville, Earl of Salisbury, and the latter’s son, Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, left London to rally supporters. On May 22, Yorkists clashed with royalists in the streets of St. Albans.

The opening round of the Wars of the Roses was won when 600 Yorkists chopped a hole through a wooden wall to enter the town and split the royalist forces. Among the royalist dead were Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland, and the Duke of Somerset. After capturing Henry VI in the market square, York and Warwick pledged their loyalty to him, then took him to London.

Half a year of queasy calm followed while York, assuming his late rival’s office as constable of England, ruled as virtual dictator. The king reigned impotently as York’s puppet, but his fiery consort, Margaret, had no intention of surrendering the patrimony of her child, Prince Edward, and began assembling a coalition to oppose York. John Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, eager to avenge the death of his father, Edmund, and the Percies, rivals of the Nevilles in the north, rallied to Margaret’s side.

In January 1456, King Henry relieved the Duke of York of his positions as protector and constable, then announced before Parliament that he was fit to rule. York and Salisbury retired to their castles, and Warwick fled to Calais, France.

Tags: Ancient-Medieval, Historical Conflicts

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