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This is Reading the Past and I’m Doctor Kat.

On 22nd August 1485, supports of Henry Tudor, Duke of Richmond unhorsed and killed King

Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth. To history this was the moment that ended the

Wars of the Roses – the new Lancastrian king Henry VII married his Yorkist princess,

Elizabeth – all would be well in the kingdom ruled over by the Tudors… they lived *comparatively*

happily ever after.

*BUT* we must be careful about reading history backwards – just because Henry VII would

die in his bed as king and be succeeded peacefully by his son and heir doesn’t mean that he

knew he could rest easy during his reign – today we’re looking at two people who would have

threatened his calm – the pretenders to his throne…

The year after Henry’s victory at Bosworth, 1486, brought news of a rival, Yorkist claimant

to the throne of England with plans to make good on that claim.

He was being recognised as Edward, earl of Warwick, the son of George, duke of Clarence,

brother of Margaret Pole, nephew of Edward IV and Richard III, cousin of Elizabeth of

York and the Princes in the Tower and, as such, rightful heir to the throne of England.

Edward had been born on 25th February 1575, making him 11 years old when this claim was

starting to be pressed.

Warwick had been placed in the Tower of London on the orders of Henry VII in 1485, but in

1486 it was rumoured that he had escaped.

It was claimed that his father had successfully smuggled his son to Ireland for his safety

in 1478, leaving an imposter child in his place.

Late in 1486, his identity and royal claim was being supported by the chancellor of Ireland,

Thomas Fitzgerald, his brother, Gerald Fizgerald, the earl of Kildare and Lord deputy of Ireland

and the archbishop of Dublin, Walter Fitzsimons.

Within months, early in 1487, the sister of Edward IV, Richard III and George, Duke of

Clarence – Margaret Plantagenet, dowager duchess of Burgundy was providing support

and safe haven for those willing to defect and challenge Henry VII in her “nephew’s”

name.

On 2nd February 1487, it was thought prudent – by Henry VII and his council – to bring

his Earl of Warwick, who would be turning 12 later that month, on 25th February, out

of the Tower of London to show him off through the city.

A priest by the name of Simonds confessed, before the Archbishop of Canterbury, on 17th

February 1487, to coaching a young man to convincingly feign being the “Duke of Warwick”

before his appearance in Ireland.

This did not end support for the other Warwick’s claim – the son of Elizabeth Plantagenet,

another sister of the last crowned Yorkist kings – Edward IV and Richard III – was

John de la Pole, earl of Lincoln. John supported the Warwick in Ireland as his real cousin,

making the Warwick that Henry’s council brought out of the Tower, the imposter.

Margaret, dowager duchess of Burgundy was responsible for sending a troop of mercenaries

(said to number between 1500 and 2000 men) under the command of the famous soldier Marin

Schwartz to Ireland to bolster the ranks of those who would soon be invading England.

On 24th May 1487 the Warwick in Ireland was crowned in the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity

in Dublin as Edward VI – new coins were struck; a parliament was called, and proclamations

were issued in the “true king’s” name.

Henry VII made a public show of laughing it all off, but I would imagine it became less

funny when “Edward” and his troop landed in England on 4th June 1487 – the rival

king of England was supported by Yorkist defectors, the mercenaries sent by Margaret Plantagenet

and around 4000 Irishmen (albeit apparently poorly armed ones).

The invading force found some more recruits as it travelled through England; there was

an attempt to proclaim the new king in York (but the city held for Henry who was on his

way to meet his challenger); there was also some unrest in London caused by a false report

of Edward’s victory, which led some in the city to come out in support of him as their

“true king”.

When Henry met the troops backing his rival, he had the superior numbers; King Henry VII

won the day at the Battle of Stoke Field on 16th June 1487. The boy who had be crowned

in Ireland as Edward VI was captured. History remembers him as Lambert Simnel son of an

organ maker, probably born in Oxfordshire.

Rather than execute him of even punish him as a traitor, tradition has it that Henry

VII took Simnel into his household as a servant and that he survived until well into the next

reign – being recorded as still living by the Polydore Vergil when he was writing his

History of England in 1534.

This was certainly more than the other “real” Edward, earl of Warwick, would be able to

expect as he would be executed for treason at 24 years old on 28th November 1499.

In his alleged treason – which consisted of being caught up in a plot to free him from

the Tower – he was joined to another apparent pretender to the throne of England, Perkin

Warbeck, who was his fellow prisoner and who would be executed a few days before him.

Less than a decade before his execution, in 1492, Warwick’s co-accused was sailing from

Cork to Harfleur on the orders of the French king, Charles VIII as Warbeck was being recognised

as Richard, Duke of York – the younger of the missing Princes in the Tower. Later that

year, in November 1492, Charles and Henry signed a treaty – Charles would cease his

support of this threat to Henry’s throne and Henry would end his military incursion

in France.

This did not bode well for “Richard, Duke of York”, who, if he was who he claimed

to be, would have been 19 years old in November 1492, having been born at Shrewsbury on 17th

August 1473.

Fortunately, he managed to get to Mechelen and the court of Margaret Plantagenet, dowager

duchess of Burgundy (yep… her again). She recognised him as her nephew and welcomed

him.

Throughout 1493, loyal Yorkists (many of whom were in exile in the Netherlands) worked to

bolster the position and claim of their Richard, while Henry and the Tudor machine looked for

ways to destabilise and debunk the claims. Unfortunately for Henry VII, he didn’t have

his own version of Richard, Duke of York in the Tower, as he had previously had with Edward,

Earl of Warwick and Lambert Simnel.

Margaret had a connection to Maximillian I (later to become the Holy Roman Emperor),

as he was the widower of her step-daughter Mary (who had died after a riding accident

in 1482, aged 25). This Richard, Duke of York was sent to meet Maximillian in Vienna – the

meeting went as desired, in that Maximillian was willing to show “Richard” his support.

He was Maximillian’s honoured guest when they travelled to the Low Countries together

in 1494 to celebrate Maximillian’s son, Philip, as ruler of a various parts of the

Netherlands. If Henry had hoped that he would be able to have any traitorous defectors dealt

with in or sent back from the Netherlands, then this “Richard’s” being supported

by Maximillian would have been pretty disappointing.

On 3rd July 1495, “Richard” and his force planned to land at Deal in Kent, while the

rival claimant was yet to disembark his troops that had landed were being routed, captured

or killed. This attempt had failed, and “Richard” retreated to Ireland, seeking support from

the Earl of Desmond and joining him in his ultimately unsuccessful siege of Waterford.

“Richard’s” next stop was Scotland, Stirling Castle and the support of James IV

of Scots, which he reached on 20th November 1495.

Evidence of James’ belief in this “Richard’s” claim was ostentatiously presented when, early

the next year, he married him to the Scottish noblewoman, Lady Katherine Gordon, and allowed

him the use of Falkland Palace to house the troops (which James was funding) as they set

about planning to invade England again.

On 21st September 1496 that invasion would ultimately come to nothing, among the reasons

for this being somewhat of a damp squib of a campaign was the lack of support for this

challenger to Henry VII’s governance of the realm.

However, in the following May 1497, the English King’s taxation to support his war efforts

against Scotland proved to be violently unpopular, especially amongst his southern subjects.

An uprising began in Cornwall (which is about as far from Scotland as you can get without

leaving the island), the rebellion spread to Somerset and threatened to march on London.

Henry VII had managed to drive them back to Cornwall, but the dissatisfaction and anger

lingered.

This was “Richard, duke of York’s” chance to ride the wave of unrest onto the throne

of England. He had come from Scotland, via Ireland, but it was in Cornwall that his invasion

force swelled in numbers.

It is estimated that around 8000 of them attacked Exeter on 17th September 1497 – however,

the earl of Devon proved to be more than a match for them and pushed them to retreat

to Taunton, which they reached on 19th September. Henry VII and his troops were closing in on

them. On 21st September, “Richard” and his closest supporters attempted to escape,

some – including the would-be-king – by claiming sanctuary in Beaulieu Abbey.

He would ultimately surrender and was brought to Taunton to answer to Henry VII and on 5th

October he confessed that he was really Perkin Warbeck, born in c.1474, his parents are thought

to have been wealthy and connected to other artisans, merchants and civic officials in

their town, Tournai.

Between completing his education and taking up his new, feigned identity, Warbeck was

working in the cloth trade; indeed, it was in the pursuit of selling silks that Warbeck

arrived in Cork in 1491, which brought him into the orbit of the Yorkists who would soon

be presenting him as Richard, Duke of York.

Warbeck returned to London with Henry VII and was displayed publicly as an imposter

in the streets and was kept in the company of the King as he went on progress around

the country.

Warbeck’s wife was placed in the household of Henry’s queen, Elizabeth of York, Lady

Catherine would become one of her favourite ladies in waiting. The king and queen treated

her generously – she would survive until 1537 and marry three more times; but, for

those marriages to take palace, she would first be widowed.

On 9th June 1498, Warbeck was on progress with Henry VII when he made an escape – his

liberty was short lived, however, as he was recaptured on 18th June and kept as a form

of close prisoner, i.e. locked up in shackles, in the Tower of London.

As I mentioned earlier, it was from this prison, that Warbeck was apparently the subject of

plotting by sympathisers in London to help him escape and take Edward, earl of Warwick,

with him. The plans were revealed, somehow, to Henry on 3rd August 1499. Warbeck was tried,

convicted and condemned to die – he was hanged at Tyburn on 23rd November 1499. In

this method of execution, the state was making clear that this was neither a royal nor even

a noble individual who would be granted the dignified death of beheading. Indeed, before

his execution, Warbeck once more affirmed that his claims to be Richard Plantagenet

had been a ruse.

So here we have the stories of two pretenders with very different fates and I wonder why…

Did Lambert Simnel’s youth save him?

Or was it the fact that the real earl of Warwick could be produced?

Some have suggested, particularly in the world of historical fiction, that Perkin Warbeck

may have been the feigned identity of Richard, Duke of York – sent abroad as a child, by

his mother, to protect him from his uncle – as a way to explain Henry’s desire to

denounce and eventually execute him?

But wouldn’t Henry’s wife have been able to discover if this were truly her long-lost

brother?

Did the

desire for a Spanish match for Prince Arthur necessitate decisive action?

Why do you think Henry VII seems to have seen Warbeck as threat to be neutralised, when

he didn’t seem to have viewed Simnel in the same way?

But what do you think?

As always, I’m looking forward to reading your conversations in the comments section

underneath this video, or you can find me on social media. I’ll leave links to my

Instagram and Twitter in my description box, follow me there and we can continue this conversation.

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