Anne Neville: Richard III's Tragic Queen

by Licence, Amy

  Just as at Warwick, Anne would have found life in a medieval castle divided into two realms; the separate households of her father and mother. The nursery was probably a subsection of those chambers presided over by the countess; an exclusively female zone, where a secluded life was encouraged and the girls were chaperoned when they interacted with the men in her father’s employ. From the beginning, Anne and Isabel would have been brought up in the expectation of their future roles as wives and mothers. Their presence in Calais would have brought them into contact with French and Flemish, as well as their own native tongue, but speaking other languages was more common than an ability to write them among noblewomen of the day. The education they received is not to be compared with modern standards or concepts of the term; it was to fit medieval girls for the running of their own households, teaching them courtesy and deportment, how to handle servants and etiquette as well as such useful skills as the use of medicinal herbs, spinning, sewing and the production of domestic textiles. The main educators of girls of all classes were their mothers; unlike their brothers, the majority stayed at home in their early years, as observers and participants in the daily lives of their elders. Thus, female education was part of an oral tradition, dependent upon the skills and abilities of the mother and the social sphere she occupied.

  There was time for play while the girls were still young. Toys dating from around 1300, recently discovered on the banks of the Thames, suggest that some figurines, such as knights, were mass produced in moulds and that girls may have played with smaller versions of the family’s crockery and tableware.10 Anne and Isabel would also have had their own ‘poppets’, wooden or cloth dolls, probably made by their mother, or women of the household. They would have sung songs, recited tales and learned simple prayers in their early years, as they learned the more formal process of reading essential for their future duties to check domestic documents and accounts. If Anne’s contemporary Margery Paston could read and write fluently, as her letters demonstrate, there is no doubt that the Earl of Warwick’s daughters could. The remnant of Richard III’s library held in the modern British Library contains books bearing the signatures ‘Anne Warrewyk’ and ‘R Gloucester’. It is probable that prayer books commissioned for the girls, which would be read to them until such a point as they could read for themselves. The Babees’ Book of 1475 was ‘turned out of Latin into my common language’11 to help infants learn the alphabet by negative example; ‘be not too Amorous, too Adventurous nor Argue too much’. The book advocated moderation in all activity and emotion. Babbling or the synonymous ‘jangling’, tale-bearing and meddling were also undesirable qualities, as were excesses of excellence, gladness, kindness and lovingness. Anne may have learned through games such as ‘Crambo’, a variant of the 1430 ‘ABC of Aristotle’ or similar poems that explore rhyme.

  Other children’s entertainments of the time included Barley-Break, Cat after Mouse and other chasing games, variants of hopscotch and skipping, nine pins and shuttlecock, whip-tops and marbles, although the earl’s daughters may not have got to play the rowdier Hot Cockles or Blind Man’s Buff. There is the possibility that there may have been other children in the castle, perhaps those of the family’s employees, who were considered of sufficient, albeit lower, status to play with the girls. Many of their class would have had pets of some kind, especially dogs or birds, separate to those used for hunting and hawking. Within the walls of Calais Castle, they may have had a small garden to attend and flowers to pick and store or dry for medicinal and household use. Indoor pursuits included cards, dice, chess, tric-trac or backgammon, juggling and games like the popular Penny Prick, which involved throwing stones at pennies balanced on pins, and the well-known game referred to by Chaucer called Drawing Dun out of the Mire. Some versions of well-known board games like chequers were considered unsuitable, such as Queke-Board and Hand-yn-Hand-out, which were banned under a statute passed by Edward IV in around 1478.12 The girls would also have spent hours at embroidery and learning to play instruments. Undoubtedly, as daughters of an earl, Anne and Isabel would have had some opportunities for play, although this would be more than balanced with training for their intended future roles. They would not be children for long.

  Many of the instructional manuals of the day were aimed at boys, but one notable exception sheds a little light on the qualities considered desirable in the rearing of girls. In the 1430 poem ‘How the Good Wife Taught her Daughter’, the ultimate goal for both subjects is the girl’s marriage: the mother instructs her child ‘full many a time and oft’ ‘a full good woman to be … if thou wilt be a wife’. The qualities most valued are piety, good husbandry, modesty, thrift and honesty. Before marriage, the daughter must

  Look wisely that thou work

  Look lovely and in good life

  Love God and Holy Kirk

  Go to Church whene’er thou may

  Look thou spare for no rain.

  Of particular relevance for wealthy children, like the Nevilles, was the message of charity and generosity:

  Gladly give thy tithes and thy offerings both

  To the poor and the bed-rid – look thou not be loth

  Give of thine own goods and be not too hard

  For seldom is the house poor where God is steward.13

  Other texts like Symon’s ‘Lesson of Wisdom’, from around 1500, The Little Children’s Book and John Russell’s 1460 Boke of Nurture urge children to be obedient, God-fearing, humble, clean, kind to animals and respectful towards their parents. In one, they are instructed to rise at six, perform their devotions, wash face and hands, cast up their bed, dress in clean clothes according to rank and be off about their business. The slightly later Young Scholar’s Paradise urged them to shake off their ‘sluggishness’ after a ‘moderate sleep’ of seven hours and think ‘of things that for thy soul’s health sweet melody brings’. They should follow four key principles: to have a virtuous and godly mind, aim at the liberal arts, act moderately and grow up to be civil. However, while Anne and Isabel were being instructed in the arts of becoming young ladies, the world around them was becoming increasingly less civil, to the point of national conflict. Playing with their poppets and singing rhymes within the tapestry-hung walls of Calais Castle, they would have been aware of their father’s absences but with no real understanding of how significant his role was to prove in the coming struggle.

  3

  Warring Cousins

  1458–1460

  But loe I found another thing,

  I was disdained of the king,

  And rated as a varlet base,

  that so betraid the good dukes grace1

  Calais had become a problematic inheritance for many reasons, both for England and for Warwick. Although it provided an important gateway for trade, it was also a significant drain on the English coffers; Parliament had refused to pay the garrison’s wages in 1454, totalling a huge £40,000. Given that the town housed the largest standing army of professional soldiers of different nationalities, the blocking of proper funding for weapons and manpower left the area weakened when an attack was mounted by the resentful French in May 1455. Queen Margaret, fearing Warwick’s intentions regarding such a large sum, withheld it, so he began to regain the trust of the soldiers by paying their arrears and wages out of his own pocket, before leading them in an expulsion of the invaders. Soon, though, the problem grew beyond Calais’ walls. As an island, dependent on sea-based trade, England had always been vulnerable. Foreign attacks had been feared back in 1452, when Henry VI had summoned all South and East Coast ship owners to assemble at Sandwich in case of Channel raids. The Confederation of Cinque Ports had been designed to protect local ships from becoming prey to foreign pirates, although its members often indulged in acts of piracy themselves. It was not until August 1457, however, that a French general, a previous friend of Margaret, mounted a devastating attack on the English seaport of Sandwich, setting off renewed fears of a full-scale invasion. Now the queen had little choice but
to trust the earl. As a result, Warwick was given the commission of Lord High Admiral to keep the seas clear for three years and granted £1,000 expenses. It is difficult to overestimate how powerful this position was, considering that Warwick was already head of England’s largest standing army, at Calais, and was now able to control sea traffic. It also gave him license to indulge in his own acts of piracy.

  There was a long history of piracy between England and France, dating back to before the outbreak of the Hundred Years’ War. One of the most famous, whose legend lingered into Anne’s lifetime, was John Hawley, politician, merchant, privateer and pirate, whose adventures were already legendary at the time of his death in 1408. His fleet seemed to be ubiquitous, appearing wherever he was feared and avoided: ‘Blow the wind high, blow the wind low, it bloweth good to Hawley’s Hoe.’2 It has been suggested that Chaucer, visiting Dartmouth in the 1370s, used Hawley as his model for the character of the Shipman in The Canterbury Tales,3 who had no conscience when drawing draughts of Bordeaux wine as the trader, or owner, slept and never lost a fight:

  Ful many a draughte of wyn had he ydrawe

  Fro Burdeux-ward, whil that the chapman sleep.

  Of nyce conscience took he no keep.

  If that he faught, and hadde the hyer hond,

  By water he sente hem hoom to every lond.4

  The role of a pirate often overlapped that of a privateer, a private sailor authorised to defend their country. Chaucer was, in fact, sent by Richard II to arrange for the release of a Genoese merchant ship that Hawley had captured, but by 1403, the privateer’s reputation had improved and he was honoured for repelling a Breton raid. However, Hawley then got in trouble when he preyed upon the ships of Breton merchants which were under the protection of Sir John de Roche, resulting in a court case that lasted eight years. His fortunes plummeted again when he was imprisoned in the Tower until he promised to return his plundered goods. In 1449, another Dartmouth man, Captain Robert Wenyngton, captured a number of trading vessels from Brittany, the Low Countries and Prussia, which he held on the Isle of Wight, so that Henry VI was forced to compensate them for their losses. In 1450, piracy was so proliferate in the Channel that over fifty Hanseatic ships were seized that year alone, with their cargoes of salt being sold in London. In 1458, two cases appear in the Close Rolls which highlight the nature of the piracy taking place on England’s south-west coast under Warwick’s rule. One Portuguese ship, the Saint Mary de Nazareth, under the command of Lewis Vaskes, had put into the port of Dartmouth the previous December and had not yet been allowed to leave.5 Another fleet of Calais ships and soldiers, ‘furnished and arrayed for war’, took, by force, three Dutch vessels at Tilbury Docks in Essex. In these, they found letters of patents from Henry VI to a Venetian merchant, allowing them to intercept cargoes of wool from London ships, which they disposed of ‘at their pleasure’. For this crime, they were fined £3,200 and the aggrieved wool owners were granted passage to trade with Italy until they had recuperated their losses.6 They had got off lightly, as one William Maurice had been hanged, drawn and quartered for his activities back in 1421. In the spring of 1458, Warwick was heading back to England but in the light of his recent activities and the queen’s distrust of him as an ally of the Duke of York, he would have to tread carefully. His piracy could give Margaret the ammunition she needed. On the surface, though, all appeared amicable.

  On Lady Day, 25 March 1458, the rival factions behind the throne were drawn together in a last-ditch attempt at solidarity. Crowds were converging outside St Paul’s Cathedral and the atmosphere in the capital was tense. Londoners were unsettled by the presence of armed troops, who had been arriving for weeks and kicking their heels while waiting for their opponents to put in a presence. York, Warwick and his father, the Earl of Salisbury, had been invited to attend a special reconciliation with the king, organised by Thomas Bourchier, Archbishop of Canterbury. This meeting was to be followed by a mass of thanksgiving, when enemies would walk hand in hand, known to history as the Loveday. However, it was all a sham; there was little love felt between the queen and the Yorkists, whom she held responsible for the massacres and looting after the Battle of St Albans. Heading a large number of troops, Warwick had already evaded one attempt to capture him on his way to Westminster and knew that, in spite of appearances, the queen was his sworn enemy. The crowds watched uneasily as the combatants emerged from the cathedral. Warwick was arm in arm with Henry Holland, Duke of Exeter, York’s son-in-law, who was reputedly furious at having been replaced as Lord High Admiral, and the young Henry Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, burning with hatred at the man whom he held responsible for his father’s death at St Albans. A contemporary ballad recorded the public truce:

  In Yorke, in Somersett, as y undyrstonde

  In Warwikke also ys love and charite

  In Salisbury eke [also] and yn Northumberlond

  That every man may reiouce the concord and unite.7

  A series of magnificent jousts followed at the Tower, held in Margaret’s honour, although perhaps only Henry VI was deceived by his enemies’ ‘lovely countenance[s]’ and ‘token that love was in the heart and thought’.8 The optimism of popular ballads, calling on the citizens to rejoice in the new peace, overlooked the tension created by the thousands of armed guards that thronged the streets. A marriage was also arranged between the queen’s seventeen-year-old ward, Isabella Ingaldsethorpe, and Warwick’s younger brother, John. However, within months, hostilities had broken out again. The owners of German merchant ships, upon which Warwick had been preying in the Channel, appealed to Henry and Margaret for support, providing the queen with the opportunity she needed. In the autumn of 1458, she attempted to have the earl indicted for piracy and rumours followed that Somerset’s men were about to break into his London property with murderous intent. Warwick appeared at court in order to answer the summons, guarded by 600 men. Margaret insisted he should stand trial and he retaliated by accusing her of insincerity on the Loveday. The next day, Warwick’s supporters rioted in London and later, as he visited Westminster, the earl narrowly avoided being killed by an ‘accident’ in the palace kitchens. Some accounts have suggested that Warwick embroidered this event, which was little more than an accident, but it indicates the depths that mutual hostilities had reached and is not at all impossible. That November, at a council meeting, his men clashed again with those of the queen, after which there was little the earl could do but flee; he fought his way to his barge, waiting on the Thames, and fled back to Calais.

  After this, the descent to civil war was rapid. Margaret attempted to establish an alternative power base in the North, where she raised an army and ordered 3,000 bows to be made. A Royal Council was summoned to Coventry in 1459 to deal with the thorny problem of Henry VI’s enemies, but York, Warwick and Salisbury were excluded, leaving little doubt who those ‘enemies’ were and that significant steps were to be taken against them. In response, the Earl of Salisbury held a family meeting at Middleham Castle to declare allegiance for the Duke of York and when, that autumn, Warwick brought an army across the Channel from Calais, a pitched battle could hardly be avoided. Warwick and Salisbury both set off to march to York’s stronghold at Ludlow Castle on the Welsh border. The intention was to join forces and head south to London but the queen’s men intercepted Salisbury midway between their strongholds of Ludlow and Middleham.

  It was a Sunday morning, 23 September 1459, St Tecla’s day, when the armies met at Blore Heath, part fields and part woodland. The weather was wet and the muddy ground churned over by the feet of horses and men. The king’s forces, which have been estimated as numbering between 6,000 and 12,000, were ranged behind a huge hedge across a brook from Salisbury’s much smaller army of 3,000–6,000. However, Warwick’s father, then aged about sixty, was a seasoned commander of the Scottish Wars and the long-running Percy–Neville family feud. He might have been outnumbered but his superior military tactics allowed him to win the day. In order to protect his men, Salisb
ury ordered huge defensive ditches lined with sharpened sticks to be dug, encircled them with carts and wagons and waited to be attacked. Seeing the odds stacked against them, though, his army initially feared the worst and supposedly fell to their knees and kissed the earth, which they believed would be their final resting place. They underestimated their commander, though, who, by drawing the royal army out towards them, was able to feign a retreat before turning on the enemy and slaughtering the leaders. Salisbury’s men shot the horses out from under the opponents, which led to the defection of around 500 terrified men to their side. After about an hour of hand-to-hand fighting, many Lancastrians deserted and Margaret’s army collapsed, yet the engagement continued well into the early hours. Salisbury ordered cannon to be fired into the darkness to give the appearance that the fighting was lasting longer than it had and deter further attacks. According to Gregory’s Chronicle, ‘the batayle … lastyd alle the aftyr none, fro one of the clocke tylle v aftyr non, and the chasse lastyd unto vii at the belle in the mornynge’.9 About 3,000 men lay dead, the majority of whom were Lancastrians.

  The queen herself is rumoured to have watched the battle from the church spire at Mucklestone and, witnessing the defeat, instructed her blacksmith to reverse her horseshoes, to deceive her enemies about her flight. She is then supposed to have executed the smith, one William Skelhorn, in order to preserve his silence, to which ‘Skelhorn’s anvil’ stands testament in Mucklestone churchyard today. Legend has it that little Prince Edward, then aged six, may have been with her; it appears she had him order and witness the executions of his enemies in the coming years. This story has all the trappings of a highly unlikely romantic legend but it is consistent with contemporary portrayals of the martial and cunning nature of Henry VI’s wife and the impression perpetrated of her as a mother. Margaret may have watched from nearby but it is unlikely to have been at Mucklestone, as the village was located behind Yorkist lines at that point. Another account has both king and queen arriving together at the battlefield the following morning, only to find it deserted in the wake of the Yorkist victory. From there, Salisbury had headed off to join Warwick and York at Ludlow, where, it was planned, their combined forces should be able to defeat the Lancastrians decisively. Blore Heath was to guarantee nothing, though. It was after this victory that their fortunes began to turn.