But did Richard really starve himself? Or was he killed on Henry’s orders? And how can the official version of his death on 14 February be squared with the French king’s statement that he had heard of the death by 29 January?
The council debated the death in early February. Astoundingly, Henry neither confirmed nor denied the French message that Richard was dead. Our evidence for this is the minutes of a council meeting, which was held on or after 3 February 1400.18 It contains two relevant entries. The first reads ‘if Richard, former king, still be living as some suppose [or ‘as may be supposed’], then it is ordered that he be well and securely guarded for the safety of the estate of the king and of his realm’.19 That such doubts about Richard’s survival were entertained by the councillors themselves (and not just by people outside the council) is shown by an even more illuminating passage on the other side of the folio, which states that: ‘it seems to the council necessary to speak to the king that, in case Richard [the] former king etcetera is still living, he should be kept in security agreeable to the lords of the realm and if he be gone from life then he should be shown openly to the people at the end so that they may recognise him’.20
This raises the question of why the council did not seek further information from Henry as to what had happened to Richard. The council’s order that ‘he should be kept in security’ shows that their doubt was not due to his escape (otherwise we would read of orders for his recapture). We might conclude that Richard had indeed taken the initiative and started to starve himself to death (and, of course, the council may have been told this, whether true or not). But the key phrase here is ‘it seems to the council necessary to speak to the king’. This shows that the council considered Richard’s fate separately, without Henry being present.21 It demonstrates a possible difference between the information communicated to the council and that available to the king. It follows that either the whole council, including Henry, did not know for certain whether Richard was dead or not, because the matter was beyond Henry’s control and could not be clarified; or knowledge that Richard was already dead was known only to Henry and those members of the council who were privy to his secrets, who would not clarify the matter to the others.
Let us now consider the instructions issued by Charles VI to his ambassador Pierre Blanchet on 29 January, particularly ‘that he had been advised of the death of King Richard’. How did Charles know this? Firstly, and most probably, there may have been a French spy in contact with someone connected with Richard’s killing. There are very few alternatives. It is possible that Henry secretly informed the French king, in order to restart peace negotiations. But why then did his messenger not inform his own ambassadors on the way, especially as Charles was on the verge of invading England? He would have been undermining his own diplomatic position by giving this information to the French. Thus this explanation is hardly credible. Even more difficult to accept is that the French acted on an unsubstantiated rumour.22 Although Charles was periodically mad, the rest of the French royal family – who ruled in his name when he was unwell – would not have accepted a mere rumour unquestioningly. There is no sign of any doubt on the part of the French government of the veracity of the information. They certainly would not have reversed their entire policy to England, confirmed the truce and initiated negotiations unless they were confident that their information about Richard’s death was shared by Henry.
Scholars have traditionally referred to the French information as a mere rumour, and presumed that we cannot connect it with the actual death. But though the French information may have prompted a rumour, in itself it was more reliable than hearsay, for the originator triggered an entire reversal of French royal policy. It is important to remember this when considering the alternative narratives of Richard’s death. Let us suppose for the sake of argument that Richard did starve himself in Pontefract on hearing of the news of the failure of the Epiphany Rising. This would tally with Richard’s reaction on his arrest – he refused to eat – and so would be believable. It would explain the council’s doubt about whether he was alive or not in February 1400, because no one at that council meeting – at least three days’ ride from Pontefract – knew whether he would go through with his self-starvation. However, the theory that Richard starved himself cannot be reconciled with the French king confidently circulating news of his death on 29 January. It would imply that it was a complete coincidence that, within a few days of Richard choosing to starve himself to death at Pontefract, someone close to the French royal family invented a spurious story that he had died and persuaded the French king to circulate the news without first checking it. This is simply not credible, especially in the light of their reversal of policy in the wake of the report. The French must have had some intelligence which they considered trustworthy, and that cannot have originated with Richard or his guards in the dungeons of Pontefract.
With this in mind, we can return to the question of why the English council was uncertain whether Richard was alive or dead at the time of their early February meeting. It is very difficult to accept that the reason was because the matter could not be clarified, for the French already had information which they considered reliable. Henry’s closest friends on the council must have claimed that they had no certain knowledge of it, or simply said nothing. Why? If Richard was already dead, and the French were circulating the information, why did Henry not confirm or deny his death to the council? The could not/would not question above would appear thus to be answered. The matter was left in doubt because those in the know would not clarify it. For this reason, the minutes of the council meeting, coupled with the French evidence, are very suspicious, if not damning.
Now let us tighten the final screws in this investigation. In searching for a source for the French information about Richard’s death, we have no option but to return to the contemporary French chronicles mentioned above, for they alone give an early January date for Henry ordering Richard’s death. According to the original of all of these French texts – preserved in The Betrayal and Death of Richard II – the name of the man whom Henry ordered to do the killing was Sir Piers (or Peter) Exton. As mentioned above, no man of this name is known, but it bears resemblance to that of Sir Peter Bucton (or Buxton), Henry’s old friend, fellow crusader and erstwhile steward. This is important for Bucton was one of the very few men who knew where Richard was secretly being held.23 The specific entry reads ‘on the day of Kings (6 January), when Henry had taken the field, outside London, with all his people who were about to fight the lords who had risen to support King Richard, he commanded a knight called Sir Piers Exton to go and deliver [Richard] straightaway from this world’.24 The man who recorded that command was a Frenchman who was in London at the time, and whose source was with Henry in person on that day.25 Furthermore, the Frenchman in question had excellent connections with the highest-ranking members of the English court. If he or one of his French contacts sent word of Henry’s order to France, this could have been the source of Charles VI’s knowledge that Richard was dead. In other words, it might not have been news of the death itself which persuaded the French king, it might have been trustworthy intelligence that Henry had issued an order for Richard to be killed. Certainly in The Betrayal and Death of Richard II we have evidence that the French had intelligence of such an order being issued in early January. Furthermore, if the French king knew that Henry had given this order, then presumably some members of the English court – and some members of Henry’s council – knew too. Hence the doubt in early February about whether Richard was dead. The royal council needed clarification as to whether Henry’s order had been carried out. The French presumed that the order had already resulted in Richard’s murder.
We cannot be certain that this is the true basis for the French information, but it would explain a great deal, including the otherwise intractable problem of the timing of the French announcement. It also allows us to reconstruct in outline the circumstances leading to Richard’s death. On or abo
ut 6 January, while riding against the rebels during the Epiphany Rising, Henry ordered Bucton to go to Pontefract and kill Richard, or at least to be prepared to kill him if the rebellion got out of hand. The essence of this order was overheard by the French agent in London, and the news was sent to Paris that Henry had secretly ordered Richard’s death. The French king, having no regard for the sensitivity of the matter in England, used the information to try to persuade Henry to return his daughter, Isabella, on the grounds that she was now a widow. He sent his messages to Henry’s ambassadors via his own representatives on 29 January. The French king’s letter would have been received by the English delegation at Calais on or about 1 February, and they lost no time in sending a copy to Westminster with William Faryngton. Henry, seeing the French king’s statement that Richard was dead, allowed the question to be discussed by the council at the early February meeting, to determine what they believed should be done with the king in the event of his death. Having no clarification of the matter, the council responded as best they could, providing for each eventuality.
The remainder of the story is evidenced in the Issue Rolls. About this time Henry sent William Loveney to Pontefract and back ‘on the king’s secret business’ with a small company of men.26 Loveney was the keeper of the great wardrobe, a faithful Lancastrian, who had been in Henry’s service since 1381.27 The task Henry now gave him was either to organise the process of announcing the death to the council (if Bucton had already killed Richard) or to outline to Thomas Swynford what to do about the ex-king (if he was still alive). On 14 February, Swynford sent a valet from Pontefract to ‘certify’ to the council that Richard was dead. He arrived in Westminster three days later, on 17 February. That same day Henry authorised the payment of one hundred marks to bring the body to London.
Taking all this evidence into account, two narratives are possible. Henry’s order to Bucton may have been simply to go to Pontefract and be ready to kill Richard if the Epiphany Rising looked like freeing him, this order being misinterpreted by the French agent in London. When news of this led the French king to infer that Richard was dead, and to offer a renewal of the peace, Henry realised the opportunity to avert both a war and the risk of Richard being rescued, and sent Loveney to Pontefract to arrange Richard’s final demise. Alternatively, Richard may have been killed by Bucton on or shortly after 9 January, as a direct consequence of Henry’s first order, issued on or about the 6th. Following that, Henry may have delayed announcing the death until it was safe for him to do so, after the heat of the Epiphany Rising had died down.
In determining which of these narratives is most likely to be correct, we have two final pieces of evidence to consider. First, there is the text of the Percy family manifesto.28 This was written in 1403, after the Percy family declared their hostility to Henry. In it the earl of Northumberland – a member of the king’s council and one of Henry’s strongest supporters in 1400 – stated that Henry ordered Richard to be killed by starvation, and that the ex-king lingered for fifteen days before he died. It goes without saying that the manifesto is an inherently biased document; nevertheless, if Bucton had killed Richard suddenly on Henry’s orders, Northumberland could have said so, rather than falsely claiming that Henry had starved Richard to death, for he was in a very good position in February 1400 to know the truth.29 The second piece of evidence tallies with this. When Thomas Swynford’s valet came south to confirm to the council that Richard was dead, he hired an extra horse ‘for speed’.30 Why would there be a need for extra speed if this was simply a ruse to cover up a death which had happened a month earlier? The council would not have known how many horses Swynford’s valet had used on the journey.
In conclusion, it appears that Richard did die on 14 February, and that Henry’s order to Bucton on 6 January was a precaution, to kill him only if it looked like he might fall into rebel hands.31 It would follow that the French agent misinterpreted this order, and that Henry did not issue the command actually to kill him until later, probably after 3 February (the earliest possible date for William Faryngton’s arrival at Westminster). That the order was taken north by Loveney, and yet news of the death did not come south until brought by Swynford’s valet, suggests that there was a period of delay between the receipt of the order and the death, and this correlates with the starvation story as officially announced and as claimed by the Percy family. More than this it is not possible to say. But whatever other details we might wish to know, and whatever clarifications of the foregoing conclusion are desirable, there can be no doubt about one thing. Richard II did not starve himself to death in Pontefract Castle; he was killed on Henry IV’s instructions.
*
How do we account for this? A man who was a pious believer in the Trinity, who enjoyed discussing morality, who went on crusades and even made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem – how come he turned into a murderer? What drove him to it? This question takes us right into the heart of what Henry was, or rather what he had become by January 1400. It is thus one of the most interesting aspects of his life.
Richard’s hatred of Henry in the past was not a critical factor in determining his death. If Henry had wanted Richard killed for past grudges, insults and attempts on his and his father’s lives, he had every opportunity to bring this about in the parliament of 1399. Indeed, it would have been far easier to let parliament execute Richard than to murder him secretly a few weeks later. Thus we may be sure that it was not a personal vendetta but a political assassination. On 4 January Henry finally realised that the die-hard Ricardian faction would never accept him as their monarch. Worse, they were prepared to murder all four of his sons to achieve their aim. Henry’s children were a part of his political world: they embodied his hope of founding a dynasty. So, now he was king, he had a duty to maintain stability and the political order, and that meant his own personal wishes were subsumed within the interests of the Crown. He had no choice but to do all he possibly could to preserve himself and the royal family, and that included eradicating the destabilising threat which was Richard II.
In this light it is striking that Richard was probably not killed on a whim, but only after the precaution of sending Bucton to Pontefract. Even if one takes the Percy manifesto literally, so that Henry starved Richard for fifteen days, he did not issue the command to begin the starvation until 27 or 28 January. The precautionary order may be seen as a strategic move, that of a general on the field of battle, which is indeed what Henry was on 6 January. The order actually to starve Richard – issued probably in early February – was more considered, after the immediate danger had passed, to make safe his position. The immediate advantages of the assassination were obvious, the long-term disadvantages less so. When news arrived of the French king’s understanding that Richard was already dead, and that Charles was now more concerned with his daughter’s return than with invading England, the opportunity to make peace with France and at the same time safeguard his throne from pro-Ricardian fanatics persuaded Henry that bringing about Richard’s death ‘by natural causes’ was the best course of action.
Although the killing of Richard was actuated by political necessity rather than personal hatred, that necessity in itself points to a profound change in Henry. To most critics, Henry weathered the Epiphany Rising with relative ease: the support of the country was never seriously in doubt, and support for Richard withered quickly. But the rising itself shattered Henry’s image of himself as a universally popular king, and seriously ruptured his faith in the value of mercy. It forced him to see political reality: that he might be required to stoop to underhand methods for the sake of the safety of the realm, including the assassination of a kinsman. Far from being the new Edward III, he was vulnerable. Of course, kings do not write letters revealing their weaknesses, so there is no overt evidence of his fear; but there can be no doubt that in Henry’s case his vulnerability was suddenly and violently exposed. The attempted revolt cannot but have raised the question in his mind of another attack. When might it come? And
would the next attacker seek also to kill all his sons?
Unsurprisingly, Henry did not lament Richard’s passing. He ordered the body to be brought to London with its face exposed, so that all who saw it could recognise the ex-king, in accordance with the council’s directions. The face was exhibited from the forehead down to the neck.32 The corpse was taken first to St Paul’s, where it arrived on 12 March.33 A Mass was sung there for the dead king’s soul, which Henry respectfully attended, bearing the pall himself. After two days on open display at St Paul’s, the body was taken through the main street, Cheapside, where it was left on its carriage for all to see it for two hours. Following that it was conducted to Westminster Abbey, where another Mass was sung for the late king, before being taken for burial at King’s Langley.
Henry’s refusal to allow Richard to be interred in the tomb in Westminster Abbey which he (Richard) had constructed for himself and his first wife has occasioned much debate and speculation among historians.34 One view is that Henry did not believe Richard was worthy to lie in the special circle of tombs around the shrine of the Confessor. The other Plantagenet kings there – Henry III, Edward I and Edward III – were all more deserving monarchs than Richard (the weakest of them, Henry III, had rebuilt the entire abbey church). But debate on this point has overlooked the fact that Henry did not remove Richard’s tomb, which he would have done if he had meant Richard never to lie in it. It lay half-empty, housing only the body of Richard’s queen, Anne of Bohemia, until Henry himself was dead. Moreover, Henry did not even move it from the innermost ring of royal tombs, where it filled the last of the six places of honour around the royal saint’s shrine.35 He was not at all averse to moving tombs: at about this time he shifted the duke of Gloucester’s body to a place more in keeping with his royal status.36 So it appears that he meant Richard only temporarily to lie at Langley. He also paid for a thousand masses to be said at Langley for the salvation of Richard’s soul, a number fully in keeping with his kingly status.37 It is therefore unlikely that the explanation for Richard’s burial at Langley was his unworthiness and far more probable that Henry simply did not wish Westminster Abbey to become a focus for political supporters of the late king. Richard had rebuilt the hall of the Palace of Westminster in a very impressive fashion, and filled it with kingly statues. He had also been a patron of the abbey, and installed his huge gilt portrait there. Thus for Henry to separate Richard’s body and the physical remains of his kingship was – like the murder itself – a political act. His successors could rebury Richard where they liked in due course, but Henry himself was not going to risk adding to Richard’s potency in death by allowing his royal body to lie at the centre of his self-glorifying art and architecture.
The Fears of Henry IV: The Life of England's Self-Made King Page 31
