Cecily Neville: Mother of Kings

by Amy Licence

  York’s grievances followed familiar lines. He protested his loyalty to Henry while asking for the removal of his evil counsellor, asking for Somerset to be handed over. His intention may well have been to put the duke on official trial so that he could level formal charges of incompetence and corruption against him. He may have had in mind a similar process that Suffolk had undergone in 1450. In 1453 he had gone as far as to have Somerset committed to the Tower, but on that occasion it is possible that Somerset’s life was saved because Henry recovered before York was able to move against him. The king and queen had been deeply upset by Suffolk’s death and, mindful of this, Henry refused to comply. Instead, he appointed Buckingham as Constable of England, with control over the royal forces, such as they were in their state of half-readiness. This could have been a reconciliatory move, as Buckingham was married to Cecily’s sister Anne and had little desire to see actual fighting take place or York and his party alienated further.

  York had not forgotten that, back in 1452, circumstances at Dartford had forced him to swear an oath to not raise arms again in opposition to the king’s supporters. To this end, he had received a papal dispensation to permit him to do so,2 which indicates the extent of his dissatisfaction, the long-standing nature of the dispute and the extent of his piety. It also indicates his intentions. The past few years had proved so frustrating, with constant threats to his person and undermining of his position, that conflict seemed the only recourse. There seems no reason to doubt that his chief objective was the removal of Somerset. At around ten in the morning of 22 May 1455, when negotiations broke down, fighting began. The battle was bloody but brief. Somerset was backed into the prophetic Castle Inn, symbolic for the duke as it had reputedly been predicted that he would die in a castle. This may be romantic legend but, at any rate, he was killed fighting his way out of a building on the square. His death brought the battle to an end; it was the outcome York had probably hoped for. In one step, it removed the man who he believed to have been working against him and it would allow him to take a key role in government again. He submitted to the king and asked for his forgiveness.

  News of the events would have been dispatched quickly. Cecily was probably miles away, at Fotheringhay or Ludlow, having retreated from London with York when the Leicester parliament was called. The days must have passed anxiously, as she supervised her household and the nursery containing her small children while heavily pregnant; no doubt she had confidence in her husband’s abilities and his right to act, yet there was always a risk involved. A messenger would have reached her within the next day or so, at a distance of just over 60 miles to Fotheringhay. If she was at Ludlow, around 130 miles from the battle scene, she may not have heard the news until York had returned to London. The news had reached Lamberhithe in London by Whitsun, three days later, on Sunday 25 May. From there, John Crane wrote to John Paston with the news that Somerset was dead and York was victorious; ‘as for any other Lordes, many of theym be hurt’.3

  Cecily probably received a letter containing news of her husband’s victory before this time or, at the very latest, on the same day. On Whit Sunday, Crane may well have witnessed York staging a crown-wearing ceremony at St Paul’s Cathedral. From St Albans, the victorious party had headed for the capital, taking Henry with them – a matter in which the king probably had little choice. On 25 May, York placed the crown on Henry’s head with his own hands. Finally, after years of being overlooked and generations of his family being bypassed, the duke’s position was being acknowledged. As his duchess, Cecily would have been considered a queen-in-waiting. While the victory was a relief, as was the removal of the Yorks’ implacable enemy Somerset, the way in which it had been achieved must have caused Cecily to fear for the future. Dependent still on the patronage and goodwill of the king and queen, they had taken a huge risk in jeopardising this connection. It is highly likely that, on receiving the news, Cecily dispatched her own letter to Margaret, attempting to use words to heal the wounds of the battlefield.

  York soon acted to secure himself and his followers; with King Henry now virtually under house arrest, he took Somerset’s old position as Constable of England, and Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, became Captain of Calais. York’s brother-in-law, Henry Bourchier, husband of his sister Isabel, was appointed as treasurer. The king was simply not able to provide the strong rule that the country needed; he is often described during this period as being unresponsive or bewildered; and many pockets of lawlessness had broken out.4 To many, it seemed that York was the only magnate capable of restoring England to stability. In his chronicle, John Hardyng addressed the duke:

  O worthy Prince! O duke of York I meane

  Discendid downe of highest bloodde royall …

  By whiche knowledge your discrete sapience

  All vyce evermore destroye maye and reprove

  By virtuous and blessedfull diligence

  And vertue love, that maye not ought greve

  How ye shall rule your subjects, while ye lyve

  In lawe, and peace, and all tranquyllite

  Whiche been the floures of all regalyte.5

  Feelings were clearly running high following the Battle of St Albans. A letter, written to William Worcester from William Barker in June 1455, recorded a planned attempt on the duke’s life: ‘It was said forsooth, that Harper and two other of the King’s Chamber, were confederated to [have] sticked [stabbed] the Duke of York in the King’s chamber, but it was not so, for they have cleared them thereof.’6 That summer’s parliament absolved York and his party from all guilt in the death of Somerset and the others who had died at St Albans. With his old adversary out of the way, York could now expect to take a central role in national politics again. He could anticipate playing the role that his descent and position as a leading magnate of the day should have facilitated since the mid-1440s.

  Then, King Henry fell ill again. If he had not suffered a relapse in his mental health, at the very least he was incapable of performing key offices, and was in need of assistance. Rymer places this occurrence as early as mid-June, but the development did not become general knowledge until much later. It may have been that Henry experienced some lucid moments rather than the state of complete catatonia that he had experienced in 1453–54, which made diagnosis more difficult. In June, according to the Barker letter, York was staying at the Franciscan friary at Ware. Now a priory, it was founded in 1338, and part of it still stands in the Hertfordshire town of Ware, as a convenient stopping point on the road to London. Details such as the grotesques carved on corbels, doorways and roof trusses give an idea of the scale of the larger building that York knew. He may well have been lodging here as a traveller in June 1455, or else, in the weeks after St Albans, the pious duke was making his amends with God for the bloodshed. He might even have been at the friary when the news of the king’s illness reached him. Doctors had attended him in June and July but the outbreaks of violence in London, Derbyshire and Devon showed that a strong leader was again required. That November, York was appointed Lord Protector for the second time.

  For Cecily, at the age of forty, their ambitions were finally within reach. However, as was often the lot of women, victory on one level overshadowed a personal tragedy. In the summer of 1455, perhaps in July, she gave birth to her last child, a girl named Ursula. Little is known about the pregnancy or delivery, or even the location of Ursula’s birth, which is assumed to have taken place at Fotheringhay, yet it is clear from the Clare Roll poem that she had died by spring 1460. No christening is recorded. It may have been another stillbirth or a loss to an early childhood illness. Writing to Margaret of Anjou back in 1453, Cecily had described the heaviness of pregnancy, and now, after possibly thirteen births over a period of sixteen years, she had seven surviving children. The recent decades had been marked for her by a string of births, which had not prevented her from travelling abroad but which must have led to significant periods of incapacity. Pregnancy customs required a woman to follow strict guidelines
regarding diet, activity and superstition, as well as a month of lying in before the birth, and a similar period of recovery afterwards. As such, it was an experience that tended to unite women in spite of political differences, such as with Cecily and Margaret, connecting them through the experience on a religious, practical and emotional level. Increasingly, though, the coming years would make this less possible for the wives of the king and his leading magnate.

  This year also marked another personal transition for Cecily. With her experience, she may have been present in person to see the arrival of her first grandchild, Lady Anne Holland, daughter of Anne and the rebellious Earl of Exeter, then still incarcerated in Wallingford Castle. After Exeter fought on the side of the king at St Albans, their marriage now had little chance of success; the young pair would go through a formal separation in years to come. Anne would have had need of her mother’s support on a number of levels and may well have called her to her bedside, as childbirth was most commonly supported by families of women of several generations. Yet, for all her ambitions and love for her children, Cecily would have still understood Margaret of Anjou’s position; if she could not sympathise with her as a queen, perhaps she did as a mother.

  Early in 1456, Queen Margaret left court with Prince Edward and established herself at Tutbury, which was more favourable to the Lancastrian cause than London. Here she set up a safe base for herself and her son, probably at the fourteenth-century Tutbury Castle, with five towers and walls 7 feet thick, or possibly at the nearby manor house, which was then owned by the Duke of Buckingham and his wife Anne, Cecily’s sister. Although it was not a good omen for national unity, it removed her temporarily from York’s way. His return to London on 9 February was recorded by John Bocking in a letter to Fastolf: ‘This day my Lordes York and Warwick comen to the Parlement in a good array, to the number of 300 men [in armour] whereof many men mervailed.’7 However, Henry VI was showing signs of being able to conduct some limited aspects of royal business and, as Bocking recounted, ‘it was said on Saterday [7 February] my Lord shuld have ben discharged this same day’.8 Henry’s fluctuating mental health afforded him moments of clarity but denied him a consistent ability to steer the reins of government, even if he had been inclined, or able, to do so. The terms of York’s November appointment specified that he could not be dismissed ‘at the king’s pleasure’, as he had before, but only by the king himself, which gave him a little more security.

  In Parliament, they spoke of ‘a greet gleymyng sterre that but late hathe been seen diverse tymes, merveilous in apperyng’.9 Such things were often considered as omens, either for good or bad. It did not bode well for York, whose position was called into question as the delicate balance of power between king and protector continued. He resigned his position on 25 February: ‘in the king’s presence the Duke of York resigned his office and withdrew from Parliament before the session ended’.10 That May, York went to Sandal Castle and was still there in June, when Bocking wrote to John Paston that he ‘waytith on the Quene and she up on him’.11 It was an uneasy truce. The uncertainty of Henry’s mental state coupled with the influence of the queen and her new favourite, Henry Beaufort, the new Duke of Somerset and son of York’s old adversary, made for a volatile political situation. A further source of tension remained in the unpaid debts that Parliament still owed the duke, which were now of several years’ standing. At the Yorkshire stronghold, Cecily and Richard must have reflected on their current position and the future of their children. As the summer days passed, within the thick walls of the castle, set high on the motte overlooking the River Calder, they were aware that their rightful power was close to hand but could easily be snatched away from their grasp. As a strong couple of royal descent, with a growing brood of children, they presented a very real alternative to the partnership of Henry VI and Margaret, possessing many of the qualities that would have made them more successful rulers of the country.

  Later that June, an occasion arose that necessitated York taking the part of king. While he was at Sandal, James II, King of Scots, sent a letter to Henry VI, threatening to invade. It was York who made the formal response to try to bring them back in line, later chiding James for his border raids.12 In August the court moved to Coventry and, once again, York feared that the queen and young Duke of Somerset would influence the king in his absence. They were to remain there for the next four years, making an alternative power base in the North, further dividing the country and its leaders. Additionally, a number of new appointments were made to the council, of men who were sympathetic to the Lancastrian cause. When York travelled there that autumn, the meeting was less than satisfactory. A letter from John Gresham to John Paston that October described how ‘my Lord of York hath be with the Kyng, and is departed ageyn in right good conceyt with the Kyng but not in gret conceyt with the Queen and sum men sey … my Lord of York had be distressed at his departyng’.13

  In early September, Benet’s Chronicle records that York was in London, staying at Salisbury House, the property of Richard Beauchamp, Bishop of Salisbury, in Fleet Street. While there, his enemies made a threatening display that left him in no doubt that, although Somerset was dead, the war was far from over. Impaled on the railings outside were the heads of five dogs, each with a verse of anti-York satire clamped between their jaws. Known as ‘The Five Dogs of London’, it is held in the collection of Trinity College Dublin and worth quoting fully:

  Whan lordschyppe fayleth, gode felowschipe awayleth

  My mayster ys cruell and can no curtesye

  ffor whos offense here am y pyghte [put]

  hyt ys no reson that y schulde dye

  ffor his trespace and he go quyte.

  Offte beryth the sone the faderis gilte

  None so gylteless as y compleyne

  ffor ones that y barked a-geynys the mone

  With mighty force here was y sleyne

  My tyme was come; my defenys ys done.

  The tonge breketh bone, yet in him is none

  ffor fawte of curasse [caress?] my throat was cutte

  y cryed for helpe, y was not herde

  y wolde my mayster hadde provide my butte

  thys hadde y for hym to my rewarde

  Off folowynge adventurous, the judgement is jeperdous

  Wat planet compelled me, or what signe

  To serve that man that all men hate?

  Y wolde hys hede were here for myne

  ffor he hath caused all the debate

  Happy is the man whom perils provided

  The blasynge starne with his late constellacioun

  ys pleynly determined weyis batayle

  To soche a remedye y holde yt geson

  And yn rancur with-owte remedy ys none avayle

  Maysterys, taketh for no grewe thewgh that we be dede

  ffor they will walke by your fleke [flank/side] in despyte of your hede.14

  The content and tone of this give the impression of disgruntled employees or former employees. In the last few years York seemed to attract those who wished to rebel under his name, only to find that he was still implacable in his adherence to the throne. Only that spring two of his men, Sir William Herbert and Sir Walter Devereux, had begun fresh trouble by seizing the mayor of Hereford and attacking local property, which developed into an attack on Kenilworth in June. Although he had planned to be, Henry was not actually in residence at the time, which scuppered the intention to capture and kill him. When they then attacked the Earl of Richmond in Carmarthen Castle, they overlooked the fact that the property was, technically, in York’s hands. The grisly warning of the five dogs reminded York of the many enemies who still opposed his claim, and of the need to play by the rules and suppress lawbreaking, no matter who lay behind it. From London he went to Sandal, then back to the capital on 11 October, and five days later he obeyed the summons to attend Parliament at Coventry. The situation was becoming increasingly tense, with the queen’s party dismissing those of York’s supporters in key roles. In November,
Warwick was ambushed by Exeter and the young Duke of Somerset. Holding the Yorkist lords responsible for his father’s death at St Alban’s, the twenty-year-old Henry Beaufort turned his attention to Richard in Coventry. According to Bale’s Chronicle, he attacked York, who was only saved after the intervention of the city’s mayor.15

  Cecily was far removed from these political tensions. In autumn 1456, she stayed at Caister Castle in Norfolk, with Sir John Fastolf, in an environment as far removed from the dangers of Coventry as possible. Reputedly the inspiration for the character of Falstaff, Sir John had been a veteran of the Hundred Years’ War by the time he served under Richard, Duke of York, in Normandy. He had retired in 1440 and his moated castle at Caister was considered a ‘ryche juelle’,16 and one of the most desirable in the country. Although little of it survives now, following a siege in 1469, the castle Cecily stayed in was a beautiful and comfortable retreat, with a garden, swannery, fish ponds, chapel and mill approached across a causeway. Accounts from 1431–32 reveal that there was a permanent staff of twenty-four, with departments for the kitchen and cellar, buttery and pantry, and bakehouse. Extensive rebuilding was undertaken at that time, costing over £1,372 and continuing through the next decade, including five turrets along the moat side, a flat roof for viewing the countryside and a gallery of glazed windows opening onto an inner courtyard which featured a mechanical clock that struck the hours. There was also a stew, or bathhouse, and there may have been an early prototype of the stacked accommodation that soon became fashionable in royal residences.17