Battle at
Hexham,
May 1464.
Rewards
and punish-
ments.
George
Ne∖ille
made arch-
bishop of
York.
The king’s
marriage
announced,
Sept. 1464.
Disappoint-
ment of the
Nevilles on
Edward’s
marriage.
206 Constitutional History. [chap.
Hungerford, and Taillebois, titular earl of Kyme, were taken.
Somerset was beheaded at once, the others two days later at
Newcastle1. Other prisoners were carried to York, where the
king was, tried before the constable, and executed. Montague,
as a reward for bis prowess, was made earl of Northumberland
and endowed with the Percy estates in that county. In July
Sir Ralph Grey, who had defended Alnwick against Warwick,
was beheaded at Doncaster2, in Edward’s presence. In Sep-
tember bishop George Neville became archbishop of York.
The point at which the fortunes of the Nevilles thus reach
their zenith almost exactly coincides with the moment at which
the political relations of the king and court are totally altered
by his marriage. For on the 29th of September Edward pro-
claimed that he had been for some time married to Elizabeth,
the lady Grey, or Ferrers, of Groby, a widow, and daughter of
a Lancastrian lord, Richard Wydville lord Rivers, who had been
steward to the great duke of Bedford and had married Jacquetta
of Luxemburg his widow.
358. Edward’s marriage was signally distasteful to the
Nevilles. Warwick had planned a great scheme3, according
to which the king should by a fitting matrimonial alliance,
connecting him with both France and Burgundy, secure the
peace of Western Europe, at all events for some years. Even
if that scheme failed he might fairly have looked for a politic
marriage, perhaps with a daughter of his own, by which the
v. as taken and executed (p. 224). Cf. Latin Chronicle (Camd. Soc. 1880),
pp. 178, 179 ; Stow, and later historians. Mr. Gaiidner, on the authority
of the act of attainder which fixes May 8 as the day on which Somerset
‘ rered weτre ’ at Hexham, places the battle on that day ; Rot. Parl.
v. 511.
1 Gregory gives a synopsis of the executions: May 15, Somerset and
four others at Hexham ; May 17, Hungerford, Roos, and three others, at
Newcastle ; May 18, Sir Philip Wentworth and six others at Middleham ;
May 26, Sir Thomas Hussey and thirteen others at York. Sir William
Taillebois, the old adversary of lord Cromwell (above, p. 150), was be-
headed at Newcastle ; Chr. pp. 225, 226 ; cf. Warkworth, notes, pip. 39.40.
3 W. Wore. p. 782 ; Warkworth, notes, p. 38.
3 On Warwick’s policy see Kirk, Charles the Bold, i. 415, ii. 15, whore
it is shown that negotiations were on foot for the king’s marriage with a
sister of the queen of France, by which a final peace was to be secured, in
1463 and 1464, on the principle on which Suffolk had negotiated in 1444.
See also Hall, Chr. p. 263 ; Rymer, xi. 518 sq. ; Warkworth, p. 3.
хунт.] Imprisonment of Henry.
207
newly-founded, dynasty might be strengthened against the risks
of a counter-restoration. All such hopes were rendered futile
bv the art of a woman or the infatuation of a boy. But the Warwick
j η . continues
earl knew that lie must endure Ins disappointment, and con- to support
, 1 ∙ι 1 ■ him.
tinned to support Edward with his counsels until his own
position became intolerable. The failure of his foreign scheme
did not prevent the king from securing the expulsion of the
Lancastrians from France. This was one of the conditions of
a truce with Lewis XI in 14651; they were too much dis-
heartened to move again yet. The year 1465 passed away Capture of
without disturbance ; in July the unfortunate Henry was ar-
rested whilst wandering about among his secret friends in
Lancashire2. The Scots had already forsaken him, and in
1464 concluded a truce for fifteen years with Edward3. He
was committed to the Toiver, only for a few months again to
be restored to light and liberty. His mind, never strong, was
probably weakened by suffering, and it is only very occasionally
that a gleam of light is cast on his desolate existence. He was His impri-
. . . . . ., rr, ∙τττι sonment in
allowed now and then to receive visitors in the lower. WhentheTower.
pressed by some impertinent person to justify his usurpation,
he used to answer, ‘ My father had been king of England, pos-
sessing his crown in peace all through his reign ; and his father
my grandfather had been king of the same realm. And I,
when a boy in the cradle, had been without any interval
crowned in peace and approved as king by the whole realm,
and wore the crown for wellnigh forty years, every lord doing
royal homage to me, and swearing fealty as they had done to
my forefathers ; so I may say with the Psalmist, “ The lines are
fallen unto me in a pleasant place, yea I have a goodly heri-
tage ; ” “ My help cometh of God, who preserveth them that
are true of heart4.” ’
From this moment!* began the contest between the earl of Rivairybe-
AVarwick and the Wydvilles; a struggle which in some degree ‰iUes'θ
resembles the former struggle with the Beauforts, but which wydv∏ies.
1 W. Wore. p. /85 ; cf. Rymer, xi. 566, 568. The chronicler refers the
truce to 1465, but the documents belong to 1466.
2 W. Wore, p. 785 ; Warkworth, p. 5.
3 Rymer, xi. 525. 4 BIakman, pp. 303, 305.