Constitutional History.
184
[chap.
Fiightof the duke and Iiis companions fled. York took refuge in Ire-
the Yorkist ɪ ...
lords. land ; the two earls went to Calais1, after writing to the king
a formal protest in which they proclaimed their own loyalty,
complained of the misrepresentations of their enemies and the
oppression of their vassals, and alleged that the cause of their
flight was not dread of those enemies but fear of God and
Parliament the kiιιo,2. This letter was written on the ɪoth of October:
CaJlelat °
Coventry. the king, on the 9tl1 of the same month, called a parliament to
meet at Coventry on the 20th of November. No summons was
addressed to the three delinquents or the lord Clinton, but all
the rest of the barons were cited. No time was given for the
earls to pack the house of commons ; the knights of the shire
were returned, on the nomination of the Lancastrian leaders, and
in such haste that the sheriffs had to petition for indemnity
as having made their returns in accordance with the dictation
of privy seal letters, and even after the expiration of their term
of office. The charge was made in the parliament of 1460 that
the members were returned without due election, and in some
cases without even the form. However this may have been,
in the result the king had it all his own ways.
Parliament The bishop of Winchester opened the proceedings with a dis-
Nov. 20, ι45g. course on the text fGrace be unto you, and peace be multi-
plied4.’ The speaker was Thomas Tresham, the member for
Northamptonshire. The business of the session was the at-
tainder of the duke of York and his friends. The bill which
contained the indictment is an important historical manifesto;
for whether its statements are true or not they furnish a proof
of what the king and the Lancastrian party believed to be true.
ɪ Whethamstede, i. 345. 2 Stow, pp. 405, 406 ; Eng. Chr. pp. So, 8ι.
s Hall, p. 243 ; Eng. Chr. p. 83 ; Rot. Parl. v. 367, 374. The writs
for the parliament of Coventry are printed in the appendix to the Lords’
Report, pp. 940 sq. in the usual form. Mr. Plummer, on the evidence of
the petition for indemnity, thinks that the elections were made under privy
seal writs and not under writs under the great seal (Fortescue, p. 35).
But the writs were in proper form, and the illegality consisted in the dic-
tating of the names of the persons to be elected in privy seal letters, together
with the action of the sheriffs of the previous year who had acted beyond
their term of office, and who in some cases made the returns without formal
election ; see Prynne, ii. 142, and beloʌv, p. 409.
i Rot. Parl. v. 345 ; cf. Whethamstede, i. 345.
XVIiI.] Parliament of Coventry.
185
The duke’s connexion with Cade’s rebellion, his conduct in
forcing himself on the king’s councils, his disloyal practices in
parliament, his attempt at rebellion in 1452, his breach of the
oath taken at S. Paul’s in the same year, his ⅛ttack on the king
at S. Alban’s, his breach of the oath taken at Coventry in 1457,
and at S. Paul’s in 1458; his responsibility for the battle of
Bloreheath and continued resistance to the king at Ludlow,
Ludford, and Calais ;—all are rehearsed in order Besides The York-
the duke and the Nevilles, the young earls of March and But- attainted,
land, lord Clinton, two of the Bourchiers, Sir John Wenlock,
the speaker of 1455, Sir AVilliam Oldhall, the speaker of 1450,
the countess of Salisbury, and several other persons of less note
were attainted on these charges2. Lord Powys and two other Sentences
knights who had submitted after the skirmish at Ludford had !lament of
. . . . Coventry.
theɪr lives spared, but forfeited their lands3. The others were
adjudged to suffer the penalties of high treason : the king
reserving however his prerogative of pardon4. A petition for
the attainder of Lord Stanley was rejected by him, although
presented by the commons. A very solemn oath of allegiance
was then taken by the lords, who swore further to defend the
queen and the prince, to accept the latter as his father’s suc-
cessor, and to do their best to secure the crown to the male
line of the king’s descendants. The latter article shows that,
although the right of the duke of York to the crown had not
been formally stated, it was sufficiently well known to require
some such precautions. The oath was recorded, signed and Oathof
sealed by the two archbishops, three dukes, sixteen bishops, taken by
five earls, two viscounts, sixteen abbots and priors, and twenty-
two barons6. Of these only a small number appeared later on as
Yorkist partisans, but the list does not furnish a complete roll
of the Lancastrian lords. It is signed by the duke of Norfolk ɪɪotwɪth-
. _ c1 . ,∙ standing
and the lords Bonneville and btourton, who were Yorkists ; the partydivi-
names of the duke of Somerset, the earls of Devonshire, Oxford,
and Westmoreland, the lords Hungerford, Lovell, and Moleyns,
1 Rot. Parl. v. 346-350-
2 lb. v. 350 ; Eng. Cliron. ed. Davies, pp. 83, 84.
3 Rot. Parl. v. 349- l lb∙ v∙ 35° i "Whethamstede, ɪ. 356,
s Rot. Parl. v. 35n