Were the Yorkists really Plantagenets?

On August 1st Edmund Mortimer, Earl of march, rode to Porchester castle to inform Henry V that there was a plot afoot to unseat him from the throne. Mortimer himself was one of the protagonists and indeed the objective of the plotters to place him on the throne due to his lineage from Lionel, Duke of Clarence, which in the minds of some trumped Henry’s own descent from John of Gaunt, a younger son of Edward III.

The plot itself was poorly conceived and poorly planned and it may have been an awareness of its poor potential that brought about Mortimer’s last minute attack of cold feet. The men he betrayed, Richard, Earl of Cambridge, Henry, Lord Scrope of Masham and Sir Thomas Gray of Heton were quickly arrested, tried and executed at Southampton. Henry acted ruthlessly. This was on the eve of the expedition to France and he had no time to waste. It is possible that in a more tranquil moment that the plotters would have been treated more leniently. Earlier plots, including two involving Edward, Duke of York and Constance, Lady Despenser,  were potentially more dangerous than this poor excuse for a plot, but in both instances the protagonists were let off relatively lightly. But in 1415, on the eve of an important invasion, three of the plotters chose the wrong time and the wrong place. The Earl of March, who does not appear to have inherited many of the characteristics of his illustrious predecessors was allowed to live out his natural life. He died in 1425.

The leader of this little cabal was Richard, Earl of Cambridge. He was the second and youngest son of Edmund of Langley, Duke of York, another younger son of Edward III. Richard was born in 1385 and had spent most of his life as a rather forgotten man in the political life of the time. He was only elevated to the status of Earl in 1413 when he was granted the redundant title of Earl of Cambridge, originally held by Edmund of Langley. Unfortunately for Richard, the title came without land or income and as T B Pugh has observed, he became the first man in English history to hold a courtesy title. Nevertheless he was still required to  live up to the status of an earl. He was, for example, required to raise as many troops for the invasion as his father-in-law, the very wealthy Earl of March. He may have had good reason to feel ill disposed towards Henry.

After his execution by beheading, Henry agreed that the body could be interred at the Chapel of St. Julien at God’s House Hospital. The head was not put on public display as was the case with the other two executed conspirators. There are no contemporary reports of a burial anywhere else and Edward IV’s benefaction to God’s House in 1462 in memory of his grandfather would tend to reinforce the notion that the body would stay there permanently and not be removed to another resting place, Fotheringhay for example.

In the succeeding centuries very little attention was paid to Richard, Earl of Cambridge. The only thing of note that he attempted in his 30 years was his final act, and this was of little political consequence, and in any case was completely overshadowed by the sensational victory at Agincourt in October of that year. He only claim to any subsequent attention was that he was the grandfather of two kings and in that sense he had the same status as Owen Tudor, who has received only marginally more attention from historians.

In 1863 the chapel of St Julien on Winkle Street was much in need of repair and renovation and the chapel was temporarily closed while this work was undertaken. There seems to have been some awareness that one of more of the conspirators was buried there and some efforts to discover the bodies. Unfortunately, as far as I can discover, no contemporary reports were made and all we know of this comes from writing in the 1890s, almost a generation later. There are three accounts, and with slight variations, are consistent with each other. This may be due to each of them relying on a single source, which may have been verbal, so there may be no way of corroborating this evidence.

Let us first examine what is written.

The Hampshire Independent reported on October 15th 1890 on a meeting of the Hampshire Field Club touring Old Southampton, and reported Mr T W Shore as telling the group:

Mr. Critchlow had made a search for the remains of the Earl of Cambridge (a direct ancestor of the Queen) who was buried here in 1415 after his execution outside the north gate or Bar Gate of the town for conspiracy to murder King Henry V as he was preparing to sail for the war with France. But, though he had dug to a depth of four feet, he had been unsuccessful, except that he had found some bones of a tall man; whether they were the bones of the unfortunate Earl it was impossible to say. 

In his own book, History of Hampshire, published two years later, Mr. Shore wrote:

The earl, who was buried within the chapel of God’s House, was the fifteenth ancestor of our present queen in the Yorkist line. During the work of restoring the chapel about thirty years ago, a skeleton was found in the chancel, with the skull lying near the bones of the legs. These remains were reinterred, and are believed to have been those of the unfortunate earl. 

Another two years later, in 1894, the Reverend James Aston Whitlock published a rather breezy account of Gods House and made the following reference:

As a confirmation of the story and the inscription, a gigantic skeleton was found, lying full length,  under the chancel floor of St. Julian’s. His head  was not in the place where the human head usually  grows, but had been carefully placed between his  knees. Evidently, these were the remains of one  of the conspirators — which, we cannot with certainty affirm — but probably of the Earl of Cambridge.

It seems likely that Shore, a leading and pioneering local historian at the time, was the single source of this information. He was however a scholarly man and a Fellow of the Geographical Society and was probably assiduous in gleaning this intelligence. He does note that the architect who oversaw the work at St Julien’s was non-committal about the skeleton but there is a consistency about it all.

From the 15th century reports we would expect to find a skeleton there. The heads of Cambridge’s co-conspirators were dispatched to York and Newcastle for public display and it is unknown what happened to the bodies. Neither of them were likely to have been found at God’s House. Shore’s conclusion may be the right one. The careful burial of the head with the body would suggest that this was a man of some importance.

This conclusion comes with caveats. The year 1863 was many years before the era of professional and scientific archaeologists. Mr Crutwell was an architect  and in any case many of the techniques now available to archeologists would have been unknown at that date. He may not even have made a written report and simply made his verbal observations to interested parties.

At the moment then we have some evidence but no corroboration, in other words no absolute proof. However, on the basis of what we do know we should be able to make some reasonable assumptions:

1. that Richard, Earl of Cambridge was buried in God’s House Chapel in 1415.

2. that the skeleton discovered in 1863, was most likely that of Richard, Earl of Cambridge.

3. that the skeleton was that of a tall man.

At this point we might be content to leave it at that. There would, on the face of it, be no good reason to disinter the bones (even supposing we knew exactly where to look) to confirm what we already know to be reliable fact.

Except that things may have changed, perhaps sensationally.

In 2012 a successful excavation in a car park in Leicester revealed the skeleton of king Richard III, one of the grandsons of Richard, Earl of Cambridge. The skeleton was subjected to DNA testing and the results compared to those of present day descendants. These DNA tests confirmed that the skeleton was indeed that of Richard III.

But there have been further developments. 

A by-product of this study, published in 2014. revealed something more surprising. The analysts discovered the possibility of a false paternity break in the y chromosome at some point between Edward III and Richard III. In other words Richard III may not have carried the y chromosome of his supposed ancestor Edward III. Since the y chromosome is uniquely passed down through the male line this is one certain way to indicate paternity. Richard, if there were no other male intervention would have carried this chromosome from Edward III. Actually, the evidence is less definitive than one would wish since the comparison was made with the DNA of a Beaufort descendant, raising other potential issues. Nevertheless, it is worth considering whether there might have been another male amongst Richard III’s ancestors.

There have for a long time been doubts about the paternity of Richard, Earl of Cambridge. Edmund of Langley married Isabella of Castille at his father’s request in 1372. The following year she gave birth to a son, Edward, who was to succeed his father as Duke of York. A daughter, Constance was born circa 1374. She later married Thomas, Lord Despenser

Isabella’s third recorded pregnancy came ten years after the birth of Contance. She gave birth to a son, Richard, at Consisborough Castle and he was probably baptized there around 20th July 1385. It should be said that there is no record of either his birth or baptism but since Richard II was staying at York at the time, and acted as his godfather, this date is inferred.  His birth date has been misreported elsewhere. The Victorian historian G R Cockayne gave Richard’s birth as 1375. He does not give reasons for this but he may have assumed that the 1385 date was a mistake, and chose to believe that the second son followed soon after the first. Possibly he inferred from a grant by Richard II of 500 marks a year to Richard of Conisborough that he had reached his majority around that time. Others repeat this date. 

What we do know of Richard of Conisborough’s life should lead us to prefer 1385. It seems less plausible that Richard of Bordeaux, as he was in 1375, and whose grandfather and father were still alive, would have been considered as a godparent at that time. It also strains credulity to believe that he assumed the role of godparent when Richard of Conisbrough was 10 years old. A 1375 date would point to a very late marriage and we might also ask why, when he was in favour, Richard II did not make use of him if he was a grown man in 1395. 1385 is a far better fit with the known facts of the earl’s life. 

Long gaps between the birth of children are not unknown and it is possible that there were other pregnancies that may have ended in miscarriages or infant deaths that were not recorded but suspicions must remain, based entirely on circumstantial evidence, that Richard was not the son of Edmund.

Neither his father, nor his brother provided for him in their lifetimes nor was he mentioned in their wills. That fact alone ought to raise a flag and leave us with the suspicion that whatever the outward claims were for his parentage, both men knew different. That he had anything at all was entirely due to his mother’s effort when she was close to death. Her will of 1392 made King Richard II the heir to all her worldly goods, and in the same document she requested that Richard make provision for her younger son, Richard of Conisborough, by granting him a life annuity of 500 marks. That Richard complied soon after her death in December 1392 suggests that this arrangement had been agreed prior to the drawing up of her will. Presumably Isabella believed (and in 1392 would have no reason not to) that the annuity would be more safely administered by Richard II than by her husband and eldest son. Richard II confirmed this in 1395. It is probable that if Richard II had continued on the throne Richard of Conisborough would have enjoyed a grant of lands and income. However, he was one of the losers from the deposition of Richard II and he was bereft of income.

Isabella was reported to have had an affair with John Holland, Earl of Huntingdon. The source of this is a note left by John Shirley while transcribing Chaucer’s poem, the Complaint of Mars, that the poem was based on the real life contemporary affair between John Holland and Isabella. Shirley seems to have lived a full 90 years and spent some years in the 15th century in the service of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick who had married Isabel Despenser, a grand daughter of Isabella. It is thought that Shirley may have learned the story from this source. John Holland was the second son of Thomas, Earl of Kent and his wife Joan, the “Fair Maid of Kent” who subsequently married the Black Prince. He was therefore a half brother to Richard II, to whom he remained close. Holland was born in 1352 and cut quite a figure in the court of Richard II and was himself not short of achievement. 

It is quite plausible that the high spirited Isabella should be attracted to him. Whether or not Richard of Conisborough was a product of this liaison we simply do not know. Chaucer’s Complaint of Mars has been dated to 1385 or perhaps a few years later. If so, then the dates do fit the story, true or not.

Isabella certainly acquired a reputation and the chronicler Thomas Walsingham sniffily describes her as “domina carnalis et delicata, mundialis et venerea” - a lady ruled by the pleasures of the flesh and worldly things.

While it is difficult to authenticate any of these stories, taken as a whole, they do help us to form a plausible picture of a wife who was bored with her husband and he in turn disinterested in her. While we have no other evidence for Richard of Conisborough’s parentage we should be prepared to assume that he was not the son of Edmund of York.

With this knowledge the skeleton of Richard, Earl of Cambridge takes on more significance than might ordinarily be the case. If it were possible to examine the bones and subject them to DNA analysis some answers to these intriguing questions could be found. If male DNA matched that of his supposed grandson Richard III that would be as expected. If, however, the DNA confirmed the finding of the previous researchers that there was a paternity break in the chain, then that would cause some considerable revision.

It would mean that the House of York, conventionally presented by historians as separate from the House of Lancaster, was in fact an entirely new dynasty, short lived as it was. It would also mean that the Tudor genetic inheritance was some distance from a Plantagenet male. Henry VII was the son of Margaret Beaufort, the great grand daughter of John of Gaunt, and his wife. His wife, Elizabeth of York was the great great grand daughter of Lionel, Duke of Clarence. In sum the Tudor claim was even more tenuous than we presently believe.

Not that this changes historical fact of the succession to the throne but it does add some interesting colour and would effectively make Henry VI the last Plantagenet king.

The Last Knight Errant

Detractors of the Woodvilles tend to skate over the life of the youngest son Edward. He was too young to be of any political significance during the reigns of Edward IV, Richard III and Henry VII, but in any case, his aptitude and interest was soldiering and he went out of his way to be in the thick of the action. Christopher Wilkins has written a full biography, The Last Knight Errant, which throws light on his somewhat obscure life.

Edward Woodville was the last Woodville with a significant reputation and he died as he had lived as a fighting man. Soldiering was very much in the Woodville tradition. His grandfather and father had been soldiers, as had two of his older brothers and they all had good reputations. Edward revelled in it. While his elder brothers Antony and John had been recognised as skilled jousters they appeared to have broader interests. Antony held a high reputation on the jousting field but was a complex man who tended to avoid the uncertainties of battle where he could. Edward actually sought out battles.

He was the youngest of the Woodville brothers. As with all of them his birth date is uncertain but it was probably c 1458.  He followed in the footsteps of his father and older brothers and became a military man.

The first record that we have of him is in April 1472, when he accompanied Anthony to Brittany with 1,000 archers. There may have been little action but at the apprentice age of 16 this was his first exposure to a military campaign.

Presumably he was on hand in the following years but there was not much military engagement during Edward’s second reign.  In 1478, he appeared at a tournament held to celebrate the marriage of young Richard, Duke of York, to Anne Mowbray; his horses were resplendent in cloth of gold.  Later that year, and he was then 20, he was sent to Scotland to negotiate a marriage contract between the widowed Anthony Woodville and Margaret of Scotland. He was accompanied by the much more experienced John Russell, Bishop of Rochester, who was presumably the lead negotiator, while Edward was there to represent his brother’s interest.  Nevertheless it was a significant posting and may signify that he could be trusted with such roles. The parties agreed a treaty with a dowry of 4000 marks to be paid by the Scottish King James and a wedding was planned for October. In the end the marriage did not come to pass as the Scots continued to raid the northern border of England and King James began to prevaricate.

Two years later in 1480, Edward Woodville was assigned the governorship of Porchester Castle. This had been under the control of Antony and it is perhaps a recognition of Edward’s growing maturity and competence that he was given this responsibility. Porchester had been an important fort since Roman times  and it had been refurbished and rebuilt during the reigns of Richard II and Henry V and was gradually taking over in importance from Southampton. Portsmouth was also becoming a naval centre as activity shifted away from Southampton. Together with Carisbroke Castle, also under the command of Antony Woodville, Porchester formed a key defence for the south coast. As commander of Porchester and governor of Portsmouth Edward was now able to learn about maritime matters.

That year he was sent to Burgundy to escort Edward IV’s sister Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy, to England for a visit.  He took with him twelve servants dressed in the York livery of ‘merry and blue’  (maroon and blue) and he was granted a yard of purple velvet and a yard of blue velvet so that his tail could make suitably resplendent clothing.

And so it was not until 1482, when Richard, Duke of Gloucester, led an army against the Scots, that Edward Woodville participated in military action. In this campaign he served as one of Richard’s lieutenants, with five hundred men in his force. This would suggest that he was experienced enough in arms to undertake this kind of leadership. As he moved north he was commissioned to recruit men and there was the option to make payment in lieu of service. The town of Coventry, we learn,  contributed twenty pounds in lieu of men.

Since the embassy of 1480 the Scots had continued to make border incursions and the northern lords, and indeed Edward himself, were determined to bring this to an end. Richard, duke of Gloucester, as warden of the north was placed in charge. The expedition was successful and the town of Berwick was restored to English control and has remained a part of England ever since. The campaign overall was successful and Richard of Gloucester emerged with great credit, not only for the military success but the diplomatic solution afterwards. Edward must have distinguished himself as Richard made him a knight banneret on July 24, 1482. The two men, brothers in arms in the summer of 1482 found themselves enemies in 1483.

The following year was of course momentous. In April 1483, Edward IV died. Edward Woodville took part in his funeral procession, and it was while he was at sea on a campaign against Philippe de Crèvecoeur, known as Lord Cortes, that word reached him of Richard’s coup at Stony Stratford. Edward V’s council had appointed Edward Woodville to deal with this French threat and had a fleet of ships at his disposal. At the time it was a straightforward appointment; he was the leading naval figure. However, that authority was put into question after Richard gained control and ordered that Edward Woodville be seized at Southampton.

Sir Edward may not have been aware of these orders. On May 14 he  sailed into Southampton Water and captured a French ship which was carrying a huge amount of gold amounting to £10,201. He appropriated this in the name of the king and prepared and signed an indenture to establish that this was not an act of piracy. He wrote that in the event ‘that it can be proved not forfeited unto the King . . . He (Sir Edward) shall repay the value of the said money in English merchandise within three months . . . If the said money is to be forfeited the Sir Edward be answering the King.^⁠1’ He also styled himself in this document  ’Sir Edward Wydeville, knight, uncle to our said sovereign Lord and great captain of his navy.” None of this reads like a man intending to raid the English treasury and defect to Brittany and the indenture was sent to the king’s council.

In London, policy was turning 180 degrees. Cortes was no longer a French invader but a victim of Sir Edward. Richard was prepared to do a deal with Cortes and restore his ships and goods.

Mancini reported that two of the ships, under the command of Genoese captains, encouraged the English soldiers on board to drink heavily, then overcame the drunken men and tied them up with ropes and chains. With the Englishmen immobilised, the Genoese announced their intent to return to England, and all but two of the ships set out for Southampton. Sir Edward Woodville was left with two loyal ships, The Trinity and The Falcon and having grasped the new reality, sailed on to Brittany, where he joined Henry Tudor, with, presumably, since it was never heard of again, the £10201 in gold coins.

When Henry sailed to England in the autumn of 1483 to join the abortive rebellion against Richard III, it seems likely that Edward would have been with him, since his brothers Richard and Lionel were involved in the rebellion and his brother-in-law the Duke of Buckingham was the highest-ranking rebel. In the event, Henry sailed into Poole harbour but, suspecting that the friendly soldiers who urged him to disembark were supporters of Richard III, sailed back to Brittany.

The Crowland chronicler described Edward as one of his leaders at the battle of Bosworth: a “brother of Queen Elizabeth and a most courageous knight.” He was rewarded for his support and was granted Porchester (previously held by him) and the Captaincy of the Isle of Wight, which included the lordship of Carisbrooke Castle. The Captaincy of the Isle of Wight was an important post, formerly held by his eldest brother Antony and historically held by the Redvers barons of Devon.

Sir Edward Woodville remained single and led the life of a libertine. We will never know if he would have grown out of that. It is not an unfamiliar pattern for young men to ‘sow their wild oats’, especially, as a younger brother, there was no dynastic pressure on him. His contemporary John Paston followed this path, chasing women constantly until at about the age of 30 he decided to settle down. Mancini, when reporting Edward’s licentious activities included Edward Woodville as one of the king’s dissolute companions.

He seems also to have inherited some of Antony’s other titles because it was as “Lord Scales” that he went to fight the Moors in Granada, serving in the armies of Ferdinand and Isabella. Here he earned some European fame as the Conde de Scala (count of Scales.) Spain was undergoing political transformation. The kingdoms of Aragon and Castille had become united through the marriage of the two monarchs, Ferdinand and Isabella, and a concerted effort was being made to drive the Moors out of Southern Spain. The struggles attracted mercenaries.

Edward must have been leading one of these groups when he arrived at Seville in 1 March 1486. Although settled in high office at home in England he must have fond life too dull and leapt at the opportunity for some real action. He had 300 men under his command, 100 were described as archers and 200 as yeomen.This phase of the Spanish campaign was fighting against a divided Moorish kingdom, but nevertheless it was still strong. As edward arrived at Loja the Spanish troops were trying to establish camp when they were ambushed by the Moors. Edward spied an opportunity to attack a Moorish weak point and asked permission of King Frednand to attack This was given and he led a  foot charge against the Moors with his men fighting in a wedge formation.

A full account is given by the Spanish chronicler Bernàldez::

Dismounting from his horse and armed with sword and battle axe, he charged forward at the Moorish host before them all, with a small company of his men, armed like himself, slashing and hacking with brave manly hearts, killing and dismounting the enemy left and right.

This inspired the Spanish.

The Castilians, seeing his charge, rushed on to support it, following on the heels of the Englishman with such valour that the Moors turned tail and fled.^⁠2

The next stage in the fight was to scale the walls and Sir Edward was not above leading his men in this dangerous mission.

Unfortunately just as the suburbs were carried, the knight, as he was mounting a scaling ladder, received a blow from a stone which dashed out to of his front teeth and stretched him senseless on the ground.

There seems to be no doubt that his charge against the Moors was pivotal to the outcome of the battle and although he played no part in its conclusion he was acknowledge and richly rewarded by the king and queen. Isabella sympathised with the loss of his teeth and he is said to have wittily replied: “Christ, who reared this whole fabric, has merely opened a window, in order more easily to discern what goes on within.” In an age before the invention of false teeth it did nothing for his appearance, or perhaps even for his speech. Edward was sent home to England with a rich array of gifts, including twelve horses, two couches, and fine linen.

Those who know about the development of medieval tactics in warfare will not that by marching with his men in a tight disciplined group Sir Edward was at the forefront of military thinking. This technique of mixing trained knights with ordinary soldiers had been pioneered successfully by the Swiss and more forward thinkers adopted this approach, hitherto lights and ordinary foot soldiers fought in separate groups on either side, but by mingling lights and men at arms with ordinary infantry proved to be a much better fighting unit.

He was back in England in 1487 fighting for Henry VII against forces led by John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, in support of Lambert Simnel, a young pretender to the throne. After three days of skirmishing near Doncaster, Edward’s troops were forced to retreat through Sherwood Forest to Nottingham. At the Battle of Stoke, however, where Edward Woodville commanded the right wing, victory went to Henry VII.

In May 1488, possibly by this time in his thirtieth year, and in his prime as a soldier Edward asked Henry VII to allow him to assist the duke in fighting the French. Henry VII, who was seeking peace with France, refused the request, but Edward ignored this and returned to the Isle of Wight, where he raised four hundred and forty “tall and hardy personages” and sailed to Brittany. Edmund Hall, writing in his chronicle in the next century suggests his motive as  “either abhorring ease and idleness or inflamed with ardent love and affection toward the Duke of Brittany.”

When he arrived in Rennes he was greeted with enthusiasm. Two barrels of claret were rolled out and consumed in their honour and as they were paraded in the Boute de Cohue square a further two barrels of white wine were opened. Musicians played and there was great celebration. Sir Edward himself snd his close entourage are treated to a great banquet. When news got back to the French they were incensed and made representations to King Henry who denied supporting the expedition and assured them he would not break the truce that existed between them. The truce however masked French preparations. The Bretons became alarmed and began to assemble an army over the summer , but the English force of Edward Woodville was probably the only professional force there. Somewhat late in the day his expedition did get official sanction in the end and Henry sent reinforcements, but the French arrived in Brittany before this could be done.

The French forces were overwhelming. Edward was in the vanguard leading 2000 men  and as they charged they were overcome by the superior French forces. Edward was killed together with many of his men. The Breton forces broke and the battle ended in a rout. It was the end of an independent Brittany.

A grey stone monument marks the battle at St. Aubin-du-Cormier on July 22, 1488. Amongst those recognised fighting for the Breton cause on that day are: “Lord Scales and 500 English archers.” Edward Woodville  had fought his last battle.

It is intriguing to ask what drove a man like Edward Woodville. He was as talented an athlete as his father and older brothers Antony and John but he was distinctive in that he deliberately sought glory on the field of battle. The other Woodvilles fought when need be and used their talent to grace tournaments in peace time. Edward clearly relished the risk and thrill of battle. Antony had at least two opportunities to fight on foreign fields but declined on both occasions. Edward was only too eager to get into a fight and travelled great distances at some expense to find glory on the battlefield.

According to Mancini, and this is the only reference, Edward was something of a libertine. He wrote that “although [Edward IV] had many promoters and companions of his vices, the more important and especial were three of the . . . relatives of the queen, her two sons and one of her brothers.”   Her two sons in this instance were the older Greys, both of whom had a reputation that is reported elsewhere and it must be assumed that the Woodville brothers the high profile Edward. Antony had a respectable, even pious, reputation; Lionel was a bishop; and Richard seems to have led a quiet life. So one concludes that Edward is the Woodville mentioned here.