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By Root 1173 0

at Calais, Warwick began courting the friendship of Philip of Burgundy, whose ships he had recently so cheerfully plundered. The merchants of Calais and those in England were anxious to preserve the important trade links between England and Burgundy, and this was Warwick’s response. By the summer of 1458 he had reached an understanding with Duke Philip and had dispatched Sir John Wenlock, now serving under him at Calais, to the Duke to negotiate on the King’s behalf – without consulting Henry – a marriage between the Prince of Wales and a Burgundian princess. Afterwards, Wenlock went to France on Queen Margaret’s behalf to open negotiations with Charles VII for the Prince’s marriage to a French princess. Not surprisingly these negotiations were complicated and long drawn out, but they did have the advantage of keeping both France and Burgundy well disposed towards England for the time being.

For some time now Warwick had engaged in acts of piracy, on one notorious occasion ordering his ships out of Calais to plunder the fleet of the German merchants of the Hanseatic city of Lübeck. This attack violated a truce between the League and the English government, and the Germans had protested strongly to Henry VI about Warwick’s behaviour. The Queen, who wished to oust the Earl from the captaincy of Calais, now saw her chance to get rid of him. She summoned him to London and ordered him to explain his actions before the Council.

Warwick responded to her summons by arriving in London at the head of 600 armed retainers, all wearing his livery. Margaret demanded of the Council that he stand trial for his crimes. On 31 July 1458 the Council instituted an enquiry, but after the first day Warwick publicly protested that the interrogation he had been made to undergo had been unduly rigorous, and that he believed there was a plot to discredit him. The Queen, he complained, had been acting insincerely on the Loveday, and had no regard for the glory of England’s achievement on the high seas.

The next day, incited by Warwick’s protests, his supporters – and there were many in London, including a number of aldermen – ran riot, demonstrating against the Queen and the authorities. In the confusion the Attorney General was murdered. The Queen commanded that pikemen be sent into the city to restore order, and when this had been done, those aldermen and citizens who had taken part in the riot were thrown into gaol. The outcome of the Council’s enquiry is not recorded, but there was no doubt that the Queen’s attempt to eliminate Warwick from the political scene had failed.

In the autumn Warwick again visited the court at Westminster. As he was passing through the royal kitchens, one of the King’s scullions nearly impaled him on a spit. It was an accident, but Warwick and the retainers with him chose to believe that the scullion had been instructed by the Queen to murder him. A fight broke out between the Earl’s followers and the royal servants, who rushed to defend the scullion. During the scuffle Warwick was set upon by the royal guard, though his men soon gained the upper hand, and the unfortunate scullion was seized by them and hauled before the Queen. Margaret knew that if she defended the man Warwick would accuse her of murder, so she ordered his execution. However, he was allowed to escape and flee to Yorkshire, while the Queen announced defiantly that the fight had been caused by Warwick’s supporters at his instigation. Fabyan asserts that she then persuaded the Council to draw up an order for the Earl’s arrest and committal to the Tower.

As soon as he heard that there was a warrant out for his arrest, Warwick left London and travelled at speed to Warwick Castle, and thence to the safety of Calais, where he would be protected by the garrison. In November, the Queen and Council, incensed at his escape, demanded that he surrender his post to Somerset. At this, Warwick boldly returned to London and stood defiantly before the Council, stating that Parliament had appointed him to his post, and therefore Parliament was the only authority that