The Wars of the Roses - Alison Weir [135]
Warwick knew it was not safe for him to remain in England, and after a hurried consultation with his father, Salisbury, he returned to Calais, where he defiantly continued his attacks on the Lübeck fleet. It was probably this that drove the conciliatory Buckingham off the political fence and firmly into the camp of the Queen’s party.
Margaret now knew she had to take decisive action against the Yorkists, and Warwick in particular. Late in 1458 she left London and during the following months travelled through Cheshire and Lancashire, cultivating support among the nobility and gentry and recruiting men. Davies’ Chronicle claims she was prompted by her dread that the Prince ‘should not succeed his father’, and states that she ‘allied unto her all the knights and squires of Cheshire, and held open household among them’.
It now seemed that a further confrontation between the Lancastrians and the Yorkists was inevitable.
15
‘A Great and Strong Labour’d Woman’
‘The Queen’, wrote a Paston correspondent, ‘is a great and strong labour’d woman, for she spareth no pain to sue her things to an intent and conclusion to her power.’ None of her supporters now doubted that she would do her utmost to destroy the Yorkists. According to Croyland, Margaret, Northumberland and Clifford caused the Duke ‘to stink in the King’s nostrils even unto death, as they insisted that he was endeavouring to gain the kingdom into his own hands’.
It was obvious to everyone that Henry VI was no longer capable of leading an initiative against the Yorkists. The Queen’s party needed a more inspiring figurehead, and who better than the appealing figure of the five-year-old Prince, a symbol of hope for the future? Margaret even tried to persuade Henry to abdicate in favour of his son, though he flatly refused. She continued to raise support in the north-west Midlands, and in Chester made the Prince bestow a livery of swans (the swan being Henry IV’s personal badge, and his own) to all the gentlemen of the county, ‘trusting through their strength to make her son king’.
The Queen spent the early months of 1459 at Coventry. In the spring Sir William Herbert urged her to take the field with her Cheshire levies, who were gathered around the city, before the Yorkists had time to unite in arms. Margaret saw the sense in this, and the Council approved it. In April, the Queen persuaded the King to issue writs commanding all his loyal magnates to meet with him at Leicester on 10 May ‘with as many men defensibly arrayed as they might, and that they should bring their expenses for two months’. She also ordered that commissions of array be issued throughout the realm, conscripting young men from every town, village and hamlet. York responded by issuing a manifesto condemning conscription and asserting that this French innovation was unwelcome to all Englishmen.
Somerset and other nobles began to muster their private armies, and the city of Coventry sent the Queen forty able men at its own expense. In May, Pembroke was given a tower of the Palace of Westminster as his London headquarters, so that he could be at hand to defend the palace if it was attacked. Soon afterwards the King and Queen took the Prince on a progress through Warwickshire, Staffordshire and Cheshire in an attempt to rally support.
York and Salisbury were also preparing for war, at first resorting to propaganda which had proved successful on earlier occasions. In the early months of 1459 there appeared throughout London a proliferation of seditious bills and mocking verses against the Queen’s government. Once again the Prince’s paternity was questioned, and Margaret herself was accused of ruling like a tyrant through extortion and corrupt practices. This propaganda went home, especially among the merchant community, who at that