The Wars of the Roses - Alison Weir [170]
Edward himself left London on the 13th, via Bishopsgate, and marched north to St Albans with a great host whose ranks were swelled by new recruits as he went. Rumours of the conduct of the Lancastrian army were still driving many to support the Yorkists. However, Edward’s army was not much better behaved, at least to begin with, for at St Albans, although Abbot Whethamstead asked the new king to forbid looting, many soldiers defied the ban and caused such extensive damage to the monks’ quarters that the abbot and his brethren were obliged to lodge in outlying manors until it could be repaired.
Meanwhile, the King’s mother, Duchess Cecily, remained in London, working tirelessly to gain and maintain support for her son’s cause among the citizens, who were fearful as a result of terrifying reports of the depredations of the Queen’s northerners that were filtering south. These made her task much easier, for the Londoners’ loyalty was now almost exclusively to the cause of York.
On 16 March Edward came to Barkway, and the next day to Cambridge, where he met up with Sir John Howard, newly arrived from the abbey of Bury St Edmunds, where the abbot and convent had raised £100 for the King, ‘by way of love’. Coventry sent him 100 men, while other contingents were arrayed by the cities of Canterbury, Bristol, Salisbury, Worcester, Gloucester, Leicester, Nottingham and Northampton. By the 22nd Edward had arrived in Nottingham, where – after several false reports – he received certain intelligence that Somerset, Rivers and a strong force were positioned to defend the river crossing at Ferrybridge in Yorkshire. By the 27th he had reached Pontefract, ‘collecting men in thousands’, according to the Milanese ambassador. ‘Some say that the Queen is exceedingly prudent, and by remaining on the defensive, as they say she is well content to do, she will bring things into subjection and will tear into pieces those attacks of the people.’ Edward was now close behind the Lancastrian army, which was blocking the road to York, where lay Henry VI, Margaret of Anjou and their son. Hall says that nearly 30,000 Lancastrians were encamped nearby, and that Edward had 25,000 Yorkists, which would shortly be reinforced by the hosts led by Warwick and Norfolk.
Between them the two armies had between 60,000 and over 100,000 men – possibly two per cent of the total population of England – yet sources differ as to whether the Lancastrians had more than the Yorkists or were of equal strength. Whethamstead saw the coming conflict as a struggle between northerners and southerners, while Waurin says that the northern commanders were inferior to the southern ones.
The Lancastrian army was indeed predominantly northern and was under the command of Somerset, Exeter, Northumberland, Devon, Trollope, and the Lords FitzHugh, Hungerford, Beaumont, Dacre of Gilsland, Roos and Grey of Codnor. It included at least nineteen peers – proof that many magnates still felt that their first allegiance was to Henry VI – while the Yorkists boasted only eight: Warwick, Norfolk, Bourchier, Grey de Wilton, Clinton, Fauconberg and the Lords Scrope and Dacre (Richard Fiennes). Somerset, commander-in-chief of the Lancastrians, was just twenty-four, while King Edward, commander-in-chief of the Yorkists, was not quite nineteen. Somerset and Exeter were in command of the Lancastrian reserve, stationed in the village of Towton, not far from York, while the Yorkist vanguard was commanded by Fauconberg.
On 28 March King Edward sent Lord FitzWalter ahead with a force to secure the bridge over the River Aire, south of Ferrybridge, but they were ambushed by Lord Clifford, leading a large contingent of cavalry. So many were massacred or drowned that hardly any of FitzWalter’s men were left, while he himself was killed and Warwick, who was with him, was wounded in the leg. When the