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driven them from the country, as he had promised and sworn to do.’ His lords advised him to make for York, because they had heard that the Queen and her supporters were there, but before they could depart the King ordered that the executions of forty-two Lancastrian knights and others captured during or after the battle be carried out. Many Lancastrians would now go into exile, while others, observed the Milanese ambassador, were ‘quitting’ King Henry ‘and coming to tender obedience to this king’. The transfer of allegiance by so many lords meant that Edward was able to consolidate his position and become in fact, as well as in title, master of his realm. Many believed that, by according him so decisive a victory, God had declared His pleasure. There were still a number who regarded Edward as a usurper, but they were now in a minority; nor was the Lancastrian faction any longer in a position to challenge his authority. Nevertheless, although he was in control of most of England, the Lancastrians still held the English border counties in the north and several strategic castles in Wales.

Edward, knowing he needed to win support in the north, did show mercy to a number of northern magnates captured at Towton, including Northumberland’s brother, Sir Ralph Percy. Others were allowed to escape and were later pardoned. Lord Rivers came to Edward and acknowledged him as the rightful king, whereupon Edward forgave his past support of the Lancastrians and promised him and his son Anthony Wydville pardons, which were issued the following July. By March 1463 both men had been admitted to the royal Council. The King also rewarded the men who had fought on his own side. Warwick’s brother, John Neville, had shown such valour in the field that the King raised him to the peerage with the title Lord Montague.

On Good Friday, 3 April, news of the King’s victory was delivered to the Lord Mayor of London; the Duchess of York learned of it the next morning when a letter from the King, written on 30 March, arrived. All her household gathered excitedly in the great hall of Baynard’s Castle to hear her read it out. That Saturday, the Lord Chancellor, George Neville, announced the victory at Paul’s Cross, and there was great rejoicing among the people. One rumour had it that Henry VI had been captured, but the Milanese ambassador shrewdly commented that ‘vain flowers always grow in good news’. In Dover and Sandwich, huge bonfires were lit to signal the news to the royal garrison at Calais, where a third beacon was kindled in response.

On the morning after the battle King Edward rode in triumph to York, ‘with great solemnity and processions’, but as he approached the Micklegate Bar his face set into grim lines as he saw above him the rotting heads of his father, his brother, and his uncle of Salisbury. This dreadful sight turned him visibly grey with anger and sorrow, and he vowed that the Lancastrians would taste his vengeance and that those responsible for the deaths of his kinsfolk would be relentlessly sought out and slaughtered. When he arrived in York his first order was that the heads be taken down and decently interred at Pontefract with the corresponding bodies.

Edward received a warm welcome from the people of York. ‘All the clergy came out to greet him,’ says Waurin, ‘and did reverence to him as their sovereign lord and prince, humbly begging him to forgive them if they had in any way offended him, and he freely forgave them [and] stayed a full week in the city with much joy and celebration.’ Representatives from major towns in Yorkshire came and offered their submission, and he issued commissions of the peace for the arrest of any rebels. The King’s officers soon discovered several Lancastrians in hiding in the city and rounded them up. Devon had barricaded himself in the ancient Norman castle, but had not the resources to defend it, so he too was taken, while Wiltshire was soon afterwards captured at Cockermouth and imprisoned. The King ordered that the Earl of Devon, Sir Baldwin Fulford and Sir William Hill, all prominent Lancastrians,