Cecily Neville: Mother of Richard III by Ashdown-Hill John

Author:Ashdown-Hill, John [Ashdown-Hill, John]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Tags: SOCIAL SCIENCE / Sociology / General
ISBN: 9781526706331
Publisher: Pen and Sword
Published: 2018-04-29T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

The Second Reign of Edward IV

In the first months of 1470, Cecily’s second son, George, found himself obliged to be out of the country in France. George returned to England in September 1470, together with his cousin and father-in-law, the Earl of Warwick. Then in the following month Cecily’s other two sons, Edward IV and Richard, Duke of Gloucester, found themselves forced to flee the country to the Netherlands, because Warwick had restored Henry VI to the English throne. This must have been a very strange time for Cecily, who found herself more or less alone in England in terms of her family of children. Only her two elder daughters, the Duchess of Exeter and the Duchess of Suffolk might have been around if she felt she needed children to talk to.

But the Duke of Clarence found himself in a very strange situation. Initially he and his cousin, the Earl of Warwick, had focused on removing the Widville family from power in England, and bringing Edward IV back to proper Yorkism (as they perceived it), making the Earl of Warwick and the Duke of Clarence the chief powers behind the throne. Warwick had also married George to his elder daughter, Isabel, and the second part of his aim was that George should once again be recognised as the heir to the throne, with the Widville marriage dismissed as illegal, and its children removed from the royal inheritance. Thus Warwick hoped that one day his own daughter would be queen, and that his own grandchildren would ultimately succeed to the crown of England.

But when Edward IV reclaimed the right to make his own decisions, and allied himself, not with his brother, George, and his cousin the Earl of Warwick, but with Elizabeth Widville and his daughters by her, George had ended up in a quandary. He was still linked to Warwick, but Warwick had now been forced to change his plans. Thus he was re-allying himself with the Lancastrians, and aiming to restore Henry VI to the throne. Logically, Henry VI would one day be succeeded by his acknowledged heir (and possible son), Edward of Westminster. Therefore Warwick now had to arrange new measures to ensure that one day his own heirs would reign. This time he did so by organising a marriage between his younger daughter, Anne, and the Lancastrian Prince of Wales. Although he also ensured a Lancastrian agreement that, if Edward of Westminster ultimately proved childless, George, Duke of Clarence, should be acknowledged as the Lancastrian heir to the English throne, George’s chance of one day becoming the king of England was not really improved thereby. The overall outcome was that George suddenly found himself now a Lancastrian instead of a Yorkist, but with very little personal advantage from his point of view.

It was in this context that Philippe de Commynes has preserved on record the fact that an intriguing piece of diplomacy was set in motion.

Now I was at Calais negotiating with Lord Wenlock ... He

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