Tudor Dawn: Henry Tudor is ready to take the crown... (The Tudor Saga Series Book 1) by David Field

Author:David Field [Field, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Sapere Books
Published: 2019-06-09T22:00:00+00:00

VI

‘What am I to do, gentlemen?’ a perplexed and sorely troubled Henry asked his Great Council at the start of a hastily-summoned meeting at Westminster in November 1487.

Henry’s successful invasion of England two years previously had been down to two nations that appeared to be destined for direct conflict, and somehow he had to choose which of them to support. On the one hand was the ailing Duke Francis of Brittany, to whom Henry owed so much for his generous hospitality during his many years in exile, while on the other was the full might of France, whose Regent, Anne of Beaujeau, had willingly provided some of the troops who had given their lives at Sutton Cheney.

Only months previously, Duke Francis, aware that his days were numbered, had begun negotiations for his heiress, the Duchess Anne, to marry Maximilian of Germany, who would be likely to inherit the Holy Roman Empire upon the death of his father Frederick III. The Regent Anne of France had other ideas, however, and was insisting that the Breton heir marry her brother, the future King Charles VIII of France, and was mobilising her forces to invade Brittany in order to ensure that this occurred. Francis was anxious to call in all his debts, and had sent emissaries to the court of Henry VII to jog his memory. However, Henry now had his own throne to defend, he was short of money, and he was anxious to expand trade with various commercial powers across the Channel.

‘We cannot afford to antagonise France at this time,’ Morton insisted. ‘And yet the Pope would wish us to side with the Holy Roman Empire.’

‘But we owe so much to Duke Francis,’ countered Giles Daubeney, who had been one of those sharing Henry’s later years in exile after he had fled to Brittany after the disastrous Buckingham Rebellion.

‘What do you think, Uncle?’ Henry asked Jasper. ‘You were with me all those years in Brittany, and you also recall the Duke’s generosity to us for all that time — surely we cannot desert him, now that our fortunes have so improved, and it is he who now needs our help?’

Jasper looked enquiringly across at John Dynham, Lord High Treasurer. ‘Would Parliament be likely to grant us the money? And can we afford it if it will not?’

Reginald Bray snorted loudly. ‘After the sums the Duke of Bedford here spent on the Queen’s coronation last year, the Household could not afford to send a herring boat, still less a fleet of ships.’

‘The last time His Majesty and I travelled to Brittany, it was in such a vessel,’ Jasper joked, looking sideways at Henry, who turned pale at the mere memory, and added another argument to the mix.

‘We surely cannot let France extend its northern shores any further west, thereby acquiring ports from which it could do grievous damage to both our military ships and our trading vessels?’

Henry had only recently persuaded Parliament to enact legislation that vastly improved England’s trading profits —

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