CHAPTER XXXII.
HENRY VI.—Continued.
How Queen Margaret and Cardinal Beaufort are said to have
caused Duke Humphrey to be murdered; how the wars of the
White and the Red Roses were brought about; how Edward
of York was chosen King by the Londoners.
Henry the Sixth grew up to be a very good but very weak man. He was married to a beautiful lady called Margaret of Anjou, who was very fierce and cruel, and who behaved more like a man than a woman. She wanted to govern the kingdom entirely herself; and as the only person she was afraid of was the king’s uncle, Humphrey, the good Duke of Gloucester, it is supposed that she agreed with Cardinal Beaufort and another person, who hated Duke Humphrey, and that they had him put to death very cruelly.
Soon after this, as the queen and her friends behaved so ill, several of the noblemen, most of the gentlemen in Parliament, and the people in London, began to think it would be better to take away the crown from the poor king, who was too silly to govern for himself, and was often so ill that he could not speak for days together.
The person they wished to make king was his cousin the Duke of York.
I have read, that some gentlemen were walking together in the Temple garden after dinner, and disputing about the king and the Duke of York; one of them took the king’s part, and said, that, though he was silly, his little son Edward, who was just born, might be wise; and he was determined to defend King Henry and his family, and desired all who agreed with him to do as he did, and pluck a red rose, and wear it in their caps, as a sign that they would defend the family of Lancaster.
The gentlemen who thought it would be best to have the Duke of York for their king turned to a white-rose bush, and each took a white rose, and put it in his cap, as a sign he loved the Duke of York; and for more than thirty years afterwards the civil wars in England were called the Wars of the Roses.
At first, the party of York only wished Richard, Duke of York, to be the king’s guardian, and govern for him; and as Duke Richard was wise and good, it might have been well for England if he had been allowed to do so.
But Queen Margaret raised an army to keep away the Duke of York, and the first battle between the people of the Red Rose and the people of the White Rose was fought at St. Alban’s.
The Yorkists gained the victory, and there was quiet for a few years. Then another battle was fought, and the queen, with the little prince, went to Scotland, and for some time the Duke of York ruled the kingdom with the king’s consent.
However, the queen found means to come back to England, and to gather another great army, with which she fought the Duke of York’s army several times, and at last beat them, at a place called Wakefield Green. She cut off the Duke of York’s head, and stuck a paper crown upon it, and put it over one of the gates of York.
Could you have thought a woman would be so cruel?
One of her friends, called Clifford, did something still worse. He saw a handsome youth of seventeen, along with an old clergyman, who was his tutor, trying to get away to some safe place after the battle: he asked who he was, and when the child said he was Rutland, the Duke of York’s son, the fierce Clifford stabbed him to the heart with his dagger, although the poor youth and his good tutor fell upon their knees and begged for mercy.
When the people knew of these two cruel things, they began to hate Queen Margaret, and a great many went to the Duke of York’s eldest son, Edward, and desired he would make himself king.
Now this Edward was brave and handsome, and loved laughing and merriment, but he was very cruel and too fond of pleasure. However, he was better than Margaret, and the people in London chose him to be king; and so there were two kings in England for ten years: one, the King of the White Rose, that was Edward; and one, the King of the Red Rose, that was poor Henry.