Princes in the Tower (7 page)

The King, with astonishing forbearance, turned a blind eye on all these things, probably realising that Clarence would soon enough become the victim of his own follies. Few took him seriously, and he had very little real power. But when Edward went to Windsor in June, Clarence went beyond the point of no return. Storming into the council chamber at Westminster, he insultingly denounced the King's justice and the sentences on Stacey and Burdett, and had their written declarations of innocence read aloud by a priest who was with him.

When he heard what Clarence had done, the King's patience gave way. Honour demanded that Clarence be punished for this crowning act of
lèse-majesté.
The Queen was insisting upon it. Mancini says she 'remembered the insults to her family and the calumnies with which she was reproached, namely that she was not the legitimate wife of the King. Thus she concluded that her offspring by the King would never come to the throne unless the Duke of Clarence were removed, and of this she easily persuaded the King. The Queen's alarm was intensified by the comeliness of the Duke of Clarence, which would make him appear worthy of the crown.' Elizabeth's fear of Clarence was, it seems, far greater than the King's, and this has led some writers to conclude that he knew something about her past that she did not want revealed. There is, however, no evidence that this was so, and we should remember that Clarence's allegations in respect of the King's bastardy and the validity of his marriage were alarming enough in the circumstances. Logically speaking, given his state of mind at that time, if Clarence had known any secrets about the Queen that could be used to his advantage, he would certainly not have hesitated to make them public. Instead, he had fallen back on old, baseless rumours about his brother and invented grounds for the invalidity of the royal marriage that were entirely nonsensical.

Edward IV left Windsor immediately and went to Westminster, where he summoned Clarence and the Mayor and aldermen of London. In the presence of the latter, 'with his own lips', he accused Clarence of 'going above the law' and 'conduct derogatory to the laws of the realm and most dangerous to judges throughout the kingdom', as well as usurping the royal prerogative by acting 'as though he had used a king's power'. Clarence could not deny that he had done these things, and he was arrested and incarcerated in the Tower of London on a blanket charge of 'committing acts violating the laws of the realm'. There was no doubt in anyone's mind that Clarence was a danger to his brother and to the succession. He languished in his prison, traditionally in the Bowyer Tower, until in November 1477 Edward IV made up his mind to try him publicly for his offences. Parliament was then summoned, chiefly for this purpose.

On 15th January, 1478, the day before Parliament was due to convene, a royal wedding took place. The bridegroom was the King's younger son, the four-year-old Duke of York, and the bride was six-year-old Anne Mowbray, Duchess of Norfolk in her own right since the death in 1476 of her father, John Mowbray, fourth and last Duke of Norfolk in the Mowbray line. The wedding, celebrated at St Stephen's Chapel, Westminster, was a splendid state occasion, with almost the whole royal family and court attending. After the marriage, the King induced Parliament to pass an Act declaring that York should enjoy the dukedom of Norfolk and the Mowbray inheritance for life, in right of his wife, even if she predeceased him. This proviso overlooked the superior claim that Anne's coheirs, the Howards and the Berkeleys, would have to the inheritance in the event of her death. The King had come to an accommodation with them, but there was no avoiding the fact that what he had done was against all legal precedents governing the laws of inheritance and there were many who blamed the Queen's influence for this.

On the day following his son's marriage, Edward IV opened Parliament and Clarence was brought to the House of Lords to be indicted on a new charge of high treason. He faced a hostile chamber, whose members had been well-briefed and even bribed by the King, as Croyland infers, with regard to the verdict they should deliver. Many were only too eager to acquiesce to the King's wishes, for Clarence had made many enemies and few friends during his turbulent career. Others, though, were shocked to see the King's brother on a capital charge.

It was an extraordinary hearing. The King himself read out the long indictment, the text of which was incorporated into the Act of Attainder afterwards brought before Parliament. The indictment accused Clarence of 'new treasons to exalt himself and his heir to the regality and crown of England', stressing that these were 'much higher, much more malicious treasons than had been found at any time previously during the reign'. The King stated that he had 'ever loved and cherished [Clarence], as tenderly or kindly as ever creature might his natural brother', giving him 'so large portion of possessions that seldom hath been seen. The Duke, for all this, no love increasing, but growing daily in more and more malice', had 'falsely and traitorously intended and purposed firmly the extreme destruction and disinheriting of the King and his issue'. He had 'spread the falsest and most unnatural coloured pretence that man might imagine, that the King our most sovereign lord was a bastard, and not begotten to reign upon us'. He had not only kept his copy of a document drawn up in 1470 naming him Henry VI's heir, but was now claiming also to be the heir to York. Finally, he had plotted to send his infant son to Ireland, 'whereby he might have gotten him assistance and favour against our sovereign lord'; a child resembling young Warwick was to have been substituted for him during his absence.

These were all quite specific charges, and all equally damning; every one attracted the death penalty. There was silence as the King read them out. Croyland recalled: 'Not a single person uttered a word against the Duke except the King; not one individual made answer to the King except the Duke.' But Clarence's protests availed him not at all, nor did his offer to have the case decided by 'wager of battle'. Edward IV meant to have a conviction for high treason, and Croyland says he did not give Clarence a chance to defend himself properly.

The Act of Attainder against Clarence became law on 8th February 1478. On the previous day the Duke of Buckingham had been appointed Seneschal of England in place of Gloucester, and in that capacity he pronounced sentence of death upon the prisoner. It may be that Gloucester had asked to be spared this duty. Buckingham also sentenced the condemned man to the forfeiture of his honours, titles, lands and estates to the Crown. Croyland felt that the King had secured his brother's condemnation 'on dubious grounds', but there was no doubt that Clarence had committed the crimes of which he had been accused.

Both Croyland and Vergil place the responsibility for Clarence's condemnation solely on the King, and they were probably right to do so, but it was widely believed at the time that the Queen and her faction had been the prime movers in the matter; they had a motive for doing so, and had probably been waiting for an opportunity to eliminate their enemy. In 1483, Mancini heard that the Queen's brother, Edward Wydville, and her sons, Dorset and Grey, had been instrumental in securing Clarence's conviction.

Gloucester certainly believed that the Wydvilles had brought about his brother's condemnation, perceiving that it was a triumph for them, but while this must have been galling in the extreme to him, he did not lift a finger to save Clarence. He may well even have acquiesced in his fall, for there is some contemporary evidence that Gloucester was involved in the proceedings against Clarence. He was at court at the time, for his nephew's wedding, and had attended the Council meetings at which Clarence's fate was discussed. He also played his part in ensuring that Parliament was obedient to the King's wishes: five members at least were his own men. Gloucester also benefited more than anyone else from Clarence's fall. The Attainder against Clarence left Gloucester next in line to the throne after the King's issue; on 15th February his son Edward of Middleham was created Earl of Salisbury, a title that had been borne by Clarence; and on 21st February, Gloucester himself was given Clarence's high office of Great Chamberlain of England. More says that, while Gloucester was opposed to his brother being executed, 'some wise men' were of the opinion that he was not displeased by Clarence's fall.

Edward IV was understandably reluctant to put his own brother to death, and he refused for over a week to give his assent to Clarence's execution. Before long, the Commons were clamouring for justice to take its course, as with any other traitor, and the Speaker came to the Bar of the Lords, requesting that what was to be done should be done at once. Finally, a deputation of members went to the King, who had no alternative but to accede to their demand for Clarence's death. At the request of their mother, the Duchess Cecily, the sentence was commuted from the full horrors of a traitor's death by hanging, drawing and quartering to beheading or, according to the French chronicler Molinet, any other method preferred by Clarence. The Duchess also begged that the execution take place in private, to avoid some of the scandal that publicity would lend to what was perceived primarily as an act of fratricide.

On 18th February, 1478, Clarence was informed that he was to die that day in the Tower. The
Calendar of Patent Rolls
records that he asked for compensation to be paid to Lord Rivers 'in consideration of the injuries perpetrated on him and his parents' by Clarence and Warwick. Then, according to the
Great Chronicle of London,
'the Duke of Clarence offered his own mass penny in the Tower, and about twelve of the clock at noon made his end in a rondolet of Malmsey'. Being drowned in wine was an unusual method of execution but Molinet says that Clarence himself had suggested it once in a joke to the King, adding that the Duke had lately expressed a real wish to end his days in this manner. Many contemporary chroniclers, including Commines, Mancini, and the Frenchmen Jean de Roye and Olivier de la Marche, corroborate the details given by Molinet and the author of the
Great Chronicle;
only Croyland is noncommittal, saying: 'The execution, whatever its nature may have been, took place in the Tower of London.' A portrait of Clarence's daughter Margaret, painted around 1530, shows her wearing a miniature wine-cask on a bracelet at her wrist -- a poignant memento of her father's fate.

Two days after Clarence's death, Ankarette Twynho's heir Roger petitioned the King to reverse the verdict and sentence on his mother, and his petition was granted.

Clarence was buried beside his wife in Tewkesbury Abbey, where his skull and a few bones are now displayed in a wall-niche near the high altar. He was given a noble funeral, the King bearing the cost and providing 'right worshipfully for his soul'. A beautiful tomb, surmounted by effigies of the Duke and Duchess, was raised to their memory, but has long gone, and the site of their vault is marked merely by a grille in the floor behind the high altar.

Clarence's attainder meant that his orphaned children could not inherit his titles or lands, which had reverted to the Crown. Warwick, however, held his earldom in right of his mother, and the King allowed him a portion of her estates. The Queen's eldest son, Lord Dorset, bought the wardship and marriage of Warwick, and he and his sister Margaret were sent to Sheen to be brought up with Edward IV's children.

Many modern writers have linked the subsequent brief imprisonment of Robert Stillington, Bishop of Bath and Wells, with the fall of Clarence. Stillington was a doctor of civil law, a brilliant intellectual with a great capacity for intrigue. He had been Chancellor of England from 1467-73, and had always enjoyed the favour of Edward IV. But between 27th February and 5th March, 1478, Stillington was arrested on a charge of 'violating his oath of fidelity by some utterance prejudicial to the King and his estate'. We do not know what he had said to give offence, nor is there any evidence that his misdemeanour was in any way connected with Clarence. It is possible that Clarence had allied himself with Stillington; his West-Country estates bordered upon Stillington's diocese. It may be that the Bishop had helped to spread Clarence's slanders about the King's bastardy and his marriage, but there is no proof of this. If Stillington's offence had been treasonable, or if he had posed any real danger to the King's security or the royal succession, he would have been permanently removed from the scene, as Clarence had been. Yet he was released on 20th June, 1478, on payment of a fine, and later given several respectable positions at court without, however, regaining his former influence.

Vergil and More both asserted that Edward IV came to regret having executed Clarence, and Croyland, who knew the King, wrote: 'As I really believe, [he] inwardly repented very often of this act.' Vergil says Edward frequently lamented that no-one had interceded on Clarence's behalf; yet the removal of Clarence had been seen by the majority as a necessary evil that made good political sense. Nevertheless, it had set a precedent for violence within the royal family itself, and demonstrated how ruthless a king sometimes had to be if he wished to remain securely on his throne.

Gloucester was certainly one who learned this lesson well, even as he was bitterly lamenting his brother's death. Only three days after it he procured the King's licence to set up two chantries at Middleham and Barnard Castle, so that prayers could be said in perpetuity for his dead siblings and all those of his House. According to Mancini, he blamed the Wydvilles for Clarence's execution. 'Richard was so overcome with grief for his brother that he could not dissimulate so well but that he was overheard to say that he would one day avenge his brother's death.' The Duke knew how ruthless the Queen could be, and must have recalled how, in 1467, she had stolen the King's signet ring and given the order for the execution of the Earl of Desmond, in revenge for his having made disparaging remarks to the King about his choice of bride. Unfortunately, the infamous John Tiptoft, Earl of Worcester, who carried out the execution in Ireland, exceeded his brief by murdering also two of Desmond's young sons, an atrocity for which Elizabeth Wydville must bear some responsibility.