But one more change of fortune was yet to come. Edward IV. borrowed
men and money from his brother-in-law, Charles of Burgundy, and boldly
returned to England in the spring of 1471. He landed in Yorkshire,
called his partisans about him, and marched on London. Edward, when
his mettle was up, was a captain of no mean ability. He completely
out-generalled his enemy, and got between him and the capital. The Duke
of Clarence, who had been entrusted with Warwick's western forces,
betrayed his father-in-law, and joined his brother with the men whom
he should have led to the earl's aid. London and the person of Henry
VI. fell into King Edward's hands. Warwick came up too late, and had
to fight the Yorkists at Barnet, a few miles north of the city. There
he was completely defeated and slain, losing the battle mainly by the
accident of a fog, which caused two divisions of his troops to attack
one another. With Warwick fell his brother Lord Montagu, and most of
the personal adherents on whom his power rested.
[Sidenote: =Battle of Tewkesbury.--End of the war.=]
But Edward was not yet secure. On the very day of Barnet, Queen
Margaret landed at Portsmouth to raise the Lancastrians of the South
in Warwick's aid. Hearing of his fall, she turned westward, gathering
up a considerable force of adherents as she fled. But Edward rapidly
pursued her, and by dint of superior pace in marching, caught her up
at Tewkesbury. The queen's army was intercepted, and penned up with
its back to the Severn, then destitute of a bridge. Unable to fly,
the Lancastrians had to turn, and fought a desperate battle outside
Tewkesbury. But King Edward never suffered a defeat in all his days;
his courage and skill carried all before it, and the queen's army
was annihilated. Her young son Edward, Prince of Wales, was slain in
the pursuit, though he cried for quarter to "his brother Clarence."
The last Duke of Somerset, the Earl of Devon, and all the surviving
Lancastrian magnates fell on the field, or were beheaded next day
by the victor. Queen Margaret was taken prisoner and thrown into
confinement.
[Sidenote: =Murder of Henry.=]
On the death of Prince Edward, the old king Henry VI. was left the only
survivor of the house of Lancaster. The ruthless heir of York resolved
that he too should die, and on his return to London had the feeble and
saintly prince murdered, by the hands of his young brother Richard,
Duke of Gloucester (1471).
Thus ended the wars of the Roses, in the complete victory of York, and
the extinction of the line of John of Gaunt, after it had sat for three
generations on the English throne.
FOOTNOTES:
[27] The sons of Catherine of France, the widow of Henry V., by her
second marriage with a Welsh knight named Owen Tudor.
[28] See p. 251.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF YORK.
1471-1485.
[Sidenote: =The Lancastrian line.--Henry, Earl of Richmond.=]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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