If the battle of Wakefield was fatal to the house of York, it proved no less fatal to the victors, for the cruelties perpetrated by the Black Clifford were repaid a few months after with tenfold vengeance at Towton, a contest in which, there is reason to believe, Peter Legh also bore a part. On the 4th of March (1461), the young Duke of York assumed the crown and sceptre, but the ceremonies attendant upon his accession to the throne were few and brief. Queen Margaret was in the field with a powerful army, and on the 12th of March Edward marched out of London northward to give her battle. On the eve of Palm Sunday (March 29th) the opposing forces met on Towton Heath; at four o'clock the battle began; the hours of darkness brought no rest, and through the long night and until the afternoon of the next day, amidst a fall of snow, it raged with unrelenting fury. It was the bloodiest battle in all the wars of the Roses, and when the sun went down thirty-three thousand Englishmen lay dead upon the field. Some of them were buried in the neighbouring church at Saxton, but by far the greater number sleep where they fell, and the red and white roses which bloom on the field of their last strife form their touching and appropriate memorial. The carnage of this terrible field is appalling. If we are to believe the statements of contemporary writers, for weeks afterwards the blood stood in puddles and stagnated in the gutters.[56] Among the slain was the "Black-faced" Clifford, who slew Rutland at Wakefield, and of those whom the sword spared upon the field not a few fell beneath the headsman's axe. Well might Warwick, dealing out a poetic justice, then say to the victorious Edward-- From off the gates of York fetch down the head-- Your father's head which Clifford placed there; Instead whereof let this supply the room, Measure for measure must be answered. The fate of the Cliffords has been consecrated by the poet. The widow of the "black-faced" lord and her infant boy fled "to the caves and to the brooks;" the child led a solitary life-- On Carrock's side a shepherd boy-- wandering at will through "Mosedale's groves" and in "Blencathra's rugged caves" until the-- Weary time That brought him up to manhood's prime. When the victory at Bosworth again placed the Lancastrians upon the throne his estates and honours were restored. Though unable to read or write when called to Parliament, he had, during his shepherd life, learnt purer and wiser lessons than those through which his progenitors had brought destruction on themselves.