The Tower of London, (Vol. 1 of 2)Gower, Ronald Sutherland, Lord
History
The Tower of London, (Vol. 1 of 2)
Gower, Ronald Sutherland, Lord
Tower of London (London, England)
The records of the Tower are not entirely of the sombre colour of
imprisonments and executions. In the month of November 1487, we read
of the pageant that took place at the coronation of Henry’s Queen,
Elizabeth, the daughter of Edward IV.; their marriage united the rival
factions of the White and Red Roses. A few days before her coronation
at Westminster, Elizabeth had been brought to the Tower from the palace
at Greenwich by water, in barges “freshely furnyshed with baners and
stremers of silk, richly besene”; one barge was “a great red dragon,
spowting Flamys of Fyer into the Temmys.” She landed at the Tower
Wharf, where the “Kyngs Hyghnesse welcomede her in suche maner and
form as was to al th’ Æstats, and other ther being present, a very
good sight, and right joyous and comfortable to beholde,” as writes a
chronicler of the scene. The following day the Queen, being “rially
apparelde” in cloth of gold and damask, and a mantle of ermine, “her
faire yelow hair hanging downe playne byhynd her Bak, with a Calle of
Pypes over it, and a Serkelet of Golde richely garnyshed with precious
Stonys upon her Hede,” was borne in a litter which was “coverde with
Cloth of Golde of damaske, and large Pelowes of downe covered with lik
Clothe of Golde,” to the Abbey, through streets hung with tapestry and
lined with “the crafts in their Lyveryes,” through lines of children,
“some arrayde like Angells and others lyke Vyrgyns, to singe sweete
Songes as her Grace passed by” (Leland).
The most serious danger to the stability of Henry’s monarchy was the
insurrection brought about by the impostor Perkin Warbeck, a man who,
by some writers, is said to have been a Florentine Jew, whilst by
others he is declared to have been a Fleming. Warbeck gave out that he
was Richard, Duke of York, the younger son of Edward IV., and that he
had not been murdered in the Tower, but had escaped. In 1491 he landed
at Cork with some followers. In Ireland he was supported by Desmond,
and was also assisted from Flanders by Margaret of Burgundy. Until the
year 1495, when he made a descent upon England, little was heard of
him. By this time Henry, owing to his avarice and tyrannical form of
government, had made himself extremely unpopular, and consequently his
enemies gladly availed themselves of such an opportunity, as Warbeck’s
claim presented, of injuring the King. In an evil moment for himself,
Sir William Stanley, who had so powerfully aided Henry in his victory
at Bosworth, and who had placed the crown, taken from Richard the
Third’s dead body, upon his head, and whom Henry had made his Lord
Chamberlain, declared that, “if he certainly knew” Perkin Warbeck to
be the son of Edward IV., he would never draw his sword or bear arms
against him. He was impeached upon a charge of uttering these words,
and tried by a Council summoned by the King, who was then in residence
in the Tower. He was found guilty, and executed on Tower Hill.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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