Treaty of Picquigny between Louis XI of France and Edward IV, Edward IV and many of his nobles were paid a ‘pension’ to return to England and not to take up arms against France again in his claim to the French throne. Richard Duke of Gloucester (later Richard III) is said to have opposed the treaty and refused the pension.
Tags: Edward IV, France, Richard III
Comments Off on 29 AUGUST 1479
Birth of Catherine of York, ninth child and sixth daughter of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville, at Eltham Palace, Greenwich. Married to William Courtenay, 1st Earl of Devon. After his death on 9 May 1511 she took a voluntary vow of chastitity. Died on 15 November 1527 at Tiverton Castle, Devon.
Tags: Edward IV, Elizabeth Woodville, Family
Comments Off on 14 AUGUST 1479
Battle of Edgecote Moor (actually Danes Moor in Northamptonshire), a battle of the Warwick Rebellion.
In the North, one of the captains of Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick (“The Kingmaker”), calling himself Robin of Redesdale (actually a trusted Neville captain, Sir William Conyers) started a rebellion against Edward IV, which was supported by Warwick and George, Duke of Clarence, brother of Edward IV and Richard III. Edward IV was at Nottingham, where he hoped to meet up with Humphrey Stafford, Earl of Devon, and William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke.
Apparently Devon and Pembroke quarreled on the way, with Pembroke continuing on his own, encountering the rebels near Banbury. Pembroke, his brother Sir Richard Herbert as well as Richard Woodville, Earl Rivers (Elizabeth Woodville’s father), and his son John were taken prisoner and executed on Warwick’s orders without trial.
Tags: Battles, Edward IV, Nevilles
Comments Off on 26 JULY 1469
Margaret, George and Richard, the three youngest children of Richard Plantagenet, 3rd Duke of York, and Cecily Neville, stay for a few weeks at the house, which had belonged to Sir John Fastolf, in Southwark, where they are visited every day by their eldest brother Edward, Earl of March (later Edward IV).
Bibliography: Christine Weightman, Margaret of York: The Diabolical Duchess. Amberley Publishing, Chalford, 2009. ISBN 978 1 84868 099 9 (paperback)
Illustration: Old London Bridge in 1616 with Southwark Priory, now Cathedral, in the foreground, by Claes van Visscher
Tags: Edward IV, Family, Richard III
Comments Off on JULY TO SEPTEMBER 1460
Richard Neville, Earl of Salisbury, his son Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, and Edward Earl of March (son of the Duke of York, later Edward IV) return from Calais, where they had fled after the Battle of Ludford Bridge (12 October 1459) to invade England in June 1460. On 2 July they are in control of London, except for the Tower.
The illustration on the left shows Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, as depicted in the Rous Roll.
Tags: Edward IV, Nevilles
Comments Off on 2 JULY 1460
Edward IV (stained glass at St Laurence, Ludlow)
Coronation of Edward IV
After winning the Battle of Mortimer’s Cross (2 February 1461), Edward, Earl of March, became King Edward IV on 4 March 1461. He defended his claim in the Battle of Towton (29 March 1461), which he won decisively. He then went on a progress of the northern counties and returned to London on 26 June 1461.
On 28 June 1461, Edward IV was crowned in a splendid ceremony in Westminster Abbey by Thomas Bourchier, Archbishop of Canterbury. His younger brothers George and Richard were made Duke of Clarence and Duke of Gloucester respectively.
Edward IV’s coronation is described in detail in Michael D. Miller’s Wars of the Roses.
Tags: Edward IV, George of Clarence
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Public statement outside St Paul’s Cathedral that Edward IV had been married to Eleanor Talbot when he married Elizabeth Woodville, declaring the children of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville illegitimate. This meant that Richard was the next legitimate heir to the throne. He was offered the crown by the Commons and became King Richard III.
Tags: Edward IV, Eleanor Talbot, Elizabeth Woodville, Princes, Richard III
Comments Off on 22 JUNE 1483
Death of Elizabeth Woodville at Bermondsey Abbey. Her will indicates that during her last years she lived in relative poverty. For her funeral she was accompanied by four people, one of them Edward IV’s illegitimate daughter Grace. Her coffin was taken quietly from Bermondsey to Windsor Castle, where she arrived in the middle of the night by just a single priest and a clerk without any formalities. She seems to have been interred virtually immediately next to Edward IV.
Bibliography: David Baldwin, Elizabeth Woodville: Mother of the Princes in the Tower. Sutton Publishing, Stroud, 2002. ISBN 0 7509 3886 2, pp. 123-125
Tags: Edward IV, Elizabeth Woodville
Comments Off on 8 JUNE 1492
Coronation of Elizabeth Woodville, wife of Edward IV.
Tags: Edward IV, Elizabeth Woodville
Comments Off on 26 MAY 1465
Death of Mary of York, second daughter of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville, at Greenwich Palace, London, buried at St Georges Chapel, Windsor
Tags: Edward IV, Elizabeth Woodville, Family
Comments Off on 23 MAY 1482