Free The Last Knight Errant: Sir Edward Woodville & the Age of Chivalry by Christopher Wilkins Page A

George of Clarence, the King’s brother and heir presumptive, to join him in sedition. The result of their machinations was a rebellion that broke out in June 1469 while King Edward was on a pilgrimage to Our Lady of Walsingham in Norfolk (an important shrine since a vision in 1061; it also claimed to have a phial of the Virgin’s milk). The King was dangerously far from his power base and so rode north, recruiting while his companions – including several Woodvilles and presumably young Edward – galloped off to gather aid.
    Anthony went to raise men from nearby Middleton, his home outside King’s Lynn, while Lord Rivers and his second son, John, were dispatched to the marches of Wales, strong Yorkist territory. There had been marching, counter-marching, skirmishes and battles that ended in a royal disaster. The King could only order his little group of followers to split up and run for cover.
    Warwick was a ruthless and arrogant adversary. He executed men as he felt inclined and without the slightest regard for the laws of either God or the land. Lord Pembroke and his brother, Sir Richard Herbert, were caught, taken to Northampton and beheaded. Lord Devon was captured and executed. Lord Rivers and John Woodville were caught beyond the Severn, taken to Warwick and Clarence at Coventry and then executed. John, with his drooping moustache, may lie in the church at Grafton with the other Woodville tombs.21
    The King was caught at Olney on his way to London. Appearing to accept defeat, he was put under house arrest at Warwick Castle. But the Earl soon found it difficult to control the country without a cooperative head of state. Law and order broke down, there was rioting and powerful men took or tried to take what they wanted. The Duke of Norfolk laid siege to the Pastons at Caistor Castle; the Duke of Clarence organized an attack on Anthony’s house at Middleton; Berkeleys fought Talbots in Gloucestershire and Stanleys fought Harringtons in Lancashire. There was rebellion in the north and fear of rebellion in Wales.
    To stop the chaos Warwick needed formal royal authority, and it was this that gave the King his chance. Assenting to a number of measures, he then sent for his Council and announced he was going to London. Warwick, nonplussed, let him go, and so by force of personality the King was back in power by late October. The Milanese ambassador at the French court was amazed:
    From England we never hear one thing like another, but always more different than day is from night. The last intelligence received thence by the king here is that the Earl of Warwick had gone north to take possession of the castles and estates of those lords whom he had caused to be beheaded. The King of England was with him, going freely to amuse himself by hunting wherever he chose. One day, being in the country, he took the road towards London, and entered that city, where he was very gladly and cordially received, as it seems that the king is much beloved by the men of that city, while the earl is hated.22
    Anthony became the head of the family as the second Earl Rivers and was also made Hereditary Constable of England, although he immediately resigned that position to Duke Richard of Gloucester, the King’s youngest brother. Already a Knight of the Garter, a large landowner, Captain of the Isle of Wight, Constable of both Carisbrooke and Porchester Castles, Anthony was an important figure with particular responsibility for a crucial part of the coast.
    Young Edward Woodville would then have been about 12, which was the age when noble boys moved from paging to squiring, when they learned to wear their armour and to ride cleanly and surely.
    At fourteen they hunt the deer; and catch on hardiness...
    At sixteen year to war and to wage, to joust and ride, and castles to assail.23
    Some started even younger, such as Anthony’s late brother-in-law, Thomas Scales the younger, who was killed in single combat at the age of 15.
    The evidence that