The Ill-Considered Insurrection of the Plantagenet Pretender

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n And, speaking of Simnel, it is a tale related innthese parts that he was called Simnel because his father was a baker of bread.nTruth be known, we have no idea what his real name was, and some say his fathernwas a shoemaker or a maker of church organs instead, but he is still rememberednby the name of Lambert Simnel.

nWhen he was about ten years old, annOxford-trained priest, Richard Simon (or a variant thereof, including Symondsnand Symons), took the boy under his wing and trained him in arts, manners, etiquettenand the procedures of court. Simon, with an eye on gaining the archbishopric ofnCanterbury, had a scheme to pass Simnel off as Richard, Duke of York, son ofnKing Edward IV, and the eldest of the tragic Little Princes in the Tower (morenof whom another day), but he changed his plans and decided that Simnel borena passing resemblance to Edward, Earl of Warwick, a claimant to the Englishnthrone who, it was rumoured, had recently died in the Tower of London.

King Henry VII

nDuring the Warsnof the Roses, there were any number of claimants to the throne, as the fortunesnof the Houses of Lancaster and York waxed and waned, and Simon was more thannlikely working in connivance with the Yorkist faction of John de la Pole, thenEarl of Lincoln, who was a nephew of King Edward IV.

Lambert Simnel carried by Sir William D’Arcy of Platten

nThe Yorkists hadnsympathisers in Ireland, and Simon took Simnel over the water early in 1487,nwhere powerful allies rallied around him and on May 24^th, he wasncrowned Edward VI, in Dublin Cathedral, and messages were sent to Margaret,nDuchess of Burgundy, who was sister of Edward IV and a vehement enemy of KingnHenry VII, whom she regarded as a low-born Lancastrian upstart who had stolennthe crown from the House of York.

Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy

nShe was likely aware of the deception butnnonetheless she responded favourably and sent 2,000 German mercenaries, undernthe command of a formidable captain, Martin Schwartz, who were also accompaniednby Lincoln and Lord Lovell, another prominent Yorkist.

Piel Castle

nIn June 1487, thisnforce, bolstered by the Yorkist Irish and including the Earl of Kildare, sailednfor England and landed first on Piel Island, Lancashire, then called Fouldreynor Fowdrey, and made their way to the mainland at Ulverston, at a place called,npurely by coincidence, Schwartz Moor.

The Pile of Fouldrey Castle

nHere they met Sir Thomas Broughton, a wealthynFurness gentleman with family ties stretching back to Anglo-Saxon times, butnthe expected support from the people of Lancashire was not forthcoming and sonthe army headed east, over the Pennines and into Yorkshire. The forced marchncovered 200 miles in five days, and the army swelled to about 8,000 men; in annight fight on June 10th, 2,000 of them engaged a force of only 400nLancastrians at Bramham Moor, near Tadcaster, and utterly defeated them. Lovellnthen swung his army south, heading for Newark, and fighting a series ofnskirmishes as they advanced through Sherwood Forest.

King Henry VII

nIn the meantime, KingnHenry VII, well aware of the insurrection, had imprisoned the Queen’s Mother inna convent at Bermondsey and arranged for Warwick, who was still alive, to benbrought from the Tower to St Paul’s and publicly displayed to the population,nwhich really ought to have put an end to the claims of the supporters ofnLambert Simnel. Henry marched north at the head of his army, through Coventrynand Leicester to Nottingham, and unbelievably got lost on their way to Newark,nwith many soldiers deserting the ranks.

nThey found five guides in Ratcliff-on-Trent, andnwere led to the village of Stoke, (not to be confused with Stoke-on-Trent,nStaffordshire), where Henry’s army, under command of the Earl of Oxford engagednthe invasion force ranged against them on the morning of June 16^thn1487. Lincoln’s troops held the strategic advantage, on a hill and surroundednon three sides by the river Trent but inexplicably they descended and took thenfight to the King. The battle raged for three or four hours and was a particularlynbloody affair, even by the standards of the fifteenth century; the Irish werenunder-armoured and ill-equipped, and were slowly but comprehensivelynslaughtered. Schwartz’s German mercenaries made a determined, obstinate standnbut they too were butchered, almost to a man.

The Last Stand of Schwartz and his Mercenaries

nThe whole insurgent army seemedndetermined to make a stand, expecting little mercy if they yielded, and overnfour thousand of them were killed, together with over two thousand of the King’snarmy. All of Simnel’s commanders bar one died in the Battle of Stoke Field;nLincoln, Kildare, Schwartz, Broughton were all killed and only Lovell escaped,nseen swimming his horse across the Trent and making his way some said,neventually, to Scotland.

nOthers claimed he had drowned in the Trent, and anromantic story was told that two hundred years later, at the family house ofnMinster Lovel, a secret underground chamber was discovered when a new chimneynwas being built. In the room was the skeleton of a man, seated at a table, withna mass book, paper and pen laid out, and dressed in rich, old-fashionednclothing; as air entered the room, the skeleton slowly crumbled into dust. Wasnit Lovell? We’ll never know. Is it true? We’ll never know.

Simnel and Simon before Henry VII

nThe Battle of StokenField was the last time Yorkist and Lancastrian armies fought each other, andnso can be called the final battle of the War of the Roses. Lambert Simnel andnRichard Simon were taken prisoner after the bloodshed, and King Henry VIInshowed admirable mercy to the boy, thinking him without blame and simply lednastray by the machinations of other more devious plotters; he gave him a job asna turn-spit in the Royal kitchens at Westminster, and through good conduct, henwas finally promoted to the position of the King’s falconer. The priest Simonnwas not so lucky. He was thrown into the dungeon and forgotten about – we cannonly assume he eventually died there.

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