The Princes in the Tower, page 32
On 11 June 1483, Brampton was shipping goods from London. The ship, the Salvatour de Porte, had Portugal listed as its home port. Its captain was Johannis Gomys. As Brampton wasn’t the captain on this occasion, it’s unclear whether he was on board.171 As we have seen in Chapter 14, on 25 July as Howard arrived in London (and was appointed admiral), Brampton was awarded, without explanation, £350 (£320,000) from Port subsidies (London, Sandwich and Southampton). On 25 January 1484, he was replaced as Governor of Guernsey by Thomas Rydley (see p. 284).172
On 20 August 1484, Brampton was a Knight of the Body and with Christopher Colyns (see p. 278) was awarded an indenture of £100 for twenty years from the Port of London.173 What these services were for was not specified.
In March and August 1484, he was awarded land in Northamptonshire and London for his ‘good service against the rebels’.174 On 22 March 1485, he was sent to Portugal to negotiate the king’s marriage to Joanna, the Holy Princess.175 Brampton was therefore out of England when King Richard III was killed at Bosworth.176 He left Portugal and King John on 1 October 1485.177
Brampton then settled in Bruges.178 It is not known if he met Richard, Duke of York, at this time, or if the boy’s true identity was revealed to him or his wife (see p. 260). Henry VII’s biographer Bernard André, probably repeating gossip and speculation, wrote that ‘Peter of Tournai’ (aka York) was brought up in England by ‘Edward, a former Jew later baptized by King Edward the Fourth’ but did not give this Jew a surname or nationality.179 Brampton returned to Portugal in 1487.
In 1489, Brampton was pardoned by Henry VII, ‘provided that the said Edward produce sufficient security in the King’s chancery for bearing himself as a faithful liege … towards the king’s person and majesty’.180
Following the execution in 1495 of Sir William Stanley and several hundred others for their support of Richard of England, on 25 April 1496, at the Setúbal Testimonies in Portugal, which considered the identity of the Yorkist pretender, Brampton revealed his wife’s connection to the young man. Regarding the claimant’s identity, he said:
… it was the worst evil in the world that he and his brother the Prince of Wales had been killed, and the one they now said [was him] was a youth from a city called Tournai and his father was a boatman who was called Bernal Uberque who lived below the St. Jean Bridge and [the boy] was called Piris.181
The Setúbal Testimonies were to be read by Henry VII.182 Brampton’s eldest son, John, was knighted by Henry VII in 1500.183
From 1483 to 1484 (exact dates unspecified), a servant called ‘Edward’ is listed in Brampton’s London house. This raises an important question for the project. No surname is given and he is described as ‘Portuguese’.184 Given Brampton’s knighthood and considerable rewards by King Richard III at this time, coupled with Edward V’s disappearance and what we now know about Richard of York’s disguise, with shaven head and poor clothing, does this add up to Brampton having a child in his household that could have been Edward V, hidden in plain sight in the capital for a short period following the July abduction attempt at the Tower? And could André have picked up on some rumour about this and applied it to the wrong boy?
Consequently, Brampton’s servant ‘Edward’ is of interest to the investigation, prior to Edward V being taken to the Channel Islands (Guernsey). (See Thomas Rydley, p.284, and Chapter 18.)
Two further events connected to the Channel Islands, and potentially related to the above, are of interest to the investigation. Before 6 September 1485, less than two weeks after Bosworth, Henry Tudor issued an order to two of his most trusted servants from Jersey (Edmund Weston and Thomas de Saint Martyn) to ‘purvey and ordeigne [provide and commission]’ at Henry’s cost such shipping from the Port of Poole in Dorset as they thought ‘suer [dependable] and moost expedient [suitable] for to passe, in all haste possible, into oure isle of Garnesey [Guernsey] for suche things as we gave them in charge [emphasis added]’.185
On 28 November, Weston and Martyn were rewarded with the joint Governorship of Guernsey for their ‘gratuitous [freely given] services rendered at great labour and expense’.186
The second event occurred on 6 December 1484 when John Nesfield, King Richard’s trusted guardian of Elizabeth Woodville (see Appendix 1), was given a letter of passage by the king to travel to Jersey with two companions. This unusual journey for Elizabeth’s guardian was believed to be for ‘some important purpose, probably connected with Richard’s attempts to win over the Woodvilles at this time’.187 The ‘two persons’ accompanying Nesfield are not named.
Christopher Colyns (Colens)
See also Chapter 14.
Christopher Colyns of London was a trusted servant of Edward IV and Richard III and employed by both Yorkist kings on ‘business with a maritime flavour, such as attacking pirates and victualling the king’s ships’.188 A Gentleman Usher to King Edward, on 20 February 1481 Colyns was awarded the commission to collect tax for goods traded through the Port of London by the king (tonnage and poundage).189
Colyns was also a friend and business associate of John Howard, who commanded that Colyns be paid £3 from his accounts for an undisclosed reason on 10 April 1482.190 This may have been related to the voyage of Howard’s ship, The Mary Flour (Flower) of London. Colyns had received a licence for a cargo of wine from Bordeaux in France and promised Howard a tun of the wine on the ship’s return.191 By 12–13 November 1482, Howard paid a considerable sum (over £18) to Colyns in separate payments over two days for eleven carpets.192 In December 1482, Colyns received a reward of £20 from King Edward for his diligent service, perhaps as a customer,193 and in January 1483 he hired and fitted out the carvel Christopher Lockwood at Sandwich, crewed by sixty men, to catch pirates who were molesting vessels in the Thames Estuary. Colyns was successful and apprehended John Miles and others of his company: he was paid £3 for his costs and a £97 reward by Richard III in 1484.194
At King Edward’s death Colyns was honoured as a mourner and on 17 April 1483 took part in the short procession of Edward’s coffin from St Stephen’s Chapel to Westminster Abbey. In front of the coffin and leading the secular procession was John Howard, carrying King Edward’s personal banner of arms. Also in the procession were John Norris and Thomas Tyrell (both referenced in this chapter). Colyns also stood vigil beside the king’s coffin as it rested overnight in St George’s Chapel. Among those accompanying Colyns at the Night Watch, as the vigil was known, was Halneth Mauleverer.195
During King Richard’s reign Colyns is described as the king’s servant and seems to have been confirmed as a merchant by trade and a draper, but he was more active as a ship’s master and outfitter. In early October 1483, Colyns was rewarded by King Richard with a forfeited ship, Barbara of Fowey.196
Colyns seems to have acted as the king’s servant on the seas and was authorised to receive £20 from the Treasurer of Calais ‘to content certain soldiers at Guînes’.197 Colyns was also entrusted with a Privy Seal from the Treasurer and Chamberlains of King Richard’s government and the wages of 200 men in his control.198
From Easter 1484, he was awarded an annuity of £100 to be paid by the Collector of the Subsidy of the Tonnage and Poundage of the Port of London.199 Towards the end of 1484, Colyns, by royal command, saw to the wages and supply of 200 men in the king’s ship The Caricon, and 100 men in Michael of Queenborough. The vessels were equipped for a period of six weeks’ service from 29 September to 11 November. His costs were substantial at over £194.200 On an unknown date, Colyns was again rewarded by the king with a further payment from the subsidy of London and paid a much larger sum for ‘habilimentes of werre [items of war]’.201
By 20 August 1484, Colyns was granted for life the office of Constable of Queenborough Castle in Kent backdated to Midsummer 1483.202 By 10 April 1485, Colyns’ brother, William, was also named as joint Constable of Queenborough Castle.203
Colyns was also granted an annuity of £100 for twenty years from Easter 1485 for services to be done by him according to indenture. It was a considerable sum. What these services were was not specified. An identical indenture was granted to Sir Edward Brampton on the same day (20 August 1484).204 It is probable that Colyns, like Brampton, had significant contacts in France and the Low Countries. Do the simultaneous indentures of Colyns and Brampton indicate a potential involvement in the transport of one or both princes, or at least the use of their ships and captains? Both men were certainly familiar with the ports of London and the continent.
Records of Colyns after Bosworth are scanty. By 21 November 1486, he is described as ‘esquire’ and ‘gentilman’ and ‘late citizen and draper of London’ and granted a pardon by Henry VII, although all his goods were forfeited to the crown.205 It’s possible that Colyns may have left the country post-Bosworth and become a fugitive. It might also be possible that he sailed to Ireland and became part of the Yorkist uprising on behalf of King Edward. The destruction of relevant records means we may never know.
By 1490, Colyn’s ship, Barbara of Fowey (awarded to him by King Richard), was in the hands of Sir John Treffry, a supporter of King Henry.206 William, Christopher’s brother (also described as ‘Draper, London’), is last heard of on 26 June 1488 when he failed to appear to answer a debt.
Christopher Colyns was a ship owner, master, organiser, helper and local agent in the Thames Estuary for both Edward IV and Richard III. He was also (with his brother) far more than a merchant and draper. He was tasked by King Richard to patrol the seas, outfit ships and men for war, ensure payments reached key English fortresses across the Channel in France, control a significant fortress in Kent and command significant numbers of men.
It is also possible that the ‘Jane Colyns’, the ‘servant’ and probable nurse of King Richard’s son and heir, Edward of Middleham, Prince of Wales, may have been a relative. It is not known what happened to Jane following the king’s death at Bosworth.207
Thomas Howard, Earl of Surrey, 2nd Duke of Norfolk (1443–1524)
See also Chapter 10.
Following Bosworth, Thomas Howard was the third person to be named in the Act of Attainder at Henry VII’s Parliament after King Richard and Howard’s father, John, Duke of Norfolk.208 At his death, Thomas’ epitaph recalled that the Lieutenant of the Tower (probably Sir James Radclyf ) offered him his freedom in 1487 during the Yorkist uprising in support of King Edward in Ireland.209 Howard did not take up the offer, probably fearing a trap.
In January 1489, he was released and his (and his father’s) attainder was reversed.210 He was, however, barred from inheriting his lands, other than those in right of his wife. By May, Howard was restored to the earldom of Surrey.211
Following the murder of the Earl of Northumberland on 28 April, Howard was sent north to suppress the northern rebels. He became Warden of the East Marches and King Henry’s quasi viceroy in the region, residing at Sheriff Hutton Castle.
In 1492, he defeated the northern rebels at Ackworth and gradually recovered his estates. Howard was tasked to array the northern levies against Richard of York’s invasion with James IV of Scotland in September 1496, an aborted affair with no clash of arms, owing to York’s withdrawal, aggrieved at the Scottish army’s treatment of the common people. Howard kept a copy of York’s royal proclamation from this time.
By 1501, Howard had returned to court and was made Lord High Treasurer. Despite Howard’s zealous show of loyalty to the new regime, the dukedom would not be restored until his victory at Flodden, some twenty-eight years after Bosworth, during the reign of Henry VIII. It seems that Howard’s loyalty to the Yorkist kings, and his knowledge of the survival of the sons of Edward IV, remained long in the memory of the new Tudor regime. Following the demise of the Tudor dynasty, Buc noted the bewildered reaction of the Howard family to the stories being told about King Richard.212
Francis, Viscount Lovell (c. 1457–92?)
In July 1471, Edward IV placed Francis Lovell in the care of the de la Pole family, where it seems he and their eldest son, John, Earl of Lincoln (aged about 14 and 11 respectively), formed a lasting friendship.213 As a child, Lovell was married to Anne Fitzhugh, the northern niece of Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick.
He succeeded to his estates and inheritances at his majority at about 20, becoming Lord of Bedale in Yorkshire, and owner of Minster Lovell, Oxfordshire, among others. By 1480, he was supporting King Edward’s campaign against the Scots led by Richard of Gloucester. He was knighted by Gloucester at Berwick in 1481 and likely took part in the 1482 invasion which returned Berwick to England. Following the Scottish invasion, Francis Lovell was made a viscount by Edward IV.
Lovell bore the Third Sword of State at Richard’s coronation. He escaped the Battle of Bosworth to take sanctuary at St John’s Abbey, Colchester, not far from Sir James Tyrell and the de la Pole homes in Suffolk. Lovell was attainted in Henry VII’s first Parliament.
In spring 1486, Lovell led a failed uprising against King Henry in Yorkshire with the apparent aim of kidnapping the new monarch.214 By April, Edward V was in his care and taken to Ireland. Lovell then travelled to Margaret of Burgundy, where he was soon joined by Lincoln. Here, the two Yorkist lords led the uprising on behalf of Edward V, crowning him in Ireland in May 1487 and attending his Parliament. Lovell escaped the Battle of Stoke with Sir Thomas Broughton and ‘many other’215 and went into hiding.
On 5 May 1488, Broughton is reported to have landed at Ravenglass, on the Cumbrian coast,216 and by 16 June, soldiers and mariners were ‘impressed’ to serve on behalf of Henry on Mare Guldeford in ‘resistance of the king’s enemies congregating on the sea’.217 By 19 June, Lovell fled to Scotland, receiving from James IV a safe conduct along with Broughton, Sir Roger Hartington, Oliver Frank, ‘their servants and all others who were of their opinion’. The safe conduct was granted for one year and afterwards at ‘the king’s pleasure’.218 By 4 November 1488, James IV issued a further safe passage to ‘Richard Harliston, knight, and Richard Ludelay, from Ireland, Englishmen, and 40 persons with them … at the instance [urgency] of the Lady Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy’. These were rebels who had come from Ireland.219
Margaret now sent a herald to Scotland with letters for the Scottish king at ‘his command’. The herald arrived on or around 26 November 1488.220 On 2 February 1490, a herald arrived in Scotland from Ireland on his way to the duchess.221 Given Lovell’s presence in Scotland, together with James IV’s communications with Margaret, it seems likely that the Scottish king was aware that the king crowned in Dublin had been Edward V.
According to English records, Lovell was alive, or thought to be alive, from 18 December 1489 to 2 May 1491 when certain properties would have been awarded to him by right of inheritance, had he not been attainted.222
On 16 July 1491, a ‘simple and pure person’ was imprisoned in York for telling ‘diverse persons’ about the city that he spoke with the ‘lord Lovell and Sir Thomas Broghton in Scotland’, which he then denied following imprisonment.223 A letter was sent to Sir Richard Tunstall at Pontefract Castle, one of King Henry’s key supporters in the north, to inform him about the event. It is not recorded what happened to the unnamed individual afterwards.
It seems likely that this York account may have been accurate because the first recorded instance of Francis Lovell’s apparent death in English records is dated 29 October 1493,224 but the precise date and location are not known. A commemoration for Lovell formally took place at Magdalen College, Oxford, annually on 17 September, but the significance of this date has, it seems, not been recorded.225
However, in the medieval calendar, this is the saint’s day for St Lambert, whose name would have resonated in conjunction with Lovell’s. Bishop Lambert was murdered at Liège in 709, a victim of political turmoil during the conflict between the Merovingian and Carolingian dynasties, a dispute mainly centred around Tournai and Cambrai. The coincidences of name and place are striking.
In 1534–35, during the reign of Henry VIII, Lovell was said to have ‘escaped beyond sea after the battle [Stoke], and to have died abroad’.226 A full translation reads:
They say the same Francis was overseas at the time of the attainder [backdated to 20 June 1487], and moreover died after the attainder, but on what day or in what year the said Francis died the appointed judges do not know.227
Although no records for Lovell post-1487 have been discovered on the continent or in Ireland, the search for further evidence continues.
On 9 August 1737, a letter from William Cowper, Clerk of Parliament, to the antiquary Francis Peck, concerned the discovery of a man’s remains in a large vault or underground room beneath the Lovell family home at Minster Lovell, Oxfordshire. The discovery was made during the construction of a new chimney. The ‘entire skeleton of a man, as having been sitting at a table, which was before him, with a book, paper and pen … in another part of the room lay a cap, much mouldered and decayed’.228 The family judged the remains to be those of Francis, Lord Lovell, but upon what grounds is not recorded.
On 2 March 1486,229 Minster Lovell had been awarded to Henry VII’s uncle, Jasper Tudor, Duke of Bedford (d. 1495), who had been married to the princes’ aunt, Katherine Woodville (d. 1497), by Henry VII within a couple of months of Bosworth. Henry VII visited Minster Lovell on 18 January 1494.230
Although attainted after Bosworth, Lovell was retrospectively attainted again in October 1495 for his part at Stoke Field in 1487. The reason for this second attainder is unclear and may have provided additional justification for the acquisition and assignment of his property. Lady Lovell, who was alive at the time, was described as ‘late wife of the said Francis’.231 Anne may have died in 1498 but had certainly died by January 1513.232
With the emergence of Richard, Duke of York, in 1491, a tradition in Bedale recounts how ‘evil’ Simon Dygby was given Bedale as an incentive to search the town in order to apprehend and execute Lovell.233
