One of the Last White Roses Decollated

Tower Hill execution site. Image credit.

Edward, the 17th Earl of Warwick, son of George, the Duke of Clarence and Isabel Neville, and brother of Margaret, later Margaret Pole, the Countess of Salisbury, was beheaded on Tower Hill, six days after Perkin Warbeck, the Pretender, was hanged at Tyburn in 1499. This blog considers the question of why (or even whether) Edward, who had been held in detention since the fall of Richard III in 1485, was a threat to the new Tudor Dynasty:

Edward was executed in 1499 because he had allegedly conspired with Perkin Warbeck to escape the Tower. It is not farfetched to believe that Henry VII set the pair up by providing them with guards who were amiable to their goals and gave them false hope. Whether they really did plot or Henry wanted everyone to believe they did, both were put to death in order to clear the way for the marriage of Prince Arthur to Katherine of Aragon.

Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, Katherine’s parents, clearly saw Edward as a threat based upon their insistence on his removal. Henry was undoubtedly reluctant to execute his wife’s cousin when she had already lost so many to the Wars of the Roses, but, in the end, he decided that the favorable match was worth the loss of one more Plantagenet son. Maybe Edward did present a greater threat than we often give him credit for.

Edward is often referred to as the son of George of Clarence, but let us not forget that his maternal ancestry is no less impressive. Isabel Neville was the daughter of the infamous Kingmaker, and the house of Neville had been powerful enough to sway the Wars of the Roses in whichever direction they chose to place themselves upon. Should Edward have determined to make a claim for himself, he had deep roots of family ties to call upon that Tudor would have been challenged to compete with.

After his decollation, Henry VII paid to have his body interred in the church at Bisham Priory/Abbey, a house of Augustinian Canons (and briefly Benedictine monks), in Berkshire, where many Nevilles and Montagus were buried. Margaret Pole's second son Arthur, who died in 1532 was also buried there. The priory was founded by William Montagu, or de Montacute, the 1st Earl of Salisbury in 1337 on the grounds on his estate.

Of course, all these graves are lost, because after the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the abbey was suppressed and:

The whole of the monastic buildings of the house of Austin Canons founded by William de Montacute Earl of Salisbury in 1337 have been demolished. The abbey hall and church had been destroyed before the site and manor were granted to Sir Philip Hoby in 1553.' (fn. 7) From the surveyors' report made at the same time it would appear that the priory was entirely independent of the buildings occupied by the Templars, which were used as a mansion-house of Margaret Pole Countess of Salisbury at the time of her attainder in 1539, (fn. 8) and had probably been utilized as a residence by the Earls of Salisbury soon after the suppression of the order. (fn. 9) The buildings at the east end of the hall, which consist of the council chamber with the cellars and cloisters under, were erected in the 14th century, and form one side of a fair-sized quadrangle, the other three sides of which were demolished by the Hobys at the time of their alterations and rebuilding, though they had apparently always been parts of a private residence. (fn. 10)

The tombs of the earls who were buried at Bisham (including that of Warwick the Kingmaker) are said to have been removed to the present hall when the abbey church was destroyed. There is, however, no evidence of this in the existing building or any record of their having been removed. In the latter part of the 15th century the screens with the gallery above were erected at the west end of the hall, and about the same time a floor was inserted in the solar and a passage made along its east side against the west wall of the hall.

The suppression of the Augustinian priory in 1537, however, was followed by the brief establishment of a Benedictine house on Henry VIII's orders, after Thomas Cromwell had first made his own arrangements for the management of the house:

Cromwell, in his scheming for his friends and tools, desired to secure the appointment of prior of Bisham for William Barlow, who was at that time prior of Haverfordwest. He ordered the then prior to resign, and sent his instructions to Thomas Benet, LL.D., vicar-general of Sarum, to repair to the priory for the election, doubtless to see that his nominee was appointed. Benet, however, wrote to Cromwell on 16 April, 1535, stating that he would have executed his commands before, only the promised resignation of the incumbent had not been received; nevertheless he would proceed to Bisham on 23 April. A letter of Sir William Carew of 27 April stated that he had heard that the prior, by the persuasion of my Lady of Salisbury and other people, refused to resign, though these very people thought him very unmeet to continue, until they saw that Cromwell meant to prefer one contrary to their minds. (fn. 11)

So Margaret, the Countess of Salisbury, thought it best not to interfere in Cromwell's project--even though the priory was on her property!

Cromwell succeeded in forcing Barlow on Bisham Priory, but it is doubtful if he ever visited his new preferment, for he was speedily dispatched on an embassy to Scotland. Whilst absent in Scotland in January, 1536, Barlow was appointed bishop of St. Asaph, the first of the many sees that he held; in April he was translated to St. David's, but was allowed as a court favourite to hold the priory of Bisham in commendam.

The summary of the Valor of 1536 gives the income of this priory as £185 11s. 0½d., which would have brought it within the suppression of the lesser houses; but the full Valor for Berkshire is missing, and the abstract among the first fruits documents is obviously incorrect in some particulars. The ministers' accounts of the Augmentation Office give the total income as £327 4s. 6d.

The obsequious Barlow was ready, however, at once to comply with the desire of Henry and Cromwell, and on 5 July, 1536, he surrendered Bisham to the king. But now came about a singular state of things. Bisham alone among all the monasteries of England was selected by the fickle Henry VIII to be re-established on a much more imposing and wealthy scale, the priory being converted into an abbey.

On 6 July, 1537, John Cordrey, abbot of Chertsey, Surrey, with William the prior and thirteen monks, surrendered, on condition of being re-established as an abbey about to be founded by the king at the late priory of Bisham. On 18 December, 1537, the king granted a charter of portentous length to the new foundation of the order of St. Benedict 'out of sincere devotion to God and the Blessed Virgin His Mother.' It was to consist of an abbot and thirteen monks, and was founded by Henry to secure prayers for his good estate during life, and for the soul of Jane his late queen, also for the souls of his posterity and progenitors, and for the souls of all the faithful departed. This new abbey of the Holy Trinity was to be endowed with the house, lands, and all the appurtenances of the late priory of Bisham, and also with the lands of the late abbey of Chertsey, and of the priories of Cardigan, Beddgelert, Ankerwyke, Little Marlow, Medmenham, &c., to the annual value of £661 14s. 9d. Moreover, to give greater dignity to this new abbey, Henry granted his beloved John Cordrey licence to wear an episcopal mitre. (fn. 12)

Abbot Cordrey did not remain at Bisham long, because "the king's sorrow over the death of Jane Seymour soon evaporated, and with it seems to have gone his short-lived desire for prayers either for the living or for the dead. The abbey of Bisham lasted for exactly six months, and then John the abbot, William the prior, and the convent of monks were called upon to execute a second farcical 'surrender' of all their possessions, which they duly executed on 19 June, 1538, in favour of Richard Layton and Edward Carne, doctors of law, the king's visitors. (fn. 14)"

Margaret Pole would eventually follow her brother to the block, although she was beheaded inside the Tower precincts, on May 27, 1541. Her son Henry Pole, Baron Montagu was beheaded on Tower Hill like his uncle on January 9, 1539.