Margaret of Anjou was born on 23 March 1430, the second legitimate daughter of René, King of Naples and his wife, Isabella, Duchess of Lorraine.
The 15 year old Margaret was married to King Henry VI 23 April 1445, and was crowned Queen Consort a few weeks later. She did her best to be a good wife and queen. She seems to have loved her husband in spite of his mental illness, been loyal to her retainers, and fiercely devoted to her son Edward. Her efforts to prevent Richard of York, the 3rd Duke of York and father of King Edward IV and Richard III, from taking the crown away from her husband and son were heroic, and the reason she was unfairly dubbed a “she-wolf”.
Richard of York served as regent whenever Henry IV was mentally unable to perform his duties as king, and the king’s years of childlessness led York to expect that either himself or his eldest son would become king once Henry died. Imagine York’s unhappiness when Margaret had a healthy little boy on 13 October 1453. Henry became completely unable to rule shortly thereafter, which left York in charge. York liked the crown, and decided he should keep it.
York and the Yorkist faction immediately began questioning Edward’s legitimacy, declaring that Henry couldn’t have possibly fathered the boy. Margaret, getting wind that York was wooing powerful nobles to back him as king even though Henry was still alive and had an heir, literally went on the warpath to protect her husband and son. Some historians have criticized her for her decision to defend the rights of her spouse and legacy of their child.
The Duke of York was powerful; Henry’s advisers corrupt; Henry himself trusting, pliable, and increasingly unstable; Margaret defiantly unpopular, grimly and gallantly determined to maintain the English crown for her progeny. Yet at least one scholar [Paul Murray Kendall] identifies the source of the eventual Lancastrian downfall not as York’s ambitions nearly so much as Margaret’s ill-judged enmity toward York and her over-indulgence in unpopular allies.
Seriously, according to Paul Murray Kendall (who wrote the very well researched yet very, VERY pro-Yorkist book Richard the Third) the whole War of the Roses was because that bitch Margaret of Anjou wouldn’t lie down and let Richard of York cake-walk into a monarchy that was her son’s by rights.
Huh.
It is as though the murder of Margaret and Henry’s friend and ally, William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk, by Yorkist supporters, the Duke of York’s bullying his way into goverment power after Suffolk’s death, and the constant rumours by the York camp that Edward of Westminster was a bastard shouldn’t have made Margaret angry and worried that York was after her child’s throne. She shouldn’t have ‘provoked’ York by trying to stop him from taking Edward’s heritage before York fully announced his intentions of usurpation. She shouldn’t have acted all manly by fighting against political shenanigans when they were right under her nose.
Huh.
Although Richard of York was slain in battle, the Yorkists eventually won, killing Margaret and Henry’s seventeen year old son at the Battle of Teweksbury. Henry VI died suddenly and conveniently after the Battle of Tewkesbury, and and Richard of York’s eldest son took the throne as Edward IV. Once in power, the Yorkists got to write most of the “official” historical record and It is a bit biased in their favor. They certainly demonized Margaret of Anjou, and those myths about her show up repeatedly in historical fiction.
The Yorkists were, in the end, unable to hold on to the crown they had stolen from Henry VI and his heir. Edward VI died young, and in a fit of historical irony (or karma), his young sons would also be killed so that an alternate claimant – Edward’s brother, who became Richard III – could take the throne. Edward’s queen, Elizabeth Woodville, then conspired with Margaret Beaufort to overthrow Richard and to place Margaret’s son, Henry Tudor, on the throne.
If Margaret of Anjou had been alive at the time, would she have laughed at the downfall of the Yorks? Or would the pain of her losses be too great for any perceived justice to soothe?
.Imagine York’s unhappiness when Margaret had a healthy little boy on October 13, 1553.
I think you made a typo..
I did. I did make a Typo. 🙂
I agree with much of what you have said but I think you rather oversimplify York’s motives and also don’t refer to his shabby treatment earlier which helped to frame his attitude to the the crown and the queen. Kendall distorted the history but you risk doing so too by glossing over Margaret’s mistakes and overemphasising York’s ambition. I think it helps an understanding of this period to avoid using the York and Lancaster labels in the early stages because it is important to remember that very few of those who fought against the king, even in 1459, intended to depose him.
I agree, but since this was a short blog post and the deeper factionalism wasn’t my focus (the focus was obviously the way the queen has been depicted as “bad” for fighting for her rights and the rights of her child; clearly her gender is the issue), I didn’t get the more involved aspects of the struggle. Also, I heartily dislike the Duke of York’s power grab and murder of the rightful heir — although the argument could be made against “rightful” since Richard II’s murder — and don’t think he was treated “shabbily” in CONTEXT. Ah … complexity.
Yes, it’s always difficult to fit all the aspects in. I was thinking of his shabby treatment after France which coloured his agenda thereafter. Which rightful heir did York kill?
Well, he was dead when it happened but his sons killed Edward of Westminster to get that crown.
What else was York going to do with Ed of Westminster in the long run?
Richard of York had grievances, many of them legitimate, but I tend to think one of the problems with interpreting the events of this period is the automatic assumption that York was entitled to just about everything.
Why was he entitled to lead the King’s armies in France? Why was he entitled to more lands, money, and power when he was already one of the greatest magnates in the land?
Why was he entitled to be his chief advisor? Why was he entitled to be his heir when he had other relatives: including some of more direct Lancastrian blood, such as the Hollands. Why was he entitled to the Regency?
In France, they had a long-established tradition for female regency, and Margaret came from a family with a history of strong female leadership- her grandmother was Yolande of Aragon. As such, I suspect claiming political power seemed an entirely natural course of action for Margaret, not one driven by blind ambition or megalomania.
Kendall’s biography is partly fictionalized, by the way. I think it also represents the extreme polarization of opinion and interpretation which the Wars of the Roses seem to cause people cause. Which is unfortunate, in my opinion.
I don’t think the evidence suggests York immediately put about the rumor that Prince Edward was illegitimate. In fact, he may not have been the original source of the rumours.
He and his wife seem to have been quite content to accept the Prince at first, even sending the expected good wishes. I suspect that only changed when events came to a head in the late 1450s.
Margaret was a tough old buzzard, no doubt, and deserved the soubriquet of “she-wolf” – which I would regard as a compliment. A good, hard fighter. Also, if you look at the campaigns of 1460-61 from Wakefield to Second St. Albans, there’s some top-notch strategic thinking in there and I would suspect that Margaret was the authoress of that plan. Her bad luck that the Earl of March was a far better battlefield general than Somerset or Pembroke.
I’ve always admired Margaret of Anjou.