March 18th 1471: ‘A King Harry!’
York’s Micklegate Bar.
Edward’s father’s head was displayed here after the Battle of Wakefield
Edward’s army completed the long trek to York, but their reception was very cool. He was met on the road and warned that it was a dangerous place to enter.
wherfore the Kynge, keping furthe his way, cam beforn Yorke, Monday the xviij. day of the same monithe. Trewthe it is that aforne the Kynge came at the citie, by iij myles, came unto him one callyd Thomas Coniers, Recordar of the citie, whiche had not bene afore that named trwe to the Kyngs partie. He tolde hym that it was not good for hym to come to the citie, for eyther he shuld not be suffred to enter, or els, in caas he enteryd, he was lost, and undone, and all his.
He had passed the point of no return, though, and returning from whence he came was not an option, so the army marched on towards the city gate, to abyde what God and good fortune woulde gyve hym. Good fortune gave him Robert Clifford and Richard Burghe, who gave him better comfort, suggesting safe passage past the city, though when Thomas Coniers caught up with them his pessimistic view was repeated.
When they arrived at the city gate, Clifford and Burghe led Edward with sixteen or seventeen of his men into the city. Warkworth’s Chronicle has it that Edward wore a Lancastrian ostrich feather badge and shouted ‘A King Harry’ as he went. He repeated that he’d returned for his inheritance of York, not the crown. Whatever he said, he charmed the burghers of York into admitting his whole army for a more comfortable night.
One of the mysteries of this affair is that Robert Clifford was a younger brother of John Clifford, ‘butcher Clifford’ who was said to have murdered Edward’s brother Edmund at the Battle of Wakefield in 1460 and was killed himself soon afterwards at Ferrybridge, on the way to the Battle of Towton. Robert was married to the Earl of Devonshire’s sister, so had strong Lancastrian credentials, which Edward must have been very aware of. Why did he help him in his darkest hour?