Key features in the reign of Henry VII

Threats to the Crown: Conclusion

Did the challenges to the throne '1486-1506' pose a real threat to Henry VII?

Threat

• Henry had no strong heirs (Arthur was only a baby)
• There was the possibility of the treacherous magnates rallying in support of the pretenders which made Henry paranoid.
• Henry's claim to the throne was weak and there were Yorkists alive with stronger claims to the throne than Henry including de la Pole.
• The mere existence of Suffolk posed a threat.
• Battles were a risky business. Henry was prepared with a big army at Stoke but there was always a chance of treachery (e.g. The Stanley's at Bosworth).
• The threats lingered on for a long time. E.g: The Warbeck plot lasted 8 years causing significant anxiety and expense for Henry. 
• Henry had very recently left France (1485) landed in Wales and won the Battle of Bosworth to take the throne. This could happen again.
• There was widespread international backing for the pretenders- Ireland, Scotland, Burgundy, and the Netherlands. 
• The Early years of Henry's reign were unstable since there was a history of bloodshed and usurpation.
• It was hard to prove Warbeck wasn't who he said he was.

Not a Threat

• Henry was helped by Parliament who granted him money with high taxes. 
• People did not want to extend the Wars of the Roses on the grounds of dubious claimants.
• There was little support for the Pretenders in England (only in the peripheries).
• Other foreign powers were unlikely to invade E.g Maximilian the Holy Roman Emperor didn't have the resources available due to the Italian Wars.
• The pretender plots were not secret. Henry's spies monitored then and used pre-emptive strikes. Henry was prepared. He defeated the Simnel with a big army at Stoke.
• International security was achieved through marriage alliances. E.g: Katherine of Aragon and Arthur Tudor, James IV of Scotland and Margaret Tudor.
• Henry was a good dimplomat, able to win over foreign powers who supported the pretenders. Henry made the Treaty of Medina del Campo with Spain in 1489 which stated Spain would not assist the Yorkists. Henry negotiated the Treaty of Etaples with France in 1492 which secured a French pension and promise not to aid Yorkists.
• The pretenders were imposters not true blood Yorkists.

Threats to the Crown: Part 3

A genuine claimant 

The Earl of Suffolk

1499- 1506.

• 1499 Suffolk (a Yorkist) was being punished for his brother's activities against Henry VII in the early years of his reign.

 

• Suffolk was summoned to ordinary court (which was humiliating as he was not surrounded by his peers) and he fled to Burgundy. 

• 1499- Henry VII issued arrest orders for Suffolk and he returned to England later that year.

• 1501- Suffolk fled England again and sought the help of Maximilian. He referred to himself as the White Rose, making it clear that he was a Yorkist contender to the throne.

• Maximilian promised to help the Yorkist heirs. Henry gave him £10,000 but Maximilian made no move to expel Edmund de la Pole from Burgundy. £250,000 was received in loans that were never repaid. Henry also reluctantly agreed to trade concessions.

• 1505 - Henry suspended trade between England and Burgundy.

• The situation changed following the death of Isabella of Castille.

• Archduke Philip of Burgundy was forced to land in England due to a freak storm. He extracted £138,000 from Henry and in return he surrendered Suffolk to Henry.

• Suffolk was paraded through the streets of London and imprisoned in the town. He was initially kept alive but executed by Henry VIII in 1513.

 

Threats to the Crown: Part 2

The pretenders:

Perkin Warbeck

Timeline:

PERKIN WARBECK, pretender to the throne of England, was the son of Jehan de Werbecque, a poor burgess of Tournay in Flanders and of his wife Katherine de Faro. The exact date of his birth is unknown, but as he represented himself as having been nine years old in 1483, it must have taken place in, or close on, 1474. His confession made at the end of his life was an account of his early years which is to some extent supported by other testimony. The names of his father and other relations whom he mentions have been found in the municipal records of Tournay, and the official description of them agrees with his statements. According to this version, which may be accepted as substantially true, he was brought up at Antwerp by a cousin Jehan Stienbecks, and served a succession of employers as a boy servant. He was for a time with an Englishman John Strewe at Middleburg, and then accompanied Lady Brampton, the wife of an exiled partisan of the house of York, to Portugal. He was for a year employed by a Portuguese knight whom he described as having only one eye, and whom he names Vacz de Cogna (Vaz da Cunha?). In 1491 he was at Cork as the servant of a Breton silk merchant Pregent (Pierre Jean) Meno. Ireland was strongly attached to the house of York, and was full of intrigue against King Henry VII. Perkin says that the people seeing him dressed in the silks of his master took him for a person of distinction, and insisted that he must be either the son of George, Duke of Clarence, or a bastard of Richard III. He was more or less encouraged by the Earls of Desmond and Kildare. The facts are ill recorded, but it is safe to presume that intriguers who wished to disturb the government of Henry VII took advantage of a popular delusion, and made use of the lad as a tool. At this time he spoke English badly. By 1492 he had become sufficiently notorious to attract the attention of King Henry's government and of foreign sovereigns. He was in that year summoned to Flanders by Margaret, the widowed Duchess of Burgundy, and sister of Edward IV, who was the main support of the Yorkist exiles, and who was the enemy of Henry VII for family reasons and for personal reasons also, for she wished to extort from him the payment of the balance of her dowry. She found the impostor useful as a means of injuring the King of England. Several European sovereigns were moved to help him by the same kind of reason. The suppositions that he was the son of Clarence or of Richard III were discarded in favour of the more useful hypothesis that he was Richard, Duke of York, the younger of the two sons of Edward IV, murdered in the Tower. Charles VIII, King of France, the counsellors of the youthful Duke of Burgundy, the Duke's father Maximilian, King of the Romans, and James IV of Scotland, none of whom can have been really deceived, took up his cause more or less actively. He was entertained in France, and was taken by Maximilian to attend the funeral of the Emperor Frederick III in 1493. At Vienna he was treated as the lawful King of England. He was naturally the cause of considerable anxiety to the English government, which was well acquainted with his real history, and made attempts to get him seized. His protectors entered into negotiations which in fact turned on the question whether more was to be gained by supporting him, or by giving him up. An appeal to Isabella, Queen of Castile, met with no response. In July 1495 he was provided with a few ships and men by Maximilian, now Emperor, and he appeared on the coast of Kent. No movement in his favour took place. A few of his followers who landed were cut off, and he went on to Ireland to join the Earl of Desmond in Munster. After an unsuccessful attack on Waterford in August, he fled to Scotland. Here King James IV showed him favour, and arranged a marriage for him with Catherine Gordon, daughter of the Earl of Huntly. He was helped to make a short inroad into Northumberland, but the intervention of the Spanish government brought about a peace between England and Scotland. In 1497 Perkin was sent on his travels again with two or three small vessels, and accompanied by his wife, who had borne him one or two children. After some obscure adventures in Ireland, he landed at Whitesand Bay, near the Land's End, on the 7th of September, and was joined by a crowd of the country people, who had been recently in revolt against excessive taxation. He advanced to Exeter, but was unable to master the town. On the approach of the royal troops he deserted his followers, and ran for refuge to the sanctuary of Beaulieu in Hampshire. He then surrendered. His wife was kindly treated and placed in the household of Henry's Queen Elizabeth. Perkin was compelled to make two ignominious public confessions at Westminster, and in Cheapside in June 1498. On the 23rd of November 1499, he was hanged on a charge of endeavouring to escape from the Tower with the imprisoned Earl of Warwick.

 In note form:

• 
  
• A young Flemish boy.
• With Yorkist backing.
• He had handsome appearance and Princely bearing.
• His clothier employer took him to Ireland with a fellow Yorkist John Taylor to impersonate Richard, Duke of York. Son of Edward IV.
• Most Irish Lords, including (crucially) Kildare refused to give Warbeck their backing.
• Henry VII dispatched troops to Ireland
• Warbeck traveled to France in 1492 and Charles VIII received him as a Prince.
• Henry and Charles signed the Treaty of Etaples in November 1492 agreeing not to shelter rebels.
• In 1493 Warbeck was forced to go to the court of Margaret of Burgundy. She tutored him in the ways of the Yorkist court.
• In 1493, Archduke Philip assumed control of Burgundy. Henry protested to him about the harboring of Warbeck. When Philip ignored the protest, Henry introduced a trade ban.
• Warbeck was then welcomed at the court of the new Holy Roman Emperor, Maximilian. Warbeck promised that if he died before becoming King, his 'claim' would fall to Maximilian. 
•  In 1494 Henry's spies uncovered English conspirators among the Government. The most prominent one was Sir William Stanley who was executed in Febuary 1495.
•  In July 1495 Warbeck failed his attempt to land at Deal. He fled to Ireland and enlisted the support of the Earl of Desmond. He was driven out by Sir Edward Poynings.
• Warbeck fled to Scotland in 1495 he was given a royal welcome by James IV. He married James' cousin. Lady Catherine Gordon. James supported an unsuccessful invasion of England in September.
• James IV signed the Truce of Ayton with Henry VII, so Warbeck had to move again, this time to Ireland. The Irish rejected him in 1497.
• Warbeck landed in Cornwall to profit from the antagonism felt towards Henry following the Cornish rebellion (1497) but he received little support and was arrested.
• In 1498 Warbeck was transferred to the Tower.
•  Warbeck and the Earl of Warwick were said to be involved in an escape attempt and were both executed. 
•  

Threats to the Crown: Part 1

The pretenders:

Lambert Sinmel

(1484-87)

What happened?

From the moment Henry, Earl of Richmond, emerged from Bosworth as King Henry VII, he knew he’d only won the battle – not the war itself.  His claim to the throne was undeniably obscure and complicated, and only his marriage to the daughter of King Edward IV, Elizabeth of York, had the potential to stabilise his claim.  But even that, he knew, thanks to Richard III’s Titulus Regius (declaring all Edward IV’s children illegitimate), would not end his woes.  He was also surrounded by those who had a greater claim to the throne than he through other avenues.  Nevertheless, in the immediate aftermath of Bosworth, he seems to have attempted to win the Yorkist’s over.  Not only did he go ahead with the marriage, but he was kind to John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln (whom Richard III had named his heir following the death of Edward of Middleham), and several others had had their lives spared following his victory.  They were not unduly punished for acting in Yorkist favour (Margaret Beaufort even praised a former servant of Richard III for their loyalty – a fact somewhat at odds with popular perception of her as a Yorkist destroying dragon). But Henry was far too intelligent a man to know that this was a cause that couldn’t be killed through kindness alone.

So, given the grim inevitability of rebellions, Henry knew also that more difficult decisions had to be made regarding other claimants; ones too close to his crown for comfort.  One such case was that of Edward Plantagenet, Earl of Warwick.  The son of George, Duke of Clarence, and Isabel Nevill, he was the nephew of two Yorkist Kings through the paternal side.  As a pre-emptive strike against would-be conspirators who were waiting in the wings, Henry had the boy transported to the Tower where he could be watched and monitored for his own safety. Which is just as well, because less than two years into the reign of Henry VII, Warwick had a double.

Not a lot is known about Lambert Simnel.  G.R Elton states that he was the son of a Joiner or Carpenter from Oxfordshire, and was roughly twelve years old when he was spotted by an ambitious Clergyman, Richard Symonds (described by Elton as: “A man of no birth, but some brains” – which leaves us wondering why he did what he did next).  Simnel was taken from his family (possibly on the promise of a career in the Church), and schooled by Symonds in the ways of the aristocracy.  Originally, he was to impersonate the younger of Edward IV’s sons, Richard of Shrewsbury.  But for some time, rumours had been circulating that Henry VII had secretly killed off the Earl of Warwick (it wouldn’t be the first time that a young heir had been secretly done away with in the Fortress).  So soon, there was a change of plan.  Instead of impersonating one of Edward IV’s unfortunate sons, Simnel was set up as the Earl.

Following very careful coaching, Simnel’s mannerisms, tone of speech and deportment were all ironed out. He was decked out in fine clothes and taught to compose himself with the haughtiness of the ruling classes; and none of the Carpenter’s son remained in him by the time he was taken to Dublin to claim “his” throne.  Once in Ireland, he was in a place safe enough to start rallying troops for an invasion of England.  The Earl of Kildare was chief among the Irish supporters (keen to be rid of English influence on Irish soil – he had his own vested interests in the enterprise).  Co-ordinating the English troops was John de la Pole, earl of Lincoln.  In Europe, the real Edward Plantagenet’s aunt, Margaret of Burgundy, had given her backing (and alongside her was Lord Francis Lovell – an exiled Yorkist).  Between them, they mustered an army of 2000 German mercenaries to take back the Crown.

 However, Henry had spies everywhere (not without good reason), and had already heard of the brewing rebellion.  Looking back from the distance of over five-hundred years, it’s hard to see what the fuss was about.  It’s clear to us that Simnel was a fake; a puppet being used for the ambitions of others (de la Pole had his own claim to the Crown and was probably just using the boy as a front, and even Symonds the Priest had his eye on the greater glory to be gotten through a puppet King).  But the plot, regardless of its flimsiness, had gained a swell of support for the Yorkist cause, and left Henry’s vulnerabilities horribly exposed.  So, Henry acted swiftly and decisively.  In May, 1487, the real Edward Plantagenet was dressed up in all his finery and paraded through the streets of London for all the people to see, and for all the foreign ambassadors to see and filter back to their European masters (thus letting the rest of the world know that the real Earl was alive and well and living at the Tower).  But, at roughly the same time, Lambert Simnel was at Dublin Cathedral being crowned King Edward VI of England and France, and Lord of Ireland.  Parading the real Earl through the streets was too little, too late. With so much riding on Lambert Simnel, military engagement was now unavoidable.

The battle happened on 16^th June, 1487 at Stoke.  Once again, Henry’s troops were outnumbered; once again Henry had the luck of the Devil on his side.  Simnel’s troops were crushed, and even de la Pole was killed in action.  The rest of the disaffected, desperate Yorkists that had flocked to his banner scattered leaving the bewildered Simnel and Symonds to pick up the flack, such as it was.  Realising that Simnel, a mere child, was a front for the ambitions of others, Henry showed him great mercy by appointing him as spit turner in the Palace Kitchens (he rose to the exalted rank of Royal Falconer, and lived to a respectable age).  Symonds, too, was even granted mercy (but was kept under lock and key for life).

Overall, Simnel had been an abysmal failure.  The only support he got was from the most desperate of old-guard Yorkists and an Irish earl who would do anything to rid his country of the English.   His disguise was all too easily lifted by the parading of the real Earl (who was also left in the Tower, but suffered no ill effects of the rebellion that was led in his name).  The biggest shock to Henry must have been the involvement of his own mother-in-law, Elizabeth Woodville (described by Elton as “meddlesome and interfering”), who would – as a result – end her days in the Nunnery at Bermondsey.  But despite the failure, Henry’s vulnerabilities had been painfully exposed.  He had been jeopardised by a child with an ambitious handler and a few desperate enemies.  It shook Henry, and given a few quirks of fate, could have ended disastrously for him.  As a result, it’s not something that we should dismiss when studying Henry’s reign and the events that made him the sort of King he became.

There is one more point to conclude this post.  Although Henry was blissfully unaware of it, Simnel was successful in just one respect: how not to be a Pretender.  People were watching, learning and waiting for the chance to strike again against Henry, and a much bigger threat to his Crown was lurking just across the sea.

Henry VII and Foriegn policy

1. Foreign Policy

• Is there one? Domestic/foreign split not in vogue then.

2. What are policy aims?

• For nobility and landed class:
  • aim is to win honour and glory in war, especially against France;
  • meaning of the English word ‘policy’ – means fighting the French and conquering their territory.
• For Henry VII:
  • security: plots, frontiers and Channel ports (Britain, Ireland, France, Netherlands, Spain)
  • finance (customs revenues)
  • prestige in Europe, some offensive aims
  • dynastic policy (later marriages)

3. Who participated in foreign policy? King, councillors, nobles, who?

• foreign policy discussed at Great Councils, crown wearings/wearing of purple: Epiphany, Easter, Whitsuntide, All Saints, Christmas; discussed at meetings that are an extension of King’s Council. 224 members during Henry’s reign;
• Morton, Fox (led retinue despite being a bishop), nobles all prominent;
• City of London, not much involved in policy apart from Mayor;
• Parliament not much involved in policy.

4. 1492 Boulogne campaign

• about security, money, prestige
• some key figures stayed home: Morton, Lord Dynham (treasurer)
• Reynold Bray (treasurer of war, president of Council) important in this campaign
• when they got there, policy debated in a Council of War made up of the King, nobles, captains, councillors. Debate the Articles of War, but unusual campaign because Henry already knew before he went that he wanted to settle.

5. Scotland – security

• James IV helps Warbeck in 1495 and 1496;
• 1497 James IV accepts truce of Ayton. Having missed opportunity to profit from the Cornish rising, expels Warbeck and agrees to series of truces;
• 1502 treaty of Perpetual Peace and marriage of James to Margaret Tudor.

6. Ireland (not strictly ‘foreign’) – security

• May 1487, Simnel crowned in Ireland as Edward VI, and invaded England. Policy in Ireland a mixture of carrot and stick: general pardon, followed by bonds and new oath of allegiance.
• 1491-2 Warbeck in Ireland. Increase in royal and military intervention. Warbeck back 1495. Sir Edward Poynings sent (1494-5) to crush the Yorkists.
• Overall policy to keep the Pale loyal by delegating government to trusted nobles.
• English legislation on retaining adapted for Ireland and the Irish Parliament to meet only with the King’s consent.

7. France – security, prestige

• 1489-92 key period. Security, prestige: Henry seeks to aid Brittany against quick absorption by Charles VIII, and wants France not to support Henry’s rebels.
• 1489: Henry agreed to aid Brittany by the treaty of Redon (Feb). 1st expedition to Brittany: 6000 troops were sent under Lord Daubeney. But Anne of Brittany had to agree to reimburse his expenses, surrender two towns as security, and make no peace, truce or marriage with France without Henry’s consent. Clause added with offensive aim: the Bretons to support any future campaign Henry might undertake against France for the recovery of his ‘right.’
• July 1490: 2nd expedition to Brittany. September: amity between Henry VII, Spain and Maximilian against France. Anne affliliates with this coalition.
• December 1491: Anne gave in and married Charles VIII.
• 1492: Henry VII made a show of strength, offensive and defensive aims (asserted Henry V’s claim to the French Crown). Invaded northern France with 26,000 men. Charles VIII’s eyes were turning to Italy, and his aim was to make a quick treaty. Treaty of Etaples by which Charles VIII agreed to drop his support for Perkin Warbeck and other rebels, to indemnify the costs of Henry’s interventions in Brittany, and to reimburse the arrears of Edward IV’s pension due by 1475 treaty.

8. Spain – dynastic, security

• 1488, negotiations began for the betrothal of Arthur.
• 1489, Medina del Campo: Spain closed to Yorkist pretenders and alliance with England.
• 1501, the marriage to Arthur and Catherine takes place. Arthur died in 1502. Henry negotiates for Henry, his second son. Henry expected to marry Catherine after his fourteenth birthday, but the wedding postponed by Henry VII, who has alternative plans for alliances with the Netherlands and France. In 1503, Elizabeth of York died in childbirth. Henry was able to remarry. He began to negotiate with France, Spain and Netherlands.

9. Netherlands (and HR Empire) – security, finance, dynasty

• Henry wants deal with Maximilian and his son Archduke Philip: trade to increase customs revenues plus Warbeck. NB Margaret of Burgundy (Edward IV’s sister – widow of Charles the Bold) supports Perkin Warbeck. Her dower lands in Netherlands, which give her freedom of action.
• 1496: Magnus Intercursus, trade treaty that also closed the Netherlands to Henry’s dynastic rivals, a major treaty.
• November 1504, Isabella of Castile died: Archduke Philip became the rival of Ferdinand of Aragon for the regency of Castille. Henry VII had to choose. Policy veered towards Philip.
• January 1506: Philip and his wife, Joanna, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, blown ashore onto the English coast near Weymouth en route for Castille, Henry VII entertained them for three months. By the treaty of Windsor, he recognized Philip as King of Castille, and the two rulers promised mutual defence and assistance against each other’s rebels. By a second treaty, Philip pledged to marry his sister, Margaret, now regent of the Netherlands, to Henry VII.
• April 1506: Malus Intercursus treaty between Henry and Philip so called because the Netherlanders believed it to be too generous to England. When Philip died (Sept 1506), Henry cheated of his investments (£342k).

10. Successes or not?

• Success achieved against rebels.
• Security from invasion achieved.
• Dynastic marriages so-so. Not much progress in Ireland.
• Commercial treaties overrated: those with the Netherlands had to be unpicked: subordinated trade to security. Henry VIII has to start again with Charles V (son of Philip and Joanna).
• Later foreign policy: huge cost to domestic revenue pulls Henry VII down in later years.
• Henry was lucky that France was embroiled in Italy and Naples after 1494.

 
 

 

Stability?

Henry VII: Founder of Stability or Incompetent Monarch?

In the conventional historiography, Henry VII may be compared to someone learning to ride a bicycle. He thrust himself into the saddle, and after a series of hazards, uncertainties, and potentially serious wobbles, finally achieved stability. The trouble is, this paradigm has passed its sell-by date. It is going to change and change radically, but how and what will emerge at the end of the process?

1. What do we THINK we know about Henry VII? According to Francis Bacon (and S.B. Chrimes):

• ‘He was of an high mind, and loved his own will and his own way; as one that revered himself, and would reign indeed, … not admitting any near or full approach either to his power or to his secrets.’
• ‘He was a prince sad, serious, and full of thoughts and secret observations; and full of notes and memorials in his own hand, especially touching persons; as whom to employ, whom to reward, whom to inquire of, whom to beware of, what were the dependencies, what were the factions, and the like; keeping (as it were) a journal of his thoughts.’
• He was a skilful but prudent statesman: he kept his ‘distance’. He was (as we are told) not a ‘participating’ ruler like Henry VIII, Francis I or Elizabeth I. He did not flaunt his wealth.
• Rapacity grew upon him with increasing years, though behind his avarice lay a principle of statesmanship: control of nobility through fiscal feudalism.
• Financial stability was fundamental to his government: the ideas of Fortescue’s Governance of England were put into practice.
  1. patrimonial kingship (exploitation of Crown estate)
  2. magnificence
  3. conciliar government (to be efficient)
  4. used the latest methods of accounting (Chamber finance)
  5. subordinate the nobility to the monarchy
  6. restored law and order

Fiscal discipline in politics: according to Bacon, ‘The less blood he drew, the more he took of treasure’. Bonds and recognisances (J.R. Lander) used as swords of Damocles to ensure stability in the provinces, even if they finally created a culture of ‘coercion and fear’.

• Henry VII was a significant legislator. Bacon claimed: ‘his times for good commonwealth’s laws did excel’. Henry VII ‘restored law and order’ by attacking retainers and appointing gentry as JPs.
• Henry chose his councillors and ministers wisely, and favoured men of the ‘middle sort’: a class of royal officials were who were entirely dependent upon the king, e.g. Bray, Empson and Dudley.
• The mainspring of his domestic and foreign policy was dynastic security. He used ‘politick’ methods to preserve himself and the Tudor dynasty.
• Stability and royal authority was restored after the Wars of the Roses. Bacon noted in his Fragments, there was now ‘no such thing as any great or mighty subject who might eclipse or overshadow the imperial power.’ Henry VII achieved:
  1. rise in prestige of the Crown (including in Europe);
  2. rise in financial resources of the Crown;
  3. rise in the social authority of the Crown (e.g. vis-à-vis overmighty subjects);
  4. creation of a service nobility;
  5. throne passed on smoothly to son, Henry VIII, thereby ensuring stable Tudor dynasty.

In other words, the effects of the Wars of the Roses were reversed and the power of the monarchy restored. All these points have become entrenched in the historical literature. Unfortunately, most are half-truths, which distract us from a coherent reevaluation of Henry VII.

NB Bacon wrote in 1621 after his impeachment for corruption and dismissal as James I’s Lord Chancellor. He wrote to advise and impress James I in the hope of making a return to power. Bacon’s History of Henry VII is intended to instruct the reader in statecraft through the study of a great practitioner of political cunning, cf. Machiavelli’s The Prince, or Justus Lipsius’s Six Books of Politics (1589). It is not a valid history of the reign of Henry VII.

2. What is now being said about the reign of Henry VII (see chapter 11 of C. Carpenter: The Wars of the Roses (1997).

• Henry VII had a view of kingship and lordship that was different to, and subversive of, that of 15th century England. His view was modelled on the new administrative monarchies of the Continent: France and Brittany.
  1. Henry VII had no experience of English government and administration;
  2. Henry undermined the relationship between Crown and nobility by excessive fiscalism and threats to landed power which destabilized the English monarchy;
  3. Good lordship required the use of social power and the arbitration of noble councils for the good order of society, but this was prejudiced by the anti-aristocratic bias of Henry VII;
  4. Was Henry VII even pursuing a conscious policy against the nobles and in support of gentry rule, or was it basically accidental and a mess;
  5. For Henry VII, service (= aristocratic service) meant subordination. Yet if the nobles were disabled and their local power prejudiced or subverted by gentry promotions (e.g. Warwickshire), their territorial power could not be used to suppress revolts, e.g. 1497 Cornish revolt and threat in North. For Carpenter, this is axiomatic;
  6. When Henry VII attacked his subjects’ lands, he followed King John, Edward II, and Richard II – no coincidence that 1509 complaints appealed to Magna Carta.
• 15th century kingship held that king and nobles worked in partnership, and king was ‘first among equals’. Landed power was respected by Crown, because land was the basis of the social power of the nobility in the regions which ensured the subjection of the realm (i.e. the masses) to authority. Power in early-modern = social power, which was hitherto predicated on land.
• The notion that Fortescue’s Governance of England represented the ideals of 15th century English kingship is a fallacy. The Governance was written in exile in north-eastern France in 1460s with a view to securing the restoration of Henry VI on the principles of French monarchical government, i.e. reflects the values of Continental new administrative monarchies, or Renaissance monarchy. This is why the convergence with Henry VII appears to be complete. Fortescue is convergent with the old paradigm of Henry VII’s ‘new monarchy’ = Tudor ‘imperial’ kingship.
• There is massive intellectual confusion over Henry VII’s alleged fiscalism.
  1. The purpose of bonds and recognisances was to subdue the nobles, but if the system was working, there would be no additional income for the Crown. If the regime was stable, there would be no forfeitures. Historians can’t have it both ways;
  2. The trick was to preserve the nobles’ abuse of power while preserving the power itself, but Henry VII’s attacks were indiscriminate;
  3. Henry VII actually caused instability in the shires by lack of judgement over how to delegate and to whom. E.g. in the North the Earl of Northumberland was killed in a tax revolt in 1489. The Council of the North aim to subordinate the nobility, but the ensuing feud between Archbishop Savage and the earl of Northumberland’s son reduces to region to chaos;
  4. problem with issue of bonds and recognisances is that no one has ever separated out political obligations from genuine debts to the Crown.
• England was not potentially unstable in 1485:
  1. Henry VII was the victor at Bosworth. He replaced an unpopular king who was already dead;
  2. no real rival;
  3. no great threat from the nobles, no super-nobles left alive;
  4. no cadet branch of the royal family;
  5. Richard III has no direct heir; he had already removed the princes in the Tower [Edward V and Richard of York];
  6. Henry VII married Elizabeth of York himself [eldest surviving daughter of Edward IV]
  7. the leading Yorkist claimant [Edward, Earl of Warwick] imprisoned in the Tower.
• Yet Henry VII was troubled by plots and rebellions for longer than he should have been:
  1. Lambert Simnel is supported in the North by Richard III’s old affinity;
  2. 1495: support for Perkin Warbeck reached into Henry VII’s household (Sir William Stanley, brother of Henry’s own stepfather, betrayed him);
  3. 1497: fulcrum of the reign. Cornish rebels reach Blackheath; turmoil in the North/war on the Border; Perkin Warbeck lands and lays seige to Exeter. Where are the nobles/local authorities? Henry VII has to rely on his councillors and household men.
• I wrote in Tudor England that ‘Henry VII governed England through his household and Council’. John Watts and Christine Carpenter do not deny that this is correct: what they say is that, if it is so, it was a radical divergence from the norms of 15th century monarchy, and a dangerous narrowing of political power = ‘new monarchy’/new administrative monarchy, i.e. Crown managerialism in place of noble consensus.
• Henry VII’s financial success is vastly overrated:
  1. Crown income is £113,000 per annum at the end of the reign;
  2. But it was £120,000 per annum under Richard III;
  3. And £160,000 per annum under Edward III.

3. Is Henry VII’s success all smoke and mirrors?

• Henry VII’s England is a bureaucrat’s paradise. The bureaucrats were out of control: all on the make.
• Henry VII’s ‘new men’ were ripping off landowners, and fixing their own deals in order to build landed fortunes for themselves;
• Henry was too mean to pay his servants properly: a culture of acquisitiveness permeated the administration (cf 1590s). E.g. Bray (former servant of Margaret Beaufort). Classic instance (apart from Empson and Dudley) is Sir Henry Wyatt, who buys land at knock-down prices from people who can’t pay their debts to the Crown;
• Does Henry VII know they are doing this, and pretends not to know, in order to be able to clobber them if they put a foot wrong, or is he just incompetent?
• Henry neglects the militia and the navy;
• He relies on his household men and mercenaries for military recruitment;
• The number of ships owned by the Crown falls from 15 to 5 during his reign;
• He relies on diplomacy backed (after death of Arthur and Elizabeth of York) by massive subsidies to Continental rulers;
• He is lucky that France is concentrating on Italy and Naples in this period;
• His trade treaties are vastly overrated: those with the Netherlands had to be unpicked and sorted out by Thomas More in 1515 on the grounds that they sacrificed trade to Henry’s concern to ensure that pretenders or rebels would not be harboured abroad.

4. Henry VII passes on his throne to his son, but not automatically

His innermost courtiers wished primarily to ensure their own survival. Henry died at 11 p.m. on 21 April 1509, but his death was kept secret until the afternoon of the 23rd, when it was revealed to the main body of councillors and Henry VIII’s accession was proclaimed. This delay gave those at the seat of power time to consolidate their position. A general pardon was issued that included treasons and felonies committed in Henry VII’s reign, and Empson and Dudley, the two most hated Councillors, were arrested. They were imprisoned in the Tower for a year, and then executed on fabricated charges. This was a ploy to win popularity, and distract attention from events at Court.

• Empson and Dudley were unpopular with their colleagues in the Council: they were the ‘new boys’ in the class, and not linked into the network of feoffees, marriage and mutual support that characterized the inner circle;
• Dudley especially hated as the ambitious Young Turk of the Council of Henry VII. He had been the first and only non-clerical president of the King’s Council;
• The courtiers of Henry VII made sure that Henry VIII (although 18 years old bar a few weeks) was not allowed fully to be King or to enjoy full sovereignty. Archbishop Warham, Thomas Howard, Earl of Surrey, and Richard Fox, held the three senior offices in the kingdom and exercised control over policy as well as patronage, and generally ran the country until Wolsey liberated Henry VIII from these constraints. NB Henry VIII was not even allowed to sign his name to royal gifts or letters patent without the counter-signature of his ‘minders’ – i.e. bureaucrats out of control?

5. Conclusion:

• ‘It may be that what we see is less a forward-looking monarch than one who had an imperfect understanding of his job’ (Carpenter).
• Was Henry’s politics one of necessity or one of incompetence? Or to put it at its lowest common denominator: Were the nobles ungovernable by 1485 without extreme royal sanctions? Had the Wars of the Roses changed the rules of the game?
• Or was England subsumed by a Continental preoccupation with new administrative monarchy? Were the norms of Renaissance monarchy encapsulated within Henry VII’s agenda?
• The questions cannot yet be answered, only debated. What is certain is that the old platitudes are gone for ever: no longer is the reign of Henry VII the easiest topic on the ‘A’-level examination syllabus.

An Overview of Henry VII and Nobility

Henry VII had to develop a positive relationship with England’s nobles if he was to survive after the Battle of Bosworth. There were nobles who supported Henry because of their Lancastrian background. There were also nobles who supported Henry VII as they saw him as a means to social and political advancement. There were also those nobles who were opposed to Henry as the Lambert and Warbeck rebellions showed. Stated as the most basic level, there were far more nobles than the king and bringing them all onto his side was a task that was to take Henry VII many years.

While the War of the Roses had killed off some of the nobility it would be a mistake to believe that England was left denuded of nobility by 1485. Research indicates that in every 25-year period during the Middle Ages, 25% of the nobility died and left no male heir. They were succeeded by newly created noble families. What Henry did to control the size and power of the nobility was limit the number of new lords – by doing this he kept the numbers to a level he felt he could better handle. Such an approach also had other affects. To be appointed to the senior social echelons in the reign of Henry VII was seen as a great honour as it was a rarity. Therefore, those people who were rewarded in this manner were suitably loyal to the man who was responsible for this social elevation. These men were also the wealthiest of the nobility and men who could probably fund larger armies. Therefore, by bringing them over to his side, Henry VII was reducing any threat to himself. In the whole of his reign, Henry only created one Earl (compared to Edward IV’s nine) and five barons (compared to the thirteen of Edward IV). The titles had very real status in Henry’s reign as so few possessed them. The number of peers dropped from 57 to 44 as more noble families died out than titles were created and granted.

Loyal nobles were also awarded the Order of the Garter, an ancient and prestigious honour. This bestowed much status on the recipient but it cost Henry VII nothing – whereas the creation of new titles invariably cost the king money as estates were usually granted from royal land. In Henry’s reign, 37 nobles received the Order of the Garter.

Ironically one of the advantages Henry had when dealing with the nobility was that he did not have to worry about family, as he had no brothers. Edward IV had two powerful brothers to contend with but Henry had none. This meant that he could focus his full attention on the nobility as opposed to being concerned about family loyalty.

Henry also bolstered his strength at the expense of the nobility by keeping land that had belonged to former peerage families. Valuable land that had belonged to the Yorkist families of Warwick, Gloucester and Clarence remained in the hands of Henry. This served two purposes. First, it increased the wealth of the king. Second, the nobles lived in hope that they might be rewarded with some of these estates if they worked well for Henry. Why this may have been a false hope, it did ensure that many nobles did what they could for the king to show loyalty. As part of this, they only married to whom Henry approved, as they needed the king’s permission to marry. This meant that the nobility could not form powerful and potentially dangerous family blocks that could serve as a platform to oppose Henry.

Clearly with the memory of the War of the Roses still fresh in many minds, there were some magnate families that were not trusted. The Percy Earls of Northumberland and the Stafford Dukes of Buckingham were among these. Rather than openly antagonise these families, Henry simply kept them under surveillance using his very effective spy network. As Henry felt more powerful and less threatened he asserted his authority even more. The murdered Earl of Northumberland left his estate to his ten-year old son in 1489. He was not allowed to receive his land until 1499 at the age of twenty – only when Henry was convinced of his loyalty.

By either bringing into his court the nobility Henry believed he could trust or diluting the power of those he distrusted, Henry had far more control over the nobility than previous monarchs. That he was quick to use an act of attainder was also common knowledge to the nobility who stood to lose everything if they were attainted. It would be easy to assume that Henry had a ‘them and us’ approach to the nobility, especially after the War of the Roses. However, this does not seem to be the case. Henry clearly believed that it was beneficial for all to have the nobility working with the king as opposed to anything else. Two of his closest advisors were the Earls of Oxford and Shrewsbury. Henry saw the nobles as his main weapon in enforcing his authority in the regions and extended local regional control to powerful and loyal magnates in areas considered to be potentially disloyal. Loyalty was well rewarded and though Henry VII faced rebellions, when they are stripped down they barely threatened his position. Even the threat from Europe seems to have been overplayed.

Henry also used money as a way of maintaining loyalty. The nobles had to pay a certain sum of money if they failed to complete written promises, based around what functions they would perform in the areas they controlled. The lesser nobles paid a sum of £400 while the senior nobles paid £10,000. If they did not keep to their part of the deal, they lost the money. If they kept to their promise, clearly this benefited Henry. This process even percolated down to men who had been given positions of responsibility. The Captain of Calais had to promise £40,000 to fulfil his duties. Such a practice had been done before but Henry refined it so that he could as much as was possible guarantee loyalty. If a noble failed in his duties, he could have his fine delayed if he accepted conditions that left him at the mercy of the king.

How did Henry's policy towards the nobility help secure the dynasty?

These policies towards the Nobles helped secure the dynasty by:

• Creating a safer domestic situation
• Helping to restore the primacy of the Monarchy
• Helping support Henry's financial policy
• Encouraging loyalty (through fear and respect not just financial reward)
• Using the nobles effectively to help him govern and reduce opposition whilst not giving the nobility too much power

How did Henry VII control the Nobility?

The nobility was a very delicate issue for Henry. He needed to decrease their power without alienating them and reducing their role completely. Henry sought to control the nobility in two key ways:  by offering inducements (rewards in return for action) and by issuing threats.

This was known as the carrot and stick policy.

The carrots

Patronage:

If Henry was to remain secure, he had to be able to win over nobles to his cause. PATRONAGE (the giving of positions of power; titles and land etc.) was one way, traditionally used by medieval kings, of buying loyalty,Henry VIII however, turned this relationship around by making it clear that patronage came as a result of (and not in the hope of ) good and loyal service. Furthermore, these rewards applied to the nobility and gentry alike. First to be rewarded were those who had given Henry loyal support at and before the Battle of Bosworth.

Bosworth:

• The Earl of Oxford (John de Vere) became the major landowner in East Anglia.
• Jasper Tudor was made Duke of Bedford and was restored to his Welsh estates and rewarded extra land.
• Thomas, Lord Stanley, Earl of Derby, retained control of Lancashire and Chesire. 

Others were rewarded on the basis of good service:

• Sir Reginald Bray, was helped to accumulate land throughout eighteen counties, worth well over £1,000 per annum by the time he died.
• Edmund Dudley, was a lawyer who became one of Henry's right hand men and in his own words used his title of King's Councillor as proudly as any peerage. Clearly this was a society in which was truly valued because such reward was not bestowed lightly.

Patronage thus encouraged and ensure loyalty. However, Henry was not as generous as his predecessors in the use of patronage. He did not want to make himself weaker at the expensive of his own wealth and security.

Order of the Garter:

This was a significant honour reserved for the King's closest servants. Henry created 37 knights of the Garter. More than half of these were his closest associates in war and government. Examples are the Earl of Oxford and Reginald Bray. The Garter was the ultimate mark of honour favoured by Henry VII. It was effective for Henry because it gave prestige but not power of land.

King's council:

A position as King's Councillor was a sign of the King's confidence. The emphasis was on loyalty to trusted servants. Two Chancellors retained their positions for long periods: John Morton (1486-1500) and William Warham (1504-09). Henry's five key Councillors had all aligned themselves with Henry before Bosworth. They were Reginald Bray, Giles Daubeney and Richard Guildford (all of whom had been involved in the Buckingham conspiracy), and Thomas Lovell and John Riselly (who had joined Henry when he was in exile).

 

Great council:

These were meetings of noblemen, called together by the King to discuss high matters of state, usually in moments of emergency when the calling of parliament would have taken too long. They were also a useful form of control for the King as they were a way of gaining the agreement and support of his most important subjects for a potentially controversial policy. If the nobles had been included in, and had agreed to,a major decision they could hardly then turn around and criticise. Henry for the policy. There were five meetings of the Great council.

1485: for the calling of Parliament and the announcement of Henry's marriage

1487: In response to Lambert Simnel's threat

1488: To authorise a subsidy for the campaign in Brittany

1491: to authorise war against France

1496: to grant a loan of £120,000 for war in Scotland

Acts of attainder:

These were acts that led to a family losing the right to possess its land as well as right to inherit its land. The loss of such land spelt economic and social ruin for any family. Importantly, attainders were reversible and were thus used by Henry VII as a sanction for good behavior. In this way, attainders could be both stick and carrot- an Act was passed first as a punishment, but good behaviour could then lead to a reversal of the attainder. The classic example is Thomas Howard, the Earl of Surrey. He and his father (John Howard, Duke of Norfolk) had fought for Richard III as Bosworth. However, rather than execute Surrey (his father was killed in action), Henry attained his lands and imprisoned him. By taking an oath of allegiance to the King in 1489 the process of reversing the attainder was started and his title as they Earl of Surrey was restored. That same year he quelled a rising in Yorkshire for Henry and was rewarded by the return of the Howard estates. Nevertheless, in spite of Howard's return to favour, Henry VII never reinstated him as Duke of Norfolk. 

Thomas Grey, Marquis of Dorset, had never been trusted by Henry since his apparent support for Richard in 1485. Thurs, in 1492 he was required to transfer all of his land to trustees, give a recognisance for £1,000 and find others who would give recognisances worth £10,000 on his behalf. By 1499 Dorset had proved his loyalty to Henry (by, for example, helping to put down the Cornish rebellion) and these agreements were cancelled. The bonds and recognisances had served their purpose.

Number of Attainders passed and reversed

Edward IV: 

140 passed and 42 reversed

Henry VII:

138 passed and 46 reversed

 

The sticks

Feudal Dues:

Henry was keen to emphasise his own power as King by asserting his feudal right s over the nobility. Feudal Dues were effectively collected to aid Henry financially and also help re-establish the monarch as a feudal lord)

Wardships: Where the King took control of the estates of minors (those who were too young to be held responsible for their inheritance) until they became of age.  In the meantime, the King would take most of the profits from their estates.

Marriage: Where the King could profit from the arranged marriages of heirs and heiresses.He also controlled marriages meaning he would not have to content with power blocs forming.

Livery: Where the King was paid in order for someone to recover land from wardship.

Relief: Where the King received money money as land was inherited- a form of inheritance tax.

e.g; Katherine, Dowager Duchess of Buckingham, was fined around £7,000 in 1496 for marrying without the King's license. Her son, Edward, Duke of Buckingham, was fined about £7,000 for entering his inheritance in 1498 without license before he was 21. The extent of Henry's increased control can be seen in the increase in proceeds from wardship and marriage: from £350 in 1487 to £6,000 in 1507.

Retaining: 

Retaining was the long-held noble practice of recruiting gentry followers. Lords would recruit those of low social status to fight for them if necessary. Retaining served the King's purpose as it could help him gather a sizable army, if needed, at short notice. However, there was a chance that nobleman (or group) could become more powerful than the King as a result of retaining. They had played an important role in the Wars of the Roses and were thus viewed by Henry as a threat to his own power as King. Henry was not prepared to tolerate this and passed laws in 1487 and 1504 restricting retaining. While Henry took clear steps to limit retaining, however, it is evident that he never intended to do away with retaining altogether.

Henry tried to attack retaining on two main occasions: 1585 and 1504. The Lords and Commons had to swear in the 1485 Parliament that they would not retain illegally. Then in 1504 proclamations ensured that nobles had to obtain licenses to retain. They had to be obtained from the King in person and are another indication of how Henry's policies relied on his personal input. This system was again supported by the threat of financial ruin- the 1504 Act had a penalty of £5 per month per illegal retainer. This was applied in 1506 to Lord Burgavenny with a fine of £70,550. So, while Henry did not stamp out illegal retaining, it seems clear that nobility was at least much more cautious about the practice.

Bonds and Recognisances:

Henry was keen to use other traditional sticks as a means of guaranteeing good behavior.  Henry VII's bonds were written agreements in which people promised to pay a sum of money if they failed to carry out their promises. Recognisances were a formal acknowledgement of a debt or an obligation that already existed, with the understanding to pay money if this obligation was not met. Between 1485 and 1509, 36 out of 62 noble families gave bonds and/or recognisances to Henry. This compares to only one peer during Yorkist rule. Bonds disabled Henry VII's nobility: 62 peerage families were alive during Henry's reign- 46 were at the King's mercy, 7 were under attainder, 36 were bound by obligations and recognisances, 5 were heavily fined, 3 under constraint which meant that only 16 families were left alone. Like Henry's use of attainders this system became more severe as his reign went on.

 Crown Lands:

 Perhaps a more subtle stick was Henry's policy to bring back as much land as possible into the hands of the Crown. Land was power: the more land Henry possessed, the more power he was seen to wield. Estimates suggest this amount of Crown lands was 5 times larger by the later years of Henry VII's reign than in Henry VI's reign (1450s). In 1486 Parliament passed the Acts of resumption, which recovered for the crown all properties granted away since 1455 (before the Wars of the Roses). Where possible, Henry rewarded loyal supporters with land not from Crown estates, but from the forfeited lands of opponents.

 

How much of a threat was posed by the nobility? Henry's nobility

Throughout Henry VII's reign he chose men solely on the basis of competence and willingness to serve the Tudor regime. Loyalty and ability were the only criteria of service.

William Stanley, for example; whose intervention at Bosworth had been critical, was initially rewarded for his role, but later, when he communicated with the pretender, Perkin Warbeck, his disloyalty was severely punished, Stanley was convicted of high treason.

Until relatively recently, historians took the line that Henry VII did not have much of a nobility to deal with. Many contemporaries said that the Wars of the Roses had more or less wiped out the ancient nobility. More recently it had been asserted that during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries it was normal for the nobility to lose a number of families from it's rank. 25% every 25 years. Were the nobilities all that powerful?

Subtly, Henry worked at decreasing the number of nobility.  Henry controlled the size and power or the nobility by limiting the number of new Lords. Henry, through his whole reign, only created one new earl, whereas Edward IV created nine! And 5 Barons (Edward created 13!) 

Peers dropped from 50 to 35 as more nobles died out than titles created. But the key point is that during the reign of Henry VII the lost noble families were quickly replaced by wealthy families previously excluded from the peerage. So it seems that the nobility did retain its position of importance in society. Yet, at the same time, changes within the nobility did occur to Henry's advantage.

The reduction in number of nobles:

No. of peers at the Start of reign:

Edward IV: 42

Henry VII: 50

No. of peers at the End of reign.

Edward IV: 46

Henry VII: 35

***

No. of major peers (Dukes, earls etc) at the Start of reign:

Edward IV: 7

Henry VII: 16

No. of major peers (Dukes, earls etc) at the End of reign:

Edward IV: 12

Henry VII: 10

It is clearly displayed that nobility remained largely intact, but subtly reduced in power. Most significant, perhaps is the reduction of over-mighty magnates (nobles who combined the lands and inheritances of several major families)  Although such nobles still did exist (for example, the Stafford dukes of Buckingham and the Percy earls of Northumberland). There was no one to compare with the dukes of Clarence and Gloucester under Edward IV. In this Henry was fortunate.  

Nevertheless, it was vital for Henry to both sustain and control the nobility's authority if he was to survive

Task: Describe the threat posed by the Nobility to Henry's position.

How much of a threat was posed by the Nobility? Past Nobility

It is important to keep in mind that Henry was unable to fully rid of nobility. Fifteenth century society saw Government as a co-operative effort between King and Nobles. Because of the wealth and power of the nobles, no King could could govern effectively without them.

During the reigns of Edward IV and Richard III, the nobility had undoubtedly gained in power as the crown had grown weaker. This was due in no small part to Edward's use of the nobility as a means of controlling large areas of England. Edward's government had been described as a 'regime founded on regional authority delegated to his most trusted lieutenants. Henry's aim was to re-establish the primacy of the throne.

Take a look at the power blocs pre-1483

Lancashire and Chesire:

Thomas, Lord Stanley

Wales and the Marches:

Earl Rivers

West Midlands and the South-West:

Thomas Grey, Marquis of Dorset

North/North-east:

Richard, Duke of Gloucester

Earl of Northumberland

North Midlands:

Lord Hastings

East Midlands and East Anglia:

Duke of Norfolk

South-East:

The King and lesser household men

Henry's relations towards nobility were conditioned by two principal factors. First and foremost, Henry realised that he himself was a usurper. If he could take the throne by force, what was stopping anyone else from doing the same thing? Second, the Wars of the Roses had rumbled on and off for nearly 30 years and the vast majority of people were tired of the uncertainty that such instability caused. Henry knew that, if he was to survive, he had to play the part of a King successfully and bring stability to England.

As the nobility's feudal Lord, Henry had to be sure of securing their loyalty or at least their submission. Without this, he could never be secure. Admittedly, the nobility had been at the heart of the of the century's political upheavals, but the idea was suppressing or ruling without the support of the nobility was seen by the contemporaries as widely eccentric.

How strong was Henry VII's claim to the throne?

To understand the competing claims to the throne in the fifteenth century, we must trace back to Edward III, whose blood ran through many veins, G.R Elton would come to later argue that in fact, it ran through
 'too many'.

Although none of Edward III's became King's, the descendents of the four eventually did.

Henry Tudors claim was essentially weak, however his Mother was a descendant of Edward III's son, John of Gaunt and his mistress, therefore Margaret was illegitimate. However, John of Gaunt would eventually legitimise his bastard children, naming them 'Beaufort' after the castle they lived in.

Practice Question:

Explain why Henry Tudor was able to usurp the throne in 1485 (25 marks)

How well did Henry VII's background prepare him for Kingship?

Henry Tudors upbringing was unusual even for fifteenth century standards!

Little is known about his first few years, his mother, Margaret Beaufort was just thirteen years of age when she gave birth to him and his father, Edmund Tudor had died before his birth. He was named Henry after the Lancastrian King Henry VI.

Henry was brought up as an heir to a great noble title, the Earl of Richmond, probably by his bachelor uncle, Jasper Tudor, Earl of Pembroke.

In 1461 there was a political revolution. Henry, now aged four, was separated from his mother and put under the guardianship of William Herbert, The Yorkist Earl of Pembroke. Herbert was preparing him to eventually marry one of his own daughters.  During 1469-71 Herbert was killed in battle, Henry's uncle, Henry VI was restored to the throne and Henry was reunited with his mother and uncle Jasper.

In 1471, the political wheel turned again; the Yorkists were restored, and Jasper Fled with his nephew, hoping to make France but landing up in Brittany. By now Henry, aged fourteen, was the best hope to the Lancastrians had to re-gain the throne. He proved to be a valuable political pawn to the Duke of Brittany, who could threaten to use him to embarrass Edward IV, if Edward were ever tempted to let the Bretens down and abandon them to the aggressive designs of the French. So from age 14-27 Henry was in Brittany, part of the time a prisoner but for most of it hanging around the Duke's court, one of a crowd of courtiers.

In 1484 the Duke's minister did a deal with the new English King, Richard III. This would involve handing Henry over to the English. Henry fled across the border to France, where he successfully maneuvered among competing parties at the French court to get support in money, soldiers and ships to stage the invasion of 1485, which led to the Battle of Bosworth, the death of Richard III and Henry becoming King.

Henry, in his teens and early twenties, had perhaps the most useful training of any King in English history. Not in any bookish way, nor in terms of experience of administration or decision making; but just in being able to observe court politics as a little-regarded outsider. Most Kings have an unreal education. They have been princes, or at any rate great noblemen, never treated quite naturally by those they meet. In  Brittany, Henry was nothing much. He must have learned a lot about courts in all that time hanging about waiting for the Duke to get ready to go hunting or sitting through never ending meals; in gossip, in getting to know what people really thought behind the flattery they used to the powerful, in joining in the hollow laughter at the ducal jokes; in watching the intrigues, the gossip campaign to do down this minister, the deals to bring somebody else to power. The Breton court had a weak ruler, a lot of intrigue and occasional blood-letting The conclusion Henry appears to have drawn was that rulers should never let themselves go,should maintain their dignity at all times, that they should always retain control and never become indebted to a party or group.

Behind-the-scenes experience, followed then by his own wheeling and dealing at the French court, must have taught Henry a vast amount about how politics really worked. No wonder, that as King, he was careful, always wanting to double check every bit of information, always determined to keep up a front, to prevent the mask slipping, never behaving as 'one of the lads' in a way that Edward IV and Henry VIII often did. He was so concerned about 'pretenders', the Simnel and Warbeck pretenders were used by foreign princes to stir up trouble against him.  But whilst distrustful, Henry was no neurotic. Calm consideration was the keynote to his policy; he was not a man for instant and impetuous decisions.

Henry had an inner depth. There was a small group of people he really trusted. His uncle Jasper, who had been with him in Brittany and France, and had looked after Wales for him until his death in 1495, was something of a father figure. His mother, Margaret Beaufort, who had been in England during Henry's time abroad, was a great noblewoman in her own right. Now married to Thomas, Lord Stanley (who switched to Henry's side during the battle of Bosworth) she worked hard to try and get Henry, her only child, rehabilitated as a Nobleman during Edward IV's life. 

After Edward's death she forged the agreement with Edward IV's widow Elizabeth Woodville by which their supporters joined forces against the usurper Richard III, in return for Henry's promising to Marry Elizabeth of York. 

Unusual to most contemplates, Henry was completely faithful to his wife, while never giving her political influence, not trusting her relatives.

Two talented clerics, both of whom had worked for him in exile, were part of the inner circle:
John Morton: Who later became Archbishop of Canterbury, and
Richard Fox: later Bishop of Winchester. 
In effect, his two successive chief ministers. 

 As King, he was always on duty, determined to give no hint of that human fallibility behind the mask.