One of the principal leaders of the conspiracy which had been formed against Richard was the Duke of Buckingham-the same that had taken so active a part in bringing Richard to the throne. What induced him to change sides so suddenly is not certainly known. It is supposed that he was dissatisfied with the rewards which Richard bestowed upon him. At any rate, he now turned against the king, and became the leader of the conspirators that were plotting against him.
When the conspirators heard of the death of the princes, they were at first at a loss to know what to do. They looked about among the branches of the York and Lancaster families for some one to make their candidate for the crown. At last they decided upon a certain Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond. This Henry, or Richmond, as he was generally called, was descended indirectly from the Lancaster line. The proposal of the conspirators, however, was, that he should marry the Princess Elizabeth, Queen Elizabeth Woodville's daughter, who has already been mentioned among those who fled with their mother to the sanctuary. Now that both the sons of Elizabeth were dead, this daughter was, of course, King Edward's next heir, and by her marriage with Richmond the claims of the houses of York and Lancaster would be, in a measure, combined.
When this plan was proposed to Queen Elizabeth, she acceded to it at once, and promised that she would give her daughter in marriage to Richmond, and acknowledge him as king, provided he would first conquer and depose King Richard, the common enemy.
The plan was accordingly all arranged. Richmond was in France at this time, having fled there some time previous, after a battle, in which his party had been defeated. They wrote to him, explaining the plan. He immediately fell in with it. He raised a small force-all that he could procure at that time-and set sail, with a few ships, from the port of St. Malo, intending to land on the coast of Devonshire, which is in the southwestern part of England.
In the mean time, the several leaders of the rebellion had gone to different parts of the kingdom, in order to raise troops, and form centres of action against Richard. Buckingham went into Wales. His plan was to march down, with all the forces that he could raise there, to the coast of Devonshire, to meet Richmond on his landing.
This Richard resolved to prevent. He raised an army, and marched to intercept Buckingham. He first, however, issued a proclamation in which he denounced the leaders of the rebellion as criminals and outlaws, and set a price upon their heads.
Buckingham did not succeed in reaching the coast in time to join Richmond. He was stopped by the River Severn, which you will see, by looking on a map of England, came directly in his way. He tried to get across the river, but the people destroyed the bridges and the boats, and he could not get over. He marched up to where the stream was small, in hopes of finding a fording place, but the waters were so swollen with the fall rains that he failed in this attempt as well as the others. The result was, that Richard came up while Buckingham was entangled among the intricacies of the ground produced by the inundations. Buckingham's soldiers, seeing that they were likely to be surrounded, abandoned him and fled. At last Buckingham fled too, and hid himself; but one of his servants came and told Richard where he was. Richard ordered him to be seized. Buckingham sent an imploring message to Richard, begging that Richard would see him, and, before condemning him, hear what he had to say; but Richard, in the place of any reply, gave orders to the soldiers to take the prisoner at once out into the public square of the town, and cut off his head. The order was immediately obeyed.
When Richmond reached the coast of Devonshire, and found that Buckingham was not there to meet him, he was afraid to land with the small force that he had under his command, and so he sailed back to France.
Thus the first attempt made to organize a forcible resistance to Richard's power totally failed.
The unhappy queen, when she heard these tidings, was once more overwhelmed with grief. Her situation in the sanctuary was becoming every day more and more painful. She had long since exhausted all her own means, and she imagined that the monks began to think that she was availing herself of their hospitality too long. Her friends without would gladly have supplied her wants, but this Richard would not permit. He set a guard around the sanctuary, and would not allow any one to come or go. He would starve her out, he said, if he could not compel her to surrender herself in any other way.
It was, however, not the queen herself, but her daughter Elizabeth, who was now the heir of whatever claims to the throne were possessed by the family, that Richard was most anxious to secure. If he could once get Elizabeth into his power, he thought, he could easily devise some plan to prevent her marriage with Henry of Richmond, and so defeat the plans of his enemies in the most effectual manner. He would have liked still better to have secured Henry himself; but Henry was in Brittany, on the other side of the Channel, beyond his reach.
He, however, formed a secret plan to get possession of Henry. He offered privately a large reward to the Duke of Brittany if he would seize Henry and deliver him into his, Richard's hands. This the duke engaged to do. But Henry gained intelligence of the plot before it was executed, and made his escape from Brittany into France. He was received kindly at Paris by the French king. The king even promised to aid him in deposing Richard, and making himself King of England instead. This alarmed Richard more than ever.
In the mean time, the summer passed away and the autumn came on. In November Richard convened Parliament, and caused very severe laws to be passed against those who had been engaged in the rebellion. Many were executed under these laws, some were banished, and others shut up in prison. Richard attempted, by these and similar measures, to break down the spirit of his enemies, and prevent the possibility of their forming any new organizations against him. Still, notwithstanding all that he could do, he felt very ill at ease so long as Henry and Elizabeth were at liberty.
At last, in the course of the winter, he conceived the idea of trying what pretended kindness could do in enticing the queen and her family out of sanctuary. So he sent a messenger to her, to make fair and friendly proposals to her in case she would give up her place of refuge and place herself under his protection. He said that he felt no animosity or ill will against her, but that, if she and her daughters would trust to him, he would receive them at court, provide for them fully in a manner suited to their rank, and treat them in all respects with the highest consideration. She herself should be recognized as the queen dowager of England, and her daughters as princesses of the royal family; and he would take proper measures to arrange marriages for the young ladies, such as should comport with the exalted station which they were entitled to hold.
The queen was at last persuaded to yield to these solicitations. She left the sanctuary, and gave herself and her daughters up to Richard's control. Many persons have censured her very strongly for doing this; but her friends and defenders allege that there was nothing else that she could do. She might have remained in the Abbey herself to starve if she had been alone, but she could not see her children perish of destitution and distress when a word from her could restore them to the world, and raise them at once to a condition of the highest prosperity and honor. So she yielded. She left the Abbey, and was established by Richard in one of his palaces, and her daughters were received at court, and treated, especially the eldest, with the utmost consideration.
But, notwithstanding this outward change in her condition, the real situation of the queen herself, after leaving the Abbey, was extremely forlorn. The apartments which Richard assigned to her were very retired and obscure. He required her, moreover, to dismiss all her own attendants, and he appointed servants and agents of his own to wait upon and guard her. The queen soon found that she was under a very strict surveillance, and not much less a prisoner, in fact, than she was before.