On 16 June the two armies met at Stoke. Lambert Simnel’s army however, was outnumbered. The Earl of Lincoln, now joined with the rebel force, didn’t receive the support from his fellow nobles, as he hoped for, and would have outnumbered the king’s force. So the rebels were defeated. Even though the rebel army was outnumbered by about 4,000, not all the nobles who supported the king were so sure that the king would win the battle and stayed back until they were sure that the King could win.
The rebel army was the weakest army, due to lack of a leader, and the fact that the Irish retainers were poorly equipped. However, the German mercenaries helped prolong the battle as they had battle experience. The King’s army however, was a well-organised, well-trained and well-disciplined force, which had no trouble cutting through the rebel fighters.
Although Lambert Simnel’s army was defeated, Simnel and Symonds were captured and spared. The reasons aren’t clear; one reason could be that the mercy shown towards them was used as Lancastrian propaganda. The real reason was probably the fact that it was a young boy and a priest and the fact that if Henry did execute them it won’t have helped Henry’s reputation. Lambert Simnel was employed to work in the Royal Kitchens and Richard Symonds was imprisoned for life. Lovell and Lincoln probably were killed on the battlefield, as they were never heard of again.
By 1491, another pretender to the throne appeared, going by the name of Perkin Warbeck. This second pretender also claimed to be Richard of York, the youngest son of Edward IV. Apparently born in Flanders, but soon travelled to Ireland and England to gain support.
The objective of this rebellion was again to overthrow the King and to finally place the true King of England on the throne. Again this was a Yorkist uprising against the Lancastrian King.
Warbeck first engineered the rumour when he was in Cork, and soon built up strong relationships with Henry’s main foreign enemies. Quite soon, Ireland, France and Scotland joined an alliance with Perkin Warbeck.
When Warbeck arrived in Cork he didn’t seem to receive much support towards his claim. However, as Henry couldn’t disprove Warbecks claim, the support to the uprising slowly built up. Next stop was France. Warbeck was greeted in the French Kings royal court and was accepted by the French King. Support also came from around 100 banished Yorkists living in France. France though, signed the Treaty of Etaples in 1492 with England and Warbeck had to flee to Flanders where he received support from Margaret of Burgundy. The Holy Roman Empire soon pledged his support to Perkin Warbeck’s cause as well. Once Warbeck had landed in Danes in 1497 and was defeated, he sailed to Ireland to try and take Waterford but was unsuccessful so fled to Scotland where he married the Scottish King’s cousin.
When Warbeck first appeared in Ireland he didn’t receive much support towards his cause as the Irish were fed up with the fighting and uprisings and therefore was now more support for the English King. Warbeck, however did gain some trusted Yorkist nobles and then travelled to France to take advantage of the negative relationship between France and England. But once in Flanders he also got backing from his ‘new’ aunt – Margaret of Burgundy.
Margaret provided support and money towards Warbeck’s campaign. The Holy Roman Empire was not able to provide any support but recognised Warbeck to be Richard of York. Once Warbeck got to Scotland, the Scottish King provided him with about 1,500 troops to cross the boarder.
Although Warbeck travelled to many countries that were enemies towards England, and tried to make use of the negative relationships towards England to his advantage, he didn’t received that much support and the uprising soon faded out.
Henry VII had learned from the rebellion against him lead by Lambert Simnel. Henry had gone some way towards winning back support towards him since 1487, and in turn Warbeck didn’t get that much interest when he landed in Ireland. Through out the time Henry was trying to stop Warbeck’s rebellion, Henry signed two treaties, the Treaty of Etaples with France, and then signed a truce with Scotland. He then gained a marriage between his daughter and King James of Scotland. The main reason why Henry managed to stop the rebellion was because he improved his relationship between England and Ireland. Ireland, France, Scotland and England were now loyal or friends towards to the King and Warbeck soon found that he wasn’t going to receive any new support when he landed in Ireland and then South West England.
The organisation of Warbeck’s army and rebellion was a very messy one. He travelled from country to country trying to gain support, moving on once he was successful. Once he had that support he eventually landed in Danes, but the army was not a battle hardened one, and the local militia soon defeated it, even before the royal army arrived. Warbeck then fled with the surviving army and again was defeated trying to conquer part of Ireland.
The only real battle hardened men in Warbeck’s army were the small number of retainers provided by the small number of Yorkist supporters. But once the King of Scotland had provided some men, these were the only real fighters in the rebel’s army.
In 1497, Warbeck was persuaded to give himself up. However, Henry couldn’t convict him of treason as Warbeck was born in Flanders, so Henry allowed him to live. In 1498 Warbeck escaped from Henry’s court, but Henry soon found him and put him in the Tower. Even though Henry had been very lenient towards Warbeck in the first place, he was soon found guilty of plotting to escape from the Tower, and was also found guilty of treason. In 1499, Perkin Warbeck was executed.
The Cornish Rebellion 1497 occurred because of Henry’s ways of financing the crown. Henry managed to get Parliament to pass a law saying that the King could introduce a tax that could pay for invasions against other foreign powers.
The Cornish started to refuse to pay for a battle against Scotland due to Warbecks actions, and were saying that it had nothing to do with them. The Cornish people wanted Henry to stop using the ‘emergency tax’, to fund the conflicts, that were sometimes never used.
The rebellion didn’t attract much of the gentry’s attention, except for Lord Audley, who was only backing the campaign as a last resort to improve his family’s money reserves. A Lawyer and a Blacksmith were the other two main leaders of the uprising.
If Warbeck had arrived a few months earlier, Henry could have had a true rebellion on his hands as the whole of the South West of England was marching towards London. But, Warbeck landed too late to gain the support that he really needed to fuel his own rebellion.
The rebels left Bodmin in 1497 and marched through Cornwall gaining much support, but while in Devon, no supporters join the ‘convey’ of rebels marching towards London. As the rebels left Somerset, they had around 15,000 men, which was a real threat to the English throne, as Henry now had to fight off Warbeck and the Cornish.
The rebels reached Blackheath; most of them had dispersed from the main force due to the thought of the actions that the King would take against them. However, Henry was worried about the fact that these rebels had not been challenged since they left Cornwall, so Henry formed a force of 25,000 men to face the rebel force. Unsurprisingly the main rebel force ran, and the rest of the rebels were either killed or captured. Those who were captured were either executed or heavily fined. Henry showed with this response that he would not tolerate any kind of uprising against the crown, and if it did occur there would be no mercy.
This was a basic rebellion lead by ‘commoners’ and therefore had no chance of winning a battle against the King’s army. Once the two armies met there was complete havoc for the rebel army, as the peasants fled. The King’s army on the other hand were all trained and were very disciplined and battle harden. Basically, this was a suicide battle that the rebels marched into.
Around 300 men were lost from the King’s army, and just over 1000 men were either killed or executed from the rebel army. Important families in the South and West were found to have connections with the rebel force and were fined. Just in Somerset, four sheriffs and three members of Parliament were heavily fined. Also Attainder’s were issued in result of the rebellion towards the King of England.
Through out Henry VII’s reign, he had to face three main threats to his seat on the throne. The most important and dangerous treat to the government was Lambert Simnel. It was the first uprising against the new king, and as a result he didn’t have the knowledge of exactly what to do to stop him. This pretender showed that Henry didn’t have a good hold on the countries support to him as the ‘real’ king. In result, Simnel was able to gain the support of Ireland and the Yorkist nobles. This showed when Henry felt the need to marry Elizabeth of York, which united the two houses of York and Lancaster together and which strengthened Henrys hold on England. Another reason why this was the most dangerous battle for the monarchy, was that the success of the rebellion was decided at the one battle, where either side could of won. The weakness of the monarchy was shown by the lack of any one trying to stop Simnel during the period of Simnel trying to gather support.
The Cornish Rebellion was the second dangerous event for Henry. The fact that 15,000 people were unhappy with the running of the country and the introduction of the ‘emergency tax’, and were then willing to risk everything and march to London and confront the King. And putting their view across that they didn’t think it was right for them to pay the tax. This event showed that not the entire Kingdom was impressed with Henry and that the King had more influence in the North rather than the South – the North South divide. This rebellion, like that of Lambert Simnel, showed that Henry didn’t seem to know how to react to this sort of behaviour towards the crown, as 15,000 people managed to march nearly all the way to London without being stopped or intercepted. Only at Blackheath, did Henry react. Maybe Henry wanted the rebels to reach Blackheath, and then attack, but sources have said that the fact that the rebellion got to Blackheath from Cornwall was worrying on the Kings part. It could be that the nobles didn’t respect the King enough to stop the army of peasants. One other reason why this was a dangerous event for Henry was because that the King was facing money troubles which is why he used the ‘emergency’ tax, so now he had to face Warbeck and the Cornish Rebellion with a low amount of money.
The least important and dangerous event for Henry in his 24-year reign was the pretender Perkin Warbeck. Warbeck did gain support from England’s main foreign enemies. Henry showed that he had learnt from Simnel’s uprising, and combated the situation quickly and effectively. As Warbeck gained support from the countries, Henry managed to get treaties signed with those countries which then in turn made the support to Warbeck in valid. Even in Ireland where Simnel received most of his support, Warbeck received none. The time since Simnel, Henry had worked on the support of Ireland, so the same wouldn’t happen again. When Warbeck landed in Danes, the local militia drove them out. The reason probably being that the local people were probably sick of fighting and rebellion as the last 50 years had been the conflict of the Wars of The Roses. Warbeck landed to late in Cornwall to gain support as the Cornish rebellion had happened a few months earlier and the Cornish were probably also fed up with conflict and drove him out of the South West.
King Henry VI had learned some lessons since the first uprising, and so once Perkin Warbeck appeared Henry soon managed to combat the problem with ease and Warbeck was soon captured and eventually executed. But through Henry’s reign his throne and government was at risk. The conquering of the two events (Lambert Simnel and the Cornish Rebellion) was not due to the loyalty from the main nobles or from the influence he had over England but due to him assembling a much larger force than those who were attacking.
However, Warbeck was defeated by partly the new loyalty from the Kings subjects especially because of the attitude of Ireland and the attitude of England’s population at the time
