History 101: Warwick the Kingmaker versus Tony Soprano--gangster-off or pie eating contest?



Thou talkest about vengeance?

I'll make him an offer he can't refuse.

Warwick didn't even make an offer. He just killed people. And you know what he did when you pissed him off? HE MADE YOU NOT KING ANYMORE. Could you imagine someone with that kind of power these days? Imagine Vito Corleone trying that crap. Warwick would just push the guy out of a castle window then continue eating his pork chops. Seriously.

 

Richard Neville was like the Donald Trump of the 1400s. As a young man he married the Paris Hilton of the era, the Lady Anne Beauchamp. Her father, Richard de Beauchamp, the Earl of Warwick (Richard was a popular name....like Joshua was in the late 90s) was a big shot in the monarchy at the time and her mother was a landed heiress. The Beauchamps were ridiculously wealthy and it was sheer luck that Richard Neville got in with the family when he did.

Now. This gets even better.  Anne Beauchamps' brother died, followed shortly after by Anne herself So the only son was Richard Beauchamps' son-in-law Richard Neville making him the Earl of Warwick. Warwick inherited a chunk of land from his family and his wife's family that is roughly the combined size of Greenville and Spartanburg counties, SC. That's like 1/4 of England. It made him a powerful person in the England at this time, where land=money.

Henry VI had a tendency to wander about in his underpants quoting the Bible to livestock



Now. Here's where the problems with people not knowing who they are dealing with come into play.  A rival contender for the Warwick lands was Edmund Beaufort, 1st Duke of Somerset who was also the King's cousin. He had married Richard de Beauchamp's daughter from a previous marriage and felt he deserved the lands more the Richard Neville did. In actuality they had about the same claim. Silly arguments are not constrained to name calling on Fox News. The problem is that Somerset was a favorite of the Queen and while King Henry VI was incapacitated (he was a crazy as hell--spent hours drooling on himself staring out the window before gallivanting around the castle in his pajamas and refusing to wear his crown) she ruled the roost. So naturally Neville's complaint was ignored.

Well. You don't ignore Neville. What do you do when someone pisses you off?

Raise an army. Duh.

Thou art a fat skank!

Warwick decided to change sides and join forces with another Richard (this time Richard of York) who was thoroughly annoyed with the way Henry VI was running things (or wasn't...because he was more interested in making sure church door hinges worked appropriately). That's also a very long story, but lets just say the whole basis of the War of the Roses amounts to someone saying someone else's claim to the throne was crap and they were a bad king so they should stop. The 1st Battle of St. Albans, Warwick's participation was crucial in winning--marks the first fight in a series of the War of the Roses a rivalry between two different groups of people (the York Family and the Lancaster family) in England from 1455-1485, which was more or less the medieval equivalent of a girlie fist-fight with some hair-pulling thrown in for good measure. 

Well anyway. The War of the Roses goes along at its interesting, twisty-turny pace and eventually York wins. Edward IV (York) is crowned in 1461 and Henry VI (Lancaster) is imprisoned in the Tower of London. His crazy ass wife Queen Margaret runs to France with her son the Prince of Wales. And here is where something very interesting happens.

 

Which babe would you pick if you were a dumb 22 year old king?

Things start to get...well....problematic for the Earl of Warwick, who was the poster child for control freaks everywhere. Edward IV kept refusing to marry his daughters to Earl of Warwick's brothers, which was a smack in the medieval face! On top of that the Earl of Warwick made a big fat deal with the Louis XI of France for Edward IV to marry Louis' sister-in-law, Bona of Savoy. Unfortunately....well. Edward IV was very romantic and a lady's man and well...he was King! So instead of running it by Warwick, Edward IV married a commoner named Elizabeth Woodville, who not only was older that Edward by 8 years but was also a widow with 3 grown sons who had a nasty habit of demanding the offices and titles that Warwick had worked so hard to fill with his own relatives.


NO THRONE FOR YOU!



AWKWARD!!!! Well Warwick is pissed. He has done some serious sucking up to get this deal with the King of France and now Edward has made him look like a complete dumbass. So he gets pissed. And what does he do? HE RIPPED EDWARD IV OFF THE THRONE. Warwick actually has two Kings in prison at once! He put Edward IV in prison then went and got Henry VI. Serious multi-tasking.

Unfortunately it didn't last long and Warwick had to let him out.

This guy is completely out of his mind with pissed off.  Warwick goes off and picks up Edward IV's brother Thomas and concocts a plan to put Thomas on the throne after marrying his daughter Isabel to Thomas. 

Edward doesn't care for that much and beats the crap out of Warwick's men---Warwick and Thomas promptly flee to France.

What do you mean I'm not King anymore!!! And where are my pants!?

And what does he do in France? He befriends Queen Margaret (who he has absolutely hated for 15 years---Warwick's father, uncle, brother and cousin had even been killed by Margaret's army at the Battle of Wakefield) and marries his daughter to her son (who grew up spending free time killing puppies with bows and arrows....that's not a joke) in hopes that his daughter'd be Queen of England once they get back to England.

The dude actually had two schemes going at the same time in the same boat with two potential Kings of England from two different sides of a civil war. SERIOUSLY. Badass crazy man with balls of steel!

Anyway.

Warwick and Margaret march on London, burst through the gates, get Henry VI out of prison (who thought he was a bird at the time and tried to fly away...I wish I was kidding) and slapped him back on the throne. Wham bam thank you ma'am.

AND IT ALMOST WORKED!!!
 

ye olde ouchie



The only thing that really stopped it was how completely Queen Margaret's complete stupidity. She completely underestimated how much she pissed off the English people---she hired Scottish mercenaries to fight for her (because she couldn't raise an army to save her soul) not knowing how much the English feared and hated the Scots. And since she was broke? She said "Oh, rape and pillage all the way to the battle site and we'll call it even...."

Well needless to say that pissed off the English people and swelled Edward IV's ranks considerably.

They met in pitched battle at the Battle of Barnet in 1471, where Warwick was killed by friendly fire by his own confused forces. He was whacked off his horse by a big arrow and got stepped on.

What a bummer way to go.

Still a awesome bad-guy though.