When they heard reports of the king’s retreat, Cade and his followers reassembled on Blackheath at the end of June; on the following day they entered Southwark, and commandeered the inns and hostelries of that district. Cade himself – who had become known as ‘the Captain’ and as ‘John Amend-All’ – stayed at the White Hart Inn, along the high street, that became the headquarters for the rebellion. The white hart had of course been the emblem of Richard II.
On 3 July Cade and his men crossed London Bridge, cutting the ropes of the drawbridge so that it could not be later raised against them, and proceeded to occupy the guildhall. In that place of justice several royal servants were convicted of high crimes against the country, and summarily executed at the fountain opposite Honey Lane known as the Cheapside Standard. The sheriff of Kent, one of the most hated, was dragged to Mile End where he was beheaded. Cade retired to the White Hart, in order to formulate his plans.
The Londoners, alarmed at the scale of the riot and damage along the streets of their city, now determined to prevent Cade from entering London once more across the bridge. A force of citizens confronted the rebels and a pitched battle, or series of battles, ensued. Cade, thwarted, determined to burn down the drawbridge; the Londoners, joined also by the remainder of the king’s servants who had escaped immediate justice, managed to close the entry-gate. Many perished in the flames of Cade’s fire.
A truce among the parties, now on opposite sides of the Thames, was mediated by a group of churchmen led by the archbishops of York and Canterbury; they had remained in the Tower during the riots. It was also concluded that the rebels, having submitted their demands, would receive a royal pardon under the great seal on condition that they dispersed to their homes. The majority of them did so, gratefully enough, but Cade refused or repented his previous submission. He raised the standard of revolt once more, but he commanded too few followers to be a serious threat. He fled south, where he was pursued and cornered; he was arrested in a garden at Heathfield in Sussex and died of his wounds soon afterwards. The revolt had been put down, but not as a result of any of the king’s actions.
At this juncture the duke of York returned from his unwelcome post in Ireland. It is of some interest that Jack Cade had called himself John Mortimer, thus aligning himself with the York family name; York had inherited the Mortimer lands and title twentyfive years before, when his mother, Anne Mortimer, had died while giving birth to him. Some of Cade’s followers spread the report that he was the duke’s cousin. This relationship is most unlikely, but it was suspected at the time that York had in some indirect way helped to foment the rebellion against the king’s authority. He returned to England without the king’s permission and was immediately seen as a potential threat to Henry’s rule; it was at this time that the king appointed York’s enemy, Somerset, as the Constable of England. In a series of formal public declarations, passing between the king and York, the duke averred that he had returned in order to clear his name of any unwarranted suspicions concerning the late rebellion; he announced that he had come in order to help to reform the king’s household. Henry duly invited him to join a ‘sad [wise or serious] and substantial council’.
This did not address the real problem concerning the enmity between York and Somerset after the debacle in Normandy. They blamed each other for the misconduct of the war, when in fact it was the king himself who should have incurred much of the responsibility for its failure. While Henry VI was still childless, York was the heir presumptive; but Somerset’s supremacy in the council of the king provoked York into the fear that he was about to be disinherited.
In September 1450, York came to Westminster with 5,000 men; he called for the dismissal of Somerset as well as others whom he believed to threaten him. But he moved a step too close to anarchy and civil war; his supporters led a noisy demonstration in Westminster Hall, and an attempt was made to assassinate Somerset. The Lords and Commons then intervened by promulgating a programme of reform in the king’s household; a bill to recognize York as the heir apparent was defeated. York retired to his ancestral estates, discomfited, and Somerset was still pre-eminent.
