{"id":11690,"date":"2023-08-15T07:30:00","date_gmt":"2023-08-15T06:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/?p=11690"},"modified":"2024-09-25T15:43:35","modified_gmt":"2024-09-25T14:43:35","slug":"richard-iii-pardon-to-john-morton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/2023\/08\/15\/richard-iii-pardon-to-john-morton\/","title":{"rendered":"A last roll of the dice? Richard III\u2019s pardon to John Morton, 16 August 1485"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

On 16 August 1485, King Richard III issued a pardon to an old adversary, John Morton, bishop of Ely. Dr Hannes Kleineke<\/a>, editor of our\u00a0Commons 1461-1504 project<\/a>,\u00a0explores the issue that Morton posed to Richard and why he felt the need to offer Morton such an elaborate pardon. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 9 August 1485 Henry Tudor, titular earl of Richmond, landed on the Welsh coast near Milford Haven with a small flotilla equipped with the aid of the French king, Charles VIII. In the days that followed, Henry\u2019s small force gradually made its way inland, and on 15 August reached the English border near Shrewsbury. The invasion was not unexpected. Earlier in the summer King Richard III had established his headquarters at Nottingham, and at the end of July he had instructed the Chancellor, John Russell, bishop of Lincoln, who remained at Westminster, to send him the great seal of England, one of the principal tools of government which alone gave a written instrument the full authority of the Crown. Richard received the seal on 1 August, and entrusted it to the keeping of the master of the rolls, Thomas Barowe, a senior administrator whom he kept by his side throughout the dramatic days of that summer.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"An<\/a>
King Richard III, late 16th c. (c) NPG<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Confirmed news of Henry Tudor\u2019s landing reached the King at Nottingham within two days of the event, on 11 August. Richard at once sprang into action and in the following days sent urgent messages summoning his supporters. Little of what else occupied the King in the final ten days of his reign is known: the final letter under the great seal was recorded on the patent roll on 9 August and concerned the confirmation to the priory of Lenton of a grant of Edward IV<\/a>. And then, on 16 August, with Henry Tudor\u2019s army already on English soil, Richard issued an elaborate pardon to an old adversary, John Morton, bishop of Ely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Morton was a die-hard Lancastrian loyalist, who served as chancellor to the young prince of Wales, Edward of Lancaster in the second half of the 1450s, and subsequently followed first Henry VI and later his queen, Margaret of Anjou, into their respective exiles. Following the extermination of the male line of the house of Lancaster after the battle of Tewkesbury<\/a>, Morton accepted a pardon from Edward IV, who recognised his administrative skills, and in 1472 appointed him master of the rolls. Frequently employed on diplomatic missions, Morton was among the envoys who in 1475 negotiated the profitable treaty of Picquigny with the French, and he received his reward four years later, when he was elevated to the bishopric of Ely.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Stained<\/a>
Cardinal John Morton. Available here<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

By the end of Edward IV\u2019s reign, he was perceived to be among the most influential of the King\u2019s councillors, and as a consequence on 13 June 1483 he was arrested during a dramatic council meeting (immortalised by Shakespeare) alongside William, Lord Hastings, and Archbishop Thomas Rotherham of York. Hastings was summarily executed without delay, but the two prelates were placed in the Tower. Handed over into the custody of Henry Stafford, duke of Buckingham, Morton regained his freedom and played his part in the duke\u2019s rebellion in the autumn of 1483, and on the failure of that rising made good his escape into exile in Flanders. As might be expected, Morton was attainted in Richard III\u2019s delayed Parliament in early 1484<\/a>, but remained at liberty on the continent. Unable to lay hands on his eloquent and well-connected opponent, Richard III tried in vain to bring him to submission with the offer of a general pardon in December 1484. This, Morton rejected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the spring of 1485, Morton was at the papal curia in Rome, and he may still have been there when the events that would lead up to Richard\u2019s death at Bosworth<\/a> began to unfold. It may, however, be a measure of how far from a foregone conclusion Henry Tudor\u2019s victory was, that Morton was apparently in contact with the nuclear court at Nottingham. While it is possible that the pardon of 16 August represented a final attempt by the King to drive a wedge between the earl of Richmond and his supporters, it is also possible that it had been prepared for some time. As C.S.L. Davies has pointed out, on 2 August, in one of the first acts after taking direct control of the great seal, Richard had issued pardons to a group of known associates of Morton\u2019s, at least one of whom had acted as a go-between at the time of the earlier, abortive, offer of a pardon the previous December. Then, Morton had rejected the King\u2019s offer. In July 1485, he may have accepted it. Certainly, he seems to have taken delivery of the letters of pardon, and would a few years later plead them in court.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strikingly, the pardon offered to Morton in July 1485 went further than other general pardons. While, like them, it covered a broad range of offences, it placed particular emphasis on Morton\u2019s legal rehabilitation and restoration following his attainder in the Parliament of January 1484. This restitution technically required a fresh act of Parliament, but in the absence of such an act, the King\u2019s pardon simply set aside the provisions of the attainder. This, in turn, may hint at a degree of desperation on King Richard\u2019s part: Morton was a problem that needed to be solved. It could not wait for a future Parliament.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

H.W.K.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Further reading:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

C.S.L. Davies, \u2018Bishop John Morton, the Holy See, and the Accession of Henry VII\u2019, English Historical Review<\/em>, cii (1987), 2-30.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Richard\u2019s pardon to Morton is printed in Pardon Rolls of Richard III, 1484-85<\/em> ed. by Hannes Kleineke (List and Index Society 365, 2023<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On 16 August 1485, King Richard III issued a pardon to an old adversary, John Morton, bishop of Ely. Dr Hannes Kleineke, editor of our\u00a0Commons 1461-1504 project,\u00a0explores the issue that Morton posed to Richard and why he felt the need to offer Morton such an elaborate pardon. On 9 August 1485 Henry Tudor, titular earl of Richmond, landed on the Welsh coast near Milford Haven … Continue reading A last roll of the dice? Richard III\u2019s pardon to John Morton, 16 August 1485<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":255138826,"featured_media":11723,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_crdt_document":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[687860035,189179080,774275695,11942052,362124,81480,48731,774275696],"tags":[63168675,35890,65986,4857647,7292347,241063396,533273,29298495],"class_list":["post-11690","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-commons-in-the-wars-of-the-roses","category-15th-century-history","category-henry-vii","category-history-of-parliament-trust","category-legal-history","category-medieval-history","category-religious-history","category-richard-iii","tag-bishop-of-ely","tag-featured","tag-house-of-commons","tag-john-morton","tag-lancastrians","tag-medieval-parliament","tag-pardons","tag-yorkist"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/cardinal_john_morton.jpg?fit=381%2C500&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2QYNW-32y","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4650,"url":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/2020\/05\/14\/what-might-have-been-the-sweating-sickness-and-the-representation-of-the-county-of-cornwall-in-henry-viis-first-parliament-of-1485-6\/","url_meta":{"origin":11690,"position":0},"title":"What might have been: The Sweating Sickness and the Representation of the County of Cornwall in Henry VII\u2019s first Parliament of 1485-6","author":"Hannes Kleineke","date":"May 14, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"In today's blog, Dr Hannes Kleineke, editor of our Commons 1461-1504 project, looks back to 1485, when a sudden epidemic impacted on the membership of Henry VII's first parliament... By the time Henry VII overcame Richard III at the battle of Bosworth and claimed the English throne, changes of dynasty\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Medieval"","block_context":{"text":"Medieval","link":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/category\/periods\/medieval-history\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/henry-vii-nt-via-artuk.jpg?fit=805%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/henry-vii-nt-via-artuk.jpg?fit=805%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/henry-vii-nt-via-artuk.jpg?fit=805%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/henry-vii-nt-via-artuk.jpg?fit=805%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":320,"url":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/2013\/05\/29\/henry-viis-first-parliament\/","url_meta":{"origin":11690,"position":1},"title":"Henry VII’s first parliament","author":"Hannes Kleineke","date":"May 29, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"As part of the 'Tudor Court' season, tomorrow night BBC2 will show 'Henry VII: The Winter King'. Dr Hannes Kleineke discusses Henry VII's first parliament in 1485... Henry VII\u2019s first Parliament assembled at Westminster on 7 November 1485, not much over two months after the decisive battle of Bosworth. Its\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Medieval"","block_context":{"text":"Medieval","link":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/category\/periods\/medieval-history\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":753,"url":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/2014\/08\/22\/battle-of-bosworth\/","url_meta":{"origin":11690,"position":2},"title":"The battle of Bosworth: consequences for winners and losers","author":"History of Parliament","date":"August 22, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"The battle of Bosworth took place on this day in 1485. Dr Charles Moreton, senior research fellow of the Commons 1422-1504 project, discusses the contrasting consequences for parliamentarians on both sides of the battle\u2026 At the battle of Bosworth the last Plantagenet King, Richard III, met his death. For some\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Commons in the Wars of the Roses"","block_context":{"text":"The Commons in the Wars of the Roses","link":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/category\/sections\/the-commons-in-the-wars-of-the-roses\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":907,"url":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/2015\/03\/26\/richard-iii-and-the-parliament-of-1484\/","url_meta":{"origin":11690,"position":3},"title":"Richard III and the Parliament of 1484","author":"Hannes Kleineke","date":"March 26, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"As Richard III is today reburied in Leicester Cathedral, Dr Hannes Kleineke, Senior Research Fellow on the Commons 1422-1504 section, discusses the importance of Richard's only Parliament... As the bones of King Richard III are laid to rest at Leicester this week, there has been much renewed debate over the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Commons in the Wars of the Roses"","block_context":{"text":"The Commons in the Wars of the Roses","link":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/category\/sections\/the-commons-in-the-wars-of-the-roses\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":13956,"url":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/2024\/09\/17\/battle-of-bosworth-election\/","url_meta":{"origin":11690,"position":4},"title":"A disputed election in the wake of the battle of Bosworth: the Shropshire election of 1485","author":"Simon Payling","date":"September 17, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Following the battle of Bosworth and Henry Tudor's accession to the English throne, the country's gentry who had sided with Henry seemed destined to be elected to Parliament uncontested. However, as Dr Simon Payling of our Commons 1461-1504 project explores, this was not always the case... Election disputes were rare\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Commons in the Wars of the Roses"","block_context":{"text":"The Commons in the Wars of the Roses","link":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/category\/sections\/the-commons-in-the-wars-of-the-roses\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/sir-gilbert-talbot.jpg?fit=452%2C354&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3069,"url":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/2019\/04\/11\/marriages-and-murders-of-the-harcourt-brothers\/","url_meta":{"origin":11690,"position":5},"title":"Medieval MP of the Month: \u2018Please Sir, can I have one more?\u2019 The marriages and murders of the Harcourt brothers of Oxfordshire \ufeff","author":"Hannes Kleineke","date":"April 11, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Further tales of murder and scandal from Dr Hannes Kleineke for April's medieval MP, or rather MPs of the Month. Today we hear of the murderous Harcourt brothers ... THE HISTORY OF PARLIAMENT: THE HOUSE OF COMMONS 1422-1461, edited by Linda Clark, is out now. For further details\u00a0about the volumes,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Medieval"","block_context":{"text":"Medieval","link":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/category\/periods\/medieval-history\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/255138826"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11690"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11690\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14316,"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11690\/revisions\/14316"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11723"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/historyofparliament.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}