WILLIAM DE LA

See also:

• POLE (FAMILY)
• POLE, REGINALD (1500-1558)
• POLE, RICHARD DE LA (d. 1525)
• POLE, WILLIAM (1814—1900)

POLE

See also:

• SUFFOLK
• SUFFOLK, CHARLES BRANDON, 1ST DUKE OF (c. 1484–'545)
• SUFFOLK, EARLS AND DUKES OF
• SUFFOLK, THOMAS HOWARD, 1ST EARL OF (1561-1626)
• WILLIAM DE LA POLE SUFFOLK

SUFFOLK  , DuiE or (1396–1450), second son of Michael de la Pole, second earl of Suffolk, was born on the 16th of October 1396 . His father died at the siege of Harfleur, and his elder brother was killed at Agincourt on the 25th of October 1415 . Suffolk served in all the later French campaigns of the reign of Henry V., and in spite of his youth held high command on the marches of Normandy in 1421–22 . In 1423 he joined the earl of Salisbury in Champagne, and shared his victory at Crevant . He fought under John, duke of Bedford, at Verneuil on the 17th of August 1424, and throughout the next four years was Salisbury's chief lieutenant in the direction of the war . When Salisbury was killed before Orleans on the 3rd of November 1428, Suffolk succeeded to the command . After the siege was raised, Suffolk was defeated and taken prisoner by Jeanne d'Arc at Jargeau on the 12th of June 1429 . He was soon ransomed, and during the next two years was again in command on the Norman frontier . He returned to England in November 1431, after over fourteen Years' continuous service in the field . Suffolk had already been employed on diplomatic missions by John of Bedford, and from this time forward he had an important share in the work of administration . He attached himself naturally to Cardinal Beaufort, and even thus early seems to have been striving for a general peace . But public opinion in England was not yet ripe, and the unsuccessful conference at Arras, with the consequent defection of Burgundy, strengthened the war party .

Nevertheless the cardinal's authority remained supreme in the

council, and . Suffolk, as his chief supporter, gained increasing influence . The question of Henry VI.'s marriage brought him to the front . Humphrey of Gloucester favoured an Armagnac alliance . Suffolk brought about the match with Margaret of Anjou . Report already represented Suffolk as too friendly with French leaders like Charles of Orleans, and it was with reluctance that he undertook the responsibility of an embassy to France . However, when he. returned to England in June 1444, after negotiating the marriage and a two years' truce, he received a triumphant reception . He was made a marquess; and in the autumn sent again to France to bring Margaret home . The French contrived to find occasion for extorting a promise to surrender all the English possessions in Anjou and Maine, a concession that was to prove fatal to Suffolk and his policy . Still for the time his success was complete, and his position as the personal friend of the young king and queen seemed secure . Humphrey of Gloucester died. in February 1447, within a few days of his arrest, and six weeks later Cardinal Beaufort died also . Suffolk was left without an obvious rival, but his difficulties were great .

Rumour, though without sufficient

reason, made him responsible for Humphrey's death, while the peace and its consequent concessions rendered him unpopular . So also did the supersession of Richard of York by Edmund Beaufort, duke of Somerset, in the French command . Suffolk's promotion to a dukedom in July 1448, marked the height of his power . The difficulties of his position may have led him to give some countenance to a treacherous attack on Fougeres during the time of truce (March 1449) . The renewal of the war and the loss of all Normandy were its direct consequences . When parliament met in November 1449, the opposition showed its strength by forcing the treasurer, Adam Molyneux, to resign . Molyneux was murdered by the sailors at Portsmouth on the 9th of January 1450 . Suffolk, realizing that an attack on himself was inevitable, boldly challenged his enemies in parliament, appealing to the long and honourable record of his public services . On the 7th of February and again on the 9th of March the Commons presented articles of accusation dealing chiefly with alleged maladministration and the ill success of the French policy; there was a charge of aiming at the throne by the betrothal of his son to the little Margaret Beaufort, but no suggestion of guilt concerning the death of Gloucester . The articles were in great part baseless, if not absurd . Suffolk, in his defence on the 13th of March, denied them as false, untrue and too horrible to speak more of . Ultimately, as a sort of compromise, the king sentenced him to banishment for five years .

Suffolk left England on the 1st of May, He was intercepted in the Channel by the

ship " Nicholas of the Tower, and next morning was beheaded in a little boat alongside . The " Nicholas " was a royal ship, and Suffolk's murder was probably instigated by his political opponents . Popular opinion at the time judged Suffolk as a traitor . This view was accepted by Yorkist chroniclers and Tudor historians, who had no reason to speak well of a Pole . Later legend made him the paramour of Margaret of Anjou . Though utterly baseless, the story gained currency in the Mirrour for ifagistraces, and was adopted in Shakespeare's 2 Henry VI . (act III. sc. ii.) . Suffolk's best defence is contained in the touching letter of farewell to his son, written on the eve of his departure (Easton Letters, i . 142), and in his noble speeches before parliament (Rolls of Parliament, v . 176, 182) . Of the former Lingard said well that it is " difficult to believe. that the writer could have been either a false subject or a bad man . " The policy of peace which Suffolk pursued was just and wise; he foresaw from the first the personal risk to which its advocacy exposed him .

This alone should acquit him of any

base motive; his conduct was " throughout open and straightforward " (Stubbs) . What-ever his defects as a statesman, he was a gallant soldier, a man of culture and a loyal servant . Suffolk's wife, Alice, was widow of Thomas, earl of Salisbury, and granddaughter of Geoffrey Chaucer . By her he had an only son John, second duke of Suffolk . France) . For modern accounts see especially W . Stubbs, Constitutional History (favourable), The Political History of England (1906), vol. iv., by C . Oman (unfavourable), and G. du Fresne de Beau-court's Histoire de Charles VII . See also H . A . Napier's Historical Notices of Swincombe and Ewelme (1858) . (C .

L .