On their way up Channel to Calais they made a dash on a ship of Warwick's lying at Southampton, but were beaten off with loss by Scales, now Earl Rivers (ib.) Presently Warwick appeared before Calais, and demanded admission from his lieutenant, Wenlock, with whom were a number of his personal followers. The Duchess of Clarence was delivered of a daughter as they lay at anchor. But Wenlock, who was not prepared to run risks for Warwick, privately advised him to take refuge in France for the present, the captain and merchants of the town being all for Edward and the Burgundian connection, and fired on him from the castle (Commines, i. 235–237; Wavrin, p. 604; Chastellain, v. 488). Sailing off from Calais, Warwick captured several merchantmen, some of which were Burgundian, and, if Wavrin may be credited, threw their crews into the sea, and on 5 May (6 May, according to Wavrin, v. 604) put into Honfleur. Duke Charles at once protested against Warwick's reception as a breach of the treaty he had made with Louis in the previous October. But Warwick would not relieve Louis from his embarrassment by removal to the Channel Islands, and the king, who could not afford to lose so valuable an ally, decided to brave Charles the Bold's wrath, and sent the Bastard of Bourbon to protect Warwick against the large Burgundian fleet which now entered the Seine (Commines, i. 238; cf. Wavrin, v. 604; Ramsay, ii. 354).
Louis and Warwick now settled on a plan for driving their common enemy King Edward from his throne and for restoring Henry VI. Foreign observers were staggered by the cynicism of this crowning illustration of the demoralisation of the English nobility in the civil strife (Chastellain, v. 467). Queen Margaret at first indignantly refused to accept the support of the man who had driven her into exile and thrown foul aspersions on her good name, or to marry her son to the daughter of one who had stigmatised him as a bastard (ib. p. 464). Louis took Warwick to Angers to meet her about the middle of July, but it was only on the strongest pressure from Louis and her Angevin advisers, and after Warwick had withdrawn his imputations on his knees, where she kept him, according to one account (ib. p. 468), for a quarter of an hour, that she gave way (Ellis, Letters, 2nd ser. ii. 132). She stipulated that the marriage of her son and Anne Neville should not be completed until Warwick had gone over and conquered most part of England for King Henry. In the church of St. Marie, Warwick, who had broken so many solemn oaths, swore on a piece of the true cross to remain faithful to the Lancastrian dynasty (ib.) In accordance with a promise made on the same occasion, Louis fitted out a small expedition, and Warwick, favoured by a storm which dispersed the Burgundian fleet, safely crossed with it to Dartmouth and Plymouth, landing on 13 Sept. with Clarence, Jasper Tudor, and the Earl of Oxford (Fabyan, p. 658). In the manifesto which he had sent over before him, Warwick had been studiously vague as to his intentions, lest the guidance of the movement should pass out of his hands (Warkworth, p. 60). But once in England, he proclaimed Henry VI, and advanced on London. Edward, who had foolishly allowed himself to be drawn into the north by a rising got up for the purpose by Warwick's brother-in-law, Lord Fitzhugh, was deserted by Montagu, and had to fly to the Netherlands.
Warwick did not enter London until 6 Oct., three days after Edward had sailed from Lynn. The merchants of the city, being heavy creditors of Edward and trading chiefly with the Low countries, were unfriendly, and Warwick waited until Sir Geoffrey Gate and other followers of his own had stirred up the mob, and even opened the prisons (Fabyan, p. 659). The men of the Cinque ports rose at the call of their old warden, and a mob of Kentishmen pillaged the eastern suburbs of London, attacking Flemings and beerhouses (Green, Town Life in the Fifteenth Century, i. 415). Warwick, who was accompanied by his brother the archbishop, the Earl of Shrewsbury, and Lord Stanley, removed King Henry from the Tower to the Bishop of London's palace, and a week later bore his train in a state procession to Westminster. New ministers were appointed, the archbishop once more becoming chancellor, and Clarence lieutenant of Ireland. As soon as Edward's flight was known at Calais, Wenlock and most of the inhabitants cast off the white rose and mounted the ragged staff (Commines, i. 254; Chastellain, v. 488). Tiptoft, earl of Worcester, who had horrified the people by impaling Warwick's crews whom he captured at Southampton in May, was executed on 18 Oct. The parliament which met on 26 Nov. confirmed the Angers concordat, and appointed Warwick and Clarence joint lieutenants of the realm (Polydore Vergil, p. 521; but cf. Arrivall of Edward IV, p. 1). But Warwick's position was a very anxious one. Clarence was looking backward, and the Lancastrians themselves had naturally no enthusiasm for government by their old enemy in the name of the poor shadow of a king. In February he went down to Dover, eagerly
