Loveday (1458)

The **Loveday of 1458** (also called the **Annunciation Loveday**) was a public peace ceremony that took place on 25 March 1458 at Old St Paul's Cathedral in London. It was meant to end the fighting between two groups of powerful English nobles — the **Lancastrians** and the **Yorkists** — during the Wars of the Roses.

A **loveday** was a type of meeting used in medieval England to settle disagreements. The word "love" here meant peace or agreement, not romantic love. The idea was for enemies to come together and agree to stop fighting, often guided by the Church or a trusted leader.

## Background
### England's troubled king
King Henry VI was a weak ruler who found it very hard to control the powerful lords around him. In 1453, he fell seriously ill and could not speak, eat by himself, or recognise the people around him. While he was ill, his cousin Richard, Duke of York was made **Lord Protector**, meaning he ran the country in the king's place.

York was helped by the powerful Neville family, led by Richard Neville, Earl of Salisbury, and his son Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick.

When Henry recovered in early 1455, York lost his role as Protector. Power passed back to the king's favourite, Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, and increasingly to the king's wife, Queen Margaret.

### The two sides
The two opposing groups are often called:
* **Lancastrians** – supporters of King Henry VI, who belonged to the House of Lancaster. Queen Margaret was a key figure on this side.
* **Yorkists** – supporters of Richard, Duke of York, who wanted more power in the government and felt pushed aside.

### The Battle of St Albans (1455)
In May 1455, York feared that his enemies were planning to destroy him politically — or perhaps even kill him. He raised an army and intercepted the king at St Albans. The fighting was short, but York's main enemies — the Duke of Somerset, the Earl of Northumberland, and Lord Clifford — were all killed. Because these three men were specifically targeted, some historians have compared the battle more to a series of planned killings than a real battle.

After the battle, the sons of the dead Lancastrian lords were left wanting revenge.

## The road to the Loveday
By 1458, King Henry was desperate to bring peace between the two sides. He also had another reason to unite his nobles: France had recently attacked the English town of Sandwich, and there were reports that the French planned to attack Calais too.

Henry called a great council — a large meeting of lords — in Westminster at the start of 1458. It was a tense and dangerous occasion. The lords arrived in London with thousands of armed men:

* York came with 400 armed followers.
* The Earl of Salisbury had 500 men.
* The new Duke of Somerset and the Duke of Exeter brought 800 men between them.
* The new Earl of Northumberland, with his brothers and Lord Clifford, brought around 1,500 men.
* The Earl of Warwick arrived last with 600 soldiers — veterans from the garrison at Calais, all dressed in red jackets.

The city of London was extremely worried about a battle breaking out in the streets. The mayor armed 5,000 men to patrol the city. The Lancastrian lords were made to stay *outside* the city walls to keep them away from the Yorkists. Even so, York and the Earl of Salisbury were nearly ambushed on their way to a council meeting.

King Henry personally appeared before the gathered lords and begged for unity, then went away to pray, leaving others to work out the details.

Negotiations went on for weeks. Henry's advisors would meet the Yorkists in the mornings and the Lancastrians in the afternoons — at separate locations — to slowly work towards a deal. Eventually, an agreement was reached.

## The agreement
King Henry announced his decision on 24 March 1458. He placed the blame for the Battle of St Albans entirely on the Yorkist lords. As punishment, they were ordered to pay money to the families of those who had been killed:

* The Duke of York had to pay 5,000 marks to the new Duke of Somerset and his mother.
* The Earl of Warwick had to pay 1,000 marks to Lord Clifford's family.
* The Earl of Salisbury agreed to cancel the large fines he had previously forced on the Percy family.
* The Yorkists agreed to pay for masses (religious prayers) to be said for those who had died, and to set up a chantry (a small chapel for prayers) at St Albans Abbey.

However, the Yorkist payments were not actually in cash. Instead of paying real money, York and Warwick gave up debts that the government already owed them — meaning the crown was effectively paying its own debt to settle the dispute.

The Lancastrian lords, as the injured party, did not have to give anything in return — except that Lord Egremont had to promise to keep the peace with the Nevilles in Yorkshire for ten years.

## The procession
The agreement was announced on 25 March 1458 — a holy day known as Lady Day (the Feast of the Annunciation). To celebrate, the king and all the major lords joined a grand procession from Westminster Palace to St Paul's Cathedral.

What made the procession remarkable was *who* walked with *whom*. Enemies were deliberately paired together, walking hand in hand:

* The new Duke of Somerset walked with the Earl of Salisbury — his father's killer.
* The Duke of Exeter walked with the Earl of Warwick.
* King Henry walked alone in the middle, wearing his crown and royal robes.
* Behind the king, the Duke of York walked hand in hand with Queen Margaret — his greatest enemy.

This public display of togetherness was meant to show everyone that the quarrel was over. The streets were full of onlookers. However, even at the ceremony at St Paul's, Salisbury's personal guard of 400 armed men waited in the churchyard outside — a sign that trust had not truly been restored.

## Reactions
People at the time had very mixed feelings about the Loveday.

Some were hopeful. A poem called *Reconciliation of Henry VI and the Yorkists* celebrated the event, writing that England should "rejoice... in accord and unity."

Others were deeply sceptical. A preacher from Coventry named William Ive compared King Henry to Judas, saying he "made Lovedays as Judas made with a kiss with Christ." The writer Thomas Malory, working on his famous book ''Le Morte d'Arthur'' around this time, expressed similar cynicism — he seemed to use the Loveday as inspiration for scenes in his book where peace ceremonies fail to prevent tragedy.

## Aftermath
The peace did not last. Within months, petty violence had broken out again between the lords' followers. In November 1458, there was a serious brawl at Westminster between the followers of Warwick and Somerset. Warwick had to fight his way out of the palace and fled to Calais.

By 1459, full armed conflict had returned. Salisbury's army was attacked at the Battle of Blore Heath, and the Yorkist lords were declared traitors by Parliament. They were still supposedly paying their Loveday fines to their enemies when the fighting resumed.

Within three years of the Loveday:
* King Henry had been removed from power (deposed).
* The Duke of York had been killed at the Battle of Wakefield.
* York's son Edward had been crowned the first Yorkist King of England.

## Historical views
Historians still debate whether the Loveday achieved anything useful:

* Some argue the Yorkists did well out of it — they gave up little of real value, and were officially accepted back as loyal subjects of the king.
* Others say it made things worse — by publicly forcing the Yorkists to accept blame for St Albans, it humiliated them without satisfying the Lancastrians' desire for true justice.
* One historian, Christine Carpenter, has argued that the Loveday was the moment when the division in England could no longer be hidden — meaning it may have actually marked the *true* beginning of the Wars of the Roses, rather than their end.

Most historians agree that the Loveday failed. It tried to bury the problems between the two sides rather than truly solve them, and the war it was meant to prevent began again very quickly.

## Related pages
* Wars of the Roses
* Henry VI of England
* Richard of York, 3rd Duke of York
* First Battle of St Albans
* Battle of Blore Heath
* Margaret of Anjou
* House of Lancaster
* House of York

## References