Lambert Simnel

This article is about the English person. For the racehorse, see Lambert Simnel (horse). For the cake, see Simnel cake.

Lambert Simnel
Pretender
Born	c. 1477
Died	After 1534 (aged approximately 57)
Regnal name claimed	Edward VI of England Crowned on 24 May 1487 at Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin
Title(s)	Pretended Earl of Warwick
Throne(s) claimed	England
Pretend from	1487
Connection with	Claimed to be Edward Plantagenet, 17th Earl of Warwick, son of George Plantagenet, 1st Duke of Clarence
Royal House	In the name of the House of York

Lambert Simnel (c. 1477 – after 1534) was a pretender to the throne of England. In 1487, his claim to be Edward Plantagenet, 17th Earl of Warwick, threatened the newly established reign of Henry VII (1485–1509). Simnel became the figurehead of a Yorkist rebellion organised by John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln. The rebellion was crushed in 1487. Simnel was pardoned because of his tender years, and was thereafter employed by the royal household as a scullion.

Early life

Simnel was born around 1477. His real name is not known—contemporary records call him John, not Lambert, and even his surname is suspect. Different sources have different claims of his parentage, from a baker and tradesman to an organ builder. Most definitely, he was of humble origin. At the age of about ten, he was taken as a pupil by an Oxford-trained priest named Richard Simon (or Richard Symonds / Richard Simons / William Symonds) who apparently decided to become a kingmaker. He tutored the boy in courtly manners and contemporaries described the boy as handsome. He was taught the necessary etiquette and was well educated by Simon.

Pretender

Simon noticed a striking resemblance between Lambert and the sons of Edward IV, so he initially intended to present Simnel as Richard, Duke of York, son of King Edward IV, the younger of the vanished Princes in the Tower. However, when he heard rumours (at the time false) that the Earl of Warwick had died during his imprisonment in the Tower of London, he changed his mind. The real Warwick was a boy of about the same age, having been born in 1475, and had a claim to the throne as the son of George Plantagenet, 1st Duke of Clarence, King Edward IV's executed brother. Warwick was a touchstone for Yorkist affections, and people still wore his badge of the bear and ragged staff.

According to James A. Williamson, Simnel was merely a figurehead for a rebellion that was already being planned by the Yorkists:

He was merely a commonplace tool to be used for important ends, and the attempt to overthrow Henry VII would have taken place had Simnel never existed. The Yorkist leaders were determined on a serious push, rising of their party in England supported by as great a force as possible from overseas.

Simon spread a rumour that Warwick had actually escaped from the Tower and was under his guardianship. He gained some support from Yorkists. He took Simnel to Ireland where there was still support for the Yorkist cause, and presented him to the Lord Deputy of Ireland, the Earl of Kildare. Kildare was willing to support the story and invade England to overthrow King Henry. Simnel was paraded through the streets, carried on the shoulders of "the tallest man of the time", an individual called D'Arcy of Platten (this was evidently Sir William Darcy, an ally of Kildare, who is known to have been exceptionally tall). When Henry heard about what was going on, he arranged for the real Earl of Warwick to be taken from the tower and paraded through London, presumably to disprove the rumours of his death or escape. This did not prevent the rebellion, likely because insufficient infrastructure and methods of transport meant news spread slowly.

"Coronation"

Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, from Picturesque views of the antiquities of Ireland. Drawn on stone by James D. Harding, from the sketches of Robert O'Callaghan Newenham (1830)

On 24 May 1487 Simnel was crowned in Christ Church Cathedral in Dublin as "King Edward VI". He was about 10 years old. Lord Kildare collected an army of Irish soldiers under the command of his younger brother, Thomas FitzGerald of Laccagh.

John de la Pole, 1st Earl of Lincoln, formerly the designated successor of his uncle the late King Richard III, joined the conspiracy against Henry VII. He fled to Burgundy, where Warwick's aunt Margaret of York, the Dowager Duchess of Burgundy, kept her court. Lincoln claimed that he had taken part in young Warwick's supposed escape. He also met Viscount Lovell, who had supported a failed Yorkist uprising in 1486. Margaret collected 2,000 Flemish mercenaries and shipped them to Ireland under the command of Martin Schwartz, a noted military leader of the time. They arrived in Ireland on 5 May. King Henry was informed of this and began to gather troops.

Battle of Stoke Field

Main article: Battle of Stoke Field

On 5 June 1487 Simnel's army—mainly Flemish and Irish troops—landed on Piel Island in the Furness area of Lancashire and were joined by some English supporters. However, most local nobles, with the exception of Sir Thomas Broughton, did not join them. Henry had been receiving information about events in Ireland, although it was vague and conflicting. Thanks to existing plans to invade Ireland he was able to react speedily to the invasion and had begun mustering troops as early as February. A lack of English support led Simnel's army to change their plans, deciding their only chance of success was one swift and decisive battle. On 15 June 1487, they set up camp near the small village of East Stoke, Nottinghamshire, near Newark-on-Trent. The royal army of 12,000 set up camp 10 miles (16 km) away.

On 16 June 1487 the rebels clashed with the King's army, at the Battle of Stoke Field in Nottinghamshire, and were defeated. Lincoln and Thomas FitzGerald were killed. Lovell went missing and was rumoured to have escaped to Scotland with Sir Thomas Broughton and hidden to avoid retribution.

Simons avoided execution due to his priestly status, but was imprisoned for life. Kildare, who had remained in Ireland, was pardoned.

Later life

King Henry pardoned young Simnel (probably because he recognised that Simnel had been merely a puppet in the hands of adults) and put him to work in the royal kitchen as a spit-turner. When he grew older, he became a falconer. Almost no information about his later life is known. He died some time after 1534. He seems to have married, as he is probably the father of Richard Simnel, a canon of St Osyth's Priory in Essex during the reign of Henry VIII.

Missing Princes Project

In 2022, Langley led "The Missing Princes Project" to discover the fate of the Princes in the Tower. The project began in 2015, following the reburial of Richard III in Leicester and was formally launched in July the following year. In 2023 she claimed to have discovered new evidence that disproved the theory that Richard III was responsible for the deaths of the princes. Along with Rob Rinder, she hosted a Channel 4 programme called Princes in the Tower: The New Evidence, in which she revealed her own theories and new archival discoveries. Although praising Langley's discoveries, The Spectator's reviewer called the programme "a calculated insult to the viewer"; The Times called it "compelling" and awarded the documentary its "Critics Choice." The programme achieved a large audience with Richard III and the Princes in the Tower trending on Twitter / X. The Richard III Society issued a press release stating:

The disappearance of the princes has always been described as a great unsolved mystery. Why? Because there was no evidence of their fate. Their murder was never more than conjecture, but it was put about by the authorities and – for safety’s sake – only the brave dared to think differently. From now on, history must take account of this new breakthrough evidence. No longer can anyone confidently claim the princes were killed by Richard III.

Three leading members of the Dutch Research Group who had assisted in the project subsequently distanced themselves from Langley's documentary and book, arguing that the documents they had discovered "are in our own opinion open to various interpretations and do not constitute irrefutable proof" for the survival of the princes. Langley responded that her conclusions were based on "the totality of evidence thus assembled and the outcomes of a modern police missing person investigation methodology ... (and not through a traditional historical research method)". Historian Michael Hicks similarly opined that the new documents "do add to knowledge of the Tudor impostors, but they fall short of proof that either Edward V or Richard Duke of York survived beyond their disappearance in the autumn of 1483". Langley again responded that her use of "police investigative methodology" had provided "sufficient reason to conclude" that the two had survived the reign of Richard III.

Cultural depictions

In the 1972 BBC serial The Shadow of the Tower Simnel was portrayed by Gary Warren.

In 1996 Blyth Power's album Out From Under the King included a song, Lambert Simnel.

In 2006 Steeleye Span's album Bloody Men included a song, The Story of the Scullion King, about Simnel.

In 2013, a sketch parodying Who Do You Think You Are in season 5, episode 7 of Horrible Histories depicted Simnel's claim to the throne.

In the 2017 Starz miniseries The White Princess, Simnel is portrayed by Max True.

The 2017 children's book The Player King, by Avi, offers a fictionalized first-person account of the key period of Simnel's life.

Further reading

• Amin, Nathen (15 April 2021). Henry VII and the Tudor Pretenders: Simnel, Warbeck, and Warwick. Amberley Publishing Limited. ISBN 978-1-4456-7509-1.
• Bennett, Michael (21 March 2024). Lambert Simnel and the Battle of Stoke. History Press. ISBN 978-1-80399-723-0.

• Langley, Philippa (November 2023). The Princes in the Tower: Solving History's Greatest Cold Case. The History Press. ISBN 978-1-80399-541-0.

• Lewis, Matthew (11 September 2017). The Survival of the Princes in the Tower: Murder, Mystery and Myth. The History Press. ISBN 978-0-7509-8528-4.
• Ashdown-Hill, John (5 January 2015). The Dublin King: The True Story of Edward Earl of Warwick, Lambert Simnel and the 'Princes in the Tower'. The History Press. ISBN 978-0-7509-6316-9.

See also

• Perkin Warbeck
• John Deydras
• Mary Baynton

References

• Ashley, Mike (2002). British Kings & Queens. Carroll & Graf. ISBN 0-7867-1104-3. pp. 229, 230