The Northeast of England in the era of the Wars of the Roses (using the example of the Paston family)

Portnov Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Postgraduate student; Faculty of History; Lomonosov Moscow State University 31a Stroiteley Ave., Ivanovo, Ivanovo region, 153040, Russia 12Alex06@mail.ru Other publications by this author

Introduction

The Wars of the Roses (1455-1485) have continued to attract the attention of scholars and history buffs interested in the Middle Ages for several centuries. In recent years, they have been studied especially closely from a local perspective: the accumulation of factual material allowed us to look at those events not only through the eyes of kings, aristocrats and princes of the church, but also of the stratum that was a direct participant, the main victim and, in some ways, the main beneficiary of those wars – the petty nobility.

The history of the Paston family has long been under the scrutiny of historians. There were both general works about this clan, for example, authored by the British historian Colin Richmond ^{[4, pp. 206-259]}, and narrowly specialized ones devoted to certain aspects of the life of the Pastors. The latter approach can be illustrated by Diane Watt's monograph "Women of the Pastors", which focuses exclusively on sources authored by women ^{[10, pp. 1-17]}. In Russian, the most complete study of the Paston archive was conducted by Elena Brown, whose monograph "Wars of the Roses: A History. Mythology. Historiography" and pushed us to choose local history as a subject of study.

Characteristics of sources

The Paston Letters, which we relied on in our research, are an epistolary collection formed by members of the Paston family from Norfolk from 1422 to 1509. John Paston (1421-1466), whose fate we will pay primary attention to, actually laid the foundation for its formation, keeping the letters of his parents, and passing them on to his son before his death. In 1735, the antiquarian Francis Blomfield (1705-1752) acquired a large collection of Paston letters and papers from the executors of the last representative of this family, William Paston, 2nd Earl of Yarmouth (1654-1732), after whose death Thomas Martin (1696-1771) became the owner of the archive, and then part turned out to be John Ives, and part was bought by the chemist John Worth. In 1774, the archive passed from the executors of the latter to the first publisher of the "Letters of the Pastors", John Fenn (1739-1794), whose two-volume edition was published in 1787.

Fenn's publication aroused general interest in the collection of Pastons, thanks to which in 1789 he published two more volumes of letters and managed before his death to prepare for publication the fifth volume, posthumously printed in 1823 by his nephew William Frere. In recognition of his services, George III knighted Fenn on May 23, 1787. However, the disappearance of the handwritten originals of the letters published by Fenn cast doubt on their authenticity. It was confirmed by the efforts of James Gardner (1828-1912) and William Frere's son Philip, who found the original of the fifth volume along with other letters and papers of the Pastors. Ten years later, the originals of the third and fourth volumes of Fenn were found with ninety-five unpublished letters, and in 1889 the originals of the two remaining volumes were discovered. The last letters found were those given by John Fenn to George III in 1787.

The edition of the "Letters of the Pastors" edited by Fenn was considered the most complete until 1872, when James Gardner undertook to republish them, including more than four hundred previously unpublished letters. Gardner's edition also included notes, a catalog of all letters, and introductions to each volume. In 1875, before all the volumes of this publication were published, some more letters from the Paston archive were discovered. These unpublished letters were added as an addition to the subsequent three-volume edition, which was published in 1896. And in 1904 Gardner published the most complete edition of the "Letters of the Pastors" in six volumes, containing 1088 documents ^{[1, pp. 21-24]}. In this study, we relied on him, and specifically on volumes II – V, covering the life and work of John Paston.

Due to the desire to focus on the fate of one particular hero of those times, we decided to limit our research to 1444-1466, when John Paston acted as the full-fledged head of his family. The sources impose certain restrictions on us, because the epistolary genre, like all narrative documents, is not devoid of bias and impartiality, however, this is compensated by the fact that the circle of addressees and addressees of letters from the archives of the Pastors is unusually wide, which means that the personal perception of one author can at any time be rechecked by the words of another. Due to the significant volume of the "Letters of the Pastors", in this study we will cover only a few of the most interesting stories from the life of our hero.

John Paston and Lord Molanes (1444-1451)

The head of the Paston family since 1444 was John, who, to distinguish himself from his own sons with similar names, is commonly called John I among historians. He inherited his father's possessions when he was still a relatively young man, and almost immediately found himself involved in several lawsuits with other Norfolk nobles, the most significant of which was the dispute over Gresham Manor with Robert Hungerford, the future 3rd Baron Hungerford, and at that time Baron (in other sources - Lord) Molanes.

The Hungerfords were, albeit distantly, but still related to the Trevelyan family from Cornwall – Baron Moleyns' wife Eleanor de Moleyns (whose marriage brought him this title) was the granddaughter of John Welsborough and Joan Raleigh, i.e. she was the cousin of Elizabeth Welsborough, the wife of John Trevelyan, a bright figure of the era of the Wars of the Roses ^{[3, pp. 35-45]}; ^{[2, pp. 44-53]}. Like him, Molanes turned out to be a follower of the Lancastrian party, while the Pastors eventually had to take the side of the Yorkists, however, at the end of the 1440s. in Norfolk, the warring parties had not yet been finalized (recall that in the south-west of England their folding was completed only by the time of the first Battle of Saint-Albans). The same Pastons could have ended up in either of the two camps – the late William Paston, for example, being a lawyer, acted as an adviser to the Duke of Norfolk (Yorkists), and Gresham was acquired by him from Thomas Chaucer (Lancastrians). The largest dynastic strife that tore apart the north-east of the kingdom was the confrontation between the de la Pole and Mowbray families, which lasted since the 1430s. - At the time of the events we are interested in, these families were headed by John de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk and John Mowbray, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, and if the former can still be quite confidently attributed to the king's party, then Norfolk, up to a certain point, did not show unequivocal sympathy in the all-English political crisis.

On February 17, 1447, Moleyns forcibly occupied Gresham, as we learn from Paston's petition to Henry VI, submitted by him three years later ^{[5, p. 127]}. According to the text of the petition, long negotiations were held between Paston and Moleyns all this time about Gresham's ownership, but as it appears from a letter from Margaret Paston to her husband dated by the publisher in 1449, the manor continued to be held by Moleyns' people for more than two years before Paston returned his possessions on October 6, 1449 ^{[5, pp. 101-102]}. We do not know under what circumstances he did this, but apparently it happened without Molains' knowledge and, moreover, without Molains' consent, since already on January 28, 1450, a whole squad of a thousand people appeared to repel Gresham, and Paston's enemies used a military trick: the petition mentions that they dressed in white suits (it is not entirely clear which ones), catching Margaret Paston – John's wife, who was holding the manor on his behalf –by surprise ^{[5, p. 127]}. The "rebels", as the petition calls the Moleyns people, were very well armed: their helmets, cuirasses, brigandines and other armor are described, as part of this thousand there were at least archers and swordsmen, plus, apparently, some artillery park (it is not entirely clear what the author means by the word "gonnes") ^{[5, p. 128]}. Unsurprisingly, the attackers did not meet much resistance. How painful the loss of Gresham was for Paston can be judged from the bill he submitted to the Archbishop of York in the same year, in which it is reported that Molanes' men looted property worth 200 pounds sterling (i.e. approximately 48 kg of silver) in the captured manor ^{[5, p. 167]}.

Paston was lucky – on the same day with the capture of Gresham, the Duke of Suffolk was arrested, who in a letter from Margaret Paston to her husband directly contacts Molanes ^{[5, p. 132]}. After the impeachment procedure in parliament, Henry VI had to expel Suffolk from England ^{[5, p. 120]}, but on the way to Calais he was killed ^{[5, p. 148]} – the balance of power in the north-east of the kingdom changed, Molains was left without a patron. However, the triumph of the Duke of Norfolk's party did not mean the immediate rise of the Pastors: as follows from a letter dated April 30, 1450, John Paston was at that moment among the supporters of a completely different feudal lord – John de Vera, 12th Earl of Oxford (who in the letter directly calls our hero his friend ^{[5, p. 144]}). Despite the title, the earl was closely involved in the politics of north-east England, and not the Midlands at all, and his letters, which we have, were created primarily in the Essex possessions of the de Vers (for example, in Wivenhoe near Colchester ^{[5, p. 150]}). The Duke of Norfolk, who had a complicated, though not as dramatic relationship with Oxford as with Suffolk, also did not formally live in Norfolk County – his main residences, judging by the same letters, were located to the south, on the territory of Suffolk ^{[5, p. 184]}. It can be noted that the "nearest district" for the provincial nobility was limited to a radius of about 120-130 km (this is how far Wivenhoe, Bury St. Edmunds and other estates of the addressees of letters addressed to Paston from Gresham are located), i.e. three to four day marches, if we are talking about a horseman, which is confirmed by data from Cornwall – the Trevelyan and Wellsborough estates were separated by almost the same distance. Such "districts" usually included three counties (Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex in the case of the Pastons, Cornwall, Devon and Somerset in the case of the Trevelyan), less often four (Cambridgeshire, the next county closest to the possessions of the Pastons, and related place names in their archive have never surfaced since 1449 ^{[5, p. 106]} by 1461 ^{[7, p. 9]}).

The death of Suffolk did not bring John Paston the immediate return of Gresham – a letter from James Gresham was dated August 1450 (the coincidence of names is apparently accidental), from which it follows that the manor is still held by the people of Moleyns ^{[5, p. 160]}. The petition to the king, however, did not go completely unnoticed, because Cardinal John Kemp, Archbishop of York (and later Canterbury), took up the case of our hero. After the fall of Suffolk, he received the position of Lord Chancellor and, despite his advanced age, tried to somehow resolve the accumulated contradictions between the noble factions. In particular, James Gresham writes that the chancellor proposed a kind of "truce plan" between Paston and Molanes, according to which the latter withdraws his people from the captured manor, and the question of its ownership becomes the subject of special proceedings ^{[5, p. 161]}. In the meantime, control over Gresham and the collection of income from him should be carried out by a third person who is not connected in any way with the warring factions. Moleyns met the chancellor's initiative without enthusiasm and tried to convince him that he was already worthy of being the owner of Gresham, because all this time he had served the king faithfully and brought order to the troubled region. Paston acted more wisely and, as mentioned above, appealed to the cardinal with a bill in which he directly called Molanes a "rebel" ^{[5, p. 166]} (a far-sighted move, given that at that very moment the Jack Cade rebellion was breaking out in Kent, the fight against which quickly became Cardinal Kemp's main task). The text of the bill, in addition to Molanes himself, also contained accusations against his wife Eleanor and John Haydon of Baconsthorpe (a village about 5 km from Gresham), a former city judge and sheriff of Norwich. Haydon was quite a prominent figure in Norfolk, because as the son of a yeoman he managed to make a successful legal career, advising many influential feudal lords of the county, such as Barons Bardolph, Cromwell and Willoughby de Ersby, and was elected to parliament in 1445, and by 1447 he became the manager of the estates of the Duke of Norfolk in East Anglia. The latter, however, did not prevent Haydon from defecting to the Duke of Suffolk when he became the most influential nobleman at court. By 1450, he was already a justice of the peace of Norfolk County and quite an influential man. It is not entirely clear for what reasons his enmity with the Paston family arose (a number of historians associate it with a long-standing dispute between the Pastons and the Winters, who were advised by Haydon in legal matters ^{[4, p. 64]}), but by the time the dispute over Gresh arose, it dragged on for decades and was so heated that Margaret Paston in a letter to her husband, he calls Haydon nothing but a "lying scoundrel" or even a "lying devil" (fals schrew) ^{[5, p. 133]}. It is Haydon Paston who, in the bill to Cardinal Kemp, calls the main instigator of the attack on Gresham ^{[5, p. 166]}.

John Paston, in a reply letter to James Gresham dated September 4, 1450, informs that their dispute with Molanes was submitted to a special commission, which included the Duke of Norfolk, Bishop of Ely (at that time Cardinal Thomas Bourchier was a representative of a very noble aristocratic family, the great–grandson of Edward III and, accordingly, the king's second cousin), Earl of Oxford, Lord Scales (meaning Thomas Scales, 7th Baron Scales), Sir John Fastolfe (Paston writes that since Fastolfe is closely associated with the plaintiff's side, that is, with himself, he will most likely be excluded from the commission), Sir Thomas Fulthorpe and William Yelverton ^{[5, c. 168]}. Paston was generally pleased with the composition of the commission, telling Gresham that all its participants were "impartial" (read – on his side), except for Lord Scales, who was married to Ismania Welsborough, aunt of Eleanor de Moleyns and sister of Thomas Welsborough, at that time not yet John Trevelyan's father–in-law. We only know about the sentiments of Bourchier and Fulthorpe from this letter (Cardinal Bourchier will soon become a prominent Yorkist, but for now he rather kept neutral between the two factions), and Norfolk, Oxford, Fastolfe and Yelverton have long maintained close ties with the Pastors (Yelverton would later have a conflict with John Paston, but at that moment he Thus, from the very beginning, the composition of the commission was formed in such a way as to outwardly demonstrate a balanced attitude towards the warring parties, but in fact legitimize Paston's claims. Apparently, Cardinal Kemp was positioned in his favor from the very beginning, since Paston mentions that among the cardinal's servants was his cousin William White, through whom it was possible to influence the decisions made by the Lord Chancellor ^{[5, p. 170]}.

On September 18, Henry VI wrote to Paston directly ^{[5, p. 171]}, who promised to summon Moleyns to court, ostensibly in order to entrust him with some important matter, but in reality - to give Paston a break ^{[5, p. 172]}. On October 6, the letter came from White, who informed his cousin that the Duke of York landed in England ^{[5, p. 174]} (York's short-term rise resulted, among other things, in the drafting of a petition for the removal of the most odious royal advisers, whose list, as we described in other works, included John Trevelyan ^{[2, pp. 35-45]}) and that their position is not the same Iridescent, as I would like. First of all, John Haydon and his henchmen managed to ingratiate themselves with William Oldhall, a knight from York's inner circle, who was elected speaker of parliament in November of the same year (in the next letter, White will inform them that it cost them 2,000 pounds ^{[5, p. 180]}), moreover, they have already been noted for terrorizing residents of the town of Pykenham, threatening to extort money from them ^{[5, p. 175]}. Finally, White directly warned Paston that Haydon wanted him (Paston) to "destroy" ^{[5, p. 176]}, and that he should be prepared for a real war. Nevertheless, based on his conversation with William Norwich (the future mayor of the city of the same name), White concluded that York was hostile to Molains, which means that all is not lost. Soon they wrote another letter in which Paston was advised not to skimp on expenses in order to organize a solemn meeting for York in Norwich, where he was soon to arrive ^{[5, p. 180]}, as well as to seek support from Oxford and Sir Miles Stapleton (the former sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk, who was related with a large number of noble families – the Howards, de la Fields, Bardolphs, Poynings, etc., White calls him his cousin), who can take care of Paston before the Duke ^{[5, p. 179]}.

As a result, Molanes, even despite his attempt to directly appeal to the king, was found guilty for all the "exploits" in Norfolk – we learn about this from an undated letter from James Gresham, saying that the baron was furious primarily at Yelverton (he was a member of the Court of King's Bench and in this capacity passed sentence) and, of course, Paston ^{[5, p. 183]}. On November 11, a letter was dated to the latter from Richard Cully (Calle), who is in the service of John Paston, in which he reports that he received an order to occupy Gresham in his name ^{[5, c. 187]}, and on March 1, 1451, the chaplain of the Pastors, James Gloys, writes that the manor is now in their possession ^{[5, p. 219]}.

John Paston, Tuddenham and Haydon (1451-1459)

However, this did not mean the end of the confrontation. First of all, there was the threat from Haydon and his henchmen, most notably Thomas Tuddenham. Tuddenham was a personality quite noticeable on the scale of Norfolk and periodically in letters his name is paired with the name of Haydon is indicated first ^{[5, p. 180]} – he served the Duke of Suffolk for a long time and thanks to him managed to become sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk, justice of the peace, deputy of several parliaments, governor of the north of the Duchy of Lancaster and keeper of the Great Royal wardrobe (more of a formal court position – for example, a few years later, the most noble aristocrat John Howard, who clearly did not perform these duties directly, will become one). Tuddenham's condition is eloquently evidenced by the fact that the monk and historian John Capgrave made a pilgrimage to Rome with his money. Tuddenham's name appears in the Pastons' correspondence, however, only in connection with the episode with Pickenham ^{[5, p. 175]} – he apparently did not take part in the struggle for Gresham.

It is not directly clear from the letters why Tuddenham chose the path of open confrontation, but, apparently, the "Suffolk case" seriously affected him: the Duke of Norfolk's commission began to purge the county of the most prominent associates of the late temp, as the fate of Molanes served as a visible confirmation, and Tuddenham, who achieved influence with the help of Suffolk, decided, that the only possible chance for him to maintain his status is to defend it with weapons in his hands. Seeing that the ground began to move away from under Tuddenham's feet, his opponents, who had previously been afraid to get involved with the former sheriff and judge, became more active. So, at the very end of the winter of 1451, the citizens of Swaffham petitioned Tuddenham, complaining of old harassment on his part (Tuddenham tainted himself with extortion, jury bribery, perjury and other violations of judicial procedure) ^{[5, p. 231]}. Nevertheless, Suffolk supporters, apparently, did not consider their situation completely hopeless, since Margaret Paston, in a letter to her husband dated March 30, reports that in the city of Lynn in the very west of Norfolk, Molanes is expected to arrive soon, intending to regain Gresham and other possessions ^{[5, p. 230]}. Margaret also writes that Tuddenham and Haydon "will have to go on a rampage again" in the county, i.e. the return of Molanes had to happen by force.

On May 2, Margaret Paston's fears were confirmed – William White and two comrades reported in a letter that the king intended to convene such a commission that would be guaranteed to justify Molanes ^{[5, p. 236]}. By that time, the political situation in England had changed significantly: if in 1450, after the death of Suffolk and the return of York from Ireland, the supporters of the latter were on horseback, then in 1451 the opposite party took over, the leader of which was now the Duke of Somerset. In the spring of 1451, the York entourage tried to get the childless Henry VI to recognize the rights of the heir presumptive for the duke, but Henry refused to do this and dissolved parliament, from whose deputy Thomas Young this initiative formally proceeded. It happened in the last days of May, but at the time of writing White's letter, apparently, Paston's informants in the king's entourage already knew what was going on.

As a result, Molanes escaped any punishment, but Gresham did not achieve it - in the same month, he offered Paston to amicably resolve their dispute and compensate for the damage caused to him ^{[5, p. 236]} and, apparently, managed to get his consent with a number of reservations ^{[5, p. 248]} (it is not entirely clear which ones), before the end of the year to take part in a campaign in France under the command of the Earl of Shrewsbury, where Molanes was safely captured and deprived of the opportunity to influence politics in Norfolk for the rest of his life. It was only in 1460 that Molains, who had already become Baron Hungerford, finally returned to England at the height of the Wars of the Roses, took part in the Battle of Towton on the side of Henry VI, fled to Scotland, from there to France ^{[6, p. 306]}, would not give up and continue the fight against the Yorks, would already get He was captured by them at Hexham and finally beheaded in 1464. Since all these events took place outside of Norfolk and the Pastors concerned only indirectly, Molanes' name disappears from the letters immediately after the royal pardon and appears only a couple of times in the next 13 years without any connection to county affairs. As for Tuddenham and Haydon, they also had a patron, albeit not as influential as the king. We are talking about Judge John Prysot, who moved the court session from Norwich to Walsingham, where it was believed that the accused had much more supporters ^{[5, p. 238]}. A letter from Sir Thomas Howes to John Fastolfe creates a fair picture of how this trial took place: Tuddenham and Haydon brought more than four hundred of their men to it (the text of the letter says that they all arrived on horseback, but it is not entirely clear whether it was an armed detachment), as a result of which even Yelverton did not dare to speak against the decision of the judge, who completely acquitted the accused, and John Paston was left alone ^{[5, p. 239]}. Chronologically, Tuddenham and Haydon were acquitted a few weeks earlier than Molanes, which makes it clear why he agreed to settle the dispute over Gresham peacefully – by the end of spring it became obvious that the Somerset party had gained the upper hand at court and its supporters, whose position between September 1450 and May 1451 was shaky, now again they were in force, and therefore victory over them through legal procedure was practically impossible.

The episode with Gresham serves as a vivid illustration of how the relationship between the provincial nobility developed on the eve of the Wars of the Roses. As can be seen from it, the Lancastrian party was the first to consolidate locally, and its representatives actively used connections at the royal court to satisfy their ambitions. On the contrary, it cannot be said about the Pastors at this stage that they definitely belong to the Yorkist camp – John Paston's actions are mostly reactive, he is forced to look for patrons among the highest aristocracy, depending on the current moment. In the future, we will follow how the processes of changing the ruling dynasty took place in Norfolk.

John Paston, Dukes of Suffolk, Norfolk and others (1459-1466)

The change of dynasties in the kingdom coincided with another lawsuit, which was led by Paston. At the end of 1459, John Fastolfe died, one of the nine executors of which our hero acted, in connection with which he managed to become the owner of Keister Castle, formerly the residence of Fastolfe ^{[6, p. 250]}, however, as in the case of Gresham, there was someone willing to challenge Paston's rights, although this time where The more noble and powerful is John Mowbray, 3rd Duke of Norfolk. According to historian Norman Davis, the first clash between Paston and Norfolk occurred back in 1458, when John and William Paston were accused of "violent behavior" along with twenty-six other nobles ^{[9, c. liv]}. The commission that investigated this incident included, in addition to Norfolk as chairman, Thomas Tuddenham, John Haydon and Miles Stapleton, who are already known to us, but the circumstances of the commission's activities are not entirely clear, because the next year Paston was elected a member of parliament without apparent difficulty ^{[6, p. 226]}.

Paston, obviously, calmly met the accession of Edward IV, since he had already suffered from Lancastrians – in his brother's letter dated April 4, 1461, the new ruler is called only "our sovereign King Edward" ^{[6, p. 266]} (however, the letter was written after the Battle of Towton, when the fall of Yorkist power was imagined an unlikely case). However, very soon he had to face the supporters of the winning party, and at first Paston was threatened not by Norfolk, but by another duke – Suffolk, the son of William de la Pole, who was killed in 1450. Despite the fact that his father was the first leader of the Lancastrians, Suffolk married the daughter of the Duke of York in 1458 and actually moved to the opposite camp, and with the coming to power of Edward IV, he also turned out to be the king's son-in-law (interestingly, the ducal status for Suffolk Jr. was recognized only in 1463 upon his achievement however, even in letters created earlier than this date, he is still named according to his paternal title ^{[6, p. 314]}). In a letter dated May 10, 1461, Paston's clerk John Smith writes that Suffolk, through third parties, intends to take over the entire inheritance of Fastolfe ^{[6, p. 271]}. However, for some time he "went into the shadows", supporting Norfolk's claims to Paston ^{[6, p. 314]} - John's brother Clement Paston mentions the duke among those who actively tried to blacken their family in the eyes of the king along with John Howard (through his wife he was the uncle of Baron Molanes, so the reasons their conflicts are understandable) and Lord Wingfield. Later, in 1463, Margaret Paston would convince her husband to seek reconciliation with Suffolk ^{[7, p. 75]}, but their relationship would remain extremely tense ^{[7, p. 129]}.

Anyway, by June 5, 1461 The caister was taken over by the Duke of Norfolk – Richard Cully mentions in his letter that the governor of the castle is an appointee of the Duke, one Fitzwilliam ^{[6, p. 277]}. Despite the fact that Paston was at the royal court at that moment and was supposed to attend the coronation of Edward IV ^{[6, c. 278]}, plus he would be elected to parliament in the same month ^{[6, c. 284]}, i.e. it was difficult to question his full loyalty to the new authorities, Paston's opponent turned out to be a Yorkist again (moreover, a year earlier he even gave reason to consider himself not a passive, but quite an active supporter of the Yorks, implicitly sabotaging the summons to parliament, which was supposed to satisfy the demands of Henry VI and Margaret of Anjou for monetary payments ^{[6, p. 231]}). The matter began to take a serious turn, since Clement Paston writes in his letter that Norfolk intends to file a complaint to the king, who by that time (i.e. by mid-October) was extremely hostile to our hero through the efforts of, among others, Suffolk, Howard and Wingfield ^{[6, p. 314]}. However, on November 6, John de Mowbray, 3rd Duke of Norfolk died suddenly, shifting the dispute with the Pastors onto the shoulders of his 17-year-old son, also John.

Relations between Paston and the king reached a low point in the autumn of 1461, when, being summoned to London, he immediately landed in prison, where, however, he did not stay long. A letter from Clement Paston to his brother, in which he called him to the capital to avoid the wrath of Edward IV, is dated October 11 ^{[6, c. 314]}, and a letter from Margaret Paston, rejoicing at her husband's release, is already November 2 ^{[7, c. 1]}, and she writes that she is in custody instead of John Paston Howard immediately turned out to be scheming against him ^{[7, p. 2]} (subsequently, he was awarded the definition from Margaret "as if Howard had lost his head" ^{[7, p. 33]}, which colorfully speaks about the emotions that the future duke felt about what happened). Obviously, the intercessors at court, who, as we know, our hero had, managed to get forgiveness for him, but in the future he would be arrested twice more – in 1464 and 1465, i.e. Paston could not get into favor with Edward. At the same time, his son, John II (John I had two sons with the same name, so he usually called himself "John Sr." in letters to his father ^{[7, p. 34]}, implying that "John Jr." is his brother, traditionally appearing in historical studies as John III) – despite the fact that we know from several sources ^{[6, p. 302]} about his participation in the king's journey along the Anglo-Welsh border (the so-called "Welsh Mark") ^{[6, p. 300]}, life at the court was also difficult. In any case, Clement Paston, according to a certain William Pecock, writes to his brother that he does not maintain close relations with anyone at the royal court, except for his cousin John Wykes, the bailiff in the royal chambers (usher of the King's chamber), and cooks and stewards are not ordered to serve him ^{[6, p. 304]}. In 1462 John II was also in Edward's retinue during his trip around the country and managed to hold out a lot, which he did not fail to inform his father ^{[7, p. 34]}.

The reason for the cold relationship between the Pastors and the Yorks, perhaps, lay not only in the intrigues of Norfolk, Howard, etc. The Earl of Oxford – the one who acted as the patron of our hero – in 1459. nevertheless, he decided to join the Lancastrians (around the same time, the son of his old enemy, the 2nd Duke of Suffolk, on the contrary, moved to the Yorkist camp). Although his participation in the Wars of the Roses was rather passive, and with the change of the dynasty, the count lived forever on his estates, feigning an attack of serious illness, in the eyes of Edward IV, all those who were somehow connected with Oakford turned out to be politically unreliable (this, however, contradicts the fact that Paston did not take any action to support the overthrown he did not undertake a dynasty). In February 1462, the Earl and his son, as well as several other nobles (including our old acquaintance Thomas Tuddenham), were beheaded on charges of conspiracy.

The dispute over the Caister seemed to be resolved with the death of the 3rd Duke of Norfolk - between the summer of 1462 ^{[7, c. 46]} and the spring of 1463 ^{[7, c. 73]} the castle returned to Paston's ownership, and on April 6, 1463, the testimony of Sir Roger Chamberlain was dated, who confirmed under oath that that the dying Fastolfe intended to make Paston the heir to his possessions, which the late Duke was aware of ^{[7, p. 74]}. John I, while he was alive, continued to hold Caister and only in 1469, three years after his death, taking advantage of the feud between the king and Warwick, the new Duke of Norfolk seized the castle by force ^{[8, p. 36]}.

Disputes over the inheritance of Fastolfe confronted Paston not only with the top of the English aristocracy – so, shortly after the Yorkists came to power, there was a quarrel between John Paston and William Yelverton, who had previously acted as his ally in clashes with lords and knights from the Lancastrian camp. Another Fastolfe confidant, William Janney, played a prominent role in this conflict, whose name is usually found in documents along with Yelverton's name. As early as 1459, quite friendly relations remained between him and Paston, as evidenced by a letter dated August 22 ^{[6, p. 146]}, however, with the disappearance of the rallying figure in the person of Fastolfe, who died on November 5 of the same year, friendship quickly turned into enmity and two years after this event and less than half a year after the accession of Edward IV, Yelverton and Jenny laid claim to the Cotton estate ^{[6, p. 308]}. At the same time, when one of Paston's servants John Pamping (Pampyng) wanted to negotiate with them, Jenny tried to arrest him, and Yelverton threatened that if Paston decided to dispose of his (Yelverton's) land, he would "regret it" (if ye toke upon yow to make any trobill in his lond ye shall repente it) ^{[6, p. 309]}. James Gloys also writes that Yelverton and Genii, if they manage to get their hands on Cotton, intend to lay claim to the rest of Paston's possessions ^{[6, p. 310]}. The next month after this episode, they have already scheduled a court hearing in this case – Richard Culley reports on October 13 that tenants in Cotton, loyal to Paston, do not want to contact Yelverton and Jenny, and therefore are in no hurry to appear at court ^{[6, p. 315]}.

Paston tried to address the King directly. At the end of 1461 or at the beginning of 1462 ^{[6, c. 53]}, he drafted a petition addressed to the Lord Chancellor (at that time George Neville, Bishop of Exeter, was the younger brother of the "Kingmaker" and, accordingly, cousin of Edward IV), in which he outlined the situation with Fastolfe's will and He accused Yelverton and Jenny of violating his last will ^{[6, p. 56]}. Apparently, it was after this that Roger Chamberlain was invited to testify about the will, but no progress was made in the dispute over Cotton until 1464, when Jenny already took over the initiative. From April to November, court sessions were held at which he and Yelverton argued that Paston had intentionally distorted the will of the late Fastolfe ^{[6, p. 101]}. Paston was summoned to court four times on this issue ^{[6, p. 107]}, however, he ignored the meetings all four times, and therefore was declared outlawed by the king ^{[6, p. 116]} – his property was confiscated, and the disputed lands were transferred to the management of Jenny. On November 3, Paston was taken into custody for the second time ^{[6, p. 118]}, however, he did not stay there for long, since in the spring Margaret Paston was waiting for her husband to return home ^{[6, p. 132]}. The verdict must have been overturned at the same time.

These perturbations in John Paston's life, which seriously undermined his health, since he died not an old man yet shortly after his third arrest, fall during the period when Edward IV pursued a policy of compromise aimed at attracting the "repentant" part of the Lancastrian nobility to the Yorkist camp. Paston was neither a Lancastrian nor an active Yorkist, and therefore his position turned out to be especially difficult – if earlier he could rely on Oxford or Norfolk against the people of Suffolk, now Norfolk and Suffolk acted together, and he had to survive in adverse conditions.

Conclusion

The biography of John Paston serves as a vivid illustration of how the fate of the provincial nobility in England of the XV century developed. Being a man who was initially far from the confrontation between the two dynastic groups, he had a lot of both friendly and hostile neighbors, in interaction with whom his life passed. This interaction determined how political battles developed at the provincial level – a dispute over a particular castle between two middle-class feudal lords could determine which of the two factions would gain power in the county; small-scale nobles sought patrons among the nobility to satisfy their rather local ambitions, and the nobility, in turn, looked for someone to she can rely on this region, hoping to use the Pastons, Moleyns, Haydons, Tuddenhams, etc. in the struggle for the crown.

Paston was not as lucky as he could have been – he tried to the last not to take sides, which, as it turned out, promised no less problems than being a supporter of the losing party. As a result, when the dynasty changed, he had to face both the Yorkists, for whom he was not unequivocally loyal, and the former Lancastrians who defected to the Yorkists, and his former allies, who, in the lull in the civil war, instantly turned into rivals. Using his example, one can see how difficult it was for a provincial nobleman to survive, even if his native county was bypassed by the battles of the Wars of the Roses.