WI "Edward VI" wins at Stoke?

It was a bloody hard fought battle. And Henry had difficulties with the loyalty of his forces, like Richard at Bosworth.

Suppose that he loses - he and his chief supporters present at Stoke fall in battle or are taken alive and summarily put to death.

Not all Henry´s supporters are present at Stoke. Some are away, like queen Elizabeth, her ten month old son Arthur and the Archbishop Morton of Morton´s Fork.

What happens to them?

Who will be in Edward VI-s government? What policies will he pursue? Who will he marry?

Remember, he is young and does no enjoy a very royal education and upbringing (khm, Lambert Simnel)....
 
Assuming that once victory is assured Simnel is packed off to a kitchen somewhere and is replaced by the real Earl of Warwick as Edward VI - then the actual ruler is John Earl of Lincoln (son of Elizabeth Duchess of Suffolk youngest sister of Edward IV and Richard of Gloucester). John is married if i remember to a Fitzalan niece of Elizabeth Wydeville (widow of Edward IV).
John is going to have to do some deft family dealing to secure the regime though - many Yorkists have affection for Edward IV's surviving daughters including the now deposed Queen Consort and her infant son and to them the situation is even better no Henry VII but instead a Yorkist dowager and an infant King Arthur undoubted grandson of Edward IV. Elizabeth had probably holed up in the tower with her mother mother in law and sisters and is heavily defended. She is hardly likely to accept her cousin now she has a son to fight for and she can also depend on surviving Lancastrian peers as well.
To proclaim Warwick King Lincoln is relying solely on Yorkists who despised Edward IV's wife and supported his brother Richard III and that's a fairly narrow band.
 
Considering Warwick's in the Tower, it would seem a bit odd for Elizabeth and baby Arthur to go and take refuge there. Either, Yorkist sympathisers would spring Warwick, or diehard Tudors would off him. It may well be, as per previous examples, that the queen and her son head for sanctuary in Westminster Abbey

Don't forget also, that the Yorkists have substantial Irish and Burgundian backing

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
Just as likely they pretend that the actual Earl of Warwick is a fake that Henry VII found.

Correcto! They wouldn't pack off Lambert Simnel to a kitchen somewhere because it would be impossible to claim that he and the real Edward were the same person. Just because they looked alike doesn't mean that they are identical twins, and another thing people forget in this era is that people actually had integrity - far more integrity than in this day and age, anyway. Remember, this is the same period as when Francis I, the King of France, heard that his sons had escaped from where they were being held as hostages specifically to secure his freedom, so he voluntarily rode to Spain and handed himself in to be a Spanish prisoner for (something like) two years. Sure, some Yorkists might play along, I mean Richard Symonds did invent his identity on purpose, but it'd be virtually impossible to assume that all the Yorkists who saw him on the campaign up the Battle of Stoke Field (and that's quite a few of them, perhaps even most) would be willing to pretend this too. They had been invited to join the campaign under Edward VI, and then being told that he was actually just a charade , a ploy, would be a massive slap in the face. The idea of using people like this as fakes would be anathema to any of the virtuous, honest nobles and knights who found out, and it would probably cause them to desert the fake Edward and spread the news. And if the news got out, it would surely be the end of the uprising, unless they somehow managed to rescue Edward before it went pear-shaped (hard) and even then his reign would be beset with problems ever after. Any peasants who heard about it would view it as a breach of trust between King/noble and the people, and the City of London would probably turn against the Yorkists...which makes rescuing Edward hard. It would also cause Europe to become outraged, meaning no more Burgundian support and lots of trouble with the Pope excommunicating people. And the Yorkists knew this. They simply couldn't afford to let anyone know that Simnel was a fake. That's why Henry VII paraded "his" Edward in London while the campaign went on - to prove to the people that the Yorkists were deceivers and shouldn't be trusted.
 
Not really it was a secure Royal Palace as well as a prison - it was easy to defend and gives the remnants of Henry's government and his Queen the opportunity to parade the real Earl if need be. Also its a mistake at this period to simply qualify supporters of revolts as Yorkist or Lancastrians - that idea was dead in the 1470's. After Richard of Gloucester's usurpation the Yorkists were fractured and by then their were very few Lancastrians who hadnt acclimatised to Yorkist rule. Also don't under estimate the ability of Elizabeth Wydeville and Margaret Beaufort to destroy all comers either. And as had been proved by her mothers flight to sanctuary with Richard of York just four years earlier the Abbey was no protection.
Over the years much has been made that it was after this rebellion that Elizabeth Wydeville was banished from court with the assumption that she supported Lincoln because she'd discovered her sons lived or discovered their true fate, however that isn't strictly true and it is highly unlikely that she would have supported a rebellion that would have unseated her daughter and grandson and raised up the son of the one brother in law she truly disliked.
As to Warwick - their bigger problem is when they present their fake to his surviving grandmother - the Countess of Warwick is still very much alive and well - and his sister Margaret Plantagenet who is in the care of Henry VII's mother - if they don't or can't substitute him for the real one they are in serious trouble.

Considering Warwick's in the Tower, it would seem a bit odd for Elizabeth and baby Arthur to go and take refuge there. Either, Yorkist sympathisers would spring Warwick, or diehard Tudors would off him. It may well be, as per previous examples, that the queen and her son head for sanctuary in Westminster Abbey

Don't forget also, that the Yorkists have substantial Irish and Burgundian backing

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
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