A Tribute to

Francis Lovell, Lord of Longdendale

1454 - 1487

The blue plaque located on Mottram Court House, Jackson Street, Mottram was unveiled on 22nd August 2001 as a tribute to Francis Lovell, Lord of Longdendale.

The Lovell family came into possession of the township of Mottram in the time of Edward III when Sir John Lovell, a warrior of great bravery and fame, held the lordship of Longdendale from the king by military service.

Most of the Lovells figure in history and Francis, Lord Viscount Lovell, born in 1454, was no exception. He was a great favourite with Richard III and exercised an immense influence in shaping the course of English affairs of the day. He was the Lovell of the ancient couplet:

"The cat, the rat and Lovell the dog, rule all England under a hog".

The cat was Catesby, the rat Ratcliffe of Ordsall Hall, Salford, and the hog represented the king.

Francis Lowell was indeed looked upon by his tenants in Mottram as being of almost equal importance to the king. His word was law, his favour was courted and his anger feared.

As the only son of Sir John, 8th Baron Lovell of Titchmarsh, through his parents and grandparents, he was heir to a vast inheritance. This included manors and fee farms as far apart as Upton Lovell in Wiltshire, Acton Burnell in Shropshire and Rotherfield and Bainton in Yorkshire. In addition, he was related to some of the great nobles, Lancastrian and Yorkist, of the age.

Francis was only eleven years old when his father died in 1465. Following his father's death he became a ward of the King. Edward IV gave him into the charge of one of his chief supporters, Richard Neville, the Earl of Warwick. Also in Warwick's household was the King's nine year old brother Richard, Duke of Gloucester.

At the Earl's great castle of Middleham in Wensleydale, the boys received instruction in Latin, law, mathematics, music, religion, and the code of chivalric behaviour and etiquette. Each day they practised riding, hunting, and the use of arms. In the evening they were taught to sing, dance, and play musical instruments.

Francis became a close friend and loyal supporter of Richard, who knighted Francis in 1480 while he was on an expedition against the Scots. Two years later, he was created Viscount Lovell by Edward IV, due possibly to Richard's influence. When Gloucester became King Richard III in 1483, Francis bore the third sword at his coronation. Later that year Richard appointed Lovell to several offices, including that of Chief Butler of all England, Privy Councillor, and Lord Chancellor of the Kings Household. The latter appointment implied constant personal contact with the king. His creation of Knight of the Garter also occurred during this year. Lovell had now been elevated from a Lord of relatively minor importance to one of the most powerful men in England.

In 1485 Sir Francis fought under Richard during the king's darkest hour, the Battle of Bosworth Field on 22nd August, where Richard was killed on the battlefield and the Crown taken by Henry VII. Francis had survived, but fled for his life and sought sanctuary at St. John's Abbey, Colchester.

Lovell went on to instigate a potentially dangerous but ill-organised revolt in Yorkshire against Henry VII where he nearly succeeded in capturing the king in 1486. When the rising was put down he fled to Lancashire and spent some time in hiding before eventually escaping to Flanders.

In May 1487 he travelled to Ireland and then to England with John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, and a force of German mercenaries in support of the Pretender Lambert Simnel. Lovell was a prominent figure at the 'court' held for a brief period by the would be king at the Peel of Fouldrey on Fouldrey Island, off the Lancashire coast.

On behalf of Simnel, Lovell fought in the Battle of Stoke, 16th June 1487, and the last seen of him was after the defeat of the rebel army, when he was observed to join in the fight, and to swim the Trent on horseback, scrambling to safety up the riverbank. Some say he was slain in this battle, but the popular version of his death ascribes to him a different ending.

An irregular shaped plate of gilded copper bearing within the Garter a shield quarterly: 1, barry wavy gold and gules (for Lovell) ; 2, azure billety and a dance gold (for Deincourt); 3, azure fleury and a leopard rampant silver (for Holand) ; 4, Barry silver and azure a baston gules (for Grey of Rotherfield) ; an escutcheon of pretence silver a lion sable crowned gold (for Burnell). Above is a silver helm garnished gold, with deep purple mantle sown with gold locks and lined ermine, with blue, red and gold tassels, surmounted by the crest, a silver dog having about his neck a gold crown and chain, and sitting on an azure and gold torse.

Sir Francis Lovell's Garter Plate, located at St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle. Reproduced by permission of the Dean and Canons of Windsor.

With his enemies in pursuit, and afraid to even trust his friends, he made his way alone to his house at Minster Lovell, near Oxford, and entered it under cover of darkness. Then, not daring to trust even his most loyal servants, he quietly made his way to a secret underground chamber, and there incarcerated himself, hoping to remain hidden until he could find some means of escape from the country.

No one knows what actually happened but it is possible to surmise. It would appear that Francis was then unable to open the door by which he entered his hiding place, and, having told no one of his intention to make use of the chamber, he was left to die of starvation. In all probability, when he found out his predicament, he attempted to set some record of it down on paper, but, if so, his story was destined never to be read.

In 1708, several hundred years after his death, a party of workmen broke into an underground chamber at Minster Lovell and, to their great surprise, came across a skeleton. The skeleton, thought to be the frame of Francis Lovell, was found sitting at a table, the hand resting on a bundle of papers. Unfortunately, with the admission of air it soon crumbled into dust along with the sacred papers.

Officially, a court held just after his disappearance decided that he had escaped to the continent and had died at Flanders, but due to the lack of evidence we will probably never know what really happened.

After the Battle of Stoke, Lovell's lands were confiscated by the crown, and were later granted to Sir William Stanley, who had turned the fortunes of the day at Bosworth Field. With this change of ownership, Longdendale was passed out of the hands of the Lovells forever.