The Junta, meanwhile, expected with impatience the emperor’s answer to their remonstrance, which they had appointed some of their number to present. The members entrusted with this commission set out immediately for Germany [Oct. 20], but having received at different places certain intelligence from court, that they could not venture to appear there without endangering their lives, they stopped short in their Journey, and acquainted the Junta of the information which had been given them. This excited such violent passions as transported the whole party beyond all bounds of prudence or of moderation. That a king of Castile should deny his subjects access into his presence, or refuse to listen to their humble petitions, was represented as an act of tyranny so unprecedented and intolerable, that nothing now remained but with arms in their hands to drive away that ravenous band of foreigners which encompassed the throne, who, after having devoured the wealth of the kingdom, found it necessary to prevent the cries of an injured people from reaching the ears of their sovereign. Many insisted warmly on approving a motion which had formerly been made, for depriving Charles, during the life of his mother, of the regal titles and authority which had been too rashly conferred upon him, from a false supposition of her total inability for government. Some proposed to provide a proper person to assist her in the administration of public affairs, by marrying the queen to the prince of Calabria, the heir of the Aragonese kings of Naples, who had been detained in prison since the time that Ferdinand had dispossessed his ancestors of their crown. An agreed, that as the hopes of obtaining redress and security, merely by presenting their requests to their sovereign, had kept them too long in a state of inaction, and prevented them from taking advantage of the unanimity with which the nation declared in their favor, it was now necessary to collect their whole force, and to exert themselves with vigour, m opposing this fatal combination of the king and nobility against their liberties.

They soon took the field with twenty thousand men. Violent disputes arose concerning the command of this army. Padilla, the darling of the people and soldiers, was the only person whom they thought worthy of this honor. But Don Pedro de Giron, the eldest son of the Conde de Uruena, a young nobleman of the first order, having lately joined the commons out of private resentment against the emperor, the respect due to his birth, together with a secret desire of disappointing Padilla, of whose popularity many members of the Junta had become jealous, procured him the office of general [Nov. 23]; though he soon gave them a fatal proof that he possessed neither the experience, the abilities, nor the steadiness, which that important station required.

The regents, meanwhile, appointed Rioseco as the place of rendezvous for their troops, which, though far inferior to those of the commons in number, excelled them greatly in discipline and in valor. They had drawn a considerable body of regular and veteran infantry out of Navarre. Their cavalry, which formed the chief strength of their army, consisted mostly of gentlemen accustomed to the military life, and animated with the martial spirit peculiar to their order in that age. The infantry of the Junta was formed entirely of citizens and mechanics, little acquainted with the use of arms. The small body of cavalry which they had been able to raise was composed of persons of ignoble birth, and perfect strangers to the service into which they entered. The character of the generals differed no less than that of their troops. The royalists were commanded by the Conde de Haro, the constable’s eldest son, an officer of great experience and of distinguished abilities.

Giron marched with his army directly to Rioseco, and seizing the villages and passes around it, hoped that the royalists would be obliged either to surrender for want of provisions, or to fight with disadvantage before all their troops were assembled. But he had not the abilities, nor his troops the patience and discipline, necessary for the execution of such a scheme. The Conde de Haro found little difficulty in conducting a considerable reinforcement through all his posts into the town; and Giron, despairing of being able to reduce it, advanced suddenly to Villapanda, a place belonging to the constable, in which the enemy had their chief magazine of provisions. By this ill-judged motion, he left Tordesillas open to the royalists, whom the Conde de Haro led thither in the night, with the utmost secrecy and dispatch; and attacking the town [Dec. 5], in which Giron had left no other garrison than a regiment of priests raised by the bishop of Zamora, he, by break of day, forced his way into it after a desperate resistance, became master of the queen's person, took prisoners many members of the Junta, and recovered the great seal, with the other ensigns of government.

By this fatal blow, the Junta lost all the reputation and authority which they had derived from seeming to act by the queen's commands; such of the nobles as had hitherto been wavering or undetermined in their choice, now joined the regents with all their forces; and a universal consternation seized the partisans of the commons. This was much increased by the suspicions they began to entertain of Giron, whom they loudly accused of having betrayed Tordesillas to the enemy; and though that charge seems to have been destitute of foundation, the success of the royalists being owing to Giron’s ill conduct rather than to his treachery, he so entirely lost credit with his party, that he resigned his commission, and retired to one of his castles.

Such members of the Junta as had escaped the enemy’s hands at Tordesillas, fled to Valladolid; and as it would have required a long time to supply the places of those who were prisoners by a new election, they made choice among themselves of a small number of persons, to whom they committed the supreme direction of affairs. Their army, which grew stronger every day by the arrival of troops from different parts of the kingdom, marched likewise to Valladolid; and Padilla being appointed commander in chief, the spirits of the soldiery revived, and the whole party forgetting the late misfortune, continued to express the same ardent zeal for the liberties of their country, and the same implacable animosity against their oppressors.

What they stood most in need of, was money to pay their troops. A great part of the current coin had been carried out of the kingdom by the Flemings; the stated taxes levied in times of peace were inconsiderable; commerce of every kind being interrupted by the war, the sum which it yielded decreased daily; and the Junta were afraid of disgusting the people by burdening them with new impositions, to which, in that age, they were little accustomed. But from this difficulty they were extricated by Donna Maria Pacheco, Padilla’s wife, a woman of noble birth, of great abilities, of boundless ambition, and animated with the most ardent zeal in support of the cause of the Junta. She, with a boldness superior to those superstitious fears which often influence her sex, proposed to seize all the rich and magnificent ornaments in the cathedral of Toledo; but lest that action, by its appearance of impiety, might offend the people, she and her retinue marched to the church in solemn procession, in mourning habits, with tears in their eyes, beating their breasts, and falling on their knees, implored the pardon of the saints whose shrines she was about to violate. By this artifice, which screened her from the imputation of sacrilege, and persuaded the people that necessity and zeal for a good cause had constrained her, though with reluctance, to venture upon this action, she stripped the cathedral of whatever was valuable, and procured a considerable supply of money for the Junta. The regents, no less at a loss how to maintain their troops, the revenues of the crown having either been dissipated by the Flemings, or seized by the commons, were obliged to take the queen’s jewels, together with the plate belonging to the nobility, and apply them to that purpose; and when those failed, they obtained a small sum by way of loan from the king of Portugal.

The nobility discovered great unwillingness to proceed to extremities with the Junta. They were animated with no less hatred than the commons against the Flemings; they approved much of several articles in the remonstrance; they thought the juncture favorable, not only for redressing past grievances, but for rendering the constitution more perfect and secure by new regulations; they were afraid, that while the two orders, of which the legislature was composed, wasted each other’s strength by mutual hostilities, the crown would rise to power on the ruin or weakness of both, and encroach no less on the independence of the nobles, than on the privileges of the commons. To this disposition were owing the frequent overtures of peace which the regents made to the Junta, and the continual negotiations they carried on during the progress of their military operations. Nor were the terms which they offered unreasonable; for on condition that the Junta would pass from a few articles most subversive of the royal authority, or inconsistent with the rights of the nobility, they engaged to procure the emperor’s consent to their other demands, which if he, through the influence of evil counselors, should refuse, several of the nobles promised to join with the commons in their endeavors to extort it.

Such divisions, however, prevailed among the members of the Junta, as prevented their deliberating calmly, or judging with prudence. Some of the cities which had entered into the confederacy, were filled with that mean jealousy and distrust of each other, which rivalship in commerce or in grandeur is apt to inspire; the constable, by his influence and promises, had prevailed on the inhabitants of Burgos to abandon the Junta, and other noblemen had shaken the fidelity of some of the lesser cities; no person had arisen among the commons of such superior abilities or elevation of mind as to acquire the direction of their affairs; Padilla, their general, was a man of popular qualities, but distrusted for that reason by those of highest rank who adhered to the Junta; the conduct of Giron led the people to view, with suspicion, every person of noble birth who joined their party; so that the strongest marks of irresolution, mutual distrust, and mediocrity of genius, appeared in all their proceedings at this time. After many consultations held concerning the terms proposed by the regents, they suffered themselves to be so carried away by resentment against the nobility, that, rejecting all thoughts of accommodation, they threatened to strip them of the crown lands, which they or their ancestors had usurped, and to re-annex these to the royal domain. Upon this preposterous scheme, which would at once have annihilated all the liberties for which they had been struggling, by rendering the kings of Castile absolute and independent on their subjects, they were so intent, that they now exclaimed with less vehemence against the exactions of the foreign ministers, than against the exorbitant power and wealth of the nobles, and seemed to hope that they might make peace with Charles, by offering to enrich him with their spoils.

The success which Padilla had met with in several small encounters, and in reducing some inconsiderable towns, helped to precipitate the members of the Junta into this measure, filling them with such confidence in the valor of their troops, that they hoped for an easy victory over the royalists. Padilla, that his army might not remain inactive while flushed with good fortune, laid siege to Torrelobaton, a place of greater strength and importance than any that he bad hitherto ventured to attack, and which was defended by a sufficient garrison; and though the besieged made a desperate resistance, and the admiral attempted to relieve them, he took the town by storm [March 1, 1531], and gave it up to be plundered by his soldiers. If he had marched instantly with his victorious army to Tordesillas, the head quarters of the royalists, he could hardly have failed of making an effectual impression on their troops, whom he would have found in astonishment at the briskness of his operations, and far from being of sufficient strength to give him battle. But the fickleness and imprudence of the Junta prevented his taking this step. Incapable, like all popular associations, either of carrying on war or of making peace, they listened again to overtures of accommodation, and even agreed to a short suspension of arms. This negotiation terminated in nothing; but while it was carrying on, many of Padilla’s soldiers, unacquainted with the restraints of discipline, went off with the booty which they had got at Torrelobaton; and others, wearied out by the unusual length of the campaign, deserted. The constable too had leisure to assemble his forces at Burgos, and to prepare everything for taking the field; and as soon as the truce expired he effected a junction with the Conde de Haro, in spite of all Padilla’s efforts to prevent it. They advanced immediately towards Torrelobaton; and Padilla, finding the number of his troops so diminished that he durst not risk a battle, attempted to retreat to Toro, which, if he could have accomplished, the invasion of Navarre at that juncture by the French, and the necessity which the regents must have been under of detaching men to that kingdom, might have saved him from danger. But Haro, sensible how fatal the consequences would be of suffering him to escape, marched with such rapidity at the head of his cavalry, that he came up with him near Villalar [April 231], and, without waiting for his infantry, advanced to the attack. Padilla’s army, fatigued and disheartened by their precipitant retreat, which they could not distinguish from a flight, happened at that time to be passing over a ploughed field, on which such a violent rain had fallen, that the soldiers sunk almost to the knees at every step, and remained exposed to the fire of some field-pieces which the royalists had brought along with them. All these circumstances so disconcerted and intimidated raw soldiers, without facing the enemy, or making any resistance, they fled in the utmost confusion. Padilla exerted himself with extraordinary courage and activity in order to rally them, though in vain; fear rendering them deaf both to his threats and entreaties; upon which, finding matters irretrievable, and resolving not to survive the disgrace of that day, and the ruin of his party, he rushed into the thickest of the enemy; but being wounded and dismounted, he was taken prisoner. His principal officers shared the same fate; the common soldiers were allowed to depart unhurt, the nobles being too generous to kill men who threw down their arms.

The resentment of his enemies did not suffer Padilla to linger long in expectation of what should befall him. Next day he was condemned to lose his head, though without any regular trial, the notoriety of the crime being supposed sufficient to supersede the formality of a legal process. He was led instantly to execution, together with Don John Bravo, and Don Francis Maldonado, the former commander of the Segovians, and the latter of the troops of Salamanca. Padilla viewed the approach of death with calm but undaunted fortitude; and when Bravo, his fellow-sufferer, expressed some indignation at hearing himself proclaimed a traitor, he checked hint, by observing, “That yesterday was the time to have displayed the spirit of gentlemen, this day to die with the meekness of Christians”. Being permitted to write to his wife and to the community of Toledo, the place of his nativity, he addressed the former with a manly and virtuous tenderness, and the latter with the exultation natural to one who considered himself as a martyr for the liberties of his country.

The letter of Don John Padilla to his wife.

"Señora,

If your grief did not afflict me more than my own death, I should deem myself perfectly happy. For the end of life being certain to all men, the Almighty confers a mark of distinguishing favor upon that person, for whom he appoints a death such as mine, which, though lamented by many, is nevertheless acceptable unto him. It would require more time than I now have, to write anything that could afford you consolation. That my enemies will not grant me, nor do I wish to delay the reception of that crown which I hope to enjoy. You may bewail your own loss, but not my death, which, being so honorable, ought not to be lamented by any. My soul, for nothing else is left to me, I bequeath to you. You will receive it, as the thing in this world which you valued most. I do not write to my father Pedro Lopez, because I dare not, for though I have shown myself to be his son in daring to lose my life, I have not been the heir of his good fortune. I will not attempt to say anything more, that I may not tire the executioner, who waits for me, and that I may not excite a suspicion, that, in order to prolong my life, I lengthen out my letter. My servant Sosia, an eyewitness, and to whom I have communicated my most secret thoughts, will inform you of what I cannot now write; and thus I rest, expecting the instrument of your grief, and of my deliverance”.

After this, he submitted quietly to his fate. Most of the Spanish historians, accustomed to ideas of government and of regal power, very different from those upon which he acted, have been so eager to testify their disapprobation of the cause in which he was engaged, that they have neglected, or have been afraid to do justice to his virtues; and by blackening his memory, have endeavored to deprive him of that pity which is seldom denied to illustrious sufferers.