Read Online Tales From the Tower of London by Mark P Donnelly - Free Book Online
Authors: Mark P Donnelly
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Chronicle and the writings of Philippe de Commines, before the end of the year rumours and accusations in connection with the boys’ disappearance and supposed deaths were running wild. There were calls for the young princes to be brought before the public. Throughout the later months of the year massed demonstrations, sometimes bordering on riot, protested their disappearance all across the south of England. Strangely, Richard refused to make any comment as to the boys’ whereabouts, their health or address any question concerning them.
But apparently everyone did not share the public’s concern for the boys. Their mother, Elizabeth Woodville, seemed unperturbed about the disappearance of her sons. As rumours and accusations rose, Elizabeth sent her three daughters from Westminster to the Tower to live with their uncle Richard. Certainly Richard was no friend; he had already executed her father, Earl Rivers, and one of her sons, Lord Richard Grey. But these executions had been carried out according to the law as part of the big game of medieval power politics. Certainly if she had thought he was complicit in the death or disappearance of the princes she would never have handed her daughters over to him.
But Richard’s life continued in a downward spiral. In April 1484, his son died at the age of ten. The following year his wife, Anne, followed their only child to the grave. With no heir and no wife to produce another, Richard again became politically vulnerable. In an attempt to bolster his position, he sent for another orphaned nephew, the Earl of Warwick – son of his late brother the Duke of Clarence – and appointed him heir to the Yorkist line. It was not enough. The combination of continuing rumours about the princes and the desperate Lancastrian longing to reclaim the kingdom brought Richard’s enemies into the open. Chief among them was Henry Tudor, Duke of Richmond. Henry Tudor had been in exile in Brittany since the Battle of Tewkesbury. Then he was only fourteen, now he was twenty-eight.
Although officially barred from the throne because he was part of the Lancastrian line, Henry was determined to reclaim the crown for his family. And he had plenty of help inside England. His mother, Lady Margaret Beaufort, the Countess of Richmond and Derby, was ambitious for her son and had plenty of money and connections, both of which she devoted wholeheartedly to his cause. On 7 August 1485, Henry Tudor landed at Milford Haven in Wales with two thousand French mercenary troops and began marching eastward to meet Richard III.
Sixteen days later the two armies met in an open field near the town of Bosworth. Richard’s army was more than twice the size of Henry’s and it should have been an easy victory. The battle only lasted two hours and no more than a hundred men were lost on either side, but at a crucial point in the fighting Richard’s allies, the Earl of Northumbria and Lord Stanley (the same Lord Stanley who Richard had briefly jailed after the council meeting of 20 June and whose army alone was larger than that of Henry Tudor) betrayed Richard, turning their men against the king and his forces.
When Richard’s horse stumbled on marshy land, he was thrown to the ground. As Lord Stanley’s men closed in around him, a loyal page fought his way through the crowd to bring Richard a horse – urging him to flee the field. Richard refused, shouting, ‘I will not budge a foot, I will die King of England.’ Now, nearly alone among his enemies, his sword broken and having only a war hammer with which to defend himself, Richard was hacked to death, crying ‘Treason – treason’, in Stanley’s direction. His mangled body was stripped naked and flung across a horse to be paraded through the streets of nearby Leicester. Richard’s crown, lost in the heat of battle, was picked up by Stanley who placed it on the head of Henry Tudor, whom he proclaimed King Henry VII.
Almost immediately, King Henry ordered the
But apparently everyone did not share the public’s concern for the boys. Their mother, Elizabeth Woodville, seemed unperturbed about the disappearance of her sons. As rumours and accusations rose, Elizabeth sent her three daughters from Westminster to the Tower to live with their uncle Richard. Certainly Richard was no friend; he had already executed her father, Earl Rivers, and one of her sons, Lord Richard Grey. But these executions had been carried out according to the law as part of the big game of medieval power politics. Certainly if she had thought he was complicit in the death or disappearance of the princes she would never have handed her daughters over to him.
But Richard’s life continued in a downward spiral. In April 1484, his son died at the age of ten. The following year his wife, Anne, followed their only child to the grave. With no heir and no wife to produce another, Richard again became politically vulnerable. In an attempt to bolster his position, he sent for another orphaned nephew, the Earl of Warwick – son of his late brother the Duke of Clarence – and appointed him heir to the Yorkist line. It was not enough. The combination of continuing rumours about the princes and the desperate Lancastrian longing to reclaim the kingdom brought Richard’s enemies into the open. Chief among them was Henry Tudor, Duke of Richmond. Henry Tudor had been in exile in Brittany since the Battle of Tewkesbury. Then he was only fourteen, now he was twenty-eight.
Although officially barred from the throne because he was part of the Lancastrian line, Henry was determined to reclaim the crown for his family. And he had plenty of help inside England. His mother, Lady Margaret Beaufort, the Countess of Richmond and Derby, was ambitious for her son and had plenty of money and connections, both of which she devoted wholeheartedly to his cause. On 7 August 1485, Henry Tudor landed at Milford Haven in Wales with two thousand French mercenary troops and began marching eastward to meet Richard III.
Sixteen days later the two armies met in an open field near the town of Bosworth. Richard’s army was more than twice the size of Henry’s and it should have been an easy victory. The battle only lasted two hours and no more than a hundred men were lost on either side, but at a crucial point in the fighting Richard’s allies, the Earl of Northumbria and Lord Stanley (the same Lord Stanley who Richard had briefly jailed after the council meeting of 20 June and whose army alone was larger than that of Henry Tudor) betrayed Richard, turning their men against the king and his forces.
When Richard’s horse stumbled on marshy land, he was thrown to the ground. As Lord Stanley’s men closed in around him, a loyal page fought his way through the crowd to bring Richard a horse – urging him to flee the field. Richard refused, shouting, ‘I will not budge a foot, I will die King of England.’ Now, nearly alone among his enemies, his sword broken and having only a war hammer with which to defend himself, Richard was hacked to death, crying ‘Treason – treason’, in Stanley’s direction. His mangled body was stripped naked and flung across a horse to be paraded through the streets of nearby Leicester. Richard’s crown, lost in the heat of battle, was picked up by Stanley who placed it on the head of Henry Tudor, whom he proclaimed King Henry VII.
Almost immediately, King Henry ordered the
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