Tudor (65 page)

                    
Men of Harlech in the hollow,

                    
Do ye hear like rushing billow,

                    
Wave on wave that surging follow,

                    
Battle's distant sound?

                    
'Tis the tramp of Saxon foemen,

                    
Saxon spearmen, Saxon bowmen,

                    
Be they knight, or hinds or yeomen

                    
They shall bite the ground!

  
9
.
  
Eric Ives,
The Reformation Experience
(2012), p. 38.

10
.
  
Pamela Nightingale,
A Medieval Mercantile Community: The Grocers Company
(1995), pp. 519, 535.

11
.
  
Vergil,
Three Books
, p. 135.

12
.
  
Ibid., p. 143.

13
.
  
Jones and Underwood,
The King's Mother
, pp. 54–5.

14
.
  
Vergil,
Three Books
, p. 146.

15
.
  
The account is that of John Warkworth, the Master of Peterhouse, Cambridge.

16
.
  
David Clark,
Barnet – 1471: Death of a Kingmaker
(2006), p. 56.

17
.
  
Cora L. Scofield,
The Life and Reign of Edward the Fourth: King
of England and of France and Lord of Ireland
(1923), Vol. 1, p. 587; HMC Report 12, Appendix 4, p. 4; Clarence witnessed Prince Edward's death and made comments in a letter written only two days later; the Lancastrian commander, Margaret's cousin Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset – the last legitimate male of the Beaufort line – managed to escape to the local abbey and claimed sanctuary, but he was taken and executed. King Edward's contemporary apologists claimed the abbey had no franchise for protecting traitors. Mancini,
Usurpation of Richard the Third
, n. 54, p. 177.

18
.
  
John Warkworth's account, Scofield,
The Life and Reign of Edward the Fourth
, Vol. 1, p. 594. King Edward's youngest brother, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, was reportedly amongst those present.

19
.
  
J. L. Laynesmith,
The Last Medieval Queens: English Queenship 1445–1503
(2004), p. 175.

20
.
  
Griffiths,
The Reign of Henry VI
, p. 892; Henry Holland, Duke of Exeter, who would be drowned in 1475, was seen by the French chronicler Philippe de Commynes as ‘next in line of succession to the Lancastrian family', but he was not a descendant of John of Gaunt. Henry Tudor was the last man standing in the House of Lancaster.

21
.
  
Sir Roger Vaughan.

22
.
  
John Leland, quoted in Thomas, PhD diss., op. cit., p. 224.

23
.
  
Philippe de Commynes,
Memoirs, The Reign of Louis XI
(ed and tr. M. Jones) (1972), p. 353.

24
.
  
Griffiths and Thomas,
The Making of the Tudor Dynasty
, pp. 76, 77; Jones and Underwood,
The King's Mother
, p. 58;
Memorials of King Henry VII
(ed James Gairdner) Rolls Series (1858), pp. 15, 16; Vergil,
Three Books
, p. 155.

25
.
  
Lord Stanley was appointed steward late in 1471 so this was a recent appointment at the time of her marriage, and took place exactly when she would have been considering her options.

26
.
  
He had inherited the title from his father thirteen years earlier.

5
     
Enter Richard III

  
1
.
  
Jones and Underwood,
The King's Mother
, p. 146; J Hoult,
The Village, Manor and Township of Knowsley
(1930), p. 32. Margaret was also close to her stepdaughter, for whom she would order clothes.

  
2
.
  
The Travels of Leo of Rozmital
(ed and tr. M. Letts), Hakluyt Society, additional series cviii (1957), pp. 46, 47.

  
3
.
  
Mancini,
Usurpation of Richard the Third
, p. 67; Rosemary Horrox, ‘Edward IV',
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
.

  
4
.
  
The French chronicler Philippe de Commynes had seen him as ‘next in line of succession to the Lancastrian family' after the death of Henry VI.

  
5
.
  
Writing only five years later, the Roman scholar and visitor to England Dominic Mancini described it as ‘sweet wine', while Philippe de Commynes describes it unequivocally as Malmsey, which was a type of sweet wine imported from Greece. Today his name adorns Blandy's Duke of Clarence Madeira.

  
6
.
  
The pardon survives on the back of the patent that made his father Earl of Richmond.

  
7
.
  
Mancini,
Usurpation of Richard the Third
, p. 59; other sources mention his death as being caused by a surfeit of wine or vegetables.

  
8
.
  
Richard had travelled from Northampton to Stony Stratford ‘at full gallop'. Mancini,
Usurpation of Richard the Third
, p. 77.

  
9
.
  
Ibid., p. 137, Appendix. Description by Nicolas von Poppeleau, who met him.

10
.
  
The type of scoliosis was idiopathic adolescent onset scoliosis. It would have developed after the age of ten and got worse as he got older. He may have stood as short as four foot eight inches tall. The body also had gracile radius bones, which would fit with descriptions of his slender limbs. John Rous'
Historia Regum Angliae
, completed after Richard's death, offered the earliest aspersions on his appearance. Richard was ‘retained within his mother's
womb for two years, emerging with teeth and hair to his shoulders' and ‘small of stature with a short face and unequal shoulders, the right higher than the left'. Scoliosis is often hereditary, so it may be relevant that not only was Richard's great-great-nephew Edward VI described as having one shoulder higher than another, but his great-great-great-niece Lady Mary Grey was described as extremely short, ‘crook backed and very ugly'. On the other claims concerning Richard: babies are often born with full heads of hair and also long fingernails – although the story of Richard's teeth seems far-fetched. Alison Hanham,
Richard III and His Early Historians 1483–1535
(1975), pp. 120, 121.

11
.
  
A descendant in the male line of John of Gaunt's youngest brother, Thomas of Woodstock, he also had a Beaufort mother, the daughter of Edmund Beaufort, 2nd Duke of Somerset. Buckingham was the nephew of Margaret Beaufort's late husband Henry Stafford.

12
.
  
Mancini,
Usurpation of Richard the Third
, pp. 78, 79.

13
.
  
DeLloyd J. Guth, ‘Richard III, Henry VII and the City' in
Kings and Nobles in the Later Middle Ages: A Tribute to Charles Derek Ross
(ed Ralph A. Griffiths and James Sherborne) (1987), p. 187.

14
.
  
Laynesmith,
The Last Medieval Queens
, p. 177.

15
.
  
Thomas More recorded how the night before the council meeting Margaret Beaufort's husband Thomas, Lord Stanley, had this nightmare. Awaking shortly before midnight Stanley sent a message to Hastings suggesting they flee the city. Hastings advised him to ignore the dream as insignificant, with fatal consequences.

16
.
  
In a public sermon that day it was alleged that Edward IV was not the son of Richard, Duke of York. According to rumours circulating in France later in the century, Cecily, Duchess of York had admitted to an affair in Rouen with a tall, blond archer called Blaybourne. The London sermon did not reveal who Edward IV's ‘real' father was – it merely focused on Edward IV's lack of resemblance to the Duke of York in contrast to Richard, his ‘real' heir.
But whoever Edward IV's father was, the fact remained that the Duke of York had recognised him as his son. Edward IV was therefore legitimate in law. Edward IV was to be characterised by Richard as a true, but failed king – and his children as illegitimate. Mancini,
Usurpation of Richard the Third
, pp. 94, 97.

17
.
  
The bishop was Robert Stillington; the woman was Eleanor Butler, who had in fact died before the princes were born.

18
.
  
Rotuli Parliamentorum
, Vol. 3, p. 419.

19
.
  
His earldom had come through his mother, Isabella, the eldest daughter of Warwick the Kingmaker.

20
.
  
Mancini,
Usurpation of Richard the Third
, p. 105. £1,000 that the City had voted as Edward V's coronation gift was passed to his uncle as the elders bowed to what they now saw as inevitable.

21
.
  
The doctor was John Argentine. Mancini,
Usurpation of Richard the Third
, p. 93.

22
.
  
Ann Wroe,
Perkin
(2004), p. 68, quoting the Burgundian chronicler Jean Molinet.

23
.
  
Mancini,
Usurpation of Richard the Third
, p. 93. He suggests they vanished before the coronation.

24
.
  
From 3 July.

25
.
  
The younger daughter of Warwick the Kingmaker, and the widow of Edward of Lancaster (the son Henry VI lost at Tewkesbury).

6
     
The Princes in the Tower

  
1
.
  
So said Jean Molinet. Griffiths and Thomas,
The Making of the Tudor Dynasty
, p. 86.

  
2
.
  
Christopher Wilkins,
The Last Knight Errant: Sir Edward Woodville and the Age of Chivalry
(2010), p. 109.

  
3
.
  
Surviving correspondence reveals Richard III was in touch with Duke Francis in July concerning Sir Edward specifically, but later correspondence suggests Henry was also being discussed. Charles Ross,
Richard III
(2011), p. 195.

  
4
.
  
Rotuli Parliamentorum
, Vol. 3, p. 419.

  
5
.
  
York Civic Records: John Kendall from Nottingham to the City of York, 23 August 1483.

  
6
.
  
One such, a copper alloy mount of a boar, crowned, was found by the Thames near the Tower in October 2012. ‘Bore' may have been an anagram of ‘
ebor
', the Latin for York – the ‘white' boar reflecting the ‘white rose' tradition.

  
7
.
  
John Ashdown-Hill,
Richard III's Beloved Cousin, John Howard and the House of York
(2009), pp. 99, 100, 107. Also Michael Hicks, ‘Unweaving the Web' in
Ricardian
9, No. 114 (September 1991), pp. 106–9.

  
8
.
  
By the middle of August Margaret Beaufort's half-brother John Welles was also in rebellion against Richard and had fled to Brittany.

  
9
.
  
Thomas More,
The History of Richard III
, at
http://www.r3.org/bookcase/more/moretext
.

10
.
  
The princes were last seen playing in the gardens of the Tower during a mayoralty that ended on 28 October. The mayor was Sir Edmund Shaa, and the timing given is in the
Great Chronicle of London
. The Croyland Chronicle indicates the princes were alive until at least the second week of September (when Thomas More claims they were killed). After then hope seems to have faded. One exactly contemporary record, the Colchester Oathbook, written on or about 29 September, described Edward V as the ‘late son' of Edward IV (although this could have referred simply to his being declared illegitimate); on this and the July plot, see Ashdown-Hill,
Richard III's Beloved Cousin
, pp. 99, 100, 107. Also Hicks, ‘Unweaving the Web' in op. cit., pp. 106–9. Intriguingly a requiem Mass was held at the Sistine Chapel in Rome on 23 September for ‘Edward, king of England'. This may refer to Edward IV, yet it was usual for such Masses to be held soon after news reached the Vatican of a monarch's death. See Cliff Davies, ‘A Requiem for King Edward' in
Ricardian
9, No. 114 (September 1991), pp. 102–5.