If you watched the recent BBC drama, The White Queen, and its bloody climax – the Battle of Bosworth Field – you would be forgiven for thinking that the battle took place during late autumn or even during early winter. For, according to the Beeb, a thick covering of fallen leaves lay on the battlefield floor and light snow covered the bridleways.

But the battle didn’t take place during winter.  It took place during the high summer of 1485 – on Monday, 22^nd August, to be precise.  On the 7^th August, Henry Tudor, soon to be crowned on a battlefield as King Henry VII, landed off the Welsh coast at Milford Haven. By late August, he was seven miles west of Leicester, near the village (or, in those days, the hamlet) of Market Bosworth.  Margaret Beaufort (born 1443, died 1509), the mother of Henry VII, recorded these momentous events in her Book of Hours.

‘August’ from The Beaufort/Beauchamp Hours (England, S. E. (London), c. 1430,
before 1443) shelfmark Royal 2 A XVIII f. 31v. (We do not know if this is her hand or if a scribe wrote the entries for her.)

The first left margin note in black reads

The day landed king harry the vijth at milford have[n] the yere of o[u]r lord vijth cccc lxxxv [1485]

The second left margin note reads

The day king harri the vijth won[n] the feeld [field] wher was slayn ki[n]g Richard the third Ao Do[m] 1485

The day before the battle, on the 21^st August, King Richard III, along with an army of 12,000, rode out from his temporary accommodation at the White Boar Inn in the city of Leicester and set up his overnight camp in a field on Ambion Hill.

Early 20^th Century etching of the Blue Boar Inn, Leicester. King Richard III spent the night of the 20^th August 1485 in the Inn. It is alleged that he left his bed behind in the inn – perhaps he thought that he’d be coming back to the inn after he had dispatched his enemy, Henry Tudor. A white boar was the personal emblem of Richard III.  Legend has it that the inn was originally called the ‘White Boar’ but after the battle and the death of Richard, the inn-keeper hastily changed the inn’s name to the Blue Boar.

By the end of that fateful day, 22^nd August 1485, King Richard III, the last of the Plantagenets, lay dead on the battlefield.  And the Tudor dynasty began with King Henry VII crowned on Crown Hill in the nearby village of Stoke Golding by the treacherous Lord Thomas Stanley, the new king’s step-father.

King Richard III holds a council of war before the battle.

King Richard III’s trusty advisers.

The general area of the Battle of Bosworth Field.  These photos were taken in the early summer of 2013. In August 1485, it is likely that these fields had the remains of that year’s crops still in the ground.

The general area of the battle.  By the end of the battle, it is thought that approximately 1,000 men on Richard’s side lay dead on the field, along with 100 men from Henry Tudor’s forces.

Overlooking the general area of the battle-site.  The spire in the distance is the (post-medieval) church spire of Stoke Golding, near to which the first Tudor King of England was crowned.

1813 Monument to Richard III.  During the battle, the King drunk from the well that was located here.

The Fellowship of the White Boar’s plaque.

Legend has it that the dead king’s body was brought back to Leicester that same evening.  Stripped naked and devoid of any dignity or kingly regalia, his body was put on display for several days in Leicester.  His enemies (and, of course, his followers) could see for themselves that he really was dead and their new king was Henry VII. Shortly afterwards, he was buried quietly, without ceremony, in the church of the Greyfriars – a Franciscan monastic order.

Modern-day statue of Richard III in a park in Leicester.

Of course, over 520 years later, we now know this legend to be true.  King Richard III was indeed buried by the Franciscans in their monastery, where he lay undisturbed until his discovery in 2012.  I, like many other people around the world, was riveted to the television during the live press release by Leicester University in February 2013, when they confirmed to the waiting world that the body that they had found was indeed that of the last of the Plantagenets. As the Tudor kings of England had so rightly said, Richard III really did lyth buryed in Leicester.

Richard ye was sonne to Richard Duwke of yorke & brother un to kyng Edward ye iiijth Was kyng after hys brother & raynyd ij yeres & lyth buryed at leator [Leicester].  From Biblical and genealogical chronicle from Adam and Eve to Edward VI (England, S. E. (London or Westminster), c. 1511 with additions before 1553) shelfmark King’s 395 ff.32v-33

Watching the astonishing live press release – showing the perfect synergy of archaeology, genealogy, forensic science, and DNA science – was my small home educated son.  He was entranced by the news.  So, keen to capture his excitement, a few months later we headed north to Leicester for our most spine tingling School Trip Friday for academically challenged.

If Leicester’s one-way system had been in existence in 1485, then Richard III would never have made it out of the city and into the nearby villages and fields to meet his nemesis.  In the 21^st Century, guided by my trusty SatNav (who told me several times to ‘please take the 7^th exit’ as I repeatedly circled the city), I eventually managed to navigate my way into Leicester, ready for a weekend of finding Richard.  Trying to be as authentic as possible, I decided to stay in the exact location where Richard III had spent his second-to-last night on earth – the Blue Boar Inn.  Except, of course, the Blue Boar Inn has long been demolished and swept away, but in its place is another hostelry with ‘blue’ as its insignia.  Yes, my son and I stayed in the Travelodge – a modern 21^st Century inn built on the exact site of its predecessor, the Blue Boar Inn.

The Blue Boar Inn 2013 (aka Travelodge).  The area is continuing its medieval drunken past by being, in the 21st century, the weekend home of countless hen and stag parties. The location is now part of Leicester’s multi-lane one way system, and so my son and I spent two nights sleeping more-or-less on a massive roundabout, with the steady stream of all-night cars noisely whizzing around the city. 

As well as visiting the site of the Battle of Bosworth (and the wonderful Bosworth Battlefield Heritage Centre), we, of course, made our way into the centre of the city to find Richard at the temporary exhibition within the medieval guildhall.

My son comes face to face with a medieval king.

The spire of Leicester Cathedral, overlooking the medieval guildhall.

Leicester Cathedral and the Guildhall.

Looking in one direction: the precinct of the Cathedral. To take this photograph, I had to stand directly in the middle of the small road shown in the next photograph.

Looking in the opposite direction: the location of the Greyfriars monastery. Behind the building on the left, halfway down is the entrance to the council car park containing the mortal remains of King Richard III.  The distance between Richard’s original resting place for over 500 years is a mere stone’s throw from his proposed next resting place. Should he be moved a mere few hundred yards into Leicester cathedral? Or should he be moved a hundred miles to be reburied in York?

Inside The Car Park. The forbidding green gates, with their modern-day graffeti and barbed-wire tops, .

The car park is tiny – a lot smaller then it appears on the television.  Georgian and Victorian buildings surround the space.  With five centuries of urban building-work, it truly is a miracle that the exact location of Richard III’s was left, in the main, undisturbed.  At some point during the Victorian period, builders managed to sever the king’s feet as they were not recovered with the remains of the rest of his body in 2012.

A temporary marque protects the grave of the five-hundred years dead king.  The building in the background is Alderman Newton’s grammar school, which will eventually become part of the new Richard III Visitors’ Centre.  If this building had been built even 50 yards further forward, then we would have lost Richard’s grave forever.

The grave of King Richard III, the last of the Plantagenets.  The only king of England to die in battle, since Harold died in a hale of arrows in 1066. Stripped naked and buried without a shroud, with his hands tied after death, Richard was stuffed into a shallow grave which was too short for him.

Seeing Richard’s grave was spine-tingling – we so nearly lost him forever to urban development.  Eventually the site of his original grave will become part of a beautiful garden next to the new Visitors’ Centre.  However, seeing the grave in the setting of a stark and bare council car park was an experience I will never forget.

The quiet serenity and beauty of Leicester Cathedral. Will this be Richard’s final resting place?

Richard, Duke of Gloucester.  Born 2^nd October 1452 at Fotheringhay Castle, Northamptonshire; died 22^nd August 1485, Bosworth Field, Leicester.
King of England 1483-1485.  Buried 1485 to 2012 in Greyfriars monastery, Leicester.
His current location is known only by the University of Leicester.

What do you think about the search and discovery of Richard III?
Where should his final resting place be?
Please do leave your thoughts in the Comments box below.

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Notes
Images from the British Library’s collection of Medieval Manuscripts are marked as being Public Domain Images and therefore free of all copyright restrictions in accordance with the British Library’s Reuse Guidance Notes for the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts.

You may also be interested in the following posts
– Richard III – ‘I am a villain: yet I lie. I am not’
– School Trip Friday – Of cabbages and kings
– Shakespeare’s version of King Richard III
– Richard III lyth buryed at Leicester
– Elizabeth of York

© Essex Voices Past 2012-2013.

There were many human pawns and casualties in the conflict now known to history as ‘The War of the Roses’.  As the dynastic feud raged furiously between the Royal houses of Lancaster and York, many died a brutal death.  The most brutal, perhaps, was that of the death of King Richard III – killed in battle at Bosworth in August 1485.  Last week, current news and history were  alive with the news that the body of Richard III had been found under a car park in Leicester.  Since the announcement, much has been discussed about the discovery of his mortal remains and what it means to our understanding of his reign.  I still maintain my original position that it doesn’t change much about our understanding of Richard III, nor our understanding of his life and times.  (See my post Richard lyth buryed at Leicester.)

My post today is about the most important pawn of all in that power struggle: Elizabeth of York.  By 1483, the time of her father Edward IV’s death, Elizabeth was 17 years old.  With her brothers locked away in the Tower of London and her uncle declaring himself to be king, Elizabeth’s position was very precarious.  She became even more vulnerable when in March 1485, Anne Neville, Richard III’s queen, died and rumours spread that Richard intended to marry Elizabeth, his own niece.  The historian Anne Crawford, in her 2007 book ‘The Yorkists: The history of a Dynasty’ comments:

‘… rumours that the king [Richard III] was planning to marry Elizabeth himself.  While a union between uncle and niece was not strictly forbidden by the church, provided dispensation was obtained (and it was later not unknown in European royal circles), the idea caused revulsion among his councillors, Richard was warned by Ratcliffe and Catesby, the men he trusted most, that, unless he abandoned the idea and publicly denied any such intention, his northern supports would rise against him for causing the death of Warwick’s daughter [his dead wife, Anne Neville] in order to enter into an incestuous marriage to his niece.  There is no reason to believe the charge that Richard murdered his wife, but the fact that people, even his loyal northerners, believed it possible indicates the air of unease and suspicion surrounding him.  The threat of their revolt was enough to bring the king to a humiliating position of making the public denial demanded of him.’ (page 146-7)

Elizabeth was most certainly a prize – daughter of the dead Edward IV and sister of the missing Edward V.  A prize that was too much for the victor of Bosworth Field, the new Henry VII, to ignore.  Henry Tudor made his intentions towards Elizabeth very clear even before that fatal day in August 1485 when Richard III was dispatched to meet his maker.  By marrying Elizabeth, Henry Tudor, at one stroke, would pacify both the house of Lancaster and the house of York.  Moreover, any child of theirs would automatically be the heirs to the throne – a fact that could not be disputed by either dynastic house.  In a cunning and an astute move, Henry VII, determined that he was to be king by conquest rather then by the birth-rights of a mere woman, did not marry Elizabeth until January 1486. The marriage took place a few months after his own coronation the previous year on 30 October.  Clever Henry VII! By marrying after his own coronation, he reinforced the point that it was he who was the anointed king: Elizabeth was merely his consort.

Contemporary documents from the period suggest that Henry VII had a loving relationship with his wife.  At her death, he did appear to grieve for her and he did spend his money on a lavish funeral for her.  She also seems to have cared for the education of her own children – very unusual for a high born medieval woman.  The historian, David Starkey, in his 2008 book ‘Henry Virtuous Prince’ strongly argues the case that Elizabeth was an exceptionally well educated woman and it was she who taught her own daughters and her young second son literacy (page 119-120), and therefore to read and write.   That second son, of course, went on to be the highly educated and intelligent Henry VIII.

Elizabeth of York, that pawn of medieval and Tudor history who aided the end of the bloody War of the Roses, was born in the Palace of Westminster on 11 February 1466 and died exactly 37 years later at the Tower of London, nine days after giving birth to her seventh and final child (who had died the previous day).

So on the anniversary of her birth and death, below are some images of Elizabeth of York.
Elizabeth Woodville, queen of Edward IV, and their five daughters (left to right) Elizabeth, Cecily, Anne, Catherine, and Mary. Royal Window, Northwest Transept, Canterbury Cathedral.

Cigarette card from Ogden’s Guinea Gold series, published 1903.

Cigarette card from Player’s Kings and Queens, published 1935.

Margaret Beaufort (born 1443, died 1509) was the mother of Henry VII.  Below is an image for February from her Book of Hours.  This Book was made between 1430 and 1443 and owned firstly by Margaret’s mother, Margaret Beauchamp (born 1405/6, died 1482), and then by Margaret.  Margaret appeared to use her Book of Hours as a calendar to record significant events in the lives of her son and grandchildren.  Thus, she used August to record her son’s landing at Milford Haven and the death of Richard III; and February for the death of Elizabeth of York (we do not know if this is her hand or if a scribe wrote the entries for her).

‘February’ from The Beaufort/Beauchamp Hours
(England, S. E. (London), c. 1430, before 1443)
shelfmark Royal 2 A XVIII f. 28v.

The first left margin note in black reads

This day wher[e] decessed Quene Elizabeth i[n] the tower of london

Postcard of the Burial chapel of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York, Westminster Abbey.

Funeral effigy of Elizabeth (plate from 1914)

Chapel of Henry VII and his queen, Elizabeth of York

Elizabeth of York: daughter of Edward IV, niece of Richard III, sister of Edward V, wife of Henry VII, mother of Henry VIII, grandmother of Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I.

What do you think about Elizabeth of York?
Please do leave your thoughts in the Comments box below.

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Notes
Images from the British Library’s collection of Medieval Manuscripts are marked as being Public Domain Images and therefore free of all copyright restrictions in accordance with the British Library’s Reuse Guidance Notes for the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts.

You may also be interested in the following posts
– Richard III lyth buryed at Leicester
– 28 January: a remarkable date in Tudor history
– British costumes in the time of Henry VII and Henry VIII
– School trip Friday – Of cabbages and kings
– Prince Arthur- Prince of Wales
– Tudor coronations

© Essex Voices Past 2012-2013.

Richard ye was sonne to Richard Duwke of yorke & brother un to kyng Edward ye iiijth Was kyng after hys brother & raynyd ij yeres & lyth buryed at leator [Leicester]

So the council car park in Leicester has yielded up its secret.  The body discovered by archaeologists in September 2012 is that of King Richard III.  The analysis by today’s live conference at the University of Leicester was remarkable – there can be absolutely no doubt that they have got their man.  Science, genealogy and history all brought together with DNA analysis, wound analysis, genealogical and historical analysis to prove this.

The discovery is one of the most exciting historical events to happen in living memory.  Not because the discovery adds more to our historical understanding of Richard III: it doesn’t.  Or because it informs us of something that we didn’t already know: it doesn’t.  The discovery of his body merely confirms what we already knew: that Richard died a brutal death on the battlefield of Bosworth, and in death was not treated with dignity.

But more staggeringly, his re-interment in Leicester Cathedral will be a never to be repeated link from our modern-day present to our past: the burial of a king of England.  King Richard III – the last of the Plantagenets, the last truly medieval king, the last king of England to die in battle.  Or the child-murderer hunchbacked bogeyman of Shakespeare and English history?

With all that will be written and said about Richard III in the coming days and weeks, let us return to contemporary documents written during Richard’s life – along with snippets written afterwards by his nemeses, the Tudors.

Signature of Richard, Duke of Gloucester – future King Richard III

King Richard III

Royal arms of England supported by boars and surmounted by a crown from De re militari (the Book of Vegecye of Dedes of Knyghthode), (London, England, c1483-c1485), shelfmark Royal 18 A XII f.1

Royal arms Anne Neville (wife of Richard III) from De re militari (the Book of Vegecye of Dedes of Knyghthode), (London, England, c1483-c1485), shelfmark Royal 18 A XII f.49

The Genealogy of Richard III
The image at the start of this post is a small portion of The Biblical and genealogical chronicle from Adam and Eve to Edward VI, a remarkable document now in the care of the British Library. The chronicle is thought to have been written and illustrated circa 1511  (i.e. shortly after Henry VIII succeeded his father to the throne of England) with additions added by another hand after Edward VI’s death in 1553.  The book stayed in the possession of the kings and queens of England until it was given to the British Museum by King George IV in 1823. Below is the full image of the kings – a stupendous display of Tudor propaganda proving that they were the rightful monarchs of England.
The genealogy of the kings of England, including Henry IV, Henry V, Henry VI, Edward IV, Richard III, and Henry VII from Biblical and genealogical chronicle from Adam and Eve to Edward VI (England, S. E. (London or Westminster), c. 1511 with additions before 1553) shelfmark King’s 395 ff.32v-33

Lady Margaret Beaufort’s Book of Hours
Margaret Beaufort (born 1443, died 1509) was the mother of Henry VII.  Below is an image of the entry for August from her Book of Hours.  This Book was made between 1430 and 1443 and owned firstly by Margaret’s mother, Margaret Beauchamp (born 1405/6, died 1482), and then by Margaret.  Margaret appeared to use her Book of Hours as a calendar to record significant events in the lives of her son and grandchildren.  Thus, she used August to record her son’s landing at Milford Haven and the death of Richard III (we do not know if this is her hand or if a scribe wrote the entries for her).

‘August’ from The Beaufort/Beauchamp Hours (England, S. E. (London), c. 1430, before 1443) shelfmark Royal 2 A XVIII f. 31v.

The first left margin note in black reads

The day landed king harry the vijth at milford have[n] the yere of o[u]r lord vijth cccc lxxxv [1485]

The second left margin note reads

The day king harri the vijth won[n] the feeld [field] wher was slayn ki[n]g Richard the third Ao Do[m] 1485

Postscript
Has the revival of interest in Richard III already started?  At a Christie’s auction of Valuable Printed Books and Manuscripts held on 13 June 2012, a rare manuscript with Richard’s signature fetched £109,250 against an estimate of £10,000 to £15,000.  Two manuscripts signed by his usurper  Henry VII, fetched £7,500 and £8,750; whilst one signed by Henry VIII only managed £20,000.

Henry VII may have won the battle and the crown but Richard III will be the king that will experience a renaissance with the next generation of modern-day historians.

Tuck’s postcard Richard III from Kings and Queens circa 1902

Richard Plantagenet – Duke of Gloucester, Knight of the Garter, Lord High Constable of England, Lord High Admiral, Governor of the North of England, Chief Justice of North Wales, Chief Steward and Chamberlain of Wales, Commander in Chief, Lord Warden of the West Marches, Lord Protector of England,. King of England, France and Lord of Ireland

What do you think about the search and discovery of Richard III? Please do leave your thoughts in the Comments box below.

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Notes
Images from the British Library’s collection of Medieval Manuscripts are marked as being Public Domain Images and therefore free of all copyright restrictions in accordance with the British Library’s Reuse Guidance Notes for the Catalogue of Illuminated Manuscripts.

You may also be interested in the following posts
– Richard III – ‘I am a villain: yet I lie. I am not’
– School Trip Friday – Of cabbages and kings
– Shakespeare’s version of King Richard III

© Essex Voices Past 2012-2013.