The Seizure of Edward IV's Throne: Malice or Political Necessity?

Richard III is one of the most vilified kings in all of English history. Accused of stealing the throne from his nephews and ordering their murders in the Tower of London, his short reign is known to many thanks to the writings of Shakespeare. Shakespeare portrays Richard as a monster, a vicious murderer of children. Richard was not a monster, however. He was a creature born in an era of violence and bloodshed, one in which personal ambition often outweighed bonds of servitude and oaths of loyalty. He was a shrewd politician, and one well aware that placing another child king on the throne of England could spell disaster for the kingdom. Before it becomes possible to pronounce sentence on Richard, however, one must first know something about the man and his life.

The man that would become Richard III was the fourth son of Richard, Duke of York. When King Henry VI had a mental breakdown in 1453, Richard, Duke of York, was made Protector of the Realm. When the King's Lancastrian supporters tried to bar York from having a share in the government of the nation, the battle of St. Albans took place, sparking what is known in history as the War of the Roses. In 1460, York pressed his claim to the throne. Descended from Edward III on both sides of his family, York actually held a stronger claim to the throne than Henry VI, and when Henry was captured by York's forces at the Battle of Northampton, the Duke managed to pass an "Act of Accord" which confirmed him as the next heir to the throne. The Act sparked another battle between Yorkists and Lancastrians at Wakefield at the end of the year. In this battle, Richard, Duke of York, was slain, as was his second son, Edmund, Earl of Rutland. The Lancastrians won the Battle of Wakefield and later, the Second Battle of St. Albans in February, but chose not to press the advantage and take London. Furthermore, Lancastrian forces were soon defeated by Edward, Earl of March, the eldest son of Richard, Duke of York, at the Battle of Mortimer's Cross.

After meeting up with his cousin Richard Neville, better known as Warwick the Kingmaker, Edward entered London and was crowned Edward IV on March 4, 1461. Edward solidified his rule at the Battle of Towton on March 26, a decisive skirmish that decimated Henry's army and sent the Lancastrian royal family into hiding in Scotland. A number of minor skirmishes occurred over the next several years, until Henry VI was finally captured in 1465, paraded through the streets of London and locked away in the Tower of London.

Shortly after his coronation, Edward called his two younger brothers, George and Richard, back to England. The former was made Duke of Clarence, while Richard was made Duke of Gloucester later in the year. At some point in his youth, as early as the later months of 1461[1] or as late at 1465,[2] Richard entered the household of his cousin Warwick in the north of England. His stay there likely had a profound effect on his development into the type of ruler he would become once crowned king. While in Warwick's care, Richard met gentlemen that he would later call upon as supporters and was given training in the knightly pursuits of warfare. He also met Anne Neville, Warwick's youngest daughter and his future wife, a woman who would be one of his strongest supporters later in life.

Descriptions of Richard vary, though most writers agree that he looked like his father and was short of stature with dark hair. It is unlikely that Sir Thomas More's depiction of him as a hunchbacked deformed creature[3] is accurate and is most likely a Tudor invention. A portrait in the Royal Collection, dated to around the early 1520s, shows a Richard with an enlarged right shoulder, but X-Rays taken in the 1950s show that this shoulder was painted over an original shoulder properly positioned for a normal human.[4] Furthermore, authors writing at the time of Richard's life make no mention of any deformity: no descriptions of a hunchback or withered arm appear in The Second Continuation of the Croyland Chronicles, in the Memoirs of Phillipe de Commynes, or in the Great Chronicle of London.[5]

It is surprising that Richard did not join Clarence and Warwick in their rebellion in 1469, despite having reason to do so. As third in line to the throne, Richard was excluded from lordship over a number of estates and titles that were instead granted to his elder brother, including the lordship of Richmond. Richmond had actually been granted to Richard in 1462, but was taken away from him, not due to any fault of his own, but due to Clarence's jealousy.[6]

Warwick's rebellion likely came about from issues stemming from Edward's surprise marriage in 1464 to Elizabeth Woodville, a commoner. At the time, Warwick had been lobbying for an alliance with Louis XI, King of France. Edward opposed such an alliance, and announced at a Council in Reading in September 1464 that he had already been secretly married to Elizabeth some months earlier. This marriage ruined Warwick's hopes of an alliance with France, and furthermore, made it difficult for him to provide for his two young daughters. The queen had many unmarried sisters, and as they were quickly married off to many of the eligible lordly bachelors, it quickly came about that the only remaining men to marry Warwick's daughters to were the King's brothers, George of Clarence and Richard of Gloucester. For whatever reason, the King refused such marriage ties, and in 1469, Warwick rebelled against Edward. The Duke of Clarence, already angered at his brother for the secret marriage to a woman that Clarence deemed beneath a king and seeking greater personal standing through the promise of a marriage alliance with the powerful Warwick, joined him. Clarence married Warwick's daughter, Isabel, possibly expecting that Warwick would make him king in his brother's place after the rebellion.[7]

Warwick's rebellion was largely ineffective, though it did force Edward into exile for some months before Warwick realized that he had no control over the nation without the King. Its most prevalent effect was that Richard became Edward's closest ally. Many historians applaud Richard for his loyalty, though Giles St. Aubyn believes Richard's motives may have been less valorous, commenting that Richard "could hardly have been insensible to the fact that it paid handsomely to put Edward in his debt."[8] Whatever his reasons, Richard did become one of Edward's closest allies. The rebellion resulted in the deaths of Warwick, slain while fleeing the battle of Barnet, and of Henry VI, whom Warwick had been trying to restore to the throne. Furthermore, Edward of Lancaster, Henry VI's son, was also killed. There appears to be little evidence that Richard murdered Edward of Lancaster and Henry VI, as Tudor legends say. According to St. Aubyn, "contemporary accounts agree that Henry's son died fighting on the battlefield, and no one other than Edward IV would have ordered the death of a King."[9] Clarence reconciled with Edward, but over the next several years, at the suggestions of the Queen and her Woodville relatives, was slowly attainted and eventually famously executed for treason, supposedly by drowning in a vat of malmsey wine. It is possible that he was instead poisoned with a glass of wine or that the story developed because Clarence's remains were preserved in a barrel of malmsey on the way to his burial site.[10] Finally, Edward's first son and heir was born during the rebellion.

After Warwick's death, Richard was given a number of his former mentor's titles and lands, particularly after marrying Anne Neville, Warwick's youngest daughter. Over the next several years, Richard became one of the most powerful and wealthy men in all of England, though he stayed largely away from court, apparently out of grief for Clarence's execution and a dislike for the Woodvilles that he believed had brought about his brother's death. Dominic Mancini, an Italian living in England and writing in 1483, comments that "[Richard] was overheard to say he would one day avenge his brother's death."[11] Other writers make the assertion that Richard's disappearance from court had little to do with Clarence's death, and that the feud between him and the Queen's relatives came much later, in the last five years of Edward's reign.[12] Over the next seven or eight years, Richard primarily kept to his lands in the North, though he was called upon from time to time to lead various military expeditions. He was known as a fierce commander who ensured the loyalty of his troops. During this time, the Queen gave birth to a second son, Richard.

In March 1483, Edward unexpectedly fell ill, supposedly from exposure to the cold during a fishing trip,[13] though some theorize that his alcoholism and his lascivious nature led to a breach of his health.[14] As the King's illness progressed, he became worried about the fates of his heirs, and rightly so. For some time, a feud had been going on between the Queen's Woodville relatives and William, Lord Hastings. The feud stemmed from the fact that Edward had awarded Hastings a lieutenancy in Calais, which Anthony Woodville, Lord Rivers, claimed had been promised to him earlier. The king, upon realizing the inevitability of his death, called together a number of his lords, including Marquis Dorset, the Queen's son from her first marriage, and Lord Hastings, warning them to set aside their differences and swear allegiance to his sons. If they did not, he warned, then war would surely follow. After his speech, Edward lacked the strength to sit up, and as he lay on his side before them, the lords each shook hands and forgave each other.[15] This seems to largely have been a farce. As soon as Edward was dead, the lords returned to their bickering. Furthermore, Edward's will named "as protector of his children and realm Richard duke of Gloucester."[16]

Richard, in his home at Middleham in the North did not immediately find out about his brother's death. In fact, he found out not from a messenger of the Queen, but rather, from Lord Hastings. Richard wrote then to Earl Rivers at Ludlow, the man that had thus far cared for and raised the boy. Richard's letter inquired as to the time and route of Prince Edward's journey to London. A second letter was sent out from Middleham to Edward IV's Council, proclaiming his loyalty to Edward V and beseeching the Council to adhere to his brother's request that Richard be made Protector. Around April 20, Richard asked a number of the nobility in York to swear an oath of allegiance to Edward V.[17]

Another letter came to Richard while he was staying at York. This letter came from Henry Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, and a steadfast enemy of the Woodvilles. At age 13, Buckingham had been forced to marry one of the Queen's sisters, Catherine Woodville. Buckingham hated the bond due to his wife's humble origins. Buckingham swore his allegiance to Richard, offering as many as a thousand men. Sometime thereafter, Richard was met in Northampton by Buckingham, where they learned that Edward V was not far away at the town of Stony Stratford. Earl Rivers came to the two dukes, and after an evening meal, the three retired to their respective inns. Rivers, however, awoke to find the doors to his inn locked and Richard and Buckingham gone. Furthermore, Mancini says, the dukes had their followers watch the roads so that none of River's men could get word to the young king.[18] When the dukes reached Edward V, Mancini described the following scene:

Wherefore they reached the young king ignorant of the arrest and deprived of his soldiers, and immediately saluted him as their sovereign. Then they exhibited a mournful countenance, while expressing profound grief at the death of the king's father whose demise they imputed to his ministers as being such that they had but little regard for his honour, since they were accounted the companions and servants of his vices, and had ruined his health. Wherefore, lest they should play the same old game with the son, the dukes said that these ministers should be removed from the king's side.[19]

Sir Thomas More adds to this description, noting that Richard and Buckingham told the king that "the lord marquis [Dorset] had entered into the Tower of London and thence taken out the king's treasure."[20] Richard had Earl Rivers, Lord Richard Grey, the Queen's other son and Dorset's brother, and Sir Thomas Vaughan, the young king's "aged chamberlain,"[21] arrested, and when Edward protested, Richard of Gloucester explained that the three had been conspiring against his own life and against his right to the Protectorship and that he had no choice but to arrest them for the sake of his own safety.[22]

Once word reached the Queen that her son had been intercepted, she quickly realized that Richard was in control, and that she needed to reclaim her son. However, when it became apparent that none of the lords in London were ready to rally to her side, largely due to Richard's letter to the Council, the Queen, her son Dorset, and her brother Lionel fled to seek sanctuary at Westminster, taking with them the queen's daughters and young Prince Richard of York.

Not long after entering the city of London, it was decided by the Council, at the Duke of Buckingham's suggestion, that Edward should take up residence in the Tower, which at the time, had not yet acquired its maligned reputation.[23] The Council also officially decided to award the Protectorship to Richard, though a Protectorship granting him more powers than that held by any other Protector of the Realm before. In effect, Richard became a sovereign regent, overseeing "not only the government of the realm, but also the 'tutelage and oversight of the King's most royal person'."[24]

Richard quickly set about changing the state of things in England to his suiting. He replaced several head officials in the government with men of his own choosing and attempted to have Rivers, Grey, and Vaughan convicted of treason because of the conspiracy of which he accused them, though the Council, on the ground of insufficient evidence, refused. Furthermore, the Council noted that even if the conspiracy was true, no treason could have been committed, since at the time, Richard was neither regent nor king.[25]

There is some debate as to when Richard actually began to consider usurping the throne. Mancini asserts that there was a rumor circulating that Richard accepted the Protectorship not for his loyalty to Edward V, but to take control of the throne himself[26], while St. Aubyn comments that as of April 1483, Richard "had done nothing more than seek his own safety in a swift pre-emptive bid."[27] It is likely, however, that Richard began to consider the throne around this time.

By mid-June, the Council had divided into two factions: those who supported Richard and those who supported the Woodvilles. Around June 12, Richard called a meeting at the Tower to which were invited Lord Hastings, as well as important officials like Stanley, Rotherham, and Morton. At this meeting, Richard surprisingly accused Hastings of conspiring against him with Elizabeth Woodville, and had him arrested, dragged to the Tower grounds, and executed without trial.[28] The others were arrested and later released. News of Hastings' execution spread quickly throughout London, and panic ensued until Richard restored order by having his herald ride through the city and explain that Hastings had been found guilty of treason and that the speed of his execution was to prevent his supporters from trying to free him.[29] Richard likely had Hastings removed in order to ensure that the powerful lord would not be an obstacle when the Protector made his bid for the throne.

A few days later, Richard held another Council meeting to discuss the extraction of Richard of York from his sanctuary at Westminster Abbey. Mancini suggests that this was because Richard knew that the younger prince would succeed the throne, should Edward V be removed.[30] With both royal heirs under his control, Richard would be better able to usurp the throne. To accomplish this new goal, Richard spoke to the Council and gave the following argument:

And, as the day [of Edward's coronation] grew near, [Richard] submitted to the Council how improper it seemed that the king should be crowned in the absence of his brother, who on account of his nearness of kin and his station, ought to play an important part in the ceremony.[31]

The Council apparently agreed, and Richard surrounded Westminster with troops. The Queen finally agreed to surrender her son, who joined his brother in the Tower. Mancini mentions that before long the brothers "were withdrawn into the inner apartments of the Tower proper, and day by day began to be seen more rarely behind bars and windows, till at length they ceased to appear altogether."[32] Around the same time, Richard took into his custody Edward of Warwick, the son of Clarence. Young Warwick had a better claim to the throne than Richard, but it was unlikely that anyone would rally behind him, especially if he was under Richard's control.

On June 16, with all the royal blood under his control and all of his major opponents disposed of or gone into hiding, Richard dropped the veil of secrecy and postponed Edward's coronation and called for Parliament. There, Richard made a failed argument that his brother Edward IV had been a bastard; no one believed the accusations, and Richard changed the story to instead bastardize Edward's heirs on the ground that Edward had been contracted to marry another woman. Alison Weir comments that this precontract was as binding in 1483 as a true marriage, and could only be dissolved by the Church, so if the story were true, then Edward's sons would indeed then be bastards.[33] The story worked, and after the signing of the act Titulus Regis, which officially declared the children of Edward IV to be bastardized, Richard III dated his reign from June 26, as referred to by a royal letter written in October 1483.[34] The day before, Richard had removed some of the last of his Woodville opponents: Rivers, Grey, and Vaughan were executed at Northampton.

Though now officially King of England, Richard's struggle for his throne was not yet over. A number of conspiracies apparently were formed by individuals devoted to Edward IV's line to try to free the sons of that king. Few details survive of these conspiracies, but news of their existence is likely the reason that Richard gave the order to have his nephews killed.[35]

The order to execute a deposed monarch could not have come from anyone other than a king and it is unlikely that the princes survived to see the reign of Henry VII; if they had, there would have been no reason for Richard III to not present them to public view when rumors of their deaths began to corrode trust in his rule. Richard's motives can be explained: England had seen a child monarch with the reign of Henry VI, a reign that led to years of war and strife. Faced with war with France, England needed a strong ruler with military experience, not a child ruled by his greedy newly-ennobled relatives. Richard had seen that the execution of blood relatives and allies was no obstacle to ensuring personal security and ambition: Edward IV had executed their own brother to ensure the security of his throne. Richard's actions were necessary, he believed, to bring an end to the chaos begun by the War of the Roses. Had he been allowed to rule longer, he might have become one of history's most honored rulers. Instead, his legacy was to become a Tudor boogeyman and the most reviled king in English history.

[1] Kendall, Paul Murray, Richard the Third (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1956), 49.

[2] Ross, Charles, Richard III (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1981), 7.

[3] More, Sir Thomas, The History of King Richard III and Selections From The English and Latin Poems, edited by Richard S. Sylvester (London: Yale University Press, 1976), 8

[4] Weir, Alison, The Princes in the Tower (New York: Ballantine Books, 1992), 32.

[5] Weir, The Princes, 31.

[6] Ross, Richard III, 9.

[7] Ross, Richard III, 14.

[8] St. Aubyn, Giles, The Year of Three Kings: 1483 (New York: Atheneum, 1983), 56.

[9] St. Aubyn, Three Kings, 58.

[10] St. Aubyn, Three Kings, 59-60.

[11] Mancini, Dominic, De Occupatione Regni Anglie Per Riccardum Tercium, translated by C.A.J. Armstrong (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969), 63.

[12] Ross, Richard III, 34.

[13] Mancini, Dominic, De Occupatione, 59.

[14] St. Aubyn, Three Kings, 74.

[15] More, The History, 14.

[16] Mancini, De Occupatione, 61.

[17] St. Aubyn, Three Kings, 84.

[18] Mancini, De Occupatione, 77.

[19] Mancini, De Occupatione, 77.

[20] More, The History, 20.

[21] Kendall, Paul Murray, Richard the Third (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1955), 210.

[22] Kendall, Richard the Third, 211.

[23] Weir, The Princes, 88-89.

[24] Weir, The Princes, 90.

[25] Weir, The Princes, 91.

[26] Mancini, De Occupatione, 81.

[27] St. Aubyn, Three Kings, 107.

[28] St. Aubyn, Three Kings, 122-126.

[29] St. Aubyn, Three Kings, 127.

[30] Mancini, De Occupatione, 89.

[31] Mancini, De Occupatione, 89.

[32] Mancini, De Occupatione, 93.

[33] Weir, The Princes, 119.

[34] Weir, The Princes, 127.

[35] Weir, The Princes, 145.