The more I’ve read about the Princes disappearence etc. the more I am beginning to doubt Thomas More’s account of the whole scene.
For a start off he was only he was only 5 when the boys disappeared, and any info he would have got would have been second or even third hand when he wrote his account. I dare say that there was a little bit of chinese whispers going on at the time in much the same way as it happens today when there is scandal, and of course the Tudor’s were new and unknown monarchs. Richard was the villian etc, so I think a lot of More’s account is possibly propaganda anyway.
More was a young man on the make in the Court of Henry 7th later years and Lard arse’s early years, well up until the 1530’s anyway and would have known how to curry favour in a monarch’s eyes. Basically tell the fat weasel (H8) what he wanted to hear. So it makes sence to me the more horrific the Princes’ disappearence sounds, the more the people are thankful to the Tudors, that they have been delivered from the Monster Richard 3rd.
Richard 3rd was no modern day Caligula or a child murdering despot, he was just a man who was trying to do what was best for England and it’s people. Unfortunately for him history has done him a great injustice, and maybe one day we will get to put the record books straight on what type of a person he really was. I see him as a loving, loyal family man, who despite his disability showed the world just exactly what he could do.
As Stephen Hawking put so aptly the other day. Disability is not about what you can’t do, it’s more about what you can do. Richard more than anyone lived up to that phrase. Nothing is impossible if you want to do it, disability is a word, not a symptom.

Maybe the killer or killers of the boys didn’t dig anything. Maybe there was a deep hole and they were just dropped into it and covered over. It’s as good a theory as any I’ve heard so far.
I’m confused. Raleigh was imprisoned after Elizabeth died in 1603. How could he have seen the bones? I missed something, right?

SteveJ said

Perhaps More was a fan of Young Frankenstein, Olga.

I agree Steve it does. There are many stories like this, guess that’s where the saying “Skeletons in the closet” comes from?
I agree Olga Henry was all York, definetely when it comes to chopping up rivals to throne. But I really don’t believe for a minute that Richard was behind the Princes deaths. He would gain nothing more from it, he had gained what he wanted.. The throne. But I thought the Princes were bastardised on the evidence that Edward had been married before to Eleanor Butler? Or did I read it wrong? I know Edward’s paternity was questionable, as he was aledgely conceived whilst his father was on campaign, by an archer in her husband’s army. I have noticed that Edward’s baptism was a very quiet affair unlike that of his brother’s Edmund and as a result this is what probably gave rise to the rumours of Richard Duke of York not being Edward’s father. However I would suggest that his baptism was low key, because at the time Richard was busy with the War with the King and Queen, and it would be uncertain to what the outcome would be, so she really couldn’t be spending lots of money on a baptism. She might need that money to buy her freedom so to speak.

Olga said

The Princes were made illegitimate because of the alleged pre-contract or first marriage, but he did also accuse his mother of being an adulteress.

I think I am finding the argument that Richard didn’t “need” to kill them a little lacking as I read more. As long as they were alive they were cause for rebellion. Nobody would have accepted Tudor against Edward V, but they supported him against Richard III. Look at the pretenders during Henry Tudors reign, they didn’t give him any peace for years. If Richard truly “had” the throne he’d have had a better chance of hanging onto it.

Agreed Olga, I guess the “need not kill them” bit come from us putting 21st century logic on it, well that what I think anyway.
If we think of it under 15th century logic, yes you are right the boys were always going to be seen as a threat no matter how many times they were declared as bastards and by whom.
Did H7 legitmise Elizabeth of York before marrying her? If so that sugggests to me that he knew that the boys were dead. So naming her as legitimate would also re-inforse her right as oldest suviving child of Edward 4th as the rightful Queen, ergo making H7 claim to the throne just that little bit stronger.

Olga said

He repealed the Titulus Regius act passed by Richard III, making all of Edward and Elizabeth Woodville’s children legitimate again. The whole act was against canon law anyway, seeing as England was still Catholic. Canon law ensured any children born during marriages made in “good faith” were not punished by being declared illegitimate. The same would have gone for his own son, as some historians have speculated he and Anne Neville never got a proper dispensation for their marriage.

Yes I’ve read that too. That there was some controvocy over Richard’s marriage with Anne Neville. Oh what a tangled wed the Yorks love life was.
So H7 repealing the Titulus Regius law was saying that he knew that the boys were dead then.
I still don’t get why H7 didn’t just ask Elizabeth Woodville about the pretenders? Surely a mother would be able to tell her own child from a million others?

Thank you Olga.
Yes you are quite right there, Ferdinand and Isabella weren’t happy with having a rival to the throne hanging about, (pardon the pun) with a marriage treaty in the offing so poor hapless Eddy Plantagenet had to die too.
Although there were still many rivals around after Eddy P was executed, although H8 took care of them.
I’m kind of thinking that E.W and M.B perhaps tolerated each other, basically because of Henry and Elizabeth, but I certainly don’t think they were freinds. I also think that H7 all but banished E.W from court anyway, because his mother told him E.W had to go.
M.B strikes me of being very domineering and wouldn’t tolerate any other woman usurping her position as King’s mother in short she viewed herself as Queen (loosely worded) and it must have got right up her bugle, that E.W was a crowned and anoited Queen, so as such out ranked M.B so she made sure that she was going to rule over her one way or another. Hope that makes sence.

Exactly right Anyanka, iI’ve seen it speculated that is why he had his coronation first and held the wedding off for a little while.

I think Margaret Beaufort has been the victim of some fairly heavy propaganda Bo. I’m not sure why EW was sent from court, it could be because she had a hand in the rebellions of Simnel and Warbeck and unlike his son Henry didn’t execute women for treason. I haven’t started reading about her yet but I have seen that speculated. Or she may just have wanted to retire in peace, she had a very hard life after her husband died. I know she requested a simple funeral in her will which people try to attribute to Henry’s supposed penny-pinching. I don’t know that Margaret Beaufort had a hand in it.
I know that, despite what is often said, she got along well with Elizabeth of York, and Elizabeth’s younger sister Cecily. When Cecily married a commoner without permission, MB sheltered them both and intervened on their behalf after Henry banished them from court and took all of Cecily’s lands. That should give us a little insight into her character. I don’t think she was any more interfering or domineering than my own mother quite frankly. Of course Greeks are reasonably interfering

That EW may have been involved in those rebellions is why some speculate that she knew one of her sons was alive. It is an interesting theory but I don’t know much about it yet. I’m sure MB must have felt some sympathy for her, she had been in EW’s household for quite a while too.
After she was sent from court Henry did take her lands but it was said she agreed to pass them onto her daughter, so again, it is difficult to gauge. If Margaret and Henry were uncomfortable having her at court it is actually not that surprising, she was a very popular queen among the people despite what some of the nobles thought of her. She’d have reminded people of her husband, who was beloved by many, and her sons, who I think people really grieved for. There’s an Italian clergyman Mancini who provides some insight into the period when the Princes disappeared and he claimed people would weep in the street at the thought of it.
Women are always popular villains of course. The domineering mother thing is also a good way for Henry’s critics to emasculate him. It suits them for him to be portrayed as a coward and a weakling, and a mummy’s boy. And I agree, Margaret’s main interests laid in that of protecting her son. I was really touched when I read that right after Bosworth when everyone was looting he took Richard’s illuminated Book of Hours to give to his mother.

On a slightly different and interesting note, MB kept a loyal Yorkist in her household and allowed him to defend Richard verbally when he felt the need without rebuking him. He was a servant of some sort, but I love the idea of that. It shows her patient side too.

Richard based his right to the throne on the boys being bastards due to Edward’s pre contract with Eleanor Butler Blah blah blah. I have a problem with this. I agree that the girls could be classed as bbastards as they were born befor Eleanor’s death, but the boys were born after she had died so in my opinion that made them legitmate surely? Plus Eleanor had entered a convent. Not too sure of the date she went to the convent however, but I have read that Edward siezed 2 manors that were hers soon after he became King in 1461.

Surely when Eleanor entered the convent she would have renoused any earthy pleasures (I.e Men and marriage) in favour of heavenly ones. There if she and Edward had, had a pre-contract that would have been considered as null and void.
Henry 8 asked K.O.A to bog off into a convent and if she had her marriage would be over, of course we know the result there.
I have to ask why Stilington waited till Edward was dead before opening his mouth too.