The King's Grave: The Discovery of Richard III's Lost Burial Place and the Clues It Holds

by Langley, Philippa

  When the terms of the arrangement were publicized throughout the realm they led to a full-scale resumption of war. Queen Margaret refused to accept the Act of Accord, and championing the rights of her son, Edward, raised a massive northern army in defiance of the agreement. York marched to meet it in atrocious winter weather. He had stumbled into a trap. At the Battle of Wakefield on 30 December he was overwhelmed by the far larger army of his opponents. York and his second son Edmund died in the fighting.

  Within the House of York Wakefield was remembered as ‘the horrible battle’. Chilling details about the fighting had begun to leak out, that Edmund, Earl of Rutland – now seventeen – had actually been killed in cold blood, fleeing the battle, and that York’s body had been desecrated, his dismembered head mockingly adorned with a paper crown and then nailed to York’s Micklegate Bar. One account – the Register of the Abbot Whethamstede, a source close to the House of York, and one Richard would certainly have known about – provided an even more harrowing version. For in Whethamstede’s account York was captured still alive: ‘They stood him on a little anthill,’ the abbot related, ‘and placed on his head, as if a crown, a vile garland made of reeds, just as the Jews did to the Lord, and bent the knee to him, saying in jest “Hail King, without rule. Hail King, without ancestry. Hail leader and prince, with no subjects or possessions.” And having said this, and various other shameful and dishonourable things to him, at last they cut off his head.’

  These images of martyrdom and desecration appalled the whole of York’s family, and had a particularly strong impact upon his youngest son, Richard, who years later led the formal reburial of his father in the family resting-place at Fotheringhay. York’s eldest son, Edward, Earl of March was now the Yorkist successor to the throne, and he fought bravely to uphold that claim, winning a stirring victory at Mortimer’s Cross on 2 February 1461. But on 17 February his ally Warwick’s army was defeated at the Second Battle of St Albans, allowing large numbers of Lancastrian soldiers to approach the capital. Still mourning the loss of her husband and son, Cecily decided that her youngest sons were no longer safe if the Lancastrians entered London. Even though they were aged only eleven and eight, Cecily now believed they represented a dynastic threat to the House of Lancaster – and if Lancastrian troops reached the capital the boys might well be killed. So she speedily sent them to the safety of the Burgundian Netherlands until the danger had receded.

  But the Lancastrians never entered London. They halted, and then returned to the north of England. Edward and Warwick were able to join forces, and arrived in the capital together. On 4 March 1461 the Earl of March was acclaimed King Edward IV in London. Later that month, on 29 March, he won a decisive victory over the Lancastrians at Towton, cementing his hold over the country. A new Yorkist dynasty had been born.

  Richard and his brother George returned to England that summer. George was created Duke of Clarence. And in October 1461 Richard was granted a suitable title of his own, the dukedom of Gloucester. After the high drama of the last few years Richard’s life once again became quieter. Documents reveal little of his whereabouts over the next few years. Cecily, whose piety was matched by her political acumen, now held a commanding position at the Yorkist court. He probably spent time with his mother at Fotheringhay and at her London residence of Baynard’s Castle. There were also lodgings for both boys in royal palaces such as Greenwich.

  In May 1464 Edward IV secretly married Elizabeth Woodville, although the match was only announced to an astonished political community some four months later. The Croyland Chronicler wrote: ‘King Edward, prompted by the ardour of youth, and relying entirely on his own choice, without consulting the nobles of the kingdom, privately married the widow of a certain knight, Elizabeth by name … This the nobility and chief men of the kingdom took amiss, seeing that he had with such immoderate haste promoted a person sprung from comparatively humble lineage, to share the throne with him.’ Dominic Mancini added bluntly: ‘On that account, not only did he [Edward] alienate the nobles … he also offended most bitterly the members of his own house.’ Mancini related that neither Edward’s mother nor his two brothers ever really came to terms with this disastrous match.

  In the autumn of 1465, now aged twelve, Richard made a highly important move to the household of Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, known to posterity as ‘the Kingmaker’, the most powerful aristocrat in the kingdom. In 1461 Warwick’s support for the Yorkist cause had been an important contributor to Edward IV’s victory, and the king now chose him to be Richard’s tutor. This experience would leave a lasting impression on Richard, as he accompanied Warwick to his northern fortresses of Middleham, Sheriff Hutton, Penrith and Barnard Castle. It was in Warwick’s household that Richard met his lifelong friend Francis, Lord Lovell, and his future wife – one of the Kingmaker’s daughters – Anne Neville.

  Although Warwick had been the pillar of the Yorkist cause, Richard had joined his establishment at a time of a souring in his relationship with the king. The cause of this was the Woodville marriage. This secret and unsuitable match had taken place when Warwick was abroad negotiating a foreign marriage alliance for the king. Warwick felt humiliated by the bizarre turn of events and never forgave Edward for it. Edward’s generous patronage of the new queen’s impoverished and acquisitive family, and disagreements over foreign policy, only served to drive Warwick and the king further apart.

  Richard had remained with Warwick until Edward IV brought him back to court early in 1469, just after his sixteenth birthday. The earliest surviving letter composed by Richard, Duke of Gloucester can be dated to 24 June 1469. It was written at Castle Rising in Norfolk, where Richard was on pilgrimage to Walsingham with his brother Edward IV. Richard, having left the tutelage of the Earl of Warwick, was now coming of age, emotionally and in his political judgement. He related that he had been given a position by the king in the north, and needed to travel there in some haste. He was short of money, and asked for a loan of £100, to be repaid next Easter. The main body of the letter had been dictated to a chancery clerk. But the postscript was in Richard’s own hand, and in it, he spoke directly and commandingly to the recipient. ‘Sir John Say,’ he declared, ‘I pray you that you fail me not at this time of my great need, as you will that I show you my good lordship in the matter that you labour me for.’

  Putting it simply, Richard was making clear that if Say helped him, Richard would provide a favour in return, in a matter that Say had already petitioned him about. This was the principle of ‘good lordship’, a fact of aristocratic life in the fifteenth century. The authority of a nobleman depended upon his ability to protect his servants’ interests, and be confident that these servants would help him in return. Support could take the form of a loan, or the performance of specific duties, alongside a more general desire to uphold the lord’s interests. The letter showed that Richard already fully understood and had mastered these techniques. Over the next few years, he would put them to good effect, building up a powerful network of personal loyalty.

  Soon afterwards shocking news arrived: Richard’s former mentor, the Earl of Warwick, was now in open revolt against the king. Warwick’s grievances against the Woodvilles could no longer be contained. According to the Croyland Chronicler, the reason for his rebellion was ‘the fact that the king, being too greatly influenced by the urgent suggestions of the queen, as well as those who were in any way connected with her by blood, had enriched them with boundless presents and by always promoting them to the most dignified offices about his person.’ Richard’s older brother Clarence joined Warwick’s cause, but Richard stayed loyal to Edward. On 26 July Warwick’s followers defeated one of the king’s leading Welsh supporters, William, Lord Herbert, at Edgecote, and shortly thereafter the king was captured. Yet Warwick was not able to dominate Edward in the way that Richard, Duke of York had manipulated Henry VI in 1460. Edward was released from Middleham in early September 1469, possibly after Richard’s intervention.

  Richar
d was rewarded for his loyalty with the important military office of Constable of England in October 1469. But the compromise brokered between the king and Warwick was an uneasy one, and by February 1470 both Warwick and Clarence were plotting again. In a remarkable sequence of events Edward first drove Warwick and Clarence out of the country, only to be faced – some six months later – by the most unlikely alliance of Warwick and the Lancastrian Queen Margaret of Anjou, arranged by the wily French king Louis XI. Edward IV underestimated the seriousness of this threat, and in October 1470 he and Richard were forced to flee, to Holland.

  Warwick restored the Lancastrian king Henry VI, held prisoner in the Tower of London; Edward negotiated for enough military support from his brother-in-law Charles, Duke of Burgundy to regain the crown. In March 1471 his small fleet landed in Yorkshire, profiting from the neutrality of Henry Percy, whom Edward had restored to the earldom of Northumberland the previous year. Edward managed to move south unmolested and join forces with William, Lord Hastings in the Midlands. As Edward’s support gathered momentum Clarence, sensing the tide was turning against Warwick, abandoned the earl and submitted to his brother.

  On 14 April 1471 the armies of Edward and Warwick met at Barnet, a chaotic battle fought in a swirling mist, and Richard displayed great courage in the mêlée. He was slightly wounded in the combat; a number of his retainers were killed around him. Edward won the victory and Warwick was found slain on the battlefield. The king now turned his attention to the invading Lancastrian army of Margaret of Anjou, which had landed in the West Country. Showing great energy, the king pursued the Lancastrian forces and brought them to battle at Tewkesbury on 4 May. Richard was given the honour of commanding the vanguard, and he did so with distinction, repulsing an impetuous attack by Edmund, Duke of Somerset and throwing the whole Lancastrian line into chaos. The result was a decisive Yorkist victory, with Henry VI’s son and heir, Edward, Prince of Wales, killed in the fighting.

  Civil war was a harsh schooling ground, and Richard had acquitted himself well. As constable he now presided over the swift trial and execution of the Duke of Somerset – hauled out of sanctuary in Tewkesbury Abbey on Edward IV’s orders on 6 May – and more controversially for his reputation was likely to have been in the Tower of London on the night of 21 May, when the victorious Yorkist army returned to the capital and when Henry VI was most probably murdered. Tudor sources made much of this, but there is no contemporary evidence that Richard was actually present when Henry VI died, and Edward IV was almost certainly responsible for ordering it.

  As a child, Richard had witnessed terrible violence against his own mother; as a young adult, his character and personality had been forged during a shocking period of civil conflict. In the midst of it, Clarence had betrayed Edward IV’s trust but Richard, to his great credit, had remained steadfastly loyal. The potent atmosphere of quarrels and intrigue, murders and executions, would have left a lasting impression on the adolescent duke. This was the environment in which Richard was introduced to political life.

  Edward IV now chose to reward his most trusted supporters with positions of regional power within the realm. Richard’s upbringing with the Earl of Warwick in the 1460s made him an obvious candidate to take over the earl’s role as royal lieutenant in the north. In the months following Tewkesbury Richard acquired Warwick’s office of chief steward of the northern parts of the Duchy of Lancaster and occupied forfeited Neville estates in Yorkshire and Cumbria. And to underline his position as Warwick’s successor, Richard married one of the earl’s daughters, Anne Neville, shortly after Easter 1472. He was determined to secure his rightful share of Warwick’s landed estate.

  Clarence had already married Warwick’s other daughter, Isabel Neville and the two brothers fought bitterly over the lucrative Neville inheritance. The Croyland Chronicler gave a vivid window on the opening of the dispute: ‘A quarrel began during Michaelmas term 1472 between the king’s two brothers that proved very difficult to settle … So much dissension arose between the brothers, and so many acute arguments were put forward, on either side, in the presence of the king, sitting in the council chamber, that all present, even lawyers, marvelled … Indeed, these three brothers, the king and the two dukes, possessed such outstanding talents that if they had been able to avoid discord, such a triple bond could only have been broken with the utmost difficulty.’ Finally, in 1474, Edward IV brokered a settlement – one that denied the rightful claim of Warwick’s nephew and nearest male heir, George Neville, Duke of Bedford, and also the rights of Warwick’s widow, Anne Beauchamp, who was now treated by Edward’s decree as if she were legally dead. Her rights now passed to her daughters, and thus to their husbands, Richard and Clarence.

  However, there was a flaw in the Neville inheritance. Edward IV had inserted a clause in the act of settlement that allowed his brothers to enjoy the lands and pass them on to their male heirs only as long as Warwick’s nephew, George Neville, Duke of Bedford or his successors were still alive. This stipulation did not pose a problem during the remainder of Edward’s reign, but was dramatically thrust to the fore at the start of Richard’s Protectorate in May 1483. In the meantime, Richard began to cultivate former Neville servants and create a powerful northern affinity.

  Richard’s actions were entirely typical of any great magnate of the fifteenth century. A lord of the realm would bind men to his cause, often retaining their loyalty through a carefully drawn up contract, where an annual fee would be paid in return for specified acts of service. Richard built up a following in an area riven with feuds and disorder, and showed considerable skill in doing so. In a letter of his, written at Middleham on 19 October 1474, he requested one follower, William FitzWilliam, to ride with him to the king: ‘Trusty and well beloved,’ Richard began, ‘we greet you. And for as much as the king’s grace, by his most honourable letters [drawn up] under his privy seal, has commanded us in all goodly haste to come to his highness at London, we therefore desire and pray you – all excuses laid apart [aside] – that you ready yourself with eight horses to accompany us thither, and that you meet us at Doncaster on the 25th day of this present month. And that you fail us not thereof, as our faithful trust is in you.’

  Such a letter, with its commanding tone, followed the form used by any great lord building up his influence. Richard had by this time also secured the East Anglian estates of the Lancastrian renegade John de Vere, Earl of Oxford and showed no qualms in pressurizing the earl’s elderly and infirm mother to hand over her own lands as well. When the countess seemed reluctant to comply, Richard threatened to take her on a winter journey from London to his Yorkshire residence at Middleham, with potentially lethal consequences. These charges against Richard’s conduct were made in a hostile Tudor parliament, and they neglected to say that the duke eventually settled the issue through legal process rather than physical force. But Richard could be aggressive and intimidating in pursuit of what he regarded as his rightful inheritance, and as he built up his power in the north between 1473 and 1474 he clashed with other magnates, particularly the Earl of Northumberland and Lord Stanley, who resented his intrusion into their own areas of interest.

  However, these actions have to be placed in an overall context. These were turbulent and dangerous times, and many aristocrats were utterly ruthless in building up power within the localities. The Stanley family stopped at nothing to further their hegemony in northern Lancashire, using their influence at court to gain possession of the heiresses to the Harrington estate, subsequently imprisoning them and marrying them against their will.

  Richard was still only twenty-one at the time settlement was reached over the Neville estates. He could be impulsive and headstrong; but he was learning other skills, forging loyalty in an area of divided interests, sharing a deeply felt piety with his wife, Anne Neville, together becoming patrons of Queens’ College, Cambridge, and setting up religious foundations at Middleham and Barnard Castle. His devotion to the memory of his father found concrete expression in
July 1476, when he acted as principal mourner at the reburial of Richard, Duke of York whose remains were reverently carried from Pontefract to Fotheringhay.

  As Richard and his fellow mourners processed towards Fotheringhay, York’s martial prowess was remembered and honoured. York’s epitaph, composed by the heralds, was given due prominence; it celebrated all his achievements and paid particular attention to one stirring feat of arms. At Pontoise, in 1441, the duke had come close to capturing the French monarch Charles VII in an audacious night-time raid. York was at this stage King Henry VI’s representative in France and his royal lieutenant. In Charles, he had faced a rival to Henry’s claim to rule over the country and he decided to confront his challenger personally. On 20 July 1441 York’s forces, showing great daring, crossed the River Oise at night, surprised and routed the French troops guarding the crossing and closed in on the French king’s residence. They were poised to capture Charles VII, who only escaped from their clutches by fleeing his dwelling with moments to spare, leaving a bed still warm when the English soldiers arrived. It was the exceptional bravery of one of the French king’s followers, Guillaume du Chastel – who sacrificed his life to buy precious time for Charles’s escape – that prevented York from achieving an astonishing success.

  This was an action Richard sought to emulate. His book collection showed a very real piety, and also a fascination with the cult of chivalry. In one book, a collection of romances, Richard had written one of his mottoes, ‘tant le desieree’ (‘I have longed for it so much’), at the bottom of the manuscript page of the story of Ipomedon, the ‘best knight in the world’. There was a yearning here, a yearning for a noble cause, seen in Richard’s opposition to the peace treaty with Louis XI at Picquigny in 1475, and his wish – alongside his brother Clarence – to support his sister Margaret, Dowager Duchess of Burgundy, with an army when her lands were threatened by the French king. But such aspirations came to nothing.