Anne Neville: Richard III's Tragic Queen

by Licence, Amy

  No modern court of law would convict Richard of killing the Princes in the Tower. The jury in a televised mock trial of 1984, examining the evidence presented by expert witnesses, returned a verdict of not guilty. As there is no conclusive source to ascertain his guilt or innocence, the balance of probabilities suggests they met their end soon after their last sighting, in the late summer. It seems most likely that they were put to death in the Tower during Richard’s absence in the North; perhaps he deliberately removed himself from the capital for that purpose. It is also possible that he did not issue a direct order but that a servant of his understood that the boys needed to be dispatched and acted independently, presenting the king on his return with a fait accompli. Richard’s servant, Sir James Tyrell, was at the Royal Wardrobe at the start of September, to collect clothing for Edward’s investiture and, according to More, made a confession in 1501, perhaps under torture, that he was responsible for their deaths.

  The investiture of his son Edward as Prince of Wales on 8 September was certainly seen by Elizabeth Wydeville as incontrovertible proof that her sons had been killed. More describes her grief when the news was broken to her in his usual melodramatic terms, yet the elevation of Richard’s son was fairly decisive. There is no doubt that the innocent boys’ murders were tragic. It would be wonderful to believe in one of the romantic tales of their escape and for decisive evidence to prove they lived long, fulfilled lives in some remote European court. Lambert Simnel and Perkin Warbeck, the pretenders to the throne who emerged under the reign of Henry Tudor, were not of the royal blood. They both made verifiable confessions of their own humble origins and the circumstances that propelled them into the public eye. Those contemporary heads of state who welcomed and ‘recognised’ them did so out of political expediency and personal inclination. No convincing report of the princes’ survival has ever been found so it would seem most likely that they died. The box of bones uncovered under the staircase of the White Tower in 1674 probably represents their hasty burial. The blame lies with Richard. Whatever his role in their demise, he was their king, uncle and protector, but he failed to protect them. As king, having given the orders for their incarceration, he had ultimate responsibility for their welfare, whether he gave the orders personally or not. If he ordered their deaths, Anne probably knew it.

  11

  Queen

  July–December 1483

  Kingdoms are but cares,

  State is devoid of stay,

  Riches are ready snares,

  And hasten to decay.

  Pleasure is a privy prick

  Which vice doth still provoke;

  Pomp, imprompt; and fame, a flame;

  Power, a smoldering smoke,

  Who meaneth to remove the rock

  Out of the slimy mud,

  Shall mire himself, and hardly ’scape

  The swelling of the flood.1

  Less than a month after her arrival in London, Anne was anticipating her Coronation. Events had moved very quickly and, for many, unexpectedly. Thomas More’s stinging comment, over twenty years later, was that she and Richard were wearing borrowed robes; ‘that solemnitie was furnished for the most part, with the self same prouision that was appointed for the Coronacioun of his nephew’.2 More’s criticism has both metaphorical and literal resonances, in a vein rather similar to the funeral ‘baked meats’ that Hamlet observes to re-emerge at his mother’s wedding. Even if the existing arrangements that had been made for Edward V’s ceremony were adapted, the seamstresses at least must have worked in considerable haste, sewing flat out to produce the royal robes, after Peter Courteys, Keeper of the Great Wardrobe, received their orders on 27 June. This allowed nine days for their commission before the Coronation day arrived, although it was not until 3 July that Richard and Anne exchanged gifts of 20 yards of purple cloth of gold decorated with garters and roses.3 Alice Claver, an experienced silk worker and mantle weaver from London, was paid handsomely for her work on various Coronation pieces; she was paid 63s and 2d for making laces of Venetian gold and purple silk, with tassels and buttons, for the king’s and queen’s robes and a further 60s and 7d for the white silk and gold lace on Anne’s mantle.4 On 4 July, Richard and Anne travelled by barge from Westminster to the Tower, where they settled into the royal apartments. Security was tight, with Londoners forbidden from carrying arms and a curfew imposed of 10 p.m. This would have meant that Richard and Anne were present in the Tower at the same time as their nephews, the princes, who, if they were still alive at that point, may have been aware of the sudden flurry of activity.

  The following day, 5 July, Anne and Richard rode out through the London streets to Westminster, followed by what Holinshed describes as a huge procession of earls, knights and dukes, although the chronicler was wrong when he stated that their son Edward rode with them. Anne’s ushers, William Joseph and John Vavasour, preceded her, guiding the way for her litter, borne by two palfreys draped in white damask. The litter itself was also of the same material, with white cloth of gold garnished with ribbon and hung with bells. Inside, Anne sat with her hair loose, her head crowned in a gold circlet set with pearls and other precious stones. She wore white cloth of gold, with a cloak and train furred with ermine and trimmed with lace and tassels. After her ‘henxmen’ came four carriages carrying her waiting women: twelve great ladies and seven ladies of the queen’s chamber. Anne was no stranger to bravery. In the midst of the exiled Lancastrians in France, and later at Tewkesbury, she had proved her mettle, but she had never before been on such public display. Now, as she watched the upturned faces that lined her route, she knew she would never again be able to escape the responsibility, scrutiny and dangers that her new role brought. She may have been reassured to see the loyal Northern soldiers stationed at key points throughout the length of their journey. Outside St Paul’s, the procession paused while she was presented with a gift of 500 marks from the city, before continuing to Westminster, where she joined Richard to partake of wine and spices in the Great Chamber. This was probably the King’s Chamber, later known as the Painted Chamber, lined with impressive Biblical wall paintings and with a state bed headed by a gilded panel depicting the Coronation of St Edward the Confessor. The image of the eleventh-century king looked out over the scene as Richard and Anne prepared to emulate the ritual.

  That night, Anne slept alone. Richard was to carry out the traditional pre-Coronation ceremony of dubbing Knights of the Bath; the arrangements for Edward’s Coronation had included forty-nine knights but the surviving documents for Richard’s day mention only seventeen. When these details were drawn up in advance, the officer who committed them to paper was unclear about the final arrangements, including the king’s intended whereabouts at the time. There may have been some doubt about the time-scale or how long he would stay at Barnard Castle5 but, in the end, protocol was observed by Richard and Anne staying in the Tower, before proceeding to Westminster. This is again indicative of the haste of the occasion, even the uncertainty over whether it would go ahead. First, these knights served dinner to the royal couple, which was fish as it was a Friday. The menu consisted of two courses, comprising nine and twelve dishes each. The first contained salt and seawater fish dishes while the second was more ceremonial, with freshwater fish and set pieces in ‘foil’, decorated in silver and gold leaf. Many were served in sauces coloured red and yellow by saffron and other spices. That evening, Richard ‘took a ceremonial bath’, which was lined and draped with 22½ ells of linen, in order to prepare spiritually, along with vigils and prayers.6

  The morning of 6 July 1483 dawned warmly down the Thames. As Anne woke in her chamber overlooking the river, she must have felt a thrill of excitement, tinged with surprise at the rapidity of the recent changes that had brought her to the capital in her husband’s wake. Perhaps her mood was also coloured by uncertainty. Did she have questions of her own about how she had been catapulted from her quiet Middleham existence onto the centre stage of English politics, or the role her hu
sband had played and the implications for the lives of her nieces and nephews? After she rose and dressed, she was a few short hours away from the ceremony that was to mark the pinnacle of her achievement and her father’s long-cherished aim. What were her thoughts that morning, and in the hours before she was due to be crowned as England’s queen? Her son, Edward, was too ill to be with them; did she know that on that special day, the Mayor and Aldermen of York rode out to Middleham to present the boy with food and wine? By 7 o’clock, the Coronation party assembled in Westminster Hall. Anne wore a royal surcoat and mantle, made from 56 yards of rich purple velvet, adorned with rings and tassels of gold, and a second gown in crimson, furred with ermine. As a duchess, she would previously have been entitled to wear a mantle of only 13 yards. She was barefoot and her hair hung long and loose.

  Richard was keen to involve as many of his kinsmen and extended family in the day’s proceedings as he could. As she processed with her husband along the special carpet of ray cloth, their Coronation robes matching, Anne would have recognised many familiar faces. Richard’s transition from protector to king had been so swift and unexpected that it was wise to surround themselves with allies, fulfilling the ceremonial roles of the day and enjoying the feasting and celebrations that would follow. At the head of the procession trumpets sounded the way, followed by the heralds of arms wearing colourful tabards that depicted the Yorkist arms. Following them, the Bishop of Rochester, Edmund Audley, carried the cross, himself a grandson of Constance of York, who was Anne’s maternal great-grandmother.7 Next came Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland, bareheaded and carrying the pointless sword naked in his hands, which signified mercy. Percy had been married to Maud Herbert, intended as a wife for the young Henry Tudor during his time as her father’s ward. Percy was related to both his new rulers: his maternal aunt was Richard’s mother, Cecily Neville, who was sister to Anne’s grandfather, the Earl of Salisbury. After Percy came William Herbert, the Earl of Huntingdon and Pembroke, Maud’s brother, who would marry Richard’s illegitimate daughter Catherine in 1484. He was also brother-in-law to Richard through his first marriage to Mary Wydeville, sister of Elizabeth, Edward IV’s wife and queen. He bore the gilt spurs signifying knighthood.

  Following Huntingdon came the Earl of Bedford, carrying the holy relic of St Edward’s staff. This title had previously been held by George Neville, the young nephew of Warwick, who had received the title on his engagement to Princess Elizabeth of York in 1470, although he was deprived of the title in 1478 and had died two months earlier. Next came Thomas Stanley, Earl of Derby. Having survived the council meeting of 13 June where Hastings had lost his life, he was now bearing the mace of constableship. Originally married to Warwick’s sister, Eleanor Neville, he had been steward of Edward IV’s household before marrying the Lancastrian Margaret Beaufort. Three ceremonial swords were carried out next. The first was in the hands of Edmund Grey, 1st Earl of Kent, who had married one of his sons to Elizabeth Wydeville’s sister Anne, and another to Joan or Eleanor Wydeville, making him Richard’s brother-in-law twice over. The second was borne by Richard’s childhood friend from Middleham, Francis, Lord Lovell, with the third carried by Thomas Howard, Earl of Surrey. In the mid-1460s Howard was a ‘henxman’ under Edward IV, possibly training with George, Duke of Clarence, not at Middleham with Richard. Following them was the Duke of Suffolk, Richard’s brother-in-law by his marriage to his sister Elizabeth, holding the sceptre of peace, and then his son, John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, with the ball and cross of monarchy. Finally, came the Duke of Norfolk, John Howard, who carried the crown in his hands.8 For all this impressive array of family, the conflicts of their youth had made Richard and Anne very aware that blood ties did not equate to loyalty. After all, the surviving aristocracy of England were already assembled in the capital in expectation of a very different Coronation.

  After his kinsmen came Richard, wearing his robes of purple velvet, with a canopy carried over his head, flanked by bishops and barons. Buckingham followed, carrying the king’s train and a white staff for the office of Lord High Steward. Anne followed her husband, also under a canopy, dressed ‘like to the king’, and ‘on hir head a rich coronet set with stones and pearle’.9 She had her own train of earls, viscounts and dukes carrying the ceremonial sceptre and rod with the dove. Anne’s crown was carried by the thirteen-year-old Earl of Wiltshire, Edward Stafford, whose mother was another Anne Neville, Richard’s great-aunt and Anne’s great-great-aunt. After him came ‘manie fair gentlewomen’: Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond was the first, bearing the train, then the Duchesses of Norfolk and Suffolk, as well as Anne’s aunt Alice FitzHugh, Warwick’s sister and her daughter, Elizabeth Parr. There was also Lovell’s wife, Anne; Katherine Neville, the queen’s great aunt; Elizabeth Talbot, mother of Anne de Mowbray; Elizabeth de la Pole, the Duchess of Suffolk, who was Richard’s sister; Lady Scrope of Masham and Upsall and Lora, Lady Mountjoy. The Coronation records also list ladies from aristocratic northern families including Anne’s illegitimate half-sister Margaret Huddleston, who was, perhaps, around her own age or a little older. All had changed the blue gowns they had worn during the procession for the crimson velvet required by the ceremony.

  The procession passed through the palace and into the abbey at the West End, while ‘divers solemn songs’ were sung as they headed to the altar. Many of those assembled to witness the day had taken part in the recent decades of conflict, many fighting on the opposing side, and had travelled to London in anticipation of seeing the twelve-year-old Edward V making the same journey. The rapidly made robes that had been created especially for him were hanging in a wardrobe somewhere in one of the palaces, never to be worn. Did any of those assembled wonder where he was or question his right? If they did, no one spoke up and interrupted proceedings. At the altar, Richard and Anne were ‘shifted of their robes’ and anointed. Then as king and queen they changed into cloth of gold, with Anne’s train furred with ermine and miniver, comprising 56 yards of material. A stage had been erected, covered with red worsted, where two empty thrones sat waiting. Richard’s was central but Anne’s was to the left and slightly lower: it was the first time in centuries that a king had succeeded to the throne who was already married. Together, they took their seats alongside the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Bourchier, in whose household Richard had spent time as a youth. Anne was given sceptre in her right hand and the rod with a dove in her left, while a ring was placed on the fourth finger of her right hand. They knelt to hear the mass sung and share one consecrated host, which was divided between them before making offerings at the shrine of St Edward.10

  The formal proceedings over, Richard and Anne were officially king and queen. He exchanged Edward the Confessor’s crown, Fabyan’s ‘regal diadem’, for one of his own before they processed outside and entered their new chambers in Westminster Palace. Here, for a moment, the pair had a rare moment of privacy. What passed between them? Were they excited at this, the high point of their lives? Were they relieved that the proceedings had passed off without a hitch, that they were now the anointed monarchs of the realm? Perhaps it would be straying into the territory of the romantic novelist to suggest they embraced and called each other ‘king’ and ‘queen’. Quite possibly, they had little time to celebrate: there was much to be done and Richard was a man of action. No doubt, as a pragmatist and realist, Anne was busy at his side straight away, as they prepared for the next stage of the day. They may have changed their clothes or taken refreshment, even rested for what would be a long night ahead.

  However they used that brief window of time, Anne was now officially Queen of England. It was a position she had once thought to attain by her first marriage to Prince Edward but had then believed lost to her forever. Now she had come to it by accident, through circumstances of fate and the choices made by her husband. As Warwick’s daughter, no doubt she had ambition and pride. As wife and consort to Richard, she would have been more than equal to the moment, standing at his side.
She had already been Princess of Wales and the sister-in-law to a queen. She may not have actively sought the crown but it would be naïve to think that Warwick’s daughter would not have welcomed it, even if she had any private reservations about what it may entail. Only hindsight warns us of rebellion, her impending death and that of her son and husband. Too many accounts of her life had taken a ‘doom-laden’ approach, suggesting her weakness and ill health. In reality though, she may not have been experiencing any symptoms of the illness that would claim her life, as many of the contemporary chroniclers agree it was of a short duration. Because of the way her husband succeeded, she may have anticipated challenges but the potential opponents were few: the Lancastrian line had been effectively wiped out, with their best candidate, Henry Tudor, still in exile in France. The news of Richard’s coup would be as much of a surprise to him as the fact that his mother, Margaret Beaufort, had borne Anne’s train. The other Yorkist claimants, sons of Edward IV and Clarence, were still children. In July 1483, at the age of twenty-seven, Anne could look forward to potential decades on the throne, with her son continuing the Yorkist dynasty.