The Princes in the Tower (eBook)

Introduction

The Inspiration

On 25 August 2012, the mortal remains of Richard III of England (1452–85) were discovered beneath a car park in Leicester. News of the discovery and the king’s eventual reburial went viral, reaching an estimated global audience of over 366 million.1 The return of the king captured the world’s imagination, but how had this come about? The search for Richard III had been instigated and led not by an academic or archaeologist, but by a writer.

The Looking For Richard Project was a research initiative which questioned received wisdom and dogma. It proved the ‘bones in the river’ story to be false. For centuries, it had been believed that at the time of the Dissolution of the Monasteries (in the late 1530s), Richard III’s remains were exhumed from their resting place, carried through the streets of Leicester by a jeering mob and reburied near the River Soar. Later, it was claimed they were exhumed again and thrown into the river.2 Without any supporting evidence, the story had been repeated as truth and fact by leading historians.

We also disproved the local projection that the lost Greyfriars Church was probably inaccessible, being under the buildings and road of Grey Friars (street). This was suggested in 1986, with a plaque erected four years later to mark the location. It would be further supported in 2002.3

The Looking For Richard Project also examined Richard III’s character by commissioning the first-ever psychological analysis by two of the UK’s leading experts, Dr Julian Boon and Professor Mark Lansdale. Their eighteen-month study, based on the known details of Richard’s life, revealed that he was not psychopathic, narcissistic or Machiavellian – three of the traits long employed by traditional writers to describe the king.

In physical terms, analysis of Richard’s remains by scientists at the University of Leicester revealed that the king was not, as Shakespeare depicted, a ‘hunchback’ afflicted by kyphosis (a forward bend of the spine). Richard suffered from a scoliosis (a sideways bend), which resulted in uneven shoulders. As there is no record in the king’s lifetime of any disparity in shoulder height, the condition was not readily apparent.4

Analysis also discovered that Richard, contrary to Shakespeare, did not walk with a limp. His hips were straight and his legs normal. He was not lame and was not described in such terms during his lifetime. Similarly, he did not suffer from a withered arm as alleged by the Tudor writer Thomas More. Both arms were of equal length and size.

In addition, the story that the king’s head had struck Bow Bridge when his body was brought to Leicester over the back of a horse following the Battle of Bosworth was also proved false. There were no marks on the king’s skull to suggest that it had come into contact with anything resembling a stone or bridge.

The Looking For Richard Project heralded a new era of evidence-based Richard III research and analysis. It was a major opportunity for the academic community and leading historians to employ this new knowledge as the basis for further discoveries.

We didn’t have to wait long. As we headed towards the king’s reburial, two key members of the team were undertaking their own evidence-based investigations.

Dr John Ashdown-Hill was investigating the king’s dental record, revealing that Richard’s teeth showed no consanguinity (blood relationship) with the ‘bones in the urn’ in Westminster Abbey, said to be those of the Princes in the Tower. The story promulgated by historians for centuries was now open to question.5

Richard III had no congenitally missing teeth, a condition known as hypodontia. This was in direct contrast to the bones in Westminster Abbey, where both skulls presented this genetic anomaly. Previously, it had been argued that this inherited dental characteristic had proved the royal identity of the remains.6

So, was this story yet another myth; as great a historical red herring as the ‘bones in the river’ story?

Another key member of the Looking For Richard Project was undertaking her own enquiries. Annette Carson, a leading biographer of Richard III, published an important constitutional examination of Richard’s legal authority in 1483. Richard, Duke of Gloucester as Lord Protector and High Constable of England (2015) revealed that Richard’s actions during the protectorate were fully compliant with his official position as Protector and Constable of England. This included the execution of William, Lord Hastings, where Richard is traditionally accused of overstepping his rightful authority. So, it seemed that the Looking For Richard Project had been the catalyst for a new era of evidence-based research that would lead to significant discoveries concerning the debate around Richard III.

It would be important for traditional historians to raise their own questions. In May 2014, a year after the announcement of the identification of the king, Professor Michael Hicks, Emeritus Professor of Medieval History at the University of Winchester, was the first.7

Despite the overwhelming evidence supporting a positive identification, Hicks contested that the remains could belong to ‘a victim of any of the battles fought during the Wars of the Roses’. He questioned the DNA evidence and singled out the carbon-14 dating analysis, which covered a period of eighty years, as ‘imprecise’. University of Leicester scientists responded firmly, explaining how the identification had been made by ‘combining different lines of evidence’. They would ‘challenge and counter’ Professor Hicks’ views in follow-up papers, ‘demonstrating that many of his assumptions are incorrect’.

In December 2014, the university published a paper on the DNA investigation, explaining that ‘analysis of all the available evidence confirms identity of King Richard III to the point of 99.999% (at its most conservative)’.8 Genealogist Ashdown-Hill examined Hicks’ suggestion and established that no other individual satisfied the criteria as an alternative candidate.9 Hicks felt that the remains were those of an illegitimate family member whose name is now lost to us.

On Tuesday, 24 March 2015, during reburial week, a headline in the Daily Mail proclaimed, ‘It’s mad to make this child killer a national hero: Richard III was one of the most evil, detestable tyrants ever to walk this earth.’ The writer, Michael Thornton, presented no verification or proof. His piece drew online comments from around the world, best summed up by Catherine from Chicago, United States, ‘This article shows a complete disregard for what counts as historical evidence’.

Thornton’s article had been prompted by a TV programme screened a few days earlier. On Saturday, 21 March 2015, the day before the king’s coffin made its historic journey to Leicester Cathedral, Channel 4 broadcast The Princes in the Tower by Oxford Film & Television,10 promoted as ‘a new drama-documentary … in which key figures … debate one of English history’s darkest murder mysteries’. An extended release from Oxford Film & Television stated:

The programme was a strange mish-mash. Despite an apparent intention to engage in meaningful debate, the broadcast failed to live up to its billing. Most historians and writers gave pertinent and important material insights, particularly Janina Ramirez, who was at pains to offer fact over reported fiction. But sadly, instead of following the known facts, the programme took the road most travelled: evil schemers in dark corners leading the viewer to the requisite conclusion – the boys were murdered, and by their uncle Richard. Indeed, the finale claimed that the mystery of the disappearance of the Princes in the Tower had been solved, a conclusion erroneously reached by a Tudor historian misrepresenting a later Tudor source. The Daily Telegraph reviewed it as a ‘flimsy documentary drama which served as hype … with little reference to any evidence’.12

I nevertheless held out hope that the traditional community might embrace a new era of evidence-based history. However, what happened next would act as a catalyst for an entirely new research initiative.

On Monday, 22 March 2015, as Richard’s coffin was received by Leicester Cathedral in preparation for reburial, Channel 4 TV presenter Jon Snow asked a Tudor historian for the evidence of Richard’s murder of the Princes in the Tower. ‘The evidence’, the historian replied, ‘is that he would have been a fool not to do it.’

In another of Snow’s television interviews on 26 March, the evening of King Richard’s reburial, I was asked, ‘What...