Richard III Read online

  RICHARD III

  ENGLAND’S MOST

  CONTROVERSIAL KING

  CHRIS SKIDMORE

  Begin Reading

  Table of Contents

  About the Author

  Photos

  Copyright Page

  Thank you for buying this

  St. Martin’s Press ebook.

  To receive special offers, bonus content,

  and info on new releases and other great reads,

  sign up for our newsletters.

  Or visit us online at

  us.macmillan.com/newslettersignup

  For email updates on the author, click here.

  The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you for your personal use only. You may not make this e-book publicly available in any way. Copyright infringement is against the law. If you believe the copy of this e-book you are reading infringes on the author’s copyright, please notify the publisher at: http://us.macmillanusa.com/piracy.

  To Lydia

  ILLUSTRATIONS

  1. Portrait of Richard III, English school, oil on panel, c.1510–40. © Society of Antiquaries of London / Bridgeman Images.

  2. Page noting the birth of Richard III, from The Book of Hours of Richard III, English school, ink on vellum, 15th century. © Lambeth Palace Library / Bridgeman Images.

  3. Church of St Mary and All Saints, Fotheringhay, Northamptonshire. Photo © NRT-Helena / Alamy.

  4. Middleham Castle, Yorkshire. Photo © English Heritage / Heritage Images / Getty Images.

  5. Letter from Richard, duke of Gloucester, to Sir John Say, 1469. British Library Cotton Vespasian MS F III fo. 19. © British Library Board / Bridgeman Images.

  6. Portrait of Edward IV, English school, oil on panel, c.1510–40. © Society of Antiquaries of London / Bridgeman Images.

  7. Portrait of George, duke of Clarence. © Paul Fearn / Alamy.

  8. Edward IV on Fortune’s wheel from The Life of Edward IV, English school, ink on vellum, 1460–c.1470. British Library Harley 7353. © British Library Board / Bridgeman Images.

  9. Portrait of Elizabeth Woodville, Queen of Edward IV, English school, oil on panel, c.1500. © Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford / Bridgeman Images.

  10. Anthony Woodville and William Caxton presenting the first printed book in English to Edward IV. Lambeth Palace Library, London. © Bridgeman Images.

  11. Battle of Barnet, English school, 15th century. Centrale Bibliotheek van de Universiteit, Ghent. © Bridgeman Images.

  12. Battle of Tewkesbury in Nouvelles du Recouvrement par Edouard IV de son Royaume d’Angleterre, French school, 15th century. Bibliothèque municipale de Besançon MS 1168, fo. 4v. Courtesy of the Ville de Besançon Bibliothèque et archives municipales

  13. The descent of the Neville family in the Beauchamp Pageants, Netherlandish school, ink on vellum, c. 1483. British Library Cotton Julius E. IV, fo. 28v. © British Library Board / Bridgeman Images.

  14. Richard of Shrewsbury, duke of York, and Edward, Prince of Wales. Royal Window, Northwest Transept, Canterbury Cathedral. Photo © Granger / Alamy.

  15. The White Tower. Photo © Erhan Elaldi / Anadolu Agency / Getty Images.

  16. The signatures of Richard, duke of Gloucester and Edward V, May 1483. British Library Cotton Vespasian MS F XIII fo. 123. © British Library Board / Bridgeman Images.

  17. Garter stall-plate of Lord Hastings from The Stall Plates of the Knights of the Order of the Garter, 1348–85 by W. H. St John Hope (Archibald Constable, 1901). Private Collection. © Look and Learn / Bridgeman Images.

  18. Letter from Richard III to John Russell, 29 July 1483. TNA C81/1392/1. Courtesy of The National Archives, Kew, Surrey.

  19. Detail from the Rous Roll, c.1483–4. © British Library Board / Bridgeman Images.

  20. Warwick Castle. Photo © Ellen Rooney / Design Pics / Bridgeman Images.

  21. Illuminated initial of the charter granted by Richard III to the Company of the Wax Chandlers of London in 1484. © Geoffrey Wheeler.

  22. Brass rubbing of William Catesby. © Geoffrey Wheeler.

  23. Stained-glass window depicting Lord Howard, 1st duke of Norfolk. © Geoffrey Wheeler.

  24. Letter from Richard III to John Russell, 12 October 1483. TNA C81/1392/6. Courtesy of The National Archives, Kew, Surrey.

  25. Henry Tudor, 16th-century French drawing. Bibliothèque Municipale, Arras. © Bridgeman Images.

  26. Elizabeth of York, English school, oil on canvas, late 16th century. © National Portrait Gallery, London.

  27. Richard III’s letter to Henry Vernon, 11 August 1485. Belvoir Mss vol. 1, fo. 20. Reproduced with kind permission of His Grace the Duke of Rutland.

  28. Silver gilt boar badge discovered at the site of the battle of Bosworth. Image courtesy of Leicestershire County Council.

  29. Cannon balls discovered at the battle site. Image courtesy of Leicestershire County Council.

  30. Gold badge of an eagle with a snake. Image courtesy of Leicestershire County Council.

  31. Tomb of Sir John Cheyne in Salisbury Cathedral. © Geoffrey Wheeler.

  32. Tomb of Thomas, Lord Stanley, in the Church of St Peter and St Paul, Ormskirk, Lancashire. © Paula Martin.

  33. The positions and movements of the forces at the battle of Bosworth. Map by John Gilkes, following an interpretation by Peter Foss.

  34. The remains of Richard III in Leicester City Council Social Services car park. © University of Leicester / Rex Features.

  35. The bones of Richard III. © University of Leicester.

  36. The skull of Richard III. © University of Leicester.

  37. Portrait of Richard III, English school, oil on panel, 1504–20. Royal Collection Trust © Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2017.

  38. Portrait of Richard III, English school, oil on panel, 16th century. © Society of Antiquaries of London / Bridgeman Images.

  ENGLAND, FRANCE AND BRITTANY DURING THE WARS OF THE ROSES

  A NOTE ON MONEY AND DATES

  English monetary values are recorded in pounds (l), shillings (s) and pence (d), with twenty shillings in the pound and twelve pence in the shilling. The mark was a unit of account, with one mark being worth thirteen shillings and four pence, therefore two-thirds of a pound. There are many pitfalls to estimating the value of currently across the centuries; however, a useful guide is the National Archives’ Currency Converter (see www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency) that suggests one pound in 1480 would have been worth an equivalent of £504.59 at 2005 prices, with one shilling worth an equivalent of £25.23 and one penny equalling £2.10. The standard unit of French money was the livre tournois, divided into twenty sols (later sous), each worth twelve denier. One ecu was worth the equivalent of six livres tournois. The value of the livre tournois to the pound fluctuated, but it is generally estimated that there were ten livres tournois in the pound, with one shilling being worth two livres tournois.

  Dates are given according to contemporary sources that followed the Julian calendar in use at the time. With the adoption of the Gregorian Calendar in 1752, account should be taken of the fact that these dates do not match with the exact dates of our current calendar. The difference between the two calendars in the fifteenth century is nine days, so the battle of Bosworth, while fought on 22 August in 1485, would have actually been 31 August in our contemporary calendar.

  INTRODUCTION

  Shortly after Palm Sunday, 1484, a Silesian knight, Niclas von Popplau, arrived in England. His first journey had been from the Kentish coast, where he had landed, to pay his own pilgrimage to the internationally renowned shrine of Thomas Becket at Canterbury, which Popplau later noted in a journal he made of his visit ‘was more beautiful than any I have seen before, decorated beyond all measure with many gem stones�
��.1 Journeying to the capital, Popplau visited Westminster Abbey, where, among others, he saw the tomb of Edward the Confessor. Eight days after Easter, Popplau set off from London with the intention of visiting the king himself, currently residing in Yorkshire. As the Silesian travelled northwards, through Ware, Cambridge, Stamford and Newark, he found himself something of a novelty to the local population, at times being pursued by ‘beautiful women who followed me around’ attempting to kiss him. ‘If I refused to kiss one’, he later wrote, ‘she would depart in embarrassment, but would return half an hour later, and with much deference offered me food and drink. And all this they did just so as to deprive me of my virginity.’ Still, Popplau found them to be the ‘most beautiful women, the likes of which I have not seen anywhere in the world. They love the Germans, they like to be flirted with, they have more beautiful home-spun breasts, and by nature from head to foot larger and sturdier limbs, than German women.’ As for the men, Popplau found them ‘hot headed and choleric disposition, and when they burst out in anger take no pity on anyone’.

  Passing through Doncaster and on to York, Popplau noted how the city ‘was the patrimony of the present king of England, before he was elected or became king by his own power’.2 Arriving in York, he found the minster there ‘an even more beautiful church than in London, and much more ostentatious, in all its buildings more extensively decorated’. On 1 May, Popplau arrived at a ‘strong castle’ not far from York, likely to have been Pontefract Castle.* ‘Here are kept the king’s treasure’, Popplau noted, ‘and great lords like the king’s children and the sons of princes which are kept like prisoners.’3

  The following day, Popplau was granted an audience with King Richard III, ‘in the presence of all princes, earls, councillors and all his nobility’. Popplau addressed Richard in Latin, delivering letters from the Holy Roman Emperor as well as the king’s sister, Margaret, the duchess of Burgundy. Richard was apparently ‘astonished’ at Popplau’s eloquence; reading the letters, Popplau later wrote, Richard ‘himself approached me, took me by the hand and drew me to him. He answered me in Latin through an interpreter that his majesty the king would gladly do everything I asked as far as lay within his power to do, for the sake of His Imperial Majesty the Prince of Burgundy and also for my own sake, on account of my eloquence, which he would not have expected of me, had he not heard it himself.’4 Richard then addressed Popplau three times (‘as is the custom in England’, Popplau noted): ‘I welcome you, and be freely welcome with me.’5 After Popplau left the king’s court, he was conducted to a nearby inn by one of Richard’s gentlemen of the royal chamber, though they quickly found that they were not alone; ‘many people followed us to the house, including women and maidens. They entered the inn secretly, but with the hostess’s permission, so that they might look at me alone.’

  The next day Richard sent for Popplau to attend mass at the nearby church, no doubt designed to impress the Silesian with the quality of musicianship that he had already collected from across the country. Popplau was suitably impressed. ‘There I heard the most delightful music that I heard in all my life, which in the purity of the voices might well be compared to the angels.’ After mass, Richard ordered a Flemish nobleman who was currently residing at court, John, lord of Bergen op Zoom, to take Popplau by the hand and lead him to his chamber, in a tent erected near to the church. Going inside, Popplau was struck by its lavish contents: ‘There I saw the King’s bed, covered in red velvet and a cloth of gold … in the same way as His Imperial Majesty’s bed is so adorned. And in the king’s tent there was also a table covered all around with cloths of silk embroidered with gold, set up next to the bed.’ Catching sight of Richard himself as the king prepared to sit down to dinner, Popplau was equally impressed at the splendour Richard had cloaked himself in. ‘The king went to dinner and wore a collar of gold with many pearls the size of peas, and diamonds. The collar was as thick as a man’s hand, and was worn over his left shoulder across his back and under his right arm.’

  It was a display, Popplau believed, that had been ‘deliberately placed by the wise men of his court in such a way that I should see him sit at table in his regal splendour’. At the king’s table were ‘his princes and Lords’; Popplau observed how when Richard ‘had sat down there sat with him two princes, the king’s blood-relatives, and the earl of Northumberland, who is the most powerful in all England. But they sat a long way from the King at the very end of the table.’

  When Richard noticed Popplau had entered the tent, he ordered that he should sit at the table ‘alongside his two kinsmen’. Popplau replied that rather than sit with the king’s companions, his ‘greatest pleasure and desire’, especially since he was due to depart shortly, was to sit close to the king, ‘to see his royal majesty’s face and exceedingly famous virtues’, an answer which, Popplau noted, ‘greatly pleased the king’.

  As the pair conversed at the table, Popplau observed how Richard ‘grew animated’ at his answers, ‘so that he barely ate of any dish, but continually talked with me’:

  He asked me about his Imperial majesty, all kings and princes of the Empire who were known to me, about their customs, fortunes, dealings, and virtues. I answered with everything that was to their honour. Then the king was silent for a while. Afterwards he began again to question me, of many things and dealings, and finally also of the Turks. And I replied to him that before Martinmas 1483 his Majesty the King of Hungary with the aid of forces sent by His Imperial Majesty and his Imperial Majesty’s lands, had slain more than 12,000 Turks of the Turkish emperor. When the king heard this, he was greatly pleased and answered ‘I would that this kingdom and land of mine lay on the Turkish border instead of the kingdom of Hungary. Then I would certainly just with my own people and without the aid of other kings, princes and lords drive away not only the Turks but all my enemies and opponents.’6

  ‘O Dear God, what a gracious lord I recognised in that king’, Popplau wrote, full of praise for his royal host. The German also noted how the king was ‘three fingers taller than I, but a little slimmer, and not as muscular7 and much thinner’, adding that ‘he has very delicate arms and legs, also a great heart’.

  Several days later, Richard gave Popplau a gift of fifty nobles. Popplau stayed at the royal court for around eight days, when he ‘was almost always present at court at his meals’, before finally deciding to continue his journey. Informing the king of his departure, Richard replied that he would ‘not impede my intended way. But should, my planned journey complete, I care to return to his majesty on the way back, I should be even more welcome to him than now.’ Richard then gave Popplau a gold collar ‘which he took from the neck of a gentleman’. Overwhelmed by the king’s generosity, Popplau begged ‘that he should not grant such a gift to me, being entirely undeserving, for I had not come to his Majesty to seek handouts or gifts, but his royal majesty’s favour’. To this Richard, almost offended, retorted that ‘if for the sake of my own honour I would refuse his gifts, which it was his honour to give, how did I expect to gain his favour? Therefore, if I desired his good grace, I should also accept this gracious mark of honour, and not reject it.’ Popplau meekly thanked Richard and with hesitation accepted the gift, though he could not help but notice that the collar was of significant weight, weighing thirteen ounces in gold.

  Popplau was given safe conduct to travel the country unharmed, though for the moment he was ‘commanded’ by the king to rent an inn, where he continued to be visited by members of Richard’s chamber, together with ‘the king’s musicians, shawms, pipers and lutenists’, whom Popplau rewarded with a gift of four crowns. Richard gave Popplau an additional fifty nobles, and when the German attempted to refuse yet another gift, the king became ‘animated’ and ‘sent me a message asking whether I were of royal or princely blood that I should hold his gifts in contempt, to whom I replied that I had refused his majesty’s gifts not out of contempt, but simply on account of honour. And he rebuked me with harsh words, and pressed me to such a de
gree that I had to accept it.’

  When Popplau was ready to depart, he was given letters of safe conduct by the king, while one of Richard’s men, a Spanish captain called Juan de Salazar, a soldier of fortune who would later fight on Richard’s behalf, approached the German with ‘letters and instructions for his good friends in his own country, that they should show me friendship and favour, and he did this of his own free will, even though I had not ever approached or asked him for it’.8

  Popplau would soon depart England for Portugal, where he visited the court of King John II. Once again, Popplau gave ample descriptions of the generosity with which he was treated at a royal court. Throughout his work, his willingness to describe the courts and holy places across Europe suggests that the knight had been sent on a mission for political purposes, rather than for his own pleasure. The same year as his visit to Richard’s court, Popplau had been promoted to the rank of palatinus at the court of Emperor Frederick III, becoming one of the monarch’s close associates. His tours across Europe seem to have been to gather information for his master, which would include descriptions of the castles that he saw, in particular the military installations at the French naval base of Honfleur and detailed accounts of Portuguese expeditions to Africa.9 Yet it is striking that Popplau had clearly been impressed with his English host, noting that, when he had finally departed, ‘the king of England had given me a dead boar’ (either a boar to eat during the farewell party that Richard had commanded be held at the local inn, or referring to the collar of gold, which would have been decorated with Richard’s insignia of the white boar).

  Popplau’s description of Richard provides us with a rare, contemporary glimpse into the world of Richard III. Of course, we are viewing Richard as he would wish to be seen, knowing that Popplau was likely to pass on any report of his conduct to his royal master, Frederick III. Richard’s personality and behaviour had become the talk of the courts of Europe. Barely over a year before, Richard had been the unswervingly loyal younger brother of Edward IV, the Yorkist king who had reigned, albeit with one deposition in 1470, for over twenty years. Edward’s death, aged just forty-one, in April 1483 had transformed everything. Many had expected his eldest son, Prince Edward, aged thirteen, to inherit the throne as Edward V. A coronation was planned, but would never take place. Richard, having been entrusted as the new king’s Protector, eventually chose to accept the crown for himself, being crowned Richard III on 6 July 1483. In the whirlwind of political events, Edward V and his younger brother, Richard, duke of York, disappeared into the Tower of London, never to be seen again. Within eighty-eight days, Richard had gone from brother to Protector to king. Immediately, his unforeseen reign had been beset by rebellion, including by his closest ally, Henry, duke of Buckingham.