Friday 30 September 2016

The Two Little Princes in the Tower of London


The two little Princes, a story of plotting, power, skulduggery, and murder.

The scene is set

One of the most interesting and puzzling periods in the history of the British Isles has got to be the story of the two little princes in the tower.

The tower referred to, is, of course, the tower of London, it houses artwork the Crown jewels and is also known as “The Bloody Tower” because of its horrific history.

The Bloody Tower was the prison and scene of many horrific final days of many figures in British history.

The two little princes referred to, were Edward V and his younger brother Richard, Duke of York. To understand the reason why they were imprisoned we need to delve a little into their background.

So OK who were the little Princes?

Now is the winter of our discontent, made glorious summer by this sun of York.

Young Edward was the eldest son of King Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville, he was born in 1470, and when his father Edward VI died on 9th April 1483 young Edward at the tender age of thirteen took the crown as Edward V. because of his age Edward V became under the protection of his evil uncle Richard Duke of York.

Richard had always been a very loyal supporter of his brother king Edward IV.

However, Young Edward V reigned for only two months before mysteriously disappearing.

And low and behold Richard became King Richard III he died two years later at the battle of Bosworth, to find out more on King Richard III I would strongly recommend reading or better still seeing, the play of the same name by William Shakespeare.

I will be writing about Richard III at a later date. so I suppose you could wait to read mine, not quite as good as Will Shakespeare, but ya get what ya pay for.

Back to the Princes

The other Prince was Edwards’s younger brother Richard, Duke of York.
Richard was born on 17 August 1473 making him three years younger, and by the time he was ten he too found himself in “The Bloody Tower”

Had he survived the death of his brother Edward he (Richard) would have taken the crown, so for Richard III to become King he too would have to die.
It is wildly thought, that in the summer of 1483, someone smothered and murdered the two Princes in their beds with a pillow.

Sir Thomas More wrote that the Princes were murdered by their uncle Richard and buried, and I quote “at the stair-foot, meetly deep" Shakespeare in his play also portrayed Richard as the culprit.

The plot thickens.

During alterations at the Tower in 1674 two skeletons were found buried beneath a stone staircase.

In 1933 the skeletons of two young boys, one aged 10, the other 13, were examined by L.E. Tannery and W. Wright, they concluded that the bones dated from1483.
So was it Richard that had them murdered so he could become King? There is no absolute proof that he did, but between you and I, the evidence looks that way.

No comments:

Post a Comment