Richard III / Makers of History

by Jacob Abbott

Richard's determination in respect to Jane Shore.

Accordingly, Richard employed his friends and partisans in talking as much as possible in all quarters about the dissoluteness and the vices of the late king. False stories would probably have been invented, if it had not been that there were enough that were true. These stories were all revived and put in circulation, and every thing was made to appear as unfavorable for Edward as possible. Richard himself, on the other hand, feigned a very strict and scrupulous regard for virtue and morality, and deemed it his duty, he said, to do all in his power to atone for and wipe away the reproach which his brother's loose and wicked life had left upon the court and the kingdom. Among other things, the cause of public morals demanded, he said, that an example should be made of Jane Shore, who had been the associate and partner of the king in his immoralities.

Jane's character.

Jane Shore, it will be recollected, was the wife of a rich citizen of London, whom Edward had enticed away from her husband and brought to court. She was naturally a very amiable and kind-hearted woman, and all accounts concur in saying that she exercised the power that she acquired over the mind of the king in a very humane and praiseworthy manner. She was always ready to interpose, when the king contemplated any act of harshness or severity, to avert his anger and save his intended victim, and, in general, she did a great deal to soften the brutality of his character, and to protect the innocent and helpless from the wrongs which he would otherwise have often done them. These amiable and gentle traits of character do not, indeed, atone at all for the grievous sin which she committed in abandoning her husband and living voluntarily with the king, but they did much toward modifying the feeling of scorn and contempt with which she would have otherwise been regarded by the people of England.

Her jewelry confiscated.
The punishment of Jane Shore.

Richard caused Jane to be arrested and sent to prison. He also seized all her plate and jewels, and confiscated them. She had a very rich and valuable collection of these things.[O] Richard then caused an ecclesiastical court to be organized, and sent her before it to be tried. The court, undoubtedly in accordance with instructions that Richard himself gave them, sentenced her, by way of penance for her sins, to walk in midday through the streets of London, from one end of the city to the other, almost entirely undressed. The intention of this severe exposure was to designate her to those who should assemble to witness the punishment as a wanton, and thus to put her to shame, and draw upon her the scorn and derision of the populace. They found some old and obsolete law which authorized such a punishment. The sentence was carried into effect on a Sunday. The unhappy criminal was conducted through the principal streets of the city, wearing a night-dress, and carrying a lighted taper in her hand, between rows of spectators that assembled by thousands along the way to witness the scene. But, instead of being disposed to receive her with taunts and reproaches, the populace were moved to compassion by her saddened look and her extreme beauty. Their hearts were softened by the remembrance of the many stories they had heard of the kindness of her heart, and the amiableness and gentleness of her demeanor, in the time of her prosperity and power. They thought it hard, too, that the law should be enforced so rigidly against her alone, while so many multitudes in all ranks of society, high as well as low, were allowed to go unpunished.

Still, Richard's object in this exhibition was accomplished. The transaction had the effect of calling the attention of the public universally and strongly to the fact that Edward the Fourth had been a loose and dissolute man, and prepared people's minds for the charge which was about to be brought against him.

Alleged marriage of Edward IV. to Elinor Talbot.

This charge was that he had been secretly married to another lady before his union with Elizabeth Woodville, and that consequently by this latter marriage he was guilty of bigamy. Of course, if this were true, the second marriage would be null and void, and the children springing from it would have no rights as heirs.