In attempting an impartial consideration of the question of the fate of King Edward's sons, it must always be remembered that the main argument against their uncle is made to rest upon the truth of his previous alleged crimes. This argument is destroyed if Richard was not a venomous hunchback born with teeth, if he was not a cold scheming and calculating villain who had already committed two atrocious murders, drowned his brother in a butt of malmsey, poisoned his wife, and waded through the blood of innocent men to an usurped throne. A careful study of the evidence establishes the fact that these accusations are false, and that they were put forward by the writers under a new dynasty in order to blacken the character of the last Plantagenet King, and to make the accusation that he murdered his nephews more plausible. For it was a matter of the most vital importance to Henry VII., not only that the boys should have been murdered, but that it should be believed that the crime was perpetrated before his accession.
We have to deal with a different man altogether. The real Richard, who is accused of the murder of his nephews, was not previously steeped in crime. The accusation must now be considered as being brought against an ordinary prince of the fifteenth century, if not better certainly not worse than his contemporaries. This at once destroys the chief points of the evidence against him. His accusers rightly felt that it was necessary to blacken Richard's character, and this they did coarsely enough, but very successfully. They knew that, without this poisoning of the wells, the case against him lost all its force. 'Nemo repente turpissimus.'
We must now approach the question relating to the fate of the two young sons of Edward IV., without having constantly before our minds the grotesque caricature portrayed by the Tudor writers. Although it is not possible, especially at this distance of time, to account for the workings of any man's mind, or for the motives which may control his actions, it is yet necessary to consider this phase of the question, with as much light as we can bring to bear upon it.
It is not disputed that Edward IV. always evinced unshaken love and affection for his young brother, and showed the most absolute confidence in him at the time of his death. Richard returned this affection with devoted loyalty. He had no love for the Woodville faction, but he must have felt some regard for his brother's children, being such a man as we believe he has been proved to have been. This feeling of regard would decrease the strength of any motive producing a desire to destroy them for his own ends. But there was no such motive. The boys had been declared to be illegitimate, after an examination of evidence, by the unanimous voice of Parliament. When the Cardinal Archbishop, surrounded by his suffragans, placed the crown of St. Edward on Richard's head, he proclaimed the belief of the Church, and released from their oaths all who under a misapprehension had sworn allegiance to Edward V. The boy, as a claimant to the throne, had ceased to be dangerous.
Unanimity at Richard's coronation
It should be borne in mind that Parliament was unanimous in recognising the title of Richard III. Excepting half a dozen Lancastrian exiles who were equally opposed to any member of the house of York,[[1]] the whole peerage was at Richard's coronation except those whose absence is accounted for by extreme age or youth, or by the calls of duty.[[2]] Even the Woodville faction had submitted, and was represented at the coronation by Viscount Lisle and the Bishop of Salisbury. Henry Tudor's mother bore the train of Richard's Queen, and his uncle Lord Welles was also at the coronation. There was absolutely no party for the illegitimate sons of Edward IV. at the time of their alleged murders, and consequently no danger to be apprehended from them. If the story had put the murders after Buckingham's rising it would have been a little more plausible. But it placed them two months before the rising, when the King had not the shadow of a suspicion that any opposition was contemplated. Setting aside all natural or religious feeling, and even assuming Richard to have been the impossible monster depicted by Tudor writers, he certainly had no motive for the crime.
But it may be argued that the workings of men's minds are inexplicable, and that Richard may have committed the crime from a motive which would seem insufficient to any reasonable man. To decide upon this proposition we can only turn to a consideration of his conduct as regards other persons in the same relationship and position as the two boys, and who were likely to cause Richard as much or as little trouble. There were seven such persons, namely, the five daughters of Edward IV. and the two children of the Duke of Clarence. The King treated his nieces with kindness and consideration as near relations, when they came under his protection. The young Earl of Warwick, son of Richard's elder brother Clarence, was a far more formidable rival than the sons of Edward. The former was incontestably legitimate; while the latter had been declared to be illegitimate by both Houses of Parliament. Richard knighted the son of Clarence, placed him at the head of the nobility, and made him a member of council and of his own household. We, therefore, know that Richard did not look upon the children of his elder brothers as enemies to be destroyed, but as relations to be cherished.
The princes alive in Richard's time
We find, then, that the two young sons of Edward IV. went to reside in the royal lodgings of the Tower in June 1483. The statement put forth by Henry VII. is that they were murdered there in the following August. But there are two pieces of evidence, one of them positive evidence, that they were alive throughout the reign of Richard III.