Death of the Prince of Wales
In March, 1484, the King and Queen left London, and proceeded northwards by way of Cambridge, reaching Nottingham on April 20. Here they received intelligence of the death of the young Prince of Wales, which took place at Middleham on the 9th of the same month. The unhappy parents were distracted with the most violent grief. 'You might have seen his father and mother in a state almost bordering on madness by reason of their sudden grief.'[[16]] The child was interred in the chapel built by Richard himself, on the north side of Sheriff Hutton church. The King had placed 'the sun in splendour,' the favourite device of his brother Edward, in one of the windows. An alabaster effigy of the young Prince of Wales, habited in a loose gown with a coronet on his head, was fixed on an altar tomb. The south side of the tomb is divided into compartments. In the centre one the heart-broken father is represented in armour, offering up prayer to the Almighty, who is supporting a crucifix. On each side, in other compartments, there are shields now quite plain, probably once painted, supported by angels; and on the window jamb there is a shield charged with a cross of St. George in bold relief, the badge of the garter. The charges on the other shields have probably been wilfully defaced, as well as any crowns or ensigns of royalty, to conceal the identity of the monument. This was perhaps done to avoid complete desecration at Tudor hands. Some months after the child's death, when Richard had to sign a warrant for the last expenses connected with the funeral of his 'most dear son,' he touchingly added, in his own handwriting, 'whom God pardon.'[[17]] This prayer may have suggested the subject of the sculptured panel on the tomb, where the petition is made to pass, in form of a scroll, from the suppliant's lips to the ear of God.
King Richard, after the death of his own son, declared his nephew Edward, Earl of Warwick, son of his brother Clarence, to be heir to the throne. It was no doubt intended to reverse the attainder in due time. Meanwhile young Warwick was given precedence before all other peers. He resided sometimes at Sheriff Hutton, sometimes with his aunt, as a member of the King's household.[[18]]
It is asserted by Rous that the King changed his mind soon afterwards, and declared his nephew the Earl of Lincoln to be his heir, closely imprisoning young Warwick.[[19]] Rous was a dishonest and unscrupulous writer, and this particular statement is disproved by documentary evidence. For on May 13, 1485, the Mayor and Corporation of York determined to address a letter to the Lords of Warwick and Lincoln and other of the Council at Sheriff Hutton.[[20]] The precedence here given to young Warwick above Lincoln, and the fact of his being addressed as one of the Council, prove the statement of Rous to be false. It shows also that Warwick had not been superseded, and that he was still heir to the throne, just before the battle of Bosworth.[[21]] He was probably a member of the King's household, and one of the children mentioned in the Royal Ordinance of July 23, 1484.
Richard III. made a progress in the north of England during the summer of 1484, superintending the coast defences, and in August he was again at Nottingham receiving an embassy from Scotland. The King gave audience to the Scottish envoys in the great hall of Nottingham Castle on September 16, seated under a royal canopy and surrounded by the chief officers of state. A truce was established for three years, and a marriage was agreed upon between the eldest son of James III. and the Lady Anne de la Pole,[[22]] niece of the King of England. At about the same time a friendly treaty was ratified between Richard and the Duke of Brittany.
In the autumn of 1484 the body of Henry VI. was, by the King's order, removed from Chertsey and interred in St. George's Chapel at Windsor, on the south side of the high altar, the tomb of Edward IV. being on the north side. The chapel was then nearly finished.
Popularity of the King
Richard III. returned to London on November 9. He was met by the Lord Mayor and Aldermen with upwards of four hundred citizens, who escorted him to his residence at the Wardrobe in Blackfriars. Christmas was kept at Westminster with all gaiety and splendour, the young niece Elizabeth being richly attired in a dress similar to that of the Queen, according to the gossiping old monk of Croyland. But the beloved consort of so many years, the playfellow of Richard's early days, who had shared all his joys and sorrows, the mother of his lost child, was passing away. Like her sister Isabella, Queen Anne was delicate, and she was now in a rapid decline. She died on March 16, 1485,[[23]] and was buried in Westminster Abbey; her sorrowing husband shedding tears over her grave.[[24]] As an aggravation of the King's grief, an odious report, probably originating in the wishes of the Queen Dowager and her daughter, was spread abroad that he meditated a marriage with his illegitimate niece. As soon as it came to Richard's ears, he gave it formal and public contradiction.[[25]]
As the spring of 1485 advanced it became known that, encouraged and aided by the French court, the Lancastrian malcontents intended to attempt an invasion of England, and that, probably at the suggestion of Bishop Morton, they had put forward a pretender as a claimant of the crown. This was Henry Tudor, who was born at Pembroke Castle on January 28, 1457. His father, Edmund Tudor, was the son of a Welsh esquire with whom the widow of Henry V. had formed a clandestine connection. Thus Edmund was a half-brother of Henry VI., who created him Earl of Richmond, and his brother Jasper Earl of Pembroke. Henry Tudor was born two months after his father's death, when the widow was only in her fifteenth year. She was daughter of John Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, and at this time was the wife of Lord Stanley, her third husband. In 1471 Jasper Tudor fled into Brittany with his nephew Henry. Both Edmund and Jasper Tudor had been attainted and deprived of their earldoms. Edward IV. had created his brother Richard Earl of Richmond,[[26]] and the title had since merged in the crown. The earldom of Pembroke had been conferred on King Edward's son Edward. Henry Tudor, who was never Earl of Richmond, had lived in Brittany for many years, but in 1484 he had gone to France, where the desire to injure her English neighbours induced the Lady of Beaujeu, daughter of Louis XI. and Regent for her young brother Charles VIII., to encourage the conspirators. Henry's claim to relationship with the Kings of the House of Lancaster was derived from his mother's descent from an illegitimate son of John of Gaunt.[[27]] It was afterwards considered unadvisable to put this untenable claim forward, except in vague terms, and Henry's title was based on conquest.
Threatened invasion