Richard III Read online

  Moreover, as Mancini attests, many Londoners believed that usurpation would be followed by murder. And, although they lived in a brutal age, fifteenth-century Englishmen could be sentimental enough about children. The feast of the Holy Innocents – commemorating King Herod’s massacre of all the children in Bethlehem – was an enormously popular devotion in the late Middle Ages. Richard would be commemorated as the Wicked Uncle in the ballad of the Babes in the Wood, which may have an origin earlier than the sixteenth century – it was undoubtedly inspired by the fate of the little King and his brother. The capital was stunned by shock and horror.

  It may be asked why was there no resistance. The answer is that, as with all successful coups d’état, Richard had taken everyone completely by surprise and with overwhelming military superiority. It was common knowledge that thousands of his much feared Northerners were on the way south. No great magnate was available to drum up opposition to the coup, and lesser folk were not ready to risk their necks. But, as will be seen, this did not stop bitter and mounting resentment.

  The Princes seem to have been attractive boys. The Croyland writer says that they were ‘sweet and beauteous children’, and he must have seen them with his own eyes. Mancini heard glowing reports of Edward V. ‘He had such dignity in his whole person, and in his face such charm, that however much they might gaze, he never wearied the eyes of beholders.’ Obviously he had inherited the good looks of his magnificent father. ‘I have seen many men burst forth into tears and lamentations when mention was made of him after his removal from men’s sight.’ The Italian scholar adds that Edward showed signs of intellectual ability unusual in one of his age. We know hardly anything about his younger brother, Shakespeare’s ‘little prating York’. The chronicler Jean Molinet – not the most reliable of sources – informs us that he was ‘joyous and witty, nimble and ever ready for dances and games’.2

  For all Richard III’s Plantagenet blood, military prowess and proven ability, many Englishmen simply could not think of him as the true King of England.3 They still acknowledged young Edward. But Richard was cursed with a weakness for self-delusion, which weakened his political judgement. Being ‘blind with covetousness of reigning’, he could not believe that he was unacceptable. A Latin poem in the Croyland Chronicle, which plainly refers to him, warns that those who usurp power ‘confound themselves and their cause by confusing private desires with public good’. No doubt the new King deluded himself for some time into believing that he was popular; after all, he really was the man best fitted to govern the country. He retained a certain amount of good will in the North, though in the end many Northerners abandoned him – the two key magnates who were to betray him at Bosworth both came from the North. He was unable to identify a whole host of secret enemies until they declared themselves and it was therefore impossible for him to remove all opposition at one blow. In consequence he failed to implement what was to be one of Machiavelli’s cardinal tenets for a successful usurpation.

  The mental climate of his age may well have conspired to prevent Richard from seeing himself as a hypocrite. There was an all too seldom resolved conflict between emotion and action in fifteenth-century minds. The King’s slightly older contemporary, Sir Thomas Malory, the author of the exquisitely noble Morte d’Arthur, was little better than a gangster and gaolbird who stood accused of armed robbery, sacrilege and rape on not just one but several occasions.

  The reign began with a forced gaiety. On Friday 4 July Richard and his wife travelled by state barge along the Thames to the Tower of London, the royal residence from which by tradition Kings and Queens of England rode to their Coronation. Anne had come down from the North early in June, apparently bringing with her the Earl of Warwick, Clarence’s nine-year-old son. (Probably Richard regarded the boy as a potential rival, even though he was excluded from the succession by his father’s attainder.)

  ‘Edward Bastard, late called King Edward V’ – as he was now described officially – was still at the Tower, together with his brother. The Great Chronicle of London refers to the two children being ‘seen shooting and playing in the garden of the Tower by sundry times’, but gives no precise date. Probably they had been moved out of the palatial apartments by the river long before the arrival of their uncle and aunt and taken into the fortress itself – Mancini says this happened as soon as Hastings was liquidated. It has been plausibly suggested that they were moved twice, first to the Garden Tower (now the Bloody Tower) from where they had access to the garden, and then into the White Tower in which State prisoners were held and where they could be kept out of sight – they had disappeared for good from the public gaze by the time of their uncle’s Coronation. It is unlikely that he visited them, though they cannot have been entirely absent from his thoughts.

  Yet perhaps Richard was too busy exulting over the kingdom he had seized. His capital was world famous for its riches and size, dwarfing even his cherished York. Thanks to Mancini, who left it the same week and recorded his impressions only a few months later, we know what it looked like at this very moment. He notes how the Thames is navigable by large vessels up to London itself, how, had the South Bank been walled, it could be described as a city in its own right. He mentions the ‘very famous bridge, built partly of wood, partly of stone. On it there are houses and several gates with portcullises; the houses are built over workshops belonging to various types of tradesman.’ He is impressed by the ‘very strong citadel next to the river, which they call the Tower of London’, and by ‘enormous warehouses for imported goods’ on the banks of the Thames, and – a curiously modern note – by ‘many cranes of extraordinary size to unload merchandise off the ships’. He describes the three main streets. The one nearest the river (Thames Street) is full of ‘all types of metal, wine, honey, pitch, wax, flax, rope, thread, grain and fish, and other rough goods’. In the central street (comprising Tower Street, East Cheap and Candlewick Street) ‘you find nothing for sale but cloth’. The third street, running through the town centre (from Aldgate on the east side to Newgate on the west, and including Cornhill and West Cheap) deals in ‘more precious goods, such as gold and silver plate, cloths of rich hue and all sorts of silks, carpets, tapestry and other rich wares from abroad’. He says he simply does not have room to describe ‘the citizens’ refined ways, the magnificence of their banquets, the lavish decoration and opulence of the churches’. Other foreigners were equally dazzled. Twelve years later a Venetian wrote that he had seen fifty-two goldsmiths’ shops in Cheapside alone, that in Milan, Rome, Venice and Florence together he had never seen so much silver plate as in London. This was indeed the ‘Flower of Cities all’ (even if as many as a third of the population may have been destitute or near destitute). Its proud inhabitants had enough confidence in their private judgement to be deeply disturbed by the usurpation. But it made no difference.

  On 5 July the new King and Queen rode from the Tower of London to their Palace of Westminster. He was dressed with breathtaking splendour, in a doublet of blue cloth of gold over which he wore a purple velvet gown trimmed with ermine. He far outshone his wife, who followed him in a litter escorted by five mounted ladies-in-waiting. The royal pair were accompanied by the vast and gorgeously clad procession of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, which included almost the entire English peerage – three dukes, nine earls and twenty-three barons. The Duke of Buckingham outshone even Richard, in a robe of blue velvet embroidered with blazing golden cartwheels. (According to Rous, the Duke was already boasting that he now had as many men wearing his livery as Warwick the King-maker.) In addition there were nearly eighty knights and countless gentlemen – a surprising number of whom would rise in rebellion within a very few weeks. As he rode through the London streets, the bare-headed King bowed to right and to left.

  Richard III and Anne Nevill were crowned in Westminster Abbey by Cardinal Bourchier (despite the old man’s unwillingness – he stayed away from the Coronation banquet)4 on Sunday 6 July 1483. Contemporaries claimed it was the m
ost magnificent Coronation that had ever been seen. The boar badge was much in evidence – 13,000 white boars on fustian hangings decorated Westminster – and a new officer-of-arms had been specially created for the occasion, Blanc Sanglier. The King and Queen walked barefoot to the Abbey. Here they submitted to the ancient (but nowadays long since discontinued) anointing with the holy oils on the breast, standing naked from the waist up. After being crowned they heard High Mass and took Communion, the King drinking from the Chalice – a privilege then enjoyed by no other English layman. (No doubt he had made a confession of his sins, in preparation.) The Te Deum after the crowning and the anthems during the Mass must have been heard only too easily by the miserable Elizabeth Woodville and her daughters in sanctuary at the Abbot’s Lodging. Wearing their crowns, the anointed King and Queen retired briefly. In their absence the Duke of Norfolk and Earl Marshal, mounted on a charger whose cloth-of-gold trappings swept down to the ground, rode up and down to drive out the crowds. At four o’clock the monarchs entered Westminster Hall, still wearing their crowns, to preside over the Coronation banquet attended by several thousand people. On bended knee the Mayor of London served them with hypocras (hot spiced wine), wafers and wine. During the banquet the King’s Champion, Sir Robert Dymmock, wearing a white armour and mounted on a charger caparisoned in white and scarlet, rode into the hall and flung down his white steel gauntlet – as a challenge to anyone who disputed Richard III’s right to the throne. There were cries of ‘King Richard! God save King Richard!’ and he rode off with his silver-gilt bowl of wine, after drinking the monarch’s health. The banquet continued until nine, when it was growing dark and great wax torches were brought in. As soon as these were lit, the lords and ladies went up to the royal dais to renew their homage and say goodnight, and then at last the King and Queen left the hall too.

  Coins were at once struck to proclaim that Richard was now a consecrated King. As was customary, the silver groats and half-groats showed him crowned with a bare, anointed breast; they had the boar’s head for their mint mark. Perhaps symbolically, the sole gold denominations issued were the beautiful angel and angelet – these were touch pieces for the ‘King’s Evil’ (scrofula) which only the hand of a consecrated monarch could heal. No act of ostentatious piety was left undone. On 12 July Richard and Anne processed barefoot around Edward the Confessor’s shrine at Westminster.

  Foreign rulers were informed with due ceremony of Richard III’s accession. The Pursuivant Blanc Sanglier was sent to Plessis-les-Tours to announce it to Louis XI and to ask for his friendship. If Commynes is to be believed, Louis had no wish to answer the usurper. However, he sent a curt note of acknowledgement. Even Kendall admits (in his study Louis XI, the Universal Spider) that ‘so shaky a government could never trouble France’. Richard appears to have been piqued by the Valois’s coldness.

  While Dymmock’s white gauntlet had been left lying on the floor of Westminster Hall, there had nevertheless been a hint of discord during the Coronation. At the moment of crowning it was noticed by some that the Duke of Buckingham – who was enjoying the privilege of carrying his new sovereign’s train – ‘could not abide the sight thereof’, but turned the other way to avoid seeing the crown being placed on Richard’s head.

  Nevertheless, Harry Buckingham had been richly rewarded, as indeed had everyone else who had helped with the usurpation. Already he possessed half the Bohun inheritance and now the King gave him the remainder – estates worth over £700 a year – with the promise that the gift would be ratified by Parliament as soon as it met. He also received Richard’s former office of Lord Great Chamberlain, besides being appointed Constable of England – in modern terms, Commander-in-Chief. He was supreme in Wales and the West Country.

  John Howard received another of the King’s former posts, that of Lord High Admiral. Moreover, on 28 June, only two days after his master’s seizure of the throne, he had received his real reward and had been made Duke of Norfolk, Earl Marshal and Earl of Surrey – the latter title being borne by his son, Sir Thomas. The new Duke had carried the crown itself at the Coronation. He was also presented with nearly as many manors as Buckingham, besides other revenues. His domain was East Anglia.

  The Earl of Northumberland, who had marched into London with some 5,000 northern troops on 3 July – Richard reviewed and thanked them in Moorfields – received the King’s old offices and privileges in the North West, becoming the new Warden of the entire Scots Marches. He was also appointed to many other great northern offices and likewise received a vast grant of manors. However, most unwisely, he had only been given many of his posts for a limited tenure and his determination to restore Percy dominance in the North remained a dream. Even so, he was none the less the most powerful magnate in the North.

  Lord Stanley, who had been forgiven, seems to have been allowed to retain his office of Steward of the Household. Presumably this was thought sufficient to secure his friendship – a gross miscalculation. He too controlled large blocks of territory, in the north Midlands.

  Buckingham, Norfolk, Northumberland and Stanley, these were the four props of the new regime. They formed an alarmingly narrow power base. All were ‘over mighty’, with large private armies. The desertion of any one of them could place Richard in grave peril.

  Yet very few people were happy about the new regime. It is likely that, with most Englishmen, the majority of peers regarded the King as an usurper for all his crowning and anointing. Robert Fabyan’s New Chronicles of England and France makes this very clear. (The author was fully adult in 1483 and living in London.) Because Richard had stolen the throne, he

  fell in great hatred of the more part of the nobles of his realm, in so much that such as before loved and praised him still as Protector, now murmured and grudged against him, in such wise that few or none favoured his party, except it were for dread or for the great gifts that they received of him; by means whereof he won divers to follow his mind, the which after deceived him.

  Plainly he sensed an undercurrent of disloyalty; there are indications that he suffered from the paranoia which afflicted his brother Clarence. This might well explain why he was always clutching his dagger and wore a mail shirt.

  However, Richard had henchmen, household men, upon whom he could rely. They appear to have worked as a team and included, to name only a few, Francis, Viscount Lovell (Lord Chamberlain), Lord Scrope of Bolton, Sir Richard Ratcliff and William Catesby (Chancellor of the Exchequer), together with Sir Robert Brackenbury (Constable of the Tower), Sir Robert Percy (Comptroller of the Household), Sir Ralph Assheton (Vice-Constable), Sir James Tyrell (Master of the Henchmen and Master of the Horse), John Harrington (Clerk of the Council), John Kendall (the King’s Secretary), Walter Hopton (Treasurer of the Household), Sir Thomas Burgh, Sir Marmaduke Constable, Sir Humphrey Stafford, Sir Thomas Pilkington, Sir Gervase Clifton and John Nesfield. Nearly all were Knights or Esquires of the Body. Edward IV had run a similar team – household men and estate managers used in central government or for security purposes – but was never sufficiently isolated to rely on it in the way that his brother did. Richard’s team was a general staff, a bodyguard and an administrative élite. It was a general staff, a bodyguard (from whom today’s Gentlemen-at-Arms are descended) and an administrative élite. Its military functions were especially important: Dynham was at Calais, while Brackenbury, as Constable of the Tower, was in control of the chief arsenal and arms depot; Brackenbury was also keeper of castles in Kent, as Tyrell was in Cornwall; Assheton would take over most of Buckingham’s military duties; and many other members served as castellans or commissioners of array. The ‘mafia’ contained some very tough men indeed, as became increasingly evident during their master’s short reign.

  It is possible that Lord Lovell had been a boyhood companion of Richard at Middleham but there is no proof that he was, as Kendall maintains, the King’s ‘oldest and dearest friend’. Nor was he a Northerner, even if he possessed estates in the North. His real home was a beautif
ul Oxfordshire mansion, Minster Lovell, which his master visited on at least one occasion and whose ruins are still elegant. Even so he was plainly close to Richard, who made him Lord Chamberlain (Hastings’s old place) and therefore the man responsible for organizing and administering his household. At the Coronation he had the honour of carrying one of the Swords of Justice. He was also appointed Chief Butler of England – a position formerly occupied by Rivers – and was later created a Knight of the Garter. Undoubtedly he was deeply committed to the King, which may well be why two years after Bosworth he was one of the leaders of a revolt against Henry VII.

  Richard Ratcliff was the team’s hit man. A Northerner and one of the King’s three principal lieutenants, Ratcliff belonged to a well-established family of minor gentry of Lancashire and Westmorland squires; in London he had lodgings in the suburb of Stepney. He was a younger son and a typical career ‘household man’; his maternal grandfather, Sir William Parr, had been Comptroller to Edward IV, while his Parr uncles may have fought by Richard’s side at both Barnet and Tewkesbury, one of them being killed. Ratcliff himself had been knighted after Tewkesbury, and then created a Knight Banneret during the siege of Berwick – no doubt for his services against the Scots at sea, off the Cumberland and Galloway coast. He could even claim distant kinship with the King, through being Lord Scrope of Bolton’s son-in-law. Richard had the utmost respect for his opinion, consulting him on matters of special importance. More says specifically that Ratcliff was employed by the King in carrying out ‘lawless enterprises’, being ‘a man that had long been secret with him, having experience of the world and a shrewd wit, short and rude in speech, rough and boisterous of behaviour, bold in mischief, as far from pity as from all fear of God’. Richard heaped honours on him and made him a Knight of the Garter together with Lord Lovell in 1484.5