Things in History You Should Know: Richard III

Originally posted here.

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If you’re up on your Shakespeare, you know this dude: the hunchbacked, conniving Duke of Gloucester who engaged in behaviour not acceptable in polite company, such as murdering practically everyone including his brother and nephews to use their bodies as makeshift stairs so he could reach the throne.

However, like the screenwriters of today, ol’ Billy was very fond of “dramatic license” and wasn’t really concerned with historical accuracy so much as entertaining the masses for money. So it shan’t surprise you at all that the real King Richard wasn’t such a cackling, iconic villain.
For starters, the hunchback? Didn’t have one. Nor was he incredibly deformed and ugly, nor did he come crawling out of his mother’s womb with hair and a full set of teeth. Honestly, how do these rumours get started?

The real Richard was born in 1452, the eighth and youngest child of Richard Duke of York and Cecily Neville. He was but eight when both dear old dad and brother Edmund got themselves killed at the Battle of Wakefield on account of their quarrels with Henry VI – more accurately, Henry’s queen, Margaret of Anjou.

Unlike her husband, she was perfectly sane, realized that she had her son’s interests to protect, and recognized that she couldn’t have rival claimants to the throne running about causing a ruckus. Pity for her that Richard’s brother Edward got it together, seized the throne, and became king at the precocious age of nineteen. They grow up so fast.

Richard didn’t live such a bad life for a few years after that. His brother was king, he got to go live with his cousin, the Earl of Warwick, and had all sorts of fun knightly training. Plus he got made the Duke of Gloucester – good times. Then it all went to shit.

The problem with Edward IV was this: he couldn’t keep it in his pants. Elizabeth Woodville, a Lancastrian widow quite a ways below his station, knew this and took advantage of it. Specifically by demanding marriage before she would make sweet love to him. Edward agreed. They got hitched and kept it secret.

Unfortunately, the Earl of Warwick had arranged a more royal, continental match for him. And when he found out about Woodville, boy, was he ever mad. Enough to enter into an alliance with Margaret of Anjou and the Lancaster faction. Henry VI became king once again and Edward IV was forced to hightail it to Burgundy to seek refuge with one of his sisters and her husband. Richard, then seventeen, took Edward’s side and followed him into exile.

Now, the fifteenth century wasn’t known for its surplus of nobility who would cut their losses and call it a day. Edward found himself some troops, he and Richard crossed back over the English Channel, kicked some ass, and he got to be king! Again! Warwick and the Prince of Wales got themselves killed (no, Richard had nothing to do with it) and Henry VI got murdered in the Tower of London, and Richard may have had something to do with this one – he was constable of the Tower at this time.

Time passed. Richard wedded the very same Anne Neville who was once saddled with the Prince of Wales, Edward and Elizabeth had a couple of boys and a lot more girls, and George got himself executed for being a whiny would-be traitor all the frickin’ time. (No, Richard didn’t off him either.) The Duke of Gloucester serves his brother with loyalty, yadda yadda yadda.

We’ve got Queen Elizabeth and the Woodvilles. The Woodvilles are unpopular. They’ve got the boys – both of ‘em. They want Edward V crowned tout suite so that they can crowd out the official Protector dude, Richard, and continue to enjoy sweet, sweet power. Richard also wants to enjoy sweet, sweet power. Custody of the king and his bro – the so-called “Princes in the Tower” – is seized, the coronation is called off, Richard goes to London, happy day.

Richard supposedly finds evidence that the princes are illegitimate – due to the whole secret marriage thing -disinherits them, gets himself proclaimed king, and becomes Richard III. The princes get lodged up in the Tower of London (you must remember that it didn’t have its horrible reputation yet) and are never seen alive again. All is well in Gloucester land.

Then Richard’s son dies, then his wife dies, then one of his former allies, the Duke of Buckingham, rebels against him and is executed. Then there’s this brat, Henry Tudor, over in France causing trouble…
1485 arrives. The armies of Richard and Henry convene on Bosworth Field in August, but the former falters while charging right for the latter. Henry Tudor is crowned Henry VII and as such, he gets the privilege of writing the history books. Or the history plays, as it were. Richard’s body gets mutilated and chucked in a river.