Upon the sudden death of Edward IV on 9th April 1483, the 12-year-old Edward became King. Conflict between his uncle, Richard, then Duke of Gloucester, and the Woodville nobles on his young Edward's mother's side, who dominated the young King, soon led the Duke to arrest the leaders of the Woodville party and secure possession of Edward and his younger brother Richard, Duke of York. The two Princes were housed in the Tower of London, which at that time served as a royal residence as well as a prison.
The only certainty about the Princes' fate is that the circumstances of their disappearance remain unknown. Skeletons were famously found in the Tower in 1674 and reburied in Westminster Abbey. However, a re-examination in 1933 showed that the bones were partly animal. Coffins discovered under St George’s Chapel, Windsor alongside Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville were thought to be their children, George and Mary. However, they were later discovered elsewhere, so could equally be the two Princes.
We will never know…
Edward's Supporters as King may not have seen much use in just over two months, but the white Lion and the white Hind, as shown at the top, have a modicum of support. Their attribution is based on a painting called The Panel of Kings in St George's Chapel, Windsor, shown here. From right to left are shown Edward, Prince of Wales (son of Henry VI), Edward IV, Edward V and Henry VII and the Panel hangs opposite the Oliver King Chapel. Oliver King served each of the Kings and the Prince shown as Principal Secretary and he was also a Canon of Windsor. The painted panel is believed to date from about 1492-95 - the same time as the Chapel - and would therefore be the most contemporaneous depiction of the Royal Coats of Arms involved |
Edward's brother and fellow Prince in the Tower was Richard, Duke of York. He possibly managed to fit in more into his even shorter life than his elder brother. Not only was he created Earl of Nottingham on 12th June 1476, but on 15th January 1478, in St Stephen's Chapel, Westminster, he was married to the 5-year-old Anne de Mowbray, 8th Countess of Norfolk, who had inherited the vast Mowbray estates when her father John Lord Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk had died. Because Anne could not inherit the title, her new husband was created Duke of Norfolk and Earl Warenne. When Anne died in November 1481 her estates should have passed to William, Viscount Berkeley and to John, Lord Howard. In January 1483 Parliament passed an act that gave the Mowbray estates to Richard, Duke of York and Norfolk, for his lifetime, and at his death to his heirs, if he had any. The rights of the two co-heirs at law were extinguished; King Edward IV, however, paid off and forgave Berkeley’s debts, who then renounced his claims to the Mowbray estate before Parliament the same year. Nothing was done for Lord Howard, not even after the Princes disappeared or Henry Tudor came to the Throne.
Richard, Duke of York and Norfolk had a singular Label, namely plain white except for a red Canton on the first Point rather than on the middle Point. This peculiarity had never been done before in English Royal Heraldry and has never been repeated.