Deliberate destruction of records?

As a new member, apologies if this has already been discussed &
"settled."
In Audrey Williamson's book The Mystery of the Princes from 1978, she
discusses the swift execution of Hastings, and notes "the extreme
oddity" of the situation - that despite the status of Hastings and of
the Council meeting itself, no official record (at least as of the time
she was writing) appeared to exist. She then goes on to point out that
John Morton's nephew Robert Morton "always very close to him" became
Master of the Rolls in the Tower in the reign of Henry VII, and would
have been in a position to destroy official records. Perhaps, not
coincidentally, leaving posterity with only the account that wound up in
More's Life, and, from there, in Shakespeare.
This discussion has no references, so I'm curious to know if her facts
are regarded as accurate today. Also what the general opinion is about
survival of records. Besides Titulus Regius, do we have evidence of
deliberate destruction of other records? If we do, then that raises a
whole new set of why questions...
A J

A J wrote:
>
> As a new member, apologies if this has already been discussed &
> "settled." In Audrey Williamson's book The Mystery of the Princes from 1978, she discusses the swift execution of Hastings, and notes "the extreme oddity" of the situation - that despite the status of Hastings and of the Council meeting itself, no official record (at least as of the time she was writing) appeared to exist. She then goes on to point out that John Morton's nephew Robert Morton "always very close to him" became Master of the Rolls in the Tower in the reign of Henry VII, and would have been in a position to destroy official records. Perhaps, not coincidentally, leaving posterity with only the account that wound up in More's Life, and, from there, in Shakespeare. This discussion has no references, so I'm curious to know if her facts are regarded as accurate today. Also what the general opinion is about survival of records. Besides Titulus Regius, do we have evidence of deliberate destruction of other records? If we do, then that raises a whole new set of why questions...
> A J

Carol responds:

Hi, AJ (or Alice, if I recall correctly?). We've discussed it, but we haven't settled anything. Robert Morton would definitely have had the opportunity to destroy records, but that and the fact that he was Morton's nephew (and therefore possibly motivated to destroy favorable evidence relating to Richard) is about all we have to point the finger at him, and much as I would like to say that we have our culprit (and much as I like Audrey Williamson, whose book I'm coincidentally rereading), I'm afraid that the evidence is circumstantial at best, like that for Richard's involvement in the supposed deaths of his nephews. However, there's no question that documents are missing. Polydore Vergil, himself accused (probably falsely) of destroying "wagonloads" of documents from an earlier period, complained of the scarcity of documents from that period, (Not that I'm a fan of Vergil, but that's a whole different matter.) Among the missing documents that I know of, aside from the burned copies of Titulus Regius, are the codicil of Edward IV's will naming Richard as Protector and Richard's own will. (It's inconceivable that he would not have had one.) And, as Williamson notes, we're missing the notes for that council meeting, and since the accounts by Mancini and the Croyland Chronicler are fragmentary and conflicting, historians have fallen back on More's account, highly embroidered and provably false in some of its details, in the hope that it came from Morton and therefore contains a grain of truth beneath the malicious distortions. (We would need Morton's hypothetical manuscript to know for sure, and even then we wouldn't know what really happened, only how much More had expanded on or exaggerated Morton.)

Marie may know of additional missing documents. I am almost certain that, except for Titulus Regius, all the Parliamentary records and Wardrobe accounts survive, but I don't know about council meetings, privy purse expenses, and so forth.

Carol

Thanks for the additional items. Something else I will be keeping my eye on as I read my new & re-read old books about Richard. Not that it will help bring any of the missing documents back. With modern examples in mind, it does make me wonder about who had done what that they didn't want known to others.

A J

--- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...> wrote:
>
>
> A J wrote:
> >
> > As a new member, apologies if this has already been discussed &
> > "settled." In Audrey Williamson's book The Mystery of the Princes from 1978, she discusses the swift execution of Hastings, and notes "the extreme oddity" of the situation - that despite the status of Hastings and of the Council meeting itself, no official record (at least as of the time she was writing) appeared to exist. She then goes on to point out that John Morton's nephew Robert Morton "always very close to him" became Master of the Rolls in the Tower in the reign of Henry VII, and would have been in a position to destroy official records. Perhaps, not coincidentally, leaving posterity with only the account that wound up in More's Life, and, from there, in Shakespeare. This discussion has no references, so I'm curious to know if her facts are regarded as accurate today. Also what the general opinion is about survival of records. Besides Titulus Regius, do we have evidence of deliberate destruction of other records? If we do, then that raises a whole new set of why questions...
> > A J
>
> Carol responds:
>
> Hi, AJ (or Alice, if I recall correctly?). We've discussed it, but we haven't settled anything. Robert Morton would definitely have had the opportunity to destroy records, but that and the fact that he was Morton's nephew (and therefore possibly motivated to destroy favorable evidence relating to Richard) is about all we have to point the finger at him, and much as I would like to say that we have our culprit (and much as I like Audrey Williamson, whose book I'm coincidentally rereading), I'm afraid that the evidence is circumstantial at best, like that for Richard's involvement in the supposed deaths of his nephews. However, there's no question that documents are missing. Polydore Vergil, himself accused (probably falsely) of destroying "wagonloads" of documents from an earlier period, complained of the scarcity of documents from that period, (Not that I'm a fan of Vergil, but that's a whole different matter.) Among the missing documents that I know of, aside from the burned copies of Titulus Regius, are the codicil of Edward IV's will naming Richard as Protector and Richard's own will. (It's inconceivable that he would not have had one.) And, as Williamson notes, we're missing the notes for that council meeting, and since the accounts by Mancini and the Croyland Chronicler are fragmentary and conflicting, historians have fallen back on More's account, highly embroidered and provably false in some of its details, in the hope that it came from Morton and therefore contains a grain of truth beneath the malicious distortions. (We would need Morton's hypothetical manuscript to know for sure, and even then we wouldn't know what really happened, only how much More had expanded on or exaggerated Morton.)
>
> Marie may know of additional missing documents. I am almost certain that, except for Titulus Regius, all the Parliamentary records and Wardrobe accounts survive, but I don't know about council meetings, privy purse expenses, and so forth.
>
> Carol
>

From: ajhibbard@...
To:
Sent: Monday, February 18, 2013 5:35 PM
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?


> Thanks for the additional items. Something else I will be keeping my eye
> on as I read my new & re-read old books about Richard. Not that it will
> help bring any of the missing documents back. With modern examples in
> mind, it does make me wonder about who had done what that they didn't want
> known to others.

What I'd like to see is any records from the nothern European Jewish
community from the mid to late 1480s which might bear on where Brampton went
and who he went with (especially if he went with two unexplained boys). I'm
assuming that Brampton converted to Christianity because they didn't let you
be a semi-piratical sea-captain in those days, if you were a Jew, rather
than out of sincere conviction, and that he would have stayed in touch with
the Jewish community. Especially as Perkin Warbeck certainly looks like a
son of Edward's and if he wasn't one of the missing boys, then he supposedly
came from a Jewish family called Warbeque, which suggests that while he was
in Bruges Edward's relationship with the local Jewish community might have
been very warm indeed....

Claire wrote:
>
> What I'd like to see is any records from the nothern European Jewish community from the mid to late 1480s which might bear on where Brampton went and who he went with (especially if he went with two unexplained boys). I'm assuming that Brampton converted to Christianity because they didn't let you be a semi-piratical sea-captain in those days, if you were a Jew, rather than out of sincere conviction, and that he would have stayed in touch with the Jewish community. Especially as Perkin Warbeck certainly looks like a son of Edward's and if he wasn't one of the missing boys, then he supposedly came from a Jewish family called Warbeque, which suggests that while he was in Bruges Edward's relationship with the local Jewish community might have been very warm indeed....
>
Carol responds:

I think that he was baptized and accepted at court before he became a "semi-piratical sea captain," but I could be mistaken. At any rate, he was apparently baptized in the late 1450s, when he was probably in his late teens, taking the first name of his godfather, Edward IV, and anglicizing his surname. But it was Richard III who knighted him, the first king of England ever to knight a converted Jew, in August 1484 (I think on a Scottish campaign). That was after Brampton had persuaded all but two of Edward Woodville's ship captains to return to port and accept the Protector's (Richard's) pardon (unfortunately not the ship carrying Woodville and the stolen treasure). I suspect that in 1484 or -85, he and Sir James Tyrrell were working together to spirit Richard's nephews out of England, but I haven't read enough on the topic to know.

But, yes, searching those Northern Jewish records would be a good idea. And more needs to be done with the court records of Burgundy, too, especially the correspondence between Margaret and Richard. I wonder if they burned each other's letters after reading them to keep them secret.

Carol

From: justcarol67
To:
Sent: Monday, February 18, 2013 11:37 PM
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?

> I think that he was baptized and accepted at court before he became a
> "semi-piratical sea captain,"

Well, yeah, the baptism would have had to have come first - and what better
age than your late teens to decide you want to be a swashbuckling sea
captain? And he might have hero-worshipped Edward, of course - I suppose he
was very charismatic, like a rock star. [I'm thinking really of
Nelson-mania, which was very like Beatlemania.]

> I suspect that in 1484 or -85, he and Sir James Tyrrell were working
> together to spirit Richard's nephews out of England, but I haven't read
> enough on the topic to know.

It seems likely. Weir's book on the missing princes refers to a local
legend in the vicinity of Gipping Hall, Tyrrell's home base, to the effect
that the boys stayed there for a while and their mother visited them there.

> especially the correspondence between Margaret and Richard.

Which I predict will be simultaneously chatty and maddeningly opaque, full
of references to "the matter which ye know of".

Pursuing this line of discussion, I hate to admit that it was in the early 60's that I read Kendall's biography of Richard, and, at that age, with a not very critical eye. Since his book formed the foundation for what I understand about Richard, I was surprised to gather from your message that we are missing the document that names Richard as Protector (or am I misinterpreting what you've said below?). I seem to recall we do at least have documents that call him Protector.

My questions then are
(1) Is Edward's will the only "place" we would expect to find such an appointment?
(2) If not, where else might we find it?
(3) Alternatively, is there some other way that Richard could have "legally" become Protector, & where would we look for that evidence.

Don't get me wrong, I very much believe that the Woodville reaction indicates their alarm over the appointment, in other words that it was "for real." But if we are now lacking any clear authoritative evidence making Richard Protector, I can understand why some people persist in saying that he had himself declared Protector (with overtones that it was an unlawful seizure of power on the road to usurping the throne, etc).

In the absence of trustworthy evidence, we wind up with folks like A Pollard, whose book on the Princes I cannot stand to read for very long because it is so full of language I find inflammatory. On the video of The King in the Car Park, he seems like a charming fellow, and not malicious at all. But he states that the Princes disappeared in the summer of 1483 (not meant to be an exact quote, so if that's wrong, it's my mistake not his) making it sound like common knowledge. What I wanted to know at that point was how many sources said it, when did they say it, and how credible is the source or sources. All subject to debate, if I'm recalling correctly. And yet it's all glossed over in a few words from an expert. Pollard then went on to say something to the effect that he was sure the Princes were dead by then. At least they would have been, if he had been Richard.

And therein is the crux of the matter. We all see Richard, especially when we cannot agree on what constitutes credible evidence to begin with, through the lenses of our own personalities & what we think would be reasonable behavior according to our perceptions of the situation.

Argghhh.

A J

--- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...> wrote:
<snip>
Among the missing documents that I know of, aside from the burned copies of Titulus Regius, are the codicil of Edward IV's will naming Richard as Protector and Richard's own will. (It's inconceivable that he would not have had one.) And, as Williamson notes, we're missing the notes for that council meeting, and since the accounts by Mancini and the Croyland Chronicler are fragmentary and conflicting, historians have fallen back on More's account, highly embroidered and provably false in some of its details, in the hope that it came from Morton and therefore contains a grain of truth beneath the malicious distortions. (We would need Morton's hypothetical manuscript to know for sure, and even then we wouldn't know what really happened, only how much More had expanded on or exaggerated Morton.)
>
> Marie may know of additional missing documents. I am almost certain that, except for Titulus Regius, all the Parliamentary records and Wardrobe accounts survive, but I don't know about council meetings, privy purse expenses, and so forth.
>
> Carol
>

From: ajhibbard@...
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 1:50 AM
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?


> Pollard then went on to say something to the effect that he was sure the
> Princes were dead by then. At least they would have been, if he had been
> Richard.

There was a very funny play in the 1980s, the title of which escapes me,
which included the following conversation between Margaret Beaufort and
somebody who knew Richard:

"... and he killed those two poor innocent boys...."
"But he didn't!"
"Well then, he should have. My Henry will, you can depend on it."

> And therein is the crux of the matter. We all see Richard, especially when
> we cannot agree on what constitutes credible evidence to begin with,
> through the lenses of our own personalities & what we think would be
> reasonable behavior according to our perceptions of the situation.

Yes. You can think up arguments either way for Richard - it would have been
out of character/it was an extraordinary situation; they were his brother's
sons/they were Woodvilles, and he held the Woodvilles responsible for
murdering the Desmond boys, and so on. But to my mind the most compelling
evidence that nobody killed them is that Henry acted as if he didn't know
what had happened to them.

Henry was plagued by pretenders and it would have been very much to his
advantage to be able to say "You can't be one of the missing princes because
I know they're dead." And even if he had killed them himself, he could have
blamed it on Richard. The only rational reason I can see for his taking
nearly 20 years to say they were dead, and then doing so in a roundabout way
which he could deny if he needed to, is that because they were his brothers
in law, if he declared them dead he would be expected to say mass for their
souls, and if you're a good Catholic you don't say mass for somebody you
know or suspect to be alive.

"Claire M Jordan" wrote:
[snip]
> It seems likely. Weir's book on the missing princes refers to a local legend in the vicinity of Gipping Hall, Tyrrell's home base, to the effect that the boys stayed there for a while and their mother visited them there.

Carol responds:

Um, I think you have Audrey Williamson confused with Alison (I-call-myself-a-historian-but-I-don't-know-research-from-my-thumbnail) Weir. They have the same initials and wrote a book on the same topic (the so-called Princes in the Tower). The only good thing I can say about Weir's book is that the cover reduces Millais's painting to thumbnail size. Williamson's, on the other hand, is interesting, well written, an thought provoking, leaving the conclusions up to the reader, whereas Weir to this day claims that she has "solved" the mystery.

We've talked a lot about Tyrrell lately, and many of us do think that there's truth in that legend and that one or both boys ended up with Aunt Margaret in Burgundy.

Carol

From: justcarol67
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 4:02 AM
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?


> Um, I think you have Audrey Williamson confused with Alison
> (I-call-myself-a-historian-but-I-don't-know-research-from-my-thumbnail)
> Weir. They have the same initials and wrote a book on the same topic (the
> so-called Princes in the Tower).

Oh, right, I saw a picture of the cover and thought it was the same book.
I'm looking for the Williamson book at the moment - it's somewhere among my
(literally) thousands of books but I can't find it. I'm pretty sure there
are photographs in it of the two skeletons from the tower and I wanted to
check something. I recently came across an article on Richard which
illustrated a section about the skeletons in the Tower with a medical-grade
drawing of a skull, and I don't know if it's one of the actual skulls in
question, or just illustrative (I asked the webmaster but they didn't
respond), so I want to compare it with the photographs.

*If* it's from one of those skeletons then we can be 99% sure that they're
not the missing boys, unless La Woodville was playing away from home. Now
that we have an accurate reconstruction of Richard, as well as Henry VII's
death mask, we can say confidently that the standard of portraiture at the
late 15th C English court was pretty high and that Edward IV and E Woodville
probably did look a lot like their portraits, and this skull is a completely
different type from either of them, and looks Saxon/Norse.

> The only good thing I can say about Weir's book is that the cover reduces
> Millais's painting to thumbnail size. Williamson's, on the other hand, is
> interesting, well written, an thought provoking, leaving the conclusions
> up to the reader, whereas Weir to this day claims that she has "solved"
> the mystery.

And what does she think happened?

A J wrote:
>
> Pursuing this line of discussion, I hate to admit that it was in the early 60's that I read Kendall's biography of Richard, and, at that age, with a not very critical eye. Since his book formed the foundation for what I understand about Richard, I was surprised to gather from your message that we are missing the document that names Richard as Protector (or am I misinterpreting what you've said below?). I seem to recall we do at least have documents that call him Protector.
>
> My questions then are
> (1) Is Edward's will the only "place" we would expect to find such an appointment?
> (2) If not, where else might we find it?
> (3) Alternatively, is there some other way that Richard could have "legally" become Protector, & where would we look for that evidence.

Carol responds:

The contemporary chronicles (Mancini and Croyland) agree that he was appointed Protector in his brother's will, and he was certainly viewed as such by the council. The problem is not the legality of his appointment, it's the apparent destruction of the codicil appointing him.


AJ:
> Don't get me wrong, I very much believe that the Woodville reaction indicates their alarm over the appointment, in other words that it was "for real." But if we are now lacking any clear authoritative evidence making Richard Protector, I can understand why some people persist in saying that he had himself declared Protector (with overtones that it was an unlawful seizure of power on the road to usurping the throne, etc).

Carol responds:

Yes. That's the problem. If the codicil or the correspondence were extant, we would have no need to prove, for example, that he escorting the young king to London in his capacity as Protector rather than "capturing" him.

AJ:
> In the absence of trustworthy evidence, we wind up with folks like A Pollard, whose book on the Princes I cannot stand to read for very long because it is so full of language I find inflammatory.

Carol responds:

I have the same reaction. I get as far as the woman having a caesarian delivery and I wonder what is wrong with this man. Of course, Desmond Seward is even worse.

AJ:
On the video of The King in the Car Park, he seems like a charming fellow, and not malicious at all. But he states that the Princes disappeared in the summer of 1483 (not meant to be an exact quote, so if that's wrong, it's my mistake not his) making it sound like common knowledge. What I wanted to know at that point was how many sources said it, when did they say it, and how credible is the source or sources. All subject to debate, if I'm recalling correctly. And yet it's all glossed over in a few words from an expert. Pollard then went on to say something to the effect that he was sure the Princes were dead by then. At least they would have been, if he had been Richard.

Carol:

Yes, that's the problem, and all the worse because he's charming. Much worse than, say Starkey, who by his own confession is the rudest man in Britain. But the problem is that we have only two chroniclers, both biased in their different ways, for the Protectorate and only one for Richard's reign (though there are other sources). I think our biggest piece of supporting evidence is Titulus Regius, which echoes the petition that the Three Estates presented to Richard in June 1483, There can be no doubt that they thought that he was the lawful Protector--and the rightful king. The only doubt appears to be for the period between Edward's death and Richard's arrival in London. However, it seems that he wrote to the council, telling them that he had taken the young king into his custody and arrested the Woodvilles, and he seems to have been welcomed into the city with relief (as if the people of London were glad to see that the boy would not be ruled by Woodvilles.

We do have solid evidence that the Woodvilles, specifically Dorset, were illegally issuing commands (wrong word?) in the name of the queen and the king's "uterine brother"--some of those have been preserved. Richard's arrival, of course, sent Dorset and his mother scuttling into sanctuary. I think even Pollard concedes that they had no business acting as if they were co[regents.

I don't have time to check sources now, but if I made any errors, I'm sure that others will correct me. Meanwhile, if you don't have access to the Croyland Chronicle, you can find it here: http://www.r3.org/bookcase/croyland/index.html

Does anyone have a link to Mancini?

Carol

Claire:
> Henry was plagued by pretenders and it would have been very much to his advantage to be able to say "You can't be one of the missing princes because I know they're dead." And even if he had killed them himself, he could have blamed it on Richard. The only rational reason I can see for his taking nearly 20 years to say they were dead, and then doing so in a roundabout way which he could deny if he needed to, is that because they were his brothers in law, if he declared them dead he would be expected to say mass for their souls, and if you're a good Catholic you don't say mass for somebody you know or suspect to be alive.

Carol responds:

I take it that you missed our discussion about what "the king [Henry VII[ gave out." There's no evidence that he ever "gave out" a confession by Sir James Tyrrell (or anyone else) or even openly stated that they were dead. The confession, and the whole story of the suffocation by Tyrrell;s servants, is More's invention. We traced the first mention of Tyrrell in the records and so forth in great detail. I think that Henry must have leaked a rumor to that effect after Tyrrell's execution--which made its way to the chronicles *as* a rumor, but that's it. He never officially said that Richard killed the "Princes," but once More's version was published, it became "fact"--which, according to Bacon, *Henry* had related to More!

And Marie will tell you that the Desmond boys are another legend. The father was certainly executed, but it appears that his sons were not--certainly not the one that Richard wrote to as king, who became Earl of Desmond in his turn.

Carol

"Claire M Jordan" wrote:

> And what does she [Weir] think happened?
>
Carol responds:

That Richard did it exactly as More describes. Clever, no? Er, no, I didn't think so.

Carol

Carol responds:

> I take it that you missed our discussion about what "the king [Henry
> VII[ gave out."

Well, yeah - I only joined yesterday morning. I was a member of the RIII
Soc for about three years round about the late 70s and again for a year some
time in the late 80s, but it was just too expensive for me.

> There's no evidence that he ever "gave out" a confession by Sir James
> Tyrrell (or anyone else) or even openly stated that they were dead. The
> confession, and the whole story of the suffocation by Tyrrell;s servants,
> is More's invention. We traced the first mention of Tyrrell in the records
> and so forth in great detail. I think that Henry must have leaked a rumor
> to that effect after Tyrrell's execution--which made its way to the
> chronicles *as* a rumor, but that's it.

Which makes it even more clear that he was hedging his bets, and the only
sane reason I can see for that is that tactically he needed people to assume
they were dead, but he didn't want to get backed into a corner where he
might either have to say mass for somebody he suspected was alive, or
actually admit that he couldn't say mass because he thought they might be
alive.

I have a whole sequence of poems around Richard and other characters at the
court, and one of the better ones is from the point of view of Henry VII,
trying to work out what Richard did with the boys, and ends:

Shadow if you know the truth which is false
from the falsehood which is true

the word
spoken from the word understood

and a jest when you see it stay with
me a while while I consider

whether
it best suit policy

to say nothing with
certainty or

to say nothing, with
certainty



> And Marie will tell you that the Desmond boys are another legend. The
> father was certainly executed, but it appears that his sons were
> not--certainly not the one that Richard wrote to as king, who became Earl
> of Desmond in his turn.

I thought there was a letter from Richard in which he spoke angrily about
the boys being killed, and blamed the Woodvilles?

From: justcarol67
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 5:26 AM
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?

> That Richard did it exactly as More describes. Clever, no? Er, no, I
> didn't think so.

Oh, dear - she's obviously no tactician. Quite apart from it being out of
character, you can start with Tey's objection that it would be no advantage
to him to have them dead unless it was *known* that they were dead, and
finish up with the mirror image, that it would have been hugely to Henry's
advantage to have people think they were dead, and yet he evidently couldn't
say so.

I can see a possible scenario in which they either died of sickness or were
done in by Buckingham (or Beaufort) and Richard then couldn't say so because
evertybody was bound to blame him for it - but then that wouldn't fit
Henry's behaviour. The only thing which makes sense of Henry's silence is
that he at least strongly supected they were alive, and if they had died
anywhere in England or Wales he would almost certainly have been able to
find out about it.

To me the biggest argument against him ordering the 'one-time' Princes (now simply illegitimate children of his brother)
remains the most obvious one.

You simply do not 'demise' such people and then hide their bodies, there is no advantage gained by such an illogical act.

Assume for a moment that the 'Hastings' plot made Richard realise their threat and he was ruthless enough to secure
the throne for himself and his heirs by having them killed.
Then being in control with his own men in place in the Tower, how simple to start putting about the rumour they were ill -
even a public request for prayer for their recovery.

Then the sad announcement 'dead of fever' - a call for mourning, black clothes worn etc and the bodies laid out for public view
before a full on Royal funeral - Richard showing how deeply he had cared for the boys and how sad he was they had died so young etc.

Of course the propoganda would be he had them killed, but everybody would still know they were dead.

I think we have had this addressed many time already, simply put: dead but disappeared has exactly the same value as
them alive but missing - none at all when it comes to securing his throne.




________________________________
From: Claire M Jordan <whitehound@...>
To:
Sent: Tuesday, 19 February 2013 10:36 AM
Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?


 
From: ajhibbard@...
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 1:50 AM
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?

> Pollard then went on to say something to the effect that he was sure the
> Princes were dead by then. At least they would have been, if he had been
> Richard.

There was a very funny play in the 1980s, the title of which escapes me,
which included the following conversation between Margaret Beaufort and
somebody who knew Richard:

"... and he killed those two poor innocent boys...."
"But he didn't!"
"Well then, he should have. My Henry will, you can depend on it."

> And therein is the crux of the matter. We all see Richard, especially when
> we cannot agree on what constitutes credible evidence to begin with,
> through the lenses of our own personalities & what we think would be
> reasonable behavior according to our perceptions of the situation.

Yes. You can think up arguments either way for Richard - it would have been
out of character/it was an extraordinary situation; they were his brother's
sons/they were Woodvilles, and he held the Woodvilles responsible for
murdering the Desmond boys, and so on. But to my mind the most compelling
evidence that nobody killed them is that Henry acted as if he didn't know
what had happened to them.

Henry was plagued by pretenders and it would have been very much to his
advantage to be able to say "You can't be one of the missing princes because
I know they're dead." And even if he had killed them himself, he could have
blamed it on Richard. The only rational reason I can see for his taking
nearly 20 years to say they were dead, and then doing so in a roundabout way
which he could deny if he needed to, is that because they were his brothers
in law, if he declared them dead he would be expected to say mass for their
souls, and if you're a good Catholic you don't say mass for somebody you
know or suspect to be alive.

Are you thinking of the radio play where Henry gets locked in a basement
at an inn by the landlord, his cook, and daughter, who mistake him for a
rich trader?
Called 'Tom, Dickon, and Harry" I still have it on cassette. That shows
it's age! Yes it is very funny.
Paul

On 19/02/2013 02:36, Claire M Jordan wrote:
> From: ajhibbard@...
> To:
> Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 1:50 AM
> Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?
>
>
>> Pollard then went on to say something to the effect that he was sure the
>> Princes were dead by then. At least they would have been, if he had been
>> Richard.
> There was a very funny play in the 1980s, the title of which escapes me,
> which included the following conversation between Margaret Beaufort and
> somebody who knew Richard:
>
> "... and he killed those two poor innocent boys...."
> "But he didn't!"
> "Well then, he should have. My Henry will, you can depend on it."
>
>> And therein is the crux of the matter. We all see Richard, especially when
>> we cannot agree on what constitutes credible evidence to begin with,
>> through the lenses of our own personalities & what we think would be
>> reasonable behavior according to our perceptions of the situation.
> Yes. You can think up arguments either way for Richard - it would have been
> out of character/it was an extraordinary situation; they were his brother's
> sons/they were Woodvilles, and he held the Woodvilles responsible for
> murdering the Desmond boys, and so on. But to my mind the most compelling
> evidence that nobody killed them is that Henry acted as if he didn't know
> what had happened to them.
>
> Henry was plagued by pretenders and it would have been very much to his
> advantage to be able to say "You can't be one of the missing princes because
> I know they're dead." And even if he had killed them himself, he could have
> blamed it on Richard. The only rational reason I can see for his taking
> nearly 20 years to say they were dead, and then doing so in a roundabout way
> which he could deny if he needed to, is that because they were his brothers
> in law, if he declared them dead he would be expected to say mass for their
> souls, and if you're a good Catholic you don't say mass for somebody you
> know or suspect to be alive.
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>


--
Richard Liveth Yet!

Those who still think that way, despite More describing the bodies being moved again and the many doubts over the finding are surely boneheads?

----- Original Message -----
From: Claire M Jordan
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 5:49 AM
Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?



From: justcarol67
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 5:26 AM
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?

> That Richard did it exactly as More describes. Clever, no? Er, no, I
> didn't think so.

Oh, dear - she's obviously no tactician. Quite apart from it being out of
character, you can start with Tey's objection that it would be no advantage
to him to have them dead unless it was *known* that they were dead, and
finish up with the mirror image, that it would have been hugely to Henry's
advantage to have people think they were dead, and yet he evidently couldn't
say so.

I can see a possible scenario in which they either died of sickness or were
done in by Buckingham (or Beaufort) and Richard then couldn't say so because
evertybody was bound to blame him for it - but then that wouldn't fit
Henry's behaviour. The only thing which makes sense of Henry's silence is
that he at least strongly supected they were alive, and if they had died
anywhere in England or Wales he would almost certainly have been able to
find out about it.

From: Paul Trevor Bale
To:
Cc: paul.bale@...
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 8:55 AM
Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of
records?

> Are you thinking of the radio play where Henry gets locked in a basement
at an inn by the landlord, his cook, and daughter, who mistake him for a
rich trader?
Called 'Tom, Dickon, and Harry" I still have it on cassette. That shows
it's age! Yes it is very funny.
Paul

Ah, yes, that's it, thanks. But as I recall, now, there was no "and" in
it - it's "Tom, Dickon, Harry" with the "on" of Dickon substituting for the
"and" in "Tom, Dick and Harry". If I could scrounge a copy off you I have a
special gadget for converting cassette recordings to .mp3 files so it can be
preserved long term.

In reality I've always felt quite sorry for Margaret Beaufort, though, even
though she was a menace. We would certainly now call her a victim of sexual
abuse, since iirc she had Henry when she was twelve, and then she had her
only child taken away from her as a toddler. And she seems to have had a
tremendous brain and nothing to do with it. Nowadays she would probably
have been finding the Higgs boson or chairing an international conglomerate,
but there wasn't much you could do with a brain like that in those days even
if you were a man, let alone a woman, so unfortunately she used it for
political scheming.

From: Aidan Donnelly
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 6:08 AM
Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of
records?


> I think we have had this addressed many time already, simply put: dead but
> disappeared has exactly the same value as them alive but missing - none at
> all when it comes to securing his throne.

That's not absolutely true, because "alive but missing" retains the
possibility that somebody might find them and put them on the throne. But
"dead and known to be dead" is clearly so much more advantageous than "Dead
and not known to be dead" that it would make no sense for him to kill them
and *conceal* their deaths, instead of passing them off as illness or
accident. As with Henry, if he didn't announce that they were dead, the
assumption must be that they weren't.

If they had been older - old enough to be hatching plots in their own
right - then killing them might make sense whether it was known about or
not. But as children they would be the focus rather than the originator of
plots, and they would continue to be a focus for plots unless they were
*known* to be dead.

You are correct , logic fail of my own there :)




________________________________
From: Claire M Jordan <whitehound@...>
To:
Sent: Tuesday, 19 February 2013 8:44 PM
Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?


 
From: Aidan Donnelly
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 6:08 AM
Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of
records?

> I think we have had this addressed many time already, simply put: dead but
> disappeared has exactly the same value as them alive but missing - none at
> all when it comes to securing his throne.

That's not absolutely true, because "alive but missing" retains the
possibility that somebody might find them and put them on the throne. But
"dead and known to be dead" is clearly so much more advantageous than "Dead
and not known to be dead" that it would make no sense for him to kill them
and *conceal* their deaths, instead of passing them off as illness or
accident. As with Henry, if he didn't announce that they were dead, the
assumption must be that they weren't.

If they had been older - old enough to be hatching plots in their own
right - then killing them might make sense whether it was known about or
not. But as children they would be the focus rather than the originator of
plots, and they would continue to be a focus for plots unless they were
*known* to be dead.

If I BELIEVE I am the 'Rightful Heir' then do I need to be or worry about being 'Protector' Surely 
I ONLY NEED to be 'Protector' if the Princes are legitimate/believed by me to be so.
 
Kind Regards,
 
Arthur W.



>________________________________
> From: justcarol67 <justcarol67@...>
>To:
>Sent: Tuesday, 19 February 2013, 4:52
>Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?
>
>
> 
>A J wrote:
>>
>> Pursuing this line of discussion, I hate to admit that it was in the early 60's that I read Kendall's biography of Richard, and, at that age, with a not very critical eye. Since his book formed the foundation for what I understand about Richard, I was surprised to gather from your message that we are missing the document that names Richard as Protector (or am I misinterpreting what you've said below?). I seem to recall we do at least have documents that call him Protector.
>>
>> My questions then are
>> (1) Is Edward's will the only "place" we would expect to find such an appointment?
>> (2) If not, where else might we find it?
>> (3) Alternatively, is there some other way that Richard could have "legally" become Protector, & where would we look for that evidence.
>
>Carol responds:
>
>The contemporary chronicles (Mancini and Croyland) agree that he was appointed Protector in his brother's will, and he was certainly viewed as such by the council. The problem is not the legality of his appointment, it's the apparent destruction of the codicil appointing him.
>
>AJ:
>> Don't get me wrong, I very much believe that the Woodville reaction indicates their alarm over the appointment, in other words that it was "for real." But if we are now lacking any clear authoritative evidence making Richard Protector, I can understand why some people persist in saying that he had himself declared Protector (with overtones that it was an unlawful seizure of power on the road to usurping the throne, etc).
>
>Carol responds:
>
>Yes. That's the problem. If the codicil or the correspondence were extant, we would have no need to prove, for example, that he escorting the young king to London in his capacity as Protector rather than "capturing" him.
>
>AJ:
>> In the absence of trustworthy evidence, we wind up with folks like A Pollard, whose book on the Princes I cannot stand to read for very long because it is so full of language I find inflammatory.
>
>Carol responds:
>
>I have the same reaction. I get as far as the woman having a caesarian delivery and I wonder what is wrong with this man. Of course, Desmond Seward is even worse.
>
>AJ:
>On the video of The King in the Car Park, he seems like a charming fellow, and not malicious at all. But he states that the Princes disappeared in the summer of 1483 (not meant to be an exact quote, so if that's wrong, it's my mistake not his) making it sound like common knowledge. What I wanted to know at that point was how many sources said it, when did they say it, and how credible is the source or sources. All subject to debate, if I'm recalling correctly. And yet it's all glossed over in a few words from an expert. Pollard then went on to say something to the effect that he was sure the Princes were dead by then. At least they would have been, if he had been Richard.
>
>Carol:
>
>Yes, that's the problem, and all the worse because he's charming. Much worse than, say Starkey, who by his own confession is the rudest man in Britain. But the problem is that we have only two chroniclers, both biased in their different ways, for the Protectorate and only one for Richard's reign (though there are other sources). I think our biggest piece of supporting evidence is Titulus Regius, which echoes the petition that the Three Estates presented to Richard in June 1483, There can be no doubt that they thought that he was the lawful Protector--and the rightful king. The only doubt appears to be for the period between Edward's death and Richard's arrival in London. However, it seems that he wrote to the council, telling them that he had taken the young king into his custody and arrested the Woodvilles, and he seems to have been welcomed into the city with relief (as if the people of London were glad to see that the boy would not be ruled by
Woodvilles.
>
>We do have solid evidence that the Woodvilles, specifically Dorset, were illegally issuing commands (wrong word?) in the name of the queen and the king's "uterine brother"--some of those have been preserved. Richard's arrival, of course, sent Dorset and his mother scuttling into sanctuary. I think even Pollard concedes that they had no business acting as if they were co[regents.
>
>I don't have time to check sources now, but if I made any errors, I'm sure that others will correct me. Meanwhile, if you don't have access to the Croyland Chronicle, you can find it here: http://www.r3.org/bookcase/croyland/index.html
>
>Does anyone have a link to Mancini?
>
>Carol
>
>
>
>
>

Claire wrote:
> I thought there was a letter from Richard in which he spoke angrily about the boys being killed, and blamed the Woodvilles?

Carol responds:

The letter involving the Earl of Desmond (actually instructions to the Bishop of Annaghdown regarding the earl) speaks only of the earl's father, not his brothers, who may be imaginary. At least two sons survived, but the chronology involved in their birth dates and when each became earl is confused. Richard clearly did blame the same people (assumed to be the Woodvilles) for the Earl's father's death and his brother Clarence's death.

Here's the actual wording, which I'm typing rather than copying and pasting from my new hardbound edition of Hammond and Sutton's "Richard III: The Road to Bosworth Field," p. 133:

"Also he shalle shewe that albeit the Fadre of the said Erle, the king than being of yong Age,was extorciously slane $ murdered by colour of the lawes within Irland by certain persones than havyng the governaunce and Rule there, ayenst alle manhood Reason & good conscience, Yet notwithstanding that the semblable chaunce was & hapned sithen within this Royalulme of England, aswele of his Brother the duc of Clarence, As other his nighe kiynnesmen and gret Frendes, the kings grace alweys contynuethe and hathe compassion of the dethe of his said Fadre, And is content that his said Cousyne, now Erle, by alle ordinate meanes and due course of the lawes when it shalle lust him at any tyme hereafter to sue or attempt for the punysshment thereof."

I've checked for typos, but given the gleaming paper, my not-so-good vision compounded by eyestrain, and the archaic spelling, I may have missed some. However, it's clear that Richard is saying only that he has compassion for the earl because of the illegal murder of his father and is implying that the same people were responsible for the deaths not only of Clarence but of other friends and kinsmen of Richard's, and he seems to be suggesting that if the earl wants to sue for the punishment of these crimes or pursue other legal means of punishing them, he has no objection.

But no sons are mentioned except the earl himself.

Carol

Claire wrote:
[snip]
> I can see a possible scenario in which they either died of sickness or were done in by Buckingham (or Beaufort) and Richard then couldn't say so because evertybody was bound to blame him for it - but then that wouldn't fit Henry's behaviour. The only thing which makes sense of Henry's silence is that he at least strongly supected they were alive, and if they had died anywhere in England or Wales he would almost certainly have been able to find out about it.

Carol responds:

I agree. And I also think it's no coincidence that (despite the absence of a confession) Tyrrell ended up being scapegoated via rumor in the early chronicles. I think Henry suspected his involvement in rescuing the so-called Princes from the Tower. I know of no such rumors circulating before Tyrrell's execution and no chronicler before Vergil provides any details. Vergil seems to have seized on Tyrrell's trip to London during Richard's progress as proof that he did it then (reluctantly and on Richard's orders). More turns the story into a fantasy and invents the confession. Bacon inadvertently turns More's story into the one that Henry "gave out" and More only copied. But the fact that the scapegoat was Tyrrell (Richard's Master of the Horse and of the Henchmen, or pages) is too convenient to be coincidence. I think there's more to it than that trip to London, as his attempt to help another Yorkist heir also suggests.

So, yes, I think that Henry suspected that they were alive, at least until he had executed Perkin Warbeck, and that after he had executed Tyrrell for another crime altogether, he used the old, familiar rumor tactic to arouse suspicions in people's minds. Once the rumor was recorded--as a rumor--in the Great Chronicle (published after Henry's death), it became "fact."

But why Tyrrell and only Tyrrell? Because he was the most likely person to have spirited the boys away from the Tower.

Carol

When thinking of Brampton, don't forget that Edward I expelled England's (religiously) Jewish population and Cromwell allowed them back. A convert was an exception.

----- Original Message -----
From: justcarol67
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 3:56 PM
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?



Claire wrote:
[snip]
> I can see a possible scenario in which they either died of sickness or were done in by Buckingham (or Beaufort) and Richard then couldn't say so because evertybody was bound to blame him for it - but then that wouldn't fit Henry's behaviour. The only thing which makes sense of Henry's silence is that he at least strongly supected they were alive, and if they had died anywhere in England or Wales he would almost certainly have been able to find out about it.

Carol responds:

I agree. And I also think it's no coincidence that (despite the absence of a confession) Tyrrell ended up being scapegoated via rumor in the early chronicles. I think Henry suspected his involvement in rescuing the so-called Princes from the Tower. I know of no such rumors circulating before Tyrrell's execution and no chronicler before Vergil provides any details. Vergil seems to have seized on Tyrrell's trip to London during Richard's progress as proof that he did it then (reluctantly and on Richard's orders). More turns the story into a fantasy and invents the confession. Bacon inadvertently turns More's story into the one that Henry "gave out" and More only copied. But the fact that the scapegoat was Tyrrell (Richard's Master of the Horse and of the Henchmen, or pages) is too convenient to be coincidence. I think there's more to it than that trip to London, as his attempt to help another Yorkist heir also suggests.

So, yes, I think that Henry suspected that they were alive, at least until he had executed Perkin Warbeck, and that after he had executed Tyrrell for another crime altogether, he used the old, familiar rumor tactic to arouse suspicions in people's minds. Once the rumor was recorded--as a rumor--in the Great Chronicle (published after Henry's death), it became "fact."

But why Tyrrell and only Tyrrell? Because he was the most likely person to have spirited the boys away from the Tower.

Carol

Arthur wrote:

"If I BELIEVE I am the 'Rightful Heir' then do I need to be or worry about
being 'Protector' Surely I ONLY NEED to be 'Protector' if the Princes are
legitimate/believed by me to be so."

Doug here:

I get the sense from your post that you don't think Richard was being honest
regarding the legitimacy of his brother's children (please correct me if I'm
mistaken). If I've taken your post correctly the following represents my
take and that of, I believe, many/most here on the subject:

Richard only worried about being Protector while it was thought his
brother's children were legitimate. Between the death of Edward IV in April
1483 and Bishop Stillington's presentation to the Council, most likely in
late May or early June of 1483, Edward IV's children were believed to
legitimate and, because of their age, there was a need for a Protector. In
his will or a codicil to it, Edward IV had appointed Richard as Protector of
Edward's children, Therefore it was Richard's duty to assume the
Protectorship and take charge of Edward (V), which he did.
However, after Bishop Stillington presented his evidence to the Council
concerning Edward IV's marriage to Dame Eleanor Butler, and that evidence
was accepted by the Council, Edward IV's children were accepted as
illegitimate and Richard became his brother's "rightful heir".
Perhaps a better phrasing of your post might be:
"Surely I ONLY NEED to be 'Protector' if the Princes are legitimate/believed
by me to be so. If I BELIEVE I am the 'Rightful Heir' then do I need to be
or worry about being 'Protector'".
Then it would fit what IS known and place the facts that WERE known in
chronological order.
Again, I hope I haven't misread your intent. Please let me know if I have.
Doug

Arthurian wrote:
>
> If I BELIEVE I am the 'Rightful Heir' then do I need to be or worry about being 'Protector' Surely I ONLY NEED to be 'Protector' if the Princes are legitimate/believed by me to be so.

Carol responds:

Not sure where you're going here, but Richard does seem to have regarded Edward V as the rightful king (in need of protection from his own Woodville relatives and others who would manipulate him) until the Stillington revelation, which changed everything and, if true, did make him the rightful king (with Edward of Warwick barred by his father's attainder). But setting aside his nephew's claim and accepting the request of the Three Estates to become king does not imply that Richard no longer needed to protect the life and well-being of his two nephews. (I suspect that he felt all the more need to get them to a place of safety to avoid their use by either renegade Yorkists or Tudor supporters.)

We tend to forget that "Protector" also meant protector of the realm and acting in *England's* best interests. As Titulus Regius indicates, that meant a grown man of proven ability with impeccable Yorkist credentials: Richard.

(May I make a small request? Using all capitals for emphasis makes a post harder to read and looks like "yelling." That's why some of us use asterisks instead.

Carol

Talking of Ms Weir, apparently her new book is about Elizabeth of  York and I read somewhere that she has "new proof" that a marriage really was intended between E of Y and Richard.  Any bets that all she will do is rehash the story of the letter that Buck allegedly saw?
 
Incidentally does anyone know how she managed to get her first book published?  I know it is incredibly difficult to get an agent, perhaps it wasn't so hard in the past?.  She certainly wasn't an academic so there was no way in through that.  
This from her website:
 
"I have been interested in history since the age of fourteen, when I read my first adult novel, a rather lurid book called Henry's Golden Queen, about Katherine of Aragon. I was so enthralled by it that I dashed off to read real history books to find out the truth behind what I had read, and thus my passion for history was born. By the time I was fifteen, I had written a three-volume reference work on the Tudor dynasty, a biography of Anne Boleyn based partly on contemporary sources, and several historical plays;"
 
 
Obviously none of the above were published but I have to say I would find it amazing if an adult, after studying a subject for ne year, wrote all the above.  Talk about over confident!
 
Liz
 
 
 
 
"Claire M Jordan" wrote:
[snip]
> It seems likely. Weir's book on the missing princes refers to a local legend in the vicinity of Gipping Hall, Tyrrell's home base, to the effect that the boys stayed there for a while and their mother visited them there.

Carol responds:

Um, I think you have Audrey Williamson confused with Alison (I-call-myself-a-historian-but-I-don't-know-research-from-my-thumbnail) Weir. They have the same initials and wrote a book on the same topic (the so-called Princes in the Tower). The only good thing I can say about Weir's book is that the cover reduces Millais's painting to thumbnail size. Williamson's, on the other hand, is interesting, well written, an thought provoking, leaving the conclusions up to the reader, whereas Weir to this day claims that she has "solved" the mystery.

We've talked a lot about Tyrrell lately, and many of us do think that there's truth in that legend and that one or both boys ended up with Aunt Margaret in Burgundy.

Carol




________________________________

From: justcarol67 <justcarol67@...>
To:
Sent: Tuesday, 19 February 2013, 4:02
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?

"I have been interested in history since the age of fourteen, when I read my first adult novel, a rather lurid book called Henry's Golden Queen, about Katherine of Aragon. I was so enthralled by it that I dashed off to read real history books to find out the truth behind what I had read, and thus my passion for history was born. By the time I was fifteen, I had written a three-volume reference work on the Tudor dynasty, a biography of Anne Boleyn based partly on contemporary sources, and several historical plays;"

That makes me want to throw up. Her books are twaddle, at best. And well gee, how many of us have been interested in history for a long time??? Would we be on this site, if not? I will never be an author. It sounds like it would be easy, but to write a really great books takes time, energy, research and TALENT. I fear she has none. Good luck to you!


From: [mailto:] On Behalf Of liz williams
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 1:51 PM
To:
Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?



Talking of Ms Weir, apparently her new book is about Elizabeth of York and I read somewhere that she has "new proof" that a marriage really was intended between E of Y and Richard. Any bets that all she will do is rehash the story of the letter that Buck allegedly saw?

Incidentally does anyone know how she managed to get her first book published? I know it is incredibly difficult to get an agent, perhaps it wasn't so hard in the past?. She certainly wasn't an academic so there was no way in through that.
This from her website:

"I have been interested in history since the age of fourteen, when I read my first adult novel, a rather lurid book called Henry's Golden Queen, about Katherine of Aragon. I was so enthralled by it that I dashed off to read real history books to find out the truth behind what I had read, and thus my passion for history was born. By the time I was fifteen, I had written a three-volume reference work on the Tudor dynasty, a biography of Anne Boleyn based partly on contemporary sources, and several historical plays;"


Obviously none of the above were published but I have to say I would find it amazing if an adult, after studying a subject for ne year, wrote all the above. Talk about over confident!

Liz




"Claire M Jordan" wrote:
[snip]
> It seems likely. Weir's book on the missing princes refers to a local legend in the vicinity of Gipping Hall, Tyrrell's home base, to the effect that the boys stayed there for a while and their mother visited them there.

Carol responds:

Um, I think you have Audrey Williamson confused with Alison (I-call-myself-a-historian-but-I-don't-know-research-from-my-thumbnail) Weir. They have the same initials and wrote a book on the same topic (the so-called Princes in the Tower). The only good thing I can say about Weir's book is that the cover reduces Millais's painting to thumbnail size. Williamson's, on the other hand, is interesting, well written, an thought provoking, leaving the conclusions up to the reader, whereas Weir to this day claims that she has "solved" the mystery.

We've talked a lot about Tyrrell lately, and many of us do think that there's truth in that legend and that one or both boys ended up with Aunt Margaret in Burgundy.

Carol

________________________________

From: justcarol67 justcarol67@...<mailto:justcarol67%40yahoo.com>>
To: <mailto:%40yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, 19 February 2013, 4:02
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?

From: justcarol67
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 3:56 PM
Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?


> But why Tyrrell and only Tyrrell? Because he was the most likely person to
> have spirited the boys away from the Tower.

And therefore the person most likely to be able to tell people they hadn't
been killed.

We've all read a few books about the Tudors.
Shall we sit down and write a book trashing a Tudor monarch? If we do
we can all call ourselves historians!!!! Just like Weir!
New film about her coming out soon, "Hansel and Gretel Witch Hunters".
She doesn't play Hansel of Gretel! :-)
Paul


On 19/02/2013 20:14, Pamela Bain wrote:
> "I have been interested in history since the age of fourteen, when I read my first adult novel, a rather lurid book called Henry's Golden Queen, about Katherine of Aragon. I was so enthralled by it that I dashed off to read real history books to find out the truth behind what I had read, and thus my passion for history was born. By the time I was fifteen, I had written a three-volume reference work on the Tudor dynasty, a biography of Anne Boleyn based partly on contemporary sources, and several historical plays;"
>
> That makes me want to throw up. Her books are twaddle, at best. And well gee, how many of us have been interested in history for a long time??? Would we be on this site, if not? I will never be an author. It sounds like it would be easy, but to write a really great books takes time, energy, research and TALENT. I fear she has none. Good luck to you!
>
>
> From: [mailto:] On Behalf Of liz williams
> Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 1:51 PM
> To:
> Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?
>
>
>
> Talking of Ms Weir, apparently her new book is about Elizabeth of York and I read somewhere that she has "new proof" that a marriage really was intended between E of Y and Richard. Any bets that all she will do is rehash the story of the letter that Buck allegedly saw?
>
> Incidentally does anyone know how she managed to get her first book published? I know it is incredibly difficult to get an agent, perhaps it wasn't so hard in the past?. She certainly wasn't an academic so there was no way in through that.
> This from her website:
>
> "I have been interested in history since the age of fourteen, when I read my first adult novel, a rather lurid book called Henry's Golden Queen, about Katherine of Aragon. I was so enthralled by it that I dashed off to read real history books to find out the truth behind what I had read, and thus my passion for history was born. By the time I was fifteen, I had written a three-volume reference work on the Tudor dynasty, a biography of Anne Boleyn based partly on contemporary sources, and several historical plays;"
>
>
> Obviously none of the above were published but I have to say I would find it amazing if an adult, after studying a subject for ne year, wrote all the above. Talk about over confident!
>
> Liz
>
>
>
>
> "Claire M Jordan" wrote:
> [snip]
>> It seems likely. Weir's book on the missing princes refers to a local legend in the vicinity of Gipping Hall, Tyrrell's home base, to the effect that the boys stayed there for a while and their mother visited them there.
> Carol responds:
>
> Um, I think you have Audrey Williamson confused with Alison (I-call-myself-a-historian-but-I-don't-know-research-from-my-thumbnail) Weir. They have the same initials and wrote a book on the same topic (the so-called Princes in the Tower). The only good thing I can say about Weir's book is that the cover reduces Millais's painting to thumbnail size. Williamson's, on the other hand, is interesting, well written, an thought provoking, leaving the conclusions up to the reader, whereas Weir to this day claims that she has "solved" the mystery.
>
> We've talked a lot about Tyrrell lately, and many of us do think that there's truth in that legend and that one or both boys ended up with Aunt Margaret in Burgundy.
>
> Carol
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: justcarol67 justcarol67@...<mailto:justcarol67%40yahoo.com>>
> To: <mailto:%40yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, 19 February 2013, 4:02
> Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>


--
Richard Liveth Yet!

Love it.....I don't think we have to write that book. Enough of Henry VIII (I am, I am) and his wives is out there, that a "really" historic book would probably not sell. We have the "bodice rippers" Ms. Weir writes, and that is enough!


From: [mailto:] On Behalf Of Paul Trevor Bale
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 2:28 PM
To:
Cc: paul.bale@...
Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?



We've all read a few books about the Tudors.
Shall we sit down and write a book trashing a Tudor monarch? If we do
we can all call ourselves historians!!!! Just like Weir!
New film about her coming out soon, "Hansel and Gretel Witch Hunters".
She doesn't play Hansel of Gretel! :-)
Paul

On 19/02/2013 20:14, Pamela Bain wrote:
> "I have been interested in history since the age of fourteen, when I read my first adult novel, a rather lurid book called Henry's Golden Queen, about Katherine of Aragon. I was so enthralled by it that I dashed off to read real history books to find out the truth behind what I had read, and thus my passion for history was born. By the time I was fifteen, I had written a three-volume reference work on the Tudor dynasty, a biography of Anne Boleyn based partly on contemporary sources, and several historical plays;"
>
> That makes me want to throw up. Her books are twaddle, at best. And well gee, how many of us have been interested in history for a long time??? Would we be on this site, if not? I will never be an author. It sounds like it would be easy, but to write a really great books takes time, energy, research and TALENT. I fear she has none. Good luck to you!
>
>
> From: <mailto:%40yahoogroups.com> [mailto:<mailto:%40yahoogroups.com>] On Behalf Of liz williams
> Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 1:51 PM
> To: <mailto:%40yahoogroups.com>
> Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?
>
>
>
> Talking of Ms Weir, apparently her new book is about Elizabeth of York and I read somewhere that she has "new proof" that a marriage really was intended between E of Y and Richard. Any bets that all she will do is rehash the story of the letter that Buck allegedly saw?
>
> Incidentally does anyone know how she managed to get her first book published? I know it is incredibly difficult to get an agent, perhaps it wasn't so hard in the past?. She certainly wasn't an academic so there was no way in through that.
> This from her website:
>
> "I have been interested in history since the age of fourteen, when I read my first adult novel, a rather lurid book called Henry's Golden Queen, about Katherine of Aragon. I was so enthralled by it that I dashed off to read real history books to find out the truth behind what I had read, and thus my passion for history was born. By the time I was fifteen, I had written a three-volume reference work on the Tudor dynasty, a biography of Anne Boleyn based partly on contemporary sources, and several historical plays;"
>
>
> Obviously none of the above were published but I have to say I would find it amazing if an adult, after studying a subject for ne year, wrote all the above. Talk about over confident!
>
> Liz
>
>
>
>
> "Claire M Jordan" wrote:
> [snip]
>> It seems likely. Weir's book on the missing princes refers to a local legend in the vicinity of Gipping Hall, Tyrrell's home base, to the effect that the boys stayed there for a while and their mother visited them there.
> Carol responds:
>
> Um, I think you have Audrey Williamson confused with Alison (I-call-myself-a-historian-but-I-don't-know-research-from-my-thumbnail) Weir. They have the same initials and wrote a book on the same topic (the so-called Princes in the Tower). The only good thing I can say about Weir's book is that the cover reduces Millais's painting to thumbnail size. Williamson's, on the other hand, is interesting, well written, an thought provoking, leaving the conclusions up to the reader, whereas Weir to this day claims that she has "solved" the mystery.
>
> We've talked a lot about Tyrrell lately, and many of us do think that there's truth in that legend and that one or both boys ended up with Aunt Margaret in Burgundy.
>
> Carol
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: justcarol67 justcarol67@...<mailto:justcarol67%40yahoo.com>>
> To: <mailto:%40yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, 19 February 2013, 4:02
> Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>

--
Richard Liveth Yet!

From: Stephen Lark
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 4:29 PM
Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of
records?


> When thinking of Brampton, don't forget that Edward I expelled England's
(religiously) Jewish population and Cromwell allowed them back. A convert
was an exception.

Of course - which reduces the likelihood that Brampton was a *sincere*
convert to Christianity, because it increases the degree to which being an
openly practising Jew would be a professional handicap. Don't forget he was
Portuguese and there was, or soon would be, an entire sub-class of Spanish
and Portuguese Jews known as Marranos who openly professed Christianity to
escape persecution, whilst practising Judaism in private.

Pamela said:
 
"I have been interested in history since the age of fourteen, when I read my first adult novel, a rather lurid book called Henry's Golden Queen, about Katherine of Aragon. I was so enthralled by it that I dashed off to read real history books to find out the truth behind what I had read, and thus my passion for history was born. By the time I was fifteen, I had written a three-volume reference work on the Tudor dynasty, a biography of Anne Boleyn based partly on contemporary sources, and several historical plays;"

That makes me want to throw up. Her books are twaddle, at best. And well gee, how many of us have been interested in history for a long time??? Would we be on this site, if not? I will never be an author. It sounds like it would be easy, but to write a really great books takes time, energy, research and TALENT. I fear she has none. Good luck to you!.
 
Liz replied:
Pamela, you and me both!  I 've been interested in history since I was about 11 and when I was a teenager, I was always scribbling stories, starting novels, etc.  some of them were quite good (she said modestly) but I never finished anything and gave it all up years ago.    Of course I have never had Ms W's monumental self confidence either!

I was asked to put a frieze about the monarchs of England around a classroom when I was seven or eight - nobody has offered to pay for my output until this month.

----- Original Message -----
From: liz williams
To:
Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 9:45 PM
Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?





Pamela said:

"I have been interested in history since the age of fourteen, when I read my first adult novel, a rather lurid book called Henry's Golden Queen, about Katherine of Aragon. I was so enthralled by it that I dashed off to read real history books to find out the truth behind what I had read, and thus my passion for history was born. By the time I was fifteen, I had written a three-volume reference work on the Tudor dynasty, a biography of Anne Boleyn based partly on contemporary sources, and several historical plays;"

That makes me want to throw up. Her books are twaddle, at best. And well gee, how many of us have been interested in history for a long time??? Would we be on this site, if not? I will never be an author. It sounds like it would be easy, but to write a really great books takes time, energy, research and TALENT. I fear she has none. Good luck to you!.

Liz replied:
Pamela, you and me both! I 've been interested in history since I was about 11 and when I was a teenager, I was always scribbling stories, starting novels, etc. some of them were quite good (she said modestly) but I never finished anything and gave it all up years ago. Of course I have never had Ms W's monumental self confidence either!

Also he had declared EoY legitimate and if she was legitimate then Edward and Richard would have been too and could have claimed the throne that Henry won by conquest.

--- In , "Claire M Jordan" <whitehound@...> wrote:
>
> From: ajhibbard@...
> To:
> Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 1:50 AM
> Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?
>
>
> > Pollard then went on to say something to the effect that he was sure the
> > Princes were dead by then. At least they would have been, if he had been
> > Richard.
>
> There was a very funny play in the 1980s, the title of which escapes me,
> which included the following conversation between Margaret Beaufort and
> somebody who knew Richard:
>
> "... and he killed those two poor innocent boys...."
> "But he didn't!"
> "Well then, he should have. My Henry will, you can depend on it."
>
> > And therein is the crux of the matter. We all see Richard, especially when
> > we cannot agree on what constitutes credible evidence to begin with,
> > through the lenses of our own personalities & what we think would be
> > reasonable behavior according to our perceptions of the situation.
>
> Yes. You can think up arguments either way for Richard - it would have been
> out of character/it was an extraordinary situation; they were his brother's
> sons/they were Woodvilles, and he held the Woodvilles responsible for
> murdering the Desmond boys, and so on. But to my mind the most compelling
> evidence that nobody killed them is that Henry acted as if he didn't know
> what had happened to them.
>
> Henry was plagued by pretenders and it would have been very much to his
> advantage to be able to say "You can't be one of the missing princes because
> I know they're dead." And even if he had killed them himself, he could have
> blamed it on Richard. The only rational reason I can see for his taking
> nearly 20 years to say they were dead, and then doing so in a roundabout way
> which he could deny if he needed to, is that because they were his brothers
> in law, if he declared them dead he would be expected to say mass for their
> souls, and if you're a good Catholic you don't say mass for somebody you
> know or suspect to be alive.
>

If I remember rightly Carol she wrote to the newspapers saying that she had found a "new source"the source being Sir Thomas More. Peter Hammond wrote an excellent review of her book in the Ricardian refuting virtually every thing she said. Particularly the bit about More being a new source.

--- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...> wrote:
>
>
> "Claire M Jordan" wrote:
>
> > And what does she [Weir] think happened?
> >
> Carol responds:
>
> That Richard did it exactly as More describes. Clever, no? Er, no, I didn't think so.
>
> Carol
>

"ricard1an" wrote:
>
> Also he had declared EoY legitimate and if she was legitimate then Edward and Richard would have been too and could have claimed the throne that Henry won by conquest.

Carol responds:

Or at least disputed his claim, which is probably one reason why Henry claimed the throne by right of conquest and took so long to marry Elizabeth of York. He didn't want to claim the throne through her because their claim would be superior to their sister's. But, of course, the claimant would have needed undisputed proof that he was Edward or Richard, and the more time that passed, the harder it was to provide that proof. If, let's say, an undisputed Edward V had claimed the throne at sixteen (whether from Henry or Richard, if Richard survived the battle), it's possible that the matter would have been decided by Parliament to avoid a civil war. But, of course, we'll never know.

Carol

That would make a great book!

On Feb 19, 2013, at 6:18 PM, "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...<mailto:justcarol67@...>> wrote:



"ricard1an" wrote:
>
> Also he had declared EoY legitimate and if she was legitimate then Edward and Richard would have been too and could have claimed the throne that Henry won by conquest.

Carol responds:

Or at least disputed his claim, which is probably one reason why Henry claimed the throne by right of conquest and took so long to marry Elizabeth of York. He didn't want to claim the throne through her because their claim would be superior to their sister's. But, of course, the claimant would have needed undisputed proof that he was Edward or Richard, and the more time that passed, the harder it was to provide that proof. If, let's say, an undisputed Edward V had claimed the throne at sixteen (whether from Henry or Richard, if Richard survived the battle), it's possible that the matter would have been decided by Parliament to avoid a civil war. But, of course, we'll never know.

Carol

I've made a start on the oyer & terminer records for Richard's reign, and haven't yet seen a single indictment for treason or participation in Buckingham's Rebellion. That can't be blamed on Robert Morton, who only looked after the Chancery Rolls. I think we need to think of these things in terms of royal policy.
Also, we are missing heralds' accounts for Richard's reign - no record of Queen Anne's funeral, for instance. The heralds were evicted from their new headquarters, Coldharbour, which Richard had given them, right at the start of Henry VII's reign because Henry had donated it to his mother.
Marie



--- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...> wrote:
>
>
> A J wrote:
> >
> > As a new member, apologies if this has already been discussed &
> > "settled." In Audrey Williamson's book The Mystery of the Princes from 1978, she discusses the swift execution of Hastings, and notes "the extreme oddity" of the situation - that despite the status of Hastings and of the Council meeting itself, no official record (at least as of the time she was writing) appeared to exist. She then goes on to point out that John Morton's nephew Robert Morton "always very close to him" became Master of the Rolls in the Tower in the reign of Henry VII, and would have been in a position to destroy official records. Perhaps, not coincidentally, leaving posterity with only the account that wound up in More's Life, and, from there, in Shakespeare. This discussion has no references, so I'm curious to know if her facts are regarded as accurate today. Also what the general opinion is about survival of records. Besides Titulus Regius, do we have evidence of deliberate destruction of other records? If we do, then that raises a whole new set of why questions...
> > A J
>
> Carol responds:
>
> Hi, AJ (or Alice, if I recall correctly?). We've discussed it, but we haven't settled anything. Robert Morton would definitely have had the opportunity to destroy records, but that and the fact that he was Morton's nephew (and therefore possibly motivated to destroy favorable evidence relating to Richard) is about all we have to point the finger at him, and much as I would like to say that we have our culprit (and much as I like Audrey Williamson, whose book I'm coincidentally rereading), I'm afraid that the evidence is circumstantial at best, like that for Richard's involvement in the supposed deaths of his nephews. However, there's no question that documents are missing. Polydore Vergil, himself accused (probably falsely) of destroying "wagonloads" of documents from an earlier period, complained of the scarcity of documents from that period, (Not that I'm a fan of Vergil, but that's a whole different matter.) Among the missing documents that I know of, aside from the burned copies of Titulus Regius, are the codicil of Edward IV's will naming Richard as Protector and Richard's own will. (It's inconceivable that he would not have had one.) And, as Williamson notes, we're missing the notes for that council meeting, and since the accounts by Mancini and the Croyland Chronicler are fragmentary and conflicting, historians have fallen back on More's account, highly embroidered and provably false in some of its details, in the hope that it came from Morton and therefore contains a grain of truth beneath the malicious distortions. (We would need Morton's hypothetical manuscript to know for sure, and even then we wouldn't know what really happened, only how much More had expanded on or exaggerated Morton.)
>
> Marie may know of additional missing documents. I am almost certain that, except for Titulus Regius, all the Parliamentary records and Wardrobe accounts survive, but I don't know about council meetings, privy purse expenses, and so forth.
>
> Carol
>

These, I take it are records that have not really been examined before? That must be very exciting. So please excuse me if I am a bit confused about what you are saying.

Are you saying there are oyer & terminer records for Richard's reign, or there are no such records for his entire reign?

If there are records for Richard's reign, are there other indictments for treason - just not for Buckingham's Rebellion? And when you say that missing records might reflect royal policy are you suggesting that records were not generated in the first place? or that they were generated, and then destroyed? Or are these questions that you don't yet have answers for?

Regarding the Heralds Accounts, are there any for years adjacent to Richard's reign, so the gap is selective, or is it more general?

A J

(Still desperately trying to play catch up & very frustrated with Yahoo & how difficult it is to follow a conversation.)

--- In , mariewalsh2003 <no_reply@...> wrote:
>
> I've made a start on the oyer & terminer records for Richard's reign, and haven't yet seen a single indictment for treason or participation in Buckingham's Rebellion. That can't be blamed on Robert Morton, who only looked after the Chancery Rolls. I think we need to think of these things in terms of royal policy.
> Also, we are missing heralds' accounts for Richard's reign - no record of Queen Anne's funeral, for instance. The heralds were evicted from their new headquarters, Coldharbour, which Richard had given them, right at the start of Henry VII's reign because Henry had donated it to his mother.
> Marie
>
>
>
> --- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@> wrote:
> >
> >
> > A J wrote:
> > >
> > > As a new member, apologies if this has already been discussed &
> > > "settled." In Audrey Williamson's book The Mystery of the Princes from 1978, she discusses the swift execution of Hastings, and notes "the extreme oddity" of the situation - that despite the status of Hastings and of the Council meeting itself, no official record (at least as of the time she was writing) appeared to exist. She then goes on to point out that John Morton's nephew Robert Morton "always very close to him" became Master of the Rolls in the Tower in the reign of Henry VII, and would have been in a position to destroy official records. Perhaps, not coincidentally, leaving posterity with only the account that wound up in More's Life, and, from there, in Shakespeare. This discussion has no references, so I'm curious to know if her facts are regarded as accurate today. Also what the general opinion is about survival of records. Besides Titulus Regius, do we have evidence of deliberate destruction of other records? If we do, then that raises a whole new set of why questions...
> > > A J
> >
> > Carol responds:
> >
> > Hi, AJ (or Alice, if I recall correctly?). We've discussed it, but we haven't settled anything. Robert Morton would definitely have had the opportunity to destroy records, but that and the fact that he was Morton's nephew (and therefore possibly motivated to destroy favorable evidence relating to Richard) is about all we have to point the finger at him, and much as I would like to say that we have our culprit (and much as I like Audrey Williamson, whose book I'm coincidentally rereading), I'm afraid that the evidence is circumstantial at best, like that for Richard's involvement in the supposed deaths of his nephews. However, there's no question that documents are missing. Polydore Vergil, himself accused (probably falsely) of destroying "wagonloads" of documents from an earlier period, complained of the scarcity of documents from that period, (Not that I'm a fan of Vergil, but that's a whole different matter.) Among the missing documents that I know of, aside from the burned copies of Titulus Regius, are the codicil of Edward IV's will naming Richard as Protector and Richard's own will. (It's inconceivable that he would not have had one.) And, as Williamson notes, we're missing the notes for that council meeting, and since the accounts by Mancini and the Croyland Chronicler are fragmentary and conflicting, historians have fallen back on More's account, highly embroidered and provably false in some of its details, in the hope that it came from Morton and therefore contains a grain of truth beneath the malicious distortions. (We would need Morton's hypothetical manuscript to know for sure, and even then we wouldn't know what really happened, only how much More had expanded on or exaggerated Morton.)
> >
> > Marie may know of additional missing documents. I am almost certain that, except for Titulus Regius, all the Parliamentary records and Wardrobe accounts survive, but I don't know about council meetings, privy purse expenses, and so forth.
> >
> > Carol
> >
>

The Warbecques weren't Jewish. There was some speculation years back that Mrs Warbeck, whose maiden surname was de Faro, could have been of Portuguese Jewish origin, but apparently the de Faros had been in Tournai for generations and weren't Jewish either.
Marie

--- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...> wrote:
>
> Claire wrote:
> >
> > What I'd like to see is any records from the nothern European Jewish community from the mid to late 1480s which might bear on where Brampton went and who he went with (especially if he went with two unexplained boys). I'm assuming that Brampton converted to Christianity because they didn't let you be a semi-piratical sea-captain in those days, if you were a Jew, rather than out of sincere conviction, and that he would have stayed in touch with the Jewish community. Especially as Perkin Warbeck certainly looks like a son of Edward's and if he wasn't one of the missing boys, then he supposedly came from a Jewish family called Warbeque, which suggests that while he was in Bruges Edward's relationship with the local Jewish community might have been very warm indeed....
> >
> Carol responds:
>
> I think that he was baptized and accepted at court before he became a "semi-piratical sea captain," but I could be mistaken. At any rate, he was apparently baptized in the late 1450s, when he was probably in his late teens, taking the first name of his godfather, Edward IV, and anglicizing his surname. But it was Richard III who knighted him, the first king of England ever to knight a converted Jew, in August 1484 (I think on a Scottish campaign). That was after Brampton had persuaded all but two of Edward Woodville's ship captains to return to port and accept the Protector's (Richard's) pardon (unfortunately not the ship carrying Woodville and the stolen treasure). I suspect that in 1484 or -85, he and Sir James Tyrrell were working together to spirit Richard's nephews out of England, but I haven't read enough on the topic to know.
>
> But, yes, searching those Northern Jewish records would be a good idea. And more needs to be done with the court records of Burgundy, too, especially the correspondence between Margaret and Richard. I wonder if they burned each other's letters after reading them to keep them secret.
>
> Carol
>

I don't know of a document formally appointing Richard as Protector, but many of Edward V's official documents refer to him as "protector et defensor regni nostri Anglie".
Marie


--- In , ajhibbard@... wrote:
>
> Pursuing this line of discussion, I hate to admit that it was in the early 60's that I read Kendall's biography of Richard, and, at that age, with a not very critical eye. Since his book formed the foundation for what I understand about Richard, I was surprised to gather from your message that we are missing the document that names Richard as Protector (or am I misinterpreting what you've said below?). I seem to recall we do at least have documents that call him Protector.
>
> My questions then are
> (1) Is Edward's will the only "place" we would expect to find such an appointment?
> (2) If not, where else might we find it?
> (3) Alternatively, is there some other way that Richard could have "legally" become Protector, & where would we look for that evidence.
>
> Don't get me wrong, I very much believe that the Woodville reaction indicates their alarm over the appointment, in other words that it was "for real." But if we are now lacking any clear authoritative evidence making Richard Protector, I can understand why some people persist in saying that he had himself declared Protector (with overtones that it was an unlawful seizure of power on the road to usurping the throne, etc).
>
> In the absence of trustworthy evidence, we wind up with folks like A Pollard, whose book on the Princes I cannot stand to read for very long because it is so full of language I find inflammatory. On the video of The King in the Car Park, he seems like a charming fellow, and not malicious at all. But he states that the Princes disappeared in the summer of 1483 (not meant to be an exact quote, so if that's wrong, it's my mistake not his) making it sound like common knowledge. What I wanted to know at that point was how many sources said it, when did they say it, and how credible is the source or sources. All subject to debate, if I'm recalling correctly. And yet it's all glossed over in a few words from an expert. Pollard then went on to say something to the effect that he was sure the Princes were dead by then. At least they would have been, if he had been Richard.
>
> And therein is the crux of the matter. We all see Richard, especially when we cannot agree on what constitutes credible evidence to begin with, through the lenses of our own personalities & what we think would be reasonable behavior according to our perceptions of the situation.
>
> Argghhh.
>
> A J
>
> --- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@> wrote:
> <snip>
> Among the missing documents that I know of, aside from the burned copies of Titulus Regius, are the codicil of Edward IV's will naming Richard as Protector and Richard's own will. (It's inconceivable that he would not have had one.) And, as Williamson notes, we're missing the notes for that council meeting, and since the accounts by Mancini and the Croyland Chronicler are fragmentary and conflicting, historians have fallen back on More's account, highly embroidered and provably false in some of its details, in the hope that it came from Morton and therefore contains a grain of truth beneath the malicious distortions. (We would need Morton's hypothetical manuscript to know for sure, and even then we wouldn't know what really happened, only how much More had expanded on or exaggerated Morton.)
> >
> > Marie may know of additional missing documents. I am almost certain that, except for Titulus Regius, all the Parliamentary records and Wardrobe accounts survive, but I don't know about council meetings, privy purse expenses, and so forth.
> >
> > Carol
> >
>

Marie wrote:

"The Warbecques weren't Jewish. There was some speculation years back that
Mrs Warbeck, whose maiden surname was de Faro, could have been of Portuguese
Jewish origin, but apparently the de Faros had been in Tournai for
generations and weren't Jewish either."

Doug here:

Isn't "faro" sort of a generic for "lighthouse" in the Mediterranean area? I
know there's a town/city named "Faro" in Portugal and one in Spain and I've
always understood that their names had come from the lighthouses built
there. And of course there's the most famous "faro" - the one at Alexandria.
Did that usage extend northwards? Even during the early Middle Ages there
was quite a bit of sea traffic between the Mediterranean and the Low
Countries (wine one way, wool the other, I believe), but Bruges, and Ghent,
are too far inland to have lighthouses and Tournai is even further from the
sea.
IF (heavily underlined) there is any data backing up the use of "faro" to
denote a lighthouse outside the Mediterranean, then it's possible that "de
Faro" is just a literal translation of where the family originated -
somewhere near a lighthouse in the Low Countries.
Otherwise I'd expect the first "de Faro" in the Low Countries had been a
merchant from the Iberian peninsula and his descendants, what HIS religion
may have been, were definitely RC.
Doug

Marie wrote:
>
>
> I don't know of a document formally appointing Richard as Protector, but many of Edward V's official documents refer to him as "protector et defensor regni nostri Anglie".

Carol responds:

Do you know if that includes Edward V's first act as king, a request to have some favorite priest given a promotion? Kendall says that it was written while they were still at Saint Albans.

Carol

Oh God, I hope she's not going to use the book signatures - one which carrie Richard's signature and under it that of "elyzabeth", and another in which "elyzabeth" asings her name under Gloucester's with the legend "sans removyr".
Unfortunately, Anne Sutton and Livia Visser-Fuchs argue from the plain "Elyzabeth" signature that Elizabeth of York was given these books by Richard and signed them when she was merely a bastard. In fact, however, queens often signed using simply their first name and there is certainly proof that Elizabeth Woodville did so. Personally, I see no reason to suppose anything other than that these were books of Richard's that were passed on to members of Henry's family after Bosworth. We don't use the fact that Margaret Beaufort took at least one of Richard's books as evidence that Richard was planning to marry her, for heaven's sake.
Anyway, if this is her "new proof" it's very old hat and not proof. But perhaps she has something else. Anyway, bandying about words like proof reminds me of myself at 15 when I had just read Daughter of Time.
Marie


--- In , liz williams <ferrymansdaughter@...> wrote:
>
> Talking of Ms Weir, apparently her new book is about Elizabeth of  York and I read somewhere that she has "new proof" that a marriage really was intended between E of Y and Richard.  Any bets that all she will do is rehash the story of the letter that Buck allegedly saw?
>  
> Incidentally does anyone know how she managed to get her first book published?  I know it is incredibly difficult to get an agent, perhaps it wasn't so hard in the past?.  She certainly wasn't an academic so there was no way in through that.  
> This from her website:
>  
> "I have been interested in history since the age of fourteen, when I read my first adult novel, a rather lurid book called Henry's Golden Queen, about Katherine of Aragon. I was so enthralled by it that I dashed off to read real history books to find out the truth behind what I had read, and thus my passion for history was born. By the time I was fifteen, I had written a three-volume reference work on the Tudor dynasty, a biography of Anne Boleyn based partly on contemporary sources, and several historical plays;"
>  
>  
> Obviously none of the above were published but I have to say I would find it amazing if an adult, after studying a subject for ne year, wrote all the above.  Talk about over confident!
>  
> Liz
>  
>  
>  
>  
> "Claire M Jordan" wrote:
> [snip]
> > It seems likely. Weir's book on the missing princes refers to a local legend in the vicinity of Gipping Hall, Tyrrell's home base, to the effect that the boys stayed there for a while and their mother visited them there.
>
> Carol responds:
>
> Um, I think you have Audrey Williamson confused with Alison (I-call-myself-a-historian-but-I-don't-know-research-from-my-thumbnail) Weir. They have the same initials and wrote a book on the same topic (the so-called Princes in the Tower). The only good thing I can say about Weir's book is that the cover reduces Millais's painting to thumbnail size. Williamson's, on the other hand, is interesting, well written, an thought provoking, leaving the conclusions up to the reader, whereas Weir to this day claims that she has "solved" the mystery.
>
> We've talked a lot about Tyrrell lately, and many of us do think that there's truth in that legend and that one or both boys ended up with Aunt Margaret in Burgundy.
>
> Carol
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: justcarol67 <justcarol67@...>
> To:
> Sent: Tuesday, 19 February 2013, 4:02
> Subject: Re: Deliberate destruction of records?
>
>
>
>

To immigrate into England between the expulsion of the Jews and their re-admittance by Cromwell, in theory at least they had to convert to Christianity. There was an establishment in London for Jewish converts called the Domus Conversorum, and Brampton lived there for some time during the 1470s. I wonder if religion really meant that much to him.
Marie

--- In , "Claire M Jordan" <whitehound@...> wrote:
>
>
> From: Stephen Lark
> To:
> Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2013 4:29 PM
> Subject: Re: Re: Deliberate destruction of
> records?
>
>
> > When thinking of Brampton, don't forget that Edward I expelled England's
> (religiously) Jewish population and Cromwell allowed them back. A convert
> was an exception.
>
> Of course - which reduces the likelihood that Brampton was a *sincere*
> convert to Christianity, because it increases the degree to which being an
> openly practising Jew would be a professional handicap. Don't forget he was
> Portuguese and there was, or soon would be, an entire sub-class of Spanish
> and Portuguese Jews known as Marranos who openly professed Christianity to
> escape persecution, whilst practising Judaism in private.
>

These, I take it are records that have not really been examined before? That must be very exciting. So please excuse me if I am a bit confused about what you are saying.

Are you saying there are oyer & terminer records for Richard's reign, or there are no such records for his entire reign?

If there are records for Richard's reign, are there other indictments for treason - just not for Buckingham's Rebellion? And when you say that missing records might reflect royal policy are you suggesting that records were not generated in the first place? or that they were generated, and then destroyed? Or are these questions that you don't yet have answers for?

Regarding the Heralds Accounts, are there any for years adjacent to Richard's reign, so the gap is selective, or is it more general?

A J

(Still desperately trying to play catch up & very frustrated with Yahoo & how difficult it is to follow a conversation.)

--- In , mariewalsh2003 <no_reply@...> wrote:
>
> I've made a start on the oyer & terminer records for Richard's reign, and haven't yet seen a single indictment for treason or participation in Buckingham's Rebellion. That can't be blamed on Robert Morton, who only looked after the Chancery Rolls. I think we need to think of these things in terms of royal policy.
> Also, we are missing heralds' accounts for Richard's reign - no record of Queen Anne's funeral, for instance. The heralds were evicted from their new headquarters, Coldharbour, which Richard had given them, right at the start of Henry VII's reign because Henry had donated it to his mother.
> Marie
>
>
>
> --- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@> wrote:
> >
> >
> > A J wrote:
> > >
> > > As a new member, apologies if this has already been discussed &
> > > "settled." In Audrey Williamson's book The Mystery of the Princes from 1978, she discusses the swift execution of Hastings, and notes "the extreme oddity" of the situation - that despite the status of Hastings and of the Council meeting itself, no official record (at least as of the time she was writing) appeared to exist. She then goes on to point out that John Morton's nephew Robert Morton "always very close to him" became Master of the Rolls in the Tower in the reign of Henry VII, and would have been in a position to destroy official records. Perhaps, not coincidentally, leaving posterity with only the account that wound up in More's Life, and, from there, in Shakespeare. This discussion has no references, so I'm curious to know if her facts are regarded as accurate today. Also what the general opinion is about survival of records. Besides Titulus Regius, do we have evidence of deliberate destruction of other records? If we do, then that raises a whole new set of why questions...
> > > A J
> >
> > Carol responds:
> >
> > Hi, AJ (or Alice, if I recall correctly?). We've discussed it, but we haven't settled anything. Robert Morton would definitely have had the opportunity to destroy records, but that and the fact that he was Morton's nephew (and therefore possibly motivated to destroy favorable evidence relating to Richard) is about all we have to point the finger at him, and much as I would like to say that we have our culprit (and much as I like Audrey Williamson, whose book I'm coincidentally rereading), I'm afraid that the evidence is circumstantial at best, like that for Richard's involvement in the supposed deaths of his nephews. However, there's no question that documents are missing. Polydore Vergil, himself accused (probably falsely) of destroying "wagonloads" of documents from an earlier period, complained of the scarcity of documents from that period, (Not that I'm a fan of Vergil, but that's a whole different matter.) Among the missing documents that I know of, aside from the burned copies of Titulus Regius, are the codicil of Edward IV's will naming Richard as Protector and Richard's own will. (It's inconceivable that he would not have had one.) And, as Williamson notes, we're missing the notes for that council meeting, and since the accounts by Mancini and the Croyland Chronicler are fragmentary and conflicting, historians have fallen back on More's account, highly embroidered and provably false in some of its details, in the hope that it came from Morton and therefore contains a grain of truth beneath the malicious distortions. (We would need Morton's hypothetical manuscript to know for sure, and even then we wouldn't know what really happened, only how much More had expanded on or exaggerated Morton.)
> >
> > Marie may know of additional missing documents. I am almost certain that, except for Titulus Regius, all the Parliamentary records and Wardrobe accounts survive, but I don't know about council meetings, privy purse expenses, and so forth.
> >
> > Carol
> >
>

--- In , ajhibbard@... wrote:
>
> These, I take it are records that have not really been examined before? That must be very exciting. So please excuse me if I am a bit confused about what you are saying.
>
> Are you saying there are oyer & terminer records for Richard's reign, or there are no such records for his entire reign?

Marie replies:
They exist (category KB 9 in the National Archives), but so far I have not encountered anything more than the usual muggings, potholes, noisy neighbours and chicken rustling.


>
> If there are records for Richard's reign, are there other indictments for treason - just not for Buckingham's Rebellion?

Marie replies:
Another source I have perused a little bit is the central King's Bench indictments (KB 27), which are available online, but not seen anything there yet either.



And when you say that missing records might reflect royal policy are you suggesting that records were not generated in the first place? or that they were generated, and then destroyed? Or are these questions that you don't yet have answers for?

Marie replies:
There would of course have been written indictments for trerason produced by the o & t commissions, and at least one has turned up in a local record office.
The wheels of bureaucracy have always ground slowly, and my suspicion is that when Bosworth happened these records had not yet been bound into files, and so were simply discarded as no longer relevant. But I may be wrong.


>
> Regarding the Heralds Accounts, are there any for years adjacent to Richard's reign, so the gap is selective, or is it more general?

Marie replies:
We have a good account of Edward IV's funeral, and of the early part of Henry VII's reign starting in spring 1486. We certainly don't have accounts of absolutely everything, but again I suspect the accounts for Richard's reign may have still been on loose sheets of paper/parchment at the time of Bosworth and either got lost in the move or discarded by Coldharbour's new owner Margaret Beaufort.

Yup, faro = lighthouse. From Latin pharus.
Marie

--- In , "Douglas Eugene Stamate" <destama@...> wrote:
>
>
> Marie wrote:
>
> "The Warbecques weren't Jewish. There was some speculation years back that
> Mrs Warbeck, whose maiden surname was de Faro, could have been of Portuguese
> Jewish origin, but apparently the de Faros had been in Tournai for
> generations and weren't Jewish either."
>
> Doug here:
>
> Isn't "faro" sort of a generic for "lighthouse" in the Mediterranean area? I
> know there's a town/city named "Faro" in Portugal and one in Spain and I've
> always understood that their names had come from the lighthouses built
> there. And of course there's the most famous "faro" - the one at Alexandria.
> Did that usage extend northwards? Even during the early Middle Ages there
> was quite a bit of sea traffic between the Mediterranean and the Low
> Countries (wine one way, wool the other, I believe), but Bruges, and Ghent,
> are too far inland to have lighthouses and Tournai is even further from the
> sea.
> IF (heavily underlined) there is any data backing up the use of "faro" to
> denote a lighthouse outside the Mediterranean, then it's possible that "de
> Faro" is just a literal translation of where the family originated -
> somewhere near a lighthouse in the Low Countries.
> Otherwise I'd expect the first "de Faro" in the Low Countries had been a
> merchant from the Iberian peninsula and his descendants, what HIS religion
> may have been, were definitely RC.
> Doug
>

--- In , "justcarol67" <justcarol67@...> wrote:
>
>
> Marie wrote:
> >
> >
> > I don't know of a document formally appointing Richard as Protector, but many of Edward V's official documents refer to him as "protector et defensor regni nostri Anglie".
>
> Carol responds:
>
> Do you know if that includes Edward V's first act as king, a request to have some favorite priest given a promotion? Kendall says that it was written while they were still at Saint Albans.
>
> Carol
>

Marie replies:
Oh, you would ask that, Carol. Check my 1483 files.... No, it's in Edward's own name.

Carol earlier:
> >
> > Do you know if that includes Edward V's first act as king, a request to have some favorite priest given a promotion? Kendall says that it was written while they were still at Saint Albans.

>
Marie replied:
> Oh, you would ask that, Carol. Check my 1483 files.... No, it's in Edward's own name.

Carol responds:

Thanks, Marie. I guess he was waiting until he was officially appointed to use that title (and maybe, he was trying to show Edward that he had nothing to fear?)

Carol