This series left that fictional twist hanging without a resolution. They showed the true Edward V reunited with his mother momentarily with her telling him not to worry about avenging his brother's death because it had already been avenged. Are we really supposed to believe she sent him away to not seek the kingship any longer because she saw the futility of war? To what end?
shareFrom her perspective, one of her children had achieved royalty, so she had access to the power she craved, and she could live with that knowing she'd saved one of her sons from death.
shareReally? Hmmm. Somewhat hard to believe she'd be able to keep Edward V under wraps for too long before he'd start making noise about reclaiming the rightful seat his father held that now belonged to him, blah blah blah, that he'd be contentedly willing to listen to his mother and live a life of anonymous aristocracy in perpetuity when he had been raised to be king. Not sure what the series was trying to achieve with that.
Do you know if the book narrative has the same plot device and what the resolution was? I would expect PG would add more depth to that fictional aspect of her story.
Thank you for responding njgill.
In response to criticisms of the series being "ahistorical", Gregory stated that "What [BBC One and Starz] wanted was not a historical series based on the documents from the War of the Roses. They wanted my take on it, so that's what they got."share
In real srory he was kill whit his brother in Tower !
In this series, they implied that Edward V was killed in the tower and his younger brother Richard is the one that Elizabeth was able to send away. Remember when Elizabeth was at prayer and said, "At least my Richard is safe." She knew this because she sent the real Richard away. At the end, he is brought back and Elizabeth tells him they will live in peace.
shareThis may not be far from the truth. There were rebellions against Henry VII led by men claiming to be Richard. They were later declared to be pretenders. But why not just claim to be Edward V rather than Richard if you're going to lead a rebellion? The intrigue continues to this day fueled by the refusal of Queen Elizabeth to allow DNA analysis of the remains found in the Tower even though she allowed DNA analysis on Richard III's remains.
shareI wonder why Warbeck never mentioned his mother having contrived to smuggle him out then. I wonder too why no one noticed that he'd been replaced by another boy.
I'm the clever one; you're the potato one.
My guess is that involving Elizabeth would have also implicated her daughter (and his sister) who was by then married to Henry VII. I haven't read it yet, but Philippa Gregory's continuation of the story, The White Princess, features Warbeck. It should be an interesting read. Apparently Gregory mentions in the epilogue of that book that she believes Warbeck's claim was genuine.
Few people had access to the Princes so not recognizing if one was a changeling is possible especially as children change in appearance as they grow.
Warbeck's tale, in letters to the crowned heads of Europe, in no way supports the romantic notion that a desperate mother smuggled one of her children (only one? Why?) to safety; he emerged years later as a young man, rather than having been taken to the obvious place - his aunt, Margaret of Burgundy's court and brought up there - and I think that the most obvious identity of Warbeck is, well, Perkin Warbeck.
I've read The White Princess. Gregory may believe what she wants, but she offers no evidence at all to support that belief - any more than she has any evidence for Henry VII being a rapist, Elizabeth of York having slept with her uncle or being a complete, spineless nonenity, nor for the king and queen despising each other. In fact there is substantial evidence that they were deeply attached to each other.
It's a ghastly book, tedious, repetitive and hysterical (unusual combination I grant you), badly written, all in all pretty pointless unless you really want to see Henry VII shat on from a great height.
I'm the clever one; you're the potato one.
Actually quite a few people think Perkin Warbeck might have been a bastard of one of three sons of York. Both Edward IV and Richard III did their share of running around and had known bastards. Both spent some time in Burgundy in exile. It isn't unreasonable to think that they might have sent their very rich, widowed, childless sister Margaret one of their bastards (either born in England or born in Burgundy) to raise or to support financially. And when circumstances took their turn, Margaret had the perfect boy to impersonate Richard, Duke of York.
As an aside one of Edward IV's bastards Arthur did end up in Henry VII and Elizabeth of York's court. Elizabeth gave him a court position (in her last year of life), partially to give Prince Henry a role model after he became an heir. He didn't have pretensions to the throne in any way and end up being very close to Henry VII and Prince Henry. He lived at least into his 70s (surpassing any of the other children of Edward IV) and only ran into trouble with Henry VIII at the end of his life. Interestingly he resembled Edward IV pretty closely and seemed to inherit Edward IV's warm, and jovial personality (like Elizabeth of York did as well).
If he was a byblow of Edward IV he still wasn't Elizabeth Woodville's son.
As an aside one of Edward IV's bastards Arthur did end up in Henry VI and Elizabeth of York's court.
From that point of view yes could indeed be a possibility.
Edward had many of them and so did George though agewise it might also have been one of Richard's two boys. Against that stands that one of them John Plantagenet was executed 1492 by Henry VII and nobody knew of the other until recently when a church ledger was found and contained the note of a burial of a one Richard Richardson Plantagenet Master builder and secretary to the lord of that village. MIght be that Richard was Perkin and ran away when the rebellion failed. So far as historians are concerned both boys died. (I described it in depth in another post i made in this thread
Might I ask where you got the info about Arthur? I do know that Edward Warwick (George's heir) lived at court until his execution.
In answer to you question "why only one?"
Elizabeth did try to get the new young Edward V to London to be crowned asap and leave Richard of Gloucestre out of the picture completely, but Richard was told Edward IV was dead and intercepted the young king. Then he sent for the younger brother. So Elizabeth had no chance to send her son Edward away - and no need until his uncle declared her a bigamist.
You have to remember that when Edward IV died, his heir was in Ludlow, quite a ways away, getting his education and training in kingship.
It's a very ridiculous idea. For one, they found a boy who looked enough like Richard of Shrewsbury to deceive aristocrats familiar with the prince? Besides that, Edward, for some reason, did not recognize this and had enough of an adult's discretion not to sound the alarm if he did? Besides that, she was "charitable" enough to cede her son's rights to the throne to an outsider with a laughable claim like Henry Tudor and even marry her daughter to this person? That's like throwing away everything she fought for and accomplished, often at the cost of others(George, Warwick, her husband, her parents, sons, brothers etc.) Even if Elizabeth Woodville is tired, I doubt she's stupid enough to think running away would solve anything or selfless enough to let go of her hard-won power and privilege. The only way she could've given her support to the Tudor cause is if both her sons were dead. I'm actually amazed at the lengths people go to for defending Richard III.
shareEdward V is presumably killed in the series, although IIRC there's never any definitive confirmation that the boys have died. I think you're thinking of his brother Richard. The show would have us believe that Perkin Warbeck was telling the truth. Elizabeth, when ordered to deliver Richard to the Tower, instead substitutes another boy and sends her real son off into hiding.
Unless Alpert's covered in bacon grease, I don't think Hugo can track anything.
might be the op is not longer interested but after reading the answers I felt I had to reply.
The sad truth from the historian's view is that both Edward of Westminster (Edward V) and Richard of Shrewsbury (Richard of York) where murdered in the Tower. By whose hands nobody knows.
There are 4 likely culprits. Richard III for apparent reasons, how else to become king? Henry and Megan Tudor. With Edward and his sons out of the way that would have left only Richard and his sickly boy in between the throne and the Tudors. And Henry Stafford the Duke of Buckingham. More and more historians now believe that it was him. The main reason Buckingham would have had was that he was the last surviving male from the line od Thomas of Gloucester the youngest son of Edward III. And he was able to trace that descend through a purely male line not like Tudor whose claim derieved from a female and at that bastard line from john of Gaunt (3rd son of Edward III) The yorks went straight through the male line of the 4th son edmund Langley of YOrk. So with Edward and his sons dead and Richard's son sickly and very likely to died soon or at least way before his father (Edward Middleham actually suffered from Leukiemia) Buckingham would have been named heir apparent to Richard. And no I do not omit Edward Warwick (George's son) because he was due to his father's behavior banned from ever inheriting the throne and besides he was barely ten years old at the time.
And not to say Buckingham was an ambitious person. After Edward Middleham died in 1484 he was indeed named heir apparent. Later that same year Richard III survied an assasination attempt and Buckingham raised his banners in rebellion. This lead to his execution. It is believed that he did order the attempt on Richard's life.
Anne Neville died early in 1485 without having born Richard another son/child. Some say it broke him and that his death on 22.8.1485 on Bosworth Field was a relief for him.
So in the end the only one profiting from the death of the Princes was Henry Tudor. Though in 1487 the remaining Yorkists rose up under the leadership of one Perkin Warbeck it couldn't have been Richard Shrewsbury as was barely 14 years of age at that point. It could have been Edward V at age 16 a man grown but on the other hand how would he have gotten out of the Tower? He was well known in court and he was taken into custody by Richard himself or by the Duke of Buckingham both would have known if Antony Rivers or Richard Grey had exchanged him for some other.
So there you are. Both dead (sceletons found at the Tower 1932 were examined and proclaimed the princes by their apparent wounds)One suffocated the other had his face smashed in by a blunt object, possibly a sword hilt or a mace. This is known through an account of one of the murderes who commited suicide after writing down his deed. The most likely culprit being Buckingham who is dead so are all the others. Both are buried at Westminster. Let's leave them to rest there and don't blame their uncle.
Uh, you got several things wrong in that post (Megan Tudor?! An attempt on Richard's life? Richard naming Buckingham his heir?!) but the biggest one is, Perkin Warbeck did ntohing in 1487, that was the Lawrence Simnell rebellion. Warbeck first claimed he was Richard Duke of York in 1490, started his rebellion in 1495, and was executed in 1499. And he was the right age to be Richard, Duke of York.
sharethat was the Lawrence Simnell rebellion.
And Henry Stafford the Duke of Buckingham. More and more historians now believe that it was him.
Sorry for the typos on Simnel's name, it was a fast answer. As for Warbeck, all I said he was the right age, contrary to the previous post. I'm not sure why you felt the need to launch into a long tirade about him.
Do they? Who believes this?
If Buckingham (or anyone else) was responsible why did the king have absolutely nothing to say about it?
I responded to a post - if you want to consider that a tirade I'm not sure that's my responsibility.
Can you cite some of the many people who see Buckingham as a plausible suspect? I don't mean blogs from the "Anyone but Richard" camp, I mean historians of any merit.
And by that you're trying to say... what exactly?
I really wish the Queen would allow forensic DNA testing to be conducted on the bones of the two skeletons that were discovered in the tower!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princes_in_the_Tower
Especially after watching the wonderful documentary on Netflix of finding Richard III's body in the parking lot near Greyfriars church and doing the tests to determine whether it was really him or not - I think there are many like me who would like to see the princes in the tower mystery solved, just like how they solved a lot of the mysteries surrounding Richard III (his scoliosis curved spine, the reconstruction of his face to see what he looked like matching pretty closely to surviving portraits from his day, etc) after they did testing on his bones.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2677712/?ref_=fn_tt_tt_38
Even if it's never known (and likely never will be at this point) who the murderers were, it would still be cool to find out definitively if the bones really did belong to the lost princes.
Light a fire, a fire, a sparkshare
Light a fire, a flame in my heart
Brooklyn Brimstone - I agree, I wish the Queen would allow testing on those bones. However if it is found that they are of the Princes in the Tower, testing will not tell us who killed them. I read recently that the lady that instigated the discovery of Richard III's bones is going to try and solve the mystery of the Princes in the Tower. I don't know what else she could find that all other historians overlooked. It will be interesting to see what she comes up with.....
share