Who Were the Princes in the Tower?

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The Princes in the Tower were Edward V and Richard, Duke of York – the sons of King Edward IV, who died suddenly in 1483. After Edward’s death, the princes’ uncle was crowned King Richard III, and the boys were sent to live at the Tower of London. However, they disappeared in the autumn of 1483, and legend has it they were killed on Richard’s orders. But investigators have other theories…

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Clip | The Imposter, Lambert Simnel

Full Episode | The Princes in the Tower

TRANSCRIPT

TRANSCRIPT

So, we're here in the White Tower.

When they first arrived in the Tower of London, they were treated honorably.

They were seen playing in the gardens, shooting arrows.

Then, by the autumn of 1483, those boys were never seen again.

And it was widely assumed at the time, and has been ever since, that they had been quietly murdered.

- So, what evidence do you have that they were murdered?

- So, this is an account written at the time by an Italian monk visiting London.

He was called Dominic Mancini.

So, he talks about those two princes "conducted "into the more inward apartments of the Tower itself, "and day by day came to be observed more rarely "through lattices and windows."

- So who else speaks about this?

- Well, somebody rather famous from the Tudor period, it's Thomas Moore, of course, a lawyer, statesman.

And we think about 50 years after the disappearance of the princes, Moore wrote his account.

- What does he actually say?

- So, Moore claims that Richard III ordered the murder of his nephews, and he names names: James Tyrrell was a servant of Richard's.

He was the one who organized it and employed two henchmen, really, to carry out his dirty work.

Here he describes in detail how the two murderers sort of crept in at midnight and smothered the boys with pillows hard into their mouths.

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