Ward's Book of Days.
Pages of interesting anniversaries.
What happened on this day in history.
NOVEMBER 4th
On this day in history in 1470, was born Edward V.
Edward was the elder of the two 'Princes in the Tower', who were cruelly murdered by their uncle, who seized the throne.
Edward was born at
Westminster Abbey, on 4th November 1470, the eldest surviving son
of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville. At the time of his birth, his father
Edward IV had been temporarily deposed by Henry
VI, who was beginning his
second reign. In June 1471, Edward IV returned from exile in Holland and
deposed the king who had deposed him, and restored himself to the throne,
creating young Edward, Prince of Wales.
In 1473, Edward was
sent to Ludlow to be titular ruler of Wales. He resided there with his mother
until 1483, when his father died suddenly, leaving Edward as king. Edward’s
uncle, Richard of Gloucester, the future Richard III, was appointed Lord
Protector until Edward came of age. Richard had Edward and his younger
brother, Richard of York, housed in the Tower of London, then a Royal
residence as well as a prison. Richard of Gloucester, having already murdered
Henry VI, and his own brother Clarence, proceeded to plot the downfall of his
nephew. He brought before Parliament, rather dubious evidence that Edward IV
was already married to Lady Eleanor Butler, when he contracted his marriage to
Elizabeth Woodville, and that therefore Edward IV was not in fact married to
the queen, and consequently all his children were illegitimate and incapable
of succeeding to the throne.
Parliament, fearing
a weak government under a boy king, leading to a possible invasion from
France, readily accepted the evidence and passed an Act, Titulus Regius, which deposed Edward and placed Gloucester on the
throne as Richard III. Soon afterwards, the two children in the Tower
disappeared and were never seen again. There is no proof that Richard III
murdered his nephews but a stack of evidence makes him the prime suspect.
Richard certainly had most to gain by the disappearance of a potential threat
to his throne.
In 1674, builders working at The Tower discovered a box containing the skeletons of two children. Charles II, believing the bones to be those of his ancestors, had them interred in Westminster Abbey. In 1933, the bones were taken out and examined by experts, but it could not be determined when the subjects had died, or what age they were, or even if they were boys or girls.
©2006 Ward’s Book of Days