Dan Snow's History Hit - What Really Happened to the Princes in the Tower?

Episode Date: December 4, 2023

For over 500 years, the mysterious disappearance of two English princes has perplexed the world. Historians have long assumed that Edward V and Richard, Duke of York were murdered in 1483 by their uncle, Richard III. But Dan's guest today brings a dramatic new theory to the table.Philippa Langley played a crucial role in the discovery and exhumation of Richard's body in 2012. She has since turned her attention to the greatest mystery that surrounds his life; did he really kill his own nephews to seize the English throne? After delving into one of history's greatest cold cases, Philippa believes she has finally solved this royal mystery...Discover the past with exclusive history documentaries and ad-free podcasts presented by world-renowned historians from History Hit. Watch them on your smart TV or on the go with your mobile device. Get 50% off your first 3 months with code DANSNOW sign up now for your 14-day free trial We'd love to hear from you! You can email the podcast at [e-mail] can take part in our listener survey here.

Hi everybody, welcome to Dan Snow's History Hit. It is one of the greatest mysteries of English history. A sordid tale of usurpation, murder, plotting, uprisings. Or is it? For five and a half centuries, inspired by the brilliant writing of one William Shakespeare, we have been trying to decipher the puzzle of the princes in the tower. Were they killed by their father's younger brother, who became Richard III, with those two cleared out of the way? Or did they survive? Did they escape? Were they rescued? Did they go on to try and lead campaigns to recover the throne of their father from Henry VII and the Tudors? What is the truth about those princes? Well, if you're living here

in the UK, you might have noticed recently that a big furore has occurred. It was the last big furore before the Napoleon furore. We like to have, in our world, in our little corner of the internet, history fans, we like to have, in our world, in our little corner of the internet, history fans, we like to have these fantastic battles that no one else pays any attention to. Well, the last Fiori book won was about the princes in the tower. Philippa Langley has been leading a transnational project of hundreds of researchers to try and separate out myth from facts, to try and uncover new evidence. And she's done so. She has collated all of these documents, all of these finds, all of this research, and brought us a dramatic new assessment of the murder that's come to define the end of the Plantagenets and the birth

of the Tudor Age. We've been arguing about this for 550 years. Will Philippa Langley's team finally settle the debate? The early indications are that no, it hasn't. People are in their trenches and they're hard to dislodge. But what Philippa and her team have found is really, really interesting. I'll let you all decide for yourselves whether this evidence is sufficient to change your opinion of what happened to those little boys 550 years ago. But as we'll hear from Philip and Al, they've come across some very interesting stuff. Enjoy. Minus 10. Atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima. God save the king. No black-white unity till there is first and black unity.

Never to go to war with one another again. And lift off. And the shuttle has cleared the tower. Philippa, good to see you. Thanks for having me, Dan. Thank you. Good to have you back on the podcast. You have been making waves. Let's get into it.

First of all, tell me what we absolutely know for absolutely certain happened in 1483. We got the death of the one-time warrior king turned slightly decedent middle-aged. So Edward IV dies, right? What happens next? Well, what we now know is that he died on the 3rd of April, not the 9th of April. So that's a little bit of a change. But then what happens is his son, the eldest son, Edward V, is due to become king. He arrives in London eventually. How old is he? He is 12. Okay. So he's a young heir. Arrives in London and he is then placed in the Tower of London by the King's Council

because this is where all kings go prior to their coronation. So he is sent there into the royal apartments to await coronation. And then his brother joins him on the 16th of June. There is somebody who comes forward and some information that comes forward. And the boys are declared illegitimate. In fact, the children of Edward IV are declared illegitimate by the three estates of the realm, the lords, the church, the commons, because evidences have come to life that Edward IV had a bigamous marriage with Elizabeth Woodville, the boy's mother. Which is not unlikely when it comes to Edward IV, right? I mean, he was one of,

in a pretty crowded field, he was one of the biggest shaggers in English royal history. Yeah, it wasn't a huge shock. But then because of that, the next legitimate heir of the House of York was then petitioned to become king. He was Richard, Duke of Gloucester, and he then was crowned Richard III on the 6th of July, instead of Edward V. So Edward V was then still apparently with his brother in the Tower of London. And when's the last reliable witness that sees the two boys alive? We have the Great Chronicle of London saying that the boys were seen playing in the Tower Gardens on a number of occasions, shooting at arrows. And in the year of a mayor and that mayor's year ends in October 1483

so it's sometime during 1483 but we know that Edward V was certainly alive at the time of the coronation because we have the documents from the coronation that are giving him his clothing for Richard III's coronation and his henchmen. And at that point, he's called the Lord Edward. Do we think he attended that coronation? We don't know. I think it looks unlikely because nobody mentions it. But certainly clothing was made for his attendance. Right, Philippa.

Now, the traditional one that we were taught in schools is that Richard III, the younger brother of the former king, Edward IV, he has the boys killed. Why is that such a persistent story? I think it's hugely persistent because the Tudors were incredibly powerful dynasty. And we should say, hang on, the Tudors come after. Richard III doesn't get to enjoy the throne much longer, does he? Because Henry VII comes along and gets rid of Richard III. The Tudors are on the throne and they want to legitimise themselves, don't they?

Yeah, they do. It's very important that they legitimise themselves because they had a very, very poor claim to the throne. In fact, there was about 30 Plantagenets at court who had a better claim to the throne than they did. But it also comes at the time of the printing press. The printing presses were now becoming normal day to day. So you have this boom, if you like, of written materials. Thomas More dies and there is a literary narrative found in his papers when he dies and it gets published. Thomas More, leading advisor, leading statesman in Henry VIII's reign. Yes, yes. And he writes during the reign of Henry VIII and he writes

what he's heard about rumours, hearsay and gossip about the reign of Richard III. And he writes about the boys being murdered by Richard in August 1483. And then that gets taken up by William Shakespeare and it gets published during the Tudor period. So there's this huge boom of Richard III murdered the princes in the tower and it only starts to get questioned once the Tudors have died. It starts to be questioned for the very first time in the reign of the Stuarts. Now in Henry VII's reign you also get these slightly odd pretenders don't you, this strange expression and there are pretenders at other periods of British history but there's something quite odd about the ones during Henry VII's reign. So in

the years just following Henry VII's seizure of the throne, Battle of Bosworth, Getsford and Richard III, and you get these young men who people will perhaps remember, Perkin Warbeck, Lambert Simnel. How are they connected with this story? Through the investigations of the Missing Princes Project, we found that they're hugely connected, that they were Yorkist claimants to the throne. The elder one, Lambert Simnel, who was given that name by the Tudor Parliament of 1487, November 1487, long after he'd been crowned and anointed in Ireland and had brought battle with Henry Tudor. That boy, well, young man, I should say at that point, described himself as King Edward. So he was Edward V. He was the elder prince. And that's what the project has now uncovered. Okay, so Lambert Simnel, very young man,

he's crowned in Ireland. They think he's one of the missing princes and there is a series of military campaigns. Perkin Warbeck also claims to be, well, the younger brother, doesn't he? Richard, the younger brother of Edward V. Yeah, he comes along a little bit later when, again, he's of the right age to claim the throne. So there's something weird going on in those years of Henry VII's reign, that these people popping up claiming to be the prince in the town. Okay, now what is the Missing Princes Project? This is a research-based project that I undertook following the reburial of Richard III because there was this continuing debate about did he or didn't he murder the

princes in the tower? And I think the catalyst for it, there was in the Daily Mail during the reburial week, there was a one-page article, which I think ran with a headline that said, it's mad to make this child killer a national hero. So when I read the article, I couldn't see where the evidence was. But I thought, okay, this could be true. This is the story that we get told. But it needs to have an evidence-based research project around it to see what we can discover, whether Richard did murder them or whether he didn't murder them. So this has been a seven-year investigation, searching archives around the world. Okay, so we've got Thomas More. We're

going to put the other side of the case first, right? What's the best piece of evidence from the time that Richard did kill them? Like, what's the one piece that makes you think, well, he could have done? Do you know, that's the problem that isn't one. Because Thomas More says that he's reporting rumour, hearsay and gossip that he's heard, various stories of what happened to the boys. But didn't foreign ambassadors also report similar kind of rumour near the time? I mean, you had no smoking gun, but people said, well, the boys have disappeared. The uncle probably got rid of them. Was there a sense of that at the time? I think who you're meaning here is Domenico Mancini. He wasn't an ambassador. He had no

contact with the English court or government. He was an Italian who spoke little to no English, but he was sent to London at the time of the death of Edward IV and left just before the coronation of Richard III, because at the time, relations between England and France were at an all-time low. And Edward IV had been considering going to war with France. So he was in the streets, if you like, trying to gauge what was happening in London. And then there was an uprising against Richard III in the summer of 1483, uprising against Richard III in the summer of 1483 and the English rebels left to the continent. So what we then have is Mancini writes his account by the 1st of December 1483 and he's very reluctant to put pen to paper because he says he's not been able to verify his information. Now, he's not interested in the younger boy. He's

only interested in the elder prince, Edward V, and he says that he's been unable to find out what happened to him. But he also reported that there was a rumour that death was facing him. So this is what Mancini says. However, about two months later, another member of the French government then says that the king in England, meaning Richard III, had murdered all of Edward IV's children. And this rumour and story then gains traction in France and on the continent. And then a pretender to the English throne called Henry Tudor arrives in France and on the continent. And then a pretender to the English throne called Henry Tudor arrives in France and then is backed by France to take the throne from Richard III. So you have got this transnational army. Why so passionate? How did all these people

come to you? What is it? I think it's the search for the truth. Because, you know, before Richard III was found in the car park, the history books and the archaeologists at the dig all said that he'd been thrown into the River Saul, because this was a later rumour from the 17th century that had become truth and fact in our history books. So I think again, in terms of this question, they all felt that it was time to look for evidences. It was time to really dig in deep and do the forensic dive into this question. How big is your shadow army, Philippa? This is very exciting. Yeah, I mean, at the moment, it's over 300 people around the world. So you've got 300 people doing archival research? Yeah, yeah. And what kind of archives

are they looking at? Basically everywhere. When you join the project, I ask you to go into your local archive and look for anything from 1483 and 1484 and 1485, 1486 and so on. Anything, whatever you can find, send it in. Well, before we get on to the princes, you must have found some quite cool stuff generally about other bits of British and European history. Yeah, there is lots of bits and pieces. I mean, I've got over 300,000 files now on this computer

and it's blown up three computers. So a specialist here in Edinburgh had to build me a supercomputer because what I have to do is I have to cross-reference and double-check every piece of information so that I can put correct timelines together and that sort of thing. And listen, just to let you know, Dan, the first forensic investigation that I did was of the contemporary source materials from the reign of Richard III, because this is where we should be seeing information that the boys died or something had happened to the boys. But what I found is that there's absolutely no evidence that the boys died during the reign of Richard III. And I've checked all the administrative accounts, all the day-to-day materials and accounting records, because this is what the police told me.

They said, Philippa, you have to follow the money and follow the law because this is where the truth is. This is what we do. So this is exactly what I did. But what I did find when I analysed the Battle of Bosworth, because this is the big one. This is when the worlds of Henry VII and Richard III collided. So I had to do the forensic investigation of this period, literally trying to go in second by second, minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day. And what I discovered was the entry point for the story of murder into England arrives with Henry Tudor and his French foreign invasion force pretty much on the 14th of August, 1485. It arrives with Henry and the French. What would you expect to find in the records when you mention there's no record of them dying?

How would they be recorded as having died? You can see very clearly that whenever Edward IV is mentioned, they say, may God rest his soul, because it was incredibly religious time so whenever anyone had died they would give pious observances and prayers in the writings even in the day-to-day administrative writings they do that but whenever Edward V is mentioned they never do that ever and also when Richard Duke of York is mentioned they they don't do that. So that is really odd. And it's also throughout the country. It's not just in London, it's everywhere. They don't give any pious prayers or observances. And I think that's another thing because I could find no details for identified bodies, for burials, for requiem masses.

Nothing. Nothing at all. You're listening to Dan Snow's History Hit. We're talking about the princes and the tower. What happened to them? More coming up. I'm Matt Lewis. And I'm Dr. Alan Orjanaga. And in Gone Medieval, we get into the greatest mysteries. The gobsmacking details and latest groundbreaking research.

From the greatest millennium in human history. We're talking Vikings. Normans. Kings and popes. Who were rarely the best of friends. Murder. Rebellions. And crusades.

Find out who we really were. By subscribing to Gone Medieval from History Hit, wherever you get your podcasts. I guess the thing is that people associate your work with the Richard III Society, and there's a sort of, people think, well, they're attempting to rehabilitate Richard III. So can people trust you? Like, on all these hundreds of thousands of documents, what if one of them was like, oh, yes, actually, we did think you killed him? Like, are you, how can we know that your army are not quietly overlooking things that might be a bit inconvenient?

Yeah, no, absolutely, Dan, I get that. I had to be very clear with myself. I do hold revisionist views, but this is because of, you know, nearly 30 years of research into Richard III from the materials from his own lifetime as Duke and King. So that's why I hold those views. But I had to put that all to one side. The police and the investigative

specialists, the barristers, the lawyers who I'm working with in the project were very clear. You have to start with a clean sheet. You cannot think you know anything. You cannot assume anything. You cannot use hindsight. You have to live in the moment, their moment, the prince's moment, and build the picture from there. And you have to do proper intelligence gathering. That is, find whatever you can find and look at it all. That's why when everyone joins, I say, find whatever you can find for the years. I don't tell them what to find.

I just tell them, look. Now tell me what they found in Lille in France. Lille was a big one. This was found by a member of the Dutch research group called Albert Janderoy. And he found this receipt from King Maximilian I. and it was just stuffed, lost in a sheaf of papers from the period. What is remarkable about the Leal receipt, again, you follow the money and you follow the law. So it's just an accounting receipt for weapons that have been made for and collected by Maximilian for the invasion that took place of England in 1487 by King Edward. And it very clearly tells us who the invasion was for. And it says that it is for a nephew of Margaret of Burgundy, who was the sister of Richard III and Edward IV, and for a son of King Edward, meaning Edward IV, who was expelled from his dominion.

And another thing we found to add to that is that we know that Edward V was expelled from his dominion prior to the Battle of Bosworth, he was sent to the Channel Islands. So actually, the receipt gives us four pointers for this being Edward V, because Edward V was now 16. In fact, the time of the receipt, he was 17. So he was of an age to lead men into battle. So they're referring to the young Edward V. He's gone back, he's tried to fight. I mean, people talk about Bosworth being the last battle of the Wars of Roses, but actually arguably the Battle of Stokefield. You think that was Edward V fighting there against Henry VII?

100%. All of the evidences that we have, and we have considerable evidences for it being Edward V. So for me, looking at everything we now know, when you read the book, undoubtedly it was Edward V at So for me, looking at everything we now know when you read the book, undoubtedly it was Edward V at the Battle of Stokefield. And that was the last battle of the Wars of the Roses. His army was defeated. If it is Edward V, what happens to the young Yorkist claimant there? Do you know? We don't know. It's quite confused. We have

Do you know? We don't know. It's quite confused. We have materials that strongly suggest that he survived because the Leal receipt does not offer prayers or observances for his soul. It offers prayers and observances for his father's soul, but not for his. And the Leal receipt is dated to December 1487, when Edward V was 17. And just a few months after the fateful battle where this exhibition, this attempt to fight Henry VII had gone so wrong. Yeah, absolutely. And we also have what happened in Ireland in 1488, which strongly suggests that the Irish lords believed that he was still alive. So that is one of the lines of investigation that we're currently still involved with and looking through is what happened to Edward V after the Battle of Stoke. He may have been injured. He may have been badly injured because we know that

one commentator says that he was led away from the field by his cousin, Edmund de la Pole. The de la Pole families, eh? Well, they paid a terrible price under the Tudors. The thing I find confusing is, is it normal in medieval history for people to sort of go missing like this? Are there other examples of, just seems like two very high status individuals who we just lose? Yeah, from the records, because they became illegitimate. And once you become illegitimate, you're not really that important anymore in terms of the royal line. But what we do have is two legitimate heirs to the throne who disappeared for quite a while. And these were the mortimer heirs at the time of Henry IV. And the mortimer heirs had been declared the heirs to the throne of Richard

II. Yes, Henry IV kicks his cousin Richard II off the throne, the House of Lancaster's arrived, they're not the oldest grandchildren of Edward III, so they haven't got a great claim, and there's a period of upheaval in the early 15th century. Yeah, there is, and Henry IV takes the throne, and these are the legitimate heirs of pretty much the Yorkist line, actually, the Mortimer line. And they disappear for about 18 months. And these are legitimate. But then they crop up again in certain accounting records, because they've been given a certain amount of bits of money and that sort of thing. But these are two heirs to the throne who

disappeared for at least about 18 months, and they were legitimate. Okay, so this is just a product of things happening 500 years ago and it being difficult to keep a tally on everybody. Yeah, yeah, because again, we don't have the connectivity that we have. One of the things that the book shows is the amount of destruction of documents that went on during the reign of Henry VII. We have seen so much. For example, Richard's Bag of the Secretus, which is where lots of the legal cases that affected the royal household, which would have given us a huge amount of information about the princes in the tower. His bag of desecretus was empty.

We don't have his will. We don't have his household accounts. We don't have his private correspondence. We don't have the privy council accounts. All of these things have disappeared, which is where we would have known everything about what happened to the princes in the tower. Hmm, interesting.

Now, another one of your amazing finds has been the Dutch one. Tell me about the Dutch breakthrough. What happened was with the Dutch research group, they seem to be in what is a hot area for records to be discovered because Henry VII's reach couldn't get there. And what we discovered about the younger prince, Richard Duke of York, was mind-blowing. This was rediscovered by Natalie Naiman Blinkendoll in November 2020, and it is a quite remarkable document. It's a four-page document, a semi-legal manuscript, and it is the witness statement of the younger prince written in the first person and telling his story from the moment he left sanctuary in Westminster in 1483, June 1483, to when he arrived at Margaret of Burgundy's court. So it's his 10-year story. And at this time, he's 20 years of age.

And how does he say he got out of the tower? He was helped out of the tower and led to safety by John Howard, Duke of Norfolk, and given two Yorkist Ricardian retainers called Henry Percy and Thomas Percy to look after him on the continent until certain years had passed. Because what had happened in London was there'd been an attempt on the tower. We think it was probably an abduction attempt to try and get the boys. So John Howard, Duke of Norfolk got them out on one of his ships, we believe. Got Richard, Duke of York out. Just what we need. Another episode in British history with the Howards and the Percys all over it,

their fingerprints all over it. Goodness me, those families. Okay, so given the kind of mystery around them, were there people cropping up elsewhere? Were there other people going, by the way, I'm Richard, Duke of York. Was this a common, was it whack-a-mole of pretenders, people who said they'd been the princes?

Or actually, can we be pretty confident that this was, well, he was the man he claimed to be? I think we can. And I think one of the things that the Dutch research group needed to do was to do a full search of all of the records that they could find in Holland that mentioned this individual.

And this was done by a member of the Dutch research group called John Roefstra. And he went and searched all of the domain accounts that he could find. And he did this with Natalie Nyman, actually. And the one thing that they both discovered that throughout the accounts in Holland, whenever this individual is mentioned, he is called Richard Duke of York, or the son of Edward IV, or the nephew of Margaret of Burgundy, or the White Rose, which is the name for him being a Yorkist. He's not given any other name. He's not given the name Perkin Warbeck or anything else that they can see. And this is throughout all of the records that they can find in Holland. So the Dutch, loosely defined, the Dutch believed that they had Richard, Duke of York, living among them.

No question at that point. No question. And the heads of the royal families in Europe believed that he was Richard, Duke of York. And we've discovered a document that showed that he had three birthmarks, which couldn't be counterfeited. And that was one of the things that made people believe that this was definitely who he said he was. There was a mark on his eye, there was his mouth, and they had a mark on his thigh. And this was found in a letter from Maximilian to Henry VII trying to mediate between the two. And Maximilian says, you know who this is because his is birthmarks. Your current thinking is Richard III takes the

throne. His nephews are just, so he's actually not that fussed by them. He doesn't regard them as an existential threat. How do you think they get from the tower to where they then continue with the rest of their lives? Yeah, you're right. Richard is crowned and he then leaves on royal progress to go north and he leaves the boys in the tower apartments. And then there's this abduction attempt. And this happens within a couple of days of Richard having left London and gone north. And it's at that point that things change, because then he realises, obviously him and his court and John Howard, Duke of Norfolk, that the boys could be a threat and that there could be insurrections in their name. So that's

when the boys are removed from the Tower of London. Howard ensures that the younger boy is sent abroad and from all of the evidences that I've been able to locate so far, it looks like Edward V was sent north to Pontefract Castle, at least by early May 1484, because we have an eyewitness account of the bastard children of Richard III being at Pontefract Castle, but also sons to the princes who are held like prisoners. The theory does sort of help us understand why the boys represented almost a greater threat to Henry VII than did to Richard III in some ways. Very much so. Very much so. I think for Richard, once he separated the boys and put them in different locations and got them out of the way, there was no insurrections. You know, they stopped.

It absolutely stopped. There was the October uprising. But again, we can't find any information that confirms this was on behalf of Edward V. Yes, there was an October uprising against Richard III by a magnate, wasn't there? There's no, he doesn't say, oh, poor Edward V, the boys aren't brought into that list of grievances. No, it only happens later in the Tudor, once people are writing in the Tudor period, then they say that. But there's no, we can't find

any documentary accounts for the towns, even in the rebel towns, that says we're fighting against Richard III because the boys have been murdered or we think they've been murdered. There's nothing. There's absolutely nothing. And it should be everywhere, particularly in the rebel towns. Well, Philippa, is it exciting doing this? I mean, you did a documentary in the UK people have been all over social media arguing one way another and it's been in the newspapers are you surprised by the sort of depth of feeling what's it like going through it yeah I think I am surprised I'm surprised that people care so much either way I'm just pleased that people are interested you know because you kind of think

you'll do this and it might get a bit of interest in terms of those who are interested in medieval history and the Wars of the Roses. But I mean, it was trending on places and that was quite something, really something. But also there's been criticism, right? I mean, almost people get quite angry about it as well. What's going on there? Look, I think that change is difficult for people. You know, and before we found Richard III, they were saying that his bones had been thrown into the River Soar,

but we don't say that now. And I think people watch the documentary and they say, oh, but that's not enough evidence. And I think, okay, if you don't think that's enough evidence, then please read the book because there's evidence after evidence after evidence after evidence. So I think I would like them to raise any evidences that they have that the boys died during the reign of Richard III. Contemporary evidences. Anything that we can find.

Because at the moment, there's nothing. And we have all of these evidences for their survival. If you do come across a Venetian document that says, oh yeah, like contemporary document going, Richard definitely had them killed. You know, here's the receipts. How would you deal with that? Well, again, we'd say, well, look what we've discovered. And it says this, and it's in the right time and the right period. And what does he say about it? Where's his

evidence so that we can go and investigate? And hopefully if it says something like they were murdered in this place around this time time, by this person, great. Then we will look into it. But again, at the moment, the totality of evidence is, we just don't have that. Interesting stuff. Well, Philippa, listen, last time I talked to you, you were talking about looking for Henry I, is it? Yeah, in Reading. Well, listen, what's going on with Henry I? You it? Yeah, in Reading. Well, listen, what's going on with Henry I?

You've got to tell me. Yeah, the Hidden Abbey Project is still underway. We're still waiting to look for Henry. And this one is for the people of Reading. So I'm just involved as part of the Hidden Abbey Project. This is not my search. This is the people of Reading's search. But yeah, I think looking at

all of the evidence is that he's in the Reading jail car park and that he's under K for King. Yeah, that's so good. Well, listen, when that happens, let me know. Come on, I'm going to come and watch that all happening. Philippa, thank you very much. Tell everyone what the book is called. The book is called The Princes in the Tower, Solving History's Greatest Cold Case. Brilliant. Thank you very much, Philippa, for coming on. Thanks, Dan. Thank you so much. you