Did Margaret Beaufort “fight all her life to make her son King?”

Posted on April 11, 2021April 11, 2021 By Gareth - Editor

“This baby must be a son – this is what my vision is telling me. My son will inherit the throne of England. The horror of war with France will be ended by the rule of my son. The unrest in our country will be turned into peace by my son. I shall bring him into the world, and I shall put him on the throne, and I shall guide him in the ways of God that I shall teach him. This is my destiny: to put my son on the throne of England, and those who laughed at my vision and doubted my vocation will call me My Lady, the King’s Mother. I shall sign myself Margaret Regina: Margaret the queen.”

– Margaret Beaufort in the “Red Queen” by Philippa Gregory

It’s a brilliant book. If you haven’t read it, I strongly recommend you do.

It’s also a book that reminds us how powerful fiction is. Since this book, and the “White Queen” TV series that is partially based on it, public perceptions of Margaret have shifted starkly.

Margaret is no longer the shrewd elder stateswoman who sensed an opportunity for her son. No longer is she the sage advisor who gently guided her boy and his wife in the early years of their fragile reign.

Instead, she is the fanatic. The woman that fought her whole life to put her son on the throne. And in doing so, she was fuelled by a belief that she was in partnership with the almighty himself.

Popular fiction has changed perceptions of Margaret

It’s the basis of a great storybook. But it’s a questionable way of doing history.

Henry VII, Margaret Beaufort’s son, owed his mother a great debt. It was she who sensed an opportunity for him as Richard III’s rule quickly crumbled. It was she who negotiated Henry’s marriage to Elizabeth, the Yorkist heiress. And it was she who attracted early supporters to the Tudor banner.

But if she really believed from birth that he was destined for the throne, she had a funny way of showing it.

Here are just three reasons why it’s unlikely Margaret had such hopes for her son before 1483.

If anyone ever thought Margaret had a claim to the throne, it was dismissed in 1449

During her childhood, Margaret’s guardian was the Duke of Suffolk, a powerful minister and a man with enemies.

No doubt with an eye on Margaret’s fortune, Suffolk “married” his charge to his own son, John. The Duke’s enemies deliberately misconstrued this. Among other charges, Suffolk was accused in Parliament of plotting:

“to destroy your most royal person [Henry VI] and your true subjects of the same realm; with the intention of making John, son of the same duke [of Suffolk], king of this your said realm, and to depose you from your high regality of the same; the same duke of Suffolk then having of your grant the wardship and marriage of Margaret, daughter and heir of John, late duke of Somerset, proposing to marry her to his said son, claiming and pretending her to be the next to inherit the crown of this your realm.”

The claim was clearly bogus. Suffolk had no interest in putting his own lad on the throne. But it has given rise to speculation that Margaret, who was possibly the primogeniture heiress to the then childless Henry VI, was considered a claimant to the crown.

This seems unlikely. By Suffolk’s critics claiming he was “pretending her to the next to inherit the crown”, Parliament was effectively rubbishing the notion that Margaret was close to the royal dignity. They were trying to present Suffolk as a grubby little upstart who would grasp at whatever straws were in reach.

And Suffolk was equally quick to dismiss Margaret’s claim. When defending himself he was clear that suggesting Margaret was next in line was “contrary to law and reason.”

Given Margaret’s own claim had been so publicly rejected less than a decade before, it would be very odd indeed if she held hopes for her newborn son. Especially as by this stage Henry VI had produced a boy of his own.

2. Margaret was loyal to Henry VI and his son. She didn’t consider her boy a rival to them.

We will never know Margaret’s inner feelings during the wars of the roses. But we can have a pretty good guess.

The Beaufort cause was intrinsically tied up with that of the house of Lancaster. They were close kin and the Beauforts had been the most stringent supporters of their mainline cousins. Margaret’s sympathies almost certainly lay with her Beaufort cousins and Lancastrian kin.

When Margaret did rise to power, as the mother of the King, she celebrated the memory of Henry VI and campaigned for him to be recognised as a saint. This might, in part, have been an attempt to emphasise her Lancastrian heritage and build credibility for the new Tudor regime. But it was more than that. Margaret had likely always been a great supporter of the pious King. She would have extended that loyalty to his son. Not seen her own boy as a rival.

Margaret always celebrated the memory of Henry VI

3. She campaigned for her son to be reconciled to the house of York, not an opponent to it

After the Lancastrian defeat of 1471, Margaret made her peace with Edward IV. He too was her cousin. And now undisputedly King of England. Margaret got closer to his court and seems to have achieved a degree of prominence. She quietly worked behind the scenes to see her son restored to his title and returned to England. It nearly worked. Had Edward not suddenly died in 1483, Henry would almost certainly have been restored to the title “Earl of Richmond” and welcomed home. Albeit without a major landed settlement.

If Margaret was secretly preparing the way for her son’s Kingship, she did a good job of hiding it.

There is not a shred of evidence that Margaret ever thought her son could be King of England until it was obvious that the Princes in the Tower were dead and that Richard III’s regime was unstable.

True, she would later claim that a vision from God prompted her to marry Edmund Tudor. This way of making sense of the world was more common then and no doubt Margaret did look back at her life and detect the hand of destiny in her family’s ultimate success. Everyone in the fifteenth century believed in the will of God.

Margaret didn’t want Kingship for her son. Why would she? In a “wars of the roses” world, being King was a risky business. It’s a myth that most nobleman secretly sought the job. What she wanted for her son, and for herself, was safety and prosperity. Unexpectedly in 1483, the crown suddenly became their best chance for both.

Subscribe to our newsletter!

The Princes in the Tower: 7 arguments that suggest it was Richard wot done it

Posted on June 25, 2020June 26, 2020 By Gareth - Editor

The fate of the Princes in the Tower will probably never be definitively answered

Richard III and the fate of the princes in the tower. It’s a debate that is unlikely to be resolved to satisfaction.

Hard evidence does not exist. We don’t even know for a fact that Edward V and his brother Richard were murdered – let alone at whose hand they met their fate.

But it isn’t true that we know nothing. And what we do have – circumstantial thought it may be – strongly suggests the blame must be laid at Richard’s door.

Here are just seven reasons why.

1. You don’t need to rely on Tudor sources to conclude that Richard’s probably guilty

“Richard’s reputation has been blackened by Tudor propaganda.” It’s a statement we often hear in this debate and is a relatively superficial analysis. It prevents each source being assessed for its individual merit. But it ain’t an argument I’m gonna win with one article.

As luck would have it, I don’t need to. The evidence that points to Richard’s guilt can be found in accounts contemporaneous to his reign. Thanks to the writings of Dominic Mancini and the 3^rd continuation of the Croyland Chronicle we have a relatively robust understanding of the chain of events in 1483.

Mancini was an Italian visiting London. He had access to a source close to the Princes and was aware of what information was being put about the capital. We would be unwise to take every word he writes as fact. But the chain of events can be verified by other sources, even though none could have read Mancini’s work. His account lingered in a French library until it was discovered in 1934.

Croyland was almost certainly a state official, though not part of Richard’s inner-circle. Technically it was written in the first few months of Henry VII’s reign. However, it was written too early to be ‘infected’ by ‘Tudor propaganda’. Crucially, it contains information that Henry VII would not have wanted preserved. To dismiss it as a ‘Tudor spin’ would be absurd.

2. Richard killed the Princes most loyal supporters before declaring himself King

Richard’s army of modern-day supporters often argue that Richard’s claim to the crown – based on the supposed illegitimacy of the princes – was widely accepted by the ‘three estates’ of the realm. But surely the fact that Richard had just killed everyone that opposed him and had armies stationed outside London had something to do with that?

Without following due legal process, Richard had William Hastings, a close supporter of Edward IV murdered. He killed – without trial – the Princes’ uncle, Earl Rivers and their half-brother Richard Grey. The message was clear. Resistance to Richard would be met with fatal force.

Richard declared his nephews illegitimate. But did people really believe him?

3. The illegitimacy of the Princes was not accepted

Ricardians also argue that Richard had no motive to have the Princes killed. He had declared them illegitimate and thus they were no threat to him. But Croyland is clear that plots were forming to free them. Clearly, the story hadn’t stuck. Besides, Richard had made them illegitimate by Act of Parliament. Parliament could simply reverse that decision.

4. Richard had the Princes in a high-security prison

Mancini tells us that “all the attendants who had waited upon the King [Edward V] were debarred access to him. He and his brother were withdrawn into the inner departments of the Tower proper, and day by day began to be seen more rarely behind the bars and windows, till at length they ceased to appear altogether.”

While the Tower of London was a royal residence and not just a prison, the boys were kept to a designated area. After a certain point they were not permitted to roam

5. Richard dismissed all the Princes’ attendants and had them guarded by loyal men

Croyland tells us that the Princes were put in the custody of ‘certain persons appointed to that purpose.’ They would have been men Richard trusted greatly.

Occasionally people speculate that these men were bribed by another. But what could they have offered? What could possibly outweigh the benefits to be had from service to the King? And surely these men knew that if they let something happen to the Princes on anyone’s orders but Richard’s they would answer for it with their heads.

6. Richard never accused anyone else of killing the Princes

Richard had the boys in a high security prison. Could anyone – even Buckingham – really have gained access? If they had, Richard would have known about it straight away. Would he really have kept quiet? After all, it would have been a stroke of luck. He could make it clear the boys were dead and pin the murder on someone else. It’s telling that he never did.

7. Richard did not ‘produce’ the boys when doing so would have saved his reign

Some argue that the Princes were never killed at all. I would love to believe that, but it seems unlikely.

In 1485, Richard III faced a great threat from a strange and unlikely coalition. The remnants of Lancaster teamed up with the keenest supporters of Edward IV to topple Richard. If Richard had been able to prove that the boys were still alive, it would have split his opposition down the middle. It might even have united all Yorkist support under him.

But he didn’t. Because they were almost certainly dead.

The Tower of London was a royal residence, not just a prison. But Richard had the boys confined to inner apartments where they could not be seen

Everything I’ve said here is circumstantial. It’s not categorical proof and I accept that. Maybe it wouldn’t stand up in court. But we’re not lawyers. This isn’t a trial. As Alison Weir says, historians don’t convict beyond all reasonable doubt. They look at the evidence we have and conclude what is most likely to have happened.

So much passion surrounds this debate and it is largely counter-productive. I have no partisan bias against Richard. If new evidence comes to light I would do my best to review it with an open mind.

What puzzles me is that multitudes of Royal History Geeks feel the need to explain away the chain of events that I have outlined above. That Richard ordered the death of the Princes is not the only interpretation of the events of 1483. But surely it is the most likely? I worry that a pre-conceived idea of Richard’s character prevents people from accepting evidence for what it is. This is a dangerous way of doing history. We know so little about the hearts and minds of the people we study.

Henry VII is a king I really admire. I believe he made important shifts in the structures of government which helped pave the way for Parliamentary democracy (which is not to suggest that Henry was in any way a democrat himself). I also think that there is evidence to suggest his character was considerably less blood thirsty than kings that came before or after him.

But I must accept that overwhelming circumstantial evidence suggests that he framed and judicially murdered Edward, Earl of Warwick. The young man had spent much of his life in prison and was probably what we would today consider a vulnerable adult. Whatever Henry’s dynastic reasons for his actions, this was a terrible crime.

Nevertheless, this doesn’t take away from Henry’s achievements as king. Nor does Edward IV’s murder of the old, virtuous and mentally unstable Henry VI diminish his legacy. He showed great skill in managing the nobility and restored order to England. It does make them both three-dimensional characters that need to be studied and analysed. Admired and respected, but never worshipped and revered.

By taking the same approach with Richard, we have a chance to truly redeem his reputation. To rescue him from both his status as unreconstructed monster and revered cult figure. He can finally emerge as the bearer of the broken humanity we all share and the wielder of skills and qualities that deserve to be remembered.

While we’re talking about the Tower of London, we must remember that our wonderful Royal palaces and historical landmarks have taken a real hit during the lockdown. Let’s make sure we get visiting as soon as we’re allowed, to show them our support. Keep an eye on the Historic Royal Palaces website as I’m sure they’ll let us know when doors are open again.

Subscribe to our newsletter!

Lockdown must-reads #6: The Hollow Crown by Dan Jones

Posted on May 6, 2020May 6, 2020 By Gareth - Editor

Let’s be honest: lockdown sucks! But it does mean there’s more time for reading. Over the next couple of weeks, I will review 10 books which all Royal History Geeks should add to their reading list.

For many years ‘The Wars of the Roses’ were confined to a paragraph or two in the introduction to Tudor history books. We, the readers, had to endure just a few lines about random battles, murderous uncles and cooky Plantagenet cousins. If we did, we knew we’d be treated to tales of religious reform, six wives and female succession.

But we didn’t know what we were missing. Under the skilful craftmanship of Dan Jones, this series of bloody conflicts finally take their place in the spotlight.

The 370-page publication spans a 45-year time period and touches on the reigns on five kings. But despite the breadth of the topic, Jones paints a vivid and detailed picture of the breakdown of England’s political system and the lust for power that followed it.

The book begins with the marriage of Henry VI’s parents. By beginning the narrative here rather than an earlier point in history, Jones is implicitly nailing his colours to the mast. Committed to the Tudor perspective that the conflicts have their origins in the downfall of Richard II? You’re going to disappointed. Sympathetic to the Whig notion that Edward III doomed his descendants to disaster? Look away now. Like recent scholarship, Jones roots the cause of conflict squarely in the ineffectual kingship of the last Lancastrian ruler.

As Henry grows, his inability to perform even the most basic facet of Kingship becomes increasingly obvious. For the best part of two decades the political establishments attempts to create a mechanism for governing England without a functioning monarch. But in the run up to 1450 it all came crumbling down

The 1450s is a decade of battles, high politics and low humanity. With vivid storytelling the author brings them to life. Characters like Margaret of Anjou, Richard of York and a succession of Somerset Dukes become real to us. Jones correctly notes that it is not until York puts his hand on the throne and claims the crown in 1460, that the Wars of the Roses can truly be called a dynastic conflict.

The book bounces through the early years of Yorkist rule under Edward IV. Like most accounts of the era, it focuses on his unpopular marriage to Elizabeth Wydeville, which in turn leads to a rebellion by Warwick and the second phases of the wars. The rest of Edward’s reign is centred on the fallout with his brother, Clarence. Eventually we follow the dramatic events of Edwards’s death, the brief succession of his son and Gloucester’s usurpation of the throne as Richard III. The author does well not to dwell on the fate of the princes in the tower. As Alison Weir has demonstrated, that topic requires a book of its own. (But let’s be honest, we all now Richard did it.)

In events familiar to Royal History Geeks, Henry VII ultimately wins the crown at Bosworth field. He holds the throne for almost 25 years and is succeeded by his son. But it is years before he is free from the threats of pretenders.

Like its predecessor, ‘The Plantagenets’, the book is ambitious in its scale. As a result, it cannot focus on any of either Edward IV or Henry VII’s reign in detail. But it does provide a cohesive overview that is essential for anyone looking to study either king in greater depth.

The book is lively and well crafted. Some of the sentences are almost poetic. It’s clear from the first few pages that Jones has grown as a writer since 2012’s ‘The Plantagenets’. (This may sound a little patronising. Let me be clear: I would give my right arm to be able to write a book as good as the Plantagenets.)

But perhaps the greatest achievement of this book is the way it makes ‘recent’ and innovative scholarship accessible. In the last three decades, historians such as John Watts and Christine Carpenter have boldly attempted to reconstruct the Kingship of Henry VI. They drive home its fundamental inadequacy from its inception. Jones’s work is the first attempt I have come across to draw on this scholarship and present it in the popular genre.

Since the discovery of Richard III’s remains, interest in the Wars of the Roses has reached fever pitch. Source material is scant and scholarship is complicated. But through well-written and beautifully crafted accounts like this, the public can access the latest thinking, correct misconceptions that arise from fiction and get a grip on one of England’s most intriguing sagas. Dan Jones sets the standard. If only more would rise to it.

The Hollow Crown – The Wars of the Roses and the Rise of the Tudors, is available from Amazon.

However, please consider supporting your local book seller. If you are based in the UK, search for your local book seller at the Book Seller Associations website.

Friends, rivals, enemies? The relationship between Margaret Beaufort and Elizabeth Woodville

Posted on May 14, 2017April 24, 2020 By Gareth - Editor

With the ‘White Princess’ currently broadcasting in America it’s important to take a more balanced look at the relationship between the so called ‘Red Queen’ and ‘White Queen.’

Being UK based I haven’t actually seen the ‘White Princess’ so I’m basing any comments on the book and what American friends have reported.

Sorry about the length and quality. Am working on my skills!

Subscribe to our newsletter!

Was Margaret Beaufort’s final marriage ever more than a business arrangement?

Posted on April 3, 2017 By Gareth - Editor

This is the last video on Margaret Beaufort’s marriages – but NOT the last video in the Margaret Beaufort min-series.

Let me know what you think…

How did Margaret Beaufort feel about her marriage to Henry Stafford?

Posted on April 3, 2017 By Gareth - Editor

We’re continuing to ask questions about Margaret’s marriages – this time to Henry Stafford.

Is it me, or do I look particularly cute in this vid 😉

Did Margaret Beaufort ever love Edmund Tudor?

Posted on April 3, 2017April 3, 2017 By Gareth - Editor

I promised you a mini-series on Margaret Beaufort. And a mini-series on Margaret Beaufort you will get.

Here’s my mutterings on her first (proper) marriage.

What think you all?

NB: I make two mistakes in this video – one I didn’t realise until I uploaded it. Can you spot it?

A new video mini-series on Margaret Beaufort

Posted on April 3, 2017 By Gareth - Editor

Hi geeks! Currently ‘shooting’ a new video mini-series on the mother of the Tudors. Got some great questions in that I was going to answer all at once – but the video got way, way, way too long.

So here’s the intro. Pretty soon all the clips about Margaret and her marriages should be up. Hope you enjoy!

Was Henry VII the first King to ‘give peace a chance’?

Posted on March 16, 2017 By Gareth - Editor

I’ve never been that interested in the debate around ‘when medieval England ended.’ It’s not a question that a contemporary could ever have asked and I don’t totally see the point in it.

Nonetheless I agree that saying the battle of Bosworth field was the ‘end of the medieval era’ is far too simplistic. People would not have looked out of their windows the day after and seen a radically different world.

That said, it is clear that the Tudor dynasty ushered in a new era in the way that England was governed. What fascinates me at the moment, is how much that may have been down (at least in part) to Henry VII’s personal style of Kingship.

I like Henry. It’s a shame that he gets so little attention in comparison to his showy son and chaotic Yorkist predecessors. But I genuinely believe he was a man of good character. Part of the reason for this, is that I believe he was less blood thirsty than your typical ruler – even if he was not adverse to tyrannical tendencies.

On the fact of it, my claim seems strange. This is, after all, a man who won the crown in battle and had to bear arms more than once to defend it. But when we take a minute to consider the context and other facts, I do think my comments have some credibility. For example:

He did not seek glory in foreign battles. Establishing his claim to the French throne was of little interest to him in contrast to the Henrys that had gone before him and the one that would succeed him. There is an added irony to this in that he was the grandson of a French princess and arguably had a far greater claim to that throne than he did to the one he occupied.
He was remarkably lenient with those who crossed him, Perkin Warbeck being the most obvious example. This is not to say that he wasn’t a man of his times. His eventual murder (because that’s what it was) of the vulnerable Earl of Warwick was almost unforgivable – but it seems that he did this for the sake of his dynasty rather than out of any blood lust.
He did not generally take part in battles himself. You could argue this made him a coward. But it does reinforce the argument that tales of great chivalry and conquest were of little personal interest to him.

Perhaps, after the Wars of the Roses, he thought England bored of battle. Maybe his own experience of a life on the run had exhausted his appetite for conquest. But whatever else can be said in critique of the miserly usurper, Henry Tudor, I would much rather live in a country with a high tax economy than one where my life was often in danger.

The Tudors didn’t destroy Richard’s reputation – he did that himself!

Posted on January 29, 2017January 29, 2017 By Gareth - Editor

People have been asking me recently what I think about historical fiction. I assume what they mean by that is ‘how much does it matter whether fiction based on history actually follows the facts.’

And my answer? Not much. Personally, I much prefer fiction that sticks as closely to the available facts as possible while adding some snap, crackle and pop where it’s needed. Philippa Gregory and last year’s ‘Victoria’ series just about got it right for me. But ultimately if something is labelled fiction than that’s exactly how it should be treated. Readers and watchers should not assume they are getting the factual truth and if they do, that is not the fault of novelists or TV producers.

But there is a genre of history that worries me much more. The 1 hour documentary. I understand – and accept – that things need to be simplified for TV. I recognise that there has to be different entry points for varying levels of knowledge and interest and many of my curiosities were sparked through this very medium. However, I am getting a little fed up with the huge oversimplifications that have been transmitted through our TV screens in the last year or so which make a big impact on popular understandings of the historic debate.

Lucy Worsley’s ‘History’s Biggest Fibs’ got me a bit riled on Thursday night. While I did really enjoy much of it, the assertion that the ‘Wars of the Roses’ was a Tudor myth and that Richard III’s name was blackened by his successors, drove me crazy.

I’ve blogged previously about the Wars of the Roses, but can I please just but in a plea for sanity when it comes to the accusation that the Tudors led some kind of deliberate propaganda campaign to tarnish the previously saintly reputation of the last Plantagenet King.

File:Henry7England.jpg

Of course Tudor writers would have been mindful of the need to please the new dynasty and this would have been reflected in their writing. As Worsley notes, John Rouse’s work is a perfect example of this – he was complimentary about Richard in his life time but negative about him once Henry Tudor came to power.

However we now know that things once believed to be a Tudor invention have turned out to be true. Richard’s curved spine, so often dismissed as Tudor spin has been established as fact.

The account of Dominic Mancini – dated 1483, two years before the Tudors took over – makes it clear that people strongly suspected Richard in his own lifetime of usurping the throne and doing away with the Princes.

Of course Richard’s reputation suffered under his successors. Things rooted in truth were exaggerated and he was not treated with a sense of balance and objectivity. But the beginnings of his huge unpopularity and the link to the crimes many hold him responsible for, can clearly be found in his own reign and lifetime.