Jump to content
Join the Unexplained Mysteries community today! It's free and setting up an account only takes a moment.
- Sign In or Create Account -

Is Richard III buried under council car park?


Still Waters

Recommended Posts

The body of King Richard III may finally be found after archaeologists identified what they believe is his resting place underneath a council car park in Leicester.

Historical records show that Richard III was buried in the church of a Franciscan friary in Leicester shortly after his defeat and death at the hands of Henry Tudor's army in the Battle of Bosworth in 1485.

But the destruction of the friary as Britain's monasteries were dissolved under Henry VIII and subsequent removal of its stone ruins meant that over the ensuing centuries the king's exact burial site was forgotten.

Now the mystery of where his body lies could finally be solved after an examination of historical maps by archaeologists located the most likely site for the church, in the car park of a social services office in the centre of Leicester.

http://www.telegraph...l-car-park.html

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Having been a member of the Richard III Society for a good few years, I've often encountered stories like this.

Several chroniclers maintain that Richard's body was disinterred from it's grave site at Greyfriar's Abbey near Leicester very soon after the battle and the bones thrown into the River Soar. This may have been done on the orders of Henry Tudor himself who was acutely conscious of his tenuous hold on the Crown, and feared that if Richard's resting place became public knowledge it would serve as a shrine for the many people who remained loyal to the House of York. The last thing the Tudor wanted was a Yorkist martyr!

(Sources ......Historia Anglica - Polydor Vergil........... The Usurpation of Richard the Third - Dominic Mancini... and others.)

........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

As a matter of probably little or no interest at all, for about 5 years now I have been researching into the story of a wall tomb in a ruined church near where I live which was reckoned to be the final resting place of one 'Richard Plantagenet', supposedly an illegitimate son of Richard III, and it's turning out to be quite a strange tale. (But that's another story)

Edited by ealdwita
  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

[snip]

As a matter of probably little or no interest at all, for about 5 years now I have been researching into the story of a wall tomb in a ruined church near where I live which was reckoned to be the final resting place of one 'Richard Plantagenet', supposedly an illegitimate son of Richard III, and it's turning out to be quite a strange tale. (But that's another story)

Do tell!

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Do tell!

As soon as I get some time to precis it Taun, I'll post it on here.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Interestingly enough... Yesterday was the 527th anniversary of The Battle Of Bosworth Field - where Richard died...

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Interestingly enough... Yesterday was the 527th anniversary of The Battle Of Bosworth Field - where Richard died...

Um...er....Not strictly true, I'm afraid, sorry.

(Ealdwita Snippet alert)

A 1485 municipal memorandum from York places the battle "on the fields of Redemore". (The name being derived from the Anglo-Saxon Hreod mor meaning 'reedy marshland'.

The historian Ralph Holinshead wrote in his 1577 Chronicle "King Richard pitched his field on a hill called Anne Beame, refreshed his soldiers and took his rest." This was compounded by William Hutton in his 1788 document The Battle of Bosworth-Field, and placed the battle-site north of the River Sence, whence it passed into accepted wisdom.

It's now believed that Hutton mistook "field" to mean "field of battle", thus creating the idea that the fight took place on Anne Beame (Ambion) Hill, which is indeed, near Market Bosworth. In reality, 'took field' meant 'to make camp'.

I won't go into it all, but there's much evidence that points to the battle being fought on the flat ground north of the village of Dadlington, some 3 miles from the historically supposed site.

(Source - my records) - Plenty more where that came from, sorry!

Edited by ealdwita
  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

True... and the Battle of Bunker Hill was actually fought on Breeds Hill...

I actually didn't know that there was uncertainty in the location of the battle until I read up on it a bit today... I'd always heard it called "Bosworth Field"...

Interestingly, both sides in the American Civil War, named battles by different criteria...

The Union tended to name battles after the nearest settlement (Gettysburg, Shiloh -named after a church in the area-, etc) While the Confederates tended to name battles after geographic points (Bull Run - a river/creek, Antietam - also a creek, etc)

General covention was that the winner got to name the battle for historical purposes...

Edited by Taun
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I remeber the battle of thorn hill it was a cold winters day when at 9 00 am the first assault & barage hit us we thought and held that bloody hill for 3 days befor reinforcements came it was a living hell. :gun:

Edited by CRIPTIC CHAMELEON
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

True... and the Battle of Bunker Hill was actually fought on Breeds Hill...

I actually didn't know that there was uncertainty in the location of the battle until I read up on it a bit today... I'd always heard it called "Bosworth Field"...

Interestingly, both sides in the American Civil War, named battles by different criteria...

The Union tended to name battles after the nearest settlement (Gettysburg, Shiloh -named after a church in the area-, etc) While the Confederates tended to name battles after geographic points (Bull Run - a river/creek, Antietam - also a creek, etc)

General covention was that the winner got to name the battle for historical purposes...

And the Battle of Hastings was fought more than 6 miles from Hastings, at Senlac Hill.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I remeber the battle of thorn hill it was a cold winters day when at 9 00 am the first assault & barage hit us we thought and held that bloody hill for 3 days befor reinforcements came it was a living hell. :gun:

Shouldn't have been that cold. The only Battle of Thorn Hill (USA) I'm aware of took place in June! Or are we talking about the English Civil War skirmish at Thornhill, Yorkshire?

'Bonys emong Stony, lyes here ful styl,

Quilst the Sawle wanders wher God wyl,

Anno Dni. MCCCCCXXIX'

....or am I missing something here? Ooooooh I hate it when that happens!!!!

s11828.gif

Edited by ealdwita
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Shouldn't have been that cold. The only Battle of Thorn Hill (USA) I'm aware of took place in June! Or are we talking about the English Civil War skirmish at Thornhill, Yorkshire?

'Bonys emong Stony, lyes here ful styl,

Quilst the Sawle wanders wher God wyl,

Anno Dni. MCCCCCXXIX'

No mate we called it thorn hill as it was covered in blackberries and we were on a school camp & another school tried to take our camp spot so for 3 days we held them of with snow balls till the rest of the school came.
  • Like 7
Link to comment
Share on other sites

No mate we called it thorn hill as it was covered in blackberries and we were on a school camp & another school tried to take our camp spot so for 3 days we held them of with snow balls till the rest of the school came.

Glad you made it ... :tu:

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

No mate we called it thorn hill as it was covered in blackberries and we were on a school camp & another school tried to take our camp spot so for 3 days we held them of with snow balls till the rest of the school came.

Oooh, I'm gonna give you such a slap! s0249.gif

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

No mate we called it thorn hill as it was covered in blackberries and we were on a school camp & another school tried to take our camp spot so for 3 days we held them of with snow balls till the rest of the school came.

Now thats funny you had me for a second Mr Cripy. :yes:
Link to comment
Share on other sites

My horse, my horse, my kingdom for a horse..Would Dick have got anywhere if someone had showed up with a horse?

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

My horse, my horse, my kingdom for a horse..Would Dick have got anywhere if someone had showed up with a horse?

No idea. He never asked for one! His battle horse, White Surrey, was cut down from under him and I doubt Richard would have been able to rise before he was hacked to death by Stanley's men, let alone make fancy 'sound-bites'! Tradition has it that his last words were "Treason, treason, treason!"

The trouble is that when Shakespeare was writing his plays, the granddaughter of Richard's opponent was on the throne, hence the cruel, scowling hunchback which nowadays forms just about everybody's mental image of him, when in fact, he was probably one of the better monarchs in English history.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oooh, I'm gonna give you such a slap! s0249.gif

I did like the way you tried to summarize which battle it might have been. :tu: I like the cut of your jib sir cheers. :yes:
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

No idea. He never asked for one! His battle horse, White Surrey, was cut down from under him and I doubt Richard would have been able to rise before he was hacked to death by Stanley's men, let alone make fancy 'sound-bites'! Tradition has it that his last words were "Treason, treason, treason!"

The trouble is that when Shakespeare was writing his plays, the granddaughter of Richard's opponent was on the throne, hence the cruel, scowling hunchback which nowadays forms just about everybody's mental image of him, when in fact, he was probably one of the better monarchs in English history.

That's about it... Shakespeare had to play up to his patrons, if he wanted to keep his theater open... he knew who buttered his bread and it wasn't Richard....

From what I've read about R III the only thing he did (or might have done) that I find reprehensible was the two young princes... Which he actually might not have had anything to do with...

ealdwita... have any other English monarchs died in actual battle?... I can't think of one - save Harold in 1066...

Edited by Taun
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I did like the way you tried to summarize which battle it might have been. :tu: I like the cut of your jib sir cheers. :yes:

My first thought was "OK, here's another guy who believes he's the reincarnation some long-dead warrior, so just for fun, let's find out how much he remembers about the battle which finished him off!" I ended up with egg on my face! Serves me right for being sarcastic, doesn't it?

s8672.gif

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

ealdwita... have any other English monarchs died in actual battle?... I can't think of one - save Harold in 1066...

Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.........

Edward the Elder.....Saxon........AD924.......killed leading an army against a Cambro-Mercian rebellion at Farndon

Harold Godwinson of course at the battle of Hastings

William the Conquerer......1087....died from injuries at the Siege of Mantes

Richard I (Coeur de Leon) .....1199....killed at the Siege of Chalus-Charbrol in France.

Then lastly, Richard III.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

From what I've read about R III the only thing he did (or might have done) that I find reprehensible was the two young princes... Which he actually might not have had anything to do with...

Oooooh, my favourite part of the whole Plantagenet era ! Please don't get me started!

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I wonder if the mystery of where his nephews are buried (if they are buried) will ever be solved, too.

In 1483, Richard III supposedly captured and imprisoned his two young nephews - the 12 year-old King Edward V and Edward's 9-year-old brother Richard, Duke of York - in the Tower of London and murdered them not long after so he could take the Throne.

The two boys were the sons of the previous monarch, King Edward IV (Richard III's brother and the grandfather of the future King Henry VIII). The King, arriving in London for his coronation in May 1483 (he became king just a couple of months before), was arrested and imprisoned in the Tower. In June, his younger brother joined him.

Both princes were declared illegitimate by an Act of Parliament of 1483 known as Titulus Regius, and their uncle Richard, Duke of Gloucester, was crowned as King Richard III. There are reports of the two princes being seen playing in the Tower grounds shortly after Richard joined his brother, but there are no recorded sightings of either of them after the summer of 1483. Their fate remains an enduring mystery, but historians and contemporary popular opinion agree that the princes may have been murdered in the Tower. There is no record of a funeral.

If Edward V died before his 15th birthday, as seems likely, then he will be England shortest-reigning monarch ever. He is also one of just three English monarchs never to have been crowned (the other three are Matilda, Jane and Edward VIII).

In 1674, the skeletons of two children were discovered under the staircase leading to the chapel, during the course of renovations to the White Tower. At that time, these were believed to have been the remains of the two princes, although the staircase was apparently the original, and therefore built around two centuries before the boys disappeared, making it unlikely that the skeletons belonged to the princes.

The fate of the two princes remains a mystery. The Tudors maintained that Richard III was a nasty piece of work, was a hunchback and had a withered arm, although all this may have been just propaganda. It was they who first claimed that Richard III murdered his two nephews shortly after they were imprisoned, although many modern historians believe this to be untrue.

If the boys were murdered, Richard III is now one of several suspects. The other suspects include Henry VII (who married the two boys' sister), who wanted to eliminate rival claimans to the Throne. However, he came to the Throne in 1485 but the two princes mysteriously disappeared for good two years earlier.

William Shakespeare believed that the Yorkist knight, James Tyrell, was the man who murdered the Princes in the Tower. Tyrrell was arrested by Henry VII's forces in 1501 for supporting another Yorkist claimant to the throne. Shortly before his execution, it is said that Tyrrell admitted, under torture, to having murdered the princes at the behest of Richard III; however, no written record of such an important confession has ever been found or referred to.

Another suspect is Henry Stafford, 2nd Duke of Buckingham. He was Richard III's right-hand man and sought personal advantage through the new king. Some regard Buckingham as the likeliest suspect: his execution, after he had rebelled against Richard in October 1483, might signify that he and the king had fallen out because Buckingham had taken it on himself for whatever reason to dispose of Richard's rival claimants (which would include the Princes in the Tower). Alternatively, he could have been acting on behalf of Henry Tudor.

Some, however, maintain than at least one of the two Princes weren't murdered and that they lived. In 1487 young man named Lambert Simnel said he, not Henry VII, was the rightful King of England by claiming to be the Earl of Warwick, who had a claim to the throne as the son of the Duke of Clarence, King Richard III's brother. A priest named Richard Simon noticed Simnel's strong resemblance to Richard, Duke of York, the younger of the two Princes in the Tower, so he initially intended to present Simnel to the King as the Duke of York. However, when he heard rumours that the Earl of Warwick had died during his imprisonment in the Tower of London, he changed his mind.

Edited by TheLastLazyGun
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks matey, you've saved me the trouble. (A few tiny points I would question, but all in all, not a bad summation!)

s3153.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.