EDWARD V. king of England and styled also "king of France and lord of Ireland", was the elder son of Edward IV. by his wife Elizabeth Woodville, and was born, during his father's temporary exile, on Nov. 2, 1470, at the Abbot's House, Westminster, where his mother had taken sanctuary on the ap proach of the King-Maker, Warwick. In June 1471 he was created prince of Wales. When Edward IV. died in April 1483, a struggle for power took place between the young king's paternal uncle, Richard, duke of Gloucester, whom Edward IV. had appointed as his guardian, and his maternal uncle, Richard Woodville, Earl Rivers. Gloucester arrested Rivers and some of his supporters, ob tained possession of the king's person at Stony Stratford and con ducted him to London, where he arrived on May 4, the day which had been appointed for his coronation. On May 19 Edward was lodged in the Tower of London, ostensibly to await his coronation, which had been postponed until June 22. But on June 13 Glouces ter revealed his purpose and, on the 25th, after a very slight and feigned reluctance, assumed the crown himself as Richard III., on the ground that the marriage of Edward IV. and Elizabeth Wood ville was invalid, and consequently its issue was illegitimate. On June 16 the boy Edward was joined in the Tower by his young brother, Richard, duke of York (b. 1473), his mother having been persuaded that Edward needed his brother's companionship. From that date neither of the brothers was seen alive outside the Tower, though, in the words of the Great Chronicle of London, "the childyr of Kyng Edward were seen shotyng and playyng in the Gardyn of the Towyr by sundry tymys". Shortly afterwards a movement was organized to free them from captivity, and then it became known that they were already dead ; but, though it was the general conviction that they had been murdered, it was 20 years before the manner of this deed was related. According to the narrative of Sir Thomas More, Sir Richard Brackenbury, the constable of the Tower, refused to obey Richard's command to put the young princes to death ; but he complied with a warrant order ing him to give up his keys for one night to Sir James Tyrell, who had arranged for the assassination. Two men, Miles Forest and John Dighton, then smothered the youths under pillows while they were asleep. The murder was committed most probably in Aug. 1483. Various attempts were at various times made to cast doubt upon the murder of the princes, and it has even been suggested that the murder should be laid at the door of Henry VII. But there seems little doubt that Sir Thomas More's story is sub stantially correct.
In 1674, in the course of certain structural alterations at the Tower, a wooden chest was found containing the bones of two boys of about the ages of the two princes. It was presumed that these were the remains of Edward and Richard and, by command of Charles II., they were buried in Henry VII.'s chapel, West minster Abbey. On July 6, 1933, the urn containing these bones was opened, and a careful examination of them was made by Pro fessor William Wright, then president of the Anatomical Society of Great Britain and Ireland. Although many bones were missing, Professor Wright was able to reach the conclusion that the re mains were those of two brothers, aged respectively between 12 and 13, and "about mid-way between nine and eleven," and that the skull of the elder child bore traces of death by suffocation. As a result of this examination, the presumption was greatly strength ened that these were in fact the bones of the two murdered princes. The remains were replaced in the urn on July it, 1933.
See RICHARD III.; and in addition, Horace Walpole, Historic Doubts on the Life and Reign of Richard III. (1768) ; Sir Thomas More, His tory of Richard III., ed. J. R. Lumby (Cambridge, 1 883) ; J. Gairdner and C. R. Markham in the English Historical Review, Vol. vi. (1891) ; J. Gairdner, Richard III. (Cambridge, 1898) ; Sir C. R. Markham, Richard III. (1907) ; L. E. Tanner and Professor W. Wright, Recent Investigations regarding the Fate of the Princes in the Tower (Oxford, printed for the Society of Antiquaries of London) .