Richard of Shrewsbury, 1st Duke of York

Infobox British Royalty|royal
name =Richard of Shrewsbury
title =Duke of York; Duke of Norfolk


imgw = 150px
spouse =Anne de Mowbray, 8th Countess of Norfolk
issue =
titles =The Duke of Norfolk and York
The Duke of York
Prince Richard
royal house =House of York
father =Edward IV of England
mother =Elizabeth Woodville
date of birth = 17 August, 1473
place of birth = Shrewsbury, Shropshire
date of death = "unknown and disputed"
place of death = |

Richard of Shrewsbury, 1st Duke of York and 1st Duke of Norfolk (17 August 1473 – 1483?) was the sixth child and second son of King Edward IV of England and Elizabeth Woodville. He was born in Shrewsbury.He was a younger brother of Elizabeth of York, Mary of York, Cecily of York, Edward V of England and Margaret Plantagenet (Princess of York). He was also an older brother of Anne of York, George Plantagenet, Duke of Bedford, Catherine of York and Bridget of York.

He was created Duke of York in 1474. From this time on, it became a tradition for the second son of the British sovereign to be Duke of York. On 15 January 1478, when he was about 4 years old, he married the 5-year-old Anne de Mowbray, 8th Countess of Norfolk, who had inherited the vast Mowbray estates in 1476. Because York's father-in-law's dukedom had become extinct when Anne could not inherit it, he was created Duke of Norfolk in 1481.

His father died on 9 April 1483. Thus his brother Edward, Prince of Wales, became King of England and was acclaimed as such, and Richard his Heir Presumptive. This was not to last. Robert Stillington, the Bishop of Bath and Wells, testified that Edward IV had agreed to marry Lady Eleanor Talbot in 1461. Lady Eleanor was still alive when Edward married Elizabeth Woodville in 1464. The Regency council under Richard Plantagenet, 1st Duke of Gloucester, concluded that this was a case of bigamy, invalidating the second marriage and the legitimacy of all children of Edward IV by this marriage. Under Richard's influence, both Edward and Richard were declared illegitimate and removed from the line of succession on 25 June 1483. The Duke of Gloucester, as a surviving younger brother of Edward IV, became King Richard III.

The Duke of York was sent to the Tower of London by King Richard in mid-1483. What happened to him and his brother—the Princes in the Tower—after that has been the subject of much speculation and debate. The view of most professional historians is that they were murdered not long afterwards on Richard's orders, but various alternative views have been put forward. In the 1490s, Perkin Warbeck claimed to be Richard, Duke of York, but he is generally considered to have been an imposter, and was labelled thus by the Tudor regime. The skeletons of two children discovered in a chest in the Tower in 1674, they were presumed to be the princes, but the evidence is not conclusive (by modern investigative standards).

In popular culture

The comedy series "The Black Adder" features an alternative history where Richard succeeded his uncle King Richard III to the throne as King Richard IV of England (reigned 1485–1498, though Richard has two grown up sons in "The Black Adder" in 1485, when in reality he would have been twelve years old) before being poisoned and succeeded by King Henry VII.

Titles, styles, honours and arms

Arms

As son of the sovereign, Richard was granted use of the arms of the kingdom, differentiated by a "label argent, on the first point a canton gules". [ [http://www.heraldica.org/topics/britain/cadency.htm Marks of Cadency in the British Royal Family] ]

Ancestry

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1= 1. Richard of Shrewsbury, 1st Duke of York
2= 2. Edward IV of England
3= 3. Elizabeth Woodville
4= 4. Richard Plantagenet, 3rd Duke of York
5= 5. Cecily Neville
6= 6. Richard Woodville, 1st Earl Rivers
7= 7. Jacquetta of Luxembourg
8= 8. Richard of Conisburgh, 3rd Earl of Cambridge
9= 9. Anne de Mortimer
10= 10. Ralph de Neville, 1st Earl of Westmorland
11= 11. Joan Beaufort, Countess of Westmorland
12= 12. Sir Richard Wydevill
13= 13. Elizabeth Bodulgate
14= 14. Pierre I de Luxembourg, Comte de St. Pol, Brienne and Conversano
15= 15. Margherita del Balzo
16= 16. Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York
17= 17. Isabella of Castile
18= 18. Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl of March
19= 19. Alianore de Holland
20= 20. John Neville, 3rd Baron Neville de Raby
21= 21. Maud Percy
22= 22. John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster
23= 23. Katherine Swynford
24= 24. Richard Wydeville
25= 25. Elizabeth Lyons
26= 26. John Bodulgate
27= 27. Joan Beauchamp
28= 28. Jean I de Luxembourg, Comte de Brienne
29= 29. Marguerite d'Enghien, Comtesse de Brienne
30= 30. Francois de Baux, Duke of Andria
31= 31. Sueva Orsini del Balzo

References

* page 218
*

ee also

* Princes in the Tower

External links

* [http://www.thepeerage.com/p10165.htm#i101647 The Peerage.com]
* [http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1486036 The Princes in the Tower]
* [http://www.stirnet.com/HTML/genie/british/pp/plantagenet2.htm stirnet.com]
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