Bid to clear King

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33045, 12 October 1972, Page 5

Bid to clear King

(N.Z.P. A.-Reuter—Copyright) LONDON.

A small international group is working to clear the name of the English King generally regarded as an evil hunchback who gained the Throne by’ killing all opposition.

Almost 500 years after his death, admirers of King Rich-! ard HI have dedicated themselves to clearing up what is] probably England’s most baf- j fling murder mystery. So convinced of the King’s; innocence are the society’s members — about 1000 of them—that they even wear! ties and handkerchiefs bear-j ing his white-boar crest. King Richard’s the last! member of the York family to rule England, was killed at the age of 32 at the Battle I of Bosworth Field in 1485. when he was defeated by an] army led by Henry VII, first of the Tudor line and father] of King Henry VIII. Two of King Richard's alleged victims were his nephew, Edward Prince of Wales, and Richard Duke of York, supposedly murdered in the Tower of London. TOUGH OPPOSITION

The society has formidable opposition in its fight to clear King Richard’s name. The Princes-in-the-Tower story is one of the great classroom tales in English history and was dramatised by William Shakespeare, who depicted the King as an archvillain.

Despite this, the organisation, which has branches tn Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the United States as well as Britain says it has been responsible for causing important changes in the history lessons given to millions of tourists. Visitors to the Tower have for hundreds of years been treated to the gory details of how the two children were smothered in their beds by their wicked uncle.

Tourists at Westminster Abbey were told similarly gruesome stories as they were shown an urn said to contain the bones of the murdered princes. Now, after the societ/s agitations, guides tell their listeners the legend of the Princes is largely fiction, and

that their fate remains a mystery.

The society has always said that skeletons found in the Tower and said to be those of the Princes could not be proved to be theirs, and that rivals had more motive than King Richard to kill them. “JUST A GOOD STORY" The chairman of the society is the managing director of a magazine, Mr Jeremy Potter, who is also a successful crime novelist. “There is no evidence that King Richard murdered his nephews, and there is a lot of evidence that he did not. It is just a good stoiy that found its way into history,"; said Mr Potter. The society says that, far from being a despot King, Richard was an initiator of important reforms and was a popular choice as Sovereign. “He was a protector of the. underdog. Surviving records suggest he performed more kindnesses to individual subjects than did any other monarch before or for a very long time afterwards,” said Mr Potter. "Shakespeare knew nothing about the facts. To him it was just a good melodrama. but it is unfortunate that King Richard’s notoriety should be enshrined in the English language through him," said Mr Potter. “We don’t blame him. The people who are blameworthy are the history teachers who go on trotting out these unsubstantiated tales,” he said. ANNUAL CEREMONY Every year the members of the society meet on Bosworth Field, now a vast arable plain, near Leicester, to pay homage to their hero. "The interest shown in King Richard and his cause by people all over the world is most impressive. “We find no difficulty in perpetuating his memory after all these years, and I have the feeling that the society is winning all the time,” Mr Potter said.