The Dark Story Of Elizabeth Woodville, England’s Most Tragic Queen D
crossbreed Game of Thrones with Cinderella and you’ll get Elizabeth woodville’s life story despite her lowborn Roots she used her beauty to catch the eye of king Edward IV and become the first Common born Queen of England once she had her crown she’d do anything and I mean anything to keep it Elizabeth Woodville is often seen as an upstart hussy who seduced her way to the top but modern historians have revealed a much more complicated story in truth Elizabeth Woodville wasn’t really a peasant Queen on her father’s side she was descended from knights sheriffs members of parliament and other high-powered ancestors this was nothing to turn your nose at but back in the 1400s it was hardly the pedigree that people expected from the future Queen of the nation as the first child of a controversial couple Scandal was in Elizabeth woodville’s blood her mother was the Widow of King Henry V’s younger brother but when it came time to choose husband number two she passed on the Royals and wed a mere Knight named
sir Richard Woodville the mismatched couple dropped Jaws at the English court and infuriated the king Elizabeth woodville’s parents were literal Outlaws her mother had to get permission from the King to remarry but in her haste to tie the knot she skipped that step the King was ticked and promptly fined the newlyweds a hefty €1,000 for getting hitched without his Royal blessing how many other queens of England can you say that their birth was literally against the law tutor portraits aren’t exactly flattering but by all accounts Elizabeth Woodville was hot stuff she was statuesque with shining blonde hair fair skin and entrancing eyes in a painting of Woodville they look Hazel but sources describe them as Link’s eyes and the eyes of a dragon some historians believe that woodville’s Eyes Were Striking leg green or even golden the 1400s were in a Bo waiting around they were about making babies as soon as possible to do her
part Elizabeth Woodville walked on the aisle when she was just 15 years old and married a knight named Sir John Gray soon enough Woodville won the medieval jackpot and gave birth to two sons however her wetted Bliss wouldn’t last very long during the War of Roses the Yorks and the lancasters played an exhausting bloody game of crown swap after Decades of conflict the lancasters lost and King Edward IV took the throne for the ycs this was great but for Elizabeth Woodville who was a Lancaster through and through it was a disaster and the bad news kept coming during the final phases of conflict enemy forces captured her brother and father before Woodville and gray even reached their anniversary their marriage was already done woodville’s first husband fought in the brutal Battle of St Albin and unfortunately he didn’t make it out alive with her husband’s passing
Woodville became a 28-year-old Widow and a single mother and now she had to deal with her hellish in-laws all alone when gray perished his parents Point Blank refused to help Elizabeth or her children although Woodville was promised money in her marriage settlement her in-laws refused to send her any funds to help her and her children survive desperate poor and widowed Woodville only had one option left for survival betray her family’s lancastrian roots and beg the new king to help her out woodville’s evil in-laws weren’t budging so to get her money Woodville had to take her fight to the new king who was awkwardly her sworn enemy however their meeting didn’t exactly go according to plan and in the end Woodville got a heck of a lot more than she bargain for she went hoping to receive some help and left with a wedding ring and a crown here’s how how does a single mom meet a guy who will
treat her like a queen in the days before dating apps all you had to do was stand under an oak tree and wait for the king to ride by or at least that’s all it took for Elizabeth Woodville Elizabeth used her legendary Beauty to catch the king’s eye as Elizabeth explained her plate to the king he was instantly smitten in some tellings of their story Edward meets Elizabeth immediately Falls for her and insists that she becomes his mistress Woodville resists the king advances and plays hard to get which obviously leads Edward to become even more obsessed with his new flame and some some other versions of the story Elizabeth plays her card so well that she goes from a widow to the queen in just 3 weeks however another version of their meeting isn’t so romantic King Edward IV was Notorious for getting with a lot of women so when Woodville resisted him some sources claimed that he responded poorly apparently Woodville had to cry and
scream to make him back off before their wedding night in other versions of the tale things got even worse According to some Legends it was actually Edward who wielded a blade against Elizabeth apparently when she refused to go to sleep with him the king supposedly used intimidation to get his way thankfully a lot of historians believe that this part of the story is just a dramatic embellishment no matter how they met here’s what we know for certain it didn’t take long for Edward and Elizabeth to make things official by May 1464 the king and his commoner brought got hitched when you think of a royal wedding you think of a lavish and expensive party but that wasn’t the case for Edward and Elizabeth’s wedding it was a really modest Affair you might be asking why it’s because the marriage was top secret Edward knew that marrying a commoner wouldn’t go over well with his advisers so he threw caution to the wind
had an impulsive Vegas style wedding and decided to marry Elizabeth but unfortunately this plan didn’t go so well when it came to marriage marage Elizabeth’s new husband didn’t have a very good track record at the same time Elizabeth married the king it was rumored that Edward’s previous mistress was heavily pregnant and waiting for her marriage to the king despite all the messiness and Scandal surrounding Elizabeth woodville’s marriage to King Edward IV her wedding was still straight out of a fairy tale before tying the knot Elizabeth was just your average girl after she was the Queen of England with her marriage Elizabeth became the first commoner Queen of England setting the stage for women like Kate Middleton and Megan Markle Edward’s key advisor the infamous King maker Richard Neville had been busy setting up a strategic French marriage for the king everything was locked and loaded until Edward revealed that actually he couldn’t marry a French girl because he’d already
eloped with Woodville Neville didn’t like that this made him seem like a lying fool in the eyes of the French Court angry and embarrassed Neville would hold a murderous grudge against both the king in Woodville for years to come Neville wasn’t the only one who hated the idea of Queen Elizabeth Woodville all of the English nobles were ticked contemporary accounts called Elizabeth undistinguished and rumors about Woodville super seductress ways spread far and wide the people believed that the king had been led by his regions and that the impulsive match was a huge mistake and that wasn’t all people really hated Elizabeth after news of the king’s marriage broke a dark rumor spread through England it claimed that Edward’s wedding didn’t count because Edward was illegitimate the story went that when Edward’s mother was in France she had an affair and that Edward was the result of that romance not the Queen’s marriage to
the king but that’s not even the wildest part of the story The King’s mother the woman whose reputation was being dragged through the mud did very little to stop it in fact some historians believe that she speared the rumor herself or instructed one of her ladies in waiting to start the gossip this woman hated Elizabeth so much that she ruined her own reputation and the reputation of her son to get a new daughter-in-law everyone hated Elizabeth Woodville but like it or not she was the new Queen Edward clearly used the occasion as a way to legitimize his new bride he hired people to dress as Angels bought Elizabeth an expensive purple gown and even made London smello which back in the 1400s was a big achievement thankfully all these expenses did the trick on May 26 1465 the coronation Pomp and Splendor along with Elizabeth’s jaw-dropping Beauty won the people over for now at
least Elizabeth woodville’s enormous family hitched a ride on her rising star in a big way the Woodville Clan shamelessly used their new fancy pan status as the king- in-laws to ens snare wealthy husbands and wives Liv most scandalously woodville’s 20-year-old brother John married The Duchess of norfol who was a whopping 65 years old at the time this was a power grab plain and simple and the Woodville were not being subtle about it their actions were guaranteed to ruffle feathers at court Richard nelville felt that his family were the ones who should have been Maring up not the ambitious Woodville as he watched Elizabeth’s family marry up in court he saw his family’s chances to gain power go up and smoke and then Elizabeth went too far Neville’s nephew was supposed to NAB a wealthy ays until Elizabeth pedy stole the girl away and married her off to her own son with this final insult Neville officially lost it
in 1470 he lashed out against the royal couple he partnered up with the King Edward’s ambitious younger brother and staged your Rebellion to replace King Edward with England’s old ruler Henry V 6 while Neville staged his Coupe King Edward told Elizabeth to run away and take shelter with her children Elizabeth got out of Dodge just in the nick of time after she left everything devolved enemy forces captured Edward and his commanders lost a major battle when all was said and done King Henry V 6 reclaimed the throne while King Edward and Elizabeth Woodville lost everything unfortunately for Elizabeth things would get worse before they got better Richard nille The Mastermind behind Henry’s takeover made things personal he declared that Elizabeth and her mother were witches and that Elizabeth used dark magic to ens snare King Edward IV not content with ruining the reputation of Elizabeth and her mom
nelville did something far worse he captured and beheaded Elizabeth’s brother and father in a matter of months Elizabeth had gone from the Queen of England to a desperate grieving mother in 1470 her husband had been exiled to France and she had to move into Westminster Abbey to hide from her enemies as though that wasn’t enough for Woodville to deal with the entire time this mess was going on Elizabeth was heavily pregnant even though her life was a dumpster fire she persevered and gave birth to a baby boy in the basement of Westminster Abbey she named her son Edward and even though she and her husband had technically been deposed Elizabeth ignored that little detail and thought of the infant as the air to the throne of England little did she know she was right to get her hopes up a lot had happened while Elizabeth was locked up in Westminster by May 1471 King Edward had staged a legendary comeback
he rallied his French allies persuaded one of Neville’s co-conspirators to switch sides and charged back into England to defeat the infamous King maker after a decisive victory at Barnett Edward deposed his competition and reclaimed his CR Richard nelville meanwhile fell off his horse and got trampled and that was the end for him with her husband back as king Elizabeth Woodville re-entered the real life Game of Thrones after all Elizabeth’s ordeals she could finally sit back and relax for the next decade she spent most of her time doing what all queens had to do make babies although King Edward’s womanizing ways meant he was hardly faithful to Elizabeth the couple had a whopping 10 children including that all-important heir Prince Edward however as years went by Elizabeth experience with motherhood became utterly horrific back in the 1400s Queens just had to deal with her husbands having Mistresses
but even the most understanding wife would have an issue with what King Edward did he had three major Mistresses and plenty of flings on the side including one rumored relationship with another man Henry bort meanwhile Elizabeth repayed her husband’s affairs with complete loyalty even though was finally peaceful drama never slept for long in King Edward’s Castle this time the king’s brother George was the one causing trouble he had a tense relationship with the king and the queen George had betrayed Edward in the past and he was also a big part of why Elizabeth’s father and brother had been executed George kept trying to marry High status women in King Edward’s Court I say trying because every time he got close to putting a ring on it Edward and Elizabeth would mess up the match to keep George from getting tooo powerful after the royal couple ruined George’s love life one too many times he got extremely angry left the court and started scheming against Edward and
Elizabeth as a warning that George should back away Edward charg some of his brother’s friends with a serious offense using dark magic to destroy both Edward and his Heir anyone with half a brain would have rained in their schemes at this point but not George he kept on keeping on and in the end he found himself drowned in a barrel of wine historians believe that Elizabeth was in on George’s brutal punishment it was belated payback for his role in the demise of her family all in all Queen Elizabeth was a pretty tame Traditional Queen She invested heavily in Acts of Christian charity and was heavily involved in her children’s upbringings her days were pretty normal until once again everything fell down around her and 1483 Elizabeth’s husband passed under ambiguous circumstances at just 40 years old his demise left Elizabeth Woodville a widow and a single mother to
the Future King during the turbulent 1400s this was a very dangerous position to be in Elizabeth knew that to ensure her safety and the safety of her family she’d have to act fast in the king’s will Edward appointed his brother Richard to become the Lord protector of Little Prince Edward unfortunately it turns out that Richard was incredibly ambitious with his big brother out of the picture he immediately used his new position to grab power for himself he promised Elizabeth that he’d keep Prince Edward safe but unfortunately he lied after getting his hands on Prince Edward Richard went to work destroying the rest of Elizabeth’s family he arrested both her brother and one of her sons from her first marriage Richard Gray then suspiciously delayed the the coronation of Prince Edward sensing that the tides were turning and her entire family would soon be in big trouble Woodville rushed
herself into Sanctuary once again when Richard was no longer satisfied with just abducting the heir to the throne he turned his eye to the spare as well his men surrounded The Abbey where Elizabeth Woodville was hiding and demanded that she hand over her son Elizabeth’s reaction to this demand has puzzled historians for centuries defying all of her Eternal instincts Elizabeth handed over her son but in Elizabeth’s defense she didn’t really have a choice in most versions of the story Elizabeth only gave the boy up because she is under extreme duress so after making the Archbishop promise that her son won’t be harmed she reluctantly gave Richard the boy when Richard defamed somebody he went hard he claimed that the priest who married Elizabeth and Edward was a fraud thus their marriage never actually happened apparently Edward would take resistant mistress to a buddy who’d pretend to be a priest and fake marry the couple once the girls thought they
had a ring they would share a bed with Edward who would usually leave soon after he deposed Prince Edward in 1483 declared himself King Richard theii of England and for good measure threw in one final reminder that Elizabeth Woodville was a witch then he hurt the ex Queen in the worst way possible during Richard II third’s Reign Elizabeth woodville’s life was miserable she was stripped of her royal title and Lance her daughters were bastardized and she would henceforth be known as the Dame Elizabeth gray in reference to her first husband during her time in the sanctuary she made an unlikely Ally Elizabeth teamed up with her deceased husband’s Chief mistress and Elizabeth’s own great rival Jane sha with Sha’s help the widowed Queen stayed in contact with her allies and bed an ingenious Revenge Woodville defied everyone’s Expectations by working with another old enemy
Margaret bort and trying to bring Richard down in October of 1483 the woman became involved in Buckingham’s Rebellion the plan was stunning B for’s son Henry tutor would come to England defeat Richard take the throne and marry woodville’s daughter thus uniting both Yorks and lancasters unfortunately things didn’t and go to plan Richard III caught wind of the rebellion and immediately shut it down she effectively had to make a deal with the devil AKA Richard himself Woodville said that if Richard let her and her daughter safely leave the ABY she wouldn’t make any more trouble for him Richard agreed but he had one sickening condition Elizabeth had to live at his court and support his Reign so if Elizabeth wanted to survive she’d have to play nice with the man who killed her sons in the end Woodville and her daughters took Richard steel thankfully things were about to change
in a big way Henry viith invaded England in 1485 defeated Richard III and successfully seized the throne in his victory speech the new King Henry declared that little prince Edward was legitimate then restored Elizabeth Woodville back to her former glory as Queen Henry’s kindness to Elizabeth and her kids wasn’t purely nice it was also way for him to bolster his own power after all he stuck to the plan where he’d married woodville’s daughter and it wasn’t like a king could marry a disgraced Woman by rancing Elizabeth the new king had also refed her daughter and crucially his future bride after defeating Richard III Woodville and her old enemy Margaret bort went back to their old ways they drove each other nuts and a petty Battle of Queens eventually bort edged Woodville o after after this defeat the ex- queen got shuttled to yet another Sanctuary after
losing her father brothers and Sons to the violence of Court politics it’s not a stretch to imagine that Woodville would welcome some peace and quiet and so after 55 years of nonstop drama Elizabeth woodville’s Health began to deteriorate and on June 8th 1942 she finally breathed her last breath so what do you guys think of the Queen’s Legacy let us know in the comments below and we can have a discussion but remember to like comment and subscribe and we’ll see you in the next video
