Disappearance
Dominic Mancini recorded that after Richard III seized the throne, Edward and his brother Richard were taken into the "inner apartments of the Tower" and then were seen less and less until late summer to early autumn 1483, when they disappeared from public view altogether. During this period, Mancini records that Edward was regularly visited by a doctor, who stated that Edward, "like a victim prepared for sacrifice, sought remission of his sins by daily confession and penance, because he believed that death was facing him." The Latin reference to Argentinus medicus was previously translated as "a doctor from Strasbourg", because the Latin name for Strasbourg, Argentoratum, was still current at the time. However, D. E. Rhodes suggests it may refer instead to "Doctor Argentine", whom he identifies as John Argentine, an English physician who later served as provost of King's College, Cambridge, and as doctor to Arthur, Prince of Wales, eldest son of King Henry VII of England.
The princes' fate after their disappearance remains unknown, but the most widely accepted theory is that they were murdered on the orders of their uncle, King Richard. Thomas More (1478–1535) wrote that they were smothered to death with their pillows, and his account forms the basis of William Shakespeare's play Richard III, in which Tyrrell murders the princes on Richard's orders. In the absence of hard evidence, a number of other theories have been put forward. The most widely discussed are that they were murdered on the orders of Henry Stafford, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, or by Henry Tudor. However, A. J. Pollard argues that these theories are less plausible than the straightforward one that they were murdered by their uncle, who in any case controlled access to them and was regarded as responsible for their welfare. In the period before the boys' disappearance, Edward was regularly being visited by a doctor; historian David Baldwin extrapolates that contemporaries may have believed Edward had died of an illness, or as the result of attempts to cure him. An alternative theory is that Perkin Warbeck, a pretender to the throne, was indeed Richard, Duke of York, as he claimed, having escaped to Flanders after his uncle's defeat at Bosworth to be raised by his aunt, Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy.
In 1486, Edward IV's daughter Elizabeth, sister of Edward V, married Henry VII, thereby uniting the Houses of York and Lancaster. In 1516, Dame Margaret Capel bequeathed a chain that had belonged to Edward V to her son Giles Capel. This is one of the few known references to the personal possessions of the Princes in the Tower.
In 2021, researchers from "The Missing Princes Project" claimed to have found evidence that Edward may have lived out his days in the Devon village of Coldridge. They linked the 13-year-old prince with a man named John Evans, who arrived in the village around 1484 and was immediately given an official position and the title of Lord of the Manor. Researcher John Dike noted Yorkist symbols and stained glass windows depicting Edward V in a Coldridge chapel commissioned by Evans and built around 1511, unusual for the location.
Bones belonging to two children were discovered in 1674 by workmen rebuilding a stairway in the Tower. On the orders of King Charles II, these were subsequently placed in Westminster Abbey, in an urn bearing the names of Edward and Richard. The bones were re-examined in 1933, at which time it was found that the skeletons were incomplete and had been interred with animal bones. It has never been proven that the bones belonged to the princes, and it is possible that they were buried before the reconstruction of that part of the Tower of London.
In 1789, workmen carrying out repairs in St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, rediscovered and accidentally broke into the vault of Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville. Adjoining this was another vault, which was found to contain the coffins of two children. This tomb was inscribed with the names of two of Edward IV's children who had predeceased him: George, Duke of Bedford, and Mary. However, the remains of these two children were later found elsewhere in the chapel, leaving the occupants of the children's coffins within the tomb unknown.
