In the complete loneliness of the ruins, with the silence only
intensified by the sounds of fluttering wings in the tops of the
towers, we in imagination sweep away the haystacks and reinstate the
former grandeur of the fortress in the days of Ralph Neville, first
Earl of Westmorland. It was he who rebuilt the Norman castle of Bertram
de Bulmer, Sheriff of Yorkshire, on a grander scale. Upon the death of
Warwick, the Kingmaker, in 1471, Edward IV gave the castle and manor of
Sheriff Hutton to his brother Richard, afterwards Richard III, and it
was he who kept Edward IV's eldest child Elizabeth a prisoner within
these massive walls. The unfortunate Edward, Earl of Warwick, the
eldest son of George, Duke of Clarence, when only eight years old, was
also incarcerated here for about three years. Richard III, the usurper,
when he lost his only son, had thought of making this boy his heir, but
the unfortunate child was passed over in favour of John de la Pole,
Earl of Lincoln, and remained in close confinement at Sheriff Hutton
until August, 1485, when the Battle of Bosworth placed Henry VII on the
throne.
Pages:
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274