In a subsequent chapter of Elizabeth's life we find her again as a widow; but this time her widowhood has brought her new and more anxious public duties: she is not merely a mother, but the mother of the young King Edward V. and of his brother, the Duke of York.
Without going into the particulars of this momentous period, which includes the death of the young Princes in the Tower, it is abundantly clear that few parents ever have endured such pain for their children as this unfortunate lady.
The rumour that so quickly spread as to the Duke of Gloucester's intentions, the sudden bloodshed of her son and brother at Pomfret (Lords Gray and Rivers), the messages back and forth between the Protector and the Sanctuary at Westminster where she had taken refuge with her youngest son, all added to the turmoil in her mind.
One moment she was giving the young Prince up to his doom, the next fearing to bring that doom on him by indiscreet jealousy, or by thwarting Gloucester's views. All this must have been awful for the recently made widow.
When, calling for her child, she finally gave him up to the Cardinal Archbishop, she immediately burst into an uncontrollable fit of anguish, and knew she had lost both her children.
Between the death of the Princes and that of their murderer, Richard, there occured a particularly distasteful part of her history. While at one period we find her eagerly engaging in the proposed marriage of the Earl of Richmond and her daughter Elizabeth; at the other, when the prospect appeared less bright, she appears to have been taken in by Richard's overtures, first marrying her daughter Elizabeth to his son, and when that son died, of giving her to himself. Whatever her conduct at this period, there is no doubt as to her subsequent misfortunes.
The king, Henry VII., certainly did redeem the promise as to the marriage made by the Earl of Richmond, but it was done so tardily and so ungraciously, that the very people were disgusted at his conduct; and by their sentiments we may guess the mother's.