He contents the people where he goes best that ever did Prince, for many a poor man that hath suffered wrong many days hath been relieved and helped by him and his commands in his progress. And in many great cities and towns were great sums of money given him which he hath refused. On my trouth I liked never the conditions of any prince so well as his; God hath sent him to us for the wele of us all.



Thomas Langton, bishop of St Davids, writing to William Sellyng, prior of Christchurch, Canterbury on the subject of Richard III, who was born on 2 October in 1452.



And when Richard was killed at the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485, the people of the City of York entered the following in their public records: This day was our good King Richard most piteously slain and murdered; to the great heaviness of this city.



The reputation of King Richard III, that admirable and gracious man, has never recovered from the calumnies heaped on him by the apologists for the Tudor dynasty, and the popular image of him as a twisted and wicked usurper has faded only in the sense that all knowledge of history earlier than the advent of Oprah and MTV has dimmed.



But Truth is the Daughter of Time, as the proverb has it. Read Josephine Tey's illuminating novel of that name, if you haven't already.