Richard III. returned to London on November 9. He was met by the Lord Mayor and Aldermen with upwards of four hundred citizens, who escorted him to his residence at the Wardrobe in Blackfriars. Christmas was kept at Westminster with all gaiety and splendour, the young niece Elizabeth being richly attired in a dress similar to that of the Queen, according to the gossiping old monk of Croyland. But the beloved consort of so many years, the playfellow of Richard's early days, who had shared all his joys and sorrows, the mother of his lost child, was passing away. Like her sister Isabella, Queen Anne was delicate, and she was now in a rapid decline. She died on March 16, 1485,[23] and was buried in Westminster Abbey; her {140} sorrowing husband shedding tears over her grave.[24] As an aggravation of the King's grief, an odious report, probably originating in the wishes of the Queen Dowager and her daughter, was spread abroad that he meditated a marriage with his illegitimate niece. As soon as it came to Richard's ears, he gave it formal and public contradiction.[25] As the spring of 1485 advanced it became known that, encouraged and aided by the French court, the Lancastrian malcontents intended to attempt an invasion of England, and that, probably at the suggestion of Bishop Morton, they had put forward a pretender as a claimant of the crown. This was Henry Tudor, who was born at Pembroke Castle on January 28, 1457. His father, Edmund Tudor, was the son of a Welsh esquire with whom the widow of Henry V. had formed a clandestine connection. Thus Edmund was a half-brother of Henry VI., who created him Earl of Richmond, and his brother Jasper Earl of Pembroke. Henry Tudor was born two months after his father's death, when the widow was only in her fifteenth year. She was daughter of John Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, and at this time was the wife of Lord Stanley, her third husband. In 1471 Jasper Tudor fled into Brittany with his nephew Henry. Both Edmund and Jasper Tudor had been attainted and deprived of their earldoms. Edward IV. had created his brother Richard Earl of Richmond,[26] and the title had since merged in the crown. The earldom of Pembroke had been conferred on King Edward's son Edward. Henry Tudor, {141} who was never Earl of Richmond, had lived in Brittany for many years, but in 1484 he had gone to France, where the desire to injure her English neighbours induced the Lady of Beaujeu, daughter of Louis XI. and Regent for her young brother Charles VIII., to encourage the conspirators. Henry's claim to relationship with the Kings of the House of Lancaster was derived from his mother's descent from an illegitimate son of John of Gaunt.[27] It was afterwards considered unadvisable to put this untenable claim forward, except in vague terms, and Henry's title was based on conquest. [Sidenote: Threatened invasion]