The Houses of Lancaster and York

1399-1485 

Henry 4th 1399-1413 (Aged 32 when crowned) House of Lancaster.

The first Lancastrian King with dubious claims to the throne, some 8th in line, who  took the throne by force from Richard.

Henry previously known as Bolingbroke after Bolingbroke Castle where he was born and then later the Duke of Lancaster, was the same age as his predecessor and cousin Richard who Henry murdered by starvation. This haunted him throughout his reign both through guilt and through the many English enemies he made by taking the crown by military force. Richard had been the eldest son of the Black Prince who himself was the eldest son of Edward 3rd. Bolingbroke or Henry 4th was only the eldest surviving son of John of Gaunt who had been Edward 3rd ‘s third son. A third man or actually a boy was Edmund Mortimer, the 5th Earl of March, was next in line after Richard being the great grand son of Lionel, Edward 3rd ‘s second son.

This level of rivalry caused some huge problems but fortunately for England, Henry had all the characteristics required for a successful Medieval King, decisiveness, intelligence and military acumen. Shakespeare writing some 150 years later dramatized his reign by majoring on the conspiracies against him. Shakespeare described the period as “a scrambling and unquiet time.” And when Henry died suffering terribly from an itching disease probably eczema or leprosy and dreaming he was in Jerusalem, Shakespeare gave him the death line “Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown”. 

Henry Bolingbroke married at 13 the English born Mary aged 10 and they produced their first son Edward when she was only 12. Edward died after 4 days. Her next child Henry who became King Henry 5th was born when she was 17.  

Chronological events

1367 Henry born, he is intelligent and learns Latin and French. He is also athletic and vigorous.

1377 Henry’s cousin Richard becomes King of England. Henry and Richard are both aged 10. Henry’s father, John of Gaunt acts as uncle-regent to Richard and includes his son Henry in the regents ruling committee. Henry and Richard hate each other from then on. Henry is eventually banished from England by Richard and when he reaches majority Richard takes much of Henry’s property.

1390 Henry aged 23 travels to Lithuania and fights with the Teutonic Knights against the Lithuanians and the Poles.

1392 He takes a personal pilgrimage to Jerusalem when he meets many country leaders en-route.

1399 Henry returns to England and seizes the English throne. Rebellion by the Earls who supported King Richard quashed by Henry. All the leaders are executed.

1400 Henry murders ex King Richard at Pontefract Castle. His skeletal starved body is shown in public in London to prove him dead.

Scotland takes opportunity to attack the north of England but repelled by Henry.

Owen Glendower (Owain Glyn Dwr) based in North East Wales rebels and calls himself the Prince of Wales. Glendower with Scottish and French support and his friend Percy the Duke of Northumberland aims to kick the English out of Wales and extend Wales to include Liverpool and Manchester.

Glendower takes Mortimer hostage and calls for a ransom which Henry quite understandably refuses to pay. Remember Mortimer was actually a rightful heir to the throne.

1401 Lollards suppressed by Archbishop Arundel. Henry introduces “Burning at the Stake” for Heretics. (The first time this word is used)

1402 Scotland invades Northumbria (in the north of England, loot and pillage and retreat to Scotland with cartloads of booty. Percy, the Earl of Northumberland, chases the Scots and routs them at the battle of Homildon Hill. (A few miles south east of Berwick on Tweed). Many Scottish nobles taken prisoner.

The King in the mean time receives a state visit from Constantinople almost 1000 miles away by the Byzantine Emperor Manuel 2nd pleading for support to fight the Islamist terror at that time, the Ottomans who have finally surrounded Constantinople.

Henry along with other European Kings and the Pope are not supportive and Constantinople falls to the Muslims some 50 years later. (1453)

1403 Percy, the Earl of Northumberland and his son Henry (called Hotspur) rebel against Henry the King of England. 

Reasons:

• Henry refuses to pay £20,000 to Percy being his dues for having an army to control the boarder with Scotland.

• Henry takes the ransom from the Scottish prisoners captured by Percy.

• Henry refuses to pay the ransom for Sir Edmund Mortimer captured by Glendower.

Percy joins forces with Glendower and Mortimer. Hotspur travelling south to meet up with Glendower is cut off by Henry and killed. Percy pays a fine to the King and is pardoned. Mortimer is taken prisoner.

1405 Percy Earl of Northumberland joins with men under Archbishop Scrope and Thomas Mobray in an attempt to free Mortimer and put him on the throne. Henry captures and executes Scrope and Mobray and Northumberland flees to Scotland.

1408 Percy Northumberland with a new army comes back into England but Henry men kill him at the battle of Bramham moor near Tadcaster.

1413 Henry dies and is succeeded by his second son Henry 5th.  

Note

1407 France under the mad and incompetent Charles 6th falls into civil war.

1411 and 1412 Henry 4th King of England cannot resist sending forces into France to capitalise on the situation but his forces are too small as the King is almost broke following his civil wars. He certainly was in no position to help in the fight against the Islamic Ottomans. 

1400 Geoffrey Chaucer 1342-1400 dies.

It was Chaucer not Shakespeare (1564-1616) who established the English Language of today with a dialect ffom southern England that spread to the rest of the country. He was the first serious writer to use English rather than Latin or French. Chaucer was a poet much influenced by the likes of the Italian Dante (1265-1321) and who was financially supported by both Richard 2nd and Henry 4th even though much of what he wrote was pornographic by today’s standards. For example a treatise on the best method of cleaning one’s bottom after a visit to the toilet. His solution was to use a swan’s neck! (His works of this type are only available from places like the Bodleian Library in Oxford England.) His best known work is the Canterbury Tales commenced in 1387 which describes the sexual and other antics of the pilgrims as they travel from London to the holy town of Canterbury. His spelling is very different from today hence students of his books tend to be over 16 or actually at university when after a few weeks reading his works becomes easily comprehensible and pleasurable.