Unit 7. The house of lancaster

Pre-Reading Tasks:

1. What events caused the change of the ruling dynasty?

2. What can you say about the second period of the Hundred Years’ War?

3. What were the main reasons for starting the Wars of the Roses?

1. Henry IV (1399-1413)

Pre-reading task:How did Henry come to power?

In the autumn of 1399 Henry of Bolingbroke became King Henry IV of England on the enforced abdication of his cousin King Richard II. Henry laid formal claim to the throne with a declaration in the English language, which was replacing French in official usage, and Parliament gave its prompt assent.

It seemed in the best interests of the disarrayed kingdom that the victorious Henry should wear the crown, but he was not the immediate heir to Richard II. Henry was, indeed, of doubly royal blood, since his father, John of Gaunt, was Edward III's third surviving son and his mother, Blanche of Lancaster, a direct descendant of Henry III. But one of John of Gaunt's elder brothers had also left a male heir, and this boy, Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March, should technically have succeeded to the throne when the childless Richard vacated it. Out of this break with royal tradition the so-called 'Wars of the Roses' were ultimately to arise, half a century later.

The new King Henry, the first ruler of the House of Lancaster, was a stocky, athletic man, lacking the tall golden looks of the Plantagenet kings, but well-read and cour­teous in his manner. He had been born at Bolingbroke Castle, in Lincolnshire, on 30 May 1366. His mother, the gracious Blanche, in whose honour Chaucer wrote the long poem called The Book of the Duchess', died when he was in infancy, and Henry of Bolingbroke was the only surviving child of his parents' marriage - though John of Gaunt's third wife, Catherine Swynford. was to provide him with a line of half-sisters and brothers, the Beauforts. At 14 Henry was married to an heiress, Mary de Bohun, and in 1387 their first son was born, the future hero of Agincourt, Henry V. It was in that year that Henry took his first inadvert­ent step towards the throne, when he joined with the Lords Appellant in opposing King Richard.

The future Henry IV's courage and spirit of adventure were well demonstrated during his early adulthood. He travelled the world, joining with the military Christian order called the Teutonic Knights on a quasi-crusading expedition to Lithuania in 1390, and later he visited the Middle East by way of Prague, returning via Venice, Milan and Paris. The rich experiences of his travels helped to prepare him for the challenges to come.

For a time after his return Henry of Bolingbroke became a king's man, but after quarrelling with another eminent noble, Thomas Mowbray, he was banished from the kingdom by Richard. When he returned, in July 1399, it was at the head of an army. His original aim was solely to reclaim his rightful inheritance and win back the estates which Richard had perfidiously confiscated on John of Gaunt's death. But when others, including the powerful northern leaders, the percy family, flocked to join his cause, the enterprise acquired a new aim - the crown. By the end of August Henry was master of England and Richard was a prisoner in the Tower where once, as a boy, he had awaited the outcome of the Peasants' Revolt.

On 13 October, Henry was crowned King Henry IV. Evil omens were said to have marked the ceremony: one of the new king’s golden spurs fell off, a sure sign of rebellion to come. But Henry IV needed no such warnings to remind him of the weakness of his situation. He was threatened on all sides. If friends of Richard did not win the crown back for the deposed King, other great subjects might attempt to do as he, Henry, had done, and claim the throne for the rightful heir, the Earl of March, or them­selves; whilst Wales and Scotland might rise at any time.

In the event it was supporters of the ex-King who struck first, early in 1400. The kingdom's honeymoon with Henry IV was not yet over, however, and the rebels were quickly crushed and put to death. Richard himself had now no hope. He was secretly murdered, certainly with Henry's agree­ment, at Pontefract Castle.

In the autumn of that year, the Welsh patriot Owen Glendower rose to fame. Glendower was a fine soldier and a rousing leader of men, and he inspired his country­men to successful defiance of the English for the next eight years. Scotland rebelled also, and when the Earl of Northumberland's heir, Henry Percy, won a great victory over the Scots in 1402, it further increased King Henry's difficulties. Young Percy, who was known as ‘Hotspur’, was as dashing and hot-tempered as his nickname implied, and the power of the Percies in the north was immense. Hotspur now turned against the king, supported by his family; and the fact that he was connected by marriage to Owen Glendower made the situation critical.

Before Hotspur and Glendower could join forces, King Henry acted, with characteristic energy. On 21 July 1403, in a crucial battle near Shrewsbury, Hotspur was killed, and so one threat was removed. But the insur­rections continued. The Earl of March, senior claimant to the throne, found strong support for his cause, from Percy's powerful father, the Earl of Northumberland, and Owen Glendower among others. To this dangerous alliance was added the backing of the Church, in the person of the Archbishop of York: and when the revolt was put down, Henry took the decision to execute all the ringleaders, including the Archbishop.

There was great public outrage at the execution of the Archbishop - and when the King was afterwards struck down by an unpleasant, unidentified disease, which his contemporaries believed to be leprosy, the superstitious saw it as a punishment sent by God. But as if to disprove such rumours Henry was also granted relief from his most urgent dangers. The death in battle of the Earl of Northumberland in 1408, the capture of King James I of Scotland and the quelling of the worst of the Welsh defiance by 1409 left the sick King more secure on his throne, to face his other problems of debt and discontented ministers.

Campaigning on so many fronts was a costly business, and Henry IV was constantly subjected to criticism and demands from the Commons, who objected to his financial management and sought concessions before they would grant him taxes and customs revenues. As his disease grew worse, he became less able to fulfil an active role in government, and rival factions emerged within his ruling council. King Henry placed his faith in Archbishop Arundel, his Chan­cellor, but his son Henry, the Prince of Wales, displayed an impatience for power, and by 1409 he had come to dominate the council. There were rumours that the Prince intended to depose his own father; as if to assert his failing strength, in 1411 Henry IV dismissed his son's faction. Any widening of the breach between father and son was prevented by Henry IV's early death at the age of 47. On 21 March 1413, whilst at his prayers in Westminster Abbey, he collapsed and was carried into the Abbot's withdrawing-room, known as the Jerusalem Chamber, where he died that night. An old prophecy, that Henry IV would die 'in Jerusalem', had been fulfilled.

(from “Kings and Queens of Great Britain” by Josephine Ross, L. 1982)

By the end of the fourteenth century, the Plantagenets had ruled England for almost 250 years. There had been eight kings, beginning with Henry II and ending, in 1399, with Richard II. But now the dynasty, although still Plantagenet, was to splinter. First the House of Lancaster, then the House of York, each tracing its line to the original Plantagenet monarch, Henry II. For the next sixty or so years, England was ruled by the House of Lancaster, the three Henrys, beginning with Richard's successor Henry Bolingbroke, who was to be Henry IV and would rule for fourteen years. In that time Owen Glyndwr began the war for Welsh independence and defeated the English at Pilleth and then mysteriously disappeared; the King crushed a rebellion led by Richard Scrope, the Archbishop of York, and then had him executed; the first James became King of the Scots and the first Lollard religious refomer was martyred by burning at Smithfield.

From the first day of his reign, Henry IV had to accommodate his supporters. After all, to attempt to overthrow a king is high treason. To fail, is death. Therefore his backers demanded their rewards and Henry needed their continu­ing support. It was by no means an easy succession for the House of Lancaster and its complications clouded the reigns of all three Lancastrian Kings. Also, when Henry came to the throne Richard II was not dead, he was merely in prison.

C+ As each change of power had been attended by capital vengeance upon the vanquished there arose in the Commons a very solid and enduring desire to let the great lords cut each other's throats if they were so minded. During this time therefore Parliamentary power over finance was greatly strengthened. Not only did the Estates supply the money by voting the taxes, but they began to follow its expenditure, and to require and to receive accounts from the high officers of the State. Nothing like this had been tolerated by any of the Kings before. They had always condemned it as a presumptuous inroad upon their prerogative. These great advances in the polity of England were the characteristics of Lancastrian rule, and followed naturally from the need the house of Lancaster had to buttress its title by public opinion and constitutional authority.

Richard II was a prisoner in Pontefract Castle and as the general bitterness towards him began to wilt, the weakness of Henry's government became more obvious. In January 1400 some of the nobles tried to rise in favour of the imprisoned Richard. They failed, but as long as Richard remained alive, the greater the chance of him becoming a rallying figure. It is generally said that he was starved to death, but one contemporary writer believed that Henry sent one of his knights, Sir Peter Exton, to kill Richard. But even then it was necessary to display Richard's body at St Paul's Cathedral to convince the people that he was really dead.

Henry was now faced with demands from the Church to restrain the excesses of the Lollards. The Lollards, who got their name from a mediaeval Dutch word meaning 'mutter', as in praying, were religious reformers, followers of the late John Wyclif. They did not believe in transinstantiation, and they believed the clergy indulged in excesses. John Wyclif had translated the Bible into English; he believed that everyone who wanted to read the Testaments should be able to. The simplest way to deal with the Lollards, said the Church, was officially to declare them heretics. And so, in 1401, a Statute of enormous significance was published, written to deal with what its draughts­men called 'the innovations and excesses of the Lollards'. The Statute De Herelko Comburendo made it legal in England to take anyone convicted of heresy and burn him, or her, at the stake.

*And if any person refuses to abjure his heresy so that according to the holy canons he ought to be handed over to the secular court, then the sheriff shall receive the said persons, all of them, after such sentence has been promulgated, and cause them to be burned in a high place, so that such punishment may strike with fear the minds of others, and by this no such wicked doctrine and heretical and erroneous opinions shall be sustained or in any way suffered.

In 1401 the burning began. It would seem that Henry IV supported the Statute only partly from his religious orthodoxy; trie greater pressure was political. Henry's loyalty debts were still being paid.

Henry also faced war with both Scotland and Wales. The Scots had renewed their alliance with France and, led by the Earl of Douglas, had destroyed the English force and captured young Hotspur, Henry Percy, the son of the first Earl of Northuniberland. Henry IV advanced north as far as Edinburgh and then had to return south. The Welsh were on the move. Adam of Usk's Chronicle of autumn 1401 tells the story.

*Owen Glyndwr, all north Wales and Cardigan and Powys siding with him, sorely harried with fire and sword the English who dwelt in those parts, and their towns. Wherefore the English, invading those parts with a strong power, and utterly laying them waste and ravaging them with fire, famine and sword, left them a desert, not even sparing children or churches and they carried away into England more than 1000 small children of both sexes to be their servants. Yet the same Owen did no small hurt to the English slaying many of them, and carrying off the arms, horses, and the tents of the King's eldest son, the Prince of Wales, which he bore away for his own use to the mountain fastness of Snowdon.

C+[But] Henry's most serious conflict was with the Percys. Diese lords of the Northern Marches, the old Earl of Northumberland and his fiery son Hotspur, had for nearly three years earned on the defence of England against the Scots unaided and almost entirely at their own expense. They could no longer bear the burden. The King in bitter poverty could offer but £40,000. The Percys had played a great part in placing Henry on the throne. But Edmund Mortimer, Hotspur's brother-in-law, had joined Glendower in rebellion, and the family were now under suspicion. Hotspur raised the standard of revolt. But at Shrewsbury on July 21, 1403 Henry [IV] overcame him and slew him. The old Earl, who was marching to his aid, was forced to submit, and pardon was freely extended to him. But two years later, with his son's death at heart, he rebelled again and this time the conspiracy was far-reaching. Archbishop Scrope of York and Thomas Mowbray, Earl of Nottingham, were his principal confederates. Once again Henry marched north, and once again he was successful. Northumberland was driven across the border. Scrope and Mowbray [were] beheaded after a summary trial. Scrope's execution caused a profound shock throughout the land, and many compared it with the murder of Thomas Becket.

If there had only been one pope at the time, Henry IV would probably have been excommunicated for Scrope's execution. But the schism in the Church had left a pope in Rome and a pope in Avignon. Henry supported the Roman pope, and if he punished Henry, Henry might defect to Avignon. So, although the Church protested, Henry remained its child.

By 1408 the Earl of Northumberland was dead, killed in battle against the King's men at Bramham Moor, and Henry's England was free from uprising if not from malcontents. But the King was ill, as Adam of Usk's Chronicle records.

*In that same year, 1413, an agreement was made hetween Prince Henry, first born son of the King, Henry, Bishop of Winchester, and almost all the lords of England, that they should ask the King to give up the crown of England, and permit his first-born to be crowned, because he was so horribly afflicted with leprosy. When this advice was given, he was unwilling to agree to this cousel but retuming to London, he died at Wesiminster in the abbot's lodging in a certain low chamber, called the Jerusalem Chamber, about the feast of St Cuthbert. Henry IV's heart gave out and he left behind a country lacking unity and woefully in debt, and therefore dependent upon the goodwill ana mercy of its magnates. The new King, the young man of twenty-five, almost immediately led his country towards the one thing that would bring order and, even, unity: war with France. Henry V and his archers were on the road to Agincourt.

(from “This Sceptred Isle” by Christopher Lee, L. 1990)