Richard III / Makers of History

by Jacob Abbott

			EDWARD = Philippa
Edward (The Black Prince).		Lionel (Duke of Clarence).		John (Of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster).		Edmund (Duke of York).
Richard II.		Phillippa = Edward Mortimer.		Henry IV.		Richard = Anne.
						(See second column.)
		Roger Mortimer		Henry V.
		(Earl of Marche).				Richard Plantagenet
				Henry VI.		(Duke of York).
		Anne = Richard of York.
		(See fourth column.)		Edward
				(Prince of Wales).
		Edward IV.		George		Richard III.
				(Duke of Clarence).

The character = denotes marriage; the short perpendicular line | a descent. There were many other children and descendants in the different branches of the family besides those whose names are inserted in the table. The table includes only those essential to an understanding of the history.

Now, as appears by the table, John of Gaunt was the third of the four sons, Lionel, Duke of Clarence, being the second. The descendants of Lionel would properly have come before those of John in the succession, but it happened that the only descendants of Lionel were Philippa, a daughter, and Roger, a grandchild, who was at this time an infant. Neither of these were able to assert their claims, although in theory their claims were acknowledged to be prior to those of the descendants of John. The people of England, however, were so desirous to be rid of Richard, that they were willing to submit to the reign of any member of the royal family who should prove strong enough to dispossess him. So they accepted Henry of Lancaster, who ascended the throne as Henry the Fourth, and he and his successors in the Lancastrian line, Henry the Fifth and Henry the Sixth, held the throne for many years.

Union of the houses of Clarence and York.

Still, though the people of England generally acquiesced in this, the families of the other brothers, namely, of Lionel and Edmund, called generally the houses of Clarence and of York, were not satisfied. They combined together, and formed a great many plots and conspiracies against the house of Lancaster, and many insurrections and wars, and many cruel deeds of violence and murder grew out of the quarrel. At length, to strengthen their alliance more fully, Richard, the second son of Edmund of York, married Anne, a descendant of the Clarence line. The other children, who came before these, in the two lines, soon afterward died, leaving the inheritance of both to this pair. Their son was Richard, the father of Richard the Third. He is called Richard Plantagenet, Duke of York. On the death of his father and mother, he, of course, became the heir not only of the immense estates and baronial rights of both the lines from which he had descended, but also of the claims of the older line to the crown of England.

The successive generations of these three lines, down to the period of the union of the second and fourth, cutting off the third, is shown clearly in the table.

Richard Plantagenet a prisoner.

Of course, the Lancaster line were much alarmed at the combination of the claims of their rivals. King Henry the Fifth was at that period on the throne, and, by the time that Richard Plantagenet was three years old, under pretense of protecting him from danger, he caused him to be shut up in a castle, and kept a close prisoner there.

King Henry VI.
His gentle and quiet character.
Portrait.