James Gairdner

“ Five confederate lords with Gloucester at their head took up arms against the king’s favourite ministers, and the Wonderful Parliament put to death without remorse almost every agent of his former administration who had not fled the country. Gloucester even contemplated the dethronement of the king, but found that in this matter he could not rely on the support of his associates, one of whom was Henry, earl of Derby, the duke of Lancaster’s son. ”

“ As Clarence was King Edward’s third son, while John of Gaunt was his fourth, in ordinary course on the failure of the elder line the issue of Clarence should have taken precedence of that of Lancaster in the succession. But the rights of Clarence were conveyed in the first instance to an only daughter, and the ambition and policy of the house of Lancaster, profiting by advantageous circumstances, enabled them not only to gain possession of the throne but to maintain themselves in it for three generations before they were dispossessed by the representatives of the elder brother. ”

“ But Henry, duke of Hereford, whose milder sentence was doubtless owing to the fact that he was the popular favourite, came back within a year, having been furnished with a very fair pretext for doing so by a new act of injustice on the part of Richard. His father, John of Gaunt, had died in the interval, and the king, troubled with a rebellion in Ireland, and sorely in want of money, had seized the duchy of Lancaster as forfeited property. Henry at once sailed for England, and landing in Yorkshire while King Richard was in Ireland, gave out that he came only to recover his inheritance. ”