The Lancastrian claimant to the English throne,…
1485 CE
The Lancastrian claimant to the English throne, twenty-nine-year-old Welshman Henry Tudor, is the posthumous son of Edmund Tudor, earl of Richmond and half-brother to Henry VI, and Margaret Beaufort, a descendant of King Edward III through John of Gaunt and his mistress Catherine Swynford.
Aided by the French and by a cabal of disaffected Yorkist nobles, Henry invades England, meeting King Richard III in battle on August 22, 1485, at Bosworth Field in Leicestershire.
Richard orders a cavalry charge, then signals for his reserves, discovering too late that their treasonous leader is attacking the main body of the royal army.
Richard himself enters the battle, but is struck from behind, falls, and is stabbed to death.
At Bosworth, Henry institutes the Yeoman of the Guard, who are to function as bodyguards of the English monarch.
John Howard, a favorite of Richard III and whose mother was the heiress of Thomas Mowbray, duke of Norfolk, had in 1483 become the first Howard to be ennobled, as the first duke of Norfolk.
John, fifty-five, is killed in the Battle of Bosworth Field.
His thirty-two son and successor, Thomas, who also fights at Bosworth, is imprisoned by the new king, Henry VII, but is later restored to influence.
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