The New Murrey and Blue blog

“….The Duchy of Lancaster came to the Crown in controversy and it’s still making headlines today….” If you want to read about the duchy, its history and what’s happening now, see here https://www.duchyoflancaster.co.uk/.

But my purpose here is to unpick certain untruths about the duchy that are constantly and unfairly stitched upon the memory of King Richard II (https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofEngland/King-Richard-II/). You’ll see what I mean if you read this link https://royalcentral.co.uk/uk/king/the-duchy-of-lancaster-came-to-the-crown-in-controversy-and-its-still-making-headlines-today-204623/. In it you’ll find the usual guff about nasty tyrannical Richard II banishing poor lickle Henry of Bolingbroke (by then the two-timing, eye-bogglingly, slippery, wealthy and powerful Duke of Lancaster) and then proceeding to steal the unfortunate chap’s patrimony. Oh, what a rotten royal fiend that Richard of Bordeaux was!

Anyone would think that scheming Bolingbroke was a lily-white babe-in-arms left alone in a dark, dark forest in the middle of a winter storm!

Well, that’s what you’re supposed to think. But never forget that the House of Lancaster was the forerunner of the Tudors, and it too had grabbed the throne and had to justify usurpation. The House of Lancaster was the first to resort to the dubious arts of lies and propaganda, the Tudors merely mastered both.

However, when it comes to Richard II, if you read this Murrey & Blue post—https://murreyandblue.org/2023/12/18/tyrants-part-1/ by sighthound6—you’ll see that the charges against Richard are simply hogwash. The lands in question weren’t confiscated forever, just until such time as Bolingbroke returned from exile to claim them. They were to be looked after properly in the meantime. Nor was Bolingbroke banished into abject poverty, for he was granted substantial monetary support. He was simply being taught a sharp but temporary lesson by a monarch who’d endured enough trouble from him to last a lifetime. That is all! Richard had never intended to keep the Lancastrian inheritance, yet time and again he is accused of precisely this. People read the headline, but don’t bother with the article to which it pertains!

Henry IV Part I happens to be the only Shakespeare I’ve seen on stage. Birmingham Repertory Theatre,16 February–9 April 1960. It was part of that year’s ‘O’ English Literature course for the Northern Universities, and the students from my school in Nottingham went to see the production. I didn’t like him then either! Bolingbroke, that is. Actually, come to that, nor was I particularly struck on Shakespeare’s “historical” plays. But I did gain my ‘O’ level!😇

Mind you, if Richard II had stolen the Lancastrian heritage it would have been no more than his first cousin Bolingbroke deserved. The fellow was a miserable turncoat who thought himself superior to everyone else, with the possible exception of the Almighty. Hm, maybe even including the Almighty….

When Richard was still a child, Bolingbroke’s father, John of Gaunt, worked on the boy’s grandfather, old Edward III (Richard’s father, the Black Prince, having already passed on) to draw up an entail that excluded female lines from the succession. This was because there was another line senior to Gaunt’s, that of his other deceased older brother Lionel of Clarence. But Lionel’s line descended through a daughter, Philippa of Clarence, who was married to Edmund Mortimer, 3^rd Earl of March. They had a baby boy, another Roger Mortimer (https://www.englishmonarchs.co.uk/plantagenet_50.html) who was widely considered to be Richard’s rightful heir. (See the genealogical tree below.)

Gaunt wanted to be sure this female line was ignored in favour of his own male line. Never mind that Gaunt himself claimed the crown of Castile through his wife, or that Edward III claimed France through his mother – what a pair of hypocrites!

If Richard II remained childless throughout his reign, and died without naming an heir (and with Gaunt undoubtedly being dead by then) Bolingbroke could produce the entail which put him neatly into position of heir apparent. There wouldn’t be anything the Mortimers could do about it.

Well before then Bolingbroke joined the Lords Appellant, who were responsible for imposing all manner of humiliation upon Richard, to say nothing of executing his friends and close advisors. They beheaded his advisor and childhood tutor Sir Simon Burley, even though the queen pleaded on her knees for Simon’s life. They also considered turning Richard himself off the throne! Perhaps they even did for a short time, before hastily restoring him. It’s not entirely clear.

These overweening lords were nothing short of murderers and bullies who seized power illegally, but do we hear them criticised? No! It’s always Richard himself—their victim!—who gets the flak because he took his revenge on them! Well, for Pete’s sake, he was hardly likely to sit back and play madrigals! Would you?

If I’d been Richard, I’d have banished the Lancastrian Bolingbroke ratbag as well. But the unworthy Bolingbroke came back from exile, just like the nursery rhyme cat.

“….But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn’t stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea….”

Bolingbroke not only came back, he brought a large army with him to seize the kingdom when Richard was away in Ireland. Pretending to be only seeking his patrimony, he overwhelmed the realm, captured and imprisoned Richard….then murdered him and usurped the throne. So one way or another the House of Lancaster wore the crown. But certainly not through the customary methods of succession.

Nor was there any sign of the supposed Edward III entail, Bolingbroke simply snatched the throne by force. Had Richard countermanded it? Had Edward III never been finally persuaded to sign it? We’ll never know.

In 1485 Henry Tudor was to take the throne by force as well. He too made noises about being the Lancastrian heir, but it was a very dodgy link through Gaunt’s originally illegitimate Beaufort line (https://luminarium.org/encyclopedia/houseofbeaufort.htm). It also descended through a union (unproven marriage) between the French widow of Henry V and a Welshman named Owen Tudor (https://murreyandblue.org/2014/11/15/on-fairy-tales/). A little ticklish, you’ll agree. But there was no argument if a battle was won decisively and the previous king was killed. Job done.

Richard II is maligned in so many ways, just like Richard III. And both died in suspect circumstances before being supplanted by their killers. No wonder thousands of us stand up for them!