The House of York was a cadet branch of the English royal House of Plantagenet.
Three of its members became Kings of England in the late 15th century.
The House of York was descended in the male line from Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York,
the fourth surviving son of Edward III, but also represented Edward's senior line, being
cognatic descendants of Lionel, Duke of Clarence, Edward III's second surviving son.
It is based on these descents that they claimed the English crown.
Compared with the House of Lancaster, it had a senior claim to the throne of England according
to cognatic primogeniture but junior claim according to the agnatic primogeniture.
Descent from Edward III
Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York, 1st Earl of Cambridge, KG was a younger son of King
Edward III of England and Philippa of Hainault, the fourth of their five sons who lived to
adulthood.
He was the founder of the House of York, but it was through the marriage of his younger
son, Richard to Anne Mortimer that the Yorkist faction in the Wars of the Roses made its
claim on the throne.
The other party in the Wars of the Roses, the Lancasters, were descendants of Edmund's
brother, John of Gaunt whose son Henry usurped the throne of Richard II in 1399 .
Edmund had two sons, Edward, and Richard of Conisburgh.
Edward succeeded to the dukedom in 1402, but was killed at the battle of Agincourt in 1415,
with no issue.
Richard married Anne Mortimer, a great-granddaughter of Lionel of Antwerp, the second son of Edward
III.
Furthermore, Anne's son Richard also became heir general to the earldom of March, after
her only brother, Edmund, 5th Earl, died without issue in 1425.
Their father Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl of March had been named heir presumptive of Richard
II before Henry IV's accession; although it had been passed over at the time, Anne's son
Richard also inherited this claim to the throne.
Richard of Conisburgh was executed following his involvement in the Southampton Plot to
depose Henry V of England in favour of the Earl of March.
The dukedom of York therefore passed to his son, Richard Plantagenet.
Through his mother, Richard Plantagenet also inherited the lands of the earldom of March,
as well as the Mortimer claim to the throne.
Wars of the Roses
Despite his elevated status, Richard Plantagenet was denied a position in government by the
advisers of the weak Henry VI, particularly John Beaufort, 1st Duke of Somerset, and the
queen consort, Margaret of Anjou.
Although he served as Protector of the Realm during Henry VI's period of incapacity in
1453-54, his reforms were reversed by Somerset's party once the king had recovered.
The Wars of the Roses began the following year, with the First Battle of St Albans.
Initially, Richard aimed only to purge his Lancastrian political opponents from positions
of influence over the king.
It was not until October 1460 that he claimed the throne for the House of York.
In that year the Yorkists had captured the king at the battle of Northampton, but victory
was short-lived.
Richard and his second son Edmund were killed at the battle of Wakefield on December 30.
Richard's claim to the throne was inherited by his son Edward.
With the support of Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick, Edward, already showing great
promise as a leader of men, defeated the Lancastrians in a succession of battles.
While Henry VI and Margaret of Anjou were campaigning in the north, Warwick gained control
of the capital and had Edward declared king in London in 1461.
Edward strengthened his claim with a decisive victory at the Battle of Towton in the same
year, in the course of which the Lancastrian army was virtually wiped out.
Reigns of the Yorkist Kings The early reign of Edward IV was marred by
Lancastrian plotting and uprisings in favour of Henry VI.
Warwick himself changed sides, and supported Margaret of Anjou and the king's jealous brother
George, Duke of Clarence, in briefly restoring Henry in 1470-71.
However, Edward regained his throne, and the house of Lancaster was all but wiped out with
the last male, Henry VI himself, murdered in the Tower of London in 1471.
In 1478, the continued trouble caused by Clarence caused him to be executed in the Tower of
London, popularly he is thought to have been drowned in a butt of malmsey wine.
On Edward's death in 1483, the crown passed to his twelve year-old son Edward.
Edward IV's younger brother Richard, Duke of Gloucester, was appointed Protector, and
escorted the young king, and his brother Richard, to the Tower of London.
The famous Princes in the Tower were never seen again.
However it is unknown whether they were killed or who killed them if it happened.
Parliament declared, in the document Titulus Regius, that the two boys were illegitimate,
on the grounds that Edward IV's marriage was invalid, and as such Richard was heir to the
throne.
He was crowned Richard III in July 1483.
Defeat of the House of York Richard III had many enemies, including the
Lancastrian sympathisers, who now rallied behind Henry Tudor, the House of Tudor being
closely linked with the House of Lancaster.
A coup attempt failed in late 1483, but in 1485 Richard met Henry Tudor at the battle
of Bosworth Field.
During the battle, some of Richard's important supporters switched sides or withheld their
retainers from the field.
Richard himself was killed, the last Plantagenet king and the last king of England to die in
battle.
Henry Tudor declared himself king, took Elizabeth of York, eldest child of Edward IV, as his
wife, symbolically uniting the surviving houses of York and Lancaster, and acceded to the
throne as Henry VII, founder of the Tudor dynasty which reigned until 1603.
Later claimants The de la Pole family were sometimes suggested
as heirs to the Yorkist cause, but Henry Tudor and his son Henry VIII of England efficiently
suppressed all such opposition.
Another Yorkist branch descends from George Plantagenet, 1st Duke of Clarence, and younger
brother of Edward IV.
The heir to this branch is the Earl of Loudoun, currently Simon Abney-Hastings.
There was in Edward IV's reign a suspicion that this king was illegitimate.
In 2004, the British station Channel 4 revived the George branch's claim as "Britain's Real
Monarch".
The Earls of Loudoun would then, at least, be the heirs to the Yorkists.
Legacy Upon Henry Tudor's uniting the rival houses
of Lancaster and York, the title Duke of York became a royal prerogative and is traditionally
accorded to the second son of the reigning monarch.
Beginning with Richard of Shrewsbury, none of its holders were able to transmit it; they
either died without a male heir or succeeded to the throne.
The title is held today by Prince Andrew, second son of Queen Elizabeth II and her consort
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.
The symbol of the House of York was a white rose, still used as the badge of Yorkshire
and Jacobitism.
York, Pennsylvania, is known as the White Rose City after the symbol of the House of
York.
The rivalry between York and Lancaster, in the modern form of the counties of Yorkshire
and Lancashire, has continued into the present day on a more friendly basis.
Dukes of York Edward Plantagenet became Edward IV in 1461,
thus merging the title of Duke of York in crown.
Yorkist Kings of England See also
Quia Emptores Yorkshire
References
External links
The White Rose of York on the 'History of York' website.
The Plantagenets on the official website of the British monarchy.
The Yorkists on the official website of the British monarchy.