Richard III
Ricardus III
King of England · Lord of Ireland · Duke of Gloucester
1452 – 1485
Biography
Last Yorkist king and last Plantagenet to wear the crown. Took the throne after declaring his nephews illegitimate and never escaped suspicion in their disappearance. Defeated and killed at Bosworth Field by Henry Tudor after barely two years on the throne, ending both the Wars of the Roses and the Plantagenet dynasty's three-and-a-half centuries on the English throne. His skeleton was rediscovered beneath a Leicester car park in 2012.
Events
Thirty-two years of intermittent civil war between the Lancastrian and Yorkist branches of the Plantagenet dynasty, triggered by the recurring incapacity of Henry VI and the rival claim of Richard, Duke of York. The conflict produced six battles in the 1450s–1460s, the murderous reign of Edward IV, the disappearance of his sons in the Tower, and the final defeat of Richard III at Bosworth in 1485. Resolved by the marriage of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York the following year.
Also there: Henry VI, Margaret of Anjou, Edward IV, Henry VII
On 22 August 1485, Henry Tudor's army of perhaps five thousand met Richard III's larger royal force on Ambion Hill in Leicestershire. The crucial defection of the Stanleys mid-battle, and Richard's reckless personal charge in an attempt to kill Henry himself, decided the outcome. Richard III became the last English king to die in battle; Henry VII was crowned on the field. The Plantagenet dynasty ended on the same hour the Tudor dynasty began.
Also there: Henry VII
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