Plantagenet, Henry IV

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Henry Plantagenet IV

Henry IV (3 April 1367 – 20 Mar 1413) was the King of England and France and Lord of Ireland from 1399 to 1413. He was born at Bolingbroke Castle in Lincolnshire, hence the other name by which he was known, "Henry (of) Bolingbroke". His father, John of Gaunt, was the third and oldest surviving son of King Edward III of England, and enjoyed a position of considerable influence during much of the reign of Richard II. Henry's mother was Blanche, heiress to the considerable Lancaster estates. In 1399, Henry's father John of Gaunt died, and without explanation, King Richard II cancelled the legal documents that would have allowed Henry to inherit Gaunt's land automatically; instead, Henry would be required to ask for the lands from Richard. After some hesitation, Henry met with the exiled Thomas Arundel, former, and future Archbishop of Canterbury, who had lost his position because of his involvement with the Lords Appellant. Henry and Arundel returned to England while Richard was on a military campaign in Ireland. With Arundel as his advisor, Henry Bolingbroke began a military campaign, confiscating land from those who opposed him and ordering his soldiers to destroy much of Cheshire. Henry quickly gained enough power and support to have himself declared King Henry IV, to imprison King Richard, and to by-pass Richard’s seven-year-old heir-presumptive, Edmund de Mortimer. After an early assassination plot was foiled, Richard died in prison in early 1400 under mysterious circumstances, seemingly by starvation, possibly ordered by Henry, although there is no firm historical evidence for this. Henry's coronation, on 13 October 1399, is notable as the first time following the Norman Conquest that the monarch made an address in English. Source: Photograph by Nick L Henry IV of England, Image from Cassell's History of England, Century Edition, published circa 1902. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_IV_of_England

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