EDWARD 



1957 



EDWARD 



ageous lad of sixteen. Calais fell to the king's 

 army after a year's siege, and in 1356 the Black 

 Prince inflicted a terrible defeat on the French 

 at Poitiers, capturing their king. Later, the 

 English were less successful, and in 1375 Ed- 

 ward withdrew from the struggle because his 

 country was exhausted. During the last years 

 of his reign he quarreled constantly with Par- 

 liament, the members of which were aided in 

 their opposition by the Black Prince. 



Edward IV (1442-1483) came to the throne 

 in 1461, when the rival houses of York and 

 Lancaster were engaged in the Wars of the 

 Roses. Edward's father, Richard, Duke of 

 York, was the grandson of the fourth son of 

 Edward III, the rival line of Lancaster being 

 descended from John of Gaunt, the third son. 

 In 1460 Richard was defeated and slain at the 

 Battle of Wakefield, and Edward, placing him- 

 self at the head of the Yorkist party, led his 

 forces to victory at Towton Field (March, 

 1461) and won the crown from the helpless 

 Henry VI. 



His hold on the throne was not secure, how- 

 ever, and when in 1469 the powerful Earl of 

 Warwick went over to the side of the Lan- 

 castrians Edward was forced to flee from Eng- 

 land. Two years later he returned, gathered 

 together an army and reestablished his claim 

 to the kingship by the decisive victories of 

 Barnet and Tewkesbury. The remainder of his 

 reign was peaceful and was marked by his 

 policy of strengthening the royal power. In 

 this manner he paved the way for the abso- 

 lute monarchy under the Tudors. During Ed- 

 ward's reign printing and silk manufactures 

 were introduced into England. 



Edward V (1470-1483) succeeded his father, 

 Edward IV, at the age of thirteen. Richard, 

 Duke of Gloucester, the cruel and unscrupu- 

 lous uncle of the young king, at once pro- 

 claimed himself Protector of the Kingdom, and 

 sent Edward and his younger brother prisoners 

 to the Tower of London. There they were 

 smothered to death by one of Richard's nobles, 

 and the Duke became king as Richard III. 

 The pathetic story of the murdered princes is 

 given poetic treatment in Shakespeare's King 

 Richard III. 



Edward VI (1537-1553), the son of Henry 

 VIII by his third wife, Jane Seymour, suc- 

 ceeded his father in 1547. Edward was one of 

 the boy kings of England, for he was only ten 

 when he came to the throne, and he died at 

 the age of .sixteen. During the greater part of 

 his reign the affairs of the kingdom were in 



the control of the king's uncle, Edward Sey- 

 mour, Duke of Somerset. During this period 

 Protestantism was established as the state re- 

 ligion. In 1549 the English Book oj Common 

 Prayer was prepared by Archbishop Cranmer, 

 and in 1552 the famous Articles of Religion 

 were published. 



Edward VII (1841-1910), whose title in full 

 was "King of the United Kingdom of Great 

 Britain and Ireland, and of all the British 

 Dominions beyond the Seas, Emperor of In- 

 dia," was the eldest son of Queen Victoria and 



ALBERT EDWARD (EDWARD VII) 

 Son of Queen Victoria and father of George V. 



the Prince Consort, Albert. He was born in 

 Buckingham Palace on November 9, 1841, was 

 christened Albert Edward, and by right of in- 

 heritance received the title Prince of Wales at 

 his birth. The Prince was educated in a man- 

 ner befitting the heir apparent to the Hnti.-h 

 throne, and among his early tutors was the 

 novelist, Charles Kingsley. His university 

 training consisted of a session at the University 

 of Edinburgh, a year at Christ Church, Oxford, 

 and four terms at Cambridge. In 1860 he 

 visited Canada and the United States, where 

 he was most cordially welcomed, and* two 

 years later, in company with Dean Stanley, 

 traveled through Egypt, Palestine and India. 



In 1863, then twenty-one years of age, Prince 

 Albert Edward took his seat in the House of 

 Lords, formally beginning his public life. The 

 same year he married Princess Alexandra, eld- 

 est daughter of Christian X of Denmark, who 

 came to be greatly loved by the English peo- 



