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Tolkien vs. Disney and Other Major Historic Feuds

Khalid Elhassan August 20, 2021 37 min

7. An Earl Caught Between A Rock and a Hard Place

The newly-crowned Yorkist King Richard III was almost immediately challenged by Henry Tudor, the last viable claimant of the defeated Lancastrian branch of the House of Plantagenet. After years of exile, Tudor returned to England in 1485 and declared his bid for the throne. Richard set out to meet his challenger at the head of his forces, which included a large contingent commanded by Thomas Stanley, 1^st Earl of Derby. Stanley was a major Yorkist supporter, but he was conflicted. His family had been Lancastrians, but he himself had defected to the Yorkists, who handsomely rewarded him with lands and estates, and appointments to powerful government positions.

Stanley was thus deeply indebted to the Yorkists. However, he also happened to be married to Henry Tudor’s mother, and that made him the Lancastrian challenger’s stepfather. That stuck Stanley between the rock of loyalty, and the hard place of peace at home. So he decided to play both sides of the feud, and secretly contacted his stepson to explore defection. Things got complicated when King Richard got wind of that: he seized Stanley’s son as a hostage for his father’s good behavior and an insurance against treachery. He then ordered Stanley to join the Yorkist army with his contingent, which the earl reluctantly did.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.