[Mid. Eng. Gaunt=Ghent, his birthplace], 134099, duke of Lancaster; fourth son of Edward III </65/ed/Edward3.html> of England. He married (1359) Blanche, heiress of Lancaster, and through her became earl (1361) and duke (1362) of Lancaster. The Lancaster holdings made him the wealthiest and one of the most influential nobles in England. He served under his brother, Edward the Black Prince </65/ed/EdwardBl.html>, in the Hundred Years War and went (1367) on his campaign to aid Peter the Cruel </65/pe/PeterCru.html> of Castile. After the death of Blanche he married (1371) Peters daughter, Constance, and thus gained a claim to the Castilian throne. When the Black Prince became ill during the French campaign of 137071, John took chief command. In 1373 he led his army from Calais to Bordeaux, but the expedition accomplished little. After a truce was reached (1375) he returned to England, where he allied himself with the corrupt court party led by Alice Perrers, mistress of the aging Edward III. For a short time John of Gaunt in effect ruled England. His party was temporarily dislodged from power by the Good Parliament of 1376, but John was soon able to restore his friends and assembled a hand-picked Parliament in 1377. Hostility to the strong clerical party, led by William of Wykeham </65/wi/WilliamW.html>, caused him to support the movement of John Wyclif </65/wy/Wyclif-W.html>. After the accession (1377) of his nephew, Richard II </65/ri/Richard2.html>, John remained the most powerful figure in the government, but he devoted himself primarily to military matters. In 1386, allied with John I of Portugal, who married one of his daughters, he led an expedition to make good his Castilian claims against John I of Castile. John of Gaunt finally agreed to peace in 1388, transferred his claims to his daughter by Constance of Castile, and married her to the future Henry III of Castile. He returned to England in 1389, was made duke of Aquitaine, and helped to restore peace between Richard II and the hostile barons led by Thomas of Woodstock, duke of Gloucester </65/gl/GloucsT.html>. In 1396, John of Gaunt married Catherine Swynford (sister of the wife of Geoffery Chaucer), many years his mistress, and had his children by her, under the name of Beaufort, declared legitimate. He died soon after the king had exiled his eldest son, the duke of Hereford (later Henry IV </65/he/Henry4Eng.html>, first of the royal line of Lancaster). John is also remembered as the patron of the poet Geoffrey Chaucer. Eric Delderfield: "Richard II [nephew of John of Gaunt] succeeded his grandfather [Edward III] in 1377 at the age of ten, at a time of social unrest. Though government was entrusted to a council of twelve, it was dominated by John of Gaunt, Richard's uncle until the fourteen-old king displayed a remarkable ability to defuse the dangerous... Peasants' Revolt, when 100,000 men from Essex and Kent marched on London. ...After seizing Rochester Castle, the men of Kent under Wat Tyler joined forces with the rebels from Essex and entered the city of London, destroying John of Gaunt's manor. Richard met the Essex men and persuaded them to return home by agreeing to meet their demands. The Kent rebels, meanwhile, burned Temple Bar, occupied the Tower of London, and executed the Chancellor and Archbishop of Canterbury, Simon of Sudbury, before meeting the king at Smithfield. During negotiations the Mayor of London killed Wat Tyler, but Richard rode amongst the rebels, and by granting their demands induced them to disperse. ...After the Peasants' Revolt, John of Gaunt receded into the background, concentrating on winning his claim through his second wife to the Crown of Castile." When John of Gaunt died in 1399, his nephew Richard II provoked his own downfall by denying Gaunt's son, Henry Bolingbroke [# 3478], of Gaunt's estates; thus did Richard also set into motion the conflict over the English crown that would be known as the Wars of the Roses.

Facts about this person:

Record Change December 07, 1999

Burial March 15, 1398/99 London, England

1399 Henry Percy is exiled for high treason. John of Gaunt who is the father of Henry Percy (Henry IV) dies in February 1399 and Richard seizes all his properties. Henry raised an army and returned to England. His campaign was successful and Richard was arrested and imprisoned. In September Henry IV had himself crowned and ascended the throne.

Born: March 1340 at St. Bavon Abbey, Ghent, Flanders Earl of Richmond Earl of Lancaster Earl of Derby Earl of Lincoln Earl of Leicester Duke of Lancaster King of Castile & Leon Died: 3rd February 1399 at Leicester Castle, Leicestershire

This prince, the fourth son of King Edward III http://www.britannia.com/history/monarchs/mon32.html and Queen Philippa, was born at Ghent (or Gaunt) in Flanders, in 1340. In his infancy, he was created Earl of Richmond and, by that title, admitted into the Order of the Garter upon the death of Thomas Holland, Earl of Kent, one of the original knights. In 1359, at Reading Abbey http://www.britannia.com/history/berks/churches/rdgab.html (Berks), he married Blanche, the younger of the two daughters and co-heirs of Henry, Duke of Lancaster, and upon the death of his father-in-law, in 1361, he was advanced to that Dukedom. He held also, in right of his wife, the Earldoms of Derby, Lincoln and Leicester, and the high office of Steward of England. Blanche, dying in 1369, the ambition of the Duke - who had taken an active part in the war carried on by the his brother, Black Prince, for the restoration of Peter, King of Castile & Leon - induced him to direct his views towards Constance, the elder of the two daughters of that monarch, then lately slain by his illegitimate brother, Henry of Transtamare, his successor under the title of Henry II. In 1372, the Duke married this princess and thus assumed the regal style of those kingdoms. These titular honours were ascribed to him in the writs of summons to Parliament from that year until 1386, when, by an arrangement with King John I of Castile & Leon, the son and successor of Henry, Catherine, the only daughter of the Duke of Lancaster by Constance, was betrothed to Henry, Prince of Asturias, his heir-apparent, and the crown settled upon the issue of that alliance. Although John of Gaunt had been engaged in warlike enterprises from his earliest years, yet his martial achievements did not increase the lustre of British glory or secure for himself the character of a great commander. In three expeditions into France, in 1369, 1370 and 1373, he gained no laurels and the peculiar misfortunes which attended the last, when a considerable number of his followers perished amongst the mountains of Auvergne, rendered him very unpopular on his return to England in July 1374. All Guienne and Gascony, with the exception of the towns of Bordeaux and Bayonne, had fallen from their allegiance and a suspension of hostilities was negotiated at Bruges, by the Duke and others, with the Duke of Anjou, before the expiration of that year. After the death of the Black Prince, in 1376, the Duke of Lancaster acquired a marked ascendency in the councils of the infirm monarch, his father. His administration of public affairs is said, furthermore, to have been stained by several acts of violence. On the 16th June 1386, "at the palace of John of Gaunt, King of Castile & Leon, in the convent of the Friars Carmelites, at Plymouth" (where he was then sojourning prior to his embarkation for Spain), he gave his remarkable testimony in favour of the right of Sir Richard Scrope to the arms borne by him in the celebrated controversy between Scrope and Sir Robert Grosvenor. John continued to govern the Kingdom during the minority of his nephew, Richard II http://www.britannia.com/history/monarchs/mon33.html, by whom, in 1389, he was created Duke of Aquitaine. His power increasing, he proffered, in open parliament, a claim to the succession for his son, Henry Bolingbroke (later King Henry IV http://www.britannia.com/history/monarchs/mon34.html), as son to Blanche, great-grandaughter of Edmund Crouchback, Earl of Lancaster, whom, he pretended, had been elder brother to King Edward I http://www.britannia.com/history/monarchs/mon30.html, but set aside on account of his deformity. The weakness of this pretension, which, if established, would have been fatal to the reigning monarch, was opposed, without difficulty, by Roger Mortimer, Earl of March, who, as son and heir of Philippa, the daughter and heir of his elder brother, Lionel http://www.britannia.com/bios/royals/ladkclre.html, Duke of Clarence, had, by the laws of the empire, an indisputably prior right and was, accordingly, declared the presumptive heir to the crown. The Duchess Constance dying in 1394, John espoused, in 1396, Catherine, daughter of Sir Paine Roet, Guienne King of Arms, and widow of Sir Hugh Swynford, a knight of Lincolnshire. This lady had been of the household of the Duchess Blanche and charged with the education of the ladies Philippa and Elizabeth during their minority. On the 3rd February 1399, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, died at the Bishop of Ely's Palace in Holborn. Conforming to his will, dated 3rd February 1398, his body was interred before the high altar of Old St. Paul's Cathedral, near the remains of Blanche, his first consort. By his first consort, Blanche of Lancaster, he had issue: 1. Henry, Duke of Hereford & Lancaster and Earl of Derby, afterwards King Henry IV. 2. Philippa, married to John I, King of Portugal. Seven kings pf her issue governed that country. 3. Elizabeth, married, firstly, to John Holland, Duke of Exeter, and, secondly, Sir John Cornwall Lord Fanhope. By his second consort, Constance of Castile, John of Gaunt had an only daughter, Catherine, wife of Henry, Prince of Asturias, afterwards Henry III, King of Castile & Leon. The descendants of this alliance were on the throne of Spain until King Charles II, who died in 1700. His issue, before his marriage to his third consort, Catherine Swynford, were legitimated by Act of Parliament, 9th February 1397. They were all surnamed "De Beaufort," having been born at Beaufort Castle in France, which had devolved to the Huse of Lancaster by the marriage of Blanche of Artois with Edmund, Earl of Lancaster. They were: 1. John Beaufort, Earl of Somerset and Marquis of Dorset, KG 2. Henry Beaufort http://www.britannia.com/bios/hbeaufrt.html, Bishop of Lincoln, afterwards of Winchester, and, at length, Cardinal and Chancellor of England 3. Thomas Beaufort, Duke of Exeter, KG 4. Joan Beaufort, married, firstly, to Sir Robert Ferrers of Worn and Oversley; and, secondly, to Ralph Neville, Earl of Westmorland. Her grandsons included Richard, Earl of Warwick 'the Kingmaker,' Kings Edward IV http://www.britannia.com/history/monarchs/mon37.html and Richard III http://www.britannia.com/history/monarchs/mon39.html.