| Richard Plantagenet, 3rd Duke of York served in | | | | England and France and prevented him from |
| senior military positions in France during the | | | | acquiring any office of major influence. He was |
| Hundred Years' War. His conflcit with King Henry | | | | well received by both the Anglo-Irish and the |
| VI was a major cause of the War of the Roses. | | | | Gaelic Irish. By the time of his departure in 1450, |
| He never became King but he was father of | | | | Richard had successively cemented the link |
| Edward IV and Richard III. Outside the Pale, | | | | between Ireland and the Yorkist cause. When the |
| Ireland was divided up into a plethora of individual | | | | Yorkist forces were routed in 1459, Richard fled |
| supremacies some were loyal to the English | | | | to Ireland where he was given sanctuary, indeed |
| Crown, some were not. The Gaelic chieftains | | | | parliament declared that Ireland was bound only |
| directed their fiefdoms with little or no recognition | | | | by laws passed by its own parliament. Ireland now |
| of the English administration. Three great | | | | recognised the rebellious Duke of York as |
| Anglo-Irish lordships, straddled the south of the | | | | opposed to supporting Henry VI. However, |
| country namely the Butler earldom of Ormond | | | | Richard was killed at the Battle of Wakefield in |
| and the Fitzgerald earldoms of Desmond and | | | | December 1460, his head was chopped off, |
| Kildare. These earls were also caught up in the | | | | crowned with a paper crown and set on the walls |
| complexities of their Gaelic neighbours through a | | | | of York. However, within months the Yorkists |
| complicated system of alliances and antagonisms. | | | | triumphed with Richard's son Edward IV ascending |
| In 1449, Richard, Duke of York arrived in Ireland, | | | | to the throne, therefore averting a fractious |
| appointed as Lord Lieutenant. This was a | | | | division between England and Ireland. |
| convenient way of removing him from both | | | | |