England and the Hundred Years' War

A warrior king claims the French throne. A peasant girl hears voices from God. Cousins tear England apart in a civil war that lasts thirty years. This is the story of the Hundred Years' War and its violent aftermath, told by the great military historian Charles Oman. Oman traces the conflict from Edward III's furious claim to the French crown in 1337 through the legendary victories at Crecy and Agincourt, the tragedy of the Black Prince, the miraculous rise and burning of Joan of Arc, and the eventual English collapse at Castillon in 1453. But the war does not end there. Oman carries the narrative through the dynastic slaughter of the Wars of the Roses, where cousin fights cousin for a crown that seems cursed, until Richard III falls at Bosworth Field and the Tudor line rises from the blood. This is narrative history at its most visceral: battles won and lost, plagues that emptied villages, and a century and a half when England and France burned each other's fields and cities. Oman's classic account remains essential for anyone who wants to understand how two nations forged their identities in fire.