Houses of Lancaster and York with the Conquest and Loss of France

This is the story of how a mighty medieval empire crumbled, and the blood price England paid for it. Gairdner traces the collapse of Plantagenet power from the death of Edward III in 1377 through the chaos of Richard II's deposition, the brief glory of Henry V's Agincourt, and the catastrophic reign of Henry VI, a king whose mind shattered under the weight of crown and conquest. The narrative braids together two intertwined catastrophes: the Hundred Years' War's final, agonizing campaigns and the internal dynastic warfare that erupted when the Lancastrian hold on power grew untenable. Gairdner demonstrates how the loss of France was not merely a military failure but the product of systemic collapse, a treasury drained by decades of war, a nobility fractured by rival claims, and a royal line cursed by madness and weak successors. His account remains essential for understanding how the dream of an English empire in France dissolved in civil strife, leaving behind a kingdom devoured by the Wars of the Roses.