There the decisive battle was fought between the great rival houses of
York and Lancaster (S300). Richard represented the first, and Henry
Tudor, Earl of Richmond, the second. The King went out the evening
before to look over the ground. He found one of his sentinels
slumbering at his post. Drawing his sword, he stabbed him in the
heart, saying, "I found him asleep and I leave him asleep." Going back
to his tent, he passed a restless night. The ghosts of all his
murdered victims seemed to pass in procession before him. Such a
sight may well, as Shakespeare says, have "struck terror to the soul
of Richard."[2]
[2] Shakespeare's "Richard III," Act V, scene iii.
At sunrise the battle began. Before the attack, Richard, it is said,
confessed to his troops the murder of his two nephews (S310), but
pleaded that he had atoned for the crime with "many salt tears and
long penance." It is probably that had it not been for the treachery
of some of his adherents the King would have won the day.
When he saw that he was deserted by those on whose help he had
counted, he uttered the cry of "Treason! treason!" and dashed forward
into the thick of the fight. With the fury of despair he hewed his
way into the very presence of Henry Tudor, and killing the standard
bearer, flung the Lancastrian banner to the ground. But he could go
no further. Numbers overpowered him, and he fell.
During the battle Richard had worn his crown. After all was over, it
was found hanging on a hawthorn bush[1] and handed to the victor, who
placed it on his own head. The army then gathered round Henry Tudor
thus crowned, and moved by one impulse joined in the exultant hymn of
the Te Deum.[2] Thus ended the last of the Plantagenet line (S159).
"Whatever their faults or crimes, there was not a coward among
them."[3]
[1] An ancient stained-glass window in the east end of Henry VII's
Chapel (Westminster Abbey) commemorates this incident.
[2] "Te Deum laudamus" (We praise thee, O God): a Roman Catholic hymn
of thanksgiving, now sung in English in the Episcopal and other
churches.
[3] W. Stubb's "Constitutional History of England."