John of Gaunt was born at Ghent, in Flanders (hence his surname), in March, 1340. In A.D. 1369 he was sent over to France with a considerable force, but owing to sickness in his camp he returned to England, to find that his wife had during his absence died of the plague, and been buried in great state in Westminster Abbey. In 51 Edward III. (1377), a grant of a chancery in his dukedom and all the rights appertaining to a county palatine was made to him; and he was ordered to send (when required) two knights to Parliament "for the commonality," two burgesses for every borough in the said county. Previous to this John of Gaunt had taken to himself a second wife--Constance, one of the daughters and heiresses of Peter the Cruel, King of Castile and Leon, whose arms he impaled with his ducal coat; his attempt by force of arms to obtain a right to the kingly title, however, failed. The life of the illustrious Duke of Lancaster is written in the pages of English history: his many military exploits, his bold bearing in opposing the bishops in the Wickliffe case, the many offices which he held under the King, his unpopularity at the time of the insurrection of Wat Tyler, his doings in Scotland and in Spain, are all incidents in the career of one whose name must for ever be remembered in the county where he held such power. For his duchy he obtained in 13 Richard II. (1390) a right to have an exchequer in the county, with barons and officers appertaining thereunto, and also the right to appoint justices itinerant for the pleas of the forests. John, named Plantagenet King of Castile and Leon, Duke of Lancaster, Earl of Leicester, Lincoln and Derby, Lieutenant of the King in Aquitaine, and High Steward of England,[89] died in the year 1399. Under this Duke, Lancaster Castle was partly rebuilt, and a considerable portion of the gateway tower (which still bears his name) added. Henry Bolingbroke, who was now Duke of Hereford, was the next heir to the dukedom, but as he was in exile for his supposed treason, the King (Richard II.) seized the possessions of the late John of Gaunt, and shortly afterwards proceeded to Ireland, where he learnt that during his absence Bolingbroke had returned to England, and that the whole kingdom had received him with open arms. The King's flight to Wales, his surrender, first of his person and then of his throne, followed in rapid succession, and on September 29, 1399, the head of the House of Lancaster became King of England under the title of Henry IV.