One battle was fought between the Welsh Yorkists and the Welsh Lancastrians. This was the battle of Mortimer’s Cross, near Wigmore, in February 1461. The victor was the young Duke of York, who was crowned king as Edward IV. later in the year. An old man, Owen Tudor, the father of Jasper Tudor, and the grandfather of the boy who was “to rule after them all” as Henry VII., was taken prisoner. They took him to Hereford, and there they cut his head off and set it on the market cross. The battles of the Wars of the Roses were very cruel ones; the noble prisoners that had been taken, even children of tender age, were murdered in cold blood on the evening of the battle. “By God’s blood,” said one, as he killed a child, “thy father slew mine, and so will I do thee.” The Welsh barons led their men to nearly all the important battles. North Wales archers, wearing the three feathers of the Prince of Wales, fought for Lancaster in the snow at the great defeat of Towton on the Palm Sunday of 1461; the archers of Gwent, led by Herbert, fought vainly for York at the battle of Edgecote, in the summer of 1469. And the Welsh waverer and traitor was seen in battle also—Grey of Ruthin led the van for Lancaster at the battle of Northampton in 1460, and caused the battle to be lost by deserting to York at the be ginning of the fighting. In Wales itself, also, the war was fought bitterly; and the stubborn defence of Harlech for the Lancastrians became famous through the whole country. The last battle fought between Lancaster and York was the battle of Tewkesbury, in May 1471, and Lancaster lost it; the Prince of Wales, the king’s only son, was killed; and his heroic mother, Margaret of Anjou, gave the struggle up. A young Welsh noble—Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond—became the Lancastrian heir. The fortunes of his house were hopeless, however; and his uncle, Jasper, sent him in safety to Brittany. The Yorkist kings, Edward IV. and Richard III., in spite of cruelty and murder, ruled well. They broke the power of the barons, and they made the people rich—by maintaining peace, by repressing piracy, by protecting the woollen industry of the towns. In Wales their rule was for peace and order. They made a Court for Wales at Ludlow, the home of their race. From Ludlow they began to force the barons to do justice and to obey the king. It seemed as if the rule of the Yorkists was to be a long one, for they were very popular in London and the towns. But the nobles were not willing to see their power taken from them day by day. Jasper Tudor appealed to the loyalty of the Welsh, and the men of West Wales wanted a king of their own blood; for the laws had been made unjust to them ever since the time of Owen Glendower.