See HANSA TOWNS. ENGLAND: A. D. 1476. Introduction of Printing by Caxton. See PRINTING, &c.: A. D. 1476-1491. ENGLAND: A. D. 1483-1485. Murder of the young king, Edward V. Accession of Richard III. The battle of Bosworth and the fall of the House of York. On the death of Edward IV., in 1483, his crafty and unscrupulous brother, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, gathered quickly into his hands the reins of power, proceeding with consummate audacity and ruthlessness to sweep every strong rival out of his path. Contenting himself for a few weeks, only, with the title of Protector, he soon disputed the validity of his brother Edward's marriage, caused an obsequious Parliament to set aside the young sons whom the latter had left, declaring them to be illegitimate, and placed the crown on his own head. The little princes (King Edward V., and Richard, Duke of York), immured in the Tower, were murdered presently at their uncle's command, and Richard III. appeared, for the time, to have triumphed in his ambitious villainy. But, popular as he made himself in many cunning ways, his deeds excited a horror which united Lancastrians with the party of York in a common detestation. Friends of Henry, Earl of Richmond, then in exile, were not slow to take advantage of this feeling. Henry could claim descent from the same John of Gaunt, son of Edward III., to whom the House of Lancaster traced its lineage; but his family--the Beauforts--sprang from the mistress, not the wife, of the great Duke of Lancaster, and had only been legitimated by act of Parliament. The Lancastrians, however, were satisfied with the royalty of his blood, and the Yorkists were made content by his promise to marry a daughter of Edward IV. On this understanding being arranged, Henry came over from Brittany to England, landing at Milford Haven on the 7th or 8th of August, 1485, and advancing through Wales, being joined by great numbers as he moved. Richard, who had no lack of courage, marched quickly to meet him, and the two forces joined battle on Bosworth Field, in Leicestershire, on Sunday, August 21. At the outset of the fighting Richard was deserted by a large division of his army and saw that his fate was sealed. He plunged, with despairing rage, into the thickest of the struggle and was slain. His crowned helmet, which he had worn, was found by Sir Reginald Bray, battered and broken, under a hawthorn bush, and placed on the head of his rival, who soon attained a more solemn coronation, as Henry VII. _C. M. Yonge, Cameos from English History, 3d Series, chapters 19-20._