By the Rev. Wm. Geo. Dimock Fletcher, M.A.
F.S.A., Vicar of St. Michael’s, Shrewsbury.

Battlefield Church owes its foundation to the success achieved by King Henry IV. at the battle of Shrewsbury. That prince, who as Duke of Hereford had been banished in 1398 for ten years by Richard II., returned to England in the following year, on the death of his father, John of Gaunt ostensibly to claim his estates which the King had seized. He was joined by the Percies, Nevills, and other barons, and marched towards the west of England. Bristol having been captured, and the King shortly afterwards made prisoner, Henry avowed his design of seizing the crown, the Duke of York supporting him. Accordingly, the King was compelled to sign a deed of renunciation to the crown, and a parliament was summoned to meet at Westminster 30 Sept. 1399, at which Richard’s cession was read and approved, and the sentence of deposition solemnly passed, and the estates of the realm forthwith consented that Henry should reign over them. Although Henry’s claim to the throne was ridiculous, as opposed to that of Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March, who was not only great-grandson of Lionel of Antwerp, but his father Roger Mortimer had been as far back as 1385 declared by the King presumptive heir to the throne, still this revolution and elevation of Henry IV. to the throne was a national act, and the Lancastrian Kings must not therefore be considered as usurpers. The inhabitants of Shrewsbury, and of the county of Salop generally, assented to Henry’s accession “most joyfully, with their most entire will and heart,” as their own words, preserved on the Rolls of Parliament, show.