The Battle of Radcot Bridge was fought on 19 December 1387 in medieval England between troops loyal to Richard II, led by court favourite Robert de Vere, and an army captained by Henry Bolingbroke, Earl of Derby.

This crisis reached a head in November 1386, when the Wonderful Parliament compelled King Richard to remove his chancellor, Michael de la Pole.

Molineux, a varlet, and a boy were the only slain in the engagement; 800 men fled into the marsh, and were drowned; the rest were surrounded, stript, and sent home.

[1]In the words of a modern English historian: De Vere's army arrived at the twin Thames bridges, only to find the first sabotaged and the second guarded by Derby's troops.

The present Radcot Bridge, spanning the southern branch of the River Thames and the Berkshire-Oxfordshire Boundary, is of 14th-century date and is therefore the one that stood during the battle.

Molineux had been one of the most important Royal agents in the Chester Palinate, and had been responsible for the daily exercise of de Vere's power in the region.

In spite of Richard II's enduring resentment against the killer of his trusted servant, there were deeper political considerations behind the proceedings against a man who had been merely one of many gentry supporters of the Appellants.

In August 1387 King Richard retaliated; he assembled a Council of magistrates at Nottingham and attempted to redefine the royal prerogative so as to render the Wonderful Parliament treasonous.

During this session, Woodstock and the Earls of Warwick and Arundel submitted an appeal which accused several of Richard's closest friends of routinely deceiving the King for their own profit.

De Vere was despatched to Cheshire, where King Richard had assembled an army of five thousand retainers, under the direct command of Sir Thomas Molineux.

The most direct routes to the capital were blocked by Arundel's men, so de Vere decided to cross the Thames at Radcot, near Faringdon.