Richard married Cecily Neville, a granddaughter of John of Gaunt, and had thirteen or possibly fifteen children:[3] Despite his elevated status, Richard Plantagenet was denied a position in government by the advisers of the weak Henry VI, particularly John Beaufort, 1st Duke of Somerset, and the queen consort, Margaret of Anjou.

Although he served as protector of the realm during Henry VI's period of incapacity in 1453–54, his reforms were reversed by Somerset's party once the king had recovered.

With the support of Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick ("The Kingmaker"), Edward, already showing great promise as a leader of men, defeated the Lancastrians in a succession of battles.

While Henry VI and Margaret of Anjou were campaigning in the north, Warwick gained control of the capital and had Edward declared king in London in 1461.

Edward strengthened his claim with a decisive victory at the Battle of Towton in the same year, in the course of which the Lancastrian army was virtually wiped out.

Warwick himself changed sides, and supported Margaret of Anjou and the king's jealous brother George, Duke of Clarence, in briefly restoring Henry in 1470–71.

In 1478, the continued trouble caused by Clarence led to his execution in the Tower of London; popularly he is thought to have been drowned in a butt of malmsey wine.

Parliament declared, in the document Titulus Regius, that the two boys were illegitimate, on the grounds that Edward IV's marriage was invalid, and as such Richard was heir to the throne.

At the point Henry VII of England seized the throne there were eighteen Plantagenet descendants who might today be thought to have a stronger hereditary claim.

John de la Pole, 1st Earl of Lincoln, joined the revolt and was killed in the suppression of the uprising at the Battle of Stoke Field in 1487.

[8] Warwick was implicated in further failed invasions supported by Margaret by Perkin Warbeck claiming to be Edward IV's son Richard of Shrewsbury and executed on 28 November 1499.