The Black Arrow: A Tale of the Two Roses Black Arrow" appeared in "Young Folks" (October 1883): The Battle of Shoreby, a fictitious battle that is the main event of Book 5, is modelled after the First Battle of St Albans in the Wars of the Roses. This battle in history as in the novel was a victory for the House of York. The presence of an abbey church in Shoreby is reminiscent of the abbey church of Tewkesbury to which the Lancastrians fled for sanctuary after the battle on 4 May 1471. In the "prologue" Stevenson intimates that the Tunstall of "The Black Arrow" is a real place:
Wars of the Roses kings of France and Scotland and the dukes of Burgundy played the two factions off against each other, pledging military and financial aid and offering asylum to defeated nobles and pretenders, to prevent a strong and unified England from making war on them. Chronicles written during the Wars of the Roses include: "The above-listed individuals with well-defined sides are coloured with red borders for Lancastrians and blue for Yorkists (The Kingmaker, his relatives and George Plantagenet changed sides, so they are represented with a purple border)" Sources: The hinge point in the succession dispute is the forced abdication of Richard