Sheen Priory a favourite residence of the last Plantagenet king Richard II (1377–1399) and his beloved wife Anne of Bohemia. When Anne died there of plague in 1394, Richard cursed the place where they had found great happiness and razed the palace to the ground. His throne was usurped by his cousin Henry Bolingbroke, Duke of Lancaster, who ruled as Henry IV (1399–1413). Henry IV had been involved in the murder of Richard in 1400, and in that of Archbishop Richard le Scrope, and made a vow to expiate his guilt by founding three monasteries, but died before he could fulfil his
Robert Waterton IV. In 1391 he was appointed Master Forester at Pontefract Castle, and in that year accompanied Bolingbroke to the siege of Vilnius. He was with Bolingbroke when he returned to Vilnius in the following year. From 1392 he received a yearly fee from Bolingbroke of £6 13s 4d, and in 1398 Bolingbroke granted him an additional annuity of 10 marks. In 1399 he was Steward and Constable at Pontefract, as well as Constable at Tickhill Castle and Castle Donnington, positions which 'made him a dominant figure in the West Riding of Yorkshire and in north Nottinghamshire'. He remained in these