Pontefract Castle earl becoming a martyr with his tomb at Pontefract Priory becoming a shrine. It next went to Henry, Duke of Lancaster and subsequently to John of Gaunt, third son of King Edward III. He made the castle his personal residence, spending vast amounts of money improving it. In the closing years of the 14th century, Richard II had banished John of Gaunt’s son Henry Bolingbroke, Duke of Hereford from the country and with the death of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster in 1399, much of Bolingbroke's patrimony was being given away by Richard II to his favourites. The castle
Pontefract Priory had resulted in a reduction of the monastery's debts from 3200 marks to 350. A later, undated, visitation return gives the average number of monks at 20. Duckett prints a letter from Stephen, Prior of Pontefract in 1323, to Pierre, Abbot of Cluny, explaining that he had been prevented from making a visitation of the English Cluniac houses, owing to the presence of the king and court at Pontefract, which prevented his leaving home. In the previous year (1322) Thomas, Earl of Lancaster had been beheaded at Pontefract, and his body buried in the priory church "on the right hand