YORCK VON WARTENBURG, HANS DAVID LUDWIG, COUNT (I759-183o), Prussian general field-marshal, was of English ancestry. He entered the Prussian army in 1772, but in 1779 was cashiered for disobedience. Entering the Dutch service, he took part in the operations of 1783-84 in the East Indies as captain. Returning to Prussia in 1785 he was, on the death of Frederick the Great, reinstated in his old service, and in I 794 took part in the operations in Poland. Five years afterwards Yorck began to make a name as commander of a light infantry regiment, being one of the first to give prominence to the training of skirmishers. In 1805 he was appointed to an infantry brigade, and in the Jena campaign played a successful part as a rearguard commander, especially at Altenzaun. He was taken prisoner, se verely wounded, at Liibeck. In the reorganization of the Prussian army after the peace of Tilsit, Yorck took a leading part. At first major-general commanding the West Prussian brigade, afterwards inspector-general of light infantry, he was finally appointed sec ond in command to General Grawert, the leader of the auxiliary corps which Prussia was compelled to send to the Russian War of 1812, succeeding to the command on Grawert's retirement. He con ducted the advance on Riga with great skill; but his conviction that the French army was doomed led him at last to neutralize the Prussian army by the Convention of Tauroggen (Dec. 3o). The step was intensely popular, and although it was officially pro posed to court-martial Yorck, he was absolved when the Treaty of Kalisch ranged Prussia with the Allies. During 1813-14 Yorck led his veterans with success at Bautzen, Katzbach, War tenburg (Oct. 4) and Leipzig (Oct. 18). In France, he dis tinguished himself at Montmirail and Laon. The storm of Paris was his last fight. In 1821 he was created general field-marshal. He had been made Count Yorck von Wartenburg in 1814. He died at his estate of Klein-ols, the gift of the king, on Oct. 4, 183o.
See Seydlitz, Tagebuch des Preussischen Armee Korps 1812 (1823); Droysen, Leben des G. F. M. Grafen Yorck von Wartenburg (1851) .
tion to Henry VI. His claim was, perhaps rightly, barred by prescription, the house of Lancaster having then occupied the throne for three generations ; it was really owing to the mis government of Margaret of Anjou that it was advanced at all. The duke was descended from Lionel, the third son of Edward III., while the house of Lancaster came of John of Gaunt, the fourth son. The claim was derived (see the Table) through females; but this could not reasonably have been objected to after Edward III.'s claim to the crown of France; and the duke's claim was probably supported by the fact that he was descended from Edward III. both through his father and through his mother. (See Table.) The earldom of Ulster, the old in heritance of the De Burghs, had descended to him from Lionel; the earldom of March came from the Mortimers and the duke dom of York and the earldom of Cambridge from his paternal ancestry. Moreover, his own marriage with Cecily Neville, though she was but the youngest daughter of Ralph, ist earl of Westmorland, allied him to a powerful family in the north of England, to whose support both he and his son were indebted.
The reasons why the claims of the line of Clarence had been so long forborne are not difficult to explain. Roger Mortimer, 4th earl of March, was designated by Richard II. as his successor ; but he died the year before Richard was dethroned, and his son Edmund, the 5th earl, was a child at Henry IV.'s usurpation. Henry took care to secure his person; but the claims of the family troubled the whole of his own and the beginning of his son's reign. It was an uncle of this Edmund who took part with Owen Glen dower and the Percies ; and for advocating the cause of Edmund Archbishop Scrope was put to death. And it was to put the crown on Edmund's head that his brother-in-law Richard, earl of Cam bridge, conspired against Henry V. soon after his accession. The plot was detected, being revealed, it is said, by the earl of March himself, who does not appear to have given it any encouragement; the earl of Cambridge was beheaded.