Set in late fifteenth-century England, The Black Arrow takes place during the Wars of the Roses, a long civil conflict between the House of Lancaster, symbolized by the red rose, and the House of York, symbolized by the white rose.

Historically, the Yorkist faction, led by Edward IV and his brother Richard III, overthrew the Lancastrian ruler Henry VI. Ultimately, Henry VII conquered Richard III in the 1485 Battle of Bosworth, but the book ends well before this turn of events.

Stevenson's narrative begins in the village of Tunstall in east Norfolk toward the end of Henry VI's reign. Seventeenyear-old Dick Shelton's search for vengeance of his father's murder and his rescue of a young heiress lead him through the English countryside, where he fights beside Richard, Duke of Gloucester, later Richard III; joins forces with the mysterious John Amend-All's followers; and steals a ship in an ill-fated attempt...