failed assassination attempt on the Protestant leader Admiral Gaspard de Coligny led to the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre. On the night of 23 to 24 August, thousands of French Protestants, including Coligny, were killed. The struggle between Catholics and Protestants erupted again in all its ferocity. Henry of Navarre was captured by the Catholics during the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre, and forced to convert to the Catholic faith. In 1576, after four years of imprisonment at the court, Henry of Navarre managed to escape. Fleeing to Protestant territory, he immediately reconverted to the Protestant faith. Meanwhile, the Catholic League, led by Henry of Guise, a childhood friend of Henry III, began to worry about the succession. The Catholic King Henry III was childless, and after the death of his younger brother Francis of Anjou in 1584, according to the Salic Laws the Protestant Henry of Navarre was the next in line of succession, being a descendant of thirteenth-century King Louis IX. Within the Catholic faction, particularly among residents of Paris, there was support for a takeover of the throne by Henry of Guise. In 1588, after a military victory over Henry of Navarre, Guise entered Paris, where he was greeted royally by the people. Henry III was forced to withdraw to the Louvre. After the French States-General proved unwilling to support him against De Guise, Henry III had Guise assassinated on 23 December 1588. The following year he reconciled with Henry of Navarre. Together they defeated the radical Catholic armies of the Catholic League and then besieged Paris, where the Catholic faction was still in power. On August 1, 1589, Henry III was fatally stabbed by a fanatical monk named Jacques Clement. Henry III died the next day from his injuries. After Henry III's death, Henry of Navarre had himself proclaimed as King Henry IV of France. For Philip II of Spain this was reason enough to enter the struggle in France on the side of the Catholic faction. His plan was to put his daughter, Isabella of Spain, on the French throne in order to secure the survival and supremacy of Catholicism in France. Amongst other actions, Philip sent his general Alexander Farnese, duke of Parma, to France. Parma, who had been very successful in leading the Army of Flanders against the Dutch Republic, managed to end the siege of Paris. Farnese achieved some military successes but died in