1
Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help.
Psalms, 146:3
Joan never knew her father, as he died when she was less than two years of age. In early March 1330, Edmund, Earl of Kent, set off from the family home at Arundel Castle to attend Parliament in Winchester, leaving his pregnant young wife Margaret with their two infant children, Edmund and Joan.1 They never saw him again. On Wednesday 14 March, shortly after his arrival in Winchester, Edmund was arrested by the king’s officers and charged with treason. Two days later his confession was read out to the assembled Parliament. In the early morning of Monday 19 March he was escorted outside Winchester Castle to be executed, where he was forced to wait until an executioner was found from among the king’s marshalsea, and then, later in the day, he was beheaded.2 It was a swift and brutal end. Edmund was twenty-nine years old.
Waiting at Arundel, Joan’s mother Margaret may have been unaware of her husband’s fate until the arrival of two of the king’s yeomen, Nicholas Langford and John Payn, who had orders to escort her from Arundel and transfer her into the custody of the sheriff of Wiltshire.3 Margaret’s shock and distress can be imagined. As Langford and Payn’s orders were dated the day of Edmund’s arrest, 14 March, they may have arrived before his execution, but the news would have swiftly followed. Margaret was told that only two of her female servants could accompany her and her children; however, as she was so near to term, it was decided that she would not be moved until after her delivery. In the meantime she was kept confined in Arundel Castle, while most of her servants were dismissed, and her jewellery and other goods were taken away.
Arundel, Joan’s first home, and for a short time also her prison, was a formidable castle, built originally by one of William the Conqueror’s henchmen, Roger de Montgomery, near the mouth of the River Arun, and it dominated the surrounding Sussex countryside. Edmund had acquired it just three years before, in February 1327.4 The castle had previously been the principal seat of Edmund Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel, and had been forfeited to the Crown with the remainder of Fitzalan’s estates when he was executed in 1326 for supporting Edward II. As the largest and grandest of the properties acquired by Edmund in 1327 it would have been his principal seat, and it is possible that Joan was born there. Today, little of the original castle survives, other than the Norman motte, gatehouse, keep and curtain wall, as it was largely destroyed by Parliamentarian forces during the English Civil War and remained in ruins until the eighteenth century, when reconstruction of the castle started. In the late nineteenth century the main structure was almost completely rebuilt in the Gothic style. The present castle gives some indication of its fourteenth-century magnificence, as it is hugely imposing, with tall, grey stone buttresses and walls, and continues to dominate the town.
Joan’s younger brother, John, was born at Arundel two and a half weeks after his father’s execution, on 7 April 1330. John’s birth, and baptism on the same day, was confirmed and noted in the records twenty-one years later when testimony was taken to prove his coming of age and his entitlement to his inheritance. With no central records of births or deaths it was customary to take evidence from witnesses who could attest to a person’s birth and so prove their age. At Steyning in Sussex on 9 April 1351 a local Sussex resident, James Byne, affirmed that John had been born at Arundel and baptised the same day on Tuesday 7 April 1330 in the church of St Bartholomew in the priory adjoining the castle, and that Edmund, Joan and the prior, John de Grenstede, had lifted John from the sacred font, as his godparents.5 Seven further witnesses confirmed the date. As Margaret and Edmund had married in the autumn of 1325 Joan and Edmund were very young children and can have been no older than eighteen months and three and a half years old. The poignant detail of Joan and Edmund’s role in their brother’s baptism is eloquent testimony of the family’s dire fortunes in the weeks after their father’s execution. Baptism was an important and indispensable rite of passage to bring children into the church, usually taking place within days of the birth, and it had become customary from the twelfth century for each child to have sponsors, or godparents, whose role included taking an interest in the child’s future welfare.6 By the fourteenth century noble families took great care to select suitably prestigious relatives or friends to act as godparents in anticipation that they would use their influence to help further their godchild’s career later in life. Siblings would not normally be considered, and it was very rare to appoint small children. But Joan’s mother had limited options. As a traitor, Edmund’s title, lands and possessions were forfeit. Margaret was isolated and alone, under close guard, and had no family or friends with her at Arundel to console her. In her haste and anxiety to arrange John’s baptism, Margaret had no choice but to appoint the only person of standing near to her, Prior John, and John’s siblings, despite their youth. The baptism must have been a hurried and awkward affair, conducted by the prior with some trepidation and possibly reluctance in view of his patron’s disgrace, while Joan and Edmund, who could have played little active part in the christening service, were probably bewildered and possibly frightened.
Edmund’s arrest and execution was not just devastating for his family; it shocked and appalled his contemporaries, as it was intended to. Just four years before, in September 1326, Queen Isabella had swept her husband, Edward II, from power in a bloodless invasion, bringing to an end five years of tyrannical rule by the king and his favourites, the Despensers. In the January parliament of 1327 it was publicly announced that the captive Edward II had agreed to abdicate in favour of his fourteen-year-old son and heir, Prince Edward. The majority of the nobility were solidly behind the queen, and hoped the king’s deposition would herald an era of political stability. At first the liberality of the new regime towards their supporters had contrasted favourably with the miserly and vindictive behaviour of Edward II and the Despensers. A council was set up to rule on behalf of the young Edward III which included his father’s two half-brothers, Thomas Brotherton, Earl of Norfolk, and Joan’s father, Edmund, Earl of Kent. However, it quickly became apparent that the council had little real authority, and that power remained with the queen, and her lover, Roger Mortimer, and it was not long before the nobility realised they had replaced Edward II with a different form of tyrant in Roger Mortimer. Retaining firm control, the queen and her lover issued orders in the king’s name, ensuring that neither Edward III nor his council were able to act freely. By 1328 Mortimer, newly created Earl of March, was king in all but name. Inevitably, Isabella and Mortimer’s exercise of power became resented, and their increasingly aggressive and acquisitive behaviour, reminiscent of the worst excesses of the Despenser rule, successively alienated most of the nobility, while Edward III’s dislike of Mortimer grew and he chafed at his lack of independence. By the autumn of 1328 opposition had united under the most powerful of the earls, Henry of Lancaster, the king’s second cousin. But when Lancaster’s forces gathered outside London in December 1328, it was Mortimer who took the initiative and launched an attack in the king’s name, and his quick thinking and decisive action induced Lancaster and his followers to withdraw. However, the encounter was not conclusive, as the opposition remained intact and entrenched in resistance, and throughout 1329 there was an uneasy peace. Isabella and Mortimer knew they could not hope to rely on securing their position through her son for much longer. Their agenda in calling the Winchester parliament in March 1330 was to reinforce their hold on power by giving the gathering of lords, prelates and knights a demonstration of the extent of their authority. They planned to do this by targeting someone with rank and status, close to the throne, but who lacked support among the nobility and who could be safely attacked with little fear of reprisal. Lancaster was too strong to openly challenge. They found a perfect victim instead in Joan’s father.
Joan’s Father, Edmund, Earl of Kent
Edmund, Earl of Kent, was the youngest son of Edward I and his second wife, Margaret of France.7 Edward I was sixty-two when his youngest son was born, and at the height of his powers. A powerful and authoritative ruler, Edward I was regarded with awe and respect by both his subjects and his enemies, and he remained vigorous and forceful despite his advancing years. Having enjoyed a long and happy marriage with Eleanor of Castile, their contentment together reflected by their numerous progeny (they had at least fourteen children, although only five survived to adulthood), nine years after Eleanor’s death Edward put aside his grief and entered into a second marriage with Margaret of France in 1299 as part of a diplomatic rapprochement to foster better relations with France.8Despite the difference in their ages (Margaret was seventeen when she married Edward I, over forty years younger than her husband), their marriage was also reputedly a happy one, and soon blessed in 1300 with the birth of a son, Thomas, born at Brotherton in Yorkshire as Margaret journeyed north to join her indefatigable husband as he engaged in yet another campaign against his unruly Scottish neighbours. Within a year Margaret bore him a second son, this time in the more comfortable surroundings of the royal palace at Woodstock, and the king named his youngest son Edmund, a family name shared by the king’s brother, Edmund of Lancaster, who had died in 1296, and his cousin Edmund, Earl of Cornwall, who had also just died. Five years later, Margaret gave birth to a girl, Eleanor, their last child.
With only one surviving son by Eleanor, Edward of Carnarvon, it is probable that Edward I welcomed the birth of his two younger sons, Thomas and Edmund. Although Thomas was born while Margaret was travelling to meet Edward, no expense was spared, with his cradle provided with fine Lincoln scarlet, dark-blue cloth, sheets of Rheims linen and fur coverlets and decorated with heraldic arms.9 Born in a secure and comfortable palace, Edmund would have been cosseted and spoiled. Delighted with his youngest son’s arrival, Edward I rewarded the messenger John Prade handsomely for bringing news of Edmund’s birth.10 Although little is known of the young princes’ childhood years, it can be assumed that they were well cared for and enjoyed the normal accoutrements of noble childhood; they did, for example, have a toy drum which was so well used it needed repair, and an iron bird cage given to them by their mother.11 The boys were kept together, and when their sister was born in 1306 she joined their nursery, the royal siblings all within the same household.12 Their shared childhood forged a bond between Thomas and Edmund which they retained in adulthood. However, they had very different personalities. Edmund appears to have been easy-going and peaceable, a likeable young man but lacking in the leadership and drive which characterised his father, whereas Thomas was an altogether more difficult man, prone to outbursts of temper. Contemporary chroniclers present a generally favourable impression of Edmund, with Jean le Bel describing him as a man who was most honourable and courteous (‘qui estoit moult proeudomme et debonnaire’), and Jean Froissart as ‘wise, affable and much beloved’, whereas Thomas had a ‘wild and disagreeable temper’.13 There are no portraits or descriptions of them physically. Their mother, Margaret, was described in complimentary terms in her youth; her brother Philip, who became King of France, was known as Philip the Fair for his handsomeness, and chroniclers considered their cousin Isabella, Philip’s daughter, with her long, blond hair, to be lovely.14
Edward I died in July 1307 when Thomas was seven years old and Edmund a year younger. Given the king’s advanced age at their birth it was hardly surprising that the princes lost their father while they were so young. Initially his loss would have made little difference to their lives, and their education would have continued as before under the supervision of their mother. The now dowager Queen Margaret was no longer required to preside over the court and therefore probably spent more time with her children as a widow than she would otherwise have done. Sadly, their sister Eleanor did not long survive her father, but despite this tragedy, and the loss of their father, there is no reason to suppose that Edmund and Thomas had anything other than a happy childhood. It was customary for the royal nursery to remain reasonably static, while the court in contrast travelled from place to place following the king, and it is therefore unlikely that the children spent much time with their much older half-siblings, Edward of Carnarvon and his sisters. There is no evidence that Edward II took an active part in his brothers’ upbringing, and he probably saw them infrequently, but he was likely to have been fond of them as he had a good relationship with his stepmother, and may have had some sympathy for them as he too had experienced the loss of a parent at an early age (his mother, Queen Eleanor, had died when he was six). They quickly acquired a sister-in-law when Edward II married Isabella of France in January 1308. The new queen was their twelve-year-old cousin, daughter of their mother’s brother, Philip IV of France. The princes attended their brother’s coronation at Westminster Abbey in February 1308.15
Edmund’s relationship with his older half-brother, and his involvement in his affairs, would dominate his career. It is likely that, young as they were, the princes quickly became aware that their brother was having a difficult time. Edward I’s legacy to his heir of the campaigns in Wales and Scotland, resulting in more or less empty coffers, with the ongoing requirement for vigilance and possible military enforcement, together with the uneasy peace with France, would have challenged a more able and politically astute man than Edward II. As it was, Edward II managed to exacerbate his own problems and create an immediate crisis at the very beginning of his reign by antagonising the majority of the nobility over his friendship with Piers Gaveston and in ennobling and enriching him within a month of the old king’s death. Gaveston was the son of a French baron and had entered royal service, being placed in the then Prince Edward’s household as a squire. The two young men had quickly developed a very close friendship, the nature of which has been much debated by historians but was probably fraternal rather than homosexual. Edward II’s coronation, which should have been a splendid and festive occasion, was marred by the barons’ anger at the prominence given to Gaveston during the ceremony, and by Gaveston’s behaviour at the banquet afterwards.16 It is notable that the author of the Vita Edwardi Secundi interpreted Gaveston’s elevation to the earldom of Cornwall in 1307 as a direct insult to Thomas and Edmund.17 They were far too young to feel personally aggrieved, but the chronicler’s observation was acute. Edward II’s action was to be symptomatic of his attitude towards providing for his younger brothers, creating a problem he never satisfactorily addressed.
As royal princes Thomas and Edmund could reasonably expect to become, as adults, among the most powerful and influential at the king’s court, but this could not be sustained on birth alone. Traditionally princes were given an earldom (the highest noble rank) which brought with it attendant lands and income to support their status. However, earldoms were scarce, with limited opportunities for obtaining one through death and forfeiture. The option of creating new titles was impractical without ensuring the availability of estates which could be attached. The business of ensuring adequate financial provision for royal siblings had vexed successive English kings who had struggled to find suitable endowments for their progeny. Henry II, for example, despite the huge Angevin empire he created, had notably failed to satisfy his sons. Edward I was more prudent than many of his predecessors, and took considerable care to provide for Thomas and Edmund. He was obliged under the terms of the marriage settlement with Margaret to assign to any male children of their marriage land to the value of 10,000 marks a year, and in 1306 he set out his plans for their children. In the charter dated 31 August 1306, Edward I promised that Thomas should be endowed with land with an annual income of 10,000 marks (a mark was worth 13s 4d), that Edmund would receive land with an annual income of 7,000 marks (in May 1307 the king increased this to 8,000 marks), and that Eleanor would have a dowry of 10,000 marks with 5,000 marks for her trousseau.18 The charter was a formal promise, intended to be binding, and a copy of the charter was made for each child, sealed and sent to the wardrobe under the chancellor’s seal for safekeeping. Very few of the nobility would have incomes greater than those the king promised his sons, and it is clear that Edward I was being intentionally generous; he wanted and expected his sons to become powerful and influential noblemen.
Edward I had planned his charter meticulously. The basic endowments for Thomas and Edmund were the two vacant earldoms of Cornwall and Norfolk which, with their attendant lands and incomes, the king already had within his gift. He had inherited the earldom of Cornwall on the death of his cousin Edmund in 1300, and in 1302 Edward I persuaded the childless Earl of Norfolk, Roger Bigod, to entail his title and lands to the Crown. When the earl died in 1306, the king secured the earldom. Edward I’s intentions were simple; Edmund, naturally, would have the Cornwall earldom after his namesake, while Thomas, as the charter made clear, would receive the earldom of Norfolk. The respective incomes attached to each earldom would provide the majority of their promised income, and he would make up the shortfall, probably anticipating arranging a suitable marriage for them to an heiress, or possibly by making separate grants at a later stage. The king’s confidence in his plans was apparent in his promised timescale, which envisaged each of his children being endowed by the age of seven or eight; Thomas could receive his immediately, Edmund within two years and Eleanor within seven.
When Edward I died in July 1307, less than a year after creating the charter, he had not had a chance to implement its provisions, but he had foreseen this possibility and had known that he might have to rely on his heir to carry it out. It was unfortunate that the king had fallen out with his eldest son, first in a spectacular row in 1305 over the treasurer Walter Langton, which resulted in a four-month estrangement, and then a further unpleasant row in January 1306 over Prince Edward’s close friendship with Piers Gaveston.19 Edward I was particularly incensed by his heir’s demand that Gaveston be granted a title, and by the further suggestion that this might be the earldom of Cornwall, which the king had specifically earmarked for his youngest son. Queen Margaret, at her stepson’s request, acted as peacemaker and intervened on his behalf in an attempt to patch things up with his father, persuading her short-tempered husband to forgive his son, and after Prince Edward had reluctantly agreed to Gaveston leaving his household and going into exile an uneasy peace between father and son was restored. When it came to making the charter in August 1306, Edward I took the precaution of making his son a party to it, clearly intending to bind his heir by the public promise to honour the charter.20It was hardly surprising that his son did not see the fulfilment of the charter as a priority after Edward I’s death, but no one anticipated what was to happen next. Within a month of his father’s death Edward II had given the earldom of Cornwall to Gaveston, newly returned to his household and high in his favour, thus upsetting his father’s carefully laid plans. In effect, he had given away Edmund’s inheritance. The author of the Vita Edwardi Secundi noted this as an insult to the young princes, fuelling the general hostility and uproar generated by Edward II’s ill-considered action and adding to the resentment and hatred of Gaveston.21 Although Edmund and Thomas were far too young to have seen it as a personal affront, their mother may well have done, and she, and probably others close to the princes, would have made sure they became aware of it.
Edward II was nevertheless morally, if not legally, bound to carry out his father’s intentions, and it is unlikely that the new king forgot his father’s charter, or intended to ignore it. However, he made no immediate attempt to make any award to his brothers. The indications are that Edward II initially failed to appreciate the limitations on the Crown’s resources, and having squandered the Cornwall earldom on his favourite he subsequently found it difficult to find a suitable replacement. Edward II ignored or avoided the issue of providing for his brothers, as, beset on all sides, he struggled with his father’s inheritance. Within months of his marriage to Isabella, the French king was complaining that his daughter had not received the promised dower. While his marriage to Isabella temporarily satisfied the French, Edward II found the continuing problems with neighbouring Scotland, Wales and Ireland almost intractable, lacking Edward I’s military competence and implacable will, but worst of all was his continued inability to reach an accord with his most powerful subjects. Having antagonised the nobility so early in his reign over his marked favouritism towards Gaveston, Edward II paid no heed to their protests, and his fondness for his friend increased rather than diminished as time passed. Under the leadership of his cousin Thomas, Earl of Lancaster, the opposition of the nobility grew. Civil war seemed increasingly inevitable, initially averted when Edward II bowed to pressure and sent Gaveston to Ireland and reached an accommodation with the earls by submitting to ordinances restricting his powers. Matters came to a head when Gaveston, having returned from Ireland early in 1312 and surrendered himself to the Earl of Pembroke, was forcibly removed by the Earl of Warwick in June 1312 and taken to Warwick Castle, and then, on the orders of the Earl of Lancaster, executed. Shocked and grief-stricken, Edward II was distraught; but he was also angry, and intent on revenge. Plotting and planning what he would do, preoccupied with arranging his friend’s funeral, the king had no time to spare for his brothers.
Within six months of Gaveston’s murder, Queen Isabella gave birth to a son and heir on 12 November 1312. This could have been a turning point in Edward II’s relationship with the nobility, as the event was heralded with national joy and brought with it a wave of loyalty. The new baby, Prince Edward, was created Earl of Chester and granted the counties of Chester and Flint within a few days of his birth.22 However, Edward II failed to take full advantage of the goodwill engendered by his heir’s birth, and his lack of forethought was abundantly apparent in his treatment of his brothers. Probably recognising that the grants to his son made his brothers’ lack of endowment blatantly obvious, a month later, on 16 December, Edward II created his twelve-year-old brother Thomas Earl of Norfolk. As the earldom brought with it an annual income from its estates of 6,000 marks a year, this substantially fulfilled Edward I’s charter promise to Thomas.23 Yet the king failed to make similar provision for Edmund. This was curious, as Gaveston’s execution, with no male heir, had left the earldom of Cornwall providentially vacant. It is possible that Edward II intended awarding the earldom to Edmund, just as their father had intended, but he did not. Since Gaveston’s murder he had been conspicuously preoccupied with planning and spending lavishly on the funeral and future interment, and had granted Margaret de Clare, Gaveston’s widow, lands with an annual income of 2,000 marks.24 The problem was that months, and then years, passed, and the king continued to do nothing for Edmund. It is hard to excuse his delay. It may be that Edward II’s deep affection for Gaveston left him with a sentimental attachment to the Cornwall earldom, but not even his friend’s eventual interment at his favourite manor of King’s Langley in January 1315 prompted him to grant the title to Edmund. Although in practical terms it may not have seemed important (as Thomas and Edmund were barely teenagers and remained together in the same household), it was a potentially damaging and provocative omission which could have alienated the young Edmund from the king. It was certainly unfair, and when, in October 1315, Edward II at last made a grant to Edmund, it amounted to no more than a small income of less than £450 a year, hardly an adequate provision for the brother of the king.25 It is difficult to understand why he was not more generous or to discern a convincing reason why Edward II failed to make better provision for Edmund. When he created Thomas Earl Marshal in February 1316, and provided no equivalent honour for Edmund, his younger brother must have wondered if he had offended the king in some way.26
The king’s attention was undoubtedly elsewhere. The acrimony of many of the nobility towards him had hardly abated after Gaveston’s execution, and Edward II continued to struggle for support. Affairs went disastrously in Scotland, with the English army under the king’s personal command suffering complete humiliation in a crushing defeat at Bannockburn in 1314. Desperate to exert his authority, Edward II slowly flouted the restrictions imposed on him by the ordinances and tried to build up support to counter the opposition towards him. He found an able and sympathetic friend in Hugh Despenser the Younger, who gradually replaced Gaveston in the king’s affections. It was perhaps inevitable that it was only when they were of an age to provide him with support that Edward II showed a more direct interest in his brothers. He summoned Thomas to serve in a new Scottish campaign in 1317, nominating him as joint commander with his older and more experienced cousin Thomas, Earl of Lancaster.27 When Queen Margaret died in February 1318, appointing her sons as her executors and beneficiaries (Edmund received two manors), Edward II appears to have realised that Edmund was now also of an age to be useful to him, and almost immediately he took advantage of this to appoint him custodian of the strategically important Gloucester Castle and later Knaresborough Castle, both part of the disputed Gloucester inheritance.28 These were nominal appointments intended as interim measures, as Edward II did not seriously contemplate his seventeen-year-old brother having sole command, but Edmund’s promotion marked his emergence into his brother’s world. When the series of negotiations intended to mend the serious rift between the king and the Earl of Lancaster culminated in an agreement which forced Edward II to agree to give up his closest counsellors and accept an advisory council of nobles and churchmen, Edmund was a signatory to the treaty confirming this, signed at Leake on 9 August 1318. Now clearly identified as his supporter, Edward II enhanced Edmund’s status by making grants to him in November 1319 which would bring his annual income to nearly £2,000.29 But although this was a significant award, it was limited, being restricted to Edmund’s lifetime, and considerably less than that envisaged by their father, with no accompanying title to boost Edmund’s prestige. In March 1320 Edward II boosted his brother’s career by sending him on a diplomatic mission to Paris, in advance of Edward II’s planned visit to their cousin Charles IV, with Bartholomew Badlesmere, an experienced diplomat, and Edmund also accompanied Badlesmere on a further visit to the Pope in Avignon.30 On his return in August 1320, Edmund was summoned to Parliament for the first time, styled Edmund of Woodstock.31
At this stage there is no evidence that Edmund was unduly concerned about his lack of title or the considerable financial distinction which remained between him and Thomas. He was young, and eager to prove his worth to his brother. He also had other things on his mind, and arranged to see his brother at King’s Langley in Hertfordshire to discuss his marriage.32 It is not known who initiated the meeting but it is a reasonable supposition that it was at Edmund’s behest, as he needed the king’s permission to marry, and he had found his bride. Joan’s mother, Margaret Wake, was from a family of northern gentry. The Wakes held land in Lincolnshire, Yorkshire, Westmorland and Cumberland, and had a tradition of royal service; Margaret’s ancestor Baldwin Wake had been held hostage for payment of Richard I’s ransom, while Hugh Wake died on crusade in the Holy Land, although Margaret’s grandfather, Baldwin Wake, had supported Simon de Montfort against Henry III.33 Margaret’s father, John, served with Edward I in Gascony and Scotland, and was created 1st Baron Wake. He fought for Edward I, and died in 1300, leaving his widow Joan with three small children, Thomas, Margaret and John.34 Joan Wake could claim kinship with Eleanor of Castile through her father, Sir William de Fiennes, a connection recognised by Edward I, who described Lady Wake as his cousin and kinswoman.35 Joan was one of Queen Isabella’s newly established household when Isabella first came to England in February 1308, but had died by 1310, leaving Margaret and her two brothers orphans.36 They became royal wards and Edward II granted the Wake lands, and Thomas’ marriage, to Piers Gaveston, and after Gaveston’s death to Queen Isabella.37 After their mother’s death, Margaret presumably remained in Isabella’s household, while Thomas appears to have been taken into the household of Henry of Lancaster.38 Thomas Wake married Henry’s daughter Blanche in October 1316, when they were both under age and without the king’s permission. Henry was evidently fond of Thomas, as he persuaded the king to allow Thomas to inherit his family title and lands before he came of age, in June 1317.39 A marriage was arranged for Margaret with John Comyn of Badenoch but his death at Bannockburn in 1314 left Margaret a childless widow (they may never have lived together as a couple), and it is likely that she stayed in the queen’s household.40 Margaret had a small dowry as Comyn’s widow but was otherwise without expectations. As marriage to Margaret could not be considered an advantageous match for a man of his birth, Edmund’s choice seems to have been a matter of personal inclination; he had presumably fallen in love with her. The fact that their betrothal was not announced and that they did not marry until 1325 suggests that Edward II may have expressed some doubts and did not immediately give his brother permission.
Dissatisfaction with Edward II’s increasing subservience to his new favourite Hugh Despenser, and Despenser’s father, erupted into violence in May 1321 when the Marcher lords attacked lands held by the Despensers in Wales. This open attack swiftly precipitated a crisis. With the Earl of Lancaster still hostile towards him and sympathetic to the Marcher lords, Edward II needed all the assistance he could muster, and his young brothers were an obvious source of support. Edmund was an immediate beneficiary of the king’s changed attitude, being successively appointed constable of Dover Castle, warden of the Cinque ports, and constable of Tonbridge Castle.41 His loyalty, and competence, brought him the reward of the long-awaited title when Edward II created him Earl of Kent on 29 July 1321.42 Meanwhile the rebel Marcher barons advanced on the king in London to present their demands in Parliament, forcing Edward II to concede to their ultimatum to get rid of his favourites, and the Despensers fled into exile in August 1321. The king then sent his steward, Bartholomew Badlesmere, to mediate with the Marcher barons on his behalf, but instead of doing so he unexpectedly joined then. Like many others he had no doubt been alienated by the Despensers, and possibly too he was offended that the earldom he had hoped for had been given to Edmund. Enraged by Badlesmere’s treachery, deserted by most of his supporters and bereft of his favourites, Edward II took stock. With the rebels’ sphere of influence being in the north and west, the king decided to launch a counter attack in the south, and determined on targeting Badlesmere’s lands, as they were in Kent and therefore vulnerable. According to the Vita Edwardi Secundi, only six earls responded to the king’s request for aid, making Edmund and Thomas foremost among his supporters, as the Anonimalle Chronicle also noted.43 For a few months Edmund and Thomas became their brother’s chief advisers, and they revelled in their newfound importance, playing a prominent part in the successful attack on Badlesmere’s stronghold in Kent at Leeds Castle, which helped to re-establish the king’s authority.
Edmund may well have felt considerable satisfaction with his enhanced position in the autumn of 1321. Now an earl, with sufficient income to support the title, publicly recognised and associated with his brother as a principal supporter of the Crown, he could justifiably have felt that his future was assured. However, Edward II had behaved less than generously towards him. Having decided to grant Edmund an earldom, the obvious choice would have been the still vacant earldom of Cornwall. Instead, the king chose an empty title. The last Earl of Kent, Hubert de Burgh, had died in 1243 without an heir, and the estates and income had long since been sequestered elsewhere.44 Earls were expected to maintain a certain lifestyle and it had long been accepted that this required a minimal annual income of around £1,000. While the grants made to Edmund in 1315 and 1319 already ensured him an income of nearly twice this, the collection of manors and rentals which provided it were spread over a number of geographically diverse counties. There was no region of the country where Edmund was the main landowner, and although he was now Earl of Kent he had nothing apart from some rental income to connect him to the county, a deficiency which his appointment as constable of Tonbridge Castle did not disguise.45 Without a concentration of landholding in any specific area, Edmund’s authority as a landowner would be limited. More significantly, Edward II had made the 1315 and 1319 grants lifetime awards only and he had not chosen to change this. So apart from the title, Edmund had only the estates inherited from his mother which he could pass on to his heirs. These disadvantages placed Edmund in a much weaker position than most of his peers, and continued to differentiate him from Thomas of Brotherton, whose earldom of Norfolk, with its concentration of land and estates in Suffolk and Norfolk, brought him extensive local influence and financial independence from the Crown. Edward I had not intended such a distinction between his two youngest sons. Edward II was no fool, and his treatment of Edmund was quite deliberate. He chose not to award the earldom of Cornwall, with its attendant estates and income, to Edmund, while he significantly failed to convert the grants he had already made from being limited to Edmund’s lifetime.46 Although he increased Edmund’s income slightly in 1321, he specifically instructed his brother to repay part of this to the exchequer on the grounds that the income exceeded what the king ‘deemed fit to grant at present’.47 This was less than generous treatment, and it is an indication of Edmund’s devotion and loyalty that he does not appear to have objected.
Edward II continued to rely increasingly on his brothers. In January 1322 Edmund and Thomas led the negotiations which resulted in two Welsh barons, Roger Mortimer of Chirk, and his nephew, also called Roger Mortimer, surrendering to the king. Their success did little to enhance their reputations among their peers. The Anonimalle chronicler was dubious about the tactics used by Edmund and Thomas, describing them as ‘false brokers’ who ‘did so much by their cunning and conspiring’.48 The Mortimers were locked up in the Tower and sentenced to life imprisonment; Roger Mortimer of Chirk died there, but his nephew made his plans and achieved a spectacular escape in 1323. Roger Mortimer did not forget the part Edmund had played in his uncle’s death and his own downfall, and he would later take his revenge on Edmund. In March Edmund and Thomas joined the king as he waged war on his most implacable enemy, Thomas, Earl of Lancaster. The earl was captured after a convincing defeat at Boroughbridge. Triumphant, and intent on revenge, the king ruled that the earl be tried for treason. No one was in any doubt of the outcome the king wanted. Testing Edmund’s loyalty, Edward II appointed Edmund to be one of the judges, ensuring that his young brother was irretrievably associated with his revenge.49 Lancaster was duly convicted, and executed. His followers, and in particular his heir, his brother Henry, would not forget Edmund’s part in the earl’s downfall.
With the removal of his most powerful enemy, Edward II was able to secure the return of his favourites from exile, and the Despensers were reinstated at the York parliament in May 1322. The king immediately found the means to give them generous financial rewards and he restored the strategically important geographical power bases on the Welsh borders to them, while making the elder Despenser Earl of Winchester.50 In comparison, Edmund’s rewards of the sheriffdom of Rutland and the town of Oakham were meagre.51 Both Despensers now enjoyed significantly larger incomes than Edmund (the younger Despenser’s annual income by 1326 has been assessed as being over £7,000, more than three times greater than Edmund’s). The return of the Despensers also relegated Thomas and Edmund to the sidelines. It would have been extraordinary if this blatant favouritism had not strained the brothers’ relationship with the king, while Edmund remained at a disadvantage compared to Thomas. Edmund could reasonably have expected better treatment from the king, but if he felt any resentment it was not apparent. In the face of Edward II’s grudging attitude towards him he continued to show remarkable devotion. Edmund accompanied him on a renewed Scottish campaign in the autumn, and was with the king when he was forced to flee ignominiously to Bridlington after being routed at Byland Abbey. Subsequently he worked willingly with the Despensers, even going to the aid of the Earl of Winchester in January 1323 when the latter was attacked and forced to take refuge in Windsor Castle, and then joining with him in recapturing Wallingford Castle from the rebels.
Despite Lancaster’s defeat at Boroughbridge there remained persistent political opposition to the king. Edmund’s unwavering loyalty was an unusual quality among the disaffected nobility, and a virtue that the king was forced to rely on. Edmund’s consistent reliability earned him successive military appointments, in February 1323 as lieutenant in the marches of Scotland and then commander, and in March as chief commissioner of array in Cumberland, Westmoreland, Lancashire and Craven, and lieutenant north of the Trent.52 Although the king showed no abatement in his preference for the Despensers, throughout the rest of that year Edmund’s increased attendance on the king suggests a growing attachment.53 On a personal level Edward II appears to have found Edmund the more congenial of his brothers, and it was easy to use Edmund’s abilities and rely on his dependability. Yet, despite the improved relationship the king did not take the opportunity to improve Edmund’s financial situation, nor did Edmund obtain permission to marry Margaret during this period of relative political calm. Edward II’s attitude towards his brother appears ungracious and he seems to have taken his goodwill for granted. It was almost certainly Edmund’s dependable allegiance which led the king to appoint his brother, rather than a nobleman with more experience, to undertake a delicate diplomatic embassy to France in 1324. On 30 March 1324 Edmund was appointed by Edward II to go to France with instructions to inquire into affairs in Gascony, reform its status and regime, and negotiate a marriage for Prince Edward.54 He was to be accompanied by two experienced diplomats, the Archbishop of Dublin and William Weston.
Gascony belonged to the English Crown, the last remaining vestige of Henry II’s great Angevin empire. Successive English kings had balked at the insistence of the French Crown on overlord suzerainty, and Edward II shared his father and grandfather’s reluctance to pay annual homage, doing everything he could to delay doing so. The French king did whatever he could to exert French authority in the region, and the local Gascon nobility used the dispute to their own advantage. In October 1323 the issue of sovereignty became critical when the French parlement held that the Benedictine priory in the village of Saint Sardos in the Agenais was exempt from English jurisdiction. The French sergeant sent to display the royal French arms was murdered, and on the initiative of the local Gascon lord, Raymond-Bernard de Montpezat, the village was burned. Delighted to have a legitimate excuse for reasserting French influence, Charles IV summoned local officials including Ralph Basset, the English seneschal in the region, to Paris to give an account of their actions. When they failed to respond Charles IV ordered the local French seneschals to take possession of de Montpezat’s castle. The questionable legality of his actions went to the heart of the sovereignty issue and Edward II could not ignore this open challenge to his authority. He ordered de Montpezat to defend the castle, and in March 1324 advised Charles IV that he was sending his ‘dear’ brother Edmund.55 Edmund probably set off for France with high hopes, as it was a prestigious appointment in keeping with his special status as the king’s brother, and he no doubt anticipated that a successful outcome would prompt his brother to be more generous in honouring the terms of their father’s charter. Although he was still unmarried, he would have felt it worth deferring his personal affairs until he returned.
Unfortunately, Edmund’s embassy was doomed to failure. Charles IV had no incentive to reach an agreement, as the crisis had given him a legitimate excuse to reassert French influence in the region. Arriving in Paris, Charles IV reputedly received Edmund’s deputation coldly, and it seems unlikely that the ambassadors could ever have suggested a solution which would satisfy all parties. The talks dragged on for three months, with obvious vacillations on the part of Edmund and the other English delegates. Charles IV had no intention of allowing the impasse to continue and by early July it was clear that he had determined on military action. When in desperation Edmund and his fellow ambassadors conceded some of the French demands, Edward II reacted with public anger and appointed replacement ambassadors. Privately, the king was finding his brother extremely useful. Edmund’s failed diplomatic overture had gained valuable time, and now invasion by the French was imminent he had a further use for him. On 20 July 1324 Edward II appointed Edmund to be his royal lieutenant in Gascony.56 This was, for the king, an expedient appointment. Edmund had obvious status as his brother; he was on the spot, loyal and known to have competence as a commander. If, as seemed likely, he failed to prevent a French invasion, then he was also a convenient scapegoat, enabling the king to distance himself from personal responsibility for any debacle. Unhappily for Edmund, this is exactly what happened. Within six weeks of his arrival in Gascony the French invading force had swept aside everything in their path. While there were many good reasons for the overwhelming French victory – the English garrison was small and poorly equipped, promised support from England never materialised, local support evaporated in the face of French numerical superiority – for Edmund it was a mortifying personal failure to add to his unsuccessful diplomatic overture. The prospect of returning to England with his reputation in tatters was not appealing. When Edward II asked Edmund to stay on as royal lieutenant in Gascony after signing the truce, he was probably relieved and thankful, and may have interpreted it as a sign of implied trust, helping to salve his bruised confidence. However, any comfort he derived may not have lasted for long. Once Edmund was established in Bordeaux, Edward II insisted that his reports and requests were channelled through Hugh Despenser. This was humiliating, and made worse by Hugh Despenser rebuffing Edmund’s friendly overtures towards him and undermining his position by conducting his own correspondence with Edmund’s officers.57
Isolated in Gascony and distanced from the English court, with the opprobrium of defeat, Edmund’s confidence in his brother was shaken and this was not helped by the news from England. The situation in Gascony dominated foreign affairs in England. In September Edward II used the defeat in the Agenais and the resulting fear of a French mainland invasion as an excuse to deprive his wife of her lands and her French servants, and to reduce her allowance. It was even rumoured he might try to obtain a divorce. These actions prompted angry reactions from many of the nobility, and considerable sympathy for Isabella. Throughout the autumn there were rumours Edward II would go in person to settle matters with Charles IV, but by February 1325 he had been persuaded by the Despensers that his wife would be a suitable emissary to her brother. Isabella departed on 9 March 1325 – joyfully, according to the Vita chronicler. With the deepening crisis at home and his supporters starting to desert him, Edward II belatedly felt concern about Edmund, and wrote to his ‘dear brother’ personally on 23 February 1325, ostensibly about his duties but in reality to ensure his loyalty.58 But although Edmund seems to have served his brother faithfully in the duchy, he was wary and no longer unhesitatingly compliant. The first indication of Edmund’s newfound independence came in April when Edmund refused to comply with the king’s order to send his chancellor, John Ellerker, back to England.59 Edward II was undoubtedly taken aback, and angry, as his order in June reveals, demanding that Edmund ‘at once lay aside all excuse’ because he was ‘putting forward certain excuses which the King deems insufficient’.60 The king sensed that it was time to bring his brother home, and when an expedition, headed by the earls of Surrey and Atholl, was dispatched to bring the long-awaited reinforcements and money to Gascony in May 1325, he recalled Edmund.61
It is not clear when Edmund left Gascony, but it is likely to have been in the autumn. The king evidently envisaged that it would take him some time to comply with his orders to complete his business before leaving, as he was paid as lieutenant until January 1326, but having received his recall Edmund turned his attention to his own personal affairs. Edmund had not forgotten Margaret, whom he knew was in Paris with the queen, and when her brother Thomas Wake arrived in Gascony with the expeditionary party, it gave him the opportunity to finalise arrangements for their marriage. Whether Edward II approved or not, Edmund was now determined to marry Margaret at the earliest opportunity, and had no intention of returning to England and leaving her in France. Knowing he would need a papal dispensation for their marriage (he and Margaret shared a common ancestor and so were related within the Church’s prohibited degrees of consanguinity), he lost no time in applying to the Pope. The necessary papal dispensation was granted on 2 October 1325, and by December Edmund had journeyed to Paris and married Margaret.62 Edward II does not seem to have objected to Edmund’s marriage, but he must have been appalled when he realised his brother was now in the enemy camp. When Edmund arrived in Paris, he found that Isabella was now surrounded by a sizeable body of supporters, all in opposition to the king. Isabella’s position had been strengthened by Prince Edward’s arrival in Paris in September to pay homage to Charles IV in his father’s place, and she had defiantly told her husband that she would not return to England until the Despensers were removed.63 Belatedly realising his mistake, Edward II made repeated demands for her to return, but to no avail. Having thoroughly alienated his wife, she ignored him, and an increasing number of disaffected nobles left England to join the queen in Paris.64
Edmund may not have appreciated the seriousness of his brother’s position in his enthusiasm and determination to complete his own personal affairs, but once he had arrived in Paris he could have been in no doubt of the antagonism and hostility felt towards Edward II, or the strength of support for the queen. Edmund’s loyalty and allegiance towards his brother, already weakened by his Gascon experience, was further weakened by his marriage. Margaret’s brother Thomas Wake was a favoured intimate of Henry of Lancaster, who headed the Lancastrian opposition to the king. Her own loyalties naturally lay with the queen, and her cousin, Roger Mortimer, was quickly becoming the queen’s champion. Isabella was also Edmund’s cousin, and he may well have felt sympathy for her complaints, while being conscious that he had a duty towards her, and his nephew. Once in Paris, he dithered. Margaret, as her later career indicated, was a forceful woman, and her influence on him would have been decisive.65 Throughout the autumn and winter of 1325 Edward II wrote to Isabella requesting her return; by March 1326 he was begging Prince Edward, and Edmund, to return.66 Edmund’s deep devotion and loyalty to his brother resurfaced, and he resolved to return, but, unsure of his welcome, he wrote to the king requesting permission.67 Unfortunately, it was by then too late. Having ignored so many of his orders, Edward II had lost patience with Edmund, and on 4 April ordered Edmund’s lands, goods and chattels to be sequestrated.68 Edmund now dared not return, and found he was committed to the queen’s cause.
Nevertheless, Edmund’s newfound allegiance to the queen was lukewarm. The driving force in her party was Roger Mortimer, who had not forgotten Edmund’s part in persuading him to surrender to Edward II in 1322. However, the recruitment of the king’s brother was a propaganda victory for Isabella, and Edmund was soon publicly associated with her. As the rift between king and queen widened Charles IV became uncomfortable with his sister’s presence and requested Isabella to leave his court, and to take her followers with her. Not yet ready to return to England, the queen travelled instead to Hainault, with the excuse of trying to arrange a match for Prince Edward. Edmund and Margaret accompanied her. Making no attempt to consult with her husband, Isabella negotiated with the Count of Hainault and agreed that Prince Edward would marry one of his three daughters in return for his promise of military support. Edmund was called on to undertake to see that the marriage took place.69 Armed with this assurance, and with a considerable body of support around her, Isabella planned her return to England. Her stated aim remained the removal of the Despensers. Meanwhile, realising that his wife was not going to return on his terms, Edward II prepared for the worst, assuming an invasion was imminent. He amassed an army, putting the Earl of Surrey in command, and appointed his remaining supporters to take command of the country’s defences, deputing Thomas of Brotherton to take charge of defences in Essex, Hertfordshire and East Anglia. However, when Isabella and her supporters, including Edmund and Margaret, sailed for England in September 1326 they chose to land on Thomas’ Suffolk estates. There they were greeted in safety by sympathisers, including Thomas, whose change of allegiance was almost certainly due to Edmund’s influence.70 Edward II had not anticipated that his brothers would betray him and could barely credit it, being at pains to exclude Edmund from the warrant issued for the arrest of Roger Mortimer and the other rebels on 27 September.71 But by October he could be in no doubt of Edmund’s changed allegiance after a joint proclamation issued in the name of Isabella, Prince Edward and Edmund called on him to be rid of the Despensers.72
Isabella’s actual intentions on returning to England, and whether or not she and Mortimer had planned all along to depose Edward II, have been much debated by historians. Whatever their real aims, they were careful to keep them secret. There was no reason for Edmund not to believe Isabella’s publicly stated objective of removing the Despensers, and he probably anticipated that an accommodation would be reached with Edward II, such as had been imposed in 1311 and 1321. No one predicted the complete and total collapse of support for the king, or the enthusiasm and approval with which the queen was greeted as she slowly made her way to London. The defeat of the king, without a single battle being fought, was overwhelming. The Earl of Winchester, the elder Despenser, was captured at Bristol, and his son at Hereford. Both were tried and executed, with Edmund and Thomas judges at their trials, showing that Edmund had long since lost any goodwill he may once have felt towards them.73 Abandoned by almost all of his supporters, Edward II was captured and imprisoned at Henry of Lancaster’s castle at Kenilworth. In January 1327 Isabella called an assembly of leading nobles to decide the king’s fate, at which the call was made for Edward II to step aside in favour of his son, Thomas Wake being one of the most vociferous of those calling for the king’s abdication. A deputation was sent to persuade the king to abdicate in favour of Prince Edward, and Edward II was forced, reluctantly, to agree. To unanimous acclaim, Prince Edward was crowned king on 29 January 1327, and shortly afterwards a council of four prelates, four earls and six barons was appointed to assist him in governing, on the grounds that at fourteen he was too young to do so himself.
Events had moved quickly and Edmund’s part in them is hard to discern. Although he had been closely involved in the Despensers’ fate, he does not seem to have been a party to his brother’s capture, or included in the deputation persuading him to abdicate, yet he was, with Thomas, on the newly formed governing council. The absence of both brothers from the removal of the king suggests that neither was comfortable with the forced abdication, but neither appear to have raised a dissenting voice. Perhaps any qualms Edmund felt were allayed by Isabella’s assurance that the king would be permitted to live out his life in comfortable seclusion. But the truth is that they had both, in effect, been bought by Isabella. Knowing how Edmund had been treated by Edward II, Isabella astutely offered to fulfil the terms of Edward I’s charter in full as the price for his acquiescence in his brother’s deposition. Naturally Margaret would have urged him to accept, and with an heir to consider (Edmund and Margaret’s first child, Edmund, was probably born in the late autumn of 1326 or early in 1327), self-interest played its part.74 Edmund was anxious that his gain would not be seen as a reward for his change of allegiance, and he tried to distance himself from his sister-in-law by formally petitioning Parliament for completion of the charter terms, making it clear that he was asking for the fulfilment of a long-standing, legitimate claim. On 10 January 1327, just days before Edward II’s abdication, the exchequer was ordered to work out what property should be granted to Edmund to provide him with sufficient further rents to ensure he enjoyed an annual income of 8,000 marks a year, as promised by Edward I.75 Thomas followed Edmund’s lead and similarly submitted his own petition, stating that he had only received 6,000 of the 10,000 marks promised.76 On 27 February 1327, in addition to a substantial grant of former Despenser and Arundel holdings, including Arundel Castle, Edmund had the satisfaction of having Edward II’s 1315 and 1319 grants to him confirmed and extended to his heirs.77 Thomas also received grants to fulfil his charter terms. At long last they both had what their father had promised them so long ago, but they would have to live with the fact that the price they had paid to achieve this was their silence in the face of Edward II’s abdication.
With Edward II’s abdication, Edmund’s position was publicly at its height and he appeared to enjoy considerable authority. He was the new king’s favourite uncle and he was on the council. Froissart described him as one of the young king’s main advisers, with Isabella and Mortimer.78 However, Edmund was not as powerful as his new position suggested. His reputation and standing had not been enhanced by his career in France, and nor had his cause been improved by the modest part he had played in Edward II’s deposition. With charisma, drive and force of personality Edmund could have made himself a dominant figure in the new regime, but he was not ambitious, and once he had obtained what he felt was his due as Edward I’s son he was content to follow the lead of others. Although he was a member of the council of twelve appointed to assist his young nephew, with Thomas Brotherton and Thomas Wake, it was headed by Henry of Lancaster and there is no evidence that Edmund enjoyed greater influence than the other council members. He was not intimate with Isabella and Mortimer, despite Froissart’s remark, and he made no attempt to become more closely associated with them. Even his achievement in obtaining the fulfilment of the charter terms indicates a crucial weakness on his part. Aware of Edmund’s ambivalence towards her cause, Isabella had been careful to ensure that (with the exception of Arundel Castle) Edmund received few key strategic properties, and that his lands were scattered (they were spread over twenty-six counties) so that he remained without a natural power base.79 Edmund must have realised this, but he does not seem to have objected, and he made no attempt to challenge Isabella and Mortimer’s dominance. In the summer of 1327 Edmund was appointed with Thomas of Brotherton, and Henry of Lancaster, to command the Scottish campaign, but it was not a successful partnership and the campaign ended badly, with Isabella and Mortimer forcing them to agree an unpopular truce. From the start of the new regime, the council had proved ineffective in taking control of affairs away from them, and Isabella and Mortimer’s acquisitive behaviour and firm grip on power started to arouse hostility. When opposition to Isabella and Mortimer started to grow in earnest, the disillusioned and unhappy nobility looked for leadership and found it in Henry of Lancaster, rather than in Edmund.
In July and August, while Edmund was in Scotland, there were attempts to free Edward II. Edmund had not made any attempt to visit his brother, and it is impossible to know how he felt about the king’s incarceration. When it was announced at the end of September 1327 that Edward II had died at Berkeley Castle, barely eight months after his abdication, Edmund, like everyone else, appears to have accepted this calmly, even though it was unexpected, and obviously convenient for Isabella and Mortimer.80 He went to the funeral in Gloucester in December 1327, and afterwards he continued with his official duties, attending his nephew’s wedding to Philippa of Hainault in York at the end of January 1328.81 However, within a few months Edmund became convinced that Edward II had not died and was being held in Corfe Castle. Having passively acquiesced in his brother’s removal from power, accepted his imprisonment and the announcement of his death, the intelligence that Edward II remained alive shook Edmund and appears to have resurrected all of his old loyalty towards his brother. Edmund would have realised that the only people who could have engineered the news of the king’s death, and the funeral, while concealing his survival, were Isabella and Mortimer, and that any attempt on his part to act on the information would threaten their position. There is frustratingly little in the way of evidence to explain why Edmund came to believe that Edward II was still alive, and even less to understand his reaction or intentions. At his own trial in October 1330 Roger Mortimer confessed that he had planted the information which led Edmund to believe Edward II was still alive in order to engineer Edmund’s downfall. Edmund was not stupid or credulous. Self-interest alone dictated that he ignore such information; he was in a very comfortable position, with the title and estates he had wanted, a wife and family (Joan was born during 1328) and a prominent position at court. Edmund had nothing to gain from Edward II returning, and a great deal to lose. But however the information came to him, Edmund believed it and determined to do something to support his brother.
While Edmund was working out what to do, opposition to Isabella and Mortimer was becoming more pronounced under Henry of Lancaster’s leadership, and in the autumn of 1328 matters came to a head with a direct armed confrontation between the parties. It is possible that Edmund had already approached Henry of Lancaster, as any plan he might have to help Edward II would obviously be to Isabella and Mortimer’s detriment. In November the Earl of Lancaster had written to the mayor and citizens of London saying that he had news from Edmund which he dared not put in writing.82 However, if he was referring to Edward II’s survival, it was soon evident that Henry had no intention of doing anything himself, perhaps not surprisingly given Lancaster’s earlier implacable hostility towards the king. Edmund and Henry were not natural allies either, as Henry would not have forgotten Edmund’s involvement in the defeat and execution of his brother Thomas in 1322. Edmund would have confided in his own brother, but it is clear that Thomas Brotherton was not prepared to take the lead on this. In the crisis the brothers were careful to appear neutral, and acted in a mediatory capacity, issuing a joint letter, probably sent to all the bishops, summoning them to a meeting in London on 19 December, and in January they accompanied the archbishop and the Bishop of London to the king as intermediaries to negotiate peace.83 Before they could start to discuss a settlement, Mortimer seized the initiative, advancing on Lancaster, and by mid-January 1329 he had gained the advantage and Lancaster had conceded defeat. In the aftermath Lancaster and his followers were fined and many, including Thomas Wake, fled abroad. The neutral stance Edmund and Thomas had taken ensured they suffered no repercussions, but they won few admirers, with one chronicler blaming Lancaster’s defeat on their failure to support him.
Almost immediately after Lancaster’s defeat, Edmund made preparations to go abroad, appointing attorneys in April 1329, and he crossed to France in June with Margaret.84 His ostensible purpose was to carry out official duties in Gascony, probably initially accompanying Edward III to Amiens to pay homage to the new French king, Philip VI. However, it appears that he had made up his mind to find and free Edward II, and had decided that he needed to find support. It is probable that Margaret and Edmund visited her exiled brother, with Edmund hoping for sympathy and assistance from Thomas Wake which, as a previous opponent of Edward II, he was unlikely to have given. While in Paris Edmund had discussions with exiled supporters of the king, Sir Henry Beaumont and Sir Thomas Rosslyn, and he also visited the Pope in Avignon to take his advice, later claiming that the Pope had commanded him to do what he could to secure Edward II’s release.85 Appealing for support in this way was risky, and Edmund received news from England warning him that there was a plot against him. He had planned to undertake a pilgrimage to Santiago in Spain with Margaret to fulfil a vow his mother had made, but once he heard of the plot he abandoned the trip and returned to England in the late autumn.86 On their return to England Edmund and Margaret outwardly resumed normal court and family life, yet, despite the obvious danger, he continued with his plans in secret, buoyed by the support he now had, which included the Archbishop of York and the Bishop of London. With Thomas of Brotherton also in his confidence, Edmund had no hesitation in involving his wife, and Margaret, perhaps surprisingly given her experience of Edward II, was supportive. In February 1330 Edmund and Thomas escorted Queen Philippa to Westminster Abbey for her coronation, and it is probable that Edmund took the opportunity at such a gathering to discuss his plans with others. By now Edmund was fairly certain that Edward II was being held at Corfe Castle, and after he had returned to Arundel to join Margaret and their children she assisted him in writing to John Deveril, the castle commander at Corfe Castle, to ascertain if it was indeed his brother’s prison.87
Unfortunately, Edmund did not keep his intentions sufficiently secret, and he unwittingly played right into Mortimer’s hands. When he attended Parliament at Winchester, Mortimer sprung the trap he had set. On 14 March 1330, shortly after Edmund arrived at the Winchester parliament, Isabella and Mortimer arranged for his arrest, and accused him of plotting to rescue Edward II and restore him to the throne.88 On 16 March, to the consternation of the gathered assembly, Edmund’s confession was read out. He admitted that he had indeed planned to rescue Edward II. This, Mortimer claimed, was treason – and the penalty for treason was death. Edmund’s confession was recorded and has survived.89 A curious mixture of fact and fiction, it was probably altered for effect by Mortimer. Nevertheless, in essence Edmund admitted that he believed his brother was being kept captive in Corfe Castle, that he had been ordered by the Pope to obtain support and rescue the imprisoned king, and that he had been planning to do so. Edmund appears to have wanted to protect, as far as he could, the others involved, and in particular his sources, and he did so by undermining his own credibility with a bizarre story that a friar had conjured up the devil and revealed to him that Edward II was still alive, a patent nonsense described as ‘fantastic and false’ by at least one chronicler.90 Although he named some of his supporters, including the Archbishop of York and the Bishop of London, it was a short and far from comprehensive list, and Mortimer later admitted that he had already known about those Edmund did name. Most of those named in his confession had been loyal to Edward II. The most striking thing about Edmund’s confession is that his stated aim was simply and solely to rescue Edward II and help him escape abroad. There appears to have been no serious intention of restoring Edward II to the throne or of threatening Edward III’s position, and the only evidence of Edmund’s rescue plan, apart from his confession, was the letters he and Margaret had written to the garrison of Corfe Castle.91
Nevertheless, appalled and paralysed, no one, not even Edward III, dared speak in Edmund’s defence. It is notable that Thomas Brotherton, who might reasonably have been expected to defend Edmund, made no attempt to help him. Isolated and deserted, Edmund realised the danger he was in and tried to save himself. He begged his nephew for forgiveness, and offered to abase himself by going barefoot wherever the king wanted, with a rope around his neck. The Brut Chronicle records that Edmund wept as he knelt before his nephew.92 Edward III either could not, or dared not, help him, and sentenced his uncle to death. In the early morning of the 19 March Edmund was escorted outside the walls of Winchester castle to be beheaded. The Anonimalle Chronicle records that, out of pity, no one wanted to behead him, and that Edmund was forced to wait all day until vespers around three o’clock in the afternoon, until at last a menial retainer of the king’s marshalsea was persuaded to act as executioner.93 It is doubtful if the reluctant recruit was skilful with the axe.
Edmund’s execution greatly shocked his contemporaries. When Edward II was deposed the revolution had been largely bloodless, other than the trials and executions of the king’s favourites, the Despensers, whose deaths were widely considered to be well deserved. But Edmund’s death was different. The chroniclers unanimously condemned the dubious legality of the proceedings, suggesting that even if Edmund’s confession was true, the punishment was too severe.94 Nothing like this had happened since Edward II wreaked vengeance on his enemies at Boroughbridge in 1322 and had executed his cousin, Thomas, Earl of Lancaster. Edmund’s judicial murder showed breathtaking ruthlessness by Mortimer and Isabella. Edward III was known to be fond of his uncle (evidenced by his affectionate address to Edmund in letters in contrast to his neutral greetings to his other uncle, Thomas Brotherton). Aside from his close relationship to the king, Edmund was Isabella’s cousin as well as her brother-in-law, and his wife Margaret was Roger Mortimer’s first cousin as well as having been one of Isabella’s attendants.95 But there was a rational purpose behind Mortimer and Isabella’s action. However incredible his belief that Edward II was still alive, Edmund’s actions in seeking support for his rescue plan jeopardised Isabella and Mortimer’s position. By his own admission Edmund had obtained a respectable body of support, and Isabella and Mortimer treated his plan as a serious threat. Edmund’s fate was an intentional act of terror designed to quash opposition, and he proved an easy target. Edmund may have been liked, and even regarded with respect because of his birth, but he was not a forceful, charismatic personality and Isabella and Mortimer gambled – correctly – that none of the nobility would be prepared to risk their own careers in defending him.
Isabella and Mortimer were swift to capitalise on Edmund’s execution. Between 18 and 22 March orders were issued in the king’s name to arrest forty-one named associates of Edmund, with a number of more minor implicated figures in the following months, and Edmund’s friends and associates fled, some abroad.96 Thomas Wake was condemned to death in the Winchester parliament for sedition; he also managed to leave the country.97 Thomas Brotherton surprisingly escaped any reprisal, probably because his son Edward had married Mortimer’s daughter Beatrice the previous year, but in April he took the precaution of absenting himself on official business in Gascony.98 The Pope disassociated himself from Edmund and several months later expressed surprise to Isabella that anyone could assert that he would have believed Edmund’s ‘incredible’ story.99 For the time being, at least, Isabella and Mortimer had succeeded in their plans.
Edmund’s Bereaved Family
Edmund’s execution had dire consequences for his family. Margaret had every reason to fear for her own future and that of her children. She was complicit in her husband’s offence, and could have no confidence she would be shown mercy. The queen and Mortimer were insecure in their hold on power, and in their weakness sought to impose their will by terrifying the aristocracy. In the civil war of 1321, nine years earlier, Edward II had shown little mercy to the families of his defeated opponents, and the wives and children of most of the Contrariants were subjected to long periods of detention. Roger Mortimer’s own wife, Joan Mortimer, had been imprisoned in the Tower and their children placed in different priories scattered around the country. Lady Badlesmere and her children had suffered similar treatment after the execution of her husband in November 1321, and even the Earl of Lancaster’s elderly mother-in-law, the Countess of Lincoln, had been imprisoned.100 There was no one to whom Margaret could turn for help. Her husband’s family had already shown their incapacity to aid Edmund, and Margaret’s closest relative, her brother, Thomas Wake, had fled abroad as soon as the orders for the arrest of Edmund’s confederates had been issued.101
Margaret did not have long to wait. The king’s yeomen, Nicholas Langeford and John Payn, arrived within days of Edmund’s arrest with orders to escort Margaret and her children from Arundel Castle into the custody of the sheriff of Wiltshire at Salisbury Castle.102 Her advanced pregnancy gave Margaret temporary respite, but she was immediately placed under house arrest, deprived of all but two of her women and restricted to an allowance of 13s 4d for her daily expenses, while her jewels and other goods were to be taken away and delivered to the king’s clerk, William Holyns, and Arundel Castle was placed in the hands of the king’s yeoman Roger Ashe.103 Edmund’s title, estates and moveable property were all forfeit. By an order dated 5 April Edmund’s goods and possessions were to be sold without delay and the proceeds sent to the Treasury.104 Margaret lost her own dower property from her first marriage, and within days of Edmund’s execution her stepson by her first husband, John Comyn, demanded her dower lands as his right on the grounds that it had exceeded her entitlement and he should have it because he had been awarded custody of his father-in-law’s estate.105
Under house arrest, deprived of her servants and all contact with the outside world, Margaret was completely on her own, with no female companions other than the two attendants left to her, and her only male companions other than her guards was the Prior and his community. Margaret’s loss of her husband, her position, the family’s wealth and possessions and the uncertainty of her own future were compounded by a deep sense of personal betrayal. Edmund’s fate had been engineered by Queen Isabella, whom she had served for many years, and by her own cousin, Roger Mortimer.106 Margaret’s own fate, and that of her children, was now at the whim of the queen and her lover, and she was helpless to prevent the disposal of her husband’s estates, goods and chattels; her children’s inheritance. Isabella and Mortimer could not resist the opportunity to enrich themselves from Edmund’s estates, and because there were so many, they took care to reward their own supporters as well. Isabella took Edmund’s houses in Westminster, the rental income from the towns of Gloucester and Cirencester, and Barnsley manor in Gloucestershire.107 Mortimer’s son Geoffrey was awarded a handsome share: Castle Donington in Leicestershire, two manors in Gloucestershire, the manor of Woking in Surrey, two manors in Derbyshire and one each in Nottinghamshire, Rutland and Wiltshire.108 Isabella and Mortimer divided the remainder of Edmund’s sixty manors, fourteen farms and assorted income sources between their supporters.109 The indecent haste with which they parcelled out Edmund’s property was such that it had not been possible for the king’s officers to complete the assessment and valuation usually done of forfeited estates, and less than eight weeks after Edmund’s death Isabella and Mortimer found it necessary to appoint commissioners to ascertain exactly what Edmund had owned, and who now had that property.110
It is not clear what Isabella and Mortimer planned to do with Margaret and her children, but incarceration for Margaret and the placing of her children into religious establishments was an obvious possibility. Although Edmund’s family hardly represented a threat to the queen and her lover, they may well have wished to make an example of his widow and children, and the orders to move them to detention at Salisbury Castle were merely an interim measure before transferring them to the Tower. John’s birth had given Margaret breathing space, as she would have been allowed to remain at Arundel Castle for at least six weeks afterwards until she was churched. This proved fortuitous, as with no record of Margaret being moved into the custody of the sheriff of Wiltshire at Salisbury Castle it appears that Isabella and Mortimer were content to leave the family at Arundel indefinitely. Probably they had not yet decided what to do with her. Luckily for Margaret, Isabella and Mortimer never got the chance to do so.