SIX

The Vow of the Heron

‘THE VOW OF the Heron’ is a political poem about Edward, written in the Low Countries in the mid-1340s. It relates how, in September 1338, Edward was sitting in his ‘marble palace’ in London with his courtiers and ‘ladies, girls and many other women’ around him. He was thinking about love and had no plans to make war, when Count Robert d’Artois returned from a hunting expedition with a heron he had caught. Having had the heron plucked, stuffed and roasted, d’Artois had two girls carry the bird on a silver plate to Edward, accompanied by minstrels playing the viol and the gitterne. D’Artois declared before all the court: ‘I have caught a heron, the most cowardly bird there is, and therefore I will give it to the greatest coward alive, King Edward, the rightful heir of France, whose heart has clearly failed him, for he fears to maintain his claim to the throne.’ In the story, Edward was embarrassed, and, red-faced, replied: ‘Since I am so accused, I swear on this heron that I am no coward but that I will cross the sea within a year to claim what is mine.’ Having heard the king’s promise, d’Artois smiled wickedly, and let the girls go forward to sing of sweet love-making to the king as the courtiers embraced their mistresses around the palace.¹

This poem gives us a vivid glimpse of how Edward was imagined by his enemies at this time, and in particular how he was seen in relation to the war. He was the sole protagonist. His warmongering could not even be excused by his leadership of a parliament which had resolved to take up arms. He personally decided to begin the conflict, and his cause was a selfish one: a frustrated claim to the throne of France, and the shame of accusations of cowardice. In the story of the Vow of the Heron the catalyst who turned this frustration into violence – Robert d’Artois – was a sinner, a heretic and a traitor. Furthermore, Edward’s decision was portrayed as being taken in the midst of a lascivious court in which nobles paraded their mistresses openly, flaunting their immoral behaviour before God. It all added up to a mélange of vice, dishonour and unworthiness.

Considering the need for pro-French propaganda, especially in the small countries whose rulers wanted to persuade their people to support them in their alliances with King Philip, there is nothing particularly surprising in the story itself. What is surprising is that modern popular understandings of the causes of the war are largely based on it. In Queen Philippa’s entry in the old Dictionary of National Biography, this vow was regarded as a real event, a chivalric ceremony in which Edward swore to make war. In twentieth-century classrooms, Edward was almost always portrayed as the guilty party on account of his dynastic ambitions and his claim to the kingdom of France (his ‘absurd’ claim, as the Encyclopaedia Britannica called it).² However, as we have already seen, Edward was very cautious about the developing diplomatic situation, and had proved scrupulous in his consultation with parliament and his council. As scholars have universally acknowledged for the last fifty years, his war-related claim that Philip had illegally seized the throne of France cannot be treated separately from his claim to Aquitaine, which Philip now openly and directly threatened.³ When he finally did claim the French throne, it was principally a technical shift to permit the Flemish legally to renounce allegiance to Philip. In this way we may see that Edward was not proceeding without parliamentary support. His decision to fight, while not encouraged by parliament, was nevertheless ratified by it. And hostilities broke out long before Edward finally and irrevocably claimed the title King of France. The dynastic claim was a symptom of the conflict, not a root cause.

In considering the events of 1337–40, Edward’s dynastic ambitions are less important than Philip’s dynastic vulnerability. When Edward’s claim to the French throne had first been put forward, during his minority, it had proved impossible to sustain it with any force. In addition, regardless of any legal claim or dynastic right, the French nobles preferred an exclusively French king to a part English, part French one, for the simple reason it was better to have a head of state who would have to consider their interests before those of the English. Thus Philip had become firmly established as the French king soon after his accession. Edward was in no position to risk a continental war in the early 1330s, and was well-advised by his parliament in 1331 to seek a peaceful solution to his disputes with Philip. This he did. But the fundamental problem had never gone away. In reality, it was in neither England’s nor France’s interests for Edward to be king of both nations; and Edward would have acknowledged that his dynastic claim to the throne of France would have been difficult (if not impossible) to assert and maintain without conflict. In later years he was happy to agree to peace treaties in which his claim was laid aside. But the very fact he had a claim could be used to his advantage if Philip tried to push his overlordship of the duchy of Aquitaine – and thus his overlordship of Edward himself – too far.

In order to counter this dynastic vulnerability, Philip had adopted a strategy of sustained diplomatic antagonism towards Edward. First he had claimed in 1331 that the form of homage which Edward had paid him was insufficient. Next he had refused to restore the parts of the Agenais seized from the English by his father. Then he had insisted on supporting the Scottish claim of David II, and had used Edward’s championing of Balliol to accuse him of threatening the crusade. After that he had threatened to invade Scotland, and had embarked on a policy of naval piracy, killing English sailors, looting English ships and burning English ports. Now he claimed Edward should not shelter d’Artois. As each dispute had been smoothed over by the patient negotiators, Philip had found another. While Philip may have benefited domestically in the short-term from such a policy, he was like a boy showing off to his peers by prodding the English lion’s rump with a sharp stick. That the lion did not immediately turn and bite – as Edward would have preferred – is probably due to three factors. These were the repeated advice of the English parliament and councils of magnates that the French question should be settled by negotiation, not war; Edward’s higher priority on asserting his Scottish rights; and a series of papal initiatives, including the crusade.

Philip’s demand that Edward should surrender d’Artois was thus just one more in a long string of grievances. If there had been no d’Artois, war would have been no less likely, as some other problem would have been put forward by Philip as a justification for taking action against the English king in Gascony. As it was, d’Artois was the best excuse Philip could find. On 30 November 1336, the pope wrote to Edward stating that Philip would not receive his peace envoys as Edward was protecting d’Artois.⁴ At the same time the pope asked Edward to send him (the pope) envoys equipped to agree a peace treaty. In the pope’s view, all was not lost. Even if Philip would not negotiate, the pope would.

Edward would have heard the pope’s view of the d’Artois dispute in December 1336. Such a contrived reason to break off diplomatic relations would certainly have infuriated him, and may well have convinced him that Philip was bent on war.⁵ This in turn may have triggered Edward’s next series of innovations. Out of the despondency of his brother’s death, his infant son’s death, and losses in Scotland, he saw a chance to recapture that enthusiasm and chivalric brilliance of the early 1330s. Philip’s antagonism had the result of challenging Edward to concentrate his attention and the bulk of his resources on France. It was exactly what Edward needed to enthuse himself, his court and parliament – and thus the country as a whole – into purposeful optimism for the future.

The seeds of the new initiative probably were sown in the days around his brother’s funeral. On 23 January 1337, almost immediately after his return from Canterbury, Edward held a council in the Tower of London.⁶ Gascony and Edward’s claim to the French throne were again discussed, but, as before, his counsellors urged him to seek peace, not war. English interests, it was said, would be best served by reinforcing the English fleet and building a league of allies against Philip, as Edward’s grandfather, Edward I, had done in 1297. Edward listened, and took these debates into parliament with him in early March 1337.

The first day of the parliament, 3 March, was momentous. Edward raised his six-year-old son, Edward, to be the duke of Cornwall. Never before in England had there been a duke; the title was connected solely with continental possessions. But in the wake of his brother’s death Edward had the idea of endowing his eldest son with the richest available earldom (Cornwall) and giving him the pre-eminent title among the nobles. In this he was emulating his grandfather’s creation of his son and heir (Edward II) as prince of Wales. Edward could not pass on that title in good faith, knowing his father – who had retained the title Prince of Wales – was still alive. So he did the next best thing: a royal dukedom. All the chroniclers were impressed, and almost all recorded the creation.

The parliament of March 1337 was radical. Innovation loomed large. The ban on all exports of unworked wool – proposed in late 1336 – was reinforced with parliamentary support. From now on weavers would be regularly invited to ply their craft in England and to teach the English how to make cloth. Grants would be offered to entice them over from the Low Countries. In this way the cloth trade could be developed and enhanced. And to maximise the potential and increasing demand, the wearing of imported cloth was banned, except of course for the king and his nobles. No one should wear imported furs unless they had an income of one hundred pounds per year. This ‘sumptuary law’, together with a similar statute of the previous year, was the first of its kind in England. Although the high income required for the wearing of furs might be seen as exclusive, the criterion is a money-related one, not restricted to the nobility. This permitted rich merchants and their families to continue to wear furs, and thus set men like the London merchants William de la Pole and John Pulteney – whose friendship and finances were beginning to make a real impression on the king – up alongside the barons. In so doing Edward was extending his principle of inviting leading townsmen to tournaments, and enforcing the requirement for all men with an income from land over forty pounds per year to be knights. A sensibility to the advantages of broadening the upper and middle tiers of the class structure was clearly at work.⁷

The major event of the parliament of March 1337 was not a law, nor anything to do with the wool trade, nor the creation of a duke, but the creation of six earls. This delighted chroniclers: so many in one triumphal creation! It was a clever move. In the past kings had been dogged by accusations of favouritism, but in raising six deserving men to such high status, no one could look at Edward favouring this or that one over the others. Each chronicler dutifully wrote down who received which earldom, documenting their names reverently, as if a new tier of chivalry had just been invented, which is, of course, what Edward had in mind. First and foremost was his closest friend, the thirty-four-year-old Sir William Montagu, captain of the plot to capture Mortimer and a war leader at Edward’s right hand ever since. He became earl of Salisbury. Lancaster’s eldest son, the twenty-six-year-old Henry of Grosmont, was created earl of Derby. The twenty-five-year-old William Bohun – another of those who had assisted at Mortimer’s arrest, a frequent participant in the Scottish wars, and recently married to the widow of Mortimer’s heir – was created earl of Northampton. Hugh Audley, son of Edward’s childhood justiciar, was created earl of Gloucester. Despite being Mortimer’s nephew, Hugh had joined Lancaster’s attempt to overthrow Mortimer in 1328, and had been unswervingly loyal to Edward ever since, providing him with troops for his Scottish wars and serving in person on the last two campaigns. William Clinton, another of the knights who had seized Mortimer in Nottingham Castle, was made earl of Huntingdon. Now thirty-two years old, he also had continued an active military life, being warden of the Cinque Ports and admiral of the western fleet during the French raids. Finally, Robert Ufford, who at the age of thirty-eight was the oldest of the new earls, was created earl of Suffolk. He too had assisted in arresting Mortimer. In surveying the credentials of those now raised to earldoms, it is striking how the removal of the dictator Mortimer was a common factor. It shows Edward continued to acknowledge and value the help he had received in throwing off the dictator’s oppression.

The end of the parliament was one huge feast. More than £439 – the equivalent of yearly wages for about one hundred and forty skilled labourers – was spent on this one meal.⁸ Edward held a great court for the men, while Philippa held a lesser court for the ladies.⁹ Twenty men were specially knighted to mark the occasion. Lord Berkeley received his official acquittal of any wrongdoing against Edward II. Two days later, on 18 March, grants were dispensed to the new earls and some of the knights, to keep them in the style befitting new men of rank. With Edward dining in state we might fairly see him presiding over a court full of confidence, looking to the future. Yet in reality it was a court beset by problems. As Edward feasted and his musicians played, and the new earls shared his dais, the Scots were planning an attack on the great stronghold of Stirling, and the French king was making plans to confiscate not just a few more English castles but the entire duchy of Aquitaine. If anything kept the smiles on the faces of the courtly retinue as they feasted that day in March 1337, it was that in Edward they had a man who, when faced with personal disaster, did not disappear in his own hunched conscience, or disdainfully shun his responsibilities as his father had done. This king faced up to his problems: he even found strength in them. He might have been aggressive, ruthless and dominating but he could turn his own mood and the mood of the court – and eventually that of the whole kingdom – simply through the force of his will.

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The parliament was followed by a flurry of diplomatic initiatives. Even while parliament was still sitting the new papal nuncio in England, Bernard Sistre, was despatched back to Avignon with letters of credence from the king and a spoken message: ‘secret business’ as it is habitually described in the records. Diplomatic exchanges were made with Alfonso of Castile, the elderly and dying count of Hainault (and his son – just in case), and the counts of Flanders, Guelderland and Juliers. Edward sent his negotiators to the Flemish cloth-working towns of Bruges, Ghent and Ypres, to discuss allowing the purchase of English wool. He sent several letters to the Gascon port of Bayonne, requesting warships, and prepared a defensive strategy for Gascony. He even sent messengers to Philip of France, still trying to find a way to negotiate rather than fight. This was certainly not appeasement – Edward’s attempts to build a federation of forces against Philip were not likely to end in a climb-down, and Edward’s only compromise was an offer to give up d’Artois if the man was given safe passage to his trial and Philip gave up his support of the Scots – but neither was it hankering after a European conflict.¹⁰ Considering that the French had burnt Portsmouth again and attacked Jersey during the parliament of March 1337, Edward’s final attempts at a negotiated settlement appear very restrained.

Edward’s busy diplomatic embassy – led by Henry Burghersh (bishop of Lincoln), William Montagu and William Clinton (earls of Salisbury and Huntingdon respectively) – were given the task of presenting Philip with a series of demands, to permit diplomacy to continue. They were not welcome to proceed into France. Instead they remained at Valenciennes, dishing out royal grants and pensions to all those who might prove useful, until a grand meeting of diplomatic representatives took place there in early May. Straightaway the battle lines became clear: Louis, Count of Flanders, stood resolutely in support of Philip of France, and, like Philip himself, failed to attend the diplomatic party (although both men had been invited). John of Luxembourg, king of Bohemia, also refused to desert Philip. On Edward’s side were the count of Hainault and his heir (Edward’s brother-in-law, the count dying just after the meeting), the count of Guelderland (Edward’s brother-in-law), the duke of Brabant (Edward’s first cousin) and a host of minor counts and margraves: Berg, Juliers, Limburg, Cleves, Marck and Namur. Peace was discussed, and the intransigence of the French king examined. Then, seeing as Philip’s allies had not sent representatives, the discussions turned to war. Edward’s representatives took the lead. Edward would pay handsomely for the support of the other nations if war broke out. Even Edward’s close relations were promised large amounts of money. William Montagu himself had some doubts about the strength of the coalition, and he was not alone in thinking that the German princes were only after Edward’s gold, or England’s wool (which for the cloth-working towns was just as valuable).¹¹ The pope was also inclined to think the worst of the German princes’ love of money. But nevertheless the negotiations continued, and towards the end of May it was clear that a military alliance had formed against France, led and financed by England.

Edward remained at Westminster until 3 May. That day he began to head north with his army at a huge speed, reaching York in time for him to dine with Richard Bury and the earls of Northampton and Gloucester on the 11th. The infantrymen with him were forced to march ‘night and day’ as he raced towards Stirling Castle, the strategically important fortress now besieged by the Scots.¹² Edward saw an opportunity to engage them in battle and, if not to defeat them permanently, at least to do them such lasting damage that his policy of constant attrition would be sustained. But in reality his efforts and attention were now being directed towards the Continent, and the Scots understood that they merely had to return to their old tactics of waiting until the English king had departed before they attacked again. Thus, as Edward approached Stirling Castle, the Scots disappeared. They remained in hiding as long as Edward was in the vicinity. With the French supplying them through Dunbar, and Edward having to return south to deal with his alliance, they were safe, and free to fight another day.

It was while Edward was at Stirling, reinforcing his garrisons and repairing the walls, that Philip finally plunged Europe into war. On 24 May he confiscated the duchy of Aquitaine. So much attention had been paid to the English province over the last thirteen years – since the War of Saint-Sardos – that Philip cannot have had any doubt as to what would be the results of his action. He had asked the question which could only be answered by force of arms. The question was whether he ruled as an absolute king of a nation which included the duchy of Aquitaine (as if Edward was just another French vassal), or was Aquitaine beyond his control, absolute rule there being the prerogative of the king of England. Having confiscated the duchy, and done away with diplomacy, Philip VI had given Edward the choice of responding with force or forever losing a major part of his birthright. For Edward, who had championed the virtues of chivalry all his young life, and who had repeatedly proved himself prepared to use war to attain his ambitions in his other threatened territory, Scotland, this was no choice. It was a declaration of war.

Edward immediately returned to the south. He gave orders for his already extensive coalition to be augmented still further. Alfonso of Castile was already at war. Promises were made and pensions offered to the palatine count of the Rhine, the counts of Geneva and Savoy, and more than a dozen others. Most important of all, negotiations for an alliance were made with the Holy Roman Emperor, Ludvig of Bavaria. For Pope Benedict XII, the news that Edward was in discussions with Ludvig – a heretic and an excommunicate – can only have caused him to pull out his hair. When it emerged that Philip too was in negotiations with the heretic emperor, he must have despaired. He wrote in mid-June to the archbishop of Sens and the bishop of Rouen, to see what they had done to prevent the war. At the end of June he wrote again. He wrote to both kings urging them to follow the path of peace, and sent a diplomat to each of them in turn, and castigated them for being so cordial to an excommunicate ruler. But despite his best efforts, it was apparent to all that Ludvig would side with either Edward or Philip, and there would be a great European war. All the pope could do was to try to use his influence to stave off the onslaught as long as possible.

In theory Edward could have taken action with no further reference to parliament, but he was dependent on his people for finance, not to mention their goodwill. He had carefully brought every single decision regarding war with France to a council or parliament, and always he had abided by the decision not to take military action. Hence in May he had held a great council of magnates and prelates at Stamford to consider the repercussions of Philip’s actions in Gascony. In July he held another.¹³ Diplomacy had failed. War was now unavoidable. Philip’s catalogue of errors was growing longer by the season. He had failed to address the question of the Agenais, had attacked English shipping, had attacked English ports and the Channel Islands, had threatened to invade Scotland, had supported Edward’s Scottish enemies, and had confiscated Aquitaine. In July 1337 he finally sent an army to invade the duchy and to prise the castles there from English control. His actions had caused several Gascon families to withdraw from openly supporting Edward. Far too much was at stake now to let these matters pass without recourse to military action.

Edward was not set on sending an army directly to Aquitaine. Troops to help defend the duchy had been summoned in preparation, but a full-scale attack on the French there would have left England unprotected, and if Philip held back sufficient men from the duchy and used them to attack the coast of England, it would be very difficult to defend it. Besides, Edward could see other options. He chose in the end to send a limited force to the duchy, under the command of John of Norwich, and to retain men in England to constitute a second army, to assemble on the borders of Northern France, and to join with the forces of his many allies, thus directly threatening Philip’s kingdom. He also played his trump card: English wool. Tens of thousands of sacks of it. For a year he had withdrawn wool from export; now, directing this precious resource carefully towards the looms of his allies in Brabant and away from those of his enemy, the count of Flanders, he could enrich his friends and impoverish his opponents. Moreover, he could do this at a profit. Through setting up an English wool company, under the oversight of the London merchants William de la Pole and Reginald Conduit, Edward could borrow large amounts of money advanced on an income to be derived from exported English wool. Using his political authority, Edward could ensure that the wool was bought at a minimum price through compulsory purchase and sold at a premium to the merchants in Brabant.¹⁴

The opening hostilities in the war were half-hearted. Philip’s large army under the command of the count of Eu had marched into the Agenais at the beginning of July. At this time, Edward’s small army under John of Norwich was still in Portsmouth, about to set sail. This left the French free for a short while to attack fortified towns and seigneurial castles in the region; but they did not do so with any great conviction. At the end of June Edward had sent letters to sixty-seven Gascon magnates thanking them for their loyalty to him, and similar letters to the leading citizens of more than twenty towns.¹⁵ His hopes that they would prove loyal when the French invaded proved well-founded. The fortified towns of Saint-Macaire, Saint-Emilion and Libourne each withstood a brief siege.¹⁶Other, smaller fortresses did not, but they were cheap gains for the French. If they fell so easily, they would be difficult to defend when the time came for a counter-attack. And Philip was more anxious about the counter-attack than he was about the initial progress of his army in the south. The growing awareness that Edward had not sent a large force to Aquitaine but was holding back, probably to attack the north of France together with his allies in the Low Countries, severely worried him.

In late August Edward won the auction for the Holy Roman Emperor’s support. He undertook to pay Ludvig an advance of 300,000 florins (£50,000) in return for two thousand men. It was a very large sum. And he was distributing grants of this magnitude all across Germany: at 15 florins for each man-at-arms per month (£27 per year), he was engaging imperial, royal and ducal support by advancing sums equivalent to ten months in the field. He was betting heavily on victory. And well he might: he seemed to be emerging as the surer diplomatic hand and the more capable strategist. Philip had invaded Aquitaine but it was Edward who had taken the military initiative in threatening the north of France. And he had not even left England.

Edward summoned parliament to Westminster to discuss the wars with Scotland and France in September 1337. ¹⁷ Parliament took the remarkable step of granting taxation for the next three years: an unprecedented grant, which demonstrates how much the kingdom supported his leadership. One of the reasons for this probably lies in Edward’s policy of making proclamations throughout the country, so that the people were aware of the dangers posed by French aggression. More than any other previous king, Edward consulted his subjects on his foreign policy, sending out important representatives such as the archbishop of Canterbury and William Bohun, earl of Northampton, to explain his decisions to the leading men of the counties.¹⁸ The result was that parliament agreed that Edward should go to take charge of the military alliance formed in the Low Countries, and to meet the Holy Roman Emperor, Ludvig of Bavaria.

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It might appear that all was going well for Edward in late 1337, and that the root of his problem – King Philip and Aquitaine – was soon to be confronted. He was about to set out to join with his magnificent array of allies, to attack a strategically indecisive French king who was not prepared to take risks or to stretch himself financially as far as Edward. But not only had his problems of Scotland and France not gone away, he had manoeuvred himself into a position of extreme debt. The three years’ taxation would not even repay his borrowing to date, let alone his planned future expenditure.¹⁹ Worse, he had put himself at the mercy of his allies, and was now dependent on them doing what they had promised to do. Worse still, he had committed himself to providing men he simply he did not have at his immediate disposal. Leaving troops in the north to hold the border against the Scots, leaving an army – albeit a small one – in Aquitaine, and securing the southern coast meant that there were fewer troops to take abroad. And whereas he could borrow money from the Italian merchants and Conduit’s and de la Pole’s wool company, and promise to pay sums he did not actually have, he could not borrow men. His advisers cautioned him that the grand expedition might have to be cancelled.

Edward did not cancel, he postponed. At which point Philip agreed to peace negotiations. Edward, too good a diplomat to refuse to deal with Philip, but eager not to lose momentum, upped the stakes by agreeing to negotiate but at the same time threatening to claim the throne of France. On 6 October 1337, three days after he had despatched a high-level diplomatic mission to France, he issued writs to the count of Hainault, the count of Juliers, the duke of Brabant and the earl of Northampton, appointing them his lieutenants in France, using the title ‘King of France and England’ in one set of documents and ‘King of England and France’ in another.²⁰ Such a declaration was not just a fist in the face of the French king, it was an insult to the pope, who regarded Edward’s potential claim to the throne of France as possibly the most destabilising aspect of the whole controversy. Benedict XII had just written to the two cardinals he had deputed to deal with Edward and Philip, ordering them to proceed to England straightaway, without waiting for Edward to cross to France. As Benedict put it: ‘for once there [in France] he cannot easily return, and the Teutons who want to get his pay would incite him to war. That the spark may not become a flame, the nuncios should dissuade the king from crossing the sea.’²¹ Now this new claim to the throne was guaranteed to undermine any possible peace negotiations. It threatened to undermine the basis of French sovereign power, and thus Philip’s right to act in Aquitaine. Although Edward did not follow up this claim with further writs issued in his name as king of France, that he had done so once, and on an international stage, was enough.

In early November the pressure on Philip increased further. On the 6th the pope wrote to him outlining in full the implications of Edward’s alliance with the rulers of the territories of Germany and the Low Countries. Benedict informed Philip that Edward was planning to bribe Ludvig of Bavaria to resign his position as Holy Roman Emperor. If this were to happen, Edward would be elected in his place, with command over the German princes. Even if Ludvig were not to resign, Edward was going to be appointed Vicar of Lower Germany (the Low Countries) for life ‘so as to be nearer to France, and so better able to attack it’.²² The pope further informed Philip that his enemies had gathered men, money and supplies, so that he (Philip) was almost entirely isolated. This confederation, the pope claimed, was to last for the lifetime of Edward and Ludvig and their sons. Further marriage alliances would bind the allies closer together. In short, the pope was outlining how Philip had been totally outmanoeuvred by Edward, who now had most of Europe behind him. The only chance Philip had was to make peace with England.

As it happened, Edward still faced many problems gathering men and money before he could set out. Without him – the undisputed leader – the rest of the confederation was worse than useless, a drain on English resources. It looked as if William Montagu and the doubters would soon be proved right: the heavy expenses of the coalition would hamper Edward’s ability to raise an army, not help it. Frustrated by the slowness of gathering troops, Edward ordered the one fleet he had in readiness, under Sir Walter Manny, to set out and harass the French ships and ports. At the same time he urged the army in Aquitaine to seize back all the castles and fortified houses which the French had taken in July. On both fronts Edward’s men did his bidding. In Flanders, the tables were almost entirely turned. Eager for battle, Manny’s fleet failed to capture Sluys but lured the garrison into combat at Cadsand, where he won a bloody victory, directing his archers to massacre the Flemings assembled on the shore.²³

Manny’s victory did not make anything easier for Edward. He was still short of men. His lack of money was greatly exacerbated shortly afterwards when Bishop Burghersh, in a rash attempt to shore up the alliance, promised unrealistic amounts of cash to the duke of Brabant and other waverers. They had begun to question Edward’s resolve, especially when the cardinals sent by the pope urged him to agree to a truce, and threatened him with everything from excommunication to an alliance between the apostolic see and Philip. The duke of Brabant – whose support for Edward had been kept secret – was just one of those tempted to open an alternative secret diplomatic channel with France. Burghersh panicked, and seized the wool which Conduit and de la Pole were about to sell. Needless to say, having no mercantile skill or experience of his own, and no appreciation of theirs, his efforts to obtain more money than the merchants proved an utter failure.²⁴

Edward was faced with financial disaster. He had already borrowed more than a hundred thousand pounds.²⁵ But when a king like Edward finds himself in such a predicament, his lifestyle does not alter, nor does his largesse. Edward now rose above his financial problems in style. He paid Sir Walter Manny eight thousand pounds for one single prisoner captured at Cadsand: the half-brother of the count of Flanders. For his games at Christmas 1337 he ordered an artificial forest foliated with gold and silver leaves, as well as more than a hundred masks, some with long beards and others in the forms of baboons’ heads, to entertain the court.²⁶ For his games on 13 April 1338 at Havering he built mock siege engines and lavished new clothes on all the participants as usual.²⁷ But the clothes he ordered for himself raised the art of dressing like a king to such heights that previous superlatives are hardly adequate. His hood, for example, was made of black cloth and

decorated on one edge with images of tigers holding court made from pearls and embossed with silver and gold, and decorated on another edge with the image of a castle made of pearls with a mounted man riding towards the castle on a horse made of pearls, with trees of pearls and gold between each tiger, and a field and a trefoil of large pearls embroidered well in from the edge²⁸

No fewer than 389 large pearls, three enormous pearls and five ounces of small pearls were used in making it. The other clothes he and the earls of Salisbury and Derby wore were equally stunning.²⁹ His only concession to impending financial ruin and his inability to raise enough men to invade France was to answer the cardinals who had so threatened him with an offer not to invade France for two months. Faced with no prospect of obtaining better terms, they accepted.

*

In dealing with the cardinals, Edward told them an extraordinary thing. He claimed that any truce he made with France would have to be ratified by parliament, because in England parliament ratified all matters regarding war and peace.³⁰ The cardinals did not believe him, and presumed this was merely a diplomatic ploy. But, as we have seen, although Edward was grossly exaggerating the legal basis for parliamentary ratification, it was not entirely untrue. Moreover, it was a development of Edward’s reign, and very much his own initiative. Mortimer had used parliament to sanction the forced abdication of Edward II in 1327, but war remained outside its remit until Edward had put the question in 1331. From then on, discussions about whether to go to war or not had never excluded parliament’s voice. Although any real decision-making still lay with the king, parliament was consulted, if only to determine the strength of support for the king’s policy.

The other point to note about parliament in 1338 is that it was no longer just the lords temporal and spiritual. Commoners played an increasingly important part. When Mortimer had summoned representatives of the shires and towns to the 1327 parliament, they had been drawn together merely to add weight to the voices of the leaders and to depose the king with the assent of all the people. Edward jumped on this idea of popular assent, and encouraged popular representation. By 1338, commoners were summoned to parliament as a matter of course. They met separately to the lords, and they were not consulted on every matter, but they had a presence and a voice. They presented their own petitions, and could expect some answer from the king. In effect, a great bargaining was going on between king and people. The commoners or representatives of the shires and towns – forerunners of modern Members of the House of Commons – wanted grievances addressed, but more importantly they wanted to know that they had a forum for raising complaints. The king wanted popular support for his main policies, and to ensure that taxation would be forthcoming when those policies entailed keeping an army in the field, or bribing continental princes. Edward was offering parliamentary power in return for money and support, and enlarging the representation of parliament to include the wealthy and important provincial townsmen and landowners, as well as the lords and bishops.³¹

In February 1338 parliament was put to the test. Edward wanted to know whether the representatives of the shires would continue to support his policies in war as well as peacetime. In particular, did parliament support his continental alliances, and his plans to go overseas, and could he rely on parliament to promise further financial support?³² With regard to Scotland he wanted to know whether he had continued support for his new attack on Dunbar Castle, through which the French were supplying the Scots nationalists. This was held by the fearsome Black Agnes, daughter of Sir Thomas Randolph and widow of Patrick of Dunbar. As the name implies, she was no wan Scots lass. As Montagu and four thousand men hammered at the gate with a battering ram and blasted away at the walls, this woman yelled defiance from the battlements at the English and berated her garrison, probably terrifying them more than the enemy. A good handful of women in the mid-fourteenth century were truly militaristic, able to inspire and lead their men in battle as well as most men. Black Agnes was certainly one of them. When a boulder from a siege engine smashed into the battlements near where she was standing, she took a cloth and ostentatiously began to dust the walls.

Parliament in February 1338 supported Edward wholeheartedly. The Scots were more dangerous than ever. The French were making plans to invade England, and in March the first incursions of their long-awaited onslaught took place.³³ Portsmouth suffered yet again, as did Jersey. Parliament urged Edward to go to the Low Countries to take command of the allied army and once and for all to bring King Philip of France to his knees. On 24 February the truce was extended until midsummer. The cardinals, the pope and King Philip were informed. But on the very same day orders were given for the northern and southern fleets to assemble at Orwell and Great Yarmouth a fortnight after Easter (12 April), ready to set out the following month. And when Bishop Burghersh was given his instructions to take new proposals for peace to the French king in May, the letters he carried were not of a conciliatory nature. In them Edward addressed Philip as ‘Philip de Valois, he who calls himself king of France’, and stated that he, Edward, had a stronger right to the French throne than Philip.³⁴ He added his intention to conquer his inheritance by force of arms. In confiscating and trying to seize control of Gascony, Philip had thrown down the gauntlet. Now Edward picked it up.

*

There were many delays before he could set out. The fleet proved very difficult to gather, with much corruption on the part of the royal officials who were charged with gathering men, money and materials. Edward’s haste may have added to the problem, as men stole what they had been ordered to requisition from others for the king’s use, and then took advantage of the need for materials and foodstuffs to sell on what they had already obtained. The problem of ‘purveyance’ – the requisitioning of food and other necessities for the royal household – became far more widespread as supplies for the forthcoming war were also seized. Edward himself was probably aware of the tension this caused; William Pagula had written in The Mirror of Edward III about the injustice of royal purveyors who would seize a hen from an old woman from which she got four or five eggs a week, or take a sheep from a man who had only taken it to market to pay his rent.³⁵ But Edward was unable or unwilling at present to curb such injustices. He was preoccupied with his political agenda, not the process of carrying it out. In April 1338 he wrote to his friend, Sir Walter Manny, expressing surprise that he had failed to assemble sufficient ships to cross the sea.³⁶ The Exchequer was still based in York, to which city it had been moved in 1333 during the Scottish wars. And Edward personally contributed to the inefficiencies by removing himself from business. In late March he made another very fast journey to Scotland, travelling from London to Newcastle in less than seven days, and completing the whole journey from London to Berwick and back (more than seven hundred miles) in less than nineteen.³⁷ If we are right in assuming that this is the ‘secret’ journey described in the record of his daily alms-giving as taking place in May or June, during which he took the time to go to Darlington to give two cloths of gold spinet to the image of the Virgin in the church there, then we have an explanation for his sudden journey, for it records that the king went ‘secretly to Scotland to visit and comfort the garrisons and commanders of certain castles there’.³⁸ It seems that this was the point at which Edward decided he could spare his Scottish troops no longer, and instructed Montagu to call off the siege if the castle had not capitulated by a certain date. In the hope of speeding up the siege, Montagu told Black Agnes that her brother (who was then a prisoner in England) would be executed beneath the walls of her castle if she did not submit. She laughed and replied that, if they did that, she would not be disappointed, for she would inherit his earldom of Moray.³⁹ There was no persuading this woman. Montagu realised that if Edward wanted to campaign in France, he would have to give up Dunbar Castle. Black Agnes on her own constituted a whole second front.

Edward, Philippa, their daughters and most of the royal household – their clerks, their musicians, their cooks, their pantlers and butlers (including John Chaucer, father of the great poet Geoffrey Chaucer) – and several thousand soldiers assembled at Orwell on 12 July 1338, seven weeks after their original intended date to set sail.⁴⁰ Edward gave presents of a pair of decorated silver basins to each of his daughters, Isabella (now aged six) and Joan (now aged four) in the days before travelling.⁴¹ A new seal of absence was struck and delivered to the Treasurer, the previous great seal being delivered to the king on his great ship the Christopher on the 14th.⁴² The elaborate arrangements for governing England in his absence (the Walton Ordinances) were drawn up. John Stratford, archbishop of Canterbury, was appointed chief officer during the regency of the eight-year-old duke of Cornwall. Finally, on 16 July 1338, Edward and his fleet finally cast off and sailed from Orwell, picking up the rest of the fleet from Great Yarmouth a couple of days later. The fleet was numerous, and decked out to create the most striking impression, Edward’s great ships carried specially made huge streamers, thirty or forty feet in length, showing the royal arms as well as those of St Edward (on Edward’s own ship, theEdward), St Edmund, and St George.⁴³ The largest of all was decorated with the life of St Thomas and was seventy-five feet in length; this probably adorned the mainmast of his great ship, the Thomas. On the 21st the royal entourage landed at Antwerp, and was received by Edward’s allies, all assembled for the occasion. His first night in Brabant was far from a comfortable one: the entire household had to flee the building they were staying in as it burnt down. The new leader of the great confederation of allies against France found himself and his pregnant queen fleeing from their beds in their nightshirts, and being accommodated at the abbey of St Bernard nearby.

The fire was not an auspicious start to the campaign. Still less auspicious, after the formal greetings, was the allies’ support, or, rather their lack of it, which may be accurately characterised as a hesitancy to go to war. Edward was of the opinion that he had paid them well; he wanted to know when they would be ready for action. In particular he planned to lead a preliminary attack on the Cambresis region – which bordered on the south-west of Hainault – in the next few weeks. His allies dithered. They pointed out that much money had been promised, and little had been delivered. They wanted to see his gold before they committed themselves to fight for him. Edward, regarding it as a royal prerogative to distribute largesse without checking his balance of accounts, had to face the fact that they would not be persuaded. They would not fight Philip for prestige alone. The problem was, as Edward knew, that he had very little actual gold.

Edward could still raise money but it was soon apparent that it would be years, not months, before he could meet his debts in full. Furthermore he had not just to meet his debts, he had to show his allies that he would go on being able to meet them. The Bardi and the Peruzzi banking houses were called upon and advanced a further eight thousand pounds. Paul de Montefiore (an Italian administrator and trusted confidant of Edward) raised another eight thousand. William de la Pole advanced eight times this amount against promised wool customs. Sir Bartholomew Burghersh (brother of the bishop of Lincoln) set about raising money through loans from continental and English magnates with the king. He and Paul de Montefiore mortgaged quantities of royal treasure, including Edward’s great crown of gold. Nor was this the most desperate money-raising measure undertaken: back in England his government licensed the clergy in Devon to start digging for buried treasure.⁴⁴ No reports of treasure survive, but somehow enough money was raised to fill the royal coffers, and to sustain obligations and payments of more than four hundred thousand pounds over the next year and a half.⁴⁵

While all this was going on, the Holy Roman Emperor also had begun to have doubts. It was suspected that Edward had promised more than he could afford to the lesser lords of the Low Countries and Germany; it went without saying that he would be even more at a disadvantage when it came to paying for the services of the Holy Roman Emperor. As a result of this information, no doubt passed back to him from his first-class intelligence network, Edward seized the initiative. Rather than wait for his money-gatherers to make careful apologies for him, he had a brief meeting with several of his diffident allies, paid them some small sums, and then took his essential entourage quickly down the Rhine to Cologne, instructing the rest of his household to follow by barge.⁴⁶ Entering Cologne, he ostentatiously gave money away, making small but careful donations at the houses of all the orders of friars in the city, offering oblations at the shrines of the cathedral, including the shrine of the Three Kings, where it had been prophesied that he would be buried. To the cathedral itself he made the very generous donation of £67 10s.⁴⁷ He spent the night in Cologne, and then next day was off again, on his way down to Koblenz. On 30 August he arrived just outside the city, and stayed on the island of Niederwerde, awaiting a response from the emperor. In the meantime he sent gifts to the emperor and the emperor’s wife (Philippa’s elder sister, Margaret).⁴⁸

Edward’s judgement had been good. His instinct to take immediate action to secure support proved decisive. Through lavishing money publicly on people, living as sumptuously and ostentatiously as he could, and through paying the emperor the next instalment of his treasure, he forced Ludvig’s hand. With all his subservient princes and petty kings present, Ludvig could not possibly go back on his earlier agreement. Any thought he had of reopening the auction for his army was ruled out, as Edward’s presence and very high profile demanded an immediate and public response. The affirmation which Edward sought – an official position to confirm his leadership of the allies in the Low Countries – came on 5 September, when he met Ludvig in a great ceremonial meeting in the marketplace at Koblenz. The two leaders processed into the cathedral and Edward, dressed in a robe of scarlet, sat at the foot of the imperial throne. The emperor himself sat in splendour, wearing his crown and holding a sceptre, with a naked sword held aloft behind him by Otto de Cuyk.⁴⁹ Edward could not resist one show of independent pride, refusing to kiss the emperor’s feet. But this irregularity was quickly smoothed over, and, with most of the great men of Germany watching, Edward was crowned Vicar of the Holy Roman Empire.

This new title was worth more than gold to Edward. It was pure and powerful propaganda. That he understood this is evidenced by the fact that he had had fifteen rich robes made in advance to be worn by the emperor, himself, the duke of Brabant and twelve other noble leaders of England and Germany.⁵⁰ Two days after his coronation the resplendent king of England rode back across to Antwerp, arriving there on 13 September. Five days later he summoned all his allies, or, rather, his new subjects, to attend him at Herk, in Loos, to hear the Imperial letters. On 12 October they gathered in the town hall. The walls were hung with ‘rich and fine cloths, like the king’s presence chamber’.⁵¹ The king himself was seated five feet higher than everyone else, and wore his new golden crown. He had the official letters of office read out, appointing him Vicar Imperial for life, lieutenant of the Holy Roman Emperor. His wars were to be treated as wars of the empire. All those subject to the authority of the emperor were to swear fealty to him. The war against the French in the Cambresis would begin the following summer. After all the solemn celebrations, Edward returned to Philippa, now eight months pregnant, at Antwerp at the beginning of November.

*

On 6 September, the day after his coronation, while still at Koblenz, Edward commended the services of one Nicholas Blank de Fieschi, master of a certain galley lately sent to him in England, and at the same time released the man from his covenants agreed in Marseilles with Niccolinus Fieschi on Edward’s behalf.⁵² Whatever the task for which Niccolinus had engaged Nicholas Blank (who was probably his nephew), it was now finished. It so happens that this coincides with the arrival at Niederwerde of one Francesco Forcetti or Forzetti, probably a member of the Forzetti family of Florence.⁵³ The reason this deserves notice in a biography of Edward III is that with Forzetti was a man called William le Galeys – William the Welshman – ‘who calls himself the father of the king of England’.⁵⁴ It appears likely that on 6 September 1338, on the island just north of Koblenz, Edward finally came face to face with his father, Edward II.

The meeting had been planned well in advance. Edward II as ‘William the Welshman’ (a name reflecting his one remaining royal title: Prince of Wales) had originally been taken to Cologne, where Edward had visions of meeting Ludvig, but due to his need to meet the emperor sooner rather than later, he had gone straight on to Koblenz. Hence William the Welshman had to be brought to him by his minder, Forzetti. That Edward had either directly or indirectly deputed Forzetti to bring his father to him is suggested by his description as a royal sergeant-at-arms on this, his first appearance in the royal accounts. (Sergeants-at-arms were middling status, well-respected men, superior to esquires of the royal household but less important than knights, expressly sent on missions to do the king’s personal bidding.) So it seems likely that it was on an island in the middle of the Rhine, near Koblenz, that Edward met his father again. And the meeting went well. Forzetti was paid in advance for the expenses of looking after Edward II for three weeks in December.

Of all meetings between members of the royal family, this and its follow-up in December must have been the strangest that ever took place. Indeed, the whole story of Edward’s survival is so amazing that historians have normally refused to believe the evidence, and preferred to present the whole episode as a series of hoaxes and deceptions. It goes against the grain of professional sobriety to present such an extraordinary story as fact, or anything other than the plot of a nineteenth-century Italian opera. But this was neither a hoax nor a deception. Edward had last seen his father in 1325, thirteen years earlier, when he had still been king, and when Edward himself had been twelve. In the months afterwards his father had written letters to him which, although they did contain shards of fatherly affection, remonstrated with him in the severest terms. Perhaps Edward had forgotten the dire pronouncement that his father would make him an example to sons everywhere to obey their fathers. Perhaps Edward II himself had forgotten that he had said it. What is undoubtedly true is that now the tables were reversed. Edward was king, and his father diminished. Indeed, Edward II had officially been dead for the last eleven years, and Edward himself had advocated that his father should continue to be treated as such. Both men probably experienced some feelings of guilt, and we may especially suspect Edward III did, as he had sanctioned the execution of his father’s beloved half-brother and refused to acknowledge his father’s continued existence. But he could explain now. He had kept his father alive by sacrificing his uncle. He had punished Mortimer. Moreover, he had won at Halidon Hill whereas his father had lost at Bannockburn. That was why he was a king and his father now a penniless hermit.

The reasons for picking December as the time when he would meet his father again was due in part to Edward’s great demonstration of imperial authority at Herk in October, but more importantly because it would be a time for the old king finally to meet his grandchildren. Not only were little Isabella and Joan at Antwerp. On 29 November 1338 Philippa gave birth to a son. Edward was overjoyed, and promised the man who brought him the news a reward of one hundred pounds.⁵⁵ He gave the child the Arthurian name Lionel, which he had himself adopted as a nickname in his youth. It may have been conceived as a tribute to his dead brother John, or with the idea that Lionel would be a lifelong companion to his elder brother, or maybe it was a reminder of how he himself had come through the test of living under the shadow of Mortimer’s authority. We do not know, but, given the stories of brotherhood and suffering with which this name was associated in the Arthurian cycle, and given Edward’s own earlier adoption of the name, it was probably not selected just because he liked the sound, especially not in his father’s presence.

We have only one vague possibility as to what was actually said at this meeting. Father and son seem to have discussed Edward I. It is noticeable that every year for the rest of his life after this meeting, Edward III ordered the wax torches to be renewed around the tomb of the old king at Westminster, this being done on or about the anniversary of his death. It is not possible to be certain, but it seems likely that Edward II had reflected over the years on his confrontational relationship with his own father, and hoped that his son would make amends with the old man on his behalf, if only in the way he was treated in death.

We have no further definite location for Edward II after December 1338. It is likely he stayed for the Christmas feast – always a lavish event in Edward’s court, costing that year £172, including £56 on cooking – and probably for the churching of Philippa at the end of December. Niccolinus Fieschi probably left Antwerp the following February. There is no further reference to Francesco Forzetti until October 1340, when he was back in England, dealing with the Italian wool business.⁵⁶ We do not know whether Edward himself took charge of his father from this point, or whether he remained in the custody of the Peruzzi as security for some of the loans they still hoped to reclaim from Edward. All we may say is that, wherever he was taken, he lived out the rest of his days in peace.

*

Edward’s journey to the Low Countries alarmed Philip. In August he responded by gathering an army and going to Saint-Denis to take the semi-mystical, ceremonial war banner of the Oriflamme. He expected Edward to invade immediately.⁵⁷ At that moment Edward was in no position to attack; but this did not make Philip any more comfortable. He tried to shift the confrontation to England, sending fifty ships to Southampton. Several thousand men landed there on a Sunday, while all the inhabitants were at church. They sacked the town, and as the inhabitants left the chuches they ran away. The French took what they wanted at their leisure. It is recorded that where they found poor people, they killed them, and where they caught any women, they raped them. And where they caught a man of wealth or status, they hanged him in his own house. Then they set the whole town on fire.⁵⁸ Guernsey too was taken and its garrisons killed. For Edward, worst of all was the capture of an English wool fleet, five ships, including one of the most prestigious, the St George, and two of his largest and most important: the Christopher and his flagship, the Edward. The sailors manning the royal vessels surrendered after being outnumbered. Even though Edward’s personal clerks were among them, they were all thrown overboard and drowned.

Philip was not the only leader threatened by Edward’s move to the Low Countries. The pope too was disappointed to see Edward cross to Brabant. As he shrewdly observed, such a move would force him to start paying his allies, and he would soon want to see some military gain in return for his investment. But what really infuriated the pope was Edward’s alliance with Ludvig, the heretic. Regardless of the fact that Philip also would have enlisted Ludvig’s support if he had been able to, the furious pope took sides. He wrote to Philip informing him that he had heard, from someone who had been at Koblenz, that Edward was planning to attack France the following May.⁵⁹ The pope added that he suspected also that this information might be deliberate misinformation, and so he urged Philip to be cautious. To Edward, he was less cordial, barely concealing his indignation despite his considerable diplomatic skills. He pointed out to Edward again that John XXII had excommunicated Ludvig for good reason. He added that he had offered to take Ludvig back into the Church if only he would give up his support for the anti-pope and be reconciled to the Avignon papacy, but Ludvig was adamant. In this light the pope was amazed that Edward was prepared to go to Germany, risking excommunication. He stressed how hard he had worked to maintain peace between Philip and Edward, sending cardinals to negotiate with them. He called on Edward ‘to free himself from the bonds and snares in which he is involved by his relations with Ludvig’.⁶⁰ At the same time (1 November) he wrote to the archbishop of Canterbury asking him to intercede and show the king how wrong he was to accept an office from an excommunicated ruler. He also wrote to the archbishops and bishops in the Low Countries and Germany forbidding them to swear to serve Edward. He also copied all these letters to the cardinals supposed to be negotiating between the two kings. As demonstrations of Benedict’s anger went, this was severe.

Edward’s principal worry lay in England. As soon as he had set sail, three years of good harvests, combined with a lack of silver in the money supply, had disastrous results. Deflation – crashing prices – set in. With money being sucked out of the kingdom, and Edward’s officers impounding wool supplies for shipment to the Low Countries and Italian markets, and the royal purveyors seizing whatever they wanted under cover of it being for the king’s campaigns, the country was fast approaching an economic crisis. Coming on top of the three-year taxation granted in 1337, this meant social catastrophe. And then the winter came, and with it came rain and cold. Where there had been plenty of supplies but no money, now there was neither money nor food.

Edward’s reaction to his logistic and economic problems was to blame his advisers. As he saw it, it was not his role to understand why supplies were late, or why money could not be raised; it was his role to enforce discipline on his enforcers, so that his instructions were carried out. In a fit of anger he sacked his treasurer, Robert Wodehouse. This was most unfortunate, as Wodehouse was probably the man responsible for managing what would yet prove to be a turn-around in Edward’s ability to raise money from wool in England.⁶¹ Wodehouse wrote to John Molyns lamenting the way he had been treated, and expressly mentioning the king’s lack of gratitude for his efforts. It was in a similarly angry mood that Edward responded to the pope’s letter, appointing the highest status embassy possible to treat with Philip – Montagu, Richard Bury, the archbishop of Canterbury, Sir Geoffrey le Scrope and Bishop Burghersh – but expressly forbidding them to address Philip as king of France.⁶² This was not the same as claiming the throne (as he had done briefly in October 1337), but it was close.

Under severe pressure on all fronts, including his own companions who doubted his strategy, Edward was beginning to show some of the character traits of his father. He was acting in a high-handed fashion, yet not more so than most kings of the middle ages, but like his father he rounded on men who were genuinely trying to help him. His utter faith in his own royal irreproachability, coupled with his frustration with the faults of his advisers, threatened to cloud his judgement. When frustrated, Edward tended to try to force his will on those around him. Wodehouse was just one example. Another example is his order in May that all debts to him were not to be paid in instalments, in the traditional manner, but all were to be paid instantly and in full, an impossible demand.⁶³ It is possible to argue that other examples are to be found in his high-handed appropriation of various rights in England, largely in order to raise money. If an heiress was unmarried – whether a spinster or a widow – Edward assumed the right of appointing her husband, partly to raise money, and partly to use the revenue from women’s lands to provide an income for his most trusted war commanders.⁶⁴ Lands of felons which had formerly reverted to their feudal lord were confiscated outright by the king and used to endow the new and rising members of the nobility. Priories dependent on foreign monasteries had their revenues temporarily confiscated and handed over to provide incomes for Edward’s associates. To those who gathered for the parliament at Westminster in February 1339, it was worrying that Edward was demanding more from them in taxes, and yet not even prepared to return to England to meet them and hear their grievances. Having empowered the commons and given them a voice, he was now running a very great risk by failing to listen to them.

It was at this point that Philip invaded Aquitaine for the second time. Believing the pope’s advice – that Edward’s campaign in the Cambresis would not begin until May – and probably trusting his own spies’ validation of this information, he judged it safe to withdraw his forces from the north. Having done so, he threw them into a sustained onslaught on the English forces in the south-west. It was an inspired strategy; Edward was unable to take his army across France and unable to mobilise a seaborne force to defend the duchy. He had also failed strongly to support those who had previously resolutely held out for him, so that their resolve was weaker on this second occasion. He had only one option left open to him: to invade France without delay, diverting Philip’s attention from the south-west. He summoned all his allies to gather for an invasion on 18 December, but, to his great anger, the response was not even lukewarm. They had settled their minds on a war in May 1339, and nothing would move them to risk everything now, in winter.

The strategic drawbacks of the alliance were now apparent. It was holding Edward back from attacking Philip, it was preventing him from taking action against the French fleet, and it was quickly bankrupting him. And it was sapping his moral authority too. It would not be long before he was reduced to little more than a paymaster for the German confederacy. He had lost papal support, and had infuriated Philip into attacking England itself as well as English trade. His own kingdom was on the brink of economic turmoil, and he was in grave danger of parliamentary opposition. But even if Edward could now see that he had been wrong, and that he had made mistakes, he was aware that to give up on the alliance now would be a waste of all he had invested. In order to maintain a degree of pressure on Philip through the alliance, it was important for him not to lose his nerve.

Edward’s saving grace was that, unlike his father, he had a sense of purpose, and it was a noble purpose by the definitions of the time. He also had a self-belief which allowed him to cope with the problems which he had brought upon himself. He could rant at his ministers, he could sack them and he could even order the council back in England to stop paying the civil servants (which he did, to their shock and indignation), but while he kept focused on England’s war with France, and while he continued to inspire those around him, no one was in a position to question him or take action against him. It was this focus, confidence and leadership which now he used to draw himself out of his predicament. He marched to Brussels with his army and threw himself into negotiations for the campaign. When these had proved futile, he declared to his allies that, if they would not fight, then he would. He would lead his army into France, and do battle, with or without them. He set down his terms for renewing negotiations in a final ultimatum. He demanded five things: that the losses on either side should be made good, that friends of either king could freely pass over the lands of both kings, that merchandise should be freely transported, that the king of France should offer no further help to the Scots and that Philip should restore those parts of Gascony which he had recently occupied.⁶⁵ It was not an excessive list; the first three were merely normal affairs. The pope, still in a hostile mood towards Edward, declined to accept the fourth point, advising merely a truce between England and Scotland, and preferred not to comment on the fifth point. King Philip refused to accept the ultimatum outright.

Edward, having made up his own mind, and seeing the pope and Philip practically united in their opposition to English interests, now put his own grievances to the pope and the college of cardinals in a long letter dated 16 July.⁶⁶ He stressed the dangers of war, asserted that he loved the ways of peace (‘as God knows’), but claimed that Philip (whom he described as his ‘persecutor’) had illicitly occupied the throne of France, and therefore threatened war. His basis for this was that although a woman was barred by Roman Law from occupying the throne, this bar only applied to the woman herself, and not her male offspring. If the bar attended to her male offspring, then Jesus had no right to be described as of the line of David, as his mother Mary, bearer of God’s child, was the parent through which this claim descended. As Edward was the nephew of the last king, and Philip was a cousin, he had a prior claim, as Philip’s was collateral. (Contrary to popular belief his claim had absolutely nothing to do with Salic Law, a local land inheritance law whose relevance was pretended by French writers in the next century.)⁶⁷ Edward went on to state that he had done nothing to provoke Philip, and that he deplored the invasion of Aquitaine and France’s support for the Scottish nationalists. He stressed how wronged he felt. The letter is very revealing, especially the sentences immediately following this claim of self-defence. Edward claimed that:

We only make a shield against him who levelled a deadly blow at our head . . . At this he storms, Holy Father, he storms, is uneasy and complains: he, who sought by his subtle devices to find us unadvised and unprepared. But according to the Theory of War, which teaches that the best way to avoid the inconvenience of war is to pursue it away from one’s own country, it is more sensible for us to fight our notorious enemy in his own realm, with the joint power of our allies, than it is to wait for him at our own doors.⁶⁸

Here we see the fundamental principle of Edward’s strategy clearly spelled out: taking the fight into France protected England. When twentieth-century historians came to assess the ‘profit and loss’ account of the English during the Hundred Years War, they completely ignored this element of his strategy, only counting Edward’s territorial conquests and losses.⁶⁹ But Edward could win and lose in France, and have nothing material to show for his troubles at the end of the day, and still would have achieved something because he had protected England from French attack. In this same letter Edward stressed that the more he thought about Philip paying for an army out of money originally gathered to fight the crusade, the more it pained him. Benedict had granted a clerical subsidy for the crusade, and another for the defence against Ludvig, and permitted Philip to use both to fight the English, which rankled with Edward. But no matter how interesting and revealing the letter was, Benedict was having none of it. In keeping with his new policy of favouring the French, he did not even reply.⁷⁰

Edward marched into France on 20 September 1339. Some of his allies followed him; Ludvig did not. The duke of Brabant was still in negotiations with Philip. Promises for payments were made, promises to leave hostages to ensure final payment were added, and Edward himself was forced to promise that he would remain in the Low Countries as security for the debts he had incurred. The cardinals who had tried hard to bring Edward to accept Philip’s absolute rule in France and his right to intervene in Scotland remained with him. On the first night Sir Geoffrey le Scrope led one of them, Bertrand de Montfavez, cardinal deacon of St Mary in Aquiro, up a tall tower, showing him the result of the first day’s work. It was a dark, moonless night, and as he looked out it was clear that every village for fifteen miles in every direction was on fire. The cardinal was reminded of something he had once declared to Edward in his negotiations: ‘the kingdom of France is surrounded by a silken thread which all the power of England will not suffice to break’. Scrope said calmly to the cardinal: ‘does it not seem to you that the silken thread encompassing France has broken?’ Seeing the terrible outcome of the invasion, the cardinal grew faint, staggered and collapsed.⁷¹

Edward’s strategy was simple. If he could bring Philip to battle and defeat him, then he would gain glory, win his arguments over Scotland and Aquitaine and limit his liabilities to his German allies. Hence the utmost destruction of France was undertaken. He besieged the town of Cambrai and destroyed as much land and as many villages as he could. But Philip did not give battle. Reactions were mixed. The duke of Brabant joined Edward at the end of September, but the young count of Hainault deserted him, and joined Philip. Further delays would mean further expense, further doubt in his resolution and inevitably more defections. Edward had no option but to go forward, and to take the fight to the French army, which was more than double the size of his own, even including his allies’ troops. With caution he advanced directly towards Péronne, where the massive French army had gathered.

On 14 October Edward brought his army within a mile of the French. Everything he stood for and believed in – chivalry, glory and royalty, divine support and the prophesies that he would be a great conqueror – was about to be put to the test. But in order to implement the military strategies he had learnt in Scotland, he needed to force the French to attack him. And in order to withstand an attack by superior numbers, he needed to draw his men up in a particularly well-defended situation, so he could catch the French in the cross-fire. Although he had found the French, and they were ready to do battle, Edward was not in a well-defended position. His smaller army was in fact exposed. He had no option but to withdraw. In the ensuing discussions about future strategy, the German allies declared they were running short of supplies. They wanted to go home.

Edward had not waited a whole year on the Continent simply to withdraw at the first onset of his allies’ fear and hunger. He had held back from encountering the French in a weakly defended position, but his resolution to do battle went far beyond this one encounter. He reinforced his original strategy, sending out the earls of Salisbury, Derby and Northampton to destroy whatever they could. He also sent Sir John of Hainault, whose men stormed into the town of Origny, looting, burning and destroying. A Benedictine nunnery was looted, and the nuns themselves raped. Sir John then proceeded to Guise, which he burnt. In the castle at Guise was his daughter, Jeanne, married to the heir of the count of Blois, a Frenchman. Jeanne pleaded with her father to save the lands and heritage of the Blois family; but Sir John had his orders, and he carried them out mercilessly. Those who fled were hunted down in the woods by the lord of Fauquemont.⁷² More than a dozen villages and towns were utterly wasted by the English troops in the next two or three days. The destruction would have made Cardinal Bertrand faint again, but the result was precisely what Edward wanted. A messenger from Philip came to him at La Flamengrie, offering to do battle on a certain day, either 21 or 22 October, in a place unencumbered by rivers, walls or earthworks. It was now down to Edward to choose the site of the battle.

He chose carefully, a place between La Flamengrie and La Capelle, on the evening of 22 October. The huge French army was just four miles away. He and his advisers had one major strategy in their minds: the tactics which had proved so effective at Dupplin Moor and Halidon Hill. They would invite the traditional charge of mounted men at them, and they would situate their archers on either side to destroy the charge. Edward’s position had a dense wood on one flank, and a slope in front of him, which would naturally reduce the speed of the French attack. On the morning of the 23rd, the king and his men attended mass, and then set about the final preparations for the battle. All knights were ordered to dismount, regardless of the fighting practices of their respective leaders. Their horses and baggage were placed in a small wood behind the three battalions of men. Trenches were dug to protect the archers from a direct charge. Then the English and their allies formed up in three battalions. The first and largest, including the English household knights, was commanded by Edward himself. The second, composed mainly of men from the Low Countries, was commanded by the duke of Guelderland and Sir John of Hainault. The third was commanded by the duke of Brabant. On the wing was another force, commanded by Sir Lawrence Hastings (whom Edward now created earl of Pembroke), the earl of Warwick, Lord Berkeley and Sir John Molyns. The express purpose of this small battalion was to hold the rear, and to rally the Germans if they tried to desert. When all was ready, Edward mounted a humble palfrey and rode along the lines, with Robert d’Artois, Sir Reginald Cobham and Sir Walter Manny, making knights of valiant men and shouting out exhortations to all the troops not to dishonour themselves or him in the forthcoming battle. Then Edward and his companions took their position at the front of the English household knights, with banners held aloft, and pennons flying above each battalion.

Nothing happened. Morning passed, noon came. The French army, restless, sent up such a great shout at the sight of a hare running across the ground in front of them that the count of Hainault at the rear of the army, thinking the attack was about to begin, knighted fourteen men in preparation for the battle. Froissart took great delight in noting that they were thereafter called ‘Knights of the Hare’. Such was his embarrassment at this faux pas that the count withdrew his forces. A little later, a letter arrived from the king of Jerusalem and Sicily, supposedly telling Philip that he had consulted the stars to tell Philip’s fortune and the prognostication was that Philip should never risk doing battle with Edward directly, for he would always lose. More serious were the discussions raging among the advisers gathered around Philip. The trenches dug in front of the English ranks were so deep, said some, that they would not be able to sustain their charge. Others argued that Philip was obliged to give battle, for it would be dishonourable to withdraw now. Dishonour or not, it was those who advocated withdrawal who prevailed. The danger to France was too great. Philip agreed, and ordered the building of his own defences to protect his army in their current position. There would be no battle.

Edward was let down by both his enemy and by his allies. The latter assured him that they thought that he had won the moral victory, as Philip had gone back on his promise to fight. But Edward knew that that was not true. The victory was as much Philip’s, for, seeing that no battle was to take place, the allies now began to withdraw. Edward had no option but to follow them. The only loser of the battle – the battle that never was – was Edward.

*

Edward’s lack of success was not obvious to those who were with him on the campaign, but his failure to make significant inroads into France was soon magnified by a string of other calamities. The Scots had recovered practically all of Edward’s hard-won Scottish lands, including Cupar Castle, the county of Fife, and the strategically important castle at Perth, which Sir Thomas Ughtred was forced to surrender on 16 August after a hard siege. Worse, while Edward had been facing the French army in October 1339, his regency council in England had been facing the anger of parliament. High prices, high taxation and widespread suffering at the hands of Edward’s purveyors had bubbled over into angry parliamentary representations. Warned of this, Edward had directed the head of the regency council, Archbishop Stratford, to grant concessions if necessary. The order that all debts were to be paid in full was to be relaxed, as was the confiscation of the property of felons.⁷³ But such concessions did not go far enough. Although Stratford made no secret of the king’s indebtedness, and at three hundred thousand pounds may even have exaggerated it, both houses of parliament refused to rush to Edward’s financial rescue.⁷⁴ The lords called for the abolition of higher wool duties. The commons supported them, and added a trenchant demand that, unless purveyors paid for what they took, they should be arrested as thieves. The king’s purveyor-in-chief, William Wallingford, was arrested. Commissions of enquiry were set up into purveyance in various counties. Although the lords were still prepared to see further taxation imposed, the commons refused, preferring further consultation in the counties before any decision was made. Edward now had to face the opposition of his own parliament in addition to that of his enemies and the half-heartedness of his allies.

Edward returned to the Low Countries, still bound by the agreements of the previous autumn not to leave until all his debts were paid. That now looked a very far-off time indeed, especially since the commons’ refusal to pay a new subsidy towards the war. But Edward now proved adaptable to his changed and challenging circumstances, and entered into new negotiations with the new leaders of Flanders, in particular a wealthy merchant called Jacob van Artevelde.

Van Artevelde’s name remains famous to this day principally on account of his revolution. When Count Louis of Flanders professed his loyalty to his overlord, Philip of France, his people were starving, penniless and riotous. The reason was Edward’s strategy of disposing of his wool at staples (designated places of trade). Flanders depended on English wool to make cloth. Starved of their raw material, and seeing more and more of their fellow cloth-workers drawn to England to ply their craft there, the great trading cities of Bruges, Ypres and Ghent had rapidly become places of violent dissent. First to tumble into revolution was Ghent, which saw an emergency committee of governors appointed in early January 1338. Five captains of the people, led by Jacob van Artevelde, took control of the city. Utterly ruthless, and unscrupulous in his use of violence to attain his ambitions, he soon destroyed any authority Count Louis had left. Bishop Burghersh immediately saw the opportunity to gain a diplomatic advantage, and quickly negotiated an agreement whereby Flanders would remain neutral during the forthcoming hostilities. Pleased with Burghersh’s coup, Edward maintained good relations with the Flemings thereafter, hoping in due course to draw them also into his grand alliance, and closer than some of the more reluctant princes who had already contracted to serve him.

Edward’s favour persuaded the Flemings that their interests were best served by supporting England. Van Artevelde had the idea of going further than this, using English military support to gain control of parts of Flanders lost to the French after the battle of Cassel. He hatched a plot with Edward that he would attack Lille, Douai and Bethune while Edward’s invasion was in progress. However, by the time van Artevelde made his move, Edward’s army was already returning from La Flamengrie. The withdrawal of the allies from the battlefield relieved the pressure on Philip, and the Flemish, having declared war on the French, realised that they had jeopardised their position. Had van Artevelde at this stage sought reconciliation with France, he would have seen his own position swept away and his life forfeit for treason against his lord, the count of Flanders. His only option was to join the alliance completely, and become an ally of England.

For Edward, this had one huge implication. If the Flemings broke their allegiance to the king of France, then automatically the whole country would fall under an interdict. They would also be obliged to pay to the pope a huge sum – two million florins (£333,333) – if they were to renounce allegiance. Such sums and such risks were beyond the townsmen who had seized power from the count. But there was a solution. If Edward were publicly to claim the title King of France, then, in maintaining loyalty to him, they would not be breaking their oaths, nor would they be obliged to pay the fine.

At Brussels in the first week of November a great tournament was proclaimed to celebrate the end of the campaign. Once more Edward indulged in costly gift-giving, as keen as ever to play the propaganda card of international largesse. But behind the scenes, serious negotiations were taking place about the Flemish situation and the claim to the throne of France. On 3 November Brabant and Flanders signed a treaty of mutual protection and trade. Edward was still hampered by debt, facing the opprobrium of the English commons in parliament, and worried about the situation in Scotland. He was probably compromised by the pope, though not in the same way as the Flemings.⁷⁵ He also had to face the fact that a public claim to the throne of France would be practically impossible to put into effect, and this carried with it the danger of ridicule for claiming something which was inappropriate and embarrassing. Nevertheless, he wanted the Flemings on his side, and he agreed a treaty. It would leave him no option but to claim France as his own inheritance.

The decision was not an easy one. Just how difficult it was can be seen by reflecting on Edward’s previous claims. His mother had first claimed the throne on his behalf in 1328. Edward had never renounced this, but had been forced to do homage to Philip in 1329. As he is supposed to have said in the Vow of the Heron, he was a young man then, and the homage was not of his own will. But he had done homage again in 1331. Not until 1337 had the question been raised again, and though debated by the king’s council and parliament from January that year it was only in the documents of 6 and 7 October that he actually styled himself ‘King of France’. By the 19th, after an intervention by the papal emissaries, he had stepped back from claiming the throne and changed his strategy to objecting to Philip claiming it. This remained the position for more than twenty months, until his letter of 16 July 1339, in which he demonstrated to the cardinals why his claim was superior to Philip’s. But still he did not actually claim the title. There was a real reluctance, much more than a mere hesitancy. Contemporary writers stressed how much discussion and thought had gone into it. It was only when the Flemish councils insisted that they would not support Edward unless he claimed the throne that the decison was made.

On 26 January 1340, Edward finally claimed the title King of France. Although he had probably weighed up every consideration which had occurred to him, his advisers, his allies and his councils, he could have had no idea how significant this decision would be in English history. He radically altered the focus of the war from being a mere dispute about feudal rights in Aquitaine to an argument about the sovereignty of the whole of France and its dependencies. That argument – to which French historians gave the name ‘the Hundred Years War’ in the early nineteenth century – did indeed continue for more than a hundred years. In fact it may be argued it lasted for a hundred and fifty years, for although the final battle was fought in 1453, peace was not agreed until 1492. It has been described as ‘perhaps the most important war in European history’.⁷⁶ It was not until 1802 that George III finally dropped the formal title ‘King of France’, after the French Revolution had destroyed the Bourbon monarchy. It is difficult to think of any other single initiative of an English king before Henry VIII’s break with Rome which had such long-lasting, widespread and dramatic consequences.⁷⁷