The history of the recruitment of armies, from the Middle Ages to modern times, has passed through three main phases. The first was the fulfilment, through military service, of the feudal obligation to take part in defence. The second was that which made military service voluntary; men served mainly because they wished to, or because some other obligation compelled them to. The third phase was that of conscription, obligatory service in the name of the state. By the time that our period begins, the first of these phases was ending. Soldiers were coming to serve largely because they chose to do so; sailors, on the other hand, were enlisted by conscription. The period is, therefore, one of change.
In 1327, in what may have appeared as a retrograde step given that the trend, in England, was strongly towards a paid army, a general summons to the feudal levy was issued. In 1334, however, the Scottish campaign of Edward III was to be based on a paid army, no general feudal service being demanded, although some mounted troops still gave obligatory service until 1336. In the following year, when the theatre of war moved to France, the largely voluntary element in the army prevailed. There was now no general feudal summons, although certain individuals were called upon to provide their obligatory service. Persuasion, rather than obligation, was winning the day. At local meetings, magnates had the king’s needs explained to them; recruiting agents were sent round the counties to raise foot soldiers through commissions of array; emphasis was placed upon the pay and the possibility of material benefits to be derived from war. The days of the feudal army were all but over: after 1385 it would be a thing of the past.2
In France the trend was much in the same direction. Yet it should be recalled that, in broad terms, Frenchmen were being called upon to fight a defensive war, the aim of which was to thwart English military ambition. The country’s defensive needs meant that the more traditional, feudal form of the French king’s army might have a longer life than had its English counterpart. Since the beginning of the fourteenth century, the king of France had had a relic of the feudal army available in the form of the arrière-ban, a call to those between the ages of eighteen and sixty to serve in times of dire necessity. This essentially defensive institution was called out on at least seven occasions between 1338 (when the war against England effectively broke out) and 1356 (the year of the defeat at Poitiers). Mainly associated with the interior regions of the country best controlled by the crown, its services could be commuted for the payment of money (as country districts often did), or, as in the case of towns, for service fulfilled by certain citizens paid for by a town. Nor was this the only form of service demanded. The nobility, sometimes called out separately, joined in when thearrière-ban was called; the towns provided urban militias, notably crossbowmen; while the Church, normally forbidden an active role in war, contributed carts or, sometimes, cash.
Such was the basis of France’s defensive potential in the early fourteenth century. It was a system with built-in deficiencies which could not effectively live up to the rapidly developing needs of the French crown, faced with attack from different directions. The system lacked both reliability and uniformity and, in the case of the service due from feudal vassals, it was difficult to impose and organise. Most important of all, it could not be summoned quickly enough to meet emergencies which were developing as a result of the English war, so that much of the onus for local defence was left in the hands of the localities themselves, which were made responsible for the guard of castles and towns, largely through the system of watch and ward (guet et garde), as genuine an example of feudal defence as one could find.
In the first half of the fourteenth century both England and France were moving away from their historic reliance upon obligation towards a voluntary system to provide them with an army. But such a system had to be paid for; money had to be found. Traditionally, this had been done through scutage, a fine paid in lieu of service, and other fines. In essence, this tradition was carried on. In France much allegedly feudal service was compounded for by payment of fines, while in England ecclesiastics, such as abbots and priors, and women who held from the king, paid money in place of personal service. Such a system, however, was unreliable and the sums paid were not always realistic. The result was that it became apparent that the financing of war, both offensive and defensive, could only be properly carried out if large sums of money became available, sums which could only be found through taxation. There was an additional factor which encouraged this general development in both countries. War was coming to be regarded as necessary for the common good, for whose defence each country needed the best available army, ready to fight for the common utility. In both countries, the levying of taxation nationwide was both a symbolic and a practical way of getting all the kings’ subjects to provide for these armies.
The instrument which typified the new system was the indenture, perhaps the most important administrative development in the English army in the late Middle Ages. The earliest indenture dates from the last years of the reign of Henry III, but it was not until the fourteenth century that it assumed its normal form. The military indenture was a binding agreement, formalising conditions of service between the king (as the employer) and his captains (usually members of the nobility) and those captains and their sub-contractors of lower rank, in time of war. The terms of the agreement were set out twice on parchment, then cut along a wavy or ‘indented’ (i.e. tooth-like) line, each party preserving one copy. In any case of dispute, the two ‘halves’ had to be confronted to see if they fitted; if they did not, accusations of fraud could be brought. The terms of the English indenture normally specified the size and composition (men-at-arms, mounted archers) of the retinue to be brought; the time and place of service; wages, and any bonuses which might be paid; the division of the ‘advantages’ of war, including special provisions regarding prisoners; details regarding transport; and, especially in early indentures, what compensation would be paid for the loss of that most expensive animal, the war horse.
In France and England a lettre de retenue or indenture (the former not normally so detailed as the latter) was a contract between the king and a commander (in Italy the contract, or condotta, was made for a period which might be six months or a year (ferma) with the possibility of an extension(de beneplacito) between the state and the leader of the group being employed) to raise troops. The commander’s first task, then, was to ensure the recruitment of sufficient soldiers of adequate standard, either from his own estates or those of others, perhaps through the dying feudal ‘network’. His indenture which, more than anything else, symbolised the new, paid, and centrally organised army, also gave him rights, for his copy was an authority to raise a retinue, while the king’s copy was sent to those responsible for the administration of payments for war. It is important to appreciate that the extension of war at this time also meant the development of institutions which dealt with its administration. In Venice the supervision of the rapidly developing system of recruiting, supervising and paying soldiers was in the hands of collaterali and provveditori, whose task it was to see to the day-to-day control of soldiers in the pay of the state. The proper and regular payment of soldiers was but one very important aspect of the development of a machinery for war much wider than that provided by the fighting forces alone. The indenture was to prove to be a document of vital importance in the long history of war finance which was being rapidly developed during these years. Its importance must not be underestimated.
While the manner in which armies were recruited remained reasonably static in England after the changes of the 1330s, the same was not true of France. There the arrière-ban proved unsatisfactory; it became unpopular and mistrusted, a political stick with which to beat the crown, and went out of use after 1356. There soon followed, under Charles V, a major restructuring of recruitment. Although the crown’s vassals were called out on three occasions when English expeditions caused moments of crisis, the main objective of regaining land lost to the English was accomplished through the creation of a moderately sized army, based almost entirely upon volunteers, and bound to the king through lettres de retenue. The emphasis was towards an army whose recruitment was organised centrally, whose commanders were appointed by the king, and whose military and organisational structures were created to meet the prime need of the day: reconquest. Above all, the king insisted on keeping firm control both of his captains and of those who served under them. It was to be very much a royal army, properly disciplined and properly controlled.
If the reign of Charles V witnessed a conscious attempt to make the army more of an instrument of state than it had been before, the death of both the king and du Guesclin in 1380, and the growing political disorder of the following decades, led to a decline in the military effectiveness of the French army. With the return to power of the princes, the local force, carrying out its traditional role, came once again to the fore; the nobility, too, reclaimed its traditional place in the leadership; and, after 1410, the old arrière-ban,virtually excluded since the disaster of Poitiers, reappeared. The political divisions of the day manifested themselves very clearly in the organisation of war. The projected invasion of England of 1386 failed – and not merely because of adverse weather. In 1415 the lack of unity showed itself again; the result was defeat at Agincourt. At no time is a unified command more valuable than in a defensive situation. The fate suffered by French armies during these years underlines the truth of that observation.
An aggressor, however, above all one not concerned with total conquest, can afford to give his commanders a freer hand. The result of this was that, although well organised, the armies of Edward III and Richard II were seldom centrally commanded as were those of Charles V. By the middle of the fourteenth century, the system of recruiting a volunteer army through indentures was well established and changed but little. Captains, some of them sons of Edward III, others men of high military repute, served under the king on those occasions when he went to war in person. On other occasions they led expeditions of their own, recruiting from their estates or from among those who had served under them before. On the whole, these armies were a powerful force of destruction in those parts of France in which they moved; however, in terms of securing military advantage it is doubtful whether they constituted the threat which, in theory, it was in their power to pose.
England’s changing war aims under Henry V and his son (conquest and the defence of that conquest) meant, first, that the short, sometimes relatively profitable campaigns of the previous century became a thing of the past. Now, with both field armies and garrisons being required, men not infrequently returned to France on several ‘tours of duty’. By the time that the war ended, the number of Englishmen who had seen service in France could probably be calculated in tens of thousands.
It was from the hands of these men and their captains that King Charles VII had to prise control of the duchies of Normandy and Aquitaine. His reign was notable in more than one way, not least for the attempt, more than partly successful, to restore royal control over the composition and discipline of the French army. As under Charles V, it was realised how essential it was for the crown to nominate the army’s leaders: the days of the princes must be ended. In 1445, having already taken practical steps to bring this about, the king issued an ordinance reestablishing royal control over the army. From now on, the crown would designate the leading captains and would provide the money from which they, and the rest of the army, would be paid. Three years later, in 1448, Charles announced the creation of a new force, the francsarchers who, representing every community and committed to regular training in the use of arms, would form the core of the permanent, national army which the king wished to create. The crown of France, more so than that of England, had stamped its influence upon the recruitment of the new-styled army.