The Perfect King (41 page)

It is likely that 'it is as it is' finally announced the death of the old king, Edward II, to those who knew he had survived Berkeley. We cannot be certain about this, but there are a number of details which support the suggestion. First and foremost, Edward III finally passed on to his son and heir, Edward of Woodstock, the tide of 'Prince of Wales' - the only tide which his father had never given up - in the next parliament (in May
1343),
strongly suggesting the old man had died by then. This was the first parliament for two years, and so it would appear that Edward III had heard about his father's death in the period May
1341
-May
1343.
Further support for this is that he made a pilgrimage to his father's tomb at Gloucester - his first such pilgrimage - in March
1343,
after a near-death experience, indicating that by then his father had very probably been placed in his tomb. An irregularity in a Nottinghamshire chantry ordinance probably arising as a result of Edward IPs survival in
1335
was finally sorted out in January
1343,
tempting us to push the
terminus
ante
quern
for Edward's death to
1342
at the latest. Given that Edward II was almost certainly still alive in
1339,
and probably died in
1341-42,
it seems not unreasonable to connect the 'it is as it is' message in February
1342
with the arrival of the news of the death not long before. It may well be that the appearance of Niccolinus Fieschi in London in November
1341
marks the critical moment.

It seems that at last Edward had the chance to lay his father to rest. It might be said that he had been fortunate to have had the services of the Fieschi and Pope John XXII to guard his father and to keep him
secretly
. But to reflect that he had lived with the problem of his father's secret survival for the last fourteen years, and had worked his foreign policy, his war and his relations with the pope around this extraordinary situation, and had even managed to meet his father again in Koblenz, is to reflect that Edward had coped successfully with the worst crisis the Plantagenet monarchy had ever faced. He had even managed to initiate and sustain an expansionist foreign policy in spite of it. It also rings a significant change in his life, for Edward from now on could be even more aggressive. From now on, as far as we know, no one had any secrets which could be used to compromise him, or restrain him. From now on, he did not need to tread so carefully. He could be himself like never before.

NINE

The
Advent
of
the
Golden
Age

Medieval ship captains preferred to sail within sight of land. Having no means of calculating longitude, it was very easy for them to lose direction, and especially so in high winds. When Edward set sail from Sandwich on
5
October
1342
there were gales to contend with, and rough seas, so his captains carefully hugged the coast all the way to Portsmouth. Even then they had to wait for the wind to change direction, so they could proceed across the Channel. Only on
23
October did the coast of England finally disappear from Edward's view, and that of Brittany appear on the horizon.

The choice of Brittany was a profoundly sensible one. like Flanders, it was a semi-autonomous part of France. If Edward could control it, he would have both a bridgehead in Philip's kingdom and a means of protecting his shipping lanes to Gascony. For years he had toyed with this idea, and had taken care to remain on good terms with John, duke of Brittany. Almost alone among French peers after
1337,
John was allowed to keep his English estates and tide (the earldom of Richmond). Thus it may be seen that, even when Edward had been trapped in his alliance with the German princes, he had had an alternative strategy in the back of his mind. The
Opportu
nity to capitalise on that far-sightedness finally arose in May
1341.
As the king was being castigated, denounced and threatened with excommunication by the archbishop of Canterbury, the news arrived that the duke of Brittany had died, without leaving an obvious heir.

As Edward had expected, the duke's death precipitated a bitter inheritance dispute between his half-brother, John de Montfort, and his niece, Jeanne. Normally there was
little
doubt that a male sibling of the half-blood took precedence over a daughter of a full-blood brother, but the late duke had disliked his synonymous half-brother. So to make sure that John de Montfort did not inherit, the duke arranged the marriage of his niece Jeanne to Charles de Blois, nephew of King Philip. Whatever the law said, John de Montfort would have to fight for his inheritance, and not only with Jeanne and her husband but with the king of France too.

John de Montfort was not unaware of the situation, and he was not unprepared. The moment his brother was l
aid to rest he took a force and
seized Nantes - the administrative centre of Brittany - as well as his half-brother's treasure and most of the other
castle
s of the region. Charles de Blois was left standing, wondering. King Philip proved similarly hesitant. Edward, in contrast, had been waiting years f
or this opportunity. Having settl
ed the Crisis of
1341
by superficially capitulating to the archbishop's supporters, he sent a knight to John de Montfort to discuss a possible treaty for mutual aid when the truce with France expired.

At this point de Montfort himself hesitated. The problem was not his opposition to Edward but his justifiable anxiety in case his association with the English king should compromise his future standing in Fran
ce. Philip assured him that he w
ould have a fair hearing with regard to his inheritance in the French parliament. It is possible that John actually believed him, to the extent that he supposed Jeanne's inheritance would be judged unlawful, as the relationship by which she claimed to be the heiress was the same as that by which Edward III claimed to be king of France. B
ut such subtl
eties were lost on Philip. The French parliament similarly saw the question not in terms of inheritance law but power. On
7
September
1341
they ruled that Philip's nephew, Charles de Blois, should be duke, inheriting through his wife. Before this judgement was given, however, Philip unwisely reprimanded John de Montfort for consorting with the English king, and ordered him to remain in Paris to await the judgement. John de Montfort fled.

Very few people in France in
1341
would have realised what a catastrophic decision their parliament had made. It threw John de Montfort and his legal claim straight into Edward's hands. Perhaps the French parliament thought that Edward, who had just agreed to extend the truce sealed at Esplechin for another year, would be disempowered by the treaty from helping de Montfort. Perhaps they thought de Montfort could be arrested, or paid off, or killed, leaving Charles de Blois free to strengthen the royal hand in Brittany. But if so they reckoned without the determination of John de Montfort's supporters, and in particular his wife, another of those redoubtable fourteenth-century women who did not flinch from the task of leading her troops into
battle
.

Edward probably understood the situation better than anyone else, and certainly better than the consensus of the French parliament. But having agreed to extend the truce until
24
June
1342,
there was little direct action he could take before then. He waited to assess the strength of the support for the de Montfortist faction. All across the region
castle
s and towns fell to the French. At l'Humeau, de Montfort came face to face with de Blois in a surprise encounter, and their armies battled each other for two days before de Montfort retreated to Nantes. After a week the Nantesians forced de Montfort to surrender himself. He went to Paris under the protection of a safe conduct. When he refused to give up his inheritance Philip immediately imprisoned him, disregarding what this said about the value of his own guarantees of safety, and believing too soon that this marked his victory. But Lady de Montfort held out. In fact she did more than just hold out. Having secured Rennes, she led an army to Redon, which she took by force, marching on to establish herself in the walled town of Hennebont, on the southern coast. With a stern realism she proclaimed her two-year-old son as the head of the de Montfortist faction in case her husband was put to death in Paris. And she wrote to Edward imploring him to come to her aid.
1

Edward was eager to get involved in the
battle
for Brittany. He did not actually need a lady in distress to heighten his ambitions in that part of France. Nevertheless her example inspired him and many others, and it required him to take action before too late. He ordered a small advance party to set off in April
1342
under the command of Sir Walter Manny. He gave the earl of Northampton and Robert d'Artois command of an expeditionary force to set off later. In the meantime he built up his military reserves at the Tower. Seven thousand longbows were ordered, and three million arrows. As soon as the terms of the truce would allow, he would invade.

Time was running short for all parties. Rennes fell in early May, and Charles de Blois advanced on Hennebont itself, sending his brother to besiege the other de Montfortist stronghold at Vannes. In England, Edward was experiencing delays in sending Northampton and d'Artois. But Manny was underway, and savaging the lands of the Bretons who had failed to support de Montfort. Truce or no truce, he could not afford to wait too long before attempting to help die countess. Manny was a practical and hardbitten man, very experienced and abounding in courage. Although Lady de Montfort worsted Charles de Blois' advance forces in a skirmish at the walls of Hennebont, Manny knew that unless she received assistance quickly, there would be no de Montfortist cause to support, and no bridgehead for Edward in northern France. Thus, despite the truce, Manny set sail for Hennebont.

Within the town the countess was doing her best to inspire her men. She wore armour, and rode around the streets of the town on a destrier, calling on the inhabitants to fight and defend what was theirs and hers. According to Froissart, she ascended a tall tower to observe the attack on the walls, and seeing that the enemy camp was almost unguarded while the assault was on, she took three hundred men-at-arms with her and made a sortie from the town, burning Charles de Blois' supplies and slashing the ropes and walls of his tents and pavilions.
3
There would be no surrender at Hennebont. Charles ordered his commanders to begin a siege, and to starve the inhabitants into submission. Promises were made and rewards offered to all those who would desert the de Montfortist cause. One of the countess's advisers - the bishop of Leon - was won over, and returned to hold a council in which he tried to persuade the countess and her vassals to agree to terms. The discussions went on for two
days. The bishop spoke eloquentl
y, and persuaded some of the Breton lords that their cause was lost. With his words ringing around the tower room in which the discussions were taking place, and with the continual thumping of the siege engines ringing in her head, the countess got up from where she was sitting and walked to the window. Looking down, she could hardly believe the sight that greeted her. She gasped: 'I see the help we have been promised for so long has arrived!' Sailing up the estuary were Sir Walter Manny's ships, their sails bearing the cross of St George.

The bishop of
Leon might have spoken eloquentl
y but the cross of St George was even more persuasive. Manny's force was small, and its commander had crossed the divide between courage and recklessness so often as not to notice it existed (he later made a sortie just to destroy a single French siege engine at Hennebont because it was disturbing his meal) but it was a significant token of future support. By July the truce had come to an end. The English were on their way.

Edward landed in Britanny on
26
October. Already the English had won several significant victories. Lady de Montfort still held Hennebont, her forces now augmented with English troops, and that was a vic
tory in itself. More significantl
y the port of Brest - where Edward landed - had fallen to the earl of Northampton. The earl had even had the satisfaction of burning a dozen Genoese galleys in the service of the French. Most important of all at Morlaix on
30
September, Northampton had moved to confront a French army under the command of Geoffrey de Charny and had won a decisive victory. Having marched through the night and dug in, and having ordered all his men to fight on foot, he had seized more than one hundred and fifty knights and killed fifty others, besides thousands of men-at-arms and infantry. Back in England the result was wonder, admiration and excitement. Murim
uth dutifully recorded incorrectl
y that 'a few English, namely a force of five hundred men' defeated three thousand French knights in
battle
. It was more like three thousand Englishmen and Bretons against five thousand Frenchmen, but that was not the way it was reported.