Assassination: The Royal Family's 1000-Year Curse (2 page)

It was the year 1014, and the Battle of London Bridge was raging. On one side the Anglo-Saxons led by King Ethelred, and on the other side the invading Danes led by King Canute.

The Anglo-Saxon leaders made for the middle of the bridge, eager to engage the Danes. Fighting alongside King Ethelred were two of his sons, Edmund and Edward. Young Prince Edward raced ahead. Spotting Canute, Edward urged his horse onward, wielding his sword to left and right, determined to plough through the mayhem and to attack the Danish king. In the din of the screams of the fighting and dying, Edward came right up alongside Canute. Edward wasted no time; grasping his heavy sword with both hands, he raised it high above his head, about to strike before Canute could defend himself.

Jarl (Earl) Thorkell the Tall was riding on the other side of Canute, and he saw that his leader was in peril. But Thorkell was in no position to stop Edward – Canute was in the way. Suddenly, with amazing quick-thinking, Thorkell took hold of Canute’s arm and pulled him off his horse, throwing Canute to the ground. So, Edward’s blade sliced the thin air and cut right through Canute’s empty saddle, sinking deep into his horse’s back, the animal’s blood spraying in all directions. The resourceful Jarl Thorkell had saved the man who would become the first king of all England from the attempt to kill him.

Ethelred was being aided by his ally, King Olaf of Norway. Olaf realised that with the Danes forcing the Anglo-Saxons backwards and taking almost all the bridge, it was time for drastic measures. Fortunately, Olaf had a plan. He ordered some of his men to manoeuvre their boats beneath the bridge and then tie ropes to the supporting posts. That done, they rowed off, pulling the posts away until the bridge collapsed, killing many of the Danes and giving Ethelred victory. It was the origin of the rhyme, ‘London Bridge is falling down’.

We could have started with Hengist and Horsa, the Jute brothers from Jutland (Denmark) who conquered Kent in the fifth century, or with Cerdic King of Wessex (the West-Saxons) in south-west England who had landed in the sixth century with warriors from his Gewisse tribe from Saxony (south of Jutland), or with Cerdic’s descendant Alfred the Great. However, these men and others were kings of a region; none of them was king of the whole country.

In fact, even by the ninth century England was not a kingdom; it was made up of seven separate kingdoms, each with its own king. So there was no ‘King of England’. Then, in 866, the Danes landed and set about the conquest of all the regional kingdoms. The heroic resistance of Alfred, a man who struggled against illness (thought to have been Crohn’s Disease) throughout his life, resulted in the country being divided between the Danelaw (the part occupied by the Danes) and the territory controlled by the Anglo-Saxons. Of all the Anglo-Saxon leaders, Alfred alone kept his crown, but it was only the crown of Wessex.

Next there were invasions from Scandinavia by the Norsemen, who established a kingdom in the north. After they had been expelled, the Vikings arrived, followed by a new wave of Danes. King Sweyn of Denmark marched his army south, slaughtering all opposition. By 1014, Sweyn had conquered most of the country, and he had forced Alfred’s descendant, King Ethelred, leader of the Anglo-Saxons, to flee to Normandy. There, Ethelred joined his second wife, Emma, who had already taken their children, Edward and Alfred, across the Channel to the court of her brother, Duke Richard II of Normandy.

All seemed lost, and then just five weeks later there was good news – King Sweyn had died. Ethelred saw his chance, and he returned to England. However, there was no let up by the Danes as Sweyn’s son, Canute (or ‘Cnut’), took over. Despite defeat at the Battle of London Bridge, Canute won victory after victory.

Ethelred was known as Ethelred the Unready,
un-raed
meaning ‘no counsel’, suggesting that he was ill-advised or did not take advice. Badly advised or not, Ethelred maintained the Anglo-Saxon resistance; and when he died, he was succeeded by Edmund Ironside, the older of Ethelred’s two surviving sons by his first wife.

Edmund went on the attack, winning several minor battles. Then, in 1016, he was heavily defeated by Canute at the Battle of Ashingdon in Essex. Although it looked like the end for the Anglo-Saxons, it was not. They had fought so effectively, nowhere more so than at the Battle of London Bridge where Edmund’s half-brother Edward nearly killed Canute, that the Danes agreed to the division of the country. Rule of the land to the south of the River Thames was given to Edmund, with Canute taking the rest of England. The two kings also agreed that if one of them died, then the other would take his territory.

If ever there was an invitation to murder, that was it. Six weeks later, on 30th November 1016, Edmund was killed (said to have been stabbed by someone crouching in the pit below as Edmund went to the toilet). That left Canute, an exceptionally tall and strong man, as king of both territories. This was the moment when Canute became the very first King of all England.

Canute’s year of birth is not known for certain. The earliest of several suggested dates is 981, and that possible year of birth for the man who would become King of England was the start of a thousand-year curse for all English monarchs. None of them would escape the curse; someone would murder, or at least attempt to murder, every single one of them.

As king, Canute knew that his first task was to eliminate all the Anglo-Saxon claimants to the crown. With Ethelred dead, those claimants started with his children. From Ethelred’s first marriage, his son Edmund Ironside had already been murdered. Edmund left two sons, Edward and Edmund. They had to be dealt with, so Canute seized them and sent them to the court of his half-brother, King Olof of Sweden.

Exile seemed a reasonable solution from everyone’s point of view, at least everyone except Canute. Little did the princes know that the soldiers taking them to Sweden were carrying a letter from Canute to Olof asking him to kill both boys. Fortunately for the princes, King Olof was unwilling to put them to death. Instead he sent them to Kiev where his daughter was the queen; but she did not want them, so she sent the princes on to Hungary where her son-in-law was the king, and there the two boys lived at court. That allowed the 28 x great-granddaughter of the older boy, Edward, to sit on the throne today.

Next, Canute dealt with Eadwig, brother of Edmund Ironside and the last surviving son of Ethelred’s first marriage. Eadwig had tried to raise resistance to Canute’s rule, so Canute had him murdered.

The other threats to Canute’s crown were Ethelred’s sons from his second marriage, Edward and Alfred. Canute could not get to them as they were safe in Normandy with their mother, Emma.

Undaunted, Canute shrewdly strengthened his position by marrying Emma of Normandy, the widow of King Ethelred
¹
. Yet despite invitations to come to their new stepfather’s court in England, the two princes wisely remained across the Channel.

With all his rivals out of the country, Canute divided England into four regions, appointing governors for three of the regions and ruling Wessex himself. He then returned to Denmark (Canute was by now King of Denmark, Norway and part of Sweden), leaving Wessex under the control of a fierce warrior named Earl Godwine, a descendant of King Aethelred (Alfred the Great’s brother and predecessor as king). Godwine had deserted his fellow Anglo-Saxons and joined Canute’s side on the death of Edmund Ironside. Improving his position further, the ambitious Godwine married Gytha whose brother, Ulf, was married to Canute’s sister, Estrith. Godwine became in effect the Viceroy of England during Canute’s absence, his only rival for power being Leofric of Mercia (the Midlands), whose wife, Godgifu (‘the gift of God’), is better remembered by the Latinised version of her name, Lady Godiva.

Several years later, Canute returned to England. Although his crown was secure, Canute was well aware that he had not dealt with Edmund Ironside’s sons who were safe in Hungary, nor had he dealt with Ethelred’s two surviving sons who were safe in Normandy.

However, none of the four princes raised a challenge, and having ruled England for nearly 20 years, King Canute died in 1035. The first King of England, and also the first in the unbroken list of monarchs to have been the victim of an attempted killing. Thanks to Jarl Thorkell, the attempt failed.

By the time he died, Canute had given his oldest son, Sweyn, the rule of Norway. Canute’s two younger sons, the illegitimate Harold Harefoot and the legitimate Harthacanute son of Emma of Normandy, were left to fight over England and Denmark.

There could be no real dispute as far as England was concerned; the Anglo-Saxon Church would never willingly accept the right of a bastard to inherit the crown. So Harthacanute was acknowledged as king. However, he had no time for England as his priority was to secure the Danish crown and defend it from the challenge of King Magnus of Norway, who had already ousted Sweyn. That left the illegitimate Harold Harefoot to assume the rule of England.

In no time at all, Harold decided that if he was acting as the king, then he ought to be the king. He is sometimes called Harold I, but Harold Harefoot was never crowned; he was merely regent for his half-brother, not king at all.

Harold Harefoot was not the only one to see an opportunity. When they learned that Harthacanute was in Denmark, the two princes in Normandy became over-confident. Recklessly, in 1036 Ethelred’s sons, Edward and Alfred, each decided that it was time to return to England. Apparently they did so in response to a letter from their mother, Emma, urging them to join her in Winchester. They had been tricked, the letter was a forgery. Harold Harefoot was luring the two princes to England in order to kill them.

Edward came first. He landed near Southampton with a party of Norman soldiers. Meeting no opposition, they started to ride inland. They must have enjoyed their gentle progress through the English countryside, until suddenly armed horsemen came at them from all sides. Edward’s landing had been discovered; it was an ambush. A violent conflict saw Edward and his forces fighting for their lives. Edward was the target, and he came under sustained attack. But he had learned to fight in England and had learned horsemanship in Normandy. Skilfully controlling his horse as he lashed out at his assailants, Edward beat off all the efforts of Harold Harefoot’s men to kill him. Now the balance of the conflict changed, and it was the Danes who were fighting for survival. The few who had not been killed rode off at speed.

It was time for Edward to reconsider the situation. He realised that the Danes were not just escaping, they were going to seek reinforcements. Edward’s reduced numbers would have no chance. He knew what he had to do. Edward quickly returned to Normandy.

A few months later, Alfred decided to make his move. He landed near Dover. Aware of how close his brother had come to disaster, Alfred brought 600 Norman horsemen – more than enough to deal with any adversaries. He had reckoned without Earl Godwine. On Canute’s death, Godwine had pledged his support to Harthacanute. Then the new king was occupied in Denmark fighting Magnus, and Godwine realised that he had gambled on the wrong brother. Godwine was desperate to find a way to ingratiate himself with Harold Harefoot. Alfred provided the opportunity. Godwine hastened southwards with a substantial force, but the cunning Godwine had no intention of taking on Alfred’s forces in open battle. The story is told in the Anglo-Saxon Cronicle: