Louis: The French Prince Who Invaded England (21 page)

On 12 November 1216, Henry’s council reissued Magna Carta. This had little immediate concrete effect, but it acted as a sign that his regime would abide by the concessions which had been wrung from John, without reneging upon them in the way John had done. This astonishing U-turn – they would agree to something John had gone to war to prevent – demonstrates the weakness of their overall position at this point: they might not have been clutching at straws quite yet, but their fingers were definitely slipping. There is no evidence to suggest that Louis would reconfirm Magna Carta, and indeed it is difficult to see how or why he would have accepted the throne of England if his rule were to be hedged and restrained in this way. Therefore this announcement by the regent and the legate effectively pulled out one of the props from under Louis’s campaign, politically if not militarily. If Henry and his regent would abide by the charter then those barons who supported Louis could not claim that their support for the charter was their principal reason for doing so.

Louis needed to think and to plan his next steps. John’s death had not resulted in his overall victory: the campaign and the crown still needed to be won, and to do that he would need to regain some momentum. But as he remained in London working on his immediate plans – having moved his base to the more securely fortified Tower – the garrison with whom he had made a truce at Dover finally emerged from behind their walls; they burned the buildings he had erected in front of the castle, and then ravaged the countryside for miles around, both to replenish their own stores in anticipation of a further siege, and to deny Louis’s troops any sustenance when they should come again. The ‘key to England’ would not turn in his favour.

Politically Louis could do little against the propaganda being issued by Henry’s council. But he still had the upper hand militarily, so his next move would capitalise on this: he would seek to capture more and more of the smaller castles being held against him, tipping the balance of power further his way, before returning to crack the larger nuts. He went on to prove that he was still the master of this strategy as a series of fortifications proved no match for him and his troops. On the same day that Henry’s council was reissuing Magna Carta Louis began a siege of Hertford Castle, which had been much strengthened during the reign of Richard the Lionheart. It was defended stoutly against him for more than three weeks, during which time he was able to deal with some administrative matters – it was here that he drew up and sealed the charter we mentioned earlier granting Grimsby to William of Huntingfield – but his tactics and machines eventually proved too much for the garrison, and they surrendered after twenty-five days. As had been the case with his previous victories, Louis kept his word and allowed the defenders to march out unharmed on 6 December 1216.

On taking charge of the castle, Louis was presented with the same dilemma which had dogged all his previous captures: into whose custody should it be given? The natural claimant in this particular case was Robert Fitzwalter, to whom Hertford had previously belonged, but according to Roger of Wendover the French argued that it should go to one of them as a spoil of war; they had, after all, followed Louis on campaign in the natural expectation of gain. This situation, as we have noted previously, was inevitable, but Louis had until now managed it gracefully and avoided any major disputes among his followers. He has been accused in some quarters of favouring his French supporters (Roger of Wendover in particular giving this as a reason why some of his English barons later chose to desert him), but in fact the evidence would suggest that he was even-handed, balancing the rights and demands of both halves of his force even though they were to all intents and purposes incompatible. Since arriving on English soil and being proclaimed king by his supporters he had set up an administration, headed by Simon Langton as chancellor, which had functioned simultaneously with his military manoeuvres; his previous hard-won lordship of and administrative experience in Artois were finally proving useful. Louis had adapted well to English forms of government, seeking to keep existing practices where possible and upholding ancient customs and liberties – as we mentioned earlier, he did not see England as a ‘conquered’ country on which foreign customs should be imposed, but rather one to which he had succeeded through entitlement. Changes were necessary in some areas, though, as he sought to enforce order on those territories under his control which were in varying states of chaos due to the flight of previous lords and officers of the law; he established in post interim officers of justice and administration while retaining the previous system of sheriffs in each county.

Louis recognised that English towns had their own urban communities and customs which would not be suited to the imposition of French-style governance, so he respected the right of burgesses to have a hand in their own self-determination. In the capital he paid particular attention to the mayor and citizens of London and did not seek to overthrow or interfere in their affairs; trade could continue as normal. The Londoners, who could be fickle if and when their interest dictated, remained loyal to him for now.

* * *

Part of the arrangement of the surrender of Hertford was that Louis would also receive Berkhamstead Castle, some 28 miles (45 km) away, so he wasted no further time and moved there on 7 December 1216. However, when he arrived he found that the garrison commander had renounced the agreement made at Hertford and would not open the gates, so despite the worsening weather Louis would have to set up a siege there as well. His siege engines, weighing several tons each and dragged in pieces on carts through the muddy and rutted roads, would need to be reassembled. The troops, strung out back along the road from Hertford, were arriving slowly and piecemeal, and the garrison took advantage of this: they made a sortie before the besiegers were properly organised, capturing baggage and supplies and inflicting casualties. Louis, cold, frustrated and undoubtedly beginning to tire, had his machines rebuilt and they ‘kept up a destructive shower of stones’ (Roger of Wendover) until the castle surrendered on 20 December. Despite the resistance he had encountered and the men he had lost, Louis once more allowed the garrison to leave with their lives, their horses and their armour.

Campaigning was difficult in the winter. Food and fodder were hard to come by, especially in the large quantities needed by an army and its horses; the short hours of daylight meant that travel was limited to a very few miles a day; the state of the roads prevented the easy movement of baggage carts and other heavy items; and men were more likely to succumb to illness and disease. The Church also frowned upon fighting taking place during its great holy feasts, so when a message reached Louis on 20 December from William Marshal, in which the regent proposed a general truce over Christmas and until 13 January, Louis accepted.

It took Louis several days to travel the 35 or so miles (55 km) back to his base at the Tower of London, breaking his journey at the abbey at St Albans where he became irritated by the abbot’s refusal to pay homage to him, apparently – according to Roger of Wendover – threatening to burn the abbey and the town before being appeased by a gift of 80 marks from the ‘dreadfully threatened’ abbot. As the likelihood of Louis inflicting violence on either a religious institution or on a man of the Church is slim, we may choose to take Roger’s version of events with a pinch of salt.

Louis was able to catch a few days’ rest in London over Christmas and the New Year, but he set out on the road again as soon as the truce was concluded, this time to the east. The cities (but not the castles) of Ely and Lincoln had been taken by his men before the truce, and now he headed for Cambridge, where he took the castle by late January 1217 without too much trouble. He was still there when word came from William Marshal, who was at that point in Oxford, that he would like to arrange another truce – that is, a complete cessation of hostilities by both parties – until the end of April. Louis agreed, with the canny proviso of the handover of more castles in order to buy his agreement: Colchester, Orford, Norwich and Hedingham were surrendered without him having to lift a finger. His military conquest of England was still moving in the right direction, keeping many of the barons in his camp or at least on the fence, untempted by Marshal’s offers and blandishments. Roger of Wendover points out that their pride may have been a factor, too: ‘On the other hand, it seemed a disgrace for them to return to their allegiance to a king whom they had renounced, lest they should be like dogs returning to their vomit.’ Despite Louis’s progress, however, the major strongholds were still a thorn in his side. Ominously, before the four agreed castles were handed over to his men, their stores were transferred to Dover.

* * *

During the winter many letters were sent back and forth to Rome on behalf of both sides. Those of Louis were less well received: Honorius was keen to retain England as a papal fief and he wanted to exercise control over it. In a letter of 6 December 1216 he noted the papacy’s dominion over England and said that the Holy See would not be compared to the shepherd who fled and left his sheep at the first sign of the wolf. He sent messages of support to Henry and to Guala, renewing the latter’s ecclesiastical powers and authorising him to annul the oaths of the barons to Louis and to suspend any members of the English clergy who refused to support Henry. Honorius also sent the abbots of Cîteaux and Clairvaux (two of the greatest monasteries in Europe and the motherhouses of the Cistercian order) directly to Philip Augustus to persuade him to order his son to cease his campaign.

Guala, no doubt disappointed that Marshal’s letters and offers to the barons had thus far had little success, responded enthusiastically to the confirmation of his powers in order to revive Henry’s flagging cause. In the pope’s name he decreed that Henry’s campaign to take the throne was now a crusade (Louis still being under sentence of excommunication) and he instructed Henry’s forces to wear white crosses. This again pulled the rug out from under Louis’s feet, as the Barnwell annalist observes: ‘Those who once called themselves the army of God, and boasted that they fought for the liberties of the Church and the kingdom, were now reputed to be the sons of Belial and compared to infidels.’ Under intense pressure, eleven of the twelve bishops who had sided with Louis went over to Henry, the exception being the bishop of Ely.

However, Henry was broke. This was a very dangerous position to be in during a campaign: if troops were not paid they were liable to slip away or to change allegiance. Guala squeezed as much as he could out of the Church in England, becoming slightly less popular with the clergy as a result, and William Marshal sanctioned more ravaging of the countryside, which also did little to promote their cause with the ordinary people. The beleaguered abbey and town of St Albans were threatened again, this time by Falkes de Bréauté and his men who extorted more protection money from the abbot. Falkes then embarked on a vicious tour of the wider region, taking clergy and civilians prisoner and extorting ransoms as he went. If this state of affairs were to continue then the general population would care less and less about who was on the throne; they just wanted peace.

Unfortunately, Louis’s own finances were such that he was unable to push for the final conquest; he had the upper hand but did not have enough troops to force the decisive victories which he needed for overall and overwhelming control. Years of stalemate beckoned which could leave much of the realm burned, unprofitable and uninhabitable. If Louis was going to win the war he needed to do it soon, which meant that he needed more men and more money. Unlike Guala he did not have the option of levying a tax on the Church, and for reasons which no chronicler specifies he chose not to embark on a ravaging campaign. Either he did not wish to antagonise the population further or he felt that the possibilities for gain were exhausted. No, there was only one place he could drum up the level of extra support he needed. It was a momentous decision which could swing the fate of England either way, but it had to be done: while the truce was still in force, Louis would go back to France.

Louis’s supporters were, not unnaturally, dismayed by this. Roger of Wendover comments rather gloatingly that Louis would never again enjoy the same level of goodwill with the English barons, while the Barnwell annalist tells us that Louis swore a solemn oath to them that he would return before the truce expired. After offering this reassurance he gathered his close companions and a troop of men, and set off for Rye on the coast.

Louis’s journey to France was not to be as straightforward as he hoped; indeed, it came close to being a total disaster. During the autumn, while he had been north of London, Hubert de Burgh had been active in the south coast area and the Cinque Ports (Dover, Sandwich, Hastings, Hythe and Romney) were no longer fully under Louis’s control. Now, in February 1217, ships under the command of Philip d’Albini – nephew of William d’Albini, now, as we have seen, in the Henrician fold – were blockading the associated port of Rye, while the castle there was held in Henry’s name. Not having enough troops with him to force a siege of Rye, Louis bypassed the town and rode instead for nearby Winchelsea, there to wait while he sent messages to his allies in an attempt to have ships sent to him there.

The people of Winchelsea, forewarned of the arrival of the host, had fled. Louis’s men could find little to eat in the already devastated areas and his losses mounted. The Anonymous of Béthune notes in his
Chronicle of the Kings of France
that as they went the people had burned their mills behind them, so that Louis’s men had to find corn and try to grind it by hand; they were reduced to eating nuts and began to starve. Meanwhile, William of Kensham and his guerrilla force had burned the bridges between Louis’s position and London and were blocking the route, so Louis could not send men back to the capital to summon help. He was trapped. What could he do?