Chapter 44

HENRY VI. AND THE LOSS OF FRANCE. =1422--1451=.

LEADING DATES

Reign of Henry VI., 1422-1461

The accession of Henry VI. 1422 The relief of Orleans 1429 End of the alliance with the Duke of Burgundy 1435 Marriage of Henry VI. with Margaret of Anjou 1445 Murder of the Duke of Suffolk and Jack Cade's rebellion 1450 Loss of the last French possessions except Calais 1451

1. =Bedford and Gloucester. 1422.=--In England Henry V. was succeeded in =1422= by his son, Henry VI., a child of nine months. In the same year, in consequence of the death of Charles VI., the infant was acknowledged as king of France in the north and east of that country. The Dauphin, holding the lands south of the Loire, and some territory even to the north of it, claimed to reign over the whole of France by hereditary right as Charles VII. Henry V. had appointed his eldest surviving brother, John, Duke of Bedford, regent in France, and his youngest brother, Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, regent in England. In England there were no longer any parties banded against the Crown, and the title of the Earl of March had not a single supporter; but both the Privy Council and the Parliament agreed that the late king could not dispose of the regency by will. Holding that Bedford as the elder brother had the better claim, they nevertheless, in consequence of his absence in France, appointed Gloucester Protector, with the proviso that he should give up his authority to Bedford if the latter were to return to England. They also imposed limitations upon the authority of the Protector, requiring him to act by the advice of the Council.

2. =Bedford's Success in France. 1423--1424.=--The English nation was bent upon maintaining its supremacy in France. Bedford was a good warrior and an able statesman. In =1423= he prudently married the sister of Philip of Burgundy, hoping thereby to secure permanently the all-important fidelity of the Duke. His next step was to place difficulties in the way of the Scottish auxiliaries who poured into France to the help of Charles. Through his influence the captive James I. (see p. 295) was liberated and sent home to Scotland, on the understanding that he would prevent his subjects from aiding the enemies of England. Bedford needed all the support he could find, as the French had lately been gaining ground. In =1424=, however, Bedford defeated them at Verneuil. In England it was believed that Verneuil was a second Agincourt, and that the French resistance would soon be at an end.

3. =Gloucester's Invasion of Hainault. 1424.=--Bedford's progress in France was checked by the folly of his brother Gloucester, who was as unwise and capricious as he was greedy of power. Gloucester had lately married Jacqueline, the heiress of Holland and Hainault, though her husband, the Duke of Brabant, was still living, on the plea that her first marriage was null on the ground of nearness of kin. In =1424= Gloucester overran Hainault, which was under the government of the Duke of Brabant, thereby giving offence to the Duke of Burgundy, who was a cousin and ally of the Duke of Brabant, and who had no wish to see the English holding a territory so near to his own county of Flanders. The Duke of Brabant recovered Hainault and captured Jacqueline, who had already been abandoned by Gloucester. A coolness arose between the Duke of Burgundy and the English which was never completely removed.

4. =Gloucester and Beaufort. 1425--1428.=--In England as well as on the Continent Gloucester's self-willed restlessness roused enemies, the most powerful of them being his uncle, the Chancellor, Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester (see pp. 301, 335), a wealthy and ambitious prelate not without those statesmanlike qualities which were sadly lacking to Gloucester. If Beaufort ruled the Council, Gloucester had the art of making himself popular with the multitude, whose sympathies were not likely to be given to a bishop of the type of Beaufort, who practised no austerities and who had nothing in him to appeal to the popular imagination. So bitter was the feud between Gloucester and Beaufort that in =1426= Bedford was obliged to visit England to keep the peace between them. Before he returned to France he persuaded Beaufort to surrender the chancellorship to Kemp, the Bishop of London, and to leave England for a time. Moreover, in =1427= he himself swore that as long as the king was under age the Council and not the Protector was to govern. When Gloucester was asked to take the same oath, he signed it, but refused to swear. In =1428=, after Bedford had returned to France, Beaufort came back, bringing with him from Rome the title of Cardinal, and authority to raise soldiers for a crusade against heretics in Bohemia. A storm was at once raised against him. A Cardinal, it was said, was a servant of the Roman See, and as no man could serve two masters, he ought not to hold an English bishopric or to sit in the English Council, far less to send to Bohemia English troops which were needed in France. Gloucester fancied that the opportunity of overthrowing his rival had come. Beaufort, however, was too prudent to press his claims. He absented himself from the Council and allowed the men whom he had raised for Bohemia to be sent to France instead. Before the end of the year the outcry against him died away, and, Cardinal as he was, he resumed his old place in the Council.

5. =The Siege of Orleans. 1428--1429.=--The time had arrived when the presence of every English soldier was needed in France. Bedford had made himself master of almost the whole country north of the Loire except Orleans. If he could gain that city it would be easy for him to overpower Charles, who kept court at Chinon. In =1428=, therefore, he laid siege to Orleans. The city, however, defended itself gallantly, though all that the French outside could hope to do was to cut off the supplies of the besiegers. In February =1429= they attempted to intercept a convoy of herrings coming from Paris for the English troops, but were beaten off in what was jocosely styled the Battle of the Herrings, and it seemed as though Orleans, and with it France itself, were doomed. Frenchmen were indeed weary of the foreign yoke and of the arrogant insolence of the rough island soldiers. Yet in France all military and civil organisation had hitherto come from the kings, and unfortunately for his subjects Charles was easy-tempered and entirely incapable either of carrying on war successfully or of inspiring that enthusiasm without which the most careful organisation is as the twining of ropes of sand. It would need a miracle to inspire Frenchmen with the belief that it was possible for them to defeat the victors of Agincourt and Verneuil, and yet without such a miracle irretrievable ruin was at hand.

6. =Jeanne Darc and the Relief of Orleans. 1429.=--The miracle was wrought by a young maiden of seventeen, Jeanne Darc, the daughter of a peasant of Domremi, in the duchy of Bar. Her home was at a distance from the actual scenes of war, but whilst she was still little more than a child, tales of horror, reaching her from afar, had filled her with 'pity for the realm of France' and for its young king, whom she idealised into the pattern of every virtue. As she brooded over the thought of possible deliverance, her warm imagination summoned up before her bright and saintly forms, St. Michael, St. Catherine, and St. Margaret, who bade her, the chosen of God, to go forth and save the king, and conduct him to Reims to be crowned and anointed with the holy oil from the vessel which, as men believed, had been brought down from heaven in days of old. At last in =1428= her native hamlet was burnt down by a Burgundian band. Then the voices of the saints bade her go to Vaucouleurs, where she would find a knight, Robert de Baudricourt, who would conduct her to Charles. Months passed before Baudricourt would do aught but scorn her message, and it was not till February =1429=, when the news from Orleans was most depressing, that he consented to take her in his train. She found Charles at Chinon, and, as the story goes, convinced him of her Divine mission by recognising him in disguise in the midst of his courtiers. Soldiers and theologians alike distrusted her, but her native good sense, her simple and earnest faith, and above all her purity of heart and life disarmed all opposition, and she was sent forth to lead an army to the relief of Orleans. She rode on horseback clothed in armour as a man, with a sword which she had taken from behind the altar of St. Catherine by her side, and a consecrated banner in her hand. She brought with her hope of victory, enthusiasm built on confidence in Divine protection, and wide-reaching patriotism. 'Pity for the realm of France' inspired her, and even the rough soldiers who followed her forsook for a time their debaucheries that they might be fit to follow God's holy maid. Such an army was invincible; but whilst to the French the maid was an instrument of the mercy of God, to the English she was an emissary of hell and the forerunner of defeat. On May 7 she led the storm of one of the English fortified posts by which the town was hemmed in. After a sharp attack she planted her standard on the wall. The English garrison was slain to a man. The line of the besiegers was broken through, and Orleans was saved. On the 12th the English army was in full retreat.

7. =The Coronation of Charles VII. and the Capture of the Maid. 1429--1430.=--The Maid followed up her victory. She had at her side brave and skilful warriors, such as La Hire and the Bastard of Orleans, the illegitimate son of the murdered Louis of Orleans, and with their help she pressed the English hard, driving them northwards and defeating them at Patay. She insisted on conducting Charles to Reims, and he, indolently resisting at first, was carried away by her persistent urgency. Hostile towns opened their gates to her on the way, and on July 17 she saw with chastened joy the man whom she had saved from destruction crowned in the great cathedral of Reims. For her part, she was eager to push on the war, but Charles was slothful, and in a hurry to be back to the pleasures of his court. When she led the troops to the attack of Paris, she was ordered back by the king, and the army sent into winter quarters. In the spring of =1430= the Maid was allowed again to attack the English, but she had no longer the support which she had once had. Many of the French soldiers were meanly jealous of her, and were vexed when they were told that they owed their victories to a woman. On the other side the Duke of Burgundy was frightened by the French successes into giving real aid to Bedford, and on May 23, in a skirmish before Compiegne, her countrymen doing nothing to save or to rescue her, the Maid was taken by Burgundian soldiers. Before the end of the year her captors sold her to the English, who firmly believed her to be a witch.

8. =The Martyrdom at Rouen. 1431.=--The English had no difficulty in finding an ecclesiastical court to judge their prisoner. Even the French clergy detested the Maid as having appealed to supernatural voices which had not been recognised by the Church; and in spite of an intelligent and noble defence she was condemned to be burnt. At the stake she behaved with heroic simplicity. When the flames curled round her she called upon the saints who had befriended her. Her last utterance was a cry of "Jesus!" An Englishman who had come to triumph hung his head for shame. "We are lost," he said; "we have burnt a saint!"

9. =The Last Years of the Duke of Bedford. 1431--1435.=--The English gained nothing by their unworthy vengeance. Though the personal presence of the Maid was no longer there to encourage her countrymen, they had learnt from her to cherish that 'pity for the realm of France' which had glowed so brightly in her own bosom. It was in vain that towards the end of =1431= Bedford carried the young Henry, now a boy of ten years, who had already been crowned in England the year before, to be crowned at Notre Dame, the cathedral of Paris. The Parisians were disgusted by the troop of foreigners which accompanied him, and their confidence was shaken when Bedford sent the king back to England as not venturing to trust him amongst his French subjects. In =1432= the armies of Charles VII. stole forwards step by step, and Bedford, who had no money to pay his troops, could do nothing to resist them. The English Parliament, which had cheerfully voted supplies as long as there seemed a prospect of conquering France, hung back from granting them when victories were no longer won. In =1433= Bedford was again forced to return to England to oppose the intrigues of Gloucester, who, though he had lost the title of Protector when the young king was crowned, had thrown the government into confusion by his intrigues. When Bedford went back to France in =1434= he found the tide running strongly against him. Little more than Paris and Normandy were held by the English, and the Duke of Burgundy was inclining more and more towards the French. In =1435= a congress was held at Arras, under the Duke of Burgundy's presidency, in the hope that peace might be made. The congress, however, failed to accomplish anything, and soon after the English ambassadors were withdrawn Bedford died at Rouen. If so wise a statesman and so skilful a warrior had failed to hold down France, no other Englishman was likely to achieve the task.

10. =The Defection of Burgundy. 1435.=--After Bedford's death the Duke of Burgundy renounced his alliance with the English and entered into a league with Charles VII. In =1430=, by the death of the Duke of Brabant, he inherited Brabant, and in =1436= he inherited from the faithless Jacqueline Hainault, Holland, Zealand, and Friesland (see p. 308). He thus, being already Count of Flanders, became ruler over well-nigh the whole of the Netherlands in addition to his own territories in Burgundy. The vassal of the king of France was now a European potentate. England had therefore to count on the enmity of a ruler whose power of injuring her was indeed serious.

11. =The Duke of York in France. 1436--1437.=--Bedford's successor was the young Richard, Duke of York, whose father was that Earl of Cambridge who had been executed at Southampton (see p. 301); whilst his mother was Anne Mortimer, the sister of the Earl of March. As the Earl of March had died in =1425=, the Duke of York was now, through his mother, the heir of Lionel, Duke of Clarence, and thus, if hereditary right was to be regarded, heir to the throne. That a man with such claims should have been entrusted with such an office shows how firmly the victories of Henry V. had established the House of Lancaster in England. Disputes in the English Council, however, delayed his departure, and in April =1436=, before he could arrive in France, Paris was lost, whilst the Duke of Burgundy besieged Calais. England, stung by the defection of Burgundy, made an unusual effort. One army drove the Burgundians away from before Calais, whilst another under the Duke of York himself regained several fortresses in Normandy, and in =1437= Lord Talbot drove the Burgundians behind the Somme.

12. =The English Lose Ground. 1437--1443.=--Gallant as the Duke of York was, he was soon recalled, and in =1437= was succeeded by Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick. Warwick, however, failed to do more than to hold what his predecessor had gained, and he died in =1439=. Both in England and France the suffering was terrible, and England would find neither men nor money to support a falling cause. In =1439= a peace conference was held at Calais, but the English continued arrogantly to claim the crown of France, and peace was not to be had. In =1440= York was sent back, and fighting went on till =1443=, in which the English lost ground both in Normandy and in Guienne.

13. =Continued Rivalry of Beaufort and Gloucester. 1439--1441.=--The chief advocate in England of the attempt to make peace at Calais in =1439= had been Cardinal Beaufort, whose immense wealth gave him authority over a Council which was always at its wits' end for money. Beaufort was wise enough to see that the attempt to reconquer the lost territory, or even to hold Normandy, was hopeless. Such a view, however, was not likely to be popular. Nations, like men, often refuse openly to acknowledge failure long after they cease to take adequate means to avert it. Of the popular feeling Gloucester made himself the mouthpiece, and it was by his influence that exorbitant pretensions had been put forward at Calais. In =1440= he accused Beaufort of using his authority for his own private interests, and though Beaufort gave over to the public service a large sum of money which he received as the ransom of the Duke of Orleans from a captivity which had lasted twenty-four years (see p. 303), Gloucester virulently charged him with an unpatriotic concession to the enemy. Gloucester's domestic relations, on the other hand, offered an easy object of attack. When he deserted Jacqueline he took a mistress, Eleanor Cobham, and subsequently married her, which he was able to do without difficulty, as his union with Jacqueline was, in the eyes of the Church, no marriage at all. The new Duchess of Gloucester being aware that if the king should die her husband would be next in order of succession to the throne, was anxious to hasten that event. It was a superstitious age, and the Duchess consulted an astrologer as to the time of the king's death, and employed a reputed witch to make a waxen image of the king under the belief that as the wax melted before the fire the king's life would waste away. In =1441= these proceedings were detected. The astrologer was hanged, the witch was burnt, whilst the Duchess escaped with doing public penance and with imprisonment for life. Gloucester could not save her, but he did not lose his place in the Council, where he continued to advocate a war policy, though with less success than before.

14. =Beaufort and Somerset. 1442--1443.=--In =1442= Henry was in his twenty-first year. Unfeignedly religious and anxious to be at peace with all men, his character was far too weak and gentle to fit him for governing in those rough times. He had attached himself to Beaufort because Beaufort's policy was pacific, and because Gloucester's life was scandalous. Beaufort's position was secured at court, but the situation was not one in which a pacific statesman could hope for success. The French would not consent to make peace till all that they had lost had been recovered; yet, hardly bested as the English in France were, it was impossible in the teeth of English public opinion for any statesman, however pacific, to abandon lands still commanded by English garrisons. Every year, however, brought the problem nearer to the inevitable solution. In =1442= the French attacked the strip of land which was all that the English now held in Guienne and Gascony, and with the exception of Bordeaux and Bayonne captured almost every fortified town. The command in France was given to Cardinal Beaufort's nephew, John Beaufort, Duke of Somerset. Somerset, who was thoroughly incompetent, did not even leave England till the autumn of =1443=, and when he arrived in France accomplished nothing worthy of his office.

15. =The Angevin Marriage Treaty. 1444--1445.=--Henry now fell under the influence of William de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk, a descendant of the favourite of Richard II. Suffolk had fought bravely in France, and had learnt by sad experience the hopelessness of the English cause. In =1444=, with the consent of the king and the Parliament, he negotiated at Tours a truce for ten months. In order to make it more lasting there was to be a marriage between Henry and Margaret of Anjou. Her father, Rene, the Duke of Anjou, was titular king of Jerusalem and Sicily, in neither of which did he possess a foot of ground, whilst his duchy of Anjou was almost valueless to him in consequence of the forays of the English, who still held posts in Maine. Charles had the more readily consented to the truce, because it was understood that the surrender of Maine would be a condition of the marriage. In =1445= Suffolk led Margaret to England, where her marriage to Henry was solemnised. A French queen who brought with her no portion except a truce bought by the surrender of territory could hardly fail to be unpopular in England.

16. =Deaths of Gloucester and Beaufort. 1447.=--The truce was renewed from time to time, and Suffolk's authority seemed firmly established. In =1447= Gloucester was charged with high treason in a Parliament held at Bury St. Edmunds, but before he had time to answer he was found dead in his bed. His death may, with strong probability, be ascribed to natural causes, but it was widely believed that he had been murdered and that Suffolk was the murderer. A few weeks later Gloucester's old rival, Cardinal Beaufort, the last real statesman who supported the throne of Henry VI., followed him to the grave, and Suffolk was left alone to bear the responsibility of government and the disgrace of failure.

17. =The Loss of the French Provinces. 1448--1449.=--Suffolk had undertaken more than he was able to fulfil. Somerset had died in =1444=, and Suffolk being jealous of all authority but his own, he sent York to govern Ireland. He could not secure the fulfilment of the conditions which he had made with the king of France. The English commanders refused to evacuate Maine, and in =1448= a French army entered the province and drove out the English. Edmund, the new Duke of Somerset, was sent to take the command in Normandy, which had formerly been held by his brother. In =1449= an Aragonese captain in the English service, who had no pay for his troops, having seized Fougeres, a place on the frontier of Brittany, for the sake of the booty to be gained, Charles made the attack an excuse for the renewal of the war. So destitute was the condition in which the English forces were left that neither Somerset nor the warlike Talbot (see p. 313), who had recently been created Earl of Shrewsbury, was able to resist him. Rouen fell in =1450=, and in =1450= the whole of Normandy was lost. In =1451= the French attacked Bordeaux and Bayonne, two port-towns which, in consequence of their close commercial intercourse with England, had no wish to transfer their allegiance to Charles. England, however, sent them no succour, and before the end of the year they were forced to capitulate. The relics of Guienne and Gascony thus passed into the hands of the French, and of all the possessions which the kings of England had once held on the Continent Calais alone remained.