1415: Henry V's Year of Glory

by Mortimer, Ian

  Monday 22nd

  The clerks in Westminster recording the payments from the exchequer noted another 10 marks paid for keeping Mordach, earl of Fife, locked up in the Tower of London. They also noted that William Bolton, one of the king’s messengers, was sent to Winchelsea, Rye and Hastings with letters to the mayors of those towns ordering ships within the Cinque Ports to go to sea ‘to resist the malice of the king’s French enemies’.

  Henry himself was probably at Windsor Castle by supper time. English kings since Edward III normally spent a couple of days travelling by barge up the River Thames to the castle, in preparation for St George’s Day.64 If the king was abroad, then the keeper of the realm had to take his place. There was no question of the royal family not celebrating the feast of St George at Windsor.

  Tuesday 23rd: St George’s Day

  The Order of the Garter had been formally established by Edward III on St George’s Day 1349.65 It consisted of the monarch and twenty-five knights, together with support staff and officers. According to its ordinances, each knight had to come to Windsor Castle to celebrate the saint’s feast day every year, without fail. If the knight could not attend, he was required to explain his absence and to celebrate the feast wherever he was, in the same way as he would have done if he had been at Windsor, wearing the appropriate robes.

  Henry himself had been nominated to a Garter stall soon after his father’s accession in 1399, and his three brothers had been nominated the following year. No doubt they travelled up the river together for the feast. With them would have been a number of the lords who had attended Henry’s great council a week earlier. The full list of Knights of the Garter on this day in 1415 was as follows:66

  Obviously not all of these men were in attendance. The kings of Portugal and Denmark and the duke of Holland were heads of state; they hardly ever attended the Garter feasts in person. The earl of Warwick and Lord Fitzhugh were still on their way back from Constance. But most of the others would have travelled to Windsor. The three knights raised to the Order during Henry’s reign – the earl of Salisbury, Lord Camoys and Sir John Daubridgecourt – would certainly have attended. They were among at least sixteen Garter knights who were preparing to set out on the expedition to Harfleur.67 There cannot have been many other occasions since 1415 when so many Knights of the Garter took part in an overseas military expedition together. Even the duke of Holland was playing his part, in providing the ships.

  Henry was not the only one celebrating St George’s Day. All around the country people were carrying dragons in processions. Town guilds carried figures of St George and the dragon around their parishes and churches.68 But nowhere did the celebrations compare with the solemnity of the gathering at Windsor, where religious services, swearing of oaths, and a lavish royal feast took place. The main procession would have seen the Knights of the Garter walking slowly together in their long deep-blue mantles, lined with scarlet, and wearing their garters on their left legs. Beneath their mantles they wore miniver-lined surcoats. Long hoods hung down their backs.69 The king’s own mantle had a longer train than the others, and was lined in ermine, not scarlet – one appears in the inventory of Henry’s possessions at his death: ‘a mantle of blue velvet, embroidered with an escutcheon of St George and a garter and furred with ermine, value £20’.70 Ahead of the knights in the procession would have been the thirteen canons of the Order, all dressed in long mantles of purple marked with the shield of St George, and thirteen other priests, dressed in red mantles. There would probably have been dragons and St George figures in the Windsor procession too. Looking through Henry’s inventory we find references to ‘a gold dragon with a cross, the gold being worth 37s 11d’, ‘a little silver-gilt dragon, worth 8d’, ‘a little gold chain and a gold cross for a dragon, worth 23s 6d’, ‘a gold dragon set with a sapphire and 12 pearls, worth 40s’ and ‘three silver-gilt dragons, worth in all 12s 4d’.71 On top of these dragons, which Henry may have worn as badges, we find that he owned a silver-gilt image of St George containing a relic of St George himself, the gold in this saint-shaped reliquary being worth £13 3s 4d.72

  Due to the rigid formality of the Order, we can say a few things about proceedings on this day, even though not a single Garter-related document survives from this particular feast. Those attending would have witnessed the formal installation of the sixty-year-old Lord Camoys, whom Henry had recently nominated to the Order following the death of Lord Ros the previous year. Thirteen ladies were given robes and attended the feast, in line with the precedent set by Edward III in the 1370s and continued since by Richard II and Henry IV.73 We even know the order in which the knights sat in the chapel and at the feast that followed: in the exact order in which they are named above. In the chapel they sat in designated stalls, each bearing their arms; during the feast they sat at two large round tables that used to be kept at Windsor Castle specially for the purpose. Each table accommodated thirteen knights, and so must have been about 9–10ft in diameter. Each place had the name of every knight who had sat there in the past inscribed on it in French.74

  As to what the knights said to one another as they sat at these tables, we have no way of knowing. But for Henry, looking across at his brother John and Sir Thomas Erpingham on the opposite side of his table, there were only two subjects on his mind: religion and war. And in celebrating the feast of St George, the warrior-saint, he was celebrating both of them.

  *

  Cardinal Fillastre, Cardinal Zabarella, and several other prelates had set out from Constance on 19 April to tell John XXIII the news of the decree promulgated against him on the 17th. He had two days to decide where he wished to abdicate; those two days would be reckoned from the moment they informed him of the news. However, when they reached Freiburg, where they believed he was staying, under the protection of the duke of Austria, they found he had abandoned the place and made his way to Breisach, on the Rhine. He was staying at a public hospice.

  The cardinals and the rest of the deputation arrived in Breisach and sought an audience with John. His servants declined to admit them. The cardinals refused to accept this response and sent their messenger back to ask again. And again. The pope’s servants claimed they did not know where he was, for they did not go into his chamber. Not until seven o’clock in the evening could the cardinals establish for certain that John was still in the hospice, when a nobleman who had served him in his chamber confirmed his presence there.

  When the pope realised he could not conceal his whereabouts any longer, he asked to have a private audience with the two cardinals before meeting the delegation. The cardinals refused, saying they had to acquit themselves of their duty to the council first. Reluctantly the pope invited the entire delegation to come to him at the hospice the following day.75

  Wednesday 24th

  Full moon was about an hour before dawn. Most men would have been aware that the nights were bright enough to travel by, even if they were not up before dawn. John XXIII must have wondered whether he should not just flee, and get as far away from Breisach as possible before he had to confront the delegation. There was a bridge over the Rhine at Breisach, and he knew that he might find shelter on the far side. It must have been tempting. But for the moment he stayed where he was, and waited for the embassy.

  When the deputation assembled, Cardinal Fillastre did the talking. He read out the council’s decree of the 17th and also the emperor’s letters of safe conduct. At the end, the pope declared that it was still his intention to bring peace and unity to the Church, and that he was prepared to abdicate – according to the council’s own formula. He denied that he planned to return to Italy but said that he would rather go into France, on the other side of the river. He had already written to the duke of Burgundy, John the Fearless, who was sending two thousand men-at-arms to be his armed guard. He added that he would respond to the council in due course, and would speak to the two cardinals after dinner.

  The news about the pope seeking shelter with John the Fearless
was astounding. The delegation agreed Cardinal Fillastre and Cardinal Zabarella should return to the pope’s hospice that afternoon and try to dissuade him from leaving. They did so – and they pleaded with him to abdicate straightaway. As they told him, by complying with the council’s wishes he might yet preserve some dignity and some material provision for himself. If he did not resign he risked losing everything, for legal proceedings would undoubtedly be brought against him. But like Jan Hus in his prison cell at Gottlieben, John XXIII refused to change his mind. The cardinals departed, empty-handed and despondent.76

  *

  Turning to the Issue Roll payments made today – handed out by royal clerks to messengers in the great hall of the Palace of Westminster – we find certain signs of personal intimacy. Historians are normally reliant on chronicles and private papers for descriptions of friendship; these are often suspect, chronicles being subject to bias and private papers from this period almost non-existent. Official records are far too formal to note personal closeness; the king’s feelings have to be inferred from grants, appointments and signs of continual proximity. However, with respect to today Henry made a special provision for his friend, the earl of Arundel. Arundel was being paid only 100 marks (£66 13s 4d) for his salary as treasurer. Despite the financial pressure he was under, Henry thought this too low and directed that a further £300 be paid to Arundel out of ‘special regard’ for him. This was similar to a special allowance he made to his uncle, Henry Beaufort, for attending council meetings. Such indicators of ‘special regard’ are doubly significant when they appear in account books. Men and women often lie or exaggerate their feelings in their letters to one another – especially heads of state – but they rarely lie in their account books.

  The king seems to have had just such a ‘special regard’ for Sir John Phelip. He was a household knight and one of the men who had travelled via Harfleur on the embassy to Paris in January. Over the year he received several grants and gifts from Henry. Today he received three – one of £20, another of 40 marks and, with his wife Alice, an annual grant of £100. Alice was the daughter of Thomas Chaucer, the king’s butler, and the granddaughter of Geoffrey Chaucer. Phelip was thus not only a friend but a man whose past and present were interwoven with the Lancastrian tapestry, and an example of the sort of enforcer Henry relied upon heavily in preparing for his campaign.

  Unremittingly, the payments in these accounts are for pensions and war. Another £60 was paid to Roger Salvayn for timber for the defence of Calais. Another £5 was paid to John Bower, turner, in return for ‘helving axes, mattocks and picks for the king’s voyage to Harfleur’. Thomas Strange received £282 for the wages of his troops keeping the peace in North Wales. Henry bought another ship from three Breton merchants, paying £500 for the St Nicholas of Guérande. Nicholas Merbury paid £10 to William Founder for more gunpowder for the expedition to Harfleur, and William Catton received 25 marks for repairs to the king’s ships.

  Among all these payments for war and pensions to supporters is a payment to John Hull for the maintenance of Mordach, earl of Fife. In itself this is nothing special – payments for Mordach’s upkeep appear regularly in these accounts – but for the first time we see the payments given a terminal date: 27 May. By that date the heir of the regent of Scotland was expected to be back on his home soil. Henry’s representatives in the north must have agreed an exchange for the earl by this date. It is another small sign of the diplomatic game at which Henry excelled. Over and over again we find signs of diplomatic initiatives that collectively contributed to his grand strategy of isolating France and maintaining the stability of England’s borders.

  Another terminal date appears in these same rolls today, and it was even more significant. At Calais on this day, Philip Morgan secured a prolongation of the truce with his French counterpart, Jean Andreu. Peace was guaranteed – until 8 June.77

  Thursday 25th

  Pope John XXIII arose early. At sunrise he slipped out of Breisach with only one servant, saying goodbye to no one and telling nobody where he had gone. His plan was to make for the bridge over the Rhine and seek shelter until he could make contact with the duke of Burgundy’s men. John the Fearless himself was still at Dijon, and showed no sign of coming to the aid of the pope in person.78 But John’s men – if the pope was right in thinking they were nearby – could easily spirit him away. Then the council of Constance would have to depose the pope in his absence, and both the other popes too. That would put the council’s authority to a very severe test.

  When John XXIII came to the bridge there was a man there waiting. In what must have been a very awkward confrontation for both parties, he stopped the pope. The pope turned back. But he met another man along the road by the river. This man took the pope to a barn, and told him to wait there while he went to fetch horses and an escort. When he returned the men in the escort were, of course, not those of the duke of Burgundy but the duke of Austria. They took John to Neuenberg, where there was no bridge across the river.

  When the emperor learned that the pope was intending to head into France and seeking the protection of John the Fearless, he was furious. Messengers rode through that afternoon and evening, ordering local lords to take action. Rumours spread: that the emperor was preparing an army to ride north and storm Neuenberg, or that the men of Basel were being ordered to march to Neuenberg to apprehend the pope. The emperor sent ambassadors to the duke of Burgundy – they met him on the 28th at Is. He also wrote to the duke of Ludwig of Bavaria-Ingolstadt, palatine count of the Rhine, the duke of Austria’s cousin, urging him to bring the duke of Austria to reason. Every possible form of influence was brought to bear on the duke of Austria.

  By 8 p.m. Duke Ludwig had contacted the duke of Austria and told him emphatically that John XXIII was a lost cause. The pope himself was by now terrified and powerless. He had been reduced from his state and greatness to something less than a normal man – unfamiliar with his surroundings and uncertain how to behave. When the duke of Austria decided that enough was enough, and that he would take the pope back to the cardinals at Breisach, he simply instructed his men to dress the pope in common clothes and lead him to Cardinal Fillastre. The pope was in no position to object; he donned a white jerkin and a black mantle and mounted a small black horse. In this guise they led him back through the night to Breisach. The pope and his escort were forced to wait for more than an hour outside the gates before they were finally admitted by the night watch.79

  Friday 26th

  In France the optimism of the show of unity on 13 March had completed dissipated, and the mood was one of deep concern. A week earlier a message had been sent to the bailiff of Rouen ordering him to prepare against an English invasion. Today an official letter was sent out from the French court confirming that the king had heard that Henry V was collecting a large fleet and an army.80 The additional news that the English refused to prolong the truce for more than five weeks would have heightened the tension. It would have hammered home the point Henry had made in his letter of the 15th: that he saw the French refusal to comply with his demands as an act of disobedience to God.

  For the princes of France, English bellicosity was only half the problem. The other reason for concern was their own divided government. The king was undergoing a severe bout of sickness and could not possibly grasp the seriousness of the situation. Nor could the septagenarian duke of Berry, for he had now left court. The duke of Orléans could not be given command without infuriating – and further alienating – John the Fearless; and likewise John could not be given command either. The ‘fearless’ duke was perhaps the one member of the French royal family who had the military experience, the political skills and the sheer energy to organise a successful defence of the realm – but of course the Armagnacs could not risk him exercising military authority. Nor would the dauphin tolerate his presence. Thus, in the absence of any member of the royal family who was sane, competent and politically acceptable, the fat, eighteen-year-old dauphin was himself
appointed captain-general of France, with orders to resist the English invasion.

  The dauphin’s appointment only worsened the situation. He was wont to sleep all morning and have his dinner at four in the afternoon, and his supper at midnight, spending the night hours playing music and dallying with his mistress, la Cassinelle – so called because she was a daughter of one Guillaume Cassinel.81 He had never resisted anything, let alone an invasion. The responsibility for actually organising the defence of the kingdom fell to the constable of France, Charles d’Albret – and herein lay yet another problem. Charles was an experienced commander, having been constable of France for eleven of the last thirteen years. Nevertheless he had no authority over the great dukes and princes. He could hardly command the duke of Burgundy, or the duke of Brittany, or the duke of Bourbon. All he could do was advise the dauphin. But the dauphin was quite a law unto himself. The chronicler Monstrelet relates a story about how the dauphin and his mother in this month commanded all the dukes of the royal blood to come to them at Melun. When the dukes had arrived, they were detained there and ordered not to return to Paris while the dauphin and his mother went back to the capital. The dauphin, having tricked his mother into placing herself in his power without the other members of the royal family, sought out the three men in Paris who had command of her treasure. He forcibly entered their houses with his supporters and removed his mother’s wealth to his own hôtel. After this act of theft, he summoned the principal men of the city and the university to the Louvre where he had the history of the realm since his father’s coronation read aloud, with particular attention to the waste of money by various men over the years, including the duke of Burgundy. As dauphin, he declared, he would not permit this to continue; but instead would henceforth take on the whole government of the realm himself. Charles d’Albret could do little in the face of such overbearing and threatening inexperience.