1415: Henry V's Year of Glory

by Mortimer, Ian

  Such were the numbers of French men-at-arms clambering over the dying front ranks that it seemed to the English that God was holding their enemies helpless for them, presenting them to be slaughtered. But not all the English were finding it easy to pick off the men-at-arms. The column of Frenchmen that pressed hardest was that facing the duke of York. It was here that the fighting was fiercest. The archers may have run out of arrows, allowing the French the advantage as they came on. And wearing quilted leather, not steel armour, they were no match for the fully-armed men-at-arms. Their best hope in the hand-to-hand fighting was a previously unknown weapon: a weighted, sharp-pointed mallet designed for penetrating steel armour and helmets: a poleaxe.135 With these, and normal axes, the archers fought against the French knights and esquires, hacking and bludgeoning them with short, rapid sweeps. But the French men-at-arms were trained to deal with hand-to-hand warfare. Gradually they advanced on the duke of York’s standard. The battle was so furious, so bitter, that all thoughts of taking prisoners had long since vanished. Englishmen tried to use their poleaxes to crush the helmets of the attacking Frenchmen; the French wielded their swords to cut and kill the English archers. In the duke of York’s own retinue ninety men were killed as they fought to protect their lord.136 Despite their great struggle, the French managed to break through and strike the duke himself. Down went the king’s much-loved cousin into the mud, fighting to his death for his king. All his regrets about his brother’s treason died there in the mud with him.137

  York was not the only English casualty. The young earl of Suffolk, eager to prove himself after his recent inheritance, was killed. So too was the recently dubbed knight, Sir John Mortimer of Worcestershire, and Sir Richard Kyghley of Lancashire, Sir John Skidmore of Herefordshire, Dafydd Gam of Breconshire, and many archers.138 At this stage of the battle the English began to sustain terrible wounds from the swords of the French. But even on the hard-pressed duke of York’s side, the lords who were second-in-command (probably Sir Gilbert Umphraville and Sir John Cornwaille) rallied the men so that the line did not break. And gradually the English became aware that they were actually holding the French and forcing them back. The French had no room for all their heavily armoured men. They could not retreat, due to the press of men behind them, nor advance, due to the strength of the English ahead. So the French onslaught turned into a supply chain of victims as each man fell and left room for another cumbersome man to wield his sword against the English poleaxes. The English, still in a state of terror, killed every Frenchman they could see in a few crazed minutes of frantic, panic-stricken killing. For these few minutes, as the men in the central French battle pressed forward, those in the column attacking the king were simply pushed towards the English men-at-arms, who slaughtered them bloodily in a kill-or-be-killed frenzy. Indeed, the word ‘kill’ is the operative one in most accounts of this stage of the battle. ‘No one was captured; many were killed,’ commented one chronicler, continuing ‘the English were increasingly eager to kill for it seemed there was no hope of safety except in victory. They killed those near them and then those who followed …’139 Thus the French were pushed to their ignominious, bloody deaths in the mud.

  When the French did stop pushing forward, it was not because of a general’s command: the men at the rear were beginning to withdraw. This allowed the English men-at-arms with Henry to break through the central column of the vanguard. When that happened, all was suddenly confusion in the French army – there were no columns, no vanguard, no main battle, just a mass of desperate men fighting for their lives, or trying to surrender and being killed as they tried to give themselves up. Few Englishmen had time to take prisoners. It was at this point, when the English were making real advances into the French ranks that the intensity of the fighting around the king increased to an uncontrollable level. Some French knights – some French chronicles give the credit to the duke of Alençon – burst through and hacked their way towards the king. The king’s bodyguard came under attack, and fell back. The king’s brother, Humphrey, fell backwards under the force of the French onslaught, wounded in the groin, and was lying in a precarious position until Henry himself stepped forward and stood astride him, swinging his battle axe, fighting directly against the front rank of the enemy. In those long, exposed moments, while Henry fought in person, the French realised that the king of England was within their reach and redoubled their efforts to kill him. Someone – perhaps the duke of Alençon, or perhaps one of the eighteen men of the seigneur de Croy who had sworn to knock the crown from Henry’s helmet – managed to break through and bring an axe down on his head. But they only succeeded in hacking off a portion of the gold crown; and as soon as the blow had landed the protagonist was beaten back by the knights who came to Henry’s assistance, rescuing both the king and his brother in the same forward movement.140

  This was the scene that confronted the duke of Brabant as he arrived now, about midday, having ridden hard from Lens, thirty miles away. He must have been exhausted. His horses must have been similarly exhausted. He stopped near a thicket and, seeing the dire situation in which the French army now found itself, realised that he had little time to prepare for battle. His armour, surcoats and accoutrements of war were all in his baggage many miles behind – so he had one of his chamberlains, Gobelet Vosken, take off his armour. He ordered one of his trumpeters to tear off the Brabant coat of arms hanging from his trumpet and, having made a hole in the material, put it over his head as a makeshift surcoat. Another trumpeter handed over the Brabant arms to serve as a flag for the duke’s lance. Then, together with the few companions who had been able to keep up with him on the road from Lens, he yelled his war cry, ‘Brabant! Brabant!’, and set his spurs to charge into the fray.141

  One chronicler stated that the duke of Brabant arrived with very few men – just those of his household – ‘right at the point of defeat’.142 In one respect this was true; the balance had shifted. Many French were lying in the mud, bleeding to death, or trapped by their horses, or suffocating under a mass of bodies. Some were in flight. One of the duke’s own men, John de Grymberg, who had the hereditary right to carry the Brabant banner, took one look at the battlefield and galloped as fast as he could in the opposite direction.143 But according to the Burgundian writers, the rearguard – or some body of men-at-arms that amounted to a rearguard – was still mounted at this point. The French who had taken flight were regrouping in companies.144

  In the confusion, few people could establish what was happening. This regrouping by the French seems to have coincided with an attack on the English baggage wagons. The way almost all the chroniclers describe this attack is as an opportunistic looting spree; but there are good reasons to believe it was a planned attack on the English, directed by a French commander. This would mean that the point at which the duke of Brabant arrived was not the end of the battle. It only appeared to be so with the benefit of hindsight.

  When Henry had given the order to advance banners, he had also taken the precaution of ordering the baggage wagons to close up on the rear of the English army. Only ten men-at-arms and twenty archers had been guarding the baggage, so it fell to them and the carters to bring forward the wagons and the horses, and to help the sick and the injured, and to protect the pages stationed at the rear. They had only partially accomplished this task – if, indeed, they had started it. So the baggage and horses remained largely in and around the village of Maisoncelle. It was attacked here by Isambard d’Agincourt, Riflart de Clamance, Robinet de Bourneville and other men-at-arms, together with six hundred local men, mainly drawn from Hesdin.145 The fact that men-at-arms were involved suggests that this was not meant to be a self-seeking raiding party, even if it turned into one. Nor was it without organisation – an attack on the English baggage had been envisaged in the first battle plan, drawn up at Rouen on or about the 12th. The French were attempting to do what the Black Prince had done at Poitiers when the battle was turning against him. On that occasion the prince sent a s
mall body of men to unfurl his banner at the rear of the French army, and to attack the king of France’s battle from behind; it only took a small number of troops on that occasion to cause confusion throughout the whole army. Such distractions could be decisive. But bringing them about was not easy. Hence local men, who knew the land, had been sent to find their way around to attack the English from behind. The problem was that they had taken too long. When they came across such rich plunder as the English horses and the king’s jewels, they delayed further, to help themselves. They found a sword set in a jewel-encrusted gold scabbard that was supposed to have belonged to King Arthur, and two crowns of gold, the orb, many precious stones and a gold cross containing a piece of the True Cross. This failure to bring the baggage forward was a huge piece of luck, for the raid did not distract the English at all, and they continued to hold the French onslaught.146

  By the time the men of Hesdin attacking the baggage wagons had been driven off, it was too late. The French line of defence was breaking up. The army was in flight. Those still mounted probably got away quite easily, as their opponents could not chase them and the archers had run out of arrows. But many – probably the majority – had lost their horses. Hundreds were lying under the huge piles of dead men, their limbs broken, or bleeding heavily from arrow wounds, or simply unable to extricate themselves from the piles or from under their dead horses. Those in armour knew their part was done. They could await discovery, and would in due course agree a ransom. For them there was no danger. Any wounded infantry on the battlefield knew their fate would be quite different; those who could still walk were no doubt trying to flee, or hide themselves as well as they could.

  *

  In London, shocking news reached the capital today, ‘replete with sadness and cause of endless sorrow’: there had been a great battle in which the English army had been defeated.147 The particulars were shrouded in mystery; it was not even known whether the king had been killed or taken prisoner. No doubt Henry’s brother, the duke of Bedford, and his uncle, Chancellor Beaufort, enquired of the mayor-elect what he had heard from merchants coming from France. But no further information was available.

  *

  It was about one o’clock in the afternoon. Henry was still anxious, lest the many men-at-arms who had fled managed to regroup and launch another attack; but most of the French had dispersed. Attention now turned to the piles of dead and wounded. The English pulled corpses off the piles, looking for lords trapped alive underneath. They checked the men lying in the mud. Lords and men-at-arms were dragged to their feet and forced to relinquish their weapons, their gauntlets and helmets; then placed under guard, to be led away by their captors. In this way, the marshal of France, the great Boucicaut, was captured by a humble esquire called William Wolf, and the bellicose duke of Bourbon was taken prisoner by Ralph Fowne esquire. Sir John Gray took the count of Eu; Sir John Cornwaille captured the count of Vendôme. Ghillebert de Lannoy, chamberlain of the count of Charolais, was found amid a pile of dead men with a wound in his knee and another to his head. The duke of Orléans was pulled out from under a pile of dead men by Sir Richard Waller. The young count of Richemont had been covered in so much blood from the dying men on top of him that no one recognised the arms on his surcoat.148

  These were the lucky ones. Those of no great value would have had their throats sliced open with a sword, or had a final vision of an axe suddenly coming down into their face. There were some exceptions. Two of the prisoners claimed by Lord Fitzhugh were a man-at-arms called Jean Garyn and his servant. The servant would normally have been despatched with a knife through his windpipe – but in this case his master was prepared to pay a ransom for him.149 Some men managed to escape from the battlefield despite their wounds. Even then they had to hide themselves: they were liable to be killed by the local men, who hated the Armagnac army on account of the pillaging and rapes they and their communities had endured. If they found a defenceless man-at-arms they killed him and stripped him of his clothes and possessions.150

  Suddenly, while the English were occupied taking prisoners, there was a shout of alarm: the French were about to launch a new attack. The chronicle of Ruisseauville claimed that this was due to Clignet de Brabant having rallied the remaining French men-at-arms. Basset’s chronicle states the men had been rallied by Guillaume de Tybouville. Des Ursins’ account states the new threat was not a case of men being rallied but the appearance of a wholly new force, led by the duke of Brittany. While we know this last suggestion is wrong – for the duke was still at Amiens – it was quite credible at the time; indeed we know that the seigneur de Longny was just three miles from the battlefield with the duke of Anjou’s six hundred men-at-arms. Other writers assumed it was the arrival of the duke of Brabant that caused the alarm; and although the duke himself was probably already a prisoner, the rest of his men might have been spotted approaching the battlefield. What is certain is that the new threat was sufficient to cause Henry to panic. He ordered all the prisoners who were not of the royal blood to be killed immediately.151

  Of all the events connected with Agincourt, this massacre is by far the most controversial. It causes anger and division among English and French historians even today.152 Some have suggested Henry’s order amounted to a war crime – and although the modern concept of war crimes did not exist in 1415, Henry’s order was against contemporary morality, against the law of chivalry (which demanded that one spare one’s prisoners), against Henry’s own ordinances of war, and against Christian teaching. These prisoners were, after all, unarmed, fellow Christians, and had given themselves up. On the other hand, many historians have wanted to stress that Henry had no choice; he had to ensure that he won the battle and protected his men. This self-defence argument has two dimensions: first, that Henry could not spare the men to guard the prisoners because he needed every hand to fight the enemy; second, if he had not killed the prisoners they could have started to fight for their fellow Frenchmen. For the majority of English historians, still wedded to the post-Shakespearian ‘great-man’ view of Henry, this is the only way of presenting him: he made a hard decision in the nick of time, and saved his army.

  In determining which line to tread between these two extremes – or, indeed, whether to accept one of the extremes – a number of points need to be carefully considered. The first is that we may dismiss the often-repeated notion that it was the attack on the baggage wagons that caused Henry to order the massacre. Although this is to be found in some fifteenth-century chronicles, this reflects an attempt in later years to shift the blame for the massacre on to the French looters. The vast majority of early accounts point to a second or regrouped army as the cause of alarm.153 In addition, there is a logical point ruling it out. Ghillebert de Lannoy wrote a memoir in which he described being taken to a house with ten or twelve other prisoners, after being pulled out of one of the piles of dying men.154 There was thus a considerable delay between the taking of prisoners and the massacre: long enough to take the prisoners back to Maisoncelle to lock them up in houses. As the baggage wagons were also still in Maisoncelle, an attack by several hundred local men here cannot have occurred so late in the day without considerable fighting: there would have been enough armed Englishmen around to fight them off. Certainly Isambard d’Agincourt and his men would not have had unfettered access to the men-at-arms’ horses and the king’s jewels. The attack on the English baggage belongs to the earlier phase of the battle, while the main fight was still in progress, long before Henry ordered the massacre.

  How significant was the new threat? Three years after the battle, Thomas Elmham wrote, ‘there was indeed a great throng of people. The English killed the French they had taken prisoner for the sake of protecting their rear. Praise was given to God.’155 Tito Livio Frulovisi, writing many years later, also referred to large numbers of new men, claiming that

  Henry immediately prepared to fight another army of the enemy, no less than the first. Considering that the English were exhausted by s
o long and hard a fight, and because they saw that they held so many prisoners – so many that they came to the same number as themselves – they feared they might have to fight another battle against both the prisoners and the enemy. So they put many to death …’156

  These English statements about the arrival of a substantial new army do not tally with the English and Burgundian eyewitness accounts. They also clash with the French accounts, which associate the massacre with the arrival of new forces. De Lannoy and Thomas Basin both mention the arrival of the duke of Brabant in person as the cause – though how much de Lannoy could have known, being locked in a house in Maisoncelle at the time, is doubtful. And as we have seen the duke of Brabant did not bring a numerous army; he had travelled too fast for more than a few dozen men to accompany him on his thirty-mile dash from Lens. It cannot have been the remainder of his men who were arriving, as they can hardly have travelled the thirty miles so quickly. However, even if it was the rest of the duke’s men, then we must remember that he had undertaken to bring a total of 1,400 men-at-arms and six hundred crossbowmen in total – and some of them had travelled with the duke and some were already at Agincourt. So the largest new force that can have been seen approaching must have been considerably less than two thousand men, accompanied by fewer than a thousand pages. As the English had lost no more than six hundred men, the ‘new army’ cannot have amounted to more than a third of the English army. The same argument applies to the men of the duke of Anjou. If Henry ordered the massacre because of intelligence that the seigneur de Longny had a force of six hundred men-at-arms three miles away, then his decision was clearly an over-reaction. To constitute an imminent threat, the French ‘new army’ would have had to be both substantial and visible; but if any large, new force actually appeared on the battlefield, the majority of chroniclers would have noted its appearance. Not one does. Thus we may be confident that any ‘new army’ was distant from, as well as much smaller than, the English force, and did not push Henry into ordering the massacre.