The Greatest Traitor

by Ian Mortimer

  Roger and Isabella were in the ascendant but they were not guaranteed success. At any time opinion could turn against them, or the king might decide to make a stand with a contingent of Welshmen. He had with him nearly £30,000 to pay an army for the purpose. Roger and Isabella were certainly very cautious as they neared Oxford. This royal town was the first they had approached as an occupying force. It was notoriously prone to violent clashes; it was a place where opinions from all over the realm met and either melded or struck sparks. At any moment there was the danger of an assassin, or the city being barred to them. As a precaution Isabella sent messengers ahead to arrange her lodgings with the Carmelite friars in the town, while Roger and the other leaders of the army arranged lodgings at Osney Abbey outside the walls. Their cautious approach was appreciated by the townsfolk, who, realising that their houses were not going to be looted, sent a presentation silver cup to Isabella as she approached. The invaders had taken their first town, and no blood had been spilt.

  At Oxford the Bishop of Hereford joined them and preached a sermon. His text was from Genesis. ‘I will put enmity between thee and the woman!’ he declared, comparing Despenser to the snake in the Garden of Eden. Despenser, he claimed, was ‘the seed of the first tyrant Satan, who would be crushed by the Lady Isabella and her son the prince’.5 In the congregation were Roger, Isabella and all the rebel leaders who had now converged on Oxford. Men marched through the streets purposefully: an army determined finally to bring Despenser to justice and to stop Edward abusing his royal power. A feeling of triumph was beginning to spread through their ranks. They marched next to Wallingford, Isabella’s own castle, which also surrendered to its lady without a fight.

  Edward was now at Tintern, in South Wales, waiting the arrival of his most trusted Welsh knights. At the Archbishop of Canterbury’s house at Lambeth, just south of London, a meeting of six bishops loyal to the king had been forced to break up without agreement. Rioting in the streets prevented them crossing the river to the city itself. All was in disarray apart from the invaders’ army. At this moment, on 15 October, Isabella issued a proclamation that she had come to rescue the country, the Crown and the Church from the evil of Hugh Despenser, Robert Baldock (the Chancellor), Walter de Stapeldon (the Treasurer), and others. The invasion had become a revolution.

  De Stapeldon never got to hear of the proclamation. The day it was issued all hell broke loose in London. Hamo de Chigwell, the mayor, one of the judges who had sentenced Roger to death, was dragged into the Guildhall. He was told that John le Marshal, a Londoner, was one of Hugh Despenser’s spies and would be executed. He was told that Walter de Stapeldon was also a traitor who deserved death. He was forced to swear to uphold the cause of the invaders. And then the crowd of Londoners put into effect all their terrible sentences. They dragged John le Marshal from his house and brought him to Cheapside, where they beheaded him. Next they went looking for de Stapeldon.6 They burnt down the doors of his house, which were barred against them, and stole his jewels and silver. His official register and many of his books were also burnt. At this point the bishop himself recklessly rode into the city in armour with his squires. Foolishly, when told at Holborn of what was being done to his house, he decided not to flee but to ride through the city to the Tower. Halfway across, frightened by the clamour of the crowd baying for his blood, he and his squires rode for shelter to St Paul’s Cathedral, hoping that there they might find sanctuary. But before they could enter the cathedral the crowd caught them. At the north door they pulled de Stapeldon from his horse, dragged him through the cemetery, down Ludgate Hill and all the way to the cross in Cheapside. There, by the decapitated body of John le Marshal, they stripped the bishop of his armour and sawed through his neck with a bread knife. Two of his attendant squires were killed in a similar fashion.

  De Stapeldon’s head was presented to the queen at Gloucester. It is not recorded what she thought of it, but it is probable that she and Roger looked on the bishop’s sunken lifeless eyes with grave disappointment. The murder of a high-ranking prelate, even such a hated one, was a definite setback. Shocking proceedings like this only served to undermine the legitimate nature of their campaign. Just as worrying, the capital was up in arms, with lynch mobs and robber gangs ruling the streets. The law courts had been abandoned, and Roger’s and Isabella’s sons were at the mercy of the mob. The Tower had fallen, and little Prince John had been proclaimed guardian of the city, and forced to swear to uphold the rights of the citizens, but there was nothing he or the city fathers could do to restore order. Not without the army.

  Roger and Isabella could not turn back now. Having sent a bodyguard to watch over the nine-year-old prince, they continued in the king’s tracks. From Gloucester they advanced to the walls of Bristol. On their arrival on 18 October the townsfolk threw open the gates of the town to them. But the gates of the castle within the town were barred. Here the Earl of Winchester had decided to make a stand.

  Ten years earlier Roger had taken the town of Bristol after a week-long siege. Now he set about attacking the castle at its heart. Fortunately, Hugh Despenser, as lord of Bristol, had recently permitted some houses to be built near the castle walls, and these weakened the castle’s defences. The siege lasted eight days, during which time the elder Despenser desperately tried to bargain for his life. But Roger offered no quarter. The Despensers had not only accused him of despoiling their property in the war of 1321–2, they had turned the king against him and cost him his lordship, his family, his wealth, his status and his reputation, and tried to have him murdered. Nothing but their complete destruction would do. The Lancastrians, who held the Despensers responsible for the death of Earl Thomas, were of a like mind. On the eighth day, 26 October, the army stormed the castle. In a very short time the elder Despenser was in chains.

  The king knew that he was in serious danger. His loyal Welsh forces had not come to his rescue, as he had hoped. This was probably partly due to knights like Hugh de Turpington, Roger’s old comrade in arms, who had nominally joined the Despensers the year before but who now disobeyed Edward’s order to guard the Marches.7 Also, in Glamorgan, many of Despenser’s tenants remembered Llywelyn Bren’s fate, and would not fight to save the man who had butchered their hero, despite their loyalty to Edward himself. The fact that Edward and Despenser were relying on such men to defend them, together with their inability to mobilise even their most loyal forces, reveals the full extent of their strategic incompetence.

  Facing defeat, Edward and Despenser decided to take ship and leave, probably hoping to reach Ireland. On 21 October, while Roger and Isabella were at Bristol, they set sail from Chepstow with Robert Baldock and a small contingent of men-at-arms. For five days they battled against the wind – a friar was paid to pray that the weather might change – but it held firm against them. Eventually they put into port at Cardiff, where the royal household rejoined the king. Moving to Caerphilly Castle, Edward made a final attempt to raise an army, summoning all the people of the lordships of Neath, Usk and Abergavenny to defend him, and men from the Despenser lordships of Gower, Pembroke, Haverford and Glamorgan. But it was too late. With his handful of men-at-arms, he could only wait for the end. On 31 October his household servants deserted him, leaving him only Despenser, Baldock and a handful of retainers.8

  All organised resistance to the invaders had capitulated. Everyone able to raise a force of men had left the king’s allegiance and joined them, or were keeping quiet. It was now time for Roger and Isabella to take control of the tatters of government. This posed a problem, since the king had taken the great seal and his privy seal with him. Their solution was simple. Since the king had left the country without appointing a surrogate to govern in his absence, they appointed his son. No one could argue with the selection of the prince; indeed, no other person would have been universally acceptable. But by making the prince custodian of the realm, at just fourteen years old and completely under the influence of his mother and her lover, it meant that Roger
and Isabella were, in effect, the unofficial joint heads of the government.

  *

  Historians have traditionally regarded the coup d’état of 1326 as Isabella’s personal victory, thereby underestimating or even ignoring Roger’s role.9 The reason for this is not hard to find: the invasion was carried out in her name and that of the prince, and the queen was accordingly the figurehead perceived to be in control, both by contemporaries and historians. There is little doubt, however, that it was Roger who planned the invasion and suggested many of the developments which followed, including the transfer of regnal authority to Prince Edward. The most reliable and well-informed chronicler of the end of Edward’s reign, Adam Murimuth, clearly states that Isabella took her direction from Roger and obeyed him in all matters.10 Roger’s presence in Hainault in 1324, before the queen had even left England, strongly suggests that he initiated discussions with the Hainaulters and was primarily responsible for the invasion strategy, whereas there is no evidence that the queen did more than assume titular leadership of the campaign. Also, while there is abundant evidence from those who knew them best – particularly the king and Despenser – that Roger was greatly feared as a military leader, they did not consider Isabella capable of treason on her own, as shown by the king permitting her to travel to France in 1325. The king’s confidence that his wife would not turn against him by herself was justified, as shown by her considering returning to Edward even after Roger had joined her in Paris. Thus we may be confident that Roger instigated the invasion and put it into effect, not Isabella, although her approbation was essential to the realisation and success of his strategy.

  Responsibility for the progress of the campaign directly after the invasion similarly may be seen to lie with Roger. The earliest evidence of this lies, ironically, in a document in which he is not named. Those listed in the declaration of 26 October (in which the prince was chosen to be the guardian of the realm) were the king’s two half-brothers (the Earls of Kent and Norfolk), Henry of Lancaster, Thomas Wake, Henry de Beaumont, William de la Zouche, Robert de Mohaut, Robert de Morley, Robert de Waterville, and ‘other barons and knights’.11 Roger, as the only significant leader of the army not mentioned, is conspicuous by his absence. Isabella would not have excluded him from such a line-up except at his specific direction, nor would any of their episcopal allies, such as Adam of Orleton. Thus it seems the declaration was at Roger’s command. By excluding himself from such official processes he avoided being held to account. No one could challenge his authority because, officially, he had none, and no one could point to his abuse of a position for the same reason. It was a technique he practised for the next four years, and partly it explains why so few writers have examined him as the key figure of the period. Unlike almost every other ruler in history, he tried to cover the tracks of his authority and thereby consciously contributed to his own official obscurity.12

  When it came to exerting judgement on others, however, Roger was not afraid to take a more prominent role. The day after the proclamation of the prince’s regency Roger assembled a tribunal of six peers to judge Hugh Despenser the elder. The tribunal consisted of himself, Thomas Wake and William Trussel (former retainers of the Earl of Lancaster), Henry of Lancaster (brother of the Earl of Lancaster), and the Earls of Kent and Norfolk. Although Isabella pleaded that the old man’s life should be spared, there was not the slightest chance that such a tribunal would agree. They deliberately conducted the trial to echo that of Thomas of Lancaster. Despenser was not allowed to speak. At the end of the deliberations Thomas Wake read the judgement and the sentence. Despenser was found guilty of encouraging his son’s illegal government, of enriching himself at other people’s expense, of despoiling the Church, and for his part in the illegal execution of Thomas of Lancaster.13 He was sentenced to be drawn, hanged in a surcoat of his own arms on the common gallows at Bristol, and beheaded. The sentence was carried out straightaway.

  Now there remained only one Despenser to pursue. On the day of his father’s death Hugh Despenser the younger was with the king at Caerphilly. Henry of Lancaster was deputed to go after them. For Roger, this had the added advantage of removing Henry from the new court while he and Isabella established their administration. Henry of Lancaster, who showed every sign of being as troublesome as his late brother, was not the sort of person they wanted interfering in the appointment of government officeholders. After his departure they appointed the Bishop of Winchester as Treasurer, and despatched him to London to take charge of what remained of the Treasury. The various departments of government were set up anew. Even while Edward was still at liberty Roger was consolidating Isabella’s position, ensuring that no one would be able to supplant her in the event of Edward’s cause being championed by a rival or envious lord.

  The king retreated to Neath in early November, and attempted to bargain with Roger and the queen through an embassy headed by the Abbot of Neath. The abbot and his companions were sent back with a stern refusal. No terms were acceptable, only complete surrender: just as Roger had been told in January 1322. He did not need to negotiate further. On 16 November, having been informed of the king’s whereabouts by Rhys ap Howel, the pursuing contingent under Lancaster caught sight of Edward, Baldock and Despenser and their few companions in the open country near Neath. They pursued them for a short distance, and caught them. The king’s men-at-arms were released; Baldock and Despenser were taken to the queen at Hereford. Also taken was Despenser’s vassal, Simon de Reading, who had been so presumptious as to insult the queen and to take the lands of Roger’s follower, John Wyard. Lancaster, gleeful at his triumph, took the king himself to Kenilworth. On hearing of the king’s capture, the last royalist castle, Caerphilly, surrendered.

  Hugh Despenser knew he could expect no mercy, and, anticipating the sentence Roger would pass upon him, he tried to starve himself to death. Even as Henry de Leybourn and Robert Stangrave took him to Hereford to meet his fate, Roger was exacting revenge for a lifetime of enmity on another of the king’s friends. On 17 November the Earl of Arundel and two of his associates, John Daniel and Thomas de Micheldever, were beheaded. In the words of the chronicler Murimuth, Roger hated these men with a ‘perfect hatred’. The earl had been a sworn enemy of Gaveston ever since the tournament at Wallingford. He had moreover taken arms against Roger’s uncle in 1312. He had opposed Roger and his uncle during the Despenser war, had taken the lands of Roger’s uncle and even some of Roger’s own estates. He had been part of the embassy which had persuaded Roger to surrender at Shrewsbury by giving the false guarantee that his life would be saved. His defence of Hugh Despenser was just another reason for him to suffer the full penalty of the law. Roger procured the official order for the deaths from the queen, who followed his advice in this ‘as she did in everything’.14

  If revenge was a dish best served cold, the Earl of Arundel was merely the starter. The main course was Hugh Despenser. In order to legalise the process against him the tribunal that had sat in judgement on the elder Despenser was reconvened.15 Roger, the Earls of Lancaster, Kent and Norfolk, and Thomas Wake and William Trussel between them drew up a list of Despenser’s crimes. Their judgement was thorough, extensive and uncompromising. Only the sentence was in doubt. The Lancastrians wanted Despenser to be sentenced and beheaded at one of his own castles, in the same way that the Earl of Lancaster had died at Pontefract in 1322. Roger, on the other hand, wanted to ensure that Despenser suffered a death every bit as horrific as his (Despenser’s) killing of Llywelyn Bren in 1317. Isabella wanted him executed in London.16 The number of aggrieved parties meant that Despenser was certain to be quartered: every lord wanted a piece to show their followers that they had exacted revenge.

  On 24 November Hugh Despenser, Robert Baldock and Simon de Reading were brought to Hereford. A huge crowd had gathered with trumpets and drums, ready to pull Despenser apart with their bare hands if need be. As the prisoners neared the city, with crowns of nettles on their heads and their surcoats bearing their co
ats of arms reversed, the crowd seized Despenser and dragged him from his horse. They stripped him of his clothes and wrote biblical verses denouncing arrogance and evil on his skin. Then they led him into the city, forcing Simon de Reading to march in front bearing his standard with the arms reversed. In the market square he was presented before Roger, Isabella and the Lancastrian lords. Sir William Trussel read out the list of charges of which Despenser was accused. He had been adjudged a traitor and an enemy of the realm, he declared. In particular, he was guilty of returning to the realm during his period of banishment without the permission of Parliament; of robbing two great ships to the value of £60,00017 ‘to the great dishonour of the king and the realm and to the great danger of English merchants in foreign countries’; of taking arms against the peers of the realm ‘to destroy them and disinherit them contrary to Magna Carta and the Ordinances’; of aiding Andrew de Harclay18 and other traitors in the ‘murder’ of the Earl of Hereford and others; of falsely imprisoning the Earl of Lancaster and arranging his death in his own castle by illegally assuming royal power; of arranging the executions of seventeen named barons and knights; of putting Roger and his uncle ‘in a harsh prison to murder them without cause except for his coveting of their lands’; of imprisoning Lord Berkeley (Roger’s son-in-law), Hugh Audley the elder (Roger’s brother-in-law) and Hugh Audley the younger (Roger’s nephew), the children of the Earl of Hereford (nephews of the king), and the noblewomen associated with these lords, and even ‘old women such as the lady Baret … whom he had made the butt of ribaldry and whose arms and legs he had had broken spitefully, against his vows of chivalry and against law and reason’; of traitorously assuming royal authority in the war with the Scots and abusing such power, thus endangering the realm; of abandoning the queen at Tynemouth Priory when the Scots were approaching, thus endangering her life; of often dishonouring the queen and damaging her noble state; of cruelty towards the queen; of confiscating illegally the possessions of the Bishops of Ely, Hereford, Lincoln and Norwich and of robbing their churches, and of making war on the Christian Church; of unlawfully procuring for his father the title of Earl of Winchester to the disinheritance of the Crown, and for Andrew de Harclay the title of Earl of Carlisle; of ‘ousting the queen from her lands’; of coming between the king and the queen and hindering their relationship; of persuading the king not to perform his royal duty in going to France to perform homage for Gascony, thereby resulting in the loss of lands to the French; of sending money to France to bribe people to murder the queen and her son the prince, or otherwise to prevent their return to England; of making grants of land to his followers against the law; of putting lords such as Henry de Beaumont unfairly in gaol; and of maliciously counselling the king to leave the realm, and taking with him the treasure of the kingdom and the great seal, contrary to the law. Trussel concluded by describing what would be done to the wretched man’s body: