The following day the King reconvened the Council which first discussed the question of Count John. Noting the Council had stripped him of his English lands, of which the King approved, Richard demanded John should present himself before his brother within forty days. The convocation then turned its attention to the means of raising the unpaid portion of the King’s ransom. The Duke of Austria had been bought off by the Holy Roman Emperor, Heinrich VI, who had taken Richard over as his own prisoner, though allowing him considerable freedoms and had generously remitted seventeen thousand marks to prevent Richard from making peace with King Philippe of France. Nevertheless, there remained outstanding a substantial sum and the King in Council settled upon a series of fines from the supporters of Count John, plus a tax on those possessing funds of ten shillings and upwards.
While these measures troubled several sitting in the great hall of the castle, what disturbed the Council most was the revelation that in order to return to England Richard had rendered homage for his Kingdom to Heinrich, and thereby made of himself and his entire barony, vassals of the Empire. For several of the assembled nobles and churchmen this expedient seemed a step too far, though none challenged the King. This fell circumstance was revealed by William Briwerre on the King’s behalf, Briwerre having with Longchamp, been forward in negotiating the conditions for the King’s release.
Richard sat stroking his beard throughout Briwerre’s revelation of this shift in the King’s powers. His eyes rove over the assembled notables, seeking to read each man as they listened to the co-Justiciar’s words.
William was non-plussed by the disclosure and wondered if the King had lost his wits. His long association with the intemperate characters of four Angevin Princes led him to consider the possibility. The King’s conduct on the staircase of the house from which they had reconnoitred the castle but three days earlier still lacked any explanation, but, like the others sitting at board, he held his tongue as Briwerre concluded. It was Archbishop FitzWalter who broke the awkward silence.
‘May it please Your Grace,’ he said, ‘that I might prevail upon you to entertain a solemn crown-wearing by way of giving thanks to Almighty God for your safe return from the Holy Land and to reassert your resumption of your throne and the dissolution of the Council of State.
‘It would please me greatly,’ Richard said. ‘I intend to pass directly into France but, my Lords, we shall spend some time at Winchester gathering our force. There shall you, my Lord Archbishop, perform your high office,’ the King rose to his feet and all present jumped to their feet as Richard swept out of the great hall. For a few moments the members of the Council turned from one to another discussing the morning’s discussions and revelations as they prepared to leave the hall themselves. William met Geoffrey FitzPeter’s raised eyebrow and then found William Briwerre beside him.
‘FitzMarshal,’ Briwerre said quietly, ‘I am to inform you that the King desires your presence in his private chamber.’
William found Richard sitting and scratching a large hound; he made his obeisance and Richard sat back and, again stroking his beard, stared at William.
‘Why did you do it, Marshal?’ he asked at last.
‘Do what my Liege?’ William asked frowning.
‘Dismiss Longchamp.’
William blew out his cheeks and gathered his wits. ‘My Lord King, you have oft told me to use a mailed fist if a velvet glove doth not prevail. Your Grace will recall entrusting me with some powers to watch the Chancellor and, should he exceed his powers and disrupt the tranquillity of your Kingdom in Your Grace’s absence, act accordingly. It so happened that the Chancellor was stirring-up trouble among the Barons, one against the other and there was no policy in it beyond what he himself gained in power thereby. I was not alone in the decision to remove him, though I am prepared to withstand the accusation of having done so.’
‘Have you anything more to say?’ the King asked sardonically, concealing a half smile under his hand as he played with his beard.
‘No, Your Grace.’
The King nodded slowly then changed the subject. ‘Once we discussed war, FitzMarshal, d’you recall?’
‘Aye, it was before Neufchâtel-en-Bray…’
‘And much has happened since.’
‘Indeed, Your Grace.’
‘As soon as this business in Winchester is concluded, I intend crossing to Normandy. You shall come with me. Your brother is dead, God rest his soul, which confers upon you the office of Marshal, a title you have long held in his name, for I never knew much of him, nor he of me. We shall have conference about our campaign in Winchester, but for the time being you should know that you have made an enemy of William Longchamp and I repose trust in him, as I do you.’
‘I understand, Your Grace.’
The King grunted. ‘You may go.’ Richard called for wine and bent to fondle the hound curled about his feet.
‘Your Grace…’
‘What is it?’ Richard asked, without looking up.
‘I would seek a step to match my Lady’s fiefs and estates, some mark that better enables my people to hold the March of Nether Gwent.’
Richard continued to tumble the wolf-hound’s ears but turned his head and looked up at William. ‘Striguil, eh? You press me for an Earldom, eh?’
Richard sat up and put his finger-tips together, touching his lips and regarding William over his two hands. Then he shook his head. ‘It shall not be, Marshal. I observed your dislike of my accommodation with the Emperor. Besides, your accusation of Longchamp as a bugger offended his dignity as Chancellor, an appointment I never removed, nor have removed from him, though I do not think you acted unwisely in replacing him with the Archbishop of Rouen.’
‘Your Grace, the remark touched him like a hot poker. He ran from the Kingdom in woman’s clothes, with a disguise to match, including wares to vend.’
If William intended to play upon Richard’s partial approval in co-opting Des Coutances, it misfired. Instead of softening, Richard’s face grew hard.
‘No matter,’ he responded curtly, waving William away.
William bowed and withdrew, recalling rumours of Richard’s sexual proclivities. In dismissing Longchamp as a sodomite, had he unwittingly touched a raw nerve in Richard? If so, it had cost him an Earldom.
***
William rode south with King Richard’s train. To all outward appearances his demeanour was unruffled, but inwardly he was seething at Richard’s curt dismissal, of the King’s lack of gratitude towards himself and the news that Longchamp was awaiting the King’s arrival at Winchester, fully and pointedly reappointed to his old office. Even the presence of FitzPeter, whose warning to William that he should not over-reach himself, had no effect as a dark mood took hold of William, for FitzPeter had been rewarded with the estates of the Earldom of Essex long since, though the title of Earl as yet eluded him. Nevertheless, it was the ownership of land that mattered, for land equated to income and with income a man could buy and sell, wield influence, make advantageous marriages and secure a future for his family. With every mile they travelled to the southward William’s feeling of having been hard done-by increased. Besides the political decisions William had made, or contributed to, in the King’s absence, Richard owed the swift capture of Nottingham Castle less to his own Lion-hearted valour than to William’s raw courage. As King, Richard’s participation in any assault was voluntary; as a vassal William did his duty as assigned to him, and he was under no illusions that Richard deliberately sent him forward in the post of greatest danger with a calculated deliberation.
On 17th April 1194, in Winchester Cathedral, among his Barons, with the Archbishop of Canterbury and his Prelates in their golden copes all assembled and the Queen Mother, Eleanor of Aquitaine looking-on, King Richard underwent a solemn ‘Crown-wearing’ during which William bore the Sword of State. Seen by many as a second coronation, the ceremony was an affirmation of his kingship after his long absence, but it contained significant undertones.
After the Archbishop’s blessing, as in his first and proper crowning, Richard required his chief Barons to swear fealty and establish the legitimacy of their own powers within the Kingdom. However, on this occasion, this otherwise routine feature of the feudal system meant a submission of the Barony to Richard’s own expedient submission to the Holy Roman Emperor. Although all knew that with much of the King’s ransom still unpaid and the pressing necessity for Richard to forge alliances to cover his forthcoming war with Philippe Augustus to recover Normandy and elsewhere, it sealed England as a fiefdom of Heinrich VI.
One-by-one the great men of the Kingdom shuffled up, knelt before the King and, as if in prayer, placed their hands between the King’s. A long and tedious process, largely of mumbling oath-taking as a herald read out the feudatories for which each man pledged his troth, William broke the dreary observance and electrified the congregation.
Having sworn allegiance for his English and Welsh land, William said nothing as the herald read out the estates in Ireland that had come to him through Isabelle’s father’s conquests. Thinking William had not heard, the herald read them out again, and it was the repetition that gained the suddenly attention of a largely bored congregation.
‘You do not swear, FitzMarshal,’ remarked the affronted King, still clasping William’s hands, though now pressing them together, hard.
William looked up at Richard. ‘No, Your Grace,’ he said, his voice icy with a cool conviction and in a tone that could be clearly heard by many standing about the throne. ‘As all the world knows, it is unnecessary. Count John is Lord of Ireland and to him I shall do homage as soon as he does homage to Your Grace.’
Then William pointedly slid his hands out from between the King’s as the words and gesture were met by a gasp of astonishment. William Longchamp shouted out, ‘beware, my Lord King, Marshal plants vines!’
Richard looked at William, ten years his senior and saw the implacable expression upon his face. ‘What mean you by this?’ he asked in a low voice, but before William could answer, FitzPeter, greatly daring but avoiding any address directly to the King, countered Longchamp’s mischievous assertion.
‘My Lord Chancellor, the Marshal is strictly correct and doubtless wishes the Count of Mortain brought to the King’s feet with all speed. Your direction to the herald is faulty and reprehensible.’
A palpable ripple ran through the assembly as the King bent and hissed in his ear. ‘God’s blood, Marshal, I admire your courage.’ William rose, bowing to the King and withdrew, stared at by all present who had heard the exchange.
‘God damn you, William, but you press your friends hard, FitzPeter said to him afterwards. ‘Have I not told you…’
‘Aye Geoffrey, many times but by God if I serve with honour by honour I shall be served. Unless I am much mistaken, Richard knows that.’
‘You will be banished…’
‘What? To Ireland?’ William riposted with a laugh. ‘Let us see, my friend. The Lionheart will need a new military establishment for the coming war with Philippe, something more durable than the fyrd which cannot be conveyed to Normandy where, in any case, the general levy there will prove inadequate, only being in the field for forty days. I will wager you fifty marks he will require some better means of raising a host and someone to effect it.’
‘You?’
William shrugged. ‘Both you and me, perhaps.’
‘Those English Barons who have lost land in Normandy and have given-up hope of recovery are less likely to hazard their dwindling fortunes on Richard’s gamble against the growing power of Philippe,’ said FitzPeter.
‘Damn them then,’ William retorted. ‘If we can make some swift inroads and gain booty to add to scutage and tallage, then sufficient money may be raised to fund a war-host from knights banneret, sergeants-at-arms, routiers and Welsh mercenaries such as will serve as long as Richard feeds them blood and treasure to gorge upon. For God’s sake, Geoffrey, you know the methods by which he makes war. He will have little trouble finding footloose men of low birth either back from the Holy Land or like those fools drawn out of Sherwood forest after he took Nottingham.’
William’s gamble proved his judgement correct. He heard little further from the King regarding the affair of his cleaving to Count John beyond a rumour that Queen Eleanor had approved his action and the almost symbolic deprivation of the shrievalty of Gloucester. No vengeance was taken elsewhere and his younger brother Henry remained secure in his Palace as Bishop of Exeter, the See to which he had been appointed the previous year. As for William, within hours he was caught up in the business of preparing the King’s war host which, in its first wave, left Portsmouth on 12 May and crossed the Channel in upwards of one hundred ships, leaving the government of England in the hands of a sole Justiciar, Hubert FitzWalter, Archbishop of Canterbury.
As the men, horses, stores and such supplies as they had brought with them, were landed at Barfleur, Richard ordered a march on Lisieux where, so word had it, Count John awaited his coming. And in Richard’s train rode William Marshal, with John de Earley at his side bearing the rampant red lion on its ground of pale gold and green behind which rode William’s mesnie.
CHAPTER TEN: WAR WITH PHILIPPE AUGUSTUS 1194 – 1199
Thus did Richard, nick-named Coeur de Lion, pass over the seas into Normandy. He arrived in all his murderous splendour intending to retake what his brother had lost, to a rapturous reception given him by the citizens of Barfleur. He, and others in the host including William Longchamp, would never set foot on English soil again, but for the first months of his campaigning, Richard maintained his reputation as a fearsome warrior.
At Lisieux, in the presence of the Queen Mother, Count John grovelled in contrition before his brother, an act made all the more specious in its character by the actions of the Count in deserting King Philippe. In fear of Richard he had but a few days earlier repudiated his oath to Philippe by quietly abandoning his post in command of the French garrison at Evreux. Richard made a gracious speech accepting John’s penitence after Queen Eleanor had spoken in her younger son’s favour. Richard told his brother he had been misled like a child but Eleanor’s politic intercession made it easier for William to boost the reconciliation between the two royal siblings by paying a conspicuously public homage to John for his Leinster lands.
‘Well, well, Marshal, you have truly compounded with the Devil’s brood now,’ Richard had casually and sardonically remarked to him the following day as the King mounted his horse.
‘I am bound by loyalty, My Liege,’ William replied solemnly, looking up at the King as Richard took the reins from the attendant page.
Richard laughed. ‘Come William,’ he growled, patting the palfrey’s neck and leaning down so that only William could hear what he said. ‘We are neither of us fit to waste our lives at Court,’ Richard chuckled. ‘We are warriors and there is work to be done.’
‘To Vernueil then, Your Grace?’
‘Where else?’ Richard spurred his mount forward and William motioned for his own palfrey to be brought up. As he swung into the saddle and shoved his feet into his stirrups, he looked about him. As always John de Earley was at hand, his own horse almost choking on its bit as foam flecked from its lips in the creature’s eagerness to be off.
‘My Lord is in favour again,’ remarked De Earley with his engagingly broad grin.
‘By God, John, you grow too big for your boots,’ William remarked without rancour, supressing his own smile. ‘Aye,’ he added, ‘Richard is himself again, God help his enemies and the common people of this fair land.’
***
And, as the King had said, to work they went. With the repentant Count John in company Richard’s war-host stormed south deeper into Normandy, the King concerting a plan for the relief of Verneuil and the taking of Evreux with his brother and William.
‘Marshal,’ the King said in conference with William one night as they broke their march in a small village from which the peasants had f
led, ‘it is my purpose to divide my force. The Count of Mortain will advance on Evreux and prove his repentance by taking the city of which he was lately Philippe’s castellan. As for Verneuil, I place you in command of half my remaining force.’
William bowed his head obediently. There would be many among the King’s Barons who would regard the King’s favour as misplaced, but age and experience, added to his reputation for prowess, secured William Marshal’s claim to this preferment. He listened as the King went on: ‘I shall employ the chevauchée and lead a division of my heaviest chivalry to cover as many bowmen as we can mount and supply with a few days’ victuals directly through the enemy lines. They will reinforce the garrison and shake the enemy’s spirit. Once I have seen them into Verneuil I will rejoin you, and you, in the meanwhile, shall take the remainder of our host east and cut off Philippe’s legs, after which he can only fall.’
William nodded. ‘You will need to give me two days’ start if I am to successfully cut King Philippe’s supply lines, my Liege.’
‘That will be too long to conceal your movements from the fox; shall we say one?’
‘As Your Grace wishes.’
‘Good. Then let it be so, but we shall need additional horses…’
‘Aye, but you may leave that to me. If we act quickly we can use our own pack-animals for half our needs, the rest I shall take from the countryside. We can mount two bowmen on any decent beast.’
‘Aye, that is good,’ the King said smiling with a disarming and almost boyish enthusiasm. ‘By the Christ, Marshal, ’tis good sport to hound this French bastard, is it not?’
‘So long as he does not escape us, my Liege,’ William responded seriously, ‘though it is always the chase the pleases most,’ he added, catching something of Richard’s mood.
As planned, one morning in the third week in May, the van of the Angevins suddenly appeared out of the woods near Verneuil, Taking the besieging forces completely by surprise Richard sent his mounted column directly up to the city gates where the besieged, recognising the devices and colours of the approaching force and the confusion it was causing among the French, threw open the barricaded gates.
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