Negotiations remained for some little time in abeyance, as Henry had crossed to England, for the first time for four years, landing at Portsmouth on 3rd March, after a stormy passage during which at least one of his forty ships was lost. The chief matter necessitating the king’s return to England was his intention of establishing the succession to the throne beyond all doubt by the coronation of his eldest son, Henry, now sixteen years old. The need for this coronation of the heir during his father’s lifetime, for which precedents could be found on the Continent but not in England, is far from clear, and its ultimate results were to prove disastrous. The most immediate result was the creation of a fresh grievance for Becket. It would seem that the pope, willing to please Henry and not knowing that the right to crown kings was a privilege of the Archbishops of Canterbury, had granted permission for the Archbishop of York to crown the young Henry, or else such permission had been granted during the vacancy of Canterbury in 1162. When the news of the proposed coronation reached Becket he wrote letters to Archbishop Roger and the English bishops in general prohibiting them from officiating, and similar letters were sent by the pope; but none of these appear to have been delivered, and on Sunday, 14th June, the younger Henry was crowned at Westminster by Archbishop Roger, the Bishops of London, Durham, Salisbury, and Rochester assisting. For some reason the young king’s wife, Margaret,
had not been crowned with him, although a royal outfit had been provided for her,[28] and she had been ordered to hold herself in readiness at Caen, where the queen was in residence. The omission was taken by Margaret’s father, King Louis, as a deliberate insult, and was possibly so intended; but it is far more probable that Henry had intended her to be crowned with her husband, but had been obliged to hasten the coronation in order to avoid the publication of the prohibitory papal letters.
Returning to Normandy, Henry met the papal commissioners at Falaise and agreed to accept the terms which they proposed. They then had an interview with Becket and persuaded him to come to Fréteval, where the French and English kings were to hold a conference. On 22nd July, therefore, Thomas rode out to meet Henry. The king was in an excellent temper, and as soon as he saw the archbishop he pressed forward, doffing his cap and saluting him affectionately. The two then withdrew and held a long private consultation. Becket began by reproaching Henry for his action in regard to the coronation. The king defended himself, pleading historical precedents, which Becket rejected as unsound, and producing papal letters granting leave for the Archbishop of York to crown the young Henry; these letters, however, dated from 1162, when, as we have seen, some such coronation was mooted if not actually performed, and were issued during the vacancy of the see of Canterbury. In the end Henry promised to do justice in the matter, and added some ambiguous remarks to the effect that he would punish all who played either him or the archbishop false. No word was said about the Constitutions, but the king promised to restore to Becket all that he had held three months before the date of his exile and to receive him and his friends back into favour. Becket dismounted and knelt before the king, but the latter leapt from his horse, raised the archbishop and held his stirrup while he remounted. The two old friends, once more united, rode back together and announced the conclusion of peace, to the amazement of all; and even a passage of arms between the excommunicate Archdeacon of Canterbury and Becket, due to the latter’s refusal to reciprocate the king’s general amnesty by absolving the excommunicates, was not allowed to disturb the serenity of the atmosphere. The only cloud was the king’s persistent refusal of the kiss of peace, based on the rash oath which he had sworn in the presence of the French that he would never give it. On this Henry was resolute, though he expressed his willingness to kiss “his mouth, and his hands, and his feet a hundred times” when he returned to England. So much importance did Becket attach to this symbolic act that he endeavoured to obtain the kiss by a ruse at Amboise in October. For this purpose he came to the chapel where Henry was going to hear mass, in the course of which service the king would be obliged to give the ceremonial kiss; but, warned by the much excommunicated Nigel de Sackville, Henry ordered the celebration of a mass for the dead, in which the ceremony of the pax is omitted.
About this time Henry wrote to the young king and the regency council in England announcing the conclusion of peace between himself and the archbishop, and ordering the restoration of the former possessions of the see and the holding of a judicial inquiry into the question of the honour of Saltwood. Early in November the king sent a message to Becket regretting that military affairs in Auvergne prevented his meeting him at Rouen, but urging him to delay his departure no longer, and appointing John of Oxford, Dean of Salisbury, to accompany him. Becket accordingly proceeded to Witsand, whence he was to cross to England. During the previous three months he had been busy corresponding with the pope, and had procured from him letters suspending and excommunicating the Archbishop of York, the bishops who had taken part with him, and the inevitable Archdeacon of Canterbury. The sentence against York, London, and Salisbury, Becket despatched from Witsand to Dover, where those prelates happened to be, before his own departure. At last, on 1st December 1170, the archbishop set sail, and, avoiding Dover, landed at Sandwich. Here he was met by Randulf de Broc, Reynold de Warenne, and Gervase of Cornhill, sheriff of Kent. Their threats of violence were restrained by John of Oxford, and after reproaching the archbishop for coming into the realm with fire and sword they suffered him to proceed to Canterbury, where he was joyfully welcomed by the clergy and populace.
The messengers whom he had sent over after the conclusion of peace between himself and the king had warned him that the estates of the see had been plundered, and their appeal to the royal officers for the promised restoration of property had been postponed long enough to enable the actual holders to secure the rents payable at Michaelmas. Becket now found that most of the Christmas rents had been anticipated, and the manors so thoroughly pillaged that nothing but empty barns and ruinous houses remained. He had, however, other matters to occupy his mind: the representatives of the censured prelates came to him desiring him to absolve their masters. So far as Archbishop Roger was concerned Becket professed inability, the pope having reserved his case to himself, but he was ready to absolve the Bishops of London and Salisbury, conditionally on their undertaking to submit to the pope’s demands. This they were willing to do, but they were dissuaded by Archbishop Roger, and all three went over to Normandy to make complaint to the king. Becket, anxious from personal affection as well as from policy to pay his respects to the young king, sent Richard, Prior of St. Martin’s, to Winchester to announce his intention, and presented Henry with three magnificent chargers gaily caparisoned. The king, or rather his council, declined the archbishop’s proffered visit, but undeterred he started for Winchester, intending after his visit to the court to make a tour of visitation throughout his province. The first night he spent at Rochester and the next at the Bishop of Winchester’s house in Southwark, but here he was met by Joscelin of Arundel, brother of Queen Adelisa, who ordered him to return to Canterbury. This he did, taking with him a small escort of some five or six men-at-arms. The existence of this escort was magnified by his enemies into a charge of riding about with a great army to capture the king’s castles, but it was certainly necessary, for threats were being openly made against his life, and the Brocs at Saltwood were indulging in a regular campaign of outrage and insult. They seized his wine, they hunted in his preserves, poached his deer and stole his hounds, and as a culminating insult cut off the tail of his pack-horse.
Becket was not a man to suffer insult patiently, and on Christmas Day he preached in the cathedral, and, after alluding to the probability of his murder, delivered a furious denunciation of his enemies, and excommunicated Robert de Broc and a number of other offenders. The news of his action was at once conveyed to King Henry, who was keeping Christmas at Bur-le-Roi, near Bayeux. Infuriated by this fresh breach of the peace, Henry uttered a wild tirade against the upstart priest and against his courtiers who sat idle and allowed their master to be insulted without avenging him. Four knights, William de Tracy, Hugh de Moreville, Reynold Fitz-Urse, and Richard le Breton, determined to gain the king’s favour by the murder of the archbishop. Taking horse at once they made for the coast, and favoured by the wind reached Saltwood Castle on Monday, 28th December. Meanwhile Henry, while refusing to go so far as Engelger de Bohun and William Mauvoisin, who urged the archbishop’s execution, had determined on his arrest. Richard de Humet was sent to England to Hugh de Gundeville and William Fitz-John, the young king’s guardians, while Earl William de Mandeville and Saer de Quincy watched the continental ports in case Becket should try to escape. The four knights, openly proclaiming that the king had decreed Becket’s death, collected a considerable force from the garrisons of the neighbouring castles, and on Tuesday, 29th December, rode into Canterbury. Failing to persuade the town authorities to assist them, they warned them not to interfere and rode on to the palace. Striding into the room where the archbishop and his attendants were sitting, the four knights, without a word of greeting, sat down in front of him. After a pause Reynold Fitz-Urse ordered him, in the king’s name, to absolve the excommunicates and afterwards to stand his trial before the young king at Winchester. Before they delivered their ultimatum, Becket, understanding that they had a private message from the king, had caused his attendants to withdraw, but he now recalled them and delivered a calm and dignified reply justifying his action and explaining his position. To their threats he replied that the king had granted him his peace, but that in any case he would never yield or waver in his obedience to God and the pope for fear of death.
The knights had entered the archbishop’s presence unarmed, and they now withdrew, uttering threats and defiance, to bring the argument of steel to bear where words had proved unavailing. The Brocs and others of their associates had seized the gatehouse of the palace and placed it in charge of Simon de Crioill and William Fitz-Nigel, the archbishop’s steward, who had joined the conspirators; Becket’s own esquire, Robert Legge, was forced by Reynold Fitz-Urse to assist in arming him, and one of the archbishop’s knights, Ralph Morin, was placed under arrest. As the armed crowd pressed forward the great door of the archbishop’s apartments was shut and bolted and for a moment they were foiled, but Robert de Broc knew the palace well, and, snatching up an axe left on the stairs by a workman, attacked a wooden partition that would give access to their victim’s room. Hearing the crash and splintering of the woodwork the monks and clerks, powerless against the mail-clad assassins, seized Becket, and in spite of his protests and resistance hurried him by a private entrance into the church. Contrary to his wishes the door was shut behind him, but when the pursuers began to thunder upon it he insisted upon its being opened, that the church might not seem to be turned into a fortress. The four knights and their followers rushed in, headed by Reynold Fitz-Urse, who flung down the axe with which he had attacked the door and brandished his sword. Hugh de Moreville faced the terrified people clustered in the body of the church, while his comrades searched for their victim. In the pillared gloom of the dim evening Becket was not at first visible, and he could easily have escaped into the darkness of the crypt or by the neighbouring stairway to the safety of the roof, but hearing cries of “Where is the traitor? Where is the archbishop?” he stepped forward, saying, “Here am I, no traitor but the priest of God. And I marvel that you are come into the church of God in such guise. What will ye with me?” To their threats of instant death he replied by commending his soul to God, St. Mary, St. Denis, and St. Elphage, and their endeavours to drive or drag him out of the church he resisted with all his strength, striking William Tracy a blow which almost felled him to the ground. Tracy replied with a cut at his head, but Edward Grim, one of the only three clerks who had remained with their master, intercepted the blow with his arm. Although most of the force of the stroke was spent on Edward Grim it drew blood from the archbishop’s head. A second blow, from Reynold’s sword, drove Becket
to his knees, and with the third he fell with his arms stretched out towards the altar of St. Benedict. As he fell Richard le Breton struck him again with such violence that his sword broke upon the pavement, crying, “Take that for the love of my lord William, the king’s brother,” Richard having served the young William, whose early death was attributed to the foiling of his matrimonial schemes by Becket. As the assassins turned to leave the church, one Hugh Mauclerc, whose name is unknown to history save for this infamy, thrust his sword into Becket’s gaping skull and scattered his brains upon the pavement. Thus fell Thomas Becket, the obstinate and imperious archbishop, and thus rose from his dead body Thomas of Canterbury, martyr and virtual patron saint of England.
Having wreaked their vengeance on the archbishop the murderers turned to the plunder of his palace. Everything of value they seized, sending off a parcel of papal bulls and similar documents to their royal master. Then they rode off, the four knights soon afterwards retiring to Moreville’s castle of Knaresborough, while the Brocs remained at Saltwood, whence they threatened to return to Canterbury and outrage the martyr’s body. Hearing of their threats the monks of Canterbury, by the advice of the Abbot of Boxley and the Prior of Dover, proceeded at once to bury the body, which, after lying for some time neglected during the panic which followed the murder, had been reverently placed before the high altar. Accordingly the martyred archbishop was laid in a marble tomb in the crypt, clad in the penitential hair-shirt, which, to the surprise of all, he was found to have worn beneath his other garments, and in the vestments worn at the time of his ordination and preserved by him against his burial. The church having been polluted by bloodshed, Mass could not be said in it, and so without the rites and services of the Church were laid to rest the remains of him whose shrine was to be for future generations the great national centre of prayer and pilgrimage.
CHAPTER VI
IRISH AFFAIRS
When news of Becket’s murder reached Henry at Argentan on 1st January 1171, he was terribly perturbed, and, retiring to his apartments, remained for three days in solitude, fasting and reviewing the situation. It must have seemed at first as if the officious knights by their rash action had wrecked his whole policy. The murder was bound to alienate many whose sympathy would otherwise have been with the king; it would put a fresh weapon in the hands of his enemies; and, above all, it would practically force the pope into that position of direct antagonism which he had hitherto skilfully contrived to evade. To extract himself from his position without complete loss of dignity and surrender of all for which he had fought was a task worthy of Henry’s diplomatic genius. It was necessary to be cautious but prompt, for his enemies were losing no time; before Henry had resumed public life the Archbishop of Sens, legate of France, King Louis and the Count of Blois had all written to Pope Alexander denouncing Henry as the murderer, and three weeks later the Archbishop of Sens had proclaimed an interdict upon the king’s continental dominions on the strength of a papal letter addressed to himself and the Archbishop of Rouen ordering such a course to be adopted in the event of the arrest or imprisonment of the Archbishop of Canterbury. Against this action the Archbishop of Rouen and the Bishops of Worcester, Evreux, and Lisieux at once appealed, and the interdict was temporarily suspended. About the end of January, when the appellants and the king’s special envoys started for the papal court at Frascati, news of the murder reached the pope. Accordingly when Richard Barre, the Archdeacons of Salisbury and Lisieux, and the other royal envoys reached Frascati they could not at first obtain a hearing, and it was generally believed that on Maundy Thursday, 25th March, the pope would excommunicate Henry and lay England under interdict. The efforts of the envoys, however, backed with the powerful argument of English gold, averted this danger, and the dreaded day brought forth only an excommunication of the actual murderers and their abettors. A month later, after hearing the appeal of the Bishops of Worcester and Evreux, Pope Alexander confirmed the sentence of interdict published by the Archbishop of Sens, but exempted the king and gave orders for the absolution of the Bishops of London and Salisbury. At the same time he announced his intention of sending legates to Henry to settle the terms of his absolution.
Henry meanwhile was preparing to carry into effect the plan which he had had to abandon in 1155 for an invasion of Ireland. The scheme possessed several attractions. To begin with, affairs in that island really called for his active interference; there was also the advantage that in Ireland he would be more completely out of reach of any unwelcome papal messengers than he would be in almost any other spot in the civilised world; and finally, by undertaking the reform of the Irish Church, which had been urged upon him by Pope Adrian IV., he would give to his expedition something of the nature of a crusade and would earn the gratitude of the pope.
Prior to 1166 Ireland had been practically exempt from English interference and had settled its own affairs by primitive methods of violence. Resembling their nearest neighbours, the Welsh, in many respects, the Irish were even more quarrelsome and less advanced in the social scale. Utterly lacking in political unity, their score of kings and princelets acknowledged the theoretical supremacy of their Head King, or Ard-Righ, for just so long as he could maintain his position by power of the battle-axe. The battle-axe, that excellent weapon for quick-tempered men, doing its work with complete finality in less time than a man can unsheathe sword or notch arrow to bow, was the constant companion of the Irishman and the arbiter of all his politics. By a not unusual combination the Irish were at the same time utter barbarians and consummate artists. Their poetry was of a high standard; in music no nation but the Welsh could compare with them; and in metal work, carving, and painting such fragments as have come down to us show a complete mastery of the beauties of line and colour. Commerce they left to the Scandinavian settlers along their seaboard. Possessing a fertile soil and a favourable climate they lacked the industry and stability for agriculture, but grazed great quantities of cattle, which served alike for the standard of exchange, coined money not being in use, and for the objective of raids during their incessant hostilities. When St. Patrick banished the reptiles and vermin it would seem that they must have left their venom and vice behind for the use of the inhabitants of the island, for never was there a race so prone to anger, so ungrateful and so treacherous, and even the miracles recorded of their saints were more often concerned with vengeance wrought upon sacrilegious offenders than with rewards bestowed upon faithful devotees.
In this race of Ishmaelites there was one man of evil pre-eminence whose hand was against all men and all men’s against him. Dermot MacMurrogh, King of Leinster, since the beginning of his reign in 1121 had had even more than his share of fighting; his voice had grown hoarse with the shouting of his battle-cry; his borders had been enlarged at the expense of his neighbours, and the envy and hatred of rival chieftains had been incurred without gaining him the affection of his own subjects. In 1152
he had carried off Dervorgille, the beautiful but middle-aged wife of Tiernan O’Rourke, King of Breifny; as the lady was well past forty and Dermot some ten years older the elopement would seem to have been less a matter of romantic passion than a studied insult to Tiernan. Dermot was speedily forced by Turlogh O’Conor, then Ard-Righ, to give up Dervorgille, but escaped for the time any serious consequences. O’Rourke, however, did not forget, and at last, in 1166, found an opportunity to head a formidable combination against Dermot. Finding himself isolated Dermot seems to have looked to England for help, for “the chancellor of the Irish king” came to this country in 1166, and certain Irishmen appear to have visited Henry’s court at Woodstock early in the same year.[29] No assistance being obtained and resistance being impossible, Dermot, with some sixty followers, crossed to England and settled for a time at Bristol under the protection of the wealthy Robert Fitz-Harding.
In the spring of 1167 Dermot crossed to Normandy and had an interview with King Henry. The latter had his hands too full to meddle with Irish affairs, but the opportunity for getting some sort of footing in Ireland which might be useful in the future was too good to be missed; he therefore took Dermot’s homage and issued a general licence in vague terms encouraging any of his subjects to assist the exiled king. With this Dermot returned to Bristol, and after vain attempts to obtain assistance in England crossed into Wales, where he succeeded in interesting Richard of Clare, Earl of Pembroke, in his cause. The earl, whose extravagance had seriously impaired his finances, was attracted by the hope of plunder and broad lands and by the promise of Dermot’s daughter Eva in marriage, with the ultimate prospect of the throne of Leinster; he was, however, too cautious to risk his English and Welsh estates by embarking on this enterprise before he had obtained leave from King Henry. Dermot therefore turned to King Rhys of South Wales, who not only gave him a small force of soldiers but undertook to allow his prisoner, Robert Fitz-Stephen of Cardigan, to collect troops and cross over to Ireland. At last Dermot landed in his country once more with a small force, part of which was commanded by Richard Fitz-Godebert of Pembrokeshire. After a little fighting Dermot came to terms with his adversaries and dismissed his mercenaries.
For a short time Dermot remained quiet, but about the end of 1168 he despatched his interpreter, Morice Regan, to remind Robert Fitz-Stephen of his promise and to obtain other assistance. Fitz-Stephen accordingly crossed to Ireland early in May 1169. With him came Meiler Fitz-Henry, grandson of Henry I., and Miles, son of the Bishop of St. David’s, Maurice Prendergast and Hervey de Montmorency, the needy uncle of Earl Richard, and Robert de Barri, a nephew of Fitz-Stephen and brother of the historian Gerald. These adventurers landed with some three hundred followers at Bannow near Wexford, and here they were welcomed by Dermot and his son Donnell Kavanagh. An assault on Wexford was repelled with loss, but next day the city surrendered and was granted to Fitz-Stephen. This success was followed by an expedition against the King of Ossory, in which the English, by skilful manœuvring, drew the Irish out into open ground, where they were able to use their cavalry with deadly effect; the flying natives were further punished by an ambuscade of archers, and at the end of the day two hundred heads were laid before Dermot for that savage king to gloat upon. MacKelan of Offelan and O’Toole of Glendalough were defeated and plundered, but Roderic O’Conor, the Ard-Righ, was able to force Dermot to acknowledge his supremacy and to surrender his son as hostage. Tired of the somewhat unprofitable fighting, Maurice Prendergast and his two hundred men proposed to return to Wales, but Dermot refused to let them sail from Wexford. Maurice at once transferred his services to the King of Ossory and assisted his former enemy against his former friends until such time as he discovered that the jealous men of Ossory were plotting his destruction, when he withdrew his contingent secretly by night to Waterford and thence crossed into Wales.
About the time that Maurice Prendergast left Ireland Maurice Fitz-Gerald, a half-brother of Robert Fitz-Stephen, had landed with some hundred and forty soldiers, and not long afterwards, in the early summer of 1170, the Earl of Pembroke obtained leave from King Henry to undertake the Irish adventure. He first sent a small force under the redoubtable Raymond the Big, who threw up a temporary fort at Dundonuil, where they had hard work to defend themselves. By the ingenious device of driving a herd of cattle before them the invaders shattered the Irish ranks and, profiting by the confusion, slew many and captured seventy prisoners. By the advice of Hervey de Montmorency the prisoners were butchered, the business of beheading them being entrusted to a bloodthirsty Welsh girl whose lover had been killed in that battle. Shortly afterwards Earl Richard landed with Maurice Prendergast, Miles de Cogan, and other barons and fifteen hundred men. Two days later, on 25th August, the attack on Waterford began, and its capture was celebrated by the marriage of the earl and Eva, daughter of King Dermot. The king and his English allies next marched against Dublin, avoiding the great host assembled against them under the Ard-Righ on Clondalkin moor. The city was not prepared to offer armed resistance, and the terms of surrender were being discussed between Morice Regan, Dermot’s representative, and the saintly Archbishop Laurence O’Toole and Hasculf Torkil’s son, the Scandinavian lord of Dublin, when suddenly, without warning, Miles de Cogan, who had no intention of being deprived of his anticipated loot by the peaceful surrender of the city, raised his war cry and stormed the walls. Hasculf and such of the inhabitants as were fortunate enough to gain the ships escaped by water, but very many were slain and the city was given over to plunder. Miles was rewarded for his treacherous act by the grant of the custody of the city, while Earl Richard retired to Waterford and Dermot to his capital at Ferns, where on 1st January, 1171, he died.
By the death of Dermot MacMurrogh, Earl Richard became virtual King of Leinster. But the success of the earl and his companion adventurers was by no means a cause of satisfaction to King Henry, who had no intention of allowing a warlike and independent kingdom to grow up so close to his own realm. He accordingly made his feelings on this subject obvious by seizing the Earl of Pembroke’s English estates, and the earl hastened to clear himself from the charge of disloyalty by sending his lieutenant, Raymond the Big, to place all his conquests at the king’s disposal. Henry, who had gone so far as to forbid the sending of any assistance in men or munitions to Ireland and to order the immediate return of the adventurers on pain of perpetual banishment, was not appeased, though he determined to profit by the earl’s submission. Raymond seems to have returned to his lord with an order for the latter’s personal appearance before the king. Matters, however, were too involved to permit of Earl Richard’s immediate departure. Under pressure from Archbishop Laurence O’Toole King Roderic O’Conor had summoned a great force for the siege of Dublin, and all the native chiefs had rallied round him, glad of an opportunity of revenging the wrongs they had suffered at the hands of the foreign invaders. Provisions soon began to fail in the city, and an attempt to come to terms having failed, the Ard-Righ insisting upon the surrender of all the conquered territory except the three towns of Dublin, Waterford, and Wexford, the only course open was to risk all in an attack upon the besieging host. The attempt might well seem desperate in view of the disparity of numbers, but its very boldness proved its salvation. Leaving a small garrison to guard the city, some six hundred picked men marched out in three columns, under Miles de Cogan, Raymond the Big, and the earl himself. The surprise was completely successful; secure in the knowledge of their numbers the Irish had neglected outposts or guards and were caught quite unprepared; many of them were actually bathing when the English cavalry dashed into their camp. Discouraged by this severe defeat, in which they lost very heavily, the Irish forces broke up and drifted away. Earl Richard was now free to attempt the relief of Robert Fitz-Stephen, who, after dangerously depleting his own forces to strengthen the garrison of Dublin, had been gallantly standing a siege in his castle of Carrick near Wexford. The earl’s forces, after a desperate action in the pass of Odrone, in which Meiler Fitz-Henry particularly distinguished himself, reached Wexford to find the
town in flames, Carrick Castle fallen and Fitz-Stephen a prisoner. The earl now turned to Waterford and prepared for an expedition against MacDonnchadh, King of Ossory, but the latter offered to come in and make terms if his old ally Maurice Prendergast would obtain him a safe conduct. This Maurice did, but when MacDonnchadh came before the earl, King O’Brien of Munster, who was acting at this time with the English, urged his arrest and execution, and it was only by the vigorous action of Prendergast, who brought his men-at-arms on the scene, that the barons were prevented from thus treacherously breaking their oaths.
Leinster was now pacified and a further imperative summons from King Henry, already on his way towards Pembroke, necessitated the departure of Earl Richard. Hardly had he gone when Hasculf, the former lord of Dublin, landed with an army raised from Norway, the Isles, and Man, under the command of a man known from the berserk fury of his valour as John the Wode, or the Mad. These well-armed Scandinavians were foes of a different type from the wild Irish, but Miles de Cogan boldly charged upon them from the east gate, while his brother Richard, with a small force of thirty men-at-arms, rode secretly out of the west gate to take them in the rear. John the Wode, wielding his great axe with fearful effect, forced back the English, and had even gained footing within the gate when Richard’s attack threw his men into confusion. Rallying his forces Miles charged again upon the Northmen, who broke and fled; John the Wode was killed fighting gallantly, and Hasculf was captured and beheaded. Another assault on the city, early in September, by the forces of Tiernan O’Rourke, ended disastrously for the Irish, and Dublin was left in peace.
Henry had landed at Portsmouth on 2nd August, and after a visit to the aged Bishop Henry of Winchester, then on his deathbed, had marched towards Bristol. At Newnham, in Gloucestershire, he was met by Earl Richard, who surrendered to him the cities of Dublin, Waterford, and Wexford, receiving in return the royal favour and a grant in fee of the residue of his conquests. About 8th September, when the English army was approaching the borders of Wales, King Rhys ap Gruffudd came to meet Henry with the offer of a tribute of horses and oxen. This tribute Henry soon afterwards respited, taking only thirty-six horses as a token of friendship; at the same time he restored to Rhys his son Howel, who had long been held as hostage. Rhys showed his appreciation of the king’s friendship next year by sending Howel to the English court to serve King Henry. The peaceful passage of the English army in Pembrokeshire, where the fleet was assembling at Milford Haven, had been secured by this tactful conciliation of King Rhys, and a troublesome chieftain, Jorwerth ap Owain, was reduced to order by the capture of his castle of Caerleon-on-Usk before Henry reached Pembroke. For some three weeks the English host lay weather-bound at Pembroke, part of the time being spent by Henry in a pilgrimage to St. David’s, where he offered in the cathedral and visited the bishop, David Fitz-Gerald. At last, on 16th October, the wind shifted and the fleet of some two hundred vessels crossed over to Crook, near Waterford. For a fortnight Henry remained at Waterford, the government of which town he had entrusted to Robert Fitz-Bernard. Here he received the submission of the kings and chieftains of Ireland, with the exception of the lords of Ulster and Roderic O’Conor, the Ard-Righ. Hither also the men of Wexford, in accordance with an undertaking given to Henry at Pembroke by their envoys, brought Robert Fitz-Stephen and his fellow-prisoners; and Henry, whose personal intervention in Ireland had been influenced in some degree by complaints of the tyranny of some of the adventurers, thought it politic to appease the natives by committing Robert to prison for a short time. If he was mindful of the demands of justice he was still more mindful of his proposed reformation of the Irish Church, and having received the homage of the Irish bishops he summoned a council or synod at Cashel in November.
At this Council of Cashel canons were passed for the observance of the degrees of affinity in marriage, the performance of baptisms by priests in the church—the local custom being for the father of the child immediately after its birth to plunge it three times into water, or into milk if the family were noble or wealthy—the payment of tithes, and the immunity of clerks and church property from secular exactions. As soon as it was over Henry sent an account of the proceedings, and of the submission tendered to him by the bishops and princes of Ireland, to the pope by the hands of the Archdeacon of Llandaff. It would seem that he also endeavoured to obtain from Alexander a confirmation of Pope Adrian’s commendatory letter issued in 1155, at the time when the conquest of Ireland was first proposed. Alexander did not grant this confirmation, but wrote letters to Henry, to the bishops and to the kings of Ireland, expressing his satisfaction at the steps taken to remedy the monstrous irregularities of which the Irish had been guilty, and his hope that Henry’s supremacy would make for the peace and better government of the island. These letters must have reached England some time in the summer of 1172. Henry, however, does not seem to have been satisfied with these expressions of papal approval; possibly he had in the first instance obtained the submission of the Irish prelates by representing himself as commissioned by Pope Alexander to reform their Church; however this may be, it would seem that a synod was held at Waterford to which William Fitz-Audelin brought probably Alexander’s letters and certainly the letter of Adrian (that famous centre of controversy “the Bull Laudabiliter,” so called from its beginning with the word Laudabiliter and, as befits an Irish document, its not being a Bull),[30] and with it a confirmation by Pope Alexander, which was almost undoubtedly a forgery.
But before this synod of Waterford was held much had happened. Christmas in 1171 had been spent by the king at Dublin, where an elaborate palace, built of wattles in the native fashion, had been erected for him, and where the magnificence and luxury of his household, simple though it was if judged by continental standards, struck surprise into the minds of the Irish. But if the royal table presented a spectacle of unwonted luxury to the natives, the food of the country, the absence of wine, and the impurity of the water proved disastrous to the English. An exceptionally stormy winter aggravated the scarcity of provisions and consequent mortality, prevented operations against Roderic of Connaught, and by severing all connection with England left Henry a prey to unappeasable anxiety. Early in March 1172, news having possibly reached him of the arrival of the papal legates in Normandy, he moved down to Wexford, the greater part of his army going at the end of the month to Waterford; but for over six weeks the weather rendered the crossing to Wales impossible, and it was not till Easter Monday, 17th April, that Henry landed near St. David’s, whence he made his way to Portsmouth, from which place he crossed to Normandy early in May.
The arrival of the papal legates, coupled with rumours of a conspiracy being formed by the young King Henry and his brothers, had compelled Henry to return from Ireland without attempting the subjugation of the Ard-Righ and without strengthening his hold upon the portions of the island already conquered by the erection of a series of castles. Before leaving, however, he took measures intended apparently to weaken the power of the original adventurers alike for action independent of himself and for the oppression of the natives. The government of Dublin, with the province of Meath, he granted to Hugh de Lacy, a man of character and ability, who justified his selection by adopting a just and conciliatory policy towards the Irish. With him were associated in the charge of the city Robert Fitz-Stephen and Meiler Fitz-Henry, while Waterford and Wexford were committed to Robert Fitz-Bernard. Earl Richard retained possession of Leinster, and was apparently recognised as in control of the conquered portion of Ireland; while the province of Ulster, whose chiefs had refused to accept the English supremacy, was handed over to John de Courcy to subdue and enjoy as best he might.
The earl, who had made Kildare his chief seat, had bestowed his daughter in marriage upon Robert de Quency, whom he created hereditary constable of Leinster; but not long after the marriage Robert was killed in an expedition against O’Dempsey of Offaly, leaving an infant daughter, who eventually married the son of Maurice Prendergast. Raymond the Big then demanded the hand of the earl’s widowed daughter, with the constableship, and upon his demand being refused retired into Wales. About the same time, in the summer of 1173, Henry, hard pressed by the rebellion of his sons, summoned some of the leading barons from Ireland, including Earl Richard, whom he made governor of Gisors. The appointment was of short duration, and the earl was soon invested with the government of Dublin, Waterford, and Wexford, and sent back to Ireland with letters recalling Hugh de Lacy, Fitz-Stephen, Fitz-Bernard, Prendergast, and others, who crossed at once, in time to take part in the battle at Fornham on 17th October 1173. The English forces in Ireland were thus seriously depleted, and an expedition led by the earl and Hervey de Montmorency into Munster having ended disastrously, all Ireland began to rise and endeavour to shake off the foreign yoke. Earl Richard hastily sent for Raymond, promising him the hand of his daughter, for which he had asked in vain before; Raymond responded to the offer, landed with a small force at Waterford and marched to Wexford, where he reduced the town to order and obtained his coveted bride. Next year, in 1175, he led a force into Limerick and captured that town, but his successes, and possibly his excesses also, were displeasing to King Henry, and early in 1176 he was summoned to England to account for his actions. The state of affairs at Limerick, however, was too desperate to permit of his absence, and after relieving the garrison he thought it good policy to obtain a renewal of their oaths of fealty to the king of England from the kings of Connaught and Thomond. Raymond was therefore still in Ireland at the beginning of June 1176, when Earl Richard died and William Fitz-Audelin landed as procurator or justiciary of Ireland.
Fitz-Audelin and his two coadjutors, Miles de Cogan and Robert Fitz-Stephen, were recalled in 1177, and Hugh de Lacy was appointed justiciary, Fitz-Audelin being associated with Robert le Poer in the custody of Waterford and Wexford, Miles and Robert receiving South Munster, and North Munster, as yet unsubdued, being granted to Philip de Braose,[31] from which he got as little good as he deserved. For the next seven years Henry left Ireland pretty much to itself, and Lacy continued to strengthen the position of the English settlement by building castles and by a firm but conciliatory attitude towards the natives. Unfortunately his success, coupled with his marriage with a daughter of the king of Connaught, aroused Henry’s jealousy, and in 1184 he was removed from office. As early as 1177 Henry had declared his intention of making his young son John king of Ireland, and in 1185 the furtherance of this design afforded an excuse for keeping the beloved boy from the distant dangers of the Crusade. John was at this time in his nineteenth year, vain, pampered, vicious, and as completely void of any redeeming virtue as any young man could be. His father, to whom he was as the apple of his eye, could hardly have found in all his broad realms any person more dangerously incompetent to undertake the difficult government of Ireland.
On 31st March 1185, the king knighted his son at Windsor, and almost immediately afterwards John set out, under the charge of Ranulph de Glanville, the justiciar, for Gloucester. After a few days’ stay in that city the heavy baggage and provisions for the expedition, with the greater part of the forces, were sent on to Bristol, while John himself with the remainder passed on to Milford Haven, whence he sailed for Waterford on 24th April. His force was of imposing dimensions—it is said to have contained three hundred knights—and as we find such men as William le Poer and Stephen le Flemeng each bringing fifty horses, the total number of the cavalry must have been large; there was probably a contingent of Flemish mercenaries, as Godescalk, “the master of the Flemish serjeants,” came from Kent, and there must have been the usual proportions of archers and foot soldiers. Significant is the entry on the Pipe Rolls of payments for Roger Rastel and other huntsmen with horses and dogs who went from Somerset into Ireland, and still more significant are the entries of large sums spent in furnishing John’s kitchen and bakery. The bulk of John’s followers were Norman courtiers, despising their English companions, who in turn regarded the Irish as despicable savages. On John’s arrival the friendly chieftains came to welcome the son of the most powerful prince in Christendom, but found an ill-mannered youth surrounded by a crowd of fashionable effeminate flatterers. The Normans mocked at the barbaric dress of the native princes, and carried their ill-bred insolence so far as to pluck them by their long beards. In justifiable anger the princes left the court at Waterford and went to warn their compatriots of the treatment in store for them. The kings of Connaught, Limerick, and Cork, who had meditated tendering their fealty to John, now naturally held aloof, and soon the faithful natives were driven by the insults and injuries suffered at the hands of the invaders into active revolt. Meanwhile the newcomers had completely alienated the early settlers, depriving them of their hard-won conquests and distributing offices of importance and honour with a complete disregard for the fitness of the candidates. The Norman courtiers, used to the luxurious life of large towns and the aristocratic campaigning of the Continent, utterly refused to endure the hardships inseparable from service in the interior of the country, and clung to the seaboard towns where alone wine was available. Hugh de Lacy and the barons who had won and held Leinster by their strength and military ability kept grimly aloof and watched disaster after disaster overtake the incompetent and inexperienced army of invasion.
Matters soon reached such a pitch that it was clear that some man of ability must be put in command, and accordingly in the autumn of 1185 John de Courcy, whose conquest of Ulster had proved him to be a warrior of consummate skill and daring, was appointed chief governor with excellent effect, and two months later Prince John returned to England. He had no difficulty in persuading his infatuated father that his failure was due to the treachery of Hugh de Lacy, and it was with unconcealed delight that Henry heard of Lacy’s murder in 1186. Early in that same year Pope Urban III. had acceded to Henry’s request for the coronation of John as king of Ireland, and had even sent him a crown of gold and peacocks’ feathers—borrowed plumes sufficiently suitable for the empty head they were to adorn. John was therefore despatched to Ireland to seize Lacy’s great fief into the king’s hand in August, but before he could sail news arrived of the death of his brother Geoffrey, and he was recalled. For the remaining three years of his reign Henry was too busy with English and foreign affairs to devote his attention to Ireland.
CHAPTER VII
THE REBELLION OF THE YOUNG KING
Henry had left Ireland, as we have seen, on 17th April 1172, and about the second week in May he crossed from Portsmouth to Barfleur with a considerable following, at least twenty-five ships accompanying him. On 17th May he met the cardinals at Savigny, and was informed by them of the terms offered by the pope for his reconciliation to the Church. It would seem that these included the entire abrogation of the Constitutions of Clarendon, and to this Henry absolutely declined to consent, declaring that sooner than accept these conditions he would return to Ireland. The diplomatic Bishop Arnulf of Lisieux now intervened and succeeded in effecting a compromise, and on Sunday, 21st May, Henry came to the cathedral of Avranches and was absolved from the guilt of the murder of Becket on a promise to comply with the modified requirements of the legates. He was to find the money to support two hundred men-at-arms for one year in the Holy Land, to go for three years on Crusade, to restore the property of the church of Canterbury, and take back into favour all who had suffered for their support of the archbishop; he was also to support the claims of Alexander and his successors against the schismatics, to permit appeals to the pope in ecclesiastical causes, and to abolish all customs injurious to the Church which had been newly introduced in his reign. The wording of the last clause left matters exactly as they were at the beginning of the quarrel with Becket, for the whole point of the dispute was Henry’s contention that the Constitutions were in force in the time of his grandfather. The final issue of the conflict was thus decidedly in Henry’s favour, and the murder, instead of proving, as it must have done in the case of a less able man, disastrous, had actually been beneficial. The king’s strength is also shown in his dealings with the four knights who had murdered the archbishop; a weaker man would almost certainly have sacrificed the murderers to appease public opinion, but Henry, admitting that they had acted on his behalf though not in accord with his intentions, took no action against them, possibly not sorry to let ecclesiastical claims reduce themselves to a logical absurdity by showing that the Church could only deal with the ecclesiastical offence of the murder of an archbishop by the ineffective method of excommunication.
The young King Henry was present at the ceremony at Avranches and joined with his father in swearing to obey the terms imposed, so far as they were not personal to the elder king; but it would seem that the representatives of France and other important personages were absent, and it was therefore arranged that the ceremony should be repeated at a later date at Caen. The absolution was duly repeated about Michaelmas, but whether at Caen or again at Avranches is not quite clear. Meanwhile Henry had arranged for the deferred coronation of his son’s wife Margaret, the daughter of King Louis. It has already been mentioned that, much to her father’s anger, she had not been crowned with her husband, but it would seem that Henry had had the genuine intention of allowing her to be crowned subsequently. He appears to have promised Becket that he should officiate, and it may have been for this purpose that Margaret crossed over to England in September 1170. She remained at Winchester until 3rd April 1171, when she crossed again to Normandy, and was no doubt with her husband at Christmas that year, when the young Henry held his court at Bur-le-Roi, to which flocked the chivalry in such numbers that it is recorded that in one hall there dined together a hundred and three knights whose Christian name was William. In August 1172 Margaret and her husband went back to England, and on the 27th of that month they were crowned together in Winchester Cathedral by Rotrou, Archbishop of Rouen, and the Bishops of Evreux and Worcester. Their stay was not of long duration, as early in November they were summoned back to Normandy by the old king. They obeyed unwillingly, but instead of joining the English court paid a visit to King Louis, who seized the opportunity to urge upon the young Henry that he should demand from his father the complete sovereignty of either England or Normandy, or at any rate something more substantial than the shadowy royalty which he had hitherto enjoyed. The counsel fell on willing ears; the prince had long smarted under his father’s strict control and the surveillance of ministers who were practically his masters, and he was in no mind to remain a king without a kingdom and without even a sufficient income.
After Christmas, which the young king and his queen kept at Bonneville while the elder Henry and Eleanor were at Chinon, the two Henrys went to Montferrand and afterwards to Limoges to negotiate for the marriage of John, now six years old, with Alais, daughter and heir of the powerful Count Hubert of Maurienne, lord of Savoy. The count undertook to make a most liberal provision for the young couple, but when it came to Henry’s turn to fix what he would bestow upon them he named the castellanies of Chinon, Loudun, and Mirabeau. The young Henry at once indignantly protested that these castles belonged to him as Count of Anjou, and absolutely declined to make them over to his brother. This, combined with his father’s action in refusing to increase either his power or his allowance and in removing from his company certain young men of bad influence, roused the young king’s resentment, which was sedulously fanned by his mother, Queen Eleanor. The latter, egged on by her uncle, Ralph de Faye, urged her son to open rebellion, and afterwards persuaded his brothers, Richard and Geoffrey, to join him in opposition to their father. At last, on 5th March, the young king slipped away, and evading pursuit reached the court of Louis.
The rebellion thus begun bore a formidable aspect and seemed to have every prospect of success. Young Henry was an admirable centre for the concentration of the disaffected. Tall, remarkably handsome, and adding to his father’s charm of manner an open-handed liberality which the elder Henry lacked, he was already earning the reputation which he established a few years later as the flower of chivalry, while his apparently complete lack of solid qualities in no way detracted from his popularity. In the struggle with his father he could of course count upon the assistance of King Louis, and though that king was singularly incompetent his resources were very considerable. The more lawless English lords, whose wings had been clipped by Henry’s anti-feudal legislation, might also be counted upon; and in this category were old Hugh Bigot, Earl of Norfolk, the other Earl Hugh, he of Chester, the young Earl of Leicester, son of the loyal justiciar who had died in 1168, Earl Ferrers of Derby, and Roger Mowbray. The discontented lords whose lands lay within Henry’s continental domains were still more numerous, and included the Counts of Ponthieu, Evreux, Eu, and Meulan, William de Tancarville, chamberlain of Normandy, and Geoffrey and Guy de Lusignan. Amongst those who seem to have supported the young king out of affection for him rather than out of hatred of his father were William Marshal, younger son of Becket’s adversary and one of the most brilliant knights of his time, Hasculf de Saint Hilaire, Robert Tregoz, and William de Dives. Further important allies were secured by recklessly liberal promises of reward: to Count Philip of Flanders young Henry promised the county of Kent with the castles of Dover and Rochester and £1000 of rent; to his brother, the Count of Boulogne, the county of Mortain and other lands; to Theobald, Count of Blois, the castle of Amboise and £500 of rents from Anjou; and a little later, when the unsatisfactory state of affairs in Normandy rendered desirable a diversion in England, Westmoreland with Carlisle and possibly also Northumberland were offered to King William of Scotland, while to his brother David the earldom of Huntingdon and Cambridge was granted.
On the other hand, though his continental domains were seething with discontent, King Henry could count upon powerful support from the English magnates. The Earls of Cornwall, Surrey, Arundel, Essex, Northampton, and Salisbury could be relied upon; Richard “Strongbow” of Pembroke was loyal, though too much engaged with affairs in Ireland to be of much assistance; and William of Gloucester, though married to the young Earl of Leicester’s sister, would be at worst neutral. The best part of the baronage, headed by the great justiciar, Richard de Luci, “the Loyal,” were to be depended upon, and included men of the military ability of Humphrey de Bohun, Robert de Stuteville, William de Vesci, and Odinell de Umfraville. The kings of Wales, David ap Owain and the redoubtable Rhys ap Gruffudd, with their hardy warriors, were also allies not to be despised. The valuable support of the Church was also, contrary to what might have been expected, strongly on the elder king’s side, the only conspicuous exceptions being the Bishop of Durham and, curiously enough, Henry’s former ardent partisan, Arnulf of Lisieux. To further strengthen his position Henry now filled up the six vacant English bishoprics, taking the opportunity to promote his faithful archdeacons; Richard of Ilchester, Archdeacon of Poictiers, receiving the see of Winchester, Geoffrey Ridel of Canterbury that of Ely, and Reynold, Archdeacon of Salisbury, that of Bath; Robert Foliot, Archdeacon of Lincoln and brother of the Bishop of London, obtained Hereford, Joscelin was promoted from the deanery to the bishopric of Chichester, and the great see of Lincoln was bestowed upon the king’s illegitimate son Geoffrey. In this manner Henry showed his obedience to the papal demand that the vacant sees should be filled, and at the same time he obtained practical control of the episcopal bench. The primacy was for a time left unfilled, owing to disputes between the monks of Canterbury and the bishops of the province, and to other causes; but in June, Richard, Prior of Dover, was elected by general consent, and, by a happy coincidence, on the day of his election there arrived a letter from the pope announcing that the martyred Thomas of Canterbury had been enrolled amongst the saints.
Thanks to his wise policy in encouraging the trading and mercantile communities and in protecting the small men from the oppression of the great, Henry had on his side the bulk of the populace and especially the citizens of London, Rouen, and the other great towns. Finally, he had great financial resources, and it was this abundance of money that turned the scale in his favour by enabling him not only to hire large numbers of mercenaries but also to buy off many of the French nobles who were supposed to be supporting his rebellious sons.
As soon as it was clear that his son had fled to raise the standard of rebellion Henry proceeded to Gisors and set that and his other frontier castles in a state of defence. While he was so doing a rumour reached the rebels that he was advancing to attack them and they at once prepared for battle. The young king had not yet been knighted, his father having intended that King Louis should bestow the dignity upon him; but feeling that it would befit his position as leader of the army he now hastily sought the honour of knighthood at the hands of his faithful comrade and instructor in the art of arms, William Marshal. The alarm proved false; Henry, so far from attacking, retired to Rouen, where he spent the greater part of the next four months hunting and apparently ignoring the outbreak, but really keeping a watchful eye upon events and waiting the opportunity to strike a crushing blow.
About the last week in June Henry appears to have made a hurried visit to England, going straight to Northampton, spending four days there, and then returning at once to Rouen.[32] Affairs in England were calculated to give rise to some anxiety. Although so many castles had been thrown down or taken into the king’s hand since the beginning of his reign a considerable number still remained in private hands, and of these at least a score were now held for the rebels. On the east coast Hugh Bigot held Framlingham and Bungay; in the Midlands, Huntingdon was held for David of Scotland; the Earl of Leicester had Leicester, Mountsorel, and Groby; the Earl Ferrers Tutbury and Duffield; while Chester was held for Earl Hugh. In the north the Bishop of Durham had fortified Durham, Norham, and Northallerton, and Mowbray held Thirsk, Malzeard, and Axholme; Hamo de Masci had castles at Dunham and Ullerwood, Geoffrey de Costantin at Stockport, and Richard de Morville at Lauder, and there were a number of smaller fortresses which might prove centres of danger. The castles in the hands of the king and his supporters must have been at least five times as numerous, and the royal officers speedily set in order those in the districts most likely to be affected—the south-east, exposed to the raids of Flemish and French, and the north, where the Scots were to be feared. Porchester, Southampton, and Winchester were strengthened, so were Arundel, Chichester, and Hastings; in Kent much money was spent on the castles of Dover, Canterbury, Rochester, and Chilham; the Tower of London was of course a centre of activity; at Oreford the outer defences were strengthened; Walton, Colchester, and Norwich were garrisoned; so were Hertford, Cambridge, Wisbeach, and Lincoln. Windsor, Oxford, Berkhamstead, Wallingford, Kenilworth, Warwick, Worcester, Nottingham, and the Peak carried the chain of royal strongholds across the country, while in the north were York, Bowes, Richmond, Carlisle, Prudhoe, Appleby, Wark, and Newcastle. For the present the chief centre of danger seemed to be Leicester, and it was no doubt as a result of the king’s flying visit to Northampton that operations were set on foot early in July against Leicester.
About the time that Henry returned to Rouen, on 29th June, Count Philip of Flanders captured Aumâle, probably by the connivance of its defender, Count William of Aumâle, and, after a more energetic resistance, the castle of Driencourt. This last success, however, was neutralised by the death of Philip’s brother, Count Matthew of Boulogne. Meanwhile the French army under King Louis and the young King Henry was vainly besieging Verneuil. Hugh de Lacy and Hugh de Beauchamp, who were in command of the defence, had no difficulty in repelling their attacks, but after a month’s siege provisions ran short in the outermost of the three “bourgs” into which the town was divided, and the inhabitants agreed that if they were not relieved before 9th August they would surrender, the French on their side swearing to do them no harm. Henry, realising that instant action was necessary, advanced at once, burning the Earl of Leicester’s abandoned castle of Breteuil on the way. When the two armies were in sight of one another on 8th August Louis sent envoys and obtained a truce until the next day, and Henry, not suspecting his good faith, retired to Conches. Next day Louis demanded the surrender of the bourg in accordance with the former agreement, and at once treacherously set it on fire and, adding cowardice to treachery, fled back to France, hotly pursued with great slaughter by Henry. The centre of action now shifted to Brittany, where the turbulent Breton nobles had risen under Ralph of Fougères and the Earl of Chester. Against them Henry sent a strong force of Brabantine mercenaries under William de Humez, who inflicted a very severe defeat on the rebels, capturing Hasculf de Saint Hilaire, William Patrie and others, and driving the remainder of the force into the castle of Dol. A messenger was sent off at full gallop to Henry at Rouen, and by an almost incredibly rapid forced march he covered the whole distance from Rouen to Dol, over 150 miles, in two days.[33] Earl Hugh and Ralph of Fougères, seeing that resistance was hopeless, surrendered on 29th August, and by this single stroke eighty persons of rank and position and a number of men of lesser estate were captured and the rebellion in Brittany stamped out. The time now seemed ripe for a reconciliation, and on 25th September Henry met his three sons and King Louis near Gisors. The terms offered by the king to his sons were liberal in the extreme, but the French king had no wish to see peace restored and he persuaded them to reject the terms. The Earl of Leicester also, who had all arrangements made for an invasion of England, did his insolent best to keep the quarrel alive.
We have seen that early in July preparations had been made for the siege of Leicester. On the 22nd of that month the town surrendered to the Earl of Cornwall and Richard de Luci; the inhabitants were allowed to withdraw to St. Albans and other places of refuge and the town was set on fire. The castle, however, still held out, and in September news from the north caused the siege to be raised. King William of Scotland, having vainly offered his services to the elder Henry in return for a grant of Northumberland, accepted the younger Henry’s promise of Westmoreland and assembled a large army to reduce the northern counties. His first move was against the castle of Wark, where Roger de Stuteville was in command; Roger obtained a truce of forty days and the Scottish army passed on, ravaging and burning as they went, and after an ineffectual attack on William de Vesci’s castle of Alnwick captured Warkworth Castle. Newcastle, held for the king by Roger Fitz-Richard, Lord of Warkworth, proved too strong for the invaders, and their efforts were next directed against Carlisle. Here Robert de Vaux made a gallant defence, and news arriving of the advance of the English relieving force the Scots retreated to Roxburgh in full flight. Richard de Luci, with the troops he had brought from Leicester, and Humphrey de Bohun, with a detachment of mercenary cavalry, pursued them across the border and burnt Berwick. But news reached them that the Earl of Leicester had landed with a force of Flemings at Walton on 29th September. Bohun at once turned southwards, while Luci negotiated with the Scottish king before the news of Leicester’s landing could reach the latter. A truce was obtained to last until January, and by the Bishop of Durham’s mediation this was afterwards extended to April 1174.
The Earl of Leicester, on landing, had spent four days in a fruitless endeavour to capture Walton Castle, but finding it too strong to be taken, although Earl Hugh of Norfolk had brought a siege train to his assistance, he turned aside and attacked Haughley. This fortress, held by Ranulph de Broc, Becket’s old adversary, was speedily captured and given to the flames, and then the earl’s initiative appears to have died out and he was content to quarter himself idly at Framlingham until Earl Hugh gave him a strong hint that he was outstaying his welcome. At last he decided to try and reach Leicester, and on 17th October he started, with the intention of passing to the north of Bury St. Edmunds. At the latter town the royalists, under Humphrey de Bohun, had been reinforced by troops under the Earls of Cornwall and Arundel, local levies under Roger le Bigod, the loyal son of old Earl Hugh, and Hugh de Cressi, and a detachment of hardy fighting men from Ireland. Setting out with St. Edmund’s banner at their head they came upon the Flemings at Fornham-St. Geneveve. In actual numbers the advantage lay with the Earl of Leicester, but his followers were almost entirely infantry of poor quality, quite unfitted to cope with the powerful cavalry opposed to them, and it was only a matter of minutes before the Flemings had been ridden down and scattered, a prey for the country people, who bore them no good-will. Earl Robert and his cousin, Hugh de Chastel, were captured, and the gallant Countess Peronelle, clad in mail, falling into a stream in her flight, was with difficulty rescued from a death which she preferred to the disgrace of surrender. A halt was now made and forces collected to crush Earl Hugh, but with the aid of his wealth he bought a truce for himself and permission for the Flemish mercenaries still in England to leave the country unharmed.
Henry, having seen the captured earl and countess safely lodged in the castle of Falaise, led an army into Anjou in November and captured Preuilly, La Haye, and Champigny with a large number of men of rank. The year 1173 thus ended favourably for the elder king, and truces with the kings of France and Scotland ensured peace until the close of Easter, 31st March 1174. But with the beginning of April the struggle began again. The Scottish king crossed the border and besieged Wark, raiding as far as Bamborough, where William de Vesci’s castle proved too strong to be attacked. Roger de Stuteville offered a vigorous defence, and the besiegers’ artillery proving more deadly to themselves than to the garrison, King William abandoned the siege of Wark and concentrated his efforts on Carlisle. He had been joined by Roger Mowbray and Adam de Port, a Norman baron who had been banished and deprived of his English estates in 1172 for conspiring against Henry, and his army included the inevitable execrated Flemish mercenaries. Ruthless as these Flemish adventurers were, they were less inhuman than the savage Highlanders and men of Galloway who accompanied them. From Carlisle plundering bands ravaged and destroyed the northern counties, while more warlike expeditions captured the border forts of Liddel and Harbottle. Far more serious was the tame surrender of Appleby Castle: the aged Gospatric, son of Orm, the English constable of the castle, was possibly too old for his responsible position, and his lack of confidence would seem to have affected the garrison, amongst whom were the steward of Hugh de Morville, the murderer of Becket, and one John de Morville, probably connections of Richard de Morville, who was a prominent supporter of the Scottish king. This success was followed up by the capture, after a desperate resistance, of Brough-under-Stanemore, and the general trend of affairs induced Robert de Vaux to obtain a truce for Carlisle on undertaking to surrender at Michaelmas if not relieved before that date.
Henry, after assuring himself of the loyalty of Maine and Anjou in the spring of 1174, had entered Poitou and inflicted a crushing defeat on the troops of his son Richard at Saintes in May. Messages had been reaching him for some time past from the justiciar, who was besieging Huntingdon, urging his return to England, and on his arrival at Bonneville in Normandy on 24th June he was met by Richard of Ilchester, bishop-elect of Winchester, with news of the gravity of affairs. There was no mistaking the significance of the selection of Richard—“they could not have sent a more urgent messenger, unless they had sent the Tower of London”—and Henry at once prepared to cross to England. He accordingly embarked at Barfleur on 7th July, and being determined to leave no centres of disaffection behind him, he carried with him the Earls of Chester and Leicester, Queen Eleanor, who had been captured the previous year trying to reach the French court in male disguise, and Queen Margaret. The weather was stormy but the wind was in the right direction, and Henry bade the shipmen set sail, saying solemnly, “If what I purpose is for the peace of Church and people, and if the King of Heaven has decreed that peace shall be restored by my coming, then in His mercy may He grant me a safe passage. But if He has turned His face from me and has decreed to afflict the kingdom with a rod, then may it never be mine to set foot on shore.” The voyage to Southampton was accomplished in safety, and Henry at once proceeded, fasting and with all signs of humility, to Canterbury, where on 12th July he performed public penance at the tomb of St. Thomas. The Bishop of London delivered an address on the king’s behalf, disavowing all share in the murder, but admitting that his rash words had been the actual cause of it; then, after long remaining in prayer at the tomb, the king submitted to a ceremonial scourging at the hands of all the monks of the convent of Christ Church. Finally he made a grant of lands to the monastery in memory of the martyr, and probably at the same time settled a small income upon Becket’s married sister, Roese,[34] his other sister, Mary, having been appointed in the previous year Abbess of Berking.
The news of Henry’s landing put an end to the plans of the younger king for an invasion of England, which he had contemplated in company with Philip of Flanders. He had even gone so far as to send over three hundred picked Flemish knights under Ralph de la Haye in June. They had landed at Orewell, placed themselves under the command of Earl Hugh of Norfolk, and, after being repulsed from Dunwich, had captured the wealthy city of Norwich by treachery and gained thereby great plunder if little military advantage. This occurred on 18th June, and the news apparently caused the justiciar to relinquish the siege of Huntingdon, leaving Earl Simon of Northampton, who claimed the earldom of Huntingdon, to win the castle and the county for himself. As we have already seen an urgent message was despatched to the king, and about the same time Robert de Vaux obtained conditions for Carlisle. The Scottish army being thus set free for fresh enterprises Roger Mowbray urged King William to move southwards to his assistance, his strongholds of Axholme and Malzeard having fallen before the troops of Geoffrey, the king’s illegitimate son, the young bishop-elect of Lincoln, and Thirsk being threatened. William preferred the less hazardous course of keeping near his own borders, and laid siege to Odinal de Umfraville’s castle of Prudhoe. The castle was strong and well provisioned, and Odinal succeeded in getting away to raise forces for its relief. Preparing to retreat into his own country, the Scottish king sent detachments of his army under Earl Duncan, the Earl of Angus, and Richard de Morville to ravage the country, while he with a small body of knights made a demonstration against Alnwick. The English forces under Ranulf de Glanvill, Odinal de Umfraville, Robert de Stuteville, William de Vesci, and Bernard de Baillol left Newcastle at daybreak on 13th July, and, favoured by a mist, surprised King William and his attendants close to Alnwick. William the Lion did not surrender tamely, but, mounting his horse, led his men against the foe. The odds were too heavy, however; the king’s charger was killed and he himself pinned to the ground by its fall, Roger de Mowbray and Adam de Port fled for safety, but the Scottish knights fought for their lord so long as resistance was possible. Thus on the day, possibly even at the hour, on which Henry completed his penance at the tomb of St. Thomas his most dangerous opponent was made prisoner. The good news was despatched at once by a mounted messenger, who found Henry resting at London, where he had had a most enthusiastic reception upon his arrival. The king, who was unwell, was asleep, but the messenger would brook no delay, and the news of William’s capture, which Henry could at first hardly believe, proved good medicine for the sick man. The nobles at court were at once told the news, and next day