Edward II: The Unconventional King (44 page)

Edward II was now merely Sir Edward of Caernarfon, and it was agreed that he would be housed in comfort for the rest of his days and treated with honour and respect as the king’s father. Presumably he was informed about the Articles of the Deposition, a list of six charges intended to justify his removal: they included the statements that he had allowed himself to be governed by others who gave him bad counsel, that he had given himself up to improper pastimes and neglected the business of his kingdom, that he had left his kingdom and his people as lost, and because of his cruelty and his defects, he was incorrigible without hope of amendment.
⁹⁴
It seems unlikely, given Edward’s personality, that he really did react with such contrite acquiescence to the demands that he abdicate his throne, and far more likely that he spat utter rage at his subjects who had dared to behave in such a manner, and that he vowed revenge. Although this would not happen, the twists and turns of Edward II’s extraordinary life continued beyond his deposition.

The early months of 1327 passed uneventfully as far as Sir Edward of Caernarfon, formerly King Edward II of England, was concerned. He was free to wander around the gardens of Kenilworth Castle at will – though not to leave the castle, of course – and his cousin Henry of Lancaster treated him with courtesy and kindness. Once again Edward’s state of mind remains unknown, and little evidence exists to tell us what his life at Kenilworth was like, though we know his son the new king sent him two tuns of wine.
¹
Queen Isabella and Roger Mortimer, now ruling the kingdom in Edward III’s name despite not being on the regency council appointed during his minority, did not trust Lancaster; they had needed his support after their invasion, but now they feared his enormous influence. With his vast income and lands and his large number of followers, Lancaster would always be far too powerful to ignore, and Mortimer and Isabella had seen first-hand how his brother Thomas had done more than anyone to ruin Edward II’s reign. Henry’s custody of the former king was a danger to them. The legality of the parliament which deposed Edward was uncertain; there remained the possibility that Edward might be able to overturn it and restore himself to the throne, if he attracted enough support. Lancaster’s custody of Edward gave him leverage over Mortimer and Isabella, as he would always have the chance to hold Edward’s possible return to the throne over their heads if they annoyed him, which they foolishly went out of their way to do. Lancaster, head of the regency council and Edward III’s legal guardian, wielded little if any power in the government, while Isabella made sure that his access to his great-nephew the king was minimal.

Therefore, the former king had to be removed from Lancaster’s custody and given to men whom Isabella and Mortimer could trust. The men they selected as Edward’s new guardians were Thomas, Lord Berkeley, and Berkeley’s brother-in-law, Sir John Maltravers, neither of whom had any reason to love Edward of Caernarfon. Berkeley, now probably in his early thirties and married to Mortimer’s eldest daughter Margaret, had been imprisoned in 1322 and seen his lands given to Hugh Despenser and plundered, while his father died in prison as a Contrariant. Maltravers was about thirty-seven and had spent years in exile on the Continent after Boroughbridge with Mortimer, although his father of the same name stayed in England and remained loyal to Edward.

On 3 April 1327, custody of the former king of England was transferred to Berkeley and Maltravers, who were appointed as Edward’s guardians with joint and equal responsibility for his safety.
²
The chronicler Henry Knighton suggested a few decades later that Lancaster gave up custody of Edward voluntarily, but it is most unlikely that he would willingly have surrendered such a powerful political weapon.
³
Although an indenture was drawn up on 21 March, the fact that Roger Mortimer waited near Kenilworth with an armed force during the transfer from Lancaster to Berkeley and Maltravers is telling, and the following year, Lancaster accused Mortimer of taking Edward from him by force.
⁴
It seems probable that Lancaster had been coerced, or tricked, or manipulated. There was another, perhaps even more pressing, reason to remove Edward from Kenilworth. Although the event is shrouded in obscurity, it seems that in March 1327, some supporters of Edward attempted to free him from Kenilworth Castle.
⁵
They failed, not surprisingly – Kenilworth was probably the most secure stronghold in the country – but this plot, combined with the doubts Mortimer and Isabella had over Henry of Lancaster, convinced them to move Edward. With a large armed escort, Thomas Berkeley and John Maltravers left Kenilworth and took Edward the few dozen miles to Berkeley’s castle, in the Gloucestershire village of Berkeley.
⁶

Geoffrey le Baker a few years later wrote a highly colourful and highly improbable account of Edward’s journey to Berkeley, claiming that his captors tormented him by crowning him with hay, forcing him to shave with cold ditchwater and eat poisoned food, clothing him in rags despite the cold, not allowing him to sleep despite his exhaustion, jeering at him and trying to make him believe that he was mad. Baker’s account of Edward’s imprisonment at Berkeley in 1327 is well known and often repeated as certain fact: he claims that Edward was kept in a cell near a deep pit containing rotting animal corpses, his jailers hoping that the stench and the contagion would kill him.
⁷
It is impossible to take Baker’s allegations seriously. (Unfortunately, many writers
have
taken them seriously.) Baker was not writing history, but hagiography; by the middle of the fourteenth century, when he wrote his chronicle, the popular, albeit highly implausible, campaign to have Edward canonised as a saint was well underway, and Baker’s intention was to portray him as a Christlike figure nobly suffering the torments of lesser men, the ‘satraps of Satan’ as he memorably called them: the Passion of Edward of Caernarfon.
⁸
Baker was keen to blame Isabella, whom he calls ‘Jezebel’ and ‘the iron virago’, for Edward’s supposed torments, yet there is nothing to suggest that she would have allowed her husband to be subjected to such inhuman treatment. And although Edward III was only fourteen, he would grow up and one day take over the governance of his kingdom, and would not take kindly to allegations that his father’s custodians had tortured and tormented him. In later years, Edward III neither accused Thomas Berkeley and John Maltravers of mistreating his father, nor Roger Mortimer of ordering the torment, as he surely would have done had Baker’s stories had any substance in fact. It was stated that Edward would ‘be looked after as was appropriate for such a lord’ and ‘honestly kept for the rest of his life, according to his estate’, which means with all the respect and deference due to a man who was the son, grandson and father of kings, not abused and mistreated as a common criminal.
⁹

All the available evidence suggests that Edward was in fact well treated during his incarceration at Berkeley. An entry on the Close Roll refers to the expenses of himself and his household, meaning that he had servants attending him, and castle records show that his custodians bought wine, cheese, capons, beef and eggs for him, and wax for his candles. He also had access to a chapel.
¹⁰
That Edward’s guardians bought expensive wax, not the much cheaper tallow, is indirect proof that they were treating him well, and they would hardly have provided candles had they been intending to kill him by incarcerating him near a pit containing animal corpses, as Baker claims. Although we cannot prove conclusively that Edward received the items bought for him, there is no reason at all to think that he didn’t.
¹¹
Berkeley and Maltravers were given an enormous five pounds a day for Edward’s upkeep, and on 15 May 1327 were given £500 for his expenses.
¹²
Adam Murimuth says that although Thomas Berkeley welcomed Edward kindly and treated him well, John Maltravers behaved with ‘much harshness’ towards him. As Murimuth believed, wrongly, that Maltravers was one of Edward’s murderers, his testimony on this point is rather suspect, however. He also states that Berkeley and Maltravers switched custody of Edward, each man taking responsibility for a month, which may be true but is uncorroborated by other sources.
¹³
Jean Froissart, who visited Berkeley Castle in 1366 with Hugh Despenser’s grandson Edward Despenser, says that Lord Berkeley ‘was urged to take good care of him, with orders to give him all honourable service and attention and to place court officials round him who were familiar with their duties, but never to allow him to leave the castle precincts’.
¹⁴
Although Froissart is an unreliable source for Edward’s reign, this account is borne out by other evidence. An anonymous fourteenth-century chronicle claims that carpenters working on the castle heard Edward moaning and groaning, which may indicate that he was being mistreated – but is far more likely to mean only that Edward, a highly emotional man at the best of times, was feeling the depths of despair at this, the worst of times.
¹⁵

Isabella kept in touch with Edward at Berkeley, sending him affectionate letters enquiring after his health and comfort, and gifts of fine clothes, linen, delicacies and little luxuries.
¹⁶
This implies that she still had feelings for him; after all, there was no reason for her to write to Edward and send him gifts unless she wanted to. Geoffrey le Baker claims that Edward begged Isabella in tears to allow him to see his children, but she, ‘whose heart was harder than stone … that woman of iron’, refused; however, Baker’s hatred of Isabella and attempts to portray Edward as a long-suffering saint make his testimony unreliable. Even if the story is true, this does not automatically mean that Isabella acted out of cruelty towards her husband, but perhaps out of a desire to spare their children – who, Edward III excepted, were only ten, eight and five – the distress of seeing their once-powerful father cast so low.

At some unknown date in 1327, Thomas Berkeley appointed Thomas Gurney to share custody of Edward of Caernarfon with himself and John Maltravers. Gurney was a knight of Somerset and a distant cousin of the Berkeleys.
¹⁷
He had briefly been a household knight of Edward II in 1318, but held on to his connections with the Berkeleys: he took the side of the Marchers during the Despenser War, and was ordered to be arrested – with John Maltravers – in February 1322. He was imprisoned in the Tower of London then pardoned in return for a fine of £100, and his lands were restored.
¹⁸
Gurney petitioned Edward for permission to pay off his fine in ten-mark instalments, fought for him in Gascony, and in March 1326, was pardoned again for his adherence to the Contrariants.
¹⁹
Presumably, however, Gurney joined the invasion forces of Queen Isabella and Roger Mortimer in the autumn of 1326. Unlike the families of some other Contrariants, Gurney’s wife and children were not imprisoned, and although he had no particular reason to love Edward of Caernarfon, neither did he have any reason to bear him deadly hatred.

A poem in French called ‘The Lament of Edward II’ dates to 1327 or shortly afterwards. Although once believed to have been written by Edward himself, this is unlikely, and it was most probably composed by one of his supporters soon after his deposition.
²⁰
In the Lament, Edward shows much repentance for his many transgressions, and the poem also has him declaring, with reference to Isabella, ‘God! How much I loved the fair one; but now the spark of true love is gone out, so that my joy is fled’. This may not, of course, represent Edward’s true feelings, but it does show that, within months of his deposition, a writer saw nothing strange in portraying him as deeply in love with his wife and desperately unhappy at losing her. Geoffrey of Paris, who saw Edward and Isabella during their visit to France in 1313, also found nothing peculiar in stating that Edward loved and desired her. Their marriage of nearly twenty years was far more complex and interesting than it is usually depicted nowadays: as little more than a disaster from start to finish with an indifferent Edward constantly neglecting and punishing his long-suffering queen, who detests him and aims at his downfall and death for years on end.

While Edward languished comfortably at Berkeley Castle, Isabella and her favourite ruled England on behalf of the teenage Edward III. Having invaded England on a platform of liberating the country from greed and tyranny, Isabella granted herself the huge annual income of 20,000 marks, or £13,333, on the day of her son’s coronation, the largest income anyone in England (kings excepted) received during the entire Middle Ages and more than 20 per cent higher than the income her enormously wealthy uncle Thomas of Lancaster had received from five earldoms. It amounted to a third of the entire annual royal revenue.
²¹
She also awarded herself cash grants of £31,843 between December 1326 and January 1327, supposedly to pay her debts abroad – which had in fact been paid already – and appropriated much of the inheritance which belonged to her uncle Henry of Lancaster and to which she had no right.
²²
The cash grants amounted to seven years of her pre-September 1324 income. And the rapidity with which queen and Mortimer spent money is truly astonishing. Edward II left just under £62,000 in his treasury in November 1326, swollen by the forfeitures of the Despensers and the earl of Arundel to nearly £80,000.
²³
By 1 December 1330, a few days after Mortimer’s execution, a derisory forty-one pounds was left.
²⁴

The
French Chronicle of London
comments, ‘The queen, Lady Isabel, and Sir Roger Mortimer, assumed to themselves royal power over many of the magnates of England and of Wales, and retained the treasures of the land themselves, and kept the young king wholly in subjection to themselves.’ It further comments that Edward III realised that he had unwise counsel and that his realm was at the point of being lost, and the people too.
²⁵
The
Brut
says, ‘There was much loss and harm to all England; for the king and all the lords that should govern him were governed and ruled after [i.e. by] the king’s mother Dame Isabel and by Sir Roger the Mortimer.’ The chronicler also says that because of Isabella and Mortimer’s counsel ‘many harms, shames and reproofs have fallen unto the king’ and criticises the way they wasted Edward II’s treasure. Within a very short time, Isabella forfeited all her popularity of 1326: ‘began the community of England to hate Isabel the queen, that so much loved her when she came to pursue the false traitors the Despensers from France’, the
Brut
continues.
²⁶
Isabella’s toleration of her favourite’s discourteous behaviour towards her son does not reflect well on her: she allowed Mortimer to remain seated in the king’s presence, to walk ahead of him, and to tell Edward’s friends that they owed loyalty to him rather than to the king. As Edward II had allowed his favourite Despenser to treat Isabella with disrespect, so she allowed her favourite Mortimer to treat her son with disrespect. As Despenser had persuaded Edward to confiscate Isabella’s lands and reduce her income to lessen her political influence, so she kept her son short of money for the same reason. And as she had hidden her hatred of the Despensers, Edward III hid his hatred of Mortimer, while gathering about himself men with whom he could overthrow his mother’s detested favourite. By 1330, most of Isabella and Mortimer’s allies had turned from them in disgust: instead of the king and his ruthless greedy Marcher lord, the kingdom now suffered the queen and her ruthless greedy Marcher lord, hardly a great improvement. Edward III launched a coup against his mother and Mortimer at Nottingham Castle on 19 October 1330, shortly before his eighteenth birthday, and began ruling his kingdom himself, to the great relief of his subjects.