Georgette Heyer

Copyright © 1973 by Georgette Heyer

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Heyer, Georgette.

My Lord John / Georgette Heyer.

p. cm.

“’A vous entière’ motto of John, Duke of Bedford.”

1. Bedford, John Plantagenet, Duke of, 1389-1435—Fiction. 2. Great Britain—History—House of Lancaster, 1399-1461—Fiction. 3. Nobility—Great Britain—Fiction. I. Title.

PR6015.E795M9 2008

823’.912—dc22

2009001207

Printed and bound in the United States of America.

VP 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

The fame of my wife, Georgette Heyer, rests largely upon her historical novels, particularly those of the Regency period. But this was not her own favourite: she preferred what she called ‘armour’, the Middle Ages. She was especially attracted to that period of English history when the House of Lancaster was at its peak, from about 1393 to 1435.

Some years ago she planned a work, a trilogy, to illustrate this period, taking John, Duke of Bedford, the younger and most trusted brother of Henry V, as its central character, for his lifespan covered the whole period, and because he was a great man though not today a well-known character. With his death the decay of the Lancastrian line set in.

Her research was enormous and meticulous. She was a perfectionist. She studied every aspect of the period – history, wars, social conditions, manners and customs, costume, armour, heraldry, falconry, and the chase. She drew genealogies of all the noble families of England (with their own armorial bearings painted on each) for she believed that the clues to events were to be found in their relationships. She had indexed files for every day of the year for the forty years she was covering with all noteworthy events duly entered on their dates. She learnt to read medieval English almost as easily as modern and amassed a large vocabulary. One summer we toured the Scottish–English borderlands, learning the country and visiting seventy-five castles and twenty-three abbeys (or their ruins). Her notes fill volumes.

For the work, as she planned it, she needed a period of about five years of single-minded concentration. But this was not granted to her. The penal burden of British taxation, coupled with the clamour of her readers for a new book, made her break off to write another Regency story. After such a break it was hard to recapture the spirit of her main work and it required a good deal of labour to refresh her knowledge. After this had happened a second time, she laid her manuscript aside, foreseeing that at least two more such interruptions would inevitably recur before she could complete the work. So a great historical novel was never finished.

She had, however, completed nearly a third of the whole work, which is now reproduced in this book. The period covered is from 1393 to 1413, almost identical with the period of Shakespeare’s
Richard II
and the two parts of
Henry IV
. The first three parts here were finalised by her. The fourth, unfinished, is from her rough draft: this has necessitated some editing.

The historian, A. J. Froude, in his famous purple passage declared that it was not possible for us to grasp the medieval mind. This is probably true. But it may be that, in this work, Georgette Heyer has come closer to bridging the gap than anyone else has done.

G. R. Rougier

The Characters

Richard II, King of England 1377–1399 (Cousin Richard)
. Son of Edward, the Black Prince (d. 1376), eldest son of King Edward III, and Joan, the Fair Maid of Kent

Anne of Bohemia
, his first wife

Isabelle of France,
his second wife

Lancaster

John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, Duke of Aquitaine (Bel sire, M. d’Espagne, M. de Guyenne)
, the King’s uncle, third son of King Edward III

Constanza of Castile (Spanish Grandmother)
, his second wife

Katherine Swynford
, his mistress, later his third wife

Henry of Bolingbroke, Earl of Derby, later Duke of Hereford, later King Henry IV
, his eldest son

Mary Bohun
, Henry of Bolingbroke’s first wife

Henry (Harry)
, their eldest son

Thomas
, their second son

John
, their third son

Humfrey
, their fourth son

Blanche
, their eldest daughter

Philippa
, their youngest daughter

Joanna of Brittany
, Henry of Bolingbroke’s second wife

York

Edmund of Langley, Duke of York
, the King’s uncle, fourth son of King Edward III

Edward, Earl of Rutland, later Duke of Aumâle, later Duke of York
, his eldest son

Richard of Coningsburgh
, his younger son

Constance
, his daughter, wife of Thomas Despenser

Gloucester

Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester
, the King’s uncle, fifth son of King Edward III

Eleanor Bohun
, his wife

Humfrey
, his son

Mortimer

Roger Mortimer, Earl of March
, grandson of Lionel, Duke of Clarence, second son of King Edward III

Edmund, later Earl of March
, his eldest son

Roger
, his younger son

Sir Edmund
, his brother, later married Owen Glendower’s daughter in Wales

Beaufort

John Beaufort, later Earl of Somerset, later Marquis of Dorset
, eldest son of John of Gaunt and Katherine Swynford

Margaret Holland
, his wife

Henry, later Bishop of Lincoln, later Bishop of Winchester
, his brother

Thomas
, his brother

Joan
, his sister, later married Ralph Neville, Earl of Westmoreland

Holland

John Holland, Earl of Huntingdon, later Duke of Exeter
, son of the King’s mother, Joan of Kent, by her third marriage

Bess
, his wife, daughter of John of Gaunt

Thomas, Earl of Kent, later Duke of Surrey
, his nephew

Margaret
, Thomas’s sister, later married John Beaufort

Edmund
, Thomas’s son

Arundel

Richard Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel

Thomas Fitzalan
,
later Earl of Arundel
, his son

Thomas (Archbishop Arundel), Archbishop of York, later Archbishop of Canterbury
, his brother

Joan, Dowager Countess of Hereford
, his sister, Mary and Eleanor Bohun’s mother, Henry of Bolingbroke’s mother-in-law

Warwick

Thomas Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick

Richard, later Earl of Warwick
, his son

Neville

Ralph Neville of Raby, later Earl of Westmoreland

Joan Beaufort
, his second wife

Sir John Neville
, his eldest son by his first marriage

Thomas, Lord Furnivall
, his brother

Percy

Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland (the Fox)

Henry (Hotspur)
, his son

Thomas, Earl of Worcester
, his brother

Mowbray

Thomas Mowbray, Earl of Nottingham, later Duke of Norfolk

Thomas, later Earl of Nottingham
, his eldest son

John
, his younger son

The Countess of Norfolk
, a remote cousin of Henry of Bolingbroke, grandmother of Thomas Mowbray

Sir Hugh Waterton
, governor of Henry of Bolingbroke’s children

Sir Robert Waterton
, his cousin, constable of Pontefract Castle

Thomas Swynford
, Katherine Swynford’s son by her first marriage

Sir Robert Umfraville
, a friend of Ralph Neville

Gilbert
, his nephew

John Talbot
, a friend of Harry’s

John Oldcastle, later Lord Cobham
, a friend of Harry’s

Henry Scrope of Masham
, a friend of Harry’s
Richard (Archbishop Scrope), Archbishop of York
, his uncle

Reginald Grey of Ruthin
, a friend of Henry of Bolingbroke

Master Chaucer
, a scrivener

Messire de Froissart
, a canon of Chimay

In France

Charles VI, King of France

Isabeau
, his wife

Louis, Duke of Orleans
, his brother

Charles, later Duke of Orleans
, Louis of Orleans’ son

Philip, Duke of Burgundy
, the King’s uncle

John (the Fearless), later Duke of Burgundy
, Philip of Burgundy’s son

John of Montfort, Duke of Brittany

Joanna
, his third wife

In Scotland

Robert III, King of Scotland

James, later James I of Scotland
, his son

Robert, Duke of Albany
, his brother,
later Regent after Robert’s death in 1406

In Wales

Owen Glendower (Prince of Wales)
, leader of the Welsh forces

Part I

Richard the Redeless

(1393–1399)

Ther is no hye estate so sadde and stable,Remember wele, lat it not be forgete,

But he to falle in perile is ful able.

Hoccleve: Regement of Princes