The Last Knight Errant: Sir Edward Woodville & the Age of Chivalry (28 page)

No attempt was made to minimize the difficulties and the report started from the premise that the claim would be so unpopular in the duchy that success was doubtful. Even if the Breton nobles could be persuaded to accept French claims, the exercise would be pointless as the nobles were unreliable. The conclusion was to use overwhelming force to take the duchy.

Landois was well aware of French aspirations and had been working hard at a new alliance. He had signed up Maximilian of Austria, Regent of Burgundy and recently elected King of the Romans, and was hopeful of Spain and England. He had allies within France itself, as Brittany was providing refuge to a cousin of the French King, Duke Louis d’Orléans, ‘a young prince and very handsome but much addicted to his pleasures’.3 Orléans was a natural athlete in his mid-20s, next in line to the French throne but a leader of the Feudal League, a group of disgruntled nobles. He had recently tested the Regent’s power, lost and fled to Brittany.

Anne de Beaujeu had dealt with the Feudal League and Maximilian’s military incursions, she had neutralized England by aiding Henry Tudor and now turned her attention to Brittany. The opposition needed little encouragement and the Marshal de Rieux executed a palace revolution. Landois was caught and hanged, the Marshal took over government and immediately signed a friendship treaty with France. This fuelled the argument about the duchy’s future and who should marry the heiress (according to Voltaire she was ‘one of the finest women in her time and in love with the Duke d’Orléans’).

Landois had wanted Orléans to marry her, although he was already married – against his wishes – to his crippled cousin, King Charles’s younger sister. The Duke liked the widowed Maximilian of Austria, while de Rieux, now effectively the chief minister, supported Alain d’Albret, the head of a powerful Gascon family, whose late wife was a distant cousin of the Duke.4 But d’Albret, known as ‘Le Grand’, was old (48), ugly and had a nasty reputation.

Once de Rieux was in power he suddenly understood France’s territorial aspirations. He thought he could re-negotiate the friendship treaty by writing to the Regent and telling her a new arrangement was needed. If she would not agree then, ‘He would regard his promises as dissolved and deem himself free to terminate his friendship with the King.’ To this the Regent sent the splendid reply, ‘The King of France has no friends and will have Brittany.’ 5

Duke Francis appealed for English help, which put King Henry in a difficult position. While Brittany had been his refuge for ten years of exile, it was France that had actively helped him take the crown; indeed the Regent had provided the money and the men that gave him the throne. So, in Vergil’s words, ‘between these two extreme calls on his goodwill he decided for a time to hold a middle course’.

At the very least, the Regent would have extracted an unequivocal commitment to neutrality over Brittany. On the other hand, as King of England it was not in his interests for Brittany to become part of France. Fortunately he did not have to commit himself, as the Regent ‘cunningly’ asked him to mediate between the two.

David Hume, the eighteenth-century Scottish historian, believed it was Bernard Stewart who was sent to London to persuade Henry to mediate. Stewart had provided 1,000 Scots infantry for the invasion and was in a strong position to persuade Henry, who agreed and commissioned the ubiquitous Christopher Urswick to find a diplomatic solution.

The last French attack had been a probe against Nantes just three days after the battle of Stoke (19 June 1487). France had already taken Vannes, Dinan, Châteaubriant and Ancenis but Nantes had not yielded by the autumn, so the French army withdrew to their winter quarters. In March the Marshal de Rieux woke them up with a series of surprise attacks and re-captured all four places. The Regent and her Minister of War were not pleased and decided the time had come to sort out the question of Brittany. This marked the start of the so-called ‘Mad War’.

They prepared a full-scale invasion. Louis de la Trémoille was appointed commander-in-chief with instructions to take the whole duchy. He was 28, methodical and a first-rate strategist who was to become one of France’s great generals. This was his first major command.

Coincidental to the French preparations, Ambassador Urswick set out for Paris and Rennes on his mission of reconciliation while King Ferdinand of Spain and envoys from Brittany urged King Henry and their English friends to take firm action. Urswick found the Regent very receptive to the offer of mediation, which was ‘readily embraced’. However, his reception in Brittany was less enthusiastic.

He was reminded that the Duke had acted as protector and guardian to Henry during his youth and adverse fortune. He expected from ‘a monarch of such virtue’ proper aid and assistance in his present difficulties. But all he was getting was ‘a barren offer of mediation’. That would not stop the French army. If Henry’s gratitude was insufficient, then his prudence, as King of England, should make him well aware of ‘the pernicious consequences attending a French conquest of Brittany’.6

Urswick reported this to King Henry but they concluded that, with more time, the Bretons might accept a negotiated settlement. So back went Urswick for more negotiations. Some time around then King Henry was staying with Edward in his castle of Carisbrooke7 where the main subject of discussion must have been the deteriorating situation in Brittany and the fact that Urswick was making little progress.

King Henry had been playing for time but it is not clear what he hoped to achieve by this; perhaps he hoped the problem would solve itself. He and Urswick must have known that the Regent was dissembling in Paris while her army prepared for war. In Brittany Duke Francis was ill so it was the Duke d’Orléans who spoke to Urswick. He was furious with his cousin, the Regent, who had out-manoeuvred him. He wanted war – no compromise for him. It may have been unconnected but at about this time King Henry ordered the construction of two new big Tower ships, each to be 600 tons, one of them to be built at Southampton.8

Foreign policy may have been difficult but life at the English court was undisturbed. The King ran the country and dealt with a predictable range of problems, petitions and so forth. It is good to see William Slater reappearing in the records on his appointment as a Yeoman of the Crown. Furthermore one recent proposal interested the King: it was the offer from Christopher Columbus to sail westward to India under the English flag. He sent his brother, Bartholomew, who arrived in February 1488, for an audience with the King. An almost immediate audience meant he had a powerful friend at court and Edward is the likeliest candidate.9 Perhaps Edward had met Christopher in Cordoba, as they were both there at the same time, or he could have overlapped with Bartholomew in Lisbon.

According to Hakluyt, the King was taken with the plan and ‘accepted the offer with joyful countenance’. He dispatched Bartholomew to bring his brother to England. But Bartholomew got lost for six years, by which time Queen Isabella had commissioned his brother, ‘and so the West Indies by providence were thus reserved for the Crown of Castilia’.10

Meanwhile all was not well in Brittany. The situation suddenly deteriorated, the French recaptured and razed Châteaubriant and Ancenis, then moved on to besiege Fougères and St Aubin. Maximilian of Austria, the Duke’s ally and Regent of Burgundy, was unable to help because he was imprisoned by the burghers in Bruges, one of his daughter’s cities.

Duke Francis, recovering from yet another bout of insanity, was in despair. If Maximilian could not help, then English help was critical. He sent two special envoys to King Henry who arrived on ‘St George’s even’. They were in time for the investiture of new Knights of the Garter and the attendant celebrations.

On 27 April 1488 ‘Sir Edward Wydville called Lord Wydville’ was formally invested with the Order of the Garter. In those days the garter was of light blue silk and the members wore the velvet surcoat, mantle and hood. Edward became one of the 25 members and his coat of arms was now circled with the garter (the near contemporary depiction of his coat of arms does not include the scallop of Scales).11

Bosworth had made vacancies in the ranks of the Order and Henry had appointed six new knights while Edward was away in Spain (the Earl of Oxford, Sir John Cheyne, Lord Dynham, Giles Daubeny, Sir William Stanley and Lord Strange); then, ‘after 30 September 1487’, Edward and the Earl of Shrewsbury were appointed and installed on 27 April 1488.12 Certainly Edward was a paladin, one of the trusted friends of the King.

It was a splendid ceremony, followed by matins and then a dinner where the nine knights present had their own special table: ‘that day the hall was marvellously ordered and served’. The next day saw a parade where the knights made offerings: ‘Lord Wodvile his helm and crest’ (which was standard). There was then a further mass. The herald reported13 and also recorded the special song used for the celebration:

England now rejoice, for joyous may thou be,

To see thy king so flowering in dignity.

O most noble king, thy fame doth spring

and so forth for some 50 lines to:

Much people present to see thee, King Henry.

Wherefore, now Saint George, all we pray to thee,

To keep our sovereign in his dignity.

A few days after the ceremony the two Breton envoys were, at last, able to see the King. One was Guillaume Guillemet, who had been the envoy sent to England in 1472 to explain to King Edward IV that Henry Tudor could not be handed over to him. ‘Why not?’ King Edward asked. Guillaume’s answer was simple. Duke Francis had given his promise of protection and that was sacrosanct. He would also have brought messages from his brother who had been Henry’s guardian for seven years. The envoys now pleaded for English help.

The language of the Bretons and the Welsh is similar so there would have been sympathy and much talk in the mother tongue around the corridors of court. The envoys would have reiterated the case that honour demanded action and, if that was not enough, England’s defence required it. Henry reluctantly decided he could not or would not help. Hume says that he was ‘desirous of preserving the appearance of strict neutrality’. Instead he sent an order to all ports prohibiting any Englishman, on pain of death, from leaving the country without his express permission, which was noted by the French with satisfaction – they were having their pound of flesh.

Sir Edward Woodville KG disagreed with King Henry, doubtless reminding his monarch of debts and honour owed to Duke Francis. Vergil reported that ‘Edward Wdeuyll, brother of King Edward’s wife Elizabeth, an impetuous man, trained to bear arms and incapable of languishing in idleness, besought King Henry for permission to lead a small band of soldiers to the aid of the Bretons’, and asked for leave ‘to try a fall with the old enemy’ (Edward’s own reported words).

Edward Hall, the Elizabethan historian, recounts: ‘Sir Edward, Lord Woodville, uncle to the Queen, a valiant captain and bold champion, either abhorring ease and idleness or inflamed with ardent loyalty and affection towards the duke of Brittany, desired very earnestly of King Henry that he, with a convenient number of good men of war, should transport himself to Brittany to aid and defend Duke Francis, the King’s good friend.’

Edward understood the King’s problem and proposed stealing away privately ‘without licence or passport’. But King Henry was still confident that peace could be made by political persuasion and by ‘the wise intentions of his elected Ambassadors’. He would not agree to Edward’s ‘hot, hasty and wild desire’. ‘Yet, Lord Woodville, despite being forbidden by the King, could not rest and determined to make his own arrangements without the King knowing. The King strictly prohibited Woodville from attempting any such enterprise but he [Edward] went straight to the Isle of Wight, of which he was ruler and captain, and there gathered together a crew of 400 tall and hardy men.’

But this is only part of the story. The Breton ambassadors decided not to press the matter with the King, an odd decision in the circumstances. Instead they left court and went straight to the Isle of Wight where they met Edward in the first week of May. We do not know if King Henry agreed to support the Bretons by covertly turning a blind eye to Edward’s plans or if Edward really did disobey his king.

Whatever happened, there was a serious ruction and Edward stalked off to the Isle of Wight where the Breton ambassadors found him. They provided Edward with ‘funds in silver’ to buy arms, munitions and equipment and recruit men. They told him that four Breton ships would be ready at the Isle of Wight on 20 May, two weeks later. Events were moving fast.

Two weeks is a very short time to find 400 men and dress them for war. Edward started recruiting. It is locally recorded that he ‘selected 40 men at arms and 400 of the strongest from among the common people, whom he armed with pikes, bows and arrows and dressed them in white tunics bearing the red-cross’. In all probability many of them were Edward’s troops from his old campaigns, but some were locally recruited, including one boy, ‘Diccon Cheke of Mottiston’, who went as Edward’s page.

At the same time, William Paston, the contemporary letter writer, was reporting what he knew to his brother:

It was said that Lord Woodville and others would go over to Brittany to help the Duke. I cannot tell you about that but on hearing the rumour many men went to wait for him [presumably they liked ‘the valiant captain and bold champion’] at Southampton where it was said he would take ship.

When Woodville was refused permission, those that were there still waited in the hope there would be a licence [to go to Brittany]. Once they knew there was no likelihood of a licence, two hundred of them boarded a Breton ship that had just come over with salt. They told the master to take them to Brittany.