Warring cousins

One of the many side-dramas of the Montfortian era in England was the bitter ongoing feud between the Lord Edward (later Edward I) and Robert de Ferrers, 6^th earl of Derby (1239-79). These men were cousins, and very alike in some ways: both were ambitious, belligerent, full of energy and willing to stoop to low methods to gain their ends. They differed in that Edward learned from his mistakes, while Robert seemed intent on compounding his.

The arms of the 6th earl

The origins of their feud are debatable. It may have stemmed from Edward’s sale of his cousin’s wardship to the queen and Peter of Savoy in 1257, though such transactions were not uncommon. Equally it may have stemmed from mere personal animosity between men who were too similar to endure each other’s presence. Whatever the case, it soon led to conflict.

Robert struck first. In 1263, when the whole of England was on the verge of civil war, he attacked and captured three of Edward’s castles. Which ones are not stated, though Robert probably focused on ravaging his kinsman’s estates in Derbyshire and the High Peak country. In early February he turned south and sacked Worcester, destroying both the town and the Jewry. On 5 March he almost had Edward cornered at Gloucester, but the latter managed to slide out of the trap by tricking Henry de Montfort into accepting a truce. Robert was so furious at Henry’s gullibility he ‘struck in his spurs’ and galloped off back to the north country.

Chartley castle

A few weeks later, after the royalist victory at Northampton, Edward went on the offensive. He blazed through Robert’s lands in Derbyshire, throwing down castles and extorting protection money from the earl’s tenants. This was part of a two-pronged campaign: at the same time Edward’s ally, Prince Dafydd of Wales, led an army of Marchers over the border to ravage the Ferrers estates in Staffordshire. Robert was in London with Earl Simon, apparently unwilling or unable to defend his lands.

The wheel of fortune took another dramatic spin at the Battle of Lewes on 14 May, where Edward and his father, Henry III, were captured. This enabled Robert to launch a counter-offensive and chase Dafydd back into Wales. He was then attacked from an unexpected quarter. In December Earl Simon summoned Robert to London to answer ‘divers trespasses’ in the king’s name. He duly turned up and was thrown into the Tower. Either Robert’s actions had got out of hand, or Simon used them as a pretext to imprison the earl and seize his lands.

After Simon’s death at Evesham in August 1265, Robert was handed an opportunity to redeem his fortunes. Both Henry and Edward were willing to take him back into the fold, and he was offered a royal pardon. For reasons that are still unclear, Robert threw the offer back in their faces and went back into rebellion. He and his allies were defeated at Chesterfield in May 1266, where Robert didn’t exactly cover himself in glory. He was discovered hiding under a pile of woolsacks in a local church, and sent to prison at Windsor in a cage mounted on a wagon.

In 1269, after three years of captivity, Robert was swindled out of his inheritance. In one of the great medieval stitch-ups, the king and his sons forced the earl to sign away his lands under impossible terms of recovery. They were granted to Henry’s second son, Edmund, who became Earl of Lancaster. This formed the basis of the great Duchy of Lancaster enjoyed by John of Gaunt, Henry of Bolingbroke et al.

In a later age Robert’s head would have decorated a pike on Tower Bridge. Instead his life was spared. After the death of Henry III and Edward’s departure on crusade, the now-landless earl mustered his followers and tried to recover his lands by force. In 1271 he briefly occupied one of his estates in Berkshire, only to be driven away by Edmund of Lancaster. Two years later he popped up again in Staffordshire and stormed Chartley Castle, one of his old strongholds.

England was now threatened with another civil war. Robert gained the support of Earl Warenne and Earl Gilbert de Clare, while his lieutenant Roger Godberd waged a guerilla campaign in the Midlands. Ferrers loyalists in the High Peak launched attacks on Nottingham, and swore an oath to kill Edward when he returned to England. The situation was rescued by the prompt action of the regents. Edmund and his colleagues Roger Mortimer and Reynold Grey raced north to crush the northern conspiracy, and in 1274 Chartley was retaken in a brutal assault that slaughtered most of Robert’s surviving followers.

The fugitive earl escaped into the wild. When Edward finally returned, the new king took a surprisingly conciliatory line. Instead of destroying his old foe, he allowed him to sue for his lands at law. Robert managed to regain the manor of Chartley (though not the castle, which was staffed by a royal garrison) and the manor of Holbrook in Derbyshire. Thus he redeemed a fragment of his inheritance, and regained a stake in the landed affairs of the realm. Robert was quiet for the rest of his days, which were short: he died of the gout in 1279, aged just forty.

Old resentments died hard among the medieval aristocracy. Robert’s heir, John Ferrers, spent his life lobbying unsuccessfully for the return of his father’s estates. Perhaps to get him out of the kingdom, Edward II made John seneschal of Gascony and packed him off to govern the duchy. This proved a disaster as John deliberately ill-treated the Gascon nobility in order to cause trouble for the king. Even Philip IV of France, no friend to the Plantagenet regime, was moved to declare:

“The said John de Ferrers, we learn, behaves thus because just as the late king of England disinherited the said John’s father, so he wishes to disinherit his and our son Edward II, but may this enterprise, with God’s help, not succeed; but, if it is true, let him perish in his iniquity”.

Philip’s wish came true. The Gascon gentry had a straightforward method of dealing with oppressive outsiders, and arranged to have John murdered. He died of ‘noxious poison’ in 1312, the luckless son of a luckless father.

The Robber Knight

I'm going to post a series of articles relating to my next novel, set during the Second Barons' War in 13th century England. The following concerns Sir Adam de Gurdun, one of several Robin Hood-type characters who infested the forests and highways of England during this period. Below the article are links to my author profiles and Goodreads account.

THE ROBBER KNIGHT - SIR ADAM DE GURDUN. By David Pilling

Sir Adam de Gurdun was a minor Hampshire knight who rose to brief fame during the Second Barons’ War in 1260s England. For three years he led a popular rebellion in Somerset, comprising peasants and clergymen as well as local knights, before taking to the forests at the head of a band of outlaws. He was finally tracked down and defeated in single combat by the Lord Edward and delivered into the custody of Edward’s mother, Eleanor of Provence. After a period of imprisonment, he was able to redeem his freedom and his estates after paying a severe fine, and spent the rest of his long life as a loyal Crown servant.

Adam hailed from a minor Hampshire landed family, though he rose in the world via military service and an advantageous marriage. A career soldier, he served Henry in Poitou (1242), Gascony (1253-4) and Wales (1257). On the latter campaign he served alongside Roger Mortimer of Wigmore, who was to prove Adam’s friend and nemesis in the future. In 1255 Adam married Constance, a member of the Venuz family in Hampshire. This connection brought him estates in Hampshire, Dorset and Gloucestershire, as well as a life-grant from his father-in-law of the lucrative keepership of Aliceholt and Woolmer forests.

Constance was an unlikely match for an obscure country knight. Her first husband, Robert de Pont de L’Arche, had died in 1246. His brother and heir, William, was an outlaw on Lundy Island wanted for the murder of a royal clerk. On Robert’s death Henry III seized the dead man’s estates after allocating dower lands to Constance, and in 1247 granted custody of the inheritance to his Poitevin half-brother, William de Valence. In 1252 William de Pont de L’Arche was finally captured and ‘received into the king’s peace’, only to sell his entire inheritance off to Valence at a knock-down sum under the most suspicious of circumstances. Valence paid William 1000 marks for the estate, though it was easily worth over £200 per annum. Land at this time normally sold for ten times its annual value, so Valence had clearly secured a tremendous bargain from William, who immediately vanishes from the record. Clearly unimpressed with the shady deal, Constance refused to remarry for ten years. King Henry had granted overlordship of her dower lands to Valence, and ordered Constance to take an oath of fealty to him ‘as her lord’ and swear not to marry without his consent. Despite this, Constance married Adam in 1255, apparently without Valence’s consent. Whatever secret history lies behind the unsanctioned wedding remains buried.

Adam was probably familiar, thanks to visiting Constance’s manor in Dorset, with local complaints since the 1250s over the king’s fiscal exactions and the tyranny of the Poitevins. These included the notorious Elias de Rabayn, Sheriff of Somerset and Devon and Keeper of Corfe Castle, and Aymer de Valence, William’s brother and bishop-elect of Winchester. Adam threw in his lot with Simon de Montfort and in 1263 was probably among the rebels who ‘rode with flags flying through the country plundering loyal subjects’. In mid-1263 he seized Dunster Castle, a hilltop fortress on the fringes of Exmoor. Dunster had been in the possession of Eleanor of Provence, Henry’s queen, since 1258, but was remote and probably undefended. Thus it made an ideal stronghold for rebels, and Adam was to garrison it for the next three years.

From Dunster, Adam launched attacks against royalists in Somerset. Some of his deeds have survived in the various court rolls. He broke into the manor of Sir Ralph de Bakeputz at Cheddar, smashing doors and windows and plundering goods and livestock to the value of £100; he raided the manors of Thomas de Audeham, another wealthy royalist, at Chiselborough and Norton, cutting down his woods and taking goods to the value of 200 marks. He also attacked and kidnapped royalist knights in person: one Walter de Matteresdune later complained that Adam had taken his armour and weapons, while the Somerset knight Sir Philip de Cantilupe was captured and ransomed.

Adam’s followers hailed from all over Dorset and Somerset and as far away as South Devon, possibly the result of him touring these areas in person to whip up support. After the Battle of Lewes government in the south-west was thrown into confusion, and uneasily divided between a type of military governor (Brian de Goviz), the sheriff (William de Staunton) and the Montfortian keepers of the castles at Bristol, Corfe and Dunster. Local peasants later complained that they had been forced into the service of Sir John de la Warr, the keeper of Bristol, and Sir Robert de Verdun, keeper of Corfe. No such complaints were lodged against Adam de Gurdun at Dunster, and it may be significant that his followers were described as his personal following rather than followers of de Montfort.

The presence of so many peasants in Adam’s company contrasts with the lack of wealthy and influential knights. A few, such as Sir Robert de Bingham, did spend time in his retinue but either strayed from it or were seconded by Adam back to the main Montfortian forces: Bingham, for instance, was captured by the royalists at the Battle of Northampton. Released after Lewes, he returned briefly to Dunster only to desert Adam’s service again, this time for good. Adam enjoyed greater support from the lesser gentry in Somerset, but more remarkable is the depth of his support from the peasantry and minor clergy. Amongst the poor men of his following we find the likes of Henry, son of the smith; William Herberd, whose worldly goods only amounted to 12 pence per annum; John Brun the potter, Thomas son of Hugh the cobbler, William the Carter - etc. The commoners of Minehead, Milverton, Chiselborough and Norton appear to have volunteered to join Adam, and fought for him with enthusiasm. One band of Milverton peasants slogged over forty miles west to fight for Adam in Devon at Barnstaple. Two priests were also later accused of ‘abetting’ Adam’s men, while his raiding band at Chiselborough and Norton included one ‘Robert le Clerc’, probably the local priest. The explanation for such loyalty may lie in Adam’s personal charisma, allied to his support for the Provisions of Oxford and the Montfortian reform movement. Records of Dorset government demonstrate the Provisions brought genuine relief to Somerset: the shrievalty was reformed, financial exactions reduced, legal reforms implemented. These were all good reasons for the local peasantry to rise in arms under an experienced fighting man who knew how to lead and organise.

Adam’s big moment came in June 1265, when the Montfortian regime was tottering. On 16^th June he was appointed Keeper of Lundy Island and on 28^th was ordered in the king’s name to repel rebels ‘raising new wars wherat the king is not a little moved and angered’. The crisis became acute when William de Valence and John de Warenne landed in Pembrokeshire with a force of mercenaries, and King Henry’s heir, the Lord Edward, escaped custody at Hereford to link up with Gilbert de Clare and Roger de Mortimer at Wigmore. In desperation, Montfort turned to Adam in the hope that he would be able to raise a fleet and prevent Valence from sailing down the Bristol Channel. In the event Adam was required to deal with a raiding force of Welshmen led by Sir William de Berkeley, a knight of ‘evil’ reputation. On 1^st August these men came across the Bristol Channel from Glamorgan and plundered Minehead. Adam rode out from Dunster to meet the raiders and drove them back into the sea with great slaughter, drowning their captain. His victory did the Montfortian cause little good. Montfort was already set on his disastrous course towards Evesham, and Berkeley’s raid may have been intended as no more than a distraction to prevent Montfortian forces leaving Somerset.

In the wake of the royalist victory at Evesham, Roger Mortimer of Wigmore came thundering into Somerset to retake Bristol, shore up his interests at Bridgewater and crush local rebels. One of his first targets was Dunster Castle, and by 22^nd August the stronghold had fallen. No details survive of the battle or siege, but it seems Adam abandoned the castle in the face of superior forces. Mortimer promptly seized Adam’s estates, while the outlaw and the remainder of his company retreated into the forests of Berkshire. They spent the next few months roaming between Berkshire and Bedfordshire and the Peak Forest in Derbyshire, before descending into Alton Wood near Hampshire. This was Adam’s old stamping ground, near his family estates.

His final defeat is recorded by several of major chroniclers of the day. By the spring of 1266 he had been joined by another Montfortian knight, Sir David de Uffington, and their company numbered eighty men. On 10^th May they raided the manor of Shortgrave and then returned to their hideout at Alton via the Chilterns, carrying away ‘all that they could’. They were betrayed by one Robert Chadde, a former follower turned spy, who had informed the Lord Edward of the location of Adam’s headquarters. Edward followed the raiders and attacked them in camp at Alton Wood. Sources differ on the precise details, but all agree that Edward engaged Adam in single combat. The Flores contains perhaps the most realistic account, stripped of chivalric gloss:

‘Who immediately the son of the king when encountering attacked alone, fighting manfully with the same Adam. But finally Adam surrendered wounded, his boldness commended him to Edward, ordering catchforms [blood catchers or bandages] to be placed near to the stabbed wounds, not thinking of him as the enemy, but he led him away just as a guest. Truly his companions he ordered to be hanged in the oaks of the wood.’

The fate of Adam’s followers was to be hanged en masse while their master was led away to honourable captivity. This was the punishment reserved for penniless commoners rather than aristocrats who could buy their way out of trouble. Edward sent his prisoner gift-wrapped to Eleanor of Provence, whose castle at Dunster the outlaw had occupied for so long. After a spell in prison Adam was able to redeem his estates for a hefty fine, and spent the rest of his days as an unremarkable Crown servant. He appears to have patched up his differences with Roger Mortimer, since the two appear together on a charter in 1270. Adam later served under Mortimer in the Montgomery command during the Welsh war of 1276-77. In 1280 he was made a Justice of the Forest, and in the 1290s made custos of the seashore in Hampshire and a commissioner of array in that county. He died in 1305, aged somewhere between 65 and 80.

Enjoyed this? You can find a list of my published works here:

https://www.amazon.com/David-Pilling/e/B0086PTSCW

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The Rebels of Ely

I haven't been active on here recently - very slack of me. The new book is taking up a lot of time, as well as research for future projects. I've also been busy on my new Facebook page devoted to the reign of King Edward I. Below is a link to the page (again) and one of the recent articles. I'll post more on here in the future.

King Edward I on Facebook

The Rebels of Ely 

The Second Barons’ War in England ended with the fall of the Isle of Ely in July 1267, almost two years after the Battle of Evesham. Henry III’s vengeful decision to disinherit all of Simon de Montfort’s surviving followers prolonged the civil war, which ought to have ended with the earl’s death. The king also seized the lands of of men who had never supported de Montfort in the first place. Thus Henry succeeded in driving approximately half the landowning class of England into armed rebellion.

Ely in Cambridgeshire had been a natural home for rebels and outlaws since the days of the Conqueror. A vast, waterlogged stretch of misty bog and fenland in Cambridgeshire, it was virtually impenetrable save to those who knew the paths. The baronial rebels first occupied the isle in April 1266, and used it as a base from which to plunder and ravage the surrounding countryside. They sacked Lincoln, where they destroyed the chests or ‘archa’ containing bonds of debts taken out from Jewish moneylenders. A number of Jewish moneylenders were murdered or kidnapped for ransom, their synagogues razed, and a hundred and sixty women and children murdered in the street.

Efforts by local militia to drive out the rebels met with disaster. Henry ordered the commons of the counties to blockade the isle and prevent the barons from making sorties. In response the barons rode out in force and drove the ‘vulgar herd’ - as Matthew Paris termed them - to flight, driving them as far as Norwich. There some of the rebel party split off to carry away loot and provisions from the town. A short while later, the people of Lynn offered to attack Ely if Henry would guarantee their liberties. This he promised to do, and the citizens manned vessels with crossbowmen, archers and men-at-arms to sail upriver and storm the isle. The wily barons saw the fleet coming and planted their standards on dry land. When the people of Lynn saw the standards, they leaped off their boats and charged. The barons pretended to retreat, then turned and closed on the citizens from all sides. Some were captured, many slaughtered or drowned, and only a few limped back to Lynn - where they were ‘received with derision.’

In the spring of 1267 the captain of the Ely rebels, John de Eyvill, left the isle to join Gilbert de Clare in the march on London. They succeeded in capturing the city, and for three months the capital of England was a rebel camp. Peace was brokered when King Henry and his son, the Lord Edward, threatened to lay siege. After some complex bartering de Eyvill and de Clare were pardoned in return for payments of money and land. The severest punishment fell on de Eyvill, who was mortgaged to the crown for the rest of his life and had to do military service in Wales as part of his redemption.

After the surrender of the barons in London, Ely was left as the only rebel fortress of any note. The captain of the isle was now Henry de Hastings, an interesting brute with a sense of humour. Hastings had led the epic defence of Kenilworth Castle, at 172 days the longest siege in English medieval history. During the siege, the papal legate had called upon the garrison to surrender. Hastings’ response was to dress up as a cardinal and stand on the battlements waving his arms in mockery of the legate’s piety. Less amusingly, when the king sent an envoy to treat for peace, Hastings cut off one of the envoy’s hands and sent him back with the severed hand in a box.

Other knights in the isle included the likes of Sir Robert Peche and Sir Ralph Perot. Neither were ideal house guests. Peche had won a reputation as one of the chief ravagers, burning farms and villages near Ely and robbing barns of their grain. He had also extorted protection money from the burgesses of Cambridge, promising to leave them alone in exchange for cash. Perot rode as far afield as the Priory of St Peter in Dunstable, where the chronicler gloomily notes he stole a horse from the mill, more horses from the town, and took ten marks as protection money.

Edward, in his role as firefighter, was sent to destroy this nest of robbers. Easier said than done. The Conqueror himself had experienced difficulty in reducing the isle, and suffered several embarrassing defeats before finally overcoming Hereward the Wake and his Saxons. Tales of Hereward’s last stand were still popular in the late 1200s. Paris describes how medieval sightseers were in the habit of visiting an old earthwork known as Hereward’s Castle at Aldreth: probably the remains of the fortress built by the Normans when they laid siege to Ely.

The prince marched on Ely and ordered his men to build a bridge of hurdles and planks. This sounds similar to the pontoon or floating bridge William the Conqueror had built to cross into the isle. Edward, who had some knowledge of military history, may have taken a leaf from the Bastard’s book. As king, he made use of pontoon bridges in his campaigns in North Wales, though the strategy didn’t always meet with success: in 1282, at Moel-y-Don near Anglesey, the bridge collapsed under weight of bodies and hundreds of his men were drowned.

At Ely the bridge was merely a distraction. While his men laboured on the construction, Edward rode to the monastery of Ramsey and gave the monks a pep-talk, encouraging them to stand firm against the rebels. Shortly afterwards he had a private meeting with an aged noblewoman, Lady Amabilia de Chaucumb.

An observer might have wondered what Edward was up to, with his bridge and his monks and his mysterious old lady. All soon became clear. Amabilia was the mother of Nicholas de Segrave, one of the baronial rebels who had submitted at London. Segrave had been a member of the Ely garrison, and after his surrender escaped from London and went back into the isle. It seems his escape was pre-arranged. While in the capital he struck a secret deal with Edward to betray his comrades, and the prince later met with his mother to make final arrangements.

There was one main path into the heart of the isle, defended by a stockade of earth and timber. Segrave persuaded Hastings to let him garrison it. When the pontoon bridge was complete, Edward crossed the water with a strong force of archers and crossbowmen. He was now faced with the stockade, guarded by Segrave. As agreed, Segrave and his men promptly abandoned their post and let the royalists pass. Edward moved on through the marshes until he arrived within sight of the rebel camp, divided from his men by a narrow rivulet.

The barons, astonished by the sudden appearance of enemy soldiers, rushed to arms. While they dragged on their armour, some bowmen and slingers were hurled forward to block the royalist advance. Meanwhile Edward placed his missile troops on high ground overlooking the camp, so they could shoot down on the heads of the rebel archers.

Seeing this, the rebels hesitated. Edward now rode forward and read out the riot act: “Any man who attacks my soldiers, or tries to stop me entering the isle, will die. Either now or after my victory. The guilty shall be hanged or beheaded.”

In the face of these threats, the barons wilted. “Consumed by sudden dismay,” according to the chronicler, they “immediately lost their indolent savageness, and walking with their heads lowered, assumed the meekness of a lamb.”

Perhaps the grim memory of Evesham was still fresh in their minds. The Leopard - as the baronial poets called Edward - had presided over one massacre. He could do it again. In the event there was no bloodshed. Edward accepted their surrender, and Hastings and the other knights were allowed to redeem their lands. Segrave was well rewarded for his treachery, and later became 1st Baron Segrave. He died in 1295, rich and respected. No doubt his mother would have approved.

The lesser members of the Ely garrison scattered to the four winds. Many continued to live as robbers, and the Dunstaple chronicle records the miserable fate of some of them. Giles of Dunstaple, Ambrose, Michael and some others left the country, to be ‘starved or hanged’ in other places. Henry Albemarle, who had robbed a mill, was hanged in France. John the clerk was excommunicated and killed in unknown circumstances at Oxford. His companions Jeffrey, Hugh and Robert were arrested and sent to Newgate prison for trial. Jeffrey died in custody and the others bribed the jury to let them off. Both were shortly arrested again in London. Hugh was hanged, and Robert died in prison.

The Soldier of Fortune cometh (again)

I interrupt my recent series of posts on Edward I and his wars in Wales to bring you news of my latest book. Titled Soldier of Fortune (II): The Heretic, this is the second of a planned trilogy following the adventures of Sir John Page, a semi-fictional English mercenary or 'soldier of fortune' in the early to mid-15th century. 

Fall of Constantinople

Captured at the final siege of Constantinople in 1453, Page is literally forced to sing for his supper (or rather, his life) by the victorious Ottoman Sultan, Mehmed the Conqueror: to save his neck from the executioner's blade, Page must tell a series of Arabian Nights-style stories for the sultan's entertainment. As an old soldier with a long military career behind him, Page chooses to tell stories from his own life - possibly a little exaggerated, but only he knows that. 

Having already recited his first tale, based on his early career as a soldier in Normandy in the army of King Henry V, Page now recounts his time among the Hussites in war-torn Bohemia (part of the modern-day Czech Republic). The Hussites were followers of the martyred Bohemian preacher, Jan Hus, who was burned at the stake as a heretic in Constance in 1415. Hus was a radical who believed in cleansing the Catholic church of sin and corruption, and unsurprisingly hated by the Pope. After being thrown out of Prague University he wandered the country, preaching his ideals to the poor. He gained immense popular support, and when the news of his death reached Bohemia the people flew to arms to avenge him. 

The Hussite armies were essentially made up of peasants, supported by a handful of nobles. Outnumbered and (supposedly) outclassed by the vast armies commanded by the Pope and his allies in Germany and Hungary, they should have been wiped out in a matter of weeks. Instead, thanks to innovative battle tactics and superb use of artillery, they won a series of unlikely victories against the odds. Thus the cream of the elite warrior nobility of Christendom was humiliated, time and again, by a few thousand commoners and some farm carts converted into gun-toting 'war wagons'.

The Hussite Wars, as they were called, raged for seventeen years. Page's story covers the years 1421-24, when the wars were at their height. For his sins, Page fights in the major battles and sieges, and witnesses some of the worst atrocities committed in a land riven by bitter civil conflicts, external invasions and extreme religious zealotry. During the course of the tale Page meets Jan Zizka, the famous Hussite general, meets a new love and loses old friends. 

My good friend Martin Bolton has drawn a splendid map of Bohemia c.1420, which will be inside the paperback version of the book:

Soldier of Fortune (II) The Heretic is currently in the last stages of editing and will be available very soon. More details to follow soon... 

A previous update on the book, including a brief account of Jan Zizka, can be read under the link below:

Hussites and Zizka

"God hath sent him for the weal of us all..."

I want to try something different, and offer some discussion of Henry VII and Richard III as rulers rather than their qualities (or lack of) as individuals. We could argue until the roses turn brown about the characters of the two men, so will set aside the 'cult of personality' for the moment and focus on what they actually did for the country. It's a big subject, so I'll tackle Richard first. I'm probably going to miss out quite a lot, being very far from an expert, so please feel free to correct me and fill in any gaps.

Ok so he killed a bunch of guys, but check out those statutes

Richard III ruled for just two years, but still managed to pack a lot in. Polydore Vergil claimed that as soon as Richard had taken/usurped the crown (delete according to inclination) he 'began to give the show and countenance of a good man, whereby he might be accounted more righteous, more mild, more better affected by the commonalty' - in other words, Richard pretended to act like a good and just ruler in order to win much-needed public support.

That sounds like a criticism - and it was certainly was, coming from Vergil - but there isn't anything unreasonable about a man doing good in order to win support. Modern politicians are still trying to pull off the same trick now.

So what did Richard do as king that was so wonderful? His main acts can be briefly summarised as follows:

• Made public his concerns that good order should be kept, ordering his judges and noblemen to 'justlly and duly minister his law without delay or favour'. 
• Issued a proclamation stating that any man who was wronged by a royal official would have justice of the King, and 'according to Justice and his laws they shall have remedy'. 
• Behaved with energy and efficiency, travelling swiftly about the realm and rarely keeping to one place, thus making himself visible and accessible to his subjects.
• Most famously of all, his one and only Parliament of 1484 issued a series of public acts that included six beneficial statutes: this included allowing bail to those suspected of felony (Richard did not invent bail, as Philippa Langley claims); protecting the rights of purchasers to land; making illegal the arbitrary system of taxation known as benevolences; preventing dishonesty in the cloth trade, and promoting English merchants over 'foreigners'.

The latter might seem a tad xenophobic by today's standards, but was a highly sensible populist move for a late medieval king sitting on a rather unsteady throne. 

Apart from his law-making, Richard went to great lengths to secure support by other means, principally by the sprinkling about of large amounts of cash. In the space of a few hectic weeks in 1483 he rewarded the scholars of Oxford with gifts, granted various local petitions, honoured debts and made all sorts of grants and gifts to religious houses, especially in the north. The latter was another shrewd move, since the north was the heartland of his support.

This barrage of schmooze got Richard what he wanted: a euphoric tidal wave of support, culminating in a triumphant entry to York. The Bishop of St David's wrote to a friend:

"He contents the people where he does best that ever did prince; for many a poor man that hath suffered wrong many days have been relieved and helped by him and his commands in the progress. And in many great cities and towns were great sums of money given him which he hath refused. On my truth, I never liked the conditions of any prince as well as his. God hath sent him to us for the weal of us all."

If the opinion of the starry-eyed bishop was reflected by the rest of Richard's subjects, then it must have seemed that Richard was set fair for a long and glorious reign. The dodgy circumstances of his accession would soon be forgotten - or smothered - and he was destined to be remembered as Richard the Brilliant. 

How, then, did it all go so horribly wrong for him? The simplest answer is that pleasing commoners and churchmen is one thing, but pleasing the nobility quite another, especially the four great magnates still standing after thirty years of inter-class genocide: Northumberland, Stanley, Norfolk and Buckingham. Of these, Richard could only truly count on his old mate Norfolk. 

That, however, is for another day and another blog post. Next up, the doings of King Henry the Seventh... 

The White Hawk (III): Restoration

Today is release day: the third part of The White Hawk, my series set during the turbulent years of The Wars of the Roses, is now available on Kindle. A paperback option may follow, but not for a while yet. 

Part III is titled Restoration, and deals with the period 1470-71, when the Earl of Warwick attempted to throw his erstwhile friend Edward IV off the throne and restore Henry VI. 

Take it away, Amazon....

 “A Warwick! A Warwick!”

England, 1470. The Earl of Warwick has fled England and the wrath of his former friend, King Edward of York. Barred from entering Calais, he turns to piracy and attacking merchant ships in the Channel.

The surviving members of the Bolton family have also fled their homes in England. Landless and condemned as traitors, they follow Warwick to France and the court of Margaret of Anjou, who has lived in exile since the destruction of the Lancastrian army at Towton. Desperate to regain power, Warwick sends James Bolton with a message to Margaret, his old enemy, offering to forge an alliance with her and overthrow King Edward. Together they plan to restore the mad Henry VI, who has spent the past ten years as a prisoner in the Tower of London.

Warwick gathers a new army from the surviving Lancastrian nobles, and begins to assemble an invasion fleet. King Edward must keep one eye on this threat, while also coping with fresh rumours of conspiracy and rebellion in the north. The peace in England is once again shattered as the war-drums beat and the banners unfurl for the final death-struggle between the rival Houses of Lancaster and York.

Part III of The White Hawk chronicles the further adventures of the Boltons, caught up in a conflict not of their own making, and forced to play their part by powers beyond their control."

The White Hawk (III): Restoration