Jane Austen's History of England

On this day, in 1813, Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice was first published in the United Kingdom.

Austen also wrote a very funny History of England. Unashamedly biased and inaccurate, it trashes pretty much everyone except the Stuarts: Austen openly admitted to liking them because she was a Catholic. Here are some quotes:

"Lord Cobham was burnt alive, but I forget what for."

"One of Edward IV's Mistresses was Jane Shore, who had a play written about her, but it is a tragedy & therefore not worth reading."

"His Majesty died & was succeeded by his son Henry VIII whose only merit was his not being quite so bad as his daughter Elizabeth."

"As I am myself partial to the roman catholic religion, it is with infinite regret that I am obliged to blame the Behaviour of any Member of it."

Etc...

Kingbreaker!

Available from Amazon UK and Amazon US

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1461 AD. England is at war. The bitter feud between the rival houses of Lancaster and York reaches a bloody climax on the field of Towton. Here, the rising sun of York is triumphant, and the red rose of Lancaster trampled into the mud."

In 1462 John de Vere, the 12th Earl of Oxford, and his eldest son Aubrey were executed at Tower Hill in London. They had been arrested for plotting against the Yorkist king, Edward IV, although the precise nature of the accusations are unclear.

  
What lay behind this spate of political killings? The twelfth earl has steered a middle course during the early stages of the dynastic conflict we know as the Wars of the Roses. He had played no active role on either side, but instead focused on preserving his power base in East Anglia. This passive role served him well, until he suddenly became involved in the fatal conspiracy of 1462. 



The bare outline of this plot is provided by a London chronicle. Quote (rendered in modern English):

“And the xii day of February the earl of Oxford and the lord Aubrey Vere, his son, Sir Thomas Tuddenham, William Tyrell and others were brought into the Tower of London. And upon the xx day of the said month the said Lod Aubrey was drawn from Westminster to the Tower Hill and there beheaded.

And the xxiii day of the said month of February Sir Thomas Tuddenham, William Tyrell, and John Montgomery were beheaded at said Tower Hill. And upon the Friday next following, which was the xxvi day of February, the earl of Oxford was led upon foot from Westminster unto the Tower Hill, and there beheaded; and after the corpse was had unto the friar Augustines, and there buried in the Choir.”

This reveals little save names and dates, and the curious detail that the earl’s execution was saved until last. A brief note in another chronicle states that Aubrey was subjected to an especially cruel execution, being hung and disembowelled (‘suspensus et tractus'), rather than beheaded. This would suggest he was regarded as the chief instigator of the failed plot against Edward IV.

The conspiracy may have been driven by the insecurity of the Yorkist king, who had only been on the throne for a year. Rumours were rife of a fresh invasion of England, led by Margaret of Anjou, the exiled queen of Henry VI. 

This was, supposedly, meant to coincide with an invasion from Scotland by exiled Lancastrians, supported by troops raised by the duke of Somerset. IN the end this elaborate three-pronged strategy came to nothing, although Edward would face many more serious threats to his rule.

   
However, one man never forgot the killing of the de Veres and their supporters at Tower Hill. This was the twelfth earl’s younger son, another John, who was allowed to succeed to the earldom. Driven by revenge on the house of York, he would pursue a remarkable career as rebel, outlaw, pirate and political prisoner, until he finally triumphed on Bosworth Field…

 

Fever and dysentery

 

Summer 1296, Robert of Artois leads a French army to conquer what remains of English-held Gascony (I'll write in the present tense for a bit of immediacy).

Artois has been granted viceregal authority by his sovereign, Philip the Fair, throughout most of southern France. He has lost no time in preparing for the campaign; no expense or detail has been spared, down to ordering special cloths and saddles from Saloman Boinebroke, a merchant of Douai, to be sent with all speed to Gascony.

The French advance quickly through the south. The march takes them through Auvergne into Poitou, Limousin and Angoumois, reaching Angouleme on 28 April. En route Artois collects more troops and summons the local nobility to serve for at least two months in the host. He crosses the frontier into Gascony in mid-May.

Artois must capture the main English strongholds of Bourg and Blaye in the north, and Bayonne in the south. If these fall, the lesser towns and strongholds still in English hands will soon follow. Artois chooses to concentrate on Bourg. The town, on the upper Gironde river, is held by a mix of English and Gascon men-at-arms. Taking it will be no easy task. The French commander hires stone-cutters to make stones for the bombardment, and workmen to construct a siege engine.

Meanwhile the French navy attempts to blockade the Gironde. Despite the large sum of 23, 141 livres tournois spent on this operation, it fails to repel a supply fleet rushed over from England by Edward I. This delivers much-needed supplies of corn, hay, beans, bacon and other victuals to the garrison.

Artois and his men suffer in the extreme heat. On 28 April his physician is ordered to treat members of the count's household, stricken with disease. Camp fever and dysentery run riot in the French army. Throughout May-July, at least a dozen epidemics are reported. Finally, on 2 July, Artois himself falls sick.

What you say is true...

 

In summer 1296 a French army led by Robert, Count of Artois, marched into the duchy of Gascony in south-west France.

The King of France, Philip the Fair, had appointed Robert lieutenant in Gascony and the duchy of Aquitaine in April. He was given extensive powers to act 'as if the king was personally present', and given a list of instructions. These included issuing pardons, negotiating alliances and truces, inspecting garrisons and fortresses, conferring knighthood, inquiring into the crimes of royal officials, and so on.

His real task was to destroy the last English garrisons in the duchy. Philip's armies had initially invaded and conquered Gascony in 1294, only to lose some key towns and castles to an English counter-attack the following year. While Philip was busy conquering Flanders, far to the north, Robert was tasked with finishing off Edward I's supporters in the south-west.

Although war was offically declared in 1294, the French had been planning it for at least a year before that. Between August and November 1293, Robert of Artois put his castle and garrison of Calais in a state of defence. Apart from the normal wages of the garrison, additional payments were made for provisions, shields, pavais for archers, lances and other weapons, helmets, crossbow strings and bolts, as well as operations to clear the castle ditches. The nobility of Artois were placed on a war footing against Edward I in June 1294, and many would serve in Robert's expedition of 1296.

Philip was also busy. In 1292 he started to purchase galleys from Genoa and Provence, assembled in Normandy, to build a fleet to launch a full-scale invasion of England. This was two years before the declaration of war.

While it is undeniable that Edward I's diplomats bungled the negotiations in 1294, it is difficult to see what they could have done to avoid conflict. When the Pope, Boniface VIII, later challenged Philip's chief minister that the French had deliberately provoked war, the Frenchman blithely answered:

“Certainly, sir, what you say is true.”

There were suspicions of French intentions in Aragon, beyond the Pyrenees. In 1296 a band of Catalan nobles wrote to Edward I, offering their service against the French and expressing disappointment that war had not broken out already.

The English king received at least thirteen such offers from Aragonese nobles between March to April 1294. One declared he would fight the French 'to the death', while others offered to do simultaneous service against France and in the Holy Land.

Steady on, boys. One thing at a time.

Plunder like Pirates

 

On 30 May 1266 a peace was concluded at Winchelsea, one of the Cinque Ports on the southern coast of England. 

After the battle of Evesham, the rebel forces in the southeast were concentrated at Winchelsea and Sandwich. The barons of the Ports were motivated by support of Simon de Montfort's widow, Countess Eleanor, and the fruits of piracy. Over the winter months of 1265/66 they sailed out to attack commercial shipping in the Channel, seizing vessels and even plundering the coast of Brittany. 

Henry III sent his son, Lord Edward, and Roger Leyburn to reduce the Ports. A string of military operations followed, combined with Edward's campaign against Simon de Montfort junior in Lincolnshire. 

Finally, in March 1266, the royalists were able to launch a combined land-sea assault on Winchelsea. On 24 March the town was stormed with great loss of life; many of the defenders were killed as Edward's shock troops forced the gates, others drowned as they attempted to escape by sea. Edward pardoned the surviving townsfolk and forbade his men from plundering the town, 'as if they were pirates'. A town that refused quarter was usually sacked without mercy, but it made little sense to destroy one of England's richest ports. 

Via the final agreement, the barons of the Ports were permitted to have their lands, houses and chattels, as well as their traditional rights and liberties. This marked a dramatic change in royalist policy: in the immediate aftermath of Evesham, Henry had ordered the disinheritance of all surviving rebels. 

This, inevitably, triggered a backlash and another round of civil war. After months of bitter fighting, the royalists were forced to change their tune. The alternative was endless conflict.

Amaury de Montfort, Caliph of Baghdad

 

Amaury de Montfort was released from custody on 21 April 1282, after six years in prison. In that time he was moved about from Corfe castle, to Sherborne, and finally to Taunton.

The timing of his release is odd. His gaoler, Edward I, was not usually inclined to let his enemies slip away. The king had previously refused to listen to any plea to let Amaury go. Everyone from the Pope to the Queen of France to the Archbishop of Canterbury had begged and pleaded on Amaury's behalf, to no avail.

Furthermore, Amaury was released barely a month after the Palm Sunday revolt in Wales. Edward had always regarded the alliance between the Montforts and Prince Llywelyn of Wales as a clear and present danger. To let Amaury walk, at such a time, was a potential risk. Yet walk he did.

There were conditions attached, of course. Amaury was only liberated after swearing an oath to leave the realm and never return. He immediately went to France and on 22 May wrote to Edward from Arras, sarcastically 'thanking' the king for his grace, promising fidelity, and asking permission to recover his rights and titles in England.

The king refused. Unabashed, in 1284 Amaury tried to sue in the court of Rome against Edward's brother, Edmund, for the restoration of his inheritance. The lawsuit got nowhere, but even in 1289, when he made his will, Amaury was still calling himself 'earl of Leicester by hereditary right, and palatine of Chester, and steward of England'.

Amaury's use of these titles recalls an old Tsar of Bulgaria, Symeon, when he called himself Emperor of Rome. As the actual emperor remarked, Symeon could call himself Caliph of Baghdad if he wished. It made no odds. Power was the only fact.

The trials of Angharad (1)

 

Angharad ferch Owain ap Maredudd of Cydewain was an important Welsh noblewoman of the late 13th century. Along with Margaret of Bromfield, Llywelyn the Last's unjustly neglected sister, her actions had a significant influence on Welsh politics, and the fate of the principality. 

Her dynastic connections were important: Angharad was a great-granddaughter of Llywelyn Fawr, and married Owain ap Maredudd (died 1275), a powerful lord of Ceredigion and descendent of the Lord Rhys of Dinefwr. Thus, Angharad linked the rival houses of north and south Wales. She and her first husband, Owain, had one son, Llywelyn. This was an unusual name for the royal house of Deheubarth, and probably in honour of Anghard's kinship with Llywelyn Fawr and Llywelyn the Last.

Her son (died 1309) was the only ruler of Ceredigion to survive the upheavals of the conquest of Wales: he became a minor Marcher lord, holding lands that eventually passed to Owain Glyn Dwr.

Llywelyn owed his survival to his mother, who spent her adult life fighting bitterly for her rights in court, just as the men fought on the battlefield. Her legal career was very similar to that of Margaret of Bromfield. Neither woman had any qualms about challenging powerful Marcher lords, or the Prince of Wales, or even the King of England.