A History of the Crusades-Vol 3 (9 page)

Next morning Saladin received Richard’s
envoy, Humphrey of Toron. He brought an offer that al-Adil should be recognized
as ruler of all Palestine so long as the Christians might have a share of
Jerusalem. It was hoped that the marriage with Joanna might be arranged, though
Richard admitted that Christian public opinion was somewhat shocked by the idea.
A Papal dispensation might, Richard thought, make Joanna change her mind. If
not, al-Adil could have his niece, Eleanor of Brittany, who as the King’s ward
could be married off without Papal interference. When all this was settled
Richard would return to Europe. Conrad’s offer was less sensational. In return
for Sidon and Beirut he would break with the other Crusaders and even suggested
returning Acre to the Moslems. But when asked if he would actually take up arms
against Richard, his ambassador prevaricated.

Saladin held a council to decide with
which Frankish party talks should continue. Al-Adil and the other emirs voted
for Richard’s party, less, perhaps, from any liking for the King than because
he would soon be leaving Palestine, whereas Conrad, for whom they all felt some
awe, meant to stay permanently there. Richard’s proposals were accepted in
principle; but Humphrey’s suite were distressed one day to see Reynald of Sidon
out hunting with al-Adil and on obvious terms of intimacy with him. Indeed, al-Adil
kept the negotiations spinning out till winter came. Fighting between the
armies had meanwhile been desultory and sporadic. One day in late November
Richard, when out hawking, fell into a Saracen ambush, and might have been
taken had not the valiant knight, William of Preaux, shouted out that he was
the King and let himself be taken prisoner. Some other knights fell that day;
but apart from that small skirmish there were no engagements of note.

1192: Richard at Beit-Nuba

When the November rains began Saladin
disbanded half his army and retired with the rest to winter-quarters at
Jerusalem. Reinforcements were on the way from Egypt. But Richard refused to be
discouraged by the weather. In the middle of the month he led his army,
increased by fresh detachments from Acre, out of Jaffa as far as Ramleh, which
he found deserted and dismantled by the Saracens. He waited there for six
weeks, looking for a chance to move on to Jerusalem. There were frequent
Saracen raids on his outposts. He himself was nearly captured when
reconnoitring near the castle of Blanchegarde. In another skirmish the Earl of
Leicester was taken but subsequently released. During the last days of the year
the weather was so bad that Saladin withdrew his raiders. Richard spent
Christmas at Latrun, on the edge of the Judaean hills; and on 28 December his
army moved up into the hills unopposed by the enemy. The rain fell in torrents.
The road was deep in mud. A high wind broke down the tent-poles before any tent
could be erected. By 3 January the army had reached the fort of Beit-Nuba, only
twelve miles from the Holy City. The English and French soldiers were full of
enthusiasm. Even the discomforts of the camp on the wet windy height and the
ruin by the rain of the stores of biscuit and pork that were their main food,
the loss from cold and under-feeding of many of their horses and their own
weariness and chills were bearable if they were so soon to attain their goal.
But the knights that knew the country, the Hospitallers, the Templars and the
native-born barons, took a wiser and a sadder view. They told King Richard that
even if he penetrated over the muddy hills through the storms to Jerusalem and
even if he could contain Saladin’s army there, there was a Saracen army from
Egypt encamped on the hills outside. He would be caught between the two. And if
he captured Jerusalem, they added, what then? The visiting Crusaders when they
had paid their pilgrimage would all return home to Europe; and the native
soldiery was not numerous enough to hold it against the forces of united Islam.
Richard was convinced. After five days’ hesitation he sounded the retreat.

Angrily and dejectedly the army marched
back through the sleet to Ramleh. The English bore the disappointment sturdily,
but the French, with their mercurial temperament, began to desert. Many of
them, including the Duke of Burgundy, retired to Jaffa, some even to Acre.
Richard saw that to restore his men’s spirits some activity was needed. He held
a council on 20 January and with its support gave orders to the army to move
from Ramleh through Ibelin to Ascalon. There he set about repairing the great
fortress that Saladin had dismantled a few months before. Like Saladin, he well
understood its strategic importance. He persuaded the French to rejoin him
there.

Apart from a visit to Acre, Richard spent
the next four months at Ascalon, making it the strongest castle on all the
coast of Palestine. His men worked well, in spite of much discomfort. There was
no harbour there, and the food supplies, which came by sea, could often not be
landed. The weather that winter was consistently bad. But Saladin did not
molest them. Some of Richard’s followers thought that he chivalrously refused
to attack them when they were so vulnerable, to the discontent of his emirs.
But in fact he wished to rest his army and to wait for reinforcements from the
Jezireh and Mosul. It may well be that some of his emirs were discontented,
though not because of his inaction. While they were in such a mood he would not
risk a battle.

1192: Fresh Negotiations

Moreover, news from Acre showed him that
the Franks were disunited. In February Richard summoned Conrad to help in the
work at Ascalon, and Conrad brusquely refused to come. A few days later Hugh of
Burgundy and many of the French deserted and went to Acre. King Philip had left
the Duke with very little money for his troops, and their pay had hitherto been
provided out of loans made by Richard. But even Richard’s huge treasury was
running low. He would not finance them any longer. At Acre the eternal rivalry
between the Pisans and the Genoese, both of whom now had many men and ships
quartered there, had blazed into open war. The Pisans, claiming to act in King
Guy’s name, seized the city in the teeth of Hugh of Burgundy who had just
arrived. They held it for three days against Hugh, Conrad and the Genoese, and
sent to Richard to come to their aid. On 20 February Richard arrived at Acre
and tried to make peace. He had an interview with Conrad at Casal Imbert on the
road to Tyre; but it was unsatisfactory. Conrad still refused to join the army
at Ascalon, even when Richard threatened that unless he did so all his lands
would be forfeited. It was a threat that could not be carried out. When Richard
returned to Ascalon, having patched up a precarious truce, he was more than
ever convinced that peace must be made with Saladin.

He was still in touch with al-Adil. An
English envoy, Stephen of Turnham, visited Jerusalem to see the Sultan and his
brother, and was shocked on his arrival at the gate of the city to see Reynald
of Sidon and Balian of Ibelin emerging. Saladin’s negotiations with Conrad had
not been broken off; and Balian’s presence was sinister, for he was a knight
whom the Sultan greatly esteemed. However, on 20 March al-Adil rode down to
Richard’s camp with a definite offer. The Christians should keep what they had
conquered and have the right of pilgrimage to Jerusalem, where the Latins could
maintain priests. The Holy Cross should be restored to them. They might annex
Beirut also, if it were dismantled. The embassy was well received by the King.
Indeed, as a mark of peculiar honour, one of al-Adil’s sons was girded with the
belt of knighthood, though doubtless the usual Christian elements in the
ceremony were omitted. When al-Adil rejoined his brother early in April it
seemed that a settlement had at last been reached.

The need for the settlement was emphasized
a few days later, when the Prior of Hereford arrived from England, to tell
Richard that things were going ill in England. The King’s brother John was
usurping more and more authority, and the Chancellor, William, Bishop of Ely,
begged Richard to come home at once. Richard had spent Easter, 5 April, in the
camp, furious because the remaining Frenchmen had just left him, summoned north
by Hugh of Burgundy. Now, more than ever, the quarrels of the Crusaders must be
stilled. A Council of all the knights and barons of Palestine was called by the
King. He told them that he soon must leave the country, and that the question
of the crown of Jerusalem must be decided; and he offered them the choice of
King Guy and the Marquis Conrad. To his shocked surprise no one spoke up for
Guy. It was Conrad whom everybody wanted.

Richard was wise and magnanimous enough to
abide by the decision. He agreed to recognize Conrad as King. A mission, headed
by his nephew Henry of Champagne, set out for Tyre to give the good news to the
Marquis.

When Henry arrived at Tyre, on about 20
April, there was great rejoicing. It was decided that the coronation should
take place within a few days at Acre; and then it was understood that Conrad
would at last consent to join the camp at Ascalon. Henry left Tyre for Acre at
once, to prepare the city for the ceremony.

On hearing the news Conrad had fallen on
his knees and asked God that if he were unworthy of the kingship it should not
be granted to him. A few days later, on Tuesday, 28 April 1192, he was kept
waiting for his dinner by his wife, the Princess Isabella, who was lingering
too late in her bath. He decided to go round and dine with his old friend, the
Bishop of Beauvais. He found that the Bishop had finished his meal, so, though
he was pressed to stay while food was prepared for him, he walked gaily
homeward. As he passed round a sharp corner two men came up, and while one of
them gave him a letter to read, the other stabbed him in the body. He was
carried dying to his palace.

1192: Murder of Conrad

One of the murderers was struck down on
the spot. The other was taken and confessed, before he was executed, that he
and his comrade were Assassins sent to do the task by the Old Man of the
Mountains, the Sheik, Sinan. The Assassins had preserved a quiet neutrality
throughout the Crusade, which had given them an opportunity to strengthen their
castles and amass greater wealth. Conrad had offended Sinan by an act of piracy
against a merchant ship, laden with a rich cargo that the sect had bought.
Despite Sinan’s remonstrances, he had not returned the goods or the crew, who,
indeed, had all been drowned. It is possible that Sinan also feared that the
establishment of a strong Crusader state on the Lebanese coast might eventually
endanger his territory. It was said that the two murderers had been for some
time in Tyre awaiting their chance, and that they had even accepted baptism,
with Conrad and Balian of Ibelin as their sponsors. But public opinion sought
deeper causes. Some said that Saladin had bribed Sinan to murder both Richard
and Conrad; but Sinan feared that Richard’s death might leave Saladin free to
march against the Assassins, so would only undertake the latter task. Another
theory more generally held was that Richard himself had arranged the
assassination. Saladin’s connivance is not to be credited; while Richard, much
as he disliked Conrad, never made use of such a weapon. But his enemies, headed
by the Bishop of Beauvais, refused to believe in his innocence.

The death of Conrad was a blow to the
renascent kingdom. Harsh, ambitious and unscrupulous, yet trusted and admired
by the native Frankish nobility, he would have been a strong and cunning king.
Yet his disappearance had its compensations. The heiress of the kingdom,
Isabella, was free to marry and bring the crown to some less controversial
candidate. When Henry of Champagne heard of the murder he hurried back from
Acre to Tyre. There the widowed Princess had shut herself up in the castle and
refused to hand over the keys of her city to any but the representative of the
King of France or the King of England. Henry on his arrival was at once
acclaimed by the people of Tyre as the man that should marry their princess and
inherit the throne. He was young and gallant and popular, and the nephew of two
Kings. Isabella yielded to the public clamour. She gave herself and her keys to
Henry. Two days after Conrad’s assassination their betrothal was announced.
There were some who thought that a longer delay would have been seemly; and it
was doubtful whether remarriage within a year could be canonically legal. Henry
himself was a little lukewarm. Isabella was a very lovely young woman of
twenty-one, but she had been twice married already, and she now had an infant
daughter, who would be her heir. It seems that Henry insisted that the
engagement should be ratified by Richard. Messengers had brought Richard up to
Acre, and there he met his nephew. It was rumoured that Henry told him of his
doubts and of his longing to go home to his fair lands in France. But to
Richard the solution seemed admirable. He advised Henry to accept election to
the throne and promised that some day he would return with fresh help for his
kingdom. He refused to give advice about the marriage; but Henry could not
become king except as Isabella’s husband. On 5 May 1192, after just one week of
widowhood, Isabella entered Acre with Henry by her side. The whole population
came out to greet them, and the marriage was celebrated with pomp and general
delight. The Princess and her husband then took up their residence in the
castle of Acre.

It was a happy marriage. Henry soon fell
deeply in love with his wife and could not bear her out of his sight; and she
found his charm irresistible, after the grimness of the ageing Piedmontese to
whom she had been forcibly united.

1192: Richard captures Daron