Henry IV (104 page)

³⁶
CCR 1409–13
, 340;
Foedera
, viii.703–4, 737.

³⁷
Lehoux,
Jean de France
, iii.297.

³⁸
Milner, ‘The English Commitment’,
passim
.

³⁹
POPC
, ii.31–2, gives the sums borrowed, whereas those recorded in
CPR 1408–13
, 421–2, and
Foedera
, viii.760–7, were assignments for repayment from the instalment of the lay subsidy due in November 1412, which were not always for the full value of the loan. Florentine and Venetian merchants contributed £533, and the king added 200 marks of his chamber money (E 403/611, 10 Dec. 1412, repayment). As well as the sums mentioned in these sources, Prince Thomas was assigned £2,270, and the duke of York £1,150, which they had borrowed to make preparations (
CPR 1408–13
, 403). These sums are included in the £16,600.

⁴⁰
Giles
, 63.

⁴¹
Foedera
, viii.743.

⁴²
B. Pocquet du Haut-Jussé, ‘La Renaissance Littéraire autour de Henri V, Roi d'Angleterre’,
Révue Historique
224 (1960), 329–38.

⁴³
POPC
, ii.33–4 (A memorandum detailing the financial arrangements for the campaign, emphasizing the need for loans to be raised, thus probably late May, before they were raised, rather than July as catalogued; it mentions men and archers going with ‘My lord the prince in the company [of] the lord king’; ‘Monseigneur le Prince’ was always Prince Henry, never Prince Thomas).

⁴⁴
SAC II
, 610–15. The prince witnessed a charter at Westminster on 1 June (McNiven, ‘Prince Henry and the English Political Crisis’, 8–16).

⁴⁵
Chronicle of London from 1089 to 1483
, 94 (quote).

⁴⁶
SAC II
, 615.

⁴⁷
The First English Life of Henry the Fifth
, ed. C. Kingsford (Oxford, 1911). McFarlane,
Lancastrian Kings
, 111, dated this story to the prince's second visit to London in late September (see below, p. 514), but Ormond was in France by then, and Kingsford's early July date (p. xxv) is to be preferred. Although the
Chronicle of London
placed the king at Clerkenwell at the beginning of July, it would have been quite easy for him to come to Westminster to meet the prince; it is suggestive (though not definitive) that letters patent were dated at Westminster by the king on 3 July (
CPR 1408–13
, 410–12).

⁴⁸
The first version of Hardyng's chronicle stated that ‘The Prynce came into his magnificence/Obeyand hole with all beyvolence/Unto the Kyng, and fully were accorde/Of all maters of which thay were discorde’ (
First English Life
, xxii–xxiii).

⁴⁹
Hardyng
, 367.

⁵⁰
BL Add. MS 35, 295, fo. 264r (
cui paternalem dedit benedictionem et eidem modulo suo omnia bona stabilivit et eius dominos ceteros subiecit, flendo et osculando ita dicens,
‘
Sicut Ysaac patriarcha Jacobum filium suum in senectute benedixit effectu paternali, ita iam te benedico, et faustum te constituo et fortunatum in bello
’.
De quo nobilissime Thoma principe et militia fortunatissimo
). Thomas's charter of creation as duke called him
praecarissimus filius
(Milner, ‘The English Commitment’, 16).

⁵¹
Genesis
, 27.

⁵²
Prince Henry had initially supported Thomas's betrothal, but by the time they married in May 1412 he had thrown his weight behind Bishop Beaufort's efforts to preserve what he could of the family's fortune from Thomas's grasp:
Giles
, 62; Harriss,
Cardinal Beaufort
, 64–5; above, pp. 469–70.

⁵³
CPR 1408–13
, 373;
Monstrelet,
ii.302. Wavrin,
Chroniques
, i.154, said that Warwick brought 2,000 men to Calais (for Calais, see also
Foedera
, viii.771). For the suggestion that Bishop Langley mediated between the king and the prince, see Milner, ‘The English Commitment’, 18.

⁵⁴
Kernezn told his master that the prince ‘had been trying for several days to prevent the departure of his brother, although at the request of his father he had changed his mind’ (
Saint-Denys
, iv.657). For Kernezn (also Carmin, Kerneau, Carnehen, Carnyan), see Pocquet du Haut-Jussé, ‘La Renaissance Littéraire’, 336 n. 2; E 403/611, 23 Nov. 1412 (his expenses as ambassador), and
Foedera
, viii.729 (safe-conduct to come to England ostensibly to joust with Sir Richard Arundel, 14 April 1412).

⁵⁵
Arrears of pay were now sent to Guyenne for the restive garrison of Fronsac:
POPC
, ii.30–3 (£2,300);
CCR 1409–13
, 366; E 404/27, no. 392 (1,000 marks).

⁵⁶
CPR 1408–13
, 414–16, 420 (general pardon to Bishop Beaufort as executor of his brother's will, 13 July), 422–3 (grant of John Beaufort's lands to Thomas and Margaret, 16 July); Bishop Beaufort retained part of his fortune, but agreed to pay 200 marks a year to support his brother's children, who were to be brought up in Thomas and Margaret's household (Harriss,
Cardinal Beaufort
, 64–5).

⁵⁷
Chronicle of London 1089–1483
, 94;
Foedera
, viii.758–60 (appointment and powers as lieutenant).

⁵⁸
The likely date is 10 August, but up to 15 August is possible (Milner, ‘The English Commitment’, 10). In addition to York and Dorset, Clarence was accompanied by the earls of Oxford, Suffolk and Ormond, and the king's brother-in-law, Sir John Cornwall.

⁵⁹
Lehoux,
Jean de France
, iii.270, 281–2;
Monstrelet
, ii.270–88;
Saint-Denys
, iv.685–713 (‘Judas’ at p. 685); Famiglietti,
Royal Intrigue
, 105–10.

⁶⁰
English Chronicle
, ed. Marx, 40.

⁶¹
Monstrelet
, ii.291–2.

⁶²
RHL II
, 322. The letters were from Berry, Orléans, Bourbon and Albret. Also enclosed was a letter to the same effect from Burgundy, although he had sworn that he had no alliances with the English that required repudiation.

⁶³
Wavrin,
Chroniques
, i.154; Famiglietti,
Royal Intrigue
, 110.

⁶⁴
RHL II
, 328.

⁶⁵
Milner, ‘The English Enterprise’, 85;
Saint-Denys
, iv.721.

⁶⁶
Wilson, ‘Anglo-French Relations’, 452;
Choix de Pièces Inédites
, ed. Douët-d'Arcq, i.359. The English would evidently have accepted 150,000
écus
had cash been available at once. For Berry's surrendered treasure, which included a great bejewelled gold crucifix containing a nail from the cross, and which never came back to France, see Milner, ‘The English Enterprise’, 87. Clarence reserved 178,000
écus
for himself and his retinue, dividing the rest between his captains (J. Bolton, ‘How Sir Thomas Rempston Paid His Ransom’,
Fifteenth-Century England VII
, ed. L. Clark (Woodbridge, 2007), 104).

⁶⁷
Saint-Denys
, iv.721; Vale,
English Gascony
, 62; Lehoux,
Jean de France
, iii.288.

⁶⁸
Choix de Pièces Inédites
, ed. Douët-d'Arcq, i.359.

⁶⁹
Compare Vale,
English Gascony
, 63–8, who interpreted the omission of explicit reference to sovereignty differently, arguing that the 13 February agreement represented a ‘profound moderation’ of their stance since Bourges. The Armagnac lords' insistence that they were not breaking their fealty to Charles VI suggests otherwise.

⁷⁰
Among whom was the count of Foix, who had been appointed Captain-General of Guyenne by Charles VI in February 1412, a challenge both to English authority and to his old foe the count of Armagnac.

⁷¹
Wylie,
Henry the Fifth
, i.116–18, 129, 134;
Monstrelet
, ii. 305. Clarence's attorney was asked in mid-October to send £500 worth of military equipment to Bordeaux, and the king sent £224 worth of bows, bowstrings and arrows in the following month (Milner, ‘English Enterprise’, 85; E 403/611, 15 Nov.). Pope John XXIII asked Henry IV to allow Clarence to come to Italy to fight for him in the winter of 1412–13, but Henry replied that he must stick to his task in Guyenne (
CE
, 420).

⁷²
Saint-Denys
, iv.733–47;
SAC II
, 616–18.

⁷³
Famiglietti,
Royal Intrigue
, 112–14; Lehoux,
Jean de France
, iii.293–7;
Monstrelet
, ii.307–33.

⁷⁴
Hardyng
, 369, was upbeat about the ‘great honour’ acquired by Clarence and his men, and the continuator of the
Polychronicon
, viii.547, thought that Clarence ‘set the country [Guyenne] at peace and rest’, but
CE
, 420, said that Clarence returned with ‘little honour’; Walsingham passed no verdict on the camapaign's outcome.

⁷⁵
Milner, ‘The English Enterprise’, 82–5.

⁷⁶
E 403/613, 18 Sept. 1413 (£5,600, plus 500 sheaves of arrows sent to Dorset ‘for the safekeeping and governance of the duchy’); Henry V consulted the Treaty of Bourges in May 1415 (
Antient Kalendars
, ii.84).

⁷⁷
Wylie,
Henry the Fifth
, i.134–5;
CGR 1413–14
, nos. 7, 9, 37, 58; Vale,
English Gascony
, 68–75. Sir John Blount's defence of Soubise against (it was said) 4,000 Frenchmen, and the capture of many French lords by Dorset at Montendre in August 1413, were especially noted by chroniclers (
Chronicle of London 1089–1483
, 95–6;
SAC II
, 616–18; Dorset's esquire, who brought news of the capture of French lords at Montendre and elsewhere, was given £20 by Henry V: E 403/613, 18 Sept.).

Chapter 33

FATHER AND SON II (1412–1413)

The king's reassertion of his authority in the autumn of 1411 and his pursuit of the recovery of Guyenne in the following year took place against a background of terminal decline in his health. By now, said Strecche, Henry's body had been committed to his doctors; by early 1412 he could no longer walk or ride without pain and was horribly disfigured.
¹
The shrinking of his life is mirrored in his itinerary: after visiting Gloucester in May 1411 he remained in and around London, never venturing further than Windsor or Canterbury. Much of his time was spent with Archbishop Arundel. He was at Lambeth palace on nine occasions during the last two years of his life, in addition to periods at Merton Priory, Stratford abbey, and the archbishop's manors of Croydon and Mortlake. From 22 February to 10 April 1412, despite the decisions awaiting resolution at Westminster, he spent six weeks at Canterbury.
²
It may have been Becket's healing powers that brought him there, but he was probably also preparing for death, for it was in Arundel's cathedral that he wished to be buried. Penitence and reconciliation weighed heavily on his mind, and there is probably some truth in the reports that he hoped, even planned, to end his days in Jerusalem, however impractical the idea. The commission to William Loveney, keeper of the king's ships, to fell 800 oaks in Eltham park for the construction of three new galleys for the king's use can hardly have been with France in mind, for it was issued on 1 October 1412, long after his plan to go to Guyenne was abandoned and two months after Clarence sailed.
³

The disagreements that had marred the summer refused to settle, not least because the heavy borrowing for Clarence's campaign, the grant of such a paltry tax in the 1411 parliament, and increased spending on the royal household were once again fuelling competition for resources.
⁴
Burgundian partisans were threatening Calais, and Prince Henry – who could be forgiven for wondering why, if Clarence was in France, he should continue to receive his fee as lieutenant of Ireland – was worried that the town was underfunded. His hand strengthened by the collapse of the Treaty of Bourges, the prince thus came to London again on 23 September ‘with a huge people’. If the later story that an attempt was made to assassinate him is to be believed, it probably dates from this time. The alleged incident took place in the Green Chamber at Westminster, where a spaniel sniffed out a man hiding behind a hanging in the room where the prince was staying. Interrogated by the earl of Arundel, the intruder claimed to have been sent by Bishop Beaufort to kill the prince; he was tied in a sack and cast into the Thames. The fact that this tale was repeated to the parliament of 1426 lends it some credibility, although the bishop's involvement is scarcely believable.
⁵

Better documented are the allegations against the prince concerning misappropriation of funds for Calais. The prince was being slandered in the town because, although he had received ‘great sums’ to pay the garrison, he had failed to distribute them to the soldiers. Suspicion also fell on Robert Thorley, who had been reappointed as treasurer of Calais when the prince took power in December 1409. Two ‘rolls of paper’ were thus brought in to the council for consideration, and although it was agreed that these demonstrated the prince's innocence, the matter did not end there. Further accounts were called for, Thorley was briefly imprisoned, and at a council meeting on 21 October at Merton Priory the king insisted that in future payments to Calais must pass through the exchequer to ensure proper scrutiny.
⁶
Two days later, all the customs collectors were ordered to bring their proceeds directly to the exchequer, despite the fact that it had been agreed in the previous parliament to reserve three-quarters of the proceeds for Calais.
⁷
Yet if
the reservation for Calais of such a large proportion of the wool customs remained controversial, so, too, was Prior Butler's conduct of Irish affairs, especially since he had failed to respond to the summons issued to him in August. On 20 November 1412 this was repeated more peremptorily, for ‘the king's will is not to leave such contempt unpunished’, but still he failed to appear. He and Prince Thomas were both replaced at the start of the new reign.
⁸