The Greatest Traitor: The Life of Sir Roger Mortimer, 1st Earl of March (24 page)

Wigmore was left empty of its lord’s possessions, a mere shell. It became a royal castle, but the king had little need of a fortress on the Marches, now that the Marcher lords were divided. In effect it became a royal farmhouse, a place of accounting for the produce of the manor, the revenue from which was supplied to the Exchequer. When, at a late stage in Alan de Charlton’s examination of the castle, a chest of documents was found relating to the Mortimer inheritance, this too was packed up and despatched to the royal treasury at the Tower, where its contents were listed and sorted into chests by the king’s clerks. All trace of the Mortimer family’s lordship of Wigmore was wiped away, with the exception of the painted effigies of the dead warriors lying in their graves in the abbey church, and the family arms in the stained glass shining down on them.

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Roger and his uncle arrived at the Tower of London ‘after dinner on the eve of St Valentine’s day’, 13 February 1322.
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They were led through to the inner courtyard, and into the medieval palace. There they were separated. Roger was taken up to a high, narrow cell, ‘less civilised than the rooms he was used to’, as one chronicler put it, and left to consider his fate.

He knew little of what was going on in the rest of the country, and this must have been infuriating for a man usually at the centre of events. Scraps of news had reached him on his journey to London, passed to him by Herefordshire merchants still loyal and bold enough to bring messages. But such men were few; and they were treated very harshly if caught.
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Once the doors of his cell had swung shut on him, there was very little news to be had of the outside world. His sole source of information was the castle garrison, as they came and went from his cell.

Roger would have been shocked to hear what was happening elsewhere. He would have been infuriated at the imprisonment of his wife, and he would have been roused to similar anger by Despenser’s renewed onslaught on the family of Llywelyn Bren. The Welshman’s widow and family were all taken into custody by Despenser on royal authority, and so too were their allies in Wales, including Rhys and Philip ap Howell, friends of the Mortimer family. Edward even took action against clergymen. Bishop Orleton was accused openly of helping the Mortimers to defy the king on their retreat in November 1321. In addition to removing the bishop’s income, the king wrote to the Pope asking that Orleton and the Bishops of Lincoln (Henry de Burghersh) and Bath and Wells (John Droxford) should be removed from their offices and exiled for supporting Roger. The Pope refused, angry that Edward should ask such a thing without presenting evidence. This was an important move by the Pope. At a stroke he had demonstrated that the king would never be able to eliminate all opposition as he would not be able to remove the bishops from their sees.

The Mortimers’ fate following their surrender was closely observed by their fellow rebels. The Earl of Hereford, who had also been prepared to submit to the king, now realised that he too faced imprisonment, and possibly death, and joined forces with the Earl of Lancaster and the northern barons. Hugh Audley the elder had decided to come with the two Mortimers to Shrewsbury to give himself up, as a loyal king’s man. A few days later Lord Berkeley followed suit. But no other Marchers followed them. It was clear that a great battle would be fought in the north, and the fates of Roger and his uncle depended on the success of the man who had hitherto always let them down: the Earl of Lancaster.

For more than a month Roger languished in his cell, knowing nothing of his fate, or the king’s actions. His captors had a mere 3d per day for
his custody, indicating he was kept in very poor conditions, although not actually starved.
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It must have seemed that he would receive the worst punishment the king felt inclined to administer. Then, at the end of March, news of events in the north filtered through to London.

Lancaster was dead.

As Edward had marched north, he had summoned men from all over England, even from the clergy and his lands in France. The French king too had been asked to send men. At Lichfield his forces had been strengthened by the return of Hugh Despenser and his father. Fearful of the size of Edward’s army, and his unmistakeable purpose, men had begun to desert the Earl of Lancaster. Even Lancaster’s own steward, Robert de Holand, had left him. In desperation Lancaster had summoned men to him on the pretence that he needed an army to defend the north against the Scots. Hardly anyone obeyed. Contemporaries were amazed at the transformation: the power of this once mighty prince had simply melted away. His failure to support the Mortimers had made his opposition seem unprincipled, weak and self-interested. Few were prepared to defend him.

Many of Lancaster’s allies now pleaded with him to let them throw themselves on the king’s mercy, but Lancaster refused. He had ruled the north like a king for years, and would not bow before Edward. Nor would he permit his vassals to do so. But his authority was almost gone. When the king besieged Tutbury Castle, Lancaster’s remaining supporters were panic-stricken. They called him to councel at Pontefract, and begged him to retreat north to his great castle of Dunstanburgh. But Lancaster would have none of it, and pointed out that men would say that he was a traitor seeking sanctuary with the Scots. He was convinced that his royal status gave him an immunity from the king’s wrath, and that he had nothing to fear from continued opposition. His vassals and allies were more vulnerable. Only a naked blade drawn in his face by Lord Clifford persuaded Lancaster that retreat was the only reasonable course of action. Hereford and the others persuaded him to make for Boroughbridge, a crossing over the River Ure in Yorkshire, about twenty miles north-east of York.

It was a fatal mistake. Both armies were riddled with spies, and a man in Lancaster’s ranks informed Sir Andrew de Harclay, Sheriff of Carlisle, about the plan to retreat by way of Boroughbridge. De Harclay roused the men of the counties of Cumberland and Westmorland, and, by forcing them to march through the night, reached the bridge first. As Hereford and Lancaster approached on 16 March 1322, they realised that they would have to fight their way across. With the king’s army to the south, they were trapped.

The earls surveyed the battlefield. Besides the bridge there was also a
ford, where de Harclay had stationed a number of pikemen. They decided that the Earl of Hereford and Lord Clifford would attack the bridge, while Lancaster would attack the ford with his cavalry. It must have seemed a relatively straightforward task, but they underestimated the redoubtable de Harclay. From long experience fighting the Scots, he knew well how to defend a strategic point, and the rebels were acting in haste, and consequently did not prepare their attack on the bridge with sufficient care. De Harclay’s men were drawn up in Scottish
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formations, preventing the knights from charging. Hereford led the fight on the bridge, but he and his men were caught in the arrow fire. Then one of de Harclay’s pikemen, concealed beneath the bridge, thrust upwards between the planks and skewered the Earl of Hereford through the anus, twisting the head of the iron pike into his intestines. His dying screams turned the advance into panic. Lancaster, amazed, and finding no easy way to cross the river with the arrows coming at him thick and fast, called off the attack, and withdrew from the river, promising to return the next morning, either to do battle or surrender.

That night, the men of the dead Earl of Hereford deserted, many of them leaving their armour in their tents and creeping away in borrowed or stolen old clothes, pretending to be peasants or beggars.

At first light de Harclay, whose scouts had kept an eye on the desertions throughout the night, seized the initiative. He crossed the bridge and moved towards Lord Lancaster. In a short while the Battle of Boroughbridge was all over. Most of the leading lords who had opposed the king, including the Earl of Lancaster, were led to gaol in York.

This was the news that came to London: all opposition to King Edward and Hugh Despenser had been defeated in battle at Boroughbridge. The Earl of Hereford and Lord Damory, two of Roger’s closest political allies, were dead. But what was truly shocking, and what astounded the whole country, was what happened to the lords who surrendered to de Harclay or who were captured by him. Six northern barons were drawn and hanged at Pontefract immediately. The Earl of Lancaster was judged by a tribunal of lords, including the two Despensers and the king. He was not allowed to speak in his defence, nor to have anyone speak for him. He was sentenced to be drawn to the gallows, hanged and beheaded. As a mark of respect for his royal blood, the king spared him the indignity of being drawn and hanged. Instead he was dressed in an old surcoat and taken on an ass a mile from his castle of Pontefract, and there beheaded in the king’s presence.

This was clearly a tremendous blow to Roger. He had not had the strength to defeat Edward himself, but with the forces of the Earl of Lancaster he and Hereford might have done so. The failure of the Earl
of Lancaster to support him had forced him to surrender; but equally it had meant the end of Lancaster too, for on the surrender of Roger and his uncle, the whole opposition movement had faltered. Indeed, when one looks back over the whole anti-Despenser campaign, it emerges as a rebellion heavily dependent on Roger Mortimer and Hereford. It was these two who had led the Marcher attacks on the Despensers, and it was entirely Marcher demands which were presented at Westminster. It was a Mortimer ally, Bartholomew de Badlesmere, who was attacked at Leeds Castle, and it was the Mortimers after whom Edward had taken the royal army at the end of 1321. Roger and Hereford may thus be seen as the focus of the king’s attention and the prime movers of the rebellion. Lancaster had merely tried to influence royal favouritism from his lands in the north, an old game which he had played often, but which was in reality a continual bluff. When the Mortimers were removed from the opposition, Lancaster could do nothing to stop the king, even with the worthy Earl of Hereford on his side.

What Roger could not have foreseen, and what indeed the rest of the country could not believe, was the extent of Edward’s vengeance. Not only did he hang the northern barons and behead Lancaster, he brought back the Marchers and southern lords to have them killed too.
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Bartholomew de Badlesmere was taken to Canterbury. There he was dragged to the gallows and hanged beside his nephew, Sir Bartholomew Ashburnham. His head was cut off and exhibited as that of a traitor. Sir Henry le Tyeys, a supporter of Roger who had gone north to fight with Lancaster, was drawn and hanged at London. Sir Francis Aldenham was drawn and hanged at Windsor. Sir John de Mowbray and Sir Roger de Clifford were drawn and hanged at York and their corpses left to decompose on the gallows. Sir Henry de Montfort and Sir Henry de Willington were drawn and hanged at Bristol. More than a dozen peers were killed or executed, and many more knights were killed or died in prison. Hundreds were served crippling fines which acted as security against any future dissent.
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All opposition to the king had been ruthlessly and very visibly crushed.

Now it seemed it was Roger’s turn to suffer the king’s retribution. But first Edward headed north, to wage an utterly unsuccessful campaign against the Scots. It was not for another three months that he began to think about his Tower prisoners. Roger’s henchman, Hugh de Turpington, who had now served Roger loyally for more than twelve years, was accused of complicity in Roger’s ‘rebellion’ and lost his lands. In June Roger and his uncle were tried for their damage to the king’s lands at Newport. On 13 July a complete review of Roger’s government of Ireland was ordered, notwithstanding the letter from the community of Dublin commending
Roger’s service. Finally, the day after the Irish order, the king at York appointed a jury to sit in London to try Roger and his uncle for treason.

A few days later, the constable of the Tower removed the Mortimers from their cells, and took them to Westminster Hall. There they confronted their judges: Walter de Norwich, Chief Baron of the Exchequer; Sir John de Friskeney, another Baron of the Exchequer; Sir William de Harley and John de Stonor, two judges, and Hamo de Chigwell, the mayor of London. With the exception of the last-named man, this was as impartial a jury as the Mortimers could have wished. But all five men knew they were not expected to produce an impartial verdict. On 21 July they concluded their deliberations. Roger and his uncle were told that each:

having contrary to his allegiance levied war against his sovereign lord along with Humphery de Bohun, Earl of Hereford (now dead), Roger Damory (now dead), Bartholomew Badlesmere (now dead), John Giffard of Brimpsfield (now dead) and Henry Tyeys (now dead), and having traitorously taken the town and castle of Gloucester and feloniously plundered the king’s goods there, and having afterwards as a traitor and enemy, with his banner displayed as in war, ridden to Bridgnorth, assaulted and plundered the king’s people there, killing some and wounding others, and burnt the town, and with banner displayed as in war, both before and after, rode in arms destroying and robbing the king’s people. All these crimes are notorious, and the king records them against him. This court therefore awards that for these treasons he be drawn, and for arsons, robberies and homicides he be hanged.
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The king was satisfied. But in his moment of victory he began to have doubts about the Mortimers’ fates, and the renewed opposition that killing his own kin and longstanding servants would have in the wake of the Boroughbridge executions. With Lancaster gone, it seemed he had little to fear from Roger and his sixty-six-year-old uncle. Upon hearing the news of the sentence, he commuted it to perpetual imprisonment. The Mortimers’ lands and possessions remained forfeit, and they and their families remained incarcerated in their respective castles and priories, but their lives were spared.