2.What is known about his character and his young years (the Crusade)?

3.What edict did he issue in 1290?

4.What changes were made in the Parliament? What strata of the population did it represent?

5.Describe Edward’s campaign in Wales.

6.Describe the events in Scotland.

7.William Wallace. Robert Bruce.

32. THE HELPLESS KING EDWARD II

King Edward II (1284-1327), the first Prince of Wales, was twenty-three when his father died. He had a certain favourite named Piers Gaveston, who had great power over him, and the English Lords detested that favourite, who was a very handsome young man. The King made him Earl of Cornwall and gave him big riches, and Gaveston made bad jokes about the English lords, calling one of them the old hog, another the stage-player; another the Jew; another the black dog of Ardenne. The Earl of Warwick, who was the black dog, swore that the time should come when Gaveston should feel the black dog's teeth.

Edward II was not fitted to carry on his father's work either in war or in statesmanship.

In 1308 Edward went to France and married the French Princess Isabel, with whom he returned to England. In 1308 the Lords insisted on the banishment of Gaveston; but the following year, after the King's appealing, the Parliament allowed him to return.

Edward's methods of raising money were, no doubt, no good ones. In 1311 the lords chose a board of seven bishops, eight earls, and six barons, to draw up Ordinances for the control of the King. The most important of these Ordinances were as follows: 1) Charters to be kept. 2) The king to make no gifts without the leave of the Lords. 3) Customs to be collected by Englishmen. 4) Gaveston to be banished. 5) The King's ministers to be chosen with the consent of the baronage. 6) The King not to go to war or leave the country without the consent of the barons. 7) Parliament to be held yearly.

Edward protested, but he had to submit and send Gaveston out of the country. Soon afterwards, however, the King recalled him again. The lords saw that there was nothing to do but to put the favourite to death. The King went to York to collect a force of soldiers, and the favourite shut him up in Scarborough Castle overlooking the sea. The Barons attacked the

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Castle and made Gaveston surrender. They took him to another castle and stopped for a night there. In the morning, when the favourite was still in bed, he was required to dress himself and come down into the court-yard. Gaveston started and turned pale, when he saw the yard full of armed men. "I think you know me?" said their leader, also armed from head to foot. "I am the black dog of Ardenne!"

The time was come, when Piers Gaveston was to feel the black dog's teeth indeed. They set him on a mule and took him to the black dog's kennel — Warwick Castle — where they sentenced him to death. In the bright landscape of the beautiful May-day they struck off his head, and stained the dust with his blood.

Gaveston's head was sent to Edward. In his grief and rage the King announced relentless war against the Barons, and both sides were in arms for half a year. But then it became necessary for them to join their forces against Bruce, who had used the time well, while they were divided, and had now great power in Scotland.

But Edward still was unable to control his Lords, and when he went north to raise the siege of Stirling (1314), Lancaster and his friends refused to go with him. Edward succeeded in raising a considerable force without their aid, and met King Robert at the Bannock River. Robert won an easy victory (Bannockburn, June 24, 1314). The King's defeat strengthened Lancaster's position. From 1314 till 1322 the country was practically governed by Lancaster; but his rule was no better than Edward's.

Plague and famine flourished in England. And the King had now a new favourite, Hugh le Despenser. The Nobles leagued against Despenser, because Edward liked him. Before 1322 Hugh Despenser's son, also Hugh, became the second favourite. A quarrel broke out between Roger Mortimer and the younger Despenser. The Despensers soon made themselves as unpopular as Gaveston had been, and Edward's worst foe was to arise in his own family.

In 1323 Queen Isabel with her son went to France. There she met Mortimer, and they both made a plan for invading England and usurping the kingly power. With money borrowed from her brother, the King of France, she raised troops and landed at Orwell (September, 24, 1326) with Mortimer. Edward, deserted by all his friends, was unable to resist. The Queen went to London and met the Parliament. And the Bishop of Hereford, the most skilful of her friends, said: "What was to be done? Here was an imbecile, indolent, miserable King upon the throne; wouldn't it be better to take him off and put his son there instead?"

So they made a deputation to Kenilworth Castle, where the King then was; and there the King came to the great hall, commonly dressed in a poor black gown; and he fell down, and made a wretched spectacle of himself. Somebody lifted him up, and the Speaker of the House of Commons made a tremendous speech, informing that he was no longer a king. Then the Steward of the Household nearly finished him by coming forward and breaking his wand — which was a ceremony only performed at a King's death. When he was asked what he thought of resigning, the King said he thought it was the best thing he could do. So, he did it, and they proclaimed his son king the next day.

The rest of his life Edward II lived in his castle, shamefully humiliated, and was very miserable.

Comprehension questions

1.How is Edward II generally evaluated as a ruler? How did the reign of Edward II end?

33.EDWARD III

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France was a far richer country than Scotland, and the King decided to conquer it. So he let Scotland alone and pretended that he had a claim to the French throne in right of his mother. Edward invaded France with his forces (1337), but he did little by that, except run into debt. The next year he did better, gaining a great sea-fight in the harbour of Sluys. Philip the French massed the troops on the Flemish border; he had collected a fleet of 500 ships to prevent the English from landing. Edward's success was only short-lived, for the Flemings ran away, leaving their weapons and baggage behind them. Edward's victory (with 300 ships only!) secured for England the command of the Channel. Edward then besieged Tournay, but his money ran short, and he had to return to England for more.

Then a dispute arose between Edward and the French king Philip as to the succession in Brittany. The French were taking English merchant-ships in the Channel, and tried to seize Guienne, so that Edward was to declare war. He despatched an army to Gascony, but on the way he changed his mind, and, as the French were concentrated in the south, determined to attack the north of France, and to march through France to Flanders. He was unable to cross the Lower Seine, as Philip had destroyed the bridges on it, and, followed by Philip's forces on the other side of the river, had to march as far north as Poissy, where he was able to repair a broken bridge. The Somme now lay in his path, and to cross this he had to descend to Abberville with his army, and near that town he found a ford.

Edward stopped his troops on a hill-side near Cressy. The next day Philip arrived with his army and rashly determined to attack without giving his men a night's rest. The Genoese cross-bowmen, who were ordered to open the battle, complained that their strings were too wet to use; but the Constable of France only called them cowards and urged them on. As they advanced until they were within bowshot, the English archers stood firm, but after the first volley the latter used their longbows, which were not so liable to be damaged by the rain, with such effect that the Genoese flew and threw their own side into confusion. The English archers made the best of their advantage, and fired volley after volley into the confused mass of men and horses, and a number of wild Cornishmen and Welshmen rushed into the thick of the fight on foot and killed many French knights with great knives.

When the French King saw the Genoese turning, he cried out to his men to kill those scoundrels, who were doing harm instead of service. This increased the confusion.

King Edward overlooked the battle from a windmill. His son, who was called Edward the Black Prince, he and his division were so much pressed, that the Earl of Warwick sent a messenger to the King, asking him to send more help.

"Is my son killed?" asked Edward.

"No, sire, please God", returned the messenger. "Is he wounded?" said the King.

"No, sire".

"Is he thrown to the ground?" said the King. "No, sire, not so; but he is very hard-pressed".

"Then", said the King, "go back to those who sent you, and tell them I shall send no aid; because I set my heart upon my son providing himself this day a brave knight, and because I am resolved, please God, that the honour of a great victory shall be his!"

When the messenger reported these bold words to the Prince and his division, their spirits rose, and they fought better than ever.

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Edward, the Black Prince

By sunset the French were routed and most of their commanders were killed. The horse was killed under the French King with an English arrow, and the knights and nobles, who surrounded him early in the day, were now completely scattered. At last, some of his few remaining followers led him off the field by force.

The battle of Cressy took place in August, 26, 1346. George Gordon Byron wrote of this battle in one of his early poems “On Leaving Newstead Abbey”, being proud of his two ancestors who had fallen in it:

"Paul and Hubert too sleep in the valley of Cressy: For the safety of Edward and England they fell".

Five days after that great battle the King laid siege to Calais. This siege lasted nearly a year. In order to starve the inhabitants out, King Edward built so many wooden houses for his troops, that it is said their quarters looked like a second Calais suddenly sprung around the first. At the beginning of the siege, the governor of the town drove out "the useless mouths", about seventeen hundred persons. King Edward allowed them to pass through his lines, and even fed them. But later he was not so merciful — five hundred more, who were afterwards driven out, died of starvation. The garrison sent a letter to King Philip, telling him that they had eaten all the horses, all the dogs, and all the rats and mice that could be found in the place; and they must either surrender to the English, or eat one another. Philip could not help them. When they wanted to surrender to King Edward, he said to their messengers: "Tell your general that I require to have sent here six of the most distinguished citizens, bare-legged, and in their shirts, with ropes about their necks; and let those six men bring with them the keys of the castle and the town".

Edward ordered the heads of all the six to be struck off. But the Queen fell upon her knees, and asked the King to give them up to her. He could not refuse her, and so the Queen had them properly dressed, made a feast for them, and sent them back with presents.

In 1348 the terrible disease, the Plague, called the Black Death, diverted the attention of both France and England from war; for in both those countries half the population perished. The Black Death was spreading from the heart of China; it killed the wretched people — especially the poor — in such enormous numbers that there were not enough to till the ground; it killed also the cattle; and so only few working men remained alive. In England the immediate result was some new laws such as the "Statute of Labourers" and the displacement of agriculture by sheep-farming.

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