Chapter XIV: Edward II (1)

{1307.} The prepossessions entertained in favor of young Edward, kept the English from being fully sensible of the extreme loss which they had sustained by the death of the great monarch who filled the throne; and all men hastened with alacrity to take the oath of allegiance to his son and successor. This prince was in the twenty-third year of his age, was of an agreeable figure, of a mild and gentle disposition, and having never discovered a propensity to any dangerous vice, it was natural to prognosticate tranquillity and happiness from his government. But the first act of his reign blasted all these hopes, and showed him to be totally unqualified for that perilous situation in which every English monarch during those ages had, from the unstable form of the constitution, and the turbulent dispositions of the people derived from it, the misfortune to be placed. The indefatigable Robert Bruce, though his army had been dispersed, and he himself had been obliged to take shelter in the Western Isles, remained not long inactive; but before the death of the late king, had sallied from his retreat, had again collected his followers, had appeared in the field, and had obtained by surprise an important advantage over Aymer de Valence, who commanded the English forces.[*]

* Trivet, p. 346.

He was now become so considerable as to have afforded the king of England sufficient glory in subduing him, without incurring any danger of seeing all those mighty preparations, made by his father, fail in the enterprise. But Edward, instead of pursuing his advantages, marched but a little way into Scotland; and having an utter incapacity, and equal aversion, for all application or serious business, he immediately returned upon his footsteps, and disbanded his army. His grandees perceived, from this conduct, that the authority of the crown, fallen into such feeble hands, was no longer to be dreaded, and that every insolence might be practised by them with impunity.

The next measure taken by Edward gave them an inclination to attack those prerogatives which no longer kept them in awe. There was one Piers Gavaston, son of a Gascon knight of some distinction, who had honorably served the late king and who, in reward of his merits, had obtained an establishment for his son in the family of the prince of Wales. This young man soon insinuated himself into the affections of his master, by his agreeable behavior, and by supplying him with all those innocent though frivolous amusements which suited his capacity and his inclinations. He was endowed with the utmost elegance of shape and person, was noted for a fine mien and easy carriage, distinguished himself in all warlike and genteel exercises, and was celebrated for those quick sallies of wit in which his countrymen usually excel. By all these accomplishments, he gained so entire an ascendant over young Edward, whose heart was strongly disposed to friendship and confidence, that the late king, apprehensive of the consequences, had banished him the kingdom, and had, before he died, made his son promise never to recall him. But no sooner did he find himself master, as he vainly imagined, than he sent for Gavaston; and even before his arrival at court, endowed him with the whole earldom of Cornwall, which had escheated to the crown by the death of Edmond, son of Richard, king of the Romans.[*] Not content with conferring on him those possessions, which had sufficed as an appanage for a prince of the blood, he daily loaded him with new honors and riches; married him to his own niece, sister of the earl of Glocester; and seemed to enjoy no pleasure in his royal dignity, but as it enabled him to exalt to the highest splendor this object of his fond affections.

* Rymer, vol. iii. p. 1. Heming. vol. i. p. 243. Walsing, p.
96.

The haughty barons, offended at the superiority of a minion, whose birth, though reputable, they despised as much inferior to their own, concealed not their discontent; and soon found reasons to justify their animosity in the character and conduct of the man they hated. Instead of disarming envy by the moderation and modesty of his behavior, Gavaston displayed his power and influence with the utmost ostentation; and deemed no circumstance of his good fortune so agreeable as its enabling him to eclipse and mortify all his rivals. He was vain-glorious, profuse, rapacious; fond of exterior pomp and appearance, giddy with prosperity; and as he imagined that his fortune was now as strongly rooted in the kingdom as his ascendant was uncontrolled over the weak monarch, he was negligent in engaging partisans, who might support his sudden and ill-established grandeur. At all tournaments he took delight in foiling the English nobility by his superior address: in every conversation he made them the object of his wit and raillery: every day his enemies multiplied upon him; and nought was wanting but a little time to cement their union, and render it fatal both to him and to his master.[*]

It behoved the king to take a journey to France, both in order to do homage for the duchy of Guienne, and to espouse the Princess Isabella, to whom he had long been affianced, though unexpected accidents had hitherto retarded the completion of the marriage.[**] Edward left Gavaston guardian of the realm,[***] with more ample powers than had usually been conferred;[****] and, on his return with his young queen, renewed all the proofs of that fond attachment to the favorite of which every one so loudly complained. This princess was of an imperious and intriguing spirit; and finding that her husband’s capacity required, as his temper inclined, him to be governed, she thought herself best entitled, on every account, to perform the office, and she contracted a mortal hatred against the person who had disappointed her in these expectations. She was well pleased, therefore, to see a combination of the nobility forming against Gavaston, who, sensible of her hatred, had wantonly provoked her by new insults and injuries.

* T. de la More, p. 593; Walsing. p. 97.

** T. de la More, p. 593. Trivet, Cont. p. 3.

*** Rymer vol. iii. p. 47. Ypod. Neust. p. 499.

**** Brady’s App. No. 49.

{1308.} Thomas, earl of Lancaster, cousin-german to the king, and first prince of the blood, was by far the most opulent and powerful subject in England, and possessed in his own right, and soon after in that of his wife, heiress of the family of Lincoln, no less than six earldoms, with a proportionable estate in land, attended with all the jurisdictions and power which commonly in that age were annexed to landed property. He was turbulent and factious in his disposition; mortally hated the favorite, whose influence over the king exceeded his own; and he soon became the head of that party among the barons who desired the depression of this insolent stranger. The confederated nobles bound themselves by oath to expel Gavaston: both sides began already to put themselves in a warlike posture: the licentiousness of the age broke out in robberies and other disorders, the usual prelude of civil war, and the royal authority, despised in the king’s own hands, and hated in those of Gavaston, became insufficient for the execution of the laws and the maintenance of peace in the kingdom. A parliament being summoned at Westminster, Lancaster and his party came thither with an armed retinue; and were there enabled to impose their own terms on the sovereign. They required the banishment of Gavaston, imposed an oath on him never to return, and engaged the bishops, who never failed to interpose in all civil concerns, to pronounce him excommunicated if he remained any longer in the kingdom.[*] Edward was obliged to submit;[**] but even in his compliance gave proofs of his fond attachment to his favorite. Instead of removing all umbrage by sending him to his own country, as was expected, he appointed him lord lieutenant of Ireland[***], attended him to Bristol on his journey thither, and before his departure conferred on him new lands and riches both in Gascony and England.[****] Gavaston, who did not want bravery, and possessed talents for war,[*****] acted, during his government, with vigor against some Irish rebels, whom he subdued.

* Trivet, Cont. p. 5.

** Rymer, vol. iii. p. 80.

*** Rymer, vol. iii. p. 92. Murimuth, p. 39.

**** Rymer, vol. iii. p. 87.

***** Heming. vol. i. p. 248. T. de la More, p. 593.

Meanwhile, the king, less shocked with the illegal violence which had been imposed upon him, than unhappy in the absence of his minion, employed every expedient to soften the opposition of the barons to his return; as if success in that point were the chief object of his government. The high office of hereditary steward was conferred on Lancaster: his father-in-law, the earl of Lincoln, was bought off by other concessions: Earl Warrenne was also mollified by civilities, grants, or promises: the insolence of Gavaston, being no longer before men’s eyes, was less the object of general indignation; and Edward, deeming matters sufficiently prepared for his purpose, applied to the court of Rome, and obtained for Gavaston a dispensation from that oath which the barons had compelled him to take, that he would forever abjure the realm.[*] He went down to Chester to receive him on his first landing from Ireland; flew into his arms with transports of joy; and having obtained the formal consent of the barons in parliament to his reëstablishment, set no longer any bounds to his extravagant fondness and affection. Gavaston himself, forgetting his past misfortunes, and blind to their causes, resumed the same ostentation and insolence, and became more than ever the object of general detestation among the nobility.

The barons first discovered their animosity by absenting themselves from parliament; and finding that this expedient had not been successful, they began to think of employing sharper and more effectual remedies. Though there had scarcely been any national ground of complaint, except some dissipation of the public treasure: though all the acts of mal-administration objected to the king and his favorite, seemed of a nature more proper to excite heart-burnings in a ball or assembly, than commotions in a great kingdom: yet such was the situation of the times, that the barons were determined, and were able, to make them the reasons of a total alteration in the constitution and civil government. Having come to parliament, in defiance of the laws and the king’s prohibition, with a numerous retinue of armed followers, they found themselves entirely masters; and they presented a petition which was equivalent to a command, requiring Edward to devolve on a chosen junto the whole authority, both of the crown and of the parliament. The king was obliged to sign a commission, empowering the prelates and barons to elect twelve persons, who should, till the term of Michaelmas in the year following, have authority to enact ordinances for the government of the kingdom, and regulation of the king’s household; consenting that these ordinances should, thenceforth and forever have the force of laws; allowing the ordainers to form associations among themselves and their friends, for their strict and regular observance; and all this for the greater glory of God, the security of the church, and the honor and advantage of the king and kingdom.[**]

* Rymer, vol. iii. p., 167.

** Brady’s App. No. 50. Heming. vol. i. p. 247., Walsing. p.
97.,Ryley, p. 526.

The barons, in return signed a declaration, in which they acknowledged that they owed these concessions merely to the king’s free grace; promised that this commission should never be drawn into precedent; and engaged that the power of the ordainers should expire at the time appointed.[*]

{1311.} The chosen junto accordingly framed their ordinances, and presented them to the king and parliament, for their confirmation in the ensuing year. Some of these ordinances were laudable, and tended to the regular execution of justice; such as those requiring sheriffs to be men of property, abolishing the practice of issuing privy seals for the suspension of justice, restraining the practice of purveyance, prohibiting the adulteration and alteration of the coin, excluding foreigners from the farms of the revenue, ordering all payments to be regularly made into the exchequer, revoking all late grants of the crown, and giving the parties damages in the case of vexatious prosecutions. But what chiefly grieved the king was the ordinance for the removal of evil counsellors, by which a great number of persons were by name excluded from every office of power and profit; and Piers Gavaston himself was forever banished the king’s dominions, under the penalty, in case of disobedience, of being declared a public enemy. Other persons, more agreeable to the barons, were substituted in all the offices. And it was ordained that, for the future, all the considerable dignities in the household, as well as by the law, revenue, and military governments, should be appointed by the baronage in parliament; and the power of making war, or assembling his military tenants, should no longer be vested solely in the king, nor be exercised without the consent of the nobility.

Edward, from the same weakness both in his temper and situation which had engaged him to grant this unlimited commission to the barons, was led to give a parliamentary sanction to their ordinances; but as a consequence of the same character, he secretly made a protest against them, and declared that, since the commission was granted only for the making of ordinances to the advantage of king and kingdom, such articles as should be found prejudicial to both, were to be held as not ratified and confirmed.[**]

* Brady’s App. No. 51.

** Ryley’s Placit. Parl. p. 530, 541.

It is no wonder, indeed, that he retained a firm purpose to revoke ordinances which had been imposed on him by violence, which entirely annihilated the royal authority, and above all, which deprived him of the company and society of a person whom, by an unusual infatuation, he valued above all the world, and above every consideration of interest or tranquillity.

As soon, therefore, as Edward, removing to York, had freed himself from the immediate terror of the barons’ power, he invited back Gavaston from Flanders, which that favorite had made the place of his retreat; and declaring his banishment to be illegal, and contrary to the laws and customs of the kingdom,[*] openly reinstated him in his former credit and authority.

{1312.} The barons, highly provoked at this disappointment, and apprehensive of danger to themselves from the declared animosity of so powerful a minion, saw that either his or their ruin was now inevitable; and they renewed with redoubled zeal their former confederacies against him. The earl of Lancaster was a dangerous head of this alliance; Guy, earl of Warwick, entered into it with a furious and precipitate passion; Humphrey Bohun, earl of Hereford, the constable, and Aymer de Valence, earl of Pembroke, brought to it a great accession of power and interest; even Earl Warrenne deserted the royal cause, which he had hitherto supported, and was induced to embrace the side of the confederates;[**] and as Robert de Winchelsey, archbishop of Canterbury, professed himself of the same party, he determined the body of the clergy, and consequently the people, to declare against the king and his minion. So predominant at that time was the power of the great nobility, that the combination of a few of them was always able to shake the throne; and such a universal concurrence became irresistible. The earl of Lancaster suddenly raised an army, and marched to York, where he found the king already removed to Newcastle:[***] he flew thither in pursuit of him, and Edward had just time to escape to Tinmouth, where he embarked, and sailed with Gavaston to Scarborough. He left his favorite in that fortress, which, had it been properly supplied with provisions, was deemed impregnable, and he marched forward to York, in hopes of raising an army which might be able to support him against his enemies.

* Brady’s App. No. 53. Walsing. p. 98.

** Trivet, Cont. p. 4.

*** Walsing. p. 101.

Pembroke was sent by the confederates to besiege the Castle of Scarborough, and Gavaston, sensible of the bad condition of his garrison, was obliged to capitulate, and to surrender himself prisoner.[*] He stipulated that he should remain in Pembroke’s hands for two months; that endeavors should, during that time, be mutually used for a general accommodation; that if the terms proposed by the barons were not accepted, the castle should be restored to him in the same condition as when he surrendered it; and that the earl of Pembroke and Henry Piercy should, by contract, pledge all their lands for the fulfilling of these conditions.[**] Pembroke, now master of the person of this public enemy, conducted him to the Castle of Dedington, near Banbury, where, on pretence of other business, he left him, protected by a feeble guard.[***] Warwick, probably in concert with Pembroke, attacked the castle: the garrison refused to make any resistance; Gavaston was yielded up to him, and conducted to Warwick Castle; the earls of Lancaster, Hereford, and Arundel immediately repaired thither;[****] and, without any regard either to the laws or the military capitulation, they ordered the head of the obnoxious favorite to be struck off by the hands of the executioner.[*****]

The king had retired northward to Berwick, when he heard of Gavaston’s murder; and his resentment was proportioned to the affection which he had ever borne him while living. He threatened vengeance on all the nobility who had been active in that bloody scene; and he made preparations for war in all parts of England. But being less constant in his enmities than in his friendships, he soon after hearkened to terms of accommodation; granted the barons a pardon of all offences; and as they stipulated to ask him publicly pardon on their knees,[******] he was so pleased with these vain appearances of submission, that he seemed to have sincerely forgiven them all past injuries. But as they still pretended, notwithstanding their lawless conduct, a great anxiety for the maintenance of law, and required the establishment of their former ordinances, as a necessary security for that purpose, Edward told them that he was willing to grant them a free and legal confirmation of such of those ordinances as were not entirely derogatory to the prerogative of the crown. This answer was received for the present as satisfactory. The king’s person, after the death of Gavaston, was now become less obnoxious to the public; and as the ordinances insisted on appeared to be nearly the same with those which had formerly been extorted from Henry III. by Mountfort, and which had been attended with so many fatal consequences, they were, on that account, demanded with less vehemence by the nobility and people. The minds of all men seemed to be much appeased; the animosities of faction no longer prevailed; and England, now united under its head, would henceforth be able, it was hoped, to take vengeance on all its enemies, particularly on the Scots, whose progress was the object of general resentment and indignation.

* Walsing, p. 101.

** Rymer, vol ii. p. 324.

*** T de la More, p. 593.

**** Dugd. Baron, vol. ii. p. 44.

***** Walsing, p. 101. T. de la More, p. 593. Trivet, Cont. p.
9*

****** Ryley, p. 538. Rymer, vol. iii. p. 366.

Immediately after Edward’s retreat from Scotland, Robert Bruce left his fastnesses, in which he intended to have sheltered his feeble army; and supplying his defect of strength by superior vigor and abilities, he made deep impression on all his enemies, foreign and domestic. He chased Lord Argyle and the chieftain of the Macdowals from their hills, and made himself entirely master of the high country; he thence invaded with success the Cummins in the low countries of the north: he took the castles of Inverness, Forfar, and Brechin; he daily gained some new accession of territory; and what was a more important acquisition, he daily reconciled the minds of the nobility to his dominion, and enlisted under his standard every bold leader, whom he enriched by the spoils of his enemies. Sir James Douglas, in whom commenced the greatness and renown of that warlike family, seconded him in all his enterprises: Edward Bruce, Robert’s own brother, distinguished himself by acts of valor; and the terror of the English power being now abated by the feeble conduct of the king, even the least sanguine of the Scots began to entertain hopes of recovering their independence; and the whole kingdom, except a few fortresses which he had not the means to attack, had acknowledged the authority of Robert.

In this situation, Edward had found it necessary to grant a truce to Scotland; and Robert successfully employed the interval in consolidating his power, and introducing order into the civil government, disjointed by a long continuance of wars and factions. The interval was very short; the truce, ill observed on both sides, was at last openly violated, and war recommenced with greater fury than ever. Robert, not content with defending himself, had made successful inroads into England, subsisted his needy followers by the plunder of that country, and taught them to despise the military genius of a people who had long been the object of their terror. Edward at last, roused from his lethargy, had marched an army into Scotland, and Robert, determined not to risk too much against an enemy so much superior, retired again into the mountains. The king advanced beyond Edinburgh; but being destitute of provisions, and being ill supported by the English nobility, who were then employed in framing their ordinances, he was soon obliged to retreat, without gaining any advantage over the enemy. But the appearing union of all the parties in England, after the death of Gavaston, seemed to restore that kingdom to its native force, opened again the prospect of reducing Scotland, and promised a happy conclusion to a war, in which both the interests and passions of the nation were so deeply engaged.

{1314.} Edward assembled forces from all quarters, with a view of finishing at one blow this important enterprise. He summoned the most warlike of his vassals from Gascony; he enlisted troops from Flanders and other foreign countries; he invited over great numbers of the disorderly Irish as to a certain prey; he joined to them a body of the Welsh, who were actuated by like motives; and, assembling the whole military force of England, he marched to the frontiers with an army which, according to the Scotch writers, amounted to a hundred thousand men.

The army collected by Robert exceeded not thirty thousand combatants; but being composed of men who had distinguished themselves by many acts of valor, who were rendered desperate by their situation, and who were inured to all the varieties of fortune, they might justly, under such a leader, be deemed formidable to the most numerous and best appointed armies. The Castle of Stirling, which, with Berwick, was the only fortress in Scotland that remained in the hands of the English, had long been besieged by Edward Bruce: Philip de Mowbray, the governor, after an obstinate defence, was at last obliged to capitulate, and to promise, that if, before a certain day, which was now approaching, he were not relieved, he should open his gates to the enemy.[*]

* Rymer, vol. iii. p. 481.

Robert, therefore, sensible that here was the ground on which he must expect the English, chose the field of battle with all the skill and prudence imaginable, and made the necessary preparations for their reception. He posted himself at Bannockburn, about two miles from Stirling, where he had a hill on his right flank, and a morass on his left; and not content with having taken these precautions to prevent his being surrounded by the more numerous army of the English, he foresaw the superior strength of the enemy in cavalry, and made provision against it. Having a rivulet in front, he commanded deep pits to be dug along its banks, and sharp stakes to be planted in them; and he ordered the whole to be carefully covered over with turf.[*] The English arrived in sight on the evening, and a bloody conflict immediately ensued between two bodies of cavalry; where Robert, who was at the head of the Scots, engaged in single combat with Henry de Bohun, a gentleman of the family of Hereford; and at one stroke cleft his adversary to the chin with a battle-axe, in sight of the two armies. The English horse fled with precipitation to their main body.

The Scots, encouraged by this favorable event, and glorying in the valor of their prince, prognosticated a happy issue to the combat on the ensuing day: the English, confident in their numbers, and elated with former successes, longed for an opportunity of revenge; and the night, though extremely short in that season and in that climate, appeared tedious to the impatience of the several combatants. Early in the morning, Edward drew out his army, and advanced towards the Scots. The earl of Glocester, his nephew, who commanded the left wing of the cavalry, impelled by the ardor of youth, rushed on to the attack without precaution, and fell among the covered pits, which had been prepared by Bruce for the reception of the enemy.[**] This body of horse was disordered; Glocester himself was overthrown and slain: Sir James Douglas, who commanded the Scottish cavalry, gave the enemy no leisure to rally, but pushed them off the field with considerable loss, and pursued them in sight of their whole line of infantry. While the English army were alarmed with this unfortunate beginning of the action, which commonly proves decisive, they observed an army on the heights towards the left, which seemed to be marching leisurely in order to surround them; and they were distracted by their multiplied fears. This was a number of wagoners and sumpter boys, whom Robert had collected; and having supplied them with military standards, gave them the appearance at a distance of a formidable body.

* T. de la More, p. 594.

** T. de la More, p. 594.

The stratagem took effect: a panic seized the English: they threw down their arms and fled: they were pursued with great slaughter for the space of ninety miles, till they reached Berwick: and the Scots, besides an inestimable booty, took many persons of quality prisoners, and above four hundred gentlemen, whom Robert treated with great humanity,[*] and whose ransom was a new accession of wealth to the victorious army. The king himself narrowly escaped by taking shelter in Dunbar, whose gates were opened to him by the earl of March; and he thence passed by sea to Berwick.

* Ypod. Neust. p. 501.

Such was the great and decisive battle of Bannockburn, which secured the independence of Scotland, fixed Bruce on the throne of that kingdom, and may be deemed the greatest overthrow that the English nation, since the conquest, has ever received. The number of slain on those occasions is always uncertain, and is commonly much magnified by the victors: but this defeat made a deep impression on the mind of the English; and it was remarked that, for some years, the superiority of numbers could encourage them to keep the field against the Scots. Robert, in order to avail himself of his present success, entered England, and ravaged all the northern counties without opposition: he besieged Carlisle; but that place was saved by the valor of Sir Andrew Harcla, the governor: he was more successful against Berwick, which he took by assault: and this prince, elated by his continued prosperity, now entertained hopes of making the most important conquests on the English.

{1315.} He sent over his brother Edward, with an army of six thousand men, into Ireland; and that nobleman assumed the title of king of that island; he himself followed soon after with more numerous forces: the horrible and absurd oppressions which the Irish suffered under the English government, made them, at first, fly to the standard of the Scots, whom they regarded as their deliverers: but a grievous famine, which at that time desolated both Ireland and Britain, reduced the Scottish army to the greatest extremities; and Robert was obliged to return, with his forces much diminished, into his own country. His brother, after having experienced a variety or fortune, was defeated and slain near Dundalk by the English, commanded by Lord Bermingham: and these projects, too extensive for the force of the Scottish nation, thus vanished into smoke.

Edward, besides suffering those disasters from the invasion of the Scots and the insurrection of the Irish, was also infested with a rebellion in Wales; and above all, by the factions of his own nobility, who took advantage of the public calamities, insulted his fallen fortunes, and endeavored to establish their own independence on the ruins of the throne. Lancaster and the barons of his party, who had declined attending him on his Scottish expedition, no sooner saw him return with disgrace, than they insisted on the renewal of their ordinances, which, they still pretended, had validity; and the king’s unhappy situation obliged him to submit to their demands. The ministry was new-modelled by the direction of Lancaster:[*] that prince was placed at the head of the council: it was declared, that all the offices should be filled, from time to time, by the votes of parliament, or rather by the will of the great barons:[**] and the nation, under this new model of government, endeavored to put itself in a better posture of defence against the Scots. But the factious nobles were far from being terrified with the progress of these public enemies: on the contrary, they founded the hopes of their own future grandeur on the weakness and distresses of the crown: Lancaster himself was suspected, with great appearance of reason, of holding a secret correspondence with the king of Scots: and though he was intrusted with the command of the English armies, he took care that every enterprise should be disappointed, and every plan of operations prove unsuccessful.

* Ryley, p, 560. Rymer, vol. iii. p. 722.

** Brady vol. ii. p. 122, from the records, App. No. 61.
Ryley p. 560.

All the European kingdoms, especially that of England, were at this time unacquainted with the office of a prime minister, so well understood at present in all regular monarchies; and the people could form no conception of a man who, though still in the rank of a subject, possessed all the power of a sovereign, eased the prince of the burden of affairs, supplied his want of experience or capacity, and maintained all the rights of the crown, without degrading the greatest nobles by their submission to his temporary authority. Edward was plainly by nature unfit to hold himself the reins of government: he had no vices, but was unhappy in a total incapacity for serious business: he was sensible of his own defects, and necessarily sought to be governed: yet every favorite whom he successively chose, was regarded as a fellow-subject exalted above his rank and station: he was the object of envy to the great nobility: his character and conduct were decried with the people: his authority over the king and kingdom was considered as a usurpation: and unless the prince had embraced the dangerous expedient of devolving his power on the earl of Lancaster, or some mighty baron, whose family interest was so extensive as to be able alone to maintain his influence, he could expect no peace or tranquillity upon the throne.

The king’s chief favorite, after the death of Gavaston, was Hugh le Despenser, or Spenser, a young man of English birth, of high rank, and of a noble family.[*] He possessed all the exterior accomplishments of person and address which were fitted to engage the weak mind of Edward; but was destitute of that moderation and prudence which might have qualified him to mitigate the envy of the great, and conduct him through all the perils of that dangerous station to which he was advanced. His father, who was of the same name, and who, by means of his son, had also attained great influence over the king, was a nobleman venerable from his years, respected through all his past life for wisdom, valor, and integrity, and well fitted by his talents and experience, could affairs have admitted of any temperament, to have supplied the defects both of the king and of his minion.[**] But no sooner was Edward’s attachment declared for young Spenser, than the turbulent Lancaster, and most of the great barons, regarded him as their rival, made him the object of their animosity, and formed violent plans for his ruin.[***] They first declared their discontent by withdrawing from parliament; and it was not long ere they found a pretence for proceeding to greater extremities against him.

{1321.} The king, who set no limits to his bounty toward his minions, had married the younger Spenser to his niece one of the coheirs of the earl of Glocester, slain at Bannockburn. The favorite, by his succession to that opulent family, had inherited great possessions in the marches of Wales,[****] and being desirous of extending still farther his influence in those quarters, he is accused of having committed injustice on the barons of Audley and Ammori, who had also married two sisters of the same family.

* Dugd. Baron, vol. i. p. 389.

** T. de la More, p. 594.

*** Walsing. p. 113. T. de la More, p. 595. Murimuth, p. 55.

**** Trivet, Cont. p. 25.

There was likewise a baron in that neighborhood, called William de Braouse, lord of Gower, who had made a settlement of his estate on John de Mowbray, his son-in-law; and in case of failure of that nobleman and his issue, had substituted the earl of Hereford in the succession to the barony of Gower. Mowbray, on the decease of his father-in-law, entered immediately in possession of the estate, without the formality of taking livery and seizin from the crown; but Spenser, who coveted that barony, persuaded the king to put in execution the rigor of the feudal law, to seize Gower as escheated to the crown, and to confer it upon him.[*] This transaction, which was the proper subject of a lawsuit, immediately excited a civil war in the kingdom. The earls of Lancaster and Hereford flew to arms: Audle and Ammori joined them with all their forces: the two Rogers de Mortimer and Roger de Clifford, with many others, disgusted for private reasons at the Spensers, brought a considerable accession to the party; and their army being now formidable, they sent a message to the king, requiring him immediately to dismiss or confine the younger Spenser; and menacing him, in case of refusal, with renouncing their allegiance to him, and taking revenge on that minister by their own authority. They scarcely waited for an answer; but immediately fell upon the lands of young Spenser, which they pillaged and destroyed; murdered his servants, drove off his cattle, and burned his houses.[**] They thence proceeded to commit like devastations on the estates of Spenser the father, whose character they had hitherto seemed to respect. And having drawn and signed a formal association among themselves,[***] they marched to London with all their forces, stationed themselves in the neighborhood of that city, and demanded of the king the banishment of both the Spensers.

* Monach. Malms.

** Murimuth, p. 55.

*** Tyrrel, vol. ii p. 280, from the register of C. C.
Canterbury.

These noblemen were then absent; the father abroad, the son at sea; and both of them employed in different commissions: the king therefore replied, that his coronation oath, by which he was bound to observe the laws, restrained him from giving his assent to so illegal a demand, or condemning noblemen who were accused of no crime, nor had any opportunity afforded them of making answer.[*] Equity and reason were but a feeble opposition to men who had arms in their hands, and who, being already involved in guilt, saw no safety but in success and victory. They entered London with their troops; and giving in to the parliament, which was then sitting, a charge against the Spensers, of which they attempted not to prove one article, they procured, by menaces and violence, a sentence of attainder and perpetual exile against these ministers.[**] This sentence was voted by the lay barons alone; for the commons, though now an estate in parliament, were yet of so little consideration, that their assent was not demanded; and even the votes of the prelates were neglected amidst the present disorders. The only symptom which these turbulent barons gave of their regard to law, was their requiring from the king an indemnity for their illegal proceedings;[***] after which they disbanded their army, and separated, in security, as they imagined, to their several castles.

This act of violence, in which the king was obliged to acquiesce, rendered his person and his authority so contemptible, that every one thought himself entitled to treat him with neglect. The queen, having occasion soon after to pass by the castle of Leeds in Kent, which belonged to the lord Badlesmere, desired a night’s lodging, but was refused admittance; and some of her attendants, who presented themselves at the gate, were killed.[****] The insult upon this princess, who had always endeavored to live on good terms with the barons, and who joined them heartily in their hatred of the young Spenser, was an action which nobody pretended to justify; and the king thought that he might, without giving general umbrage, assemble an army, and take vengeance on the offender. No one came to the assistance of Badlesmere; and Edward prevailed.[*****]

* Walsing. p. 114.

** Tottle’s Collect, part ii p. 50. Walsing. p. 114.

*** Tottle’s Collect, part ii. p. 54. Rymer, vol. iii. p. 891.

**** Rymer, vol. iii. p. 89. Walsing. p. 114, 115. T. de la
Mare, p. 595. Murimuth, p. 56.

***** Walsing. p. 115.

But having now some forces on foot, and having concerted measures with his friends throughout England, he ventured to take off the mask, to attack all his enemies, and to recall the two Spensers, whose sentence he declared illegal, unjust, contrary to the tenor of the Great Charter, passed without the assent of the prelates, and extorted by violence from him and the estate of barons.[*] Still the commons were not mentioned by either party.

{1322.} The king had now got the start of the barons, an advantage which, in those times, was commonly decisive, and he hastened with his army to the marches of Wales, the chief seat of the power of his enemies, whom he found totally unprepared for resistance. Many of the barons in those parts endeavored to appease him by submission:[**] their castles were seized, and their persons committed to custody. But Lancaster, in order to prevent the total ruin of his party, summoned together his vassals and retainers; declared his alliance with Scotland, which had long been suspected; received the promise of a reënforcement from that country, under the command of Randolf, earl of Murray, and Sir James Douglas;[***] and being joined by the earl of Hereford, advanced with all his forces against the king, who had collected an army of thirty thousand men, and was superior to his enemies. Lancaster posted himself at Burton upon Trent, and endeavored to defend the passages of the river:[****] but being disappointed in that plan of operations, this prince, who had no military genius, and whose personal courage was even suspected, fled with his army to the north, in expectation of being there joined by his Scottish allies.[*****] He was pursued by the king, and his army diminished daily, till he came to Boroughbridge, where he found Sir Andrew Harcla posted with some forces on the opposite side of the river, and ready to dispute the passage with him. He was repulsed in an attempt which he made to force his way: the earl of Hereford was killed; the whole army of the rebels was disconcerted: Lancaster himself was become incapable of taking any measures either for flight or defence; and he was seized without resistance by Harcla, and conducted to the king.[******]

* Rymer, vol. iii. p. 907. T. de la More, p. 595.

** Walsing. p. 115. Murimuth, p. 57.

*** Rymer, vol. iii. p. 958.

**** Walsing. p. 115.

***** Ypod. Neust. p. 504.

****** T. de la More, p. 596. Walsing. p. 116.

In those violent times, the laws were so much neglected on both sides, that, even where they might, without any sensible inconvenience, have been observed, the conquerors deemed it unnecessary to pay any regard to them. Lancaster, who was guilty of open rebellion, and was taken in arms against his sovereign, instead of being tried by the laws of his country, which pronounced the sentence of death against him, was condemned by a court-martial,[*] and led to execution. Edward, however, little vindictive in his natural temper, here indulged his revenge, and employed against the prisoner the same indignities which had been exercised by his orders against Gavaston. He was clothed in a mean attire, placed on a lean jade without a bridle, a hood was put on his head, and in this posture, attended by the acclamations of the people, this prince was conducted to an eminence near Pomfret, one of his own castles, and there beheaded.[**]

* Tyrrel, vol. 11. p. 291.

** Leland’s Coll. vol. i. p. 668.

Thus perished Thomas, earl of Lancaster, prince of the blood, and one of the most potent barons that had ever been in England. His public conduct sufficiently discovers the violence and turbulence of his character: his private deportment appears not to have been more innocent: and his hypocritical devotion, by which he gained the favor of the monks and populace, will rather be regarded as an aggravation than an alleviation of his guilt. Badlesmere, Giffard, Barret, Cheyney, Fleming, and about eighteen of the most notorious offenders, were afterwards condemned by a legal trial, and were executed. Many were thrown into prison: others made their escape beyond sea: some of the king’s servants were rewarded from the forfeitures: Harcla received for his services the earldom of Carlisle, and a large estate, which he soon after forfeited with his life, for a treasonable correspondence with the king of Scotland. But the greater part of those vast escheats were seized by young Spenser, whose rapacity was insatiable. Many of the barons of the king’s party were disgusted with this partial division of the spoils: the envy against Spenser rose higher than ever: the usual insolence of his temper, inflamed by success, impelled him to commit many acts of violence: the people, who always hated him, made him still more the object of aversion: all the relations of the attainted barons and gentlemen secretly vowed revenge: and though tranquillity was in appearance restored to the kingdom, the general contempt of the king, and odium against Spenser, bred dangerous humors, the source of future revolutions and convulsions.

In this situation, no success could be expected from foreign wars; and Edward, after making one more fruitless attempt against Scotland, whence he retreated with dishonor, found it necessary to terminate hostilities with that kingdom, by a truce of thirteen years.[*] Robert, though his title to the crown was not acknowledged in the treaty, was satisfied with insuring his possession of it during so long a time. He had repelled with gallantry all the attacks of England: he had carried war both into that kingdom and into Ireland: he had rejected with disdain the pope’s authority, who pretended to impose his commands upon him, and oblige him to make peace with his enemies: his throne was firmly established, as well in the affections of his subjects, as by force of arms: yet there naturally remained some inquietude in his mind, while at war with a state which, however at present disordered by faction, was of itself so much an overmatch for him both in riches and in numbers of people. And this truce was, at the same time, the more seasonable for England, because the nation was at that juncture threatened with hostilities from France.

{1324.} Philip the Fair, king of France, who died in 1315, had left the crown to his son Lewis Hutin, who, after a short reign, dying without male issue, was succeeded by Philip the Long, his brother, whose death soon after made way for Charles the Fair, the youngest brother of that family. This monarch had some grounds of complaint against the king’s ministers in Guienne; and as there was no common or equitable judge in that strange species of sovereignty established by the feudal law, he seemed desirous to take advantage of Edward’s weakness, and under that pretence to confiscate all his foreign dominions.[**]

* Rymer, vol. iii. p. 1022. Murimuth, p. 60.

** Rymer, vol. iv. p. 74, 98.

After an embassy by the earl of Kent, the king’s brother, had been tried in vain, Queen Isabella obtained permission to go over to Paris, and endeavor to adjust, in an amicable manner, the difference with her brother: but while she was making some progress in this negotiation, Charles started a new pretension, the justice of which could not be disputed, that Edward himself should appear in his court, and do homage for the fees which he held in France. But there occurred many difficulties in complying with this demand. Young Spenser, by whom the king was implicitly governed, had unavoidably been engaged in many quarrels with the queen, who aspired to the same influence, and though that artful princess, on her leaving England, had dissembled her animosity, Spenser, well acquainted with her secret sentiments, was unwilling to attend his master to Paris, and appear in a court where her credit might expose him to insults, if not to danger. He hesitated no less on allowing the king to make the journey alone; both fearing lest that easy prince should in his absence fall under other influence, and foreseeing the perils to which he himself should be exposed if, without the protection of royal authority, he remained in England where he was so generally hated.

{1325.} While these doubts occasioned delays and difficulties, Isabella proposed that Edward should resign the dominion of Guienne to his son, now thirteen years of age; and that the prince should come to Paris, and do the homage which every vassal owed to his superior lord. This expedient, which seemed so happily to remove all difficulties, was immediately embraced: Spenser was charmed with the contrivance: young Edward was sent to Paris: and the ruin covered under this fatal snare, was never perceived or suspected by any of the English council.

The queen, on her arrival in France, had there found a great number of English fugitives, the remains of the Lancastrian faction; and their common hatred of Spenser soon begat a secret friendship and correspondence between them and that princess. Among the rest was young Roger Mortimer, a potent baron in the Welsh marches, who had been obliged, with others, to make his submissions to the king, had been condemned for high treason; but having received a pardon for his life, was afterwards detained in the Tower, with an intention of rendering his confinement perpetual, He was so fortunate as to make his escape into France;[*] and being one of the most considerable persons now remaining of the party, as well as distinguished by his violent animosity against Spenser, he was easily admitted to pay his court to Queen Isabella. The graces of his person and address advanced him quickly in her affections: he became her confident and counsellor in all her measures; and gaining ground daily upon her heart, he engaged her to sacrifice at last, to her passion, all the sentiments of honor and of fidelity to her husband.[**]

* Rymer, vol. iv. p. 7, 8, 20. T. de la More, p. 596.
Walsing.[** unclear] p. 120. Ypoa. Neust. p. 506.

** T. de la More, p. 598. Murimuth, p. 65.

Hating now the man whom she had injured, and whom she never valued, she entered ardently into all Mortimer’s conspiracies; and having artfully gotten into her hands the young prince, and heir of the monarchy, she resolved on the utter ruin of the king, as well as of his favorite. She engaged her brother to take part in the same criminal purpose: her court was daily filled with the exiled barons: Mortimer lived in the most declared intimacy with her: a correspondence was secretly carried on with the malecontent party in England: and when Edward, informed of those alarming circumstances, required her speedily to return with the prince, she publicly replied, that she would never set foot in the kingdom till Spenser was forever removed from his presence and councils; a declaration which procured her great popularity in England, and threw a decent veil over all her treasonable enterprises.

Edward endeavored to put himself in a posture of defence;[*] but, besides the difficulties arising from his own indolence and slender abilities, and the want of authority, which of consequence attended all his resolutions, it was not easy for him, in the present state of the kingdom and revenue, to maintain a constant force ready to repel an invasion, which he knew not at what time or place he had reason to expect.

* Rymer, vol. iv. p. 184, 188, 225.

All his efforts were unequal to the traitorous and hostile conspiracies which, both at home and abroad, were forming against his authority, and which were daily penetrating farther even into his own family. His brother, the earl of Kent, a virtuous but weak prince, who was then at Paris, was engaged by his sister-in-law, and by the king of France, who was also his cousin-german, to give countenance to the invasion, whose sole object, he believed, was the expulsion of the Spensers: he prevailed on his elder brother, the earl of Norfolk, to enter secretly into the same design: the earl of Leicester, brother and heir of the earl of Lancaster, had too many reasons for his hatred of these ministers to refuse his concurrence. Walter de Reynel, archbishop of Canterbury, and many of the prelates, expressed their approbation of the queen’s measures: several of the most potent barons, envying the authority of the favorite, were ready to fly to arms: the minds of the people, by means of some truths and many calumnies, were strongly disposed to the same party: and there needed but the appearance of the queen and prince, with such a body of foreign troops as might protect her against immediate violence, to turn all this tempest, so artfully prepared, against the unhappy Edward.

{1326.} Charles, though he gave countenance and assistance to the faction, was ashamed openly to support the queen and prince against the authority of a husband and father; and Isabella was obliged to court the alliance of some other foreign potentate, from whose dominions she might set out on her intended enterprise. For this purpose, she affianced young Edward, whose tender age made him incapable to judge of the consequences, with Philippa, daughter of the count of Holland and Hainault;[*] and having, by the open assistance of this prince, and the secret protection of her brother, enlisted in her service near three thousand men, she set sail from the harbor of Dort, and landed safely, and without opposition, on the coast of Suffolk. The earl of Kent was in her company: two other princes of the blood, the earl of Norfolk and the earl of Leicester, joined her soon after her landing with all their followers: three prelates, the bishops of Ely, Lincoln, and Hereford, brought her both the force of their vassals and the authority of their character:[**] even Robert de Watteville, who had been sent by the king to oppose her progress in Suffolk, deserted to her with all his forces. To render her cause more favorable, she renewed her declaration, that the solo purpose of her enterprise was to free the king and kingdom from the tyranny of the Spensers, and of Chancellor Baldoc, their creature.[*] The populace were allured by her specious pretences: the barons thought themselves secure against forfeitures by the appearance of the prince in her army: and a weak, irresolute king, supported by ministers generally odious, was unable to stem this torrent, which bore with such irresistible violence against him.

Edward, after trying in vain to rouse the citizens of London to some sense of duty,[****] departed for the west, where he hoped to meet with a better reception; and he had no sooner discovered his weakness by leaving the city, than the rage of the populace broke out without control against him and his ministers.

* T. de la More, p. 598.

** Walsing. p. 123. Ypod. Neust, p. 507. T. de la More, p.
598., Murimuth, p. 66.

*** Ypod, Neust. p. 508.

**** Walsing. p. 123.