Joan of Kent: The First Princess of Wales

by Penny Lawne

  The grumblings of Parliament and the general dissatisfaction with the lack of progress in France did not affect Joan’s growing sense of security in Richard’s position. Her concern remained focussed on his personal welfare and she turned her attention towards his marriage. As Richard was barely twelve there was no great urgency, but Joan was very conscious of the importance of his marriage and she was determined that he should not follow his father’s example. Richard’s best friend, Robert de Vere, had married Princess Isabella’s daughter Philippa the previous year. It was time, Joan felt, for a suitable bride to be found for Richard; this, for Joan, meant marriage to a foreign princess. Her own experience had reinforced rather than weakened the attractions of a traditional match. Under her influence a marriage council had been set up within a few months of Richard being crowned, its members comprised exclusively of people close to Joan and dominated by her. Potential matches were identified and considered. Initially, in January 1378, a French match had been discussed.53 When this came to nothing, the possibilities of a Navarrese princess was considered. When this faltered, another foreign princess was soon identified, and negotiations began with the King of Bohemia for a match between his sister, Anne, and Richard. As ever, the choice of suitable foreign brides was restricted; nevertheless there was little, on the face of it, to recommend Anne, diplomatically or financially. With England’s interests overseas firmly centred on France and the Spanish peninsula, Bohemia was not an obvious or particularly desirable ally, while the country’s inability to supply Anne with a dowry was a considerable disadvantage. Joan does not seem to have regarded these as obstacles, although she was careful to enlist Gaunt’s support, having the opportunity to discuss it with him at Christmas, which she and Richard spent as his guests at Kenilworth. Their relationship remained as close as ever. Gaunt’s New Year gift to Joan of a covered gold cup and crucifix garnished with precious stones and pearls, and adorned with an image of the Blessed Virgin and St John, is revealing.54 The implicit, if unconscious, identification of Joan with Mary and Gaunt with her protector, St John, is intriguing, suggesting that this, perhaps, is how Gaunt saw their relationship. By February Joan had returned to Kennington with the family, confident that she had the duke’s support and, indeed, in June 1380 Gaunt played host to the King of Bohemia’s envoy, continuing the discussions.55 The king’s marriage was naturally a matter of great importance and an affair in which all members of the nobility had an interest, but Joan’s influence here was strong. Simon Burley was one of the principal negotiators and on 26 December 1380 Thomas Holand was appointed as one of the ambassadors to treat for his brother’s marriage.56

  Thomas and John Holand benefited from their mother’s new confidence. By February 1380 Thomas was acting as Marshal of England, formally confirmed on the 13 March, and in May he was appointed justice of the peace for Surrey with his brother-in-law, the Earl of Arundel. When there was a renewed threat of invasion from France in June, he was placed in charge of defending Southampton with a garrison of 150 men at arms, seventy balisters and eighty archers, and a further eighty men were sent to joint them in July.57 By the end of the year he was at last elevated to the earldom of Kent.58 At the same time Joan granted him her interests in Kent: the manor of Wickhambreaux and £30 county annuity. A seal of Thomas’ from 1380 shows his shield suspended from the neck of a white hind, incorporating his mother’s personal insignia with the Holand arms.59 John Holand similarly gained, receiving a life grant of Northwich town in Cheshire, the Hope and Hopedale lordships, rent from Overmarsh, Flintshire, and when Blanche Wake died in 1380 Joan granted John three Wake manors: Long Marton in Cumberland, Langton in Yorkshire and Stevington in Bedfordshire.60 John also received public recognition from his young brother through official appointments; in September he was granted the Marensin lordship in the Landes region of Gascony and in March 1381 he was appointed justice for Cheshire for life, a strategically important post in view of the extensive Crown estates in the county, part of Richard’s inheritance from his father.61 This was a notable mark of approval, when in only August 1379 the most reward he had received had been a gift of clothing from his royal brother (eight long gowns and other garments).62 Maud also gained from her mother’s more relaxed attitude, and on 1 April 1380 Maud married Waleran, the Count of St Pol, at Windsor, the occasion notable for being celebrated with a great concourse of trumpeters and entertainers, in the presence of Richard and all of Maud’s family, with most of the court in attendance.63 Maud received a typically generous gift from John of Gaunt of a three-legged vessel, cup and ewer.64 It was a year of marriages, with Gaunt’s daughter Elizabeth being married to John Hastings, Earl of Pembroke, at Kenilworth on 24 June 1380, followed in October by the marriage of her brother, Henry of Bolingbroke, to Mary Bohun, at her mother’s home at Rothford Hall in Essex.

  As she became more convinced of the security of Richard’s position as king, Joan felt able to turn her attention towards other areas, and she started to show a much greater personal interest in her own affairs. Loyal and long-serving retainers were high on Joan’s list. Although the awards were made by Richard, there can be no doubt that Joan was using her influence to secure them. Her long-time clerk John Carleton had become sub-deacon at Lincoln Cathedral in April 1378 and canon at St Paul’s in London in February 1379 while receiving an additional clerical appointment to the vicarage of Huyssh and Lamport, her chaplain John Yernmouth was given the church of Stoke Basset in Oxfordshire in August 1378, and in April 1379 Robert Braybrooke was nominated to Lichfield church.65 William Harpele was granted a manor and other income in February 1381, and her squire Henry Norton received a life grant in April 1380 ‘in consideration of his services to her and to her daughter de Courtenay’.66 In March 1378 Andrew and Elizabeth Luttrell were granted a lifetime annuity of £200 in recognition of their service to Joan and the prince during his lifetime, and when Andrew subsequently died Joan ensured this annuity was confirmed for Elizabeth.67 Joan de la Warr, daughter of Joan’s friend Eleanor, received a wardship in 1379.68 William Beauchamp, her steward John Worthe and Adam Louches were all granted annuities in the spring of 1378; John Worthe was also granted a life interest in her Northweald manor, while Aubrey de Vere was given a life grant of the bailiwick of Rochford hundred in Essex in January 1380.69 She committed the custody of Cardigan Castle to Lewis Clifford for life, and granted Richard Stury the post of constable and keeper of the castle and town of Aberystwyth in Wales for her lifetime, a position confirmed by Richard three weeks later.70 Joan was almost certainly influential in ensuring rewards given by Richard to John Clanvowe, William Beauchamp, Richard Stury and Lewis Clifford around this time, small but significant grants in financial terms including those of wardship and marriage.71

  Joan also showed a renewed interest in her estates, which she had previously been content to leave in the hands of her council. The only surviving copy of Joan’s personal seal is attached to a document signed at Waghen on 20 April 1380 to record an exchange of rental at Miserden manor with Meaux Abbey.72 A similar personal involvement is evident at this time in Joan’s personal request for a series of commissions to investigate incidents on her estates held in Dartford, Cottingham, Essex, Deeping and Bourn, Chesterfield and Barnstable.73 In May 1381 personal requests made by Joan in the interests of her uncle Thomas Wake’s foundations at Bourne and Ware in Lincolnshire, on behalf of the prior William Herbert, were granted, and a pardon issued to Adam Aldeby, the vicar of Stamford, for causing the death of John Bell.74 The indication of Joan’s new and detailed interest in personal affairs suggests that she was now considering her retirement from the court, and this is confirmed by the order for the construction of a new barge for her in May 1381, which would give her easy access downstream to Windsor, Kennington and Westminster from Wallingford.75 In the same month Simon Burley became constable of Windsor Castle, an appointment which would have reassured Joan that he remained very close at hand for Richard (the favour shown to Burley included the gifts of manors at Windso
r, Henley, West Hampstead and Charing Cross).76

  It is easy to imagine that Joan would have been feeling generally well satisfied with affairs by the spring of 1381 and thinking that the time was right for her to retire from public life. She had clearly shown that she had little interest in taking a central role in public affairs and had taken great care to refrain from becoming too prominent. It is notable that she preferred to exercise her influence indirectly even as an intercessor where possible, with official requests for pardons to be given to individuals for capital offences made as frequently by members of her family (her daughter Maud, her sons Thomas and John and Robert Braybrooke) and her staff (such as her clerks William Fulbourne and William Harpele, her damsels Agnes Corby and Margery Lodewyk, and her knights John Worthe and William Neville) as by Joan in person.77 Joan had no desire to maintain her public role. The last important aspect of Richard’s life which she had wanted to oversee was his marriage, and now the final arrangements for this were in place. In April the conclusion of the marriage treaty was celebrated at a sumptuous banquet hosted at the Savoy by Gaunt for the envoy of the King of Bohemia.78 This was a joyful occasion for Joan and very much a family affair. Her Holand children, now seemingly settled, were all in attendance. The choice of venue and host for the celebrations was natural, given Gaunt’s position, but it was also a reflection of Joan’s continuing close friendship with her brother-in-law, unaffected by his marriage to Constance of Castile or his affair with Katherine Swynford, evidenced by the regular visits between them and the many gifts exchanged (listed in the duke’s register), including another gold drinking vessel and several books (‘livres’) given to Joan in March 1381, and further expensive gifts for Joan and her daughter the Duchess of Brittany in May 1382.79 Having satisfactorily finalised his nephew’s marriage arrangements, Gaunt then departed for Scotland, having been appointed to broker peace and agree a truce with the Scots. Joan meanwhile made preparations for her annual visit to Canterbury in June, to mark the anniversary of the prince’s death. With Richard now fourteen, and his marriage imminent, Joan could feel that she had fulfilled the prince’s expectations and done as much as she could for her son. She could not have realised or foreseen the danger which was so nearly upon them.

  The popular armed rising which overwhelmed and paralysed the government for two weeks in June 1381 is usually described as the Peasants’ Revolt, although this is a misnomer as it was hardly restricted to the peasant class. It appears to have been sparked by the arrival of royal officials into local areas to investigate and enforce the collection of a poll tax passed by the Northampton parliament in November 1380. The reasons for the uprising and its course and events continue to be debated by historians, but what is not in doubt is that it came at a time when the government was unpopular and weak. The conciliar government set up to rule for Richard had struggled to be an effective body, weakened at the outset by the lack of strong leadership, and the exclusion of the king’s uncles. Unable to manage Parliament effectively and lacking clear direction, the councillors had resigned en masse at the beginning of 1380 and been replaced with a group of men headed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Simon Sudbury. But the new councillors proved similarly unable to provide strong and decisive leadership. Worse still, there was no good news from abroad. Popular support for the war with France, weakened by successive failures, was probably at its lowest when the campaigning army which had set out in July 1380 returned from their chevauchée through France in April 1381 with little to show for their progress, having swallowed up the taxes raised in the Parliament of January 1380. The sad truth was that the spectacular victories of the prince and Edward III were becoming distant memories, and there was little sympathy for Thomas of Woodstock’s bellicose enthusiasm and energy for a new campaign. Even John of Gaunt showed little interest. Fear of invasion from France now drove the war effort, rather than a belief in establishing and maintaining the English Crown’s claim to the French throne. It was a disastrously expensive defensive policy which consumed and exhausted each successive round of taxation and had left the government in a state of financial crisis in the autumn of 1380. Sudbury’s council, although horrified by the parlous state of the royal finances, had been overwhelmed by the responsibility for keeping Buckingham’s army in France through the winter, and had managed to convince the Commons in the parliament held in November 1380 at Northampton of the need for further taxes to raise money. Parliament had grudgingly agreed to grant a further poll tax and in the wrangling between the various vested interests the resultant tax was passed on the basis it would be levied at a flat rate. Although this inevitably meant that it would fall hardest on the poorest, no one foresaw the extent to which the tax would be resented, or anticipated the resistance that would be encountered by those collecting the tax.

  Despite the many reports of the events which took place in the first two weeks of June by the various chroniclers, it remains difficult to determine with accuracy the exact sequence of events.80 It is generally considered that the rising started around the beginning of June with unrest in Essex and Kent which spread into London, sparked by the commissions of enquiry set up to investigate the widespread evasion of the latest poll tax. On 1 June the commission of enquiry set up at Brentwood in Essex erupted into violence with three jurors killed. In Kent the violence spread from the east coast at Gravesend through Dartford, Rochester, Maidstone and Canterbury and then up to London, led by Wat Tyler and John Ball. From the inception of the rising the targets for the rebels were government officials and representatives, rather than the king himself, but first on the list of their hated targets was John of Gaunt and very quickly their anger turned into demands for the executions of unpopular leading figures. The numbers of men joining in the rising rose rapidly and the Anonimalle Chronicle estimated that 50,000 men had taken to the roads by 2 June. Buildings of authority such as castles and prisons were targeted, along with the homes of those in authority; property was looted, burned and destroyed and many of those unfortunate enough to be caught by the rebels met a violent end.

  The government was slow to react. It is evident that the first reports of unrest which came to the king did not give cause for concern. During the first week of June 1381 Joan left Richard at Windsor and made her way to Canterbury for her annual pilgrimage to the prince’s tomb, accompanied by her daughter, Joan, and a handful of her women, probably including Eleanor Clifford. The cathedral at Canterbury was a major pilgrimage destination, as it housed the body of Thomas à Becket, and the route from London was well known, the road winding through Southwark, Deptford, Greenwich and down into Kent, to Canterbury via Sittingbourne. For Joan, this had become an annual private and personal pilgrimage to visit the prince’s tomb on the anniversary of his death rather than to pray at the site of the saint’s martyrdom. She would stay for a few days, arriving shortly before the 8 June, so that she could listen to services in commemoration of the prince throughout the day, returning a day or so later to London. Although Joan had recently given her manor at Wickhambreaux to Thomas, it seems likely that she stayed there on this occasion, and on previous annual visits, as it was only five miles east of Canterbury, in the valley of the Little Stour river.81 Had Richard, or anyone else at court, realised the impending danger Joan would never have left Windsor for Canterbury. Joan appears to have left Canterbury after commemorating the prince’s anniversary on 8 June without appreciating how near the rebels were to her. The Anonimalle Chronicle records that by Monday 10 June, just after Joan had set out on her return journey, about 4,000 rebels had gathered at Canterbury, entering the cathedral during Mass.82 According to Froissart, as she was on the road travelling back to London to rejoin Richard and the court, she was overtaken and stopped by a large crowd: ‘She was in great jeopardy to have been lost, for these people came to her carriage and dealt rudely with her, whereof the good lady was in great doubt lest they would have done some villainy to her or to her damosels. Howbeit, God kept her, and she came in one day from Canterbury to
London, for she never durst tarry by the way.’83

  Froissart is the only chronicler to record this encounter, and his account cannot be verified. However, other sources do corroborate the timing and the route of the rebels marching on London from Canterbury and the coincidence of Joan’s return from her annual visit to Canterbury makes such an encounter at least possible. Froissart knew Joan personally, and it is not unreasonable to suggest that his account may have been drawn from a contemporary recollection. Joan would have been travelling in a carriage emblazoned with her arms, and although there were few in her party she would have had a small armed escort. To be stopped, and accosted in this way, was extremely unusual. The crowd would have realised Joan’s identity from the insignia on her carriage, and although their behaviour towards her was familiar they appear to have held her in respect, as there was no suggestion that the personal safety of Joan or her companions was threatened. Exactly what the men said to Joan is unknown, but their demeanour and intention was apparently clear. It seems likely that they may have aired some of their grievances to Joan, and at least made it clear that they intended to see the king. It does not seem to have occurred to any of them that they could have taken the king’s mother hostage, or that by accompanying her back to London they could have used her presence as a bargaining tool with her son. Joan’s reaction, according to Froissart, was immediate; she returned to London as quickly as she could (in one day). This meant that she followed the rebels on the road to the capital, or possibly even overtook them; they, after all, were on foot, whereas she was in a carriage. This was not the action of a frightened woman; it was rather the instinct of a mother to protect her son. Knowing that this unruly mob was intent on accosting the king, Joan was desperate to reach him first; to warn him, and to ensure he was protected. Joan had no means of knowing what the situation was in London and whether this was an isolated group of discontented men or one of many. For all she knew no one in London was aware of the impending army of rebels advancing on the capital. She also knew that Richard was relatively unprotected, as many of the nobility were away, with Gaunt in Scotland and Edmund, Earl of Cambridge, on expedition abroad. It seems probable that Joan ordered one of her mounted escort to ride ahead of her back to the court to warn the king, and that she followed as quickly as she could. As she was uncomfortably jolted in her carriage as it swayed behind her straining horses, she would almost certainly have seen many more peasants and labourers marching along the road towards London, as the chroniclers testify that men poured into the capital from Kent over this period. Although estimates vary, by 12 June around 100,000 had gathered on the outskirts of London.84