by Ian Mortimer
On 20 June, one week late, Edward stepped aboard his largest remaining ship, the Thomas and received his new great seal from the archbishop of Canterbury. The archbishop apologised to Edward. Edward accepted the apology and reinstated him as Chancellor, but the prelate, having thought over his position, would not accept. He was too old, he said. He could have added that he was too old to argue politics with a twenty-eight-year-old king who annually made a pilgrimage to see the point of the sword which had killed Thomas Becket, an earlier archbishop of Canterbury. For a second time Edward accepted his resignation. He appointed the archbishop's brother, Robert Stratford, instead. Then, resolved to fight the French, he gave the order for his fleet to sail towards Flanders.
The ships of the fleet all came together over the next two days, keeping close. Small wooden vessels bobbed up and down around Edward's cog: tiny by comparison with some of the vessels they would be facing. Nineteen of the French ships - including a few giant galleys hired from the Genoese - were said to have been larger than anything hitherto seen in the Channel.
Late on the next day, Friday 23 June, as the English approached the Zwin estuary, they all saw for themselves. There was no more arrogant bragging or self-delusion. Every man in the fleet could see what stood between them and their purpose. Masts like a forest rose up before them in the evening light. The ships' prows were all armoured with wooden castles, one after the other, all in a row, totally blocking the mouth of the River Zwin.
Edward gave the order for the fleet to drop anchor, and wait the night. The next few hours cannot have been easy for him or his men, trying to sleep with the movement of the ship, each half-listening for a surprise night attack. No sound but the waves lapping at the side of the boat and the low voices of those talking about strategies for the morning. No refuge from the thoughts of the danger that lay ahead. For the women Edward had brought to attend to his wife and newborn son, it must have been a troubling experience. They knew the horrific consequences if they were captured. Aware of their fears and vulnerability, the king ordered them to be kept well back from the battle.
In the morning Edward saw that the enemy ships had not moved overnight. As the sun came up, he and his men waited for them to leave the estuary, to sail towards him. He probably hoped that they would do what the mounted knights at Dupplin Moor had done: charge into the sights of his archers on the flanks. But the French did not move. Their greatest and largest ships were placed at the front, defensively. If Edward wanted to land in Flanders, he would have to take the fight to them.
Still he waited. It was 24 June, the feast of St John the Baptist. Facing the French, the English archers would have looked into the sun. So Edward continued to wait, close to the coast. He knew that if he sailed north, the French could sail between him and the midday sun. Only in the early afternoon, when he knew that the sun would be behind his ships for the rest of the day, and the wind and the tide were with him, did he give the signal to advance. The first of the three lines of English ships sailed forward, the Thomas in their centre, with Edward on board and with the new royal banner of England and France, resplendent in red, blue and gold above him.
Slowly he came within arrowshot of the huge French ships. The French and Genoese crossbowmen waited. The English loosed their arrows. The greater range and the faster speed of the English longbows swept the decks of the French vessels. The crossbowmen were powerless to put up a line of fire. Even with the rising and falling of the boats, the English arrows tore through the lines of men on the French vessels. Realising that the impetus lay with them, the English sailed their ships into the French line and hurled their grappling hooks over the sides, drawing them together. The French responded, sending galleys forward to pick off some of the leading English ships. Four great galleys armed with springalds (giant catapults) sailed towards one English ship, the Oliver, and fired large amounts of stone shot into its sails and across the decks of the vessel. Soon many aboard the Oliver were killed or wounded. But Edward gave orders to respond to the challenge, and several English ships reached the beleaguered boat, driving off the galleys.
Over die next few hours it became clear that to judge the armies by the numbers of ships and men had been misleading. The first line of the French fleet blocked the second line from attacking, and they blocked the third line. All the English ships massed in an attack on the leading French vessels. The men who now rushed from the English on to the French and Spanish ships were hardened fighters. Foremost among them were the earl of Huntingdon, Sir Walter Manny and John Crabb: men used to warfare at sea as well as on land. The men they commanded had marched with Edward against the Scots. They had marched with Edward against Philip at La Flamengrie. They had thought, talked and dreamed of war for the last ten years. Now, at last, they saw that a momentous victory was within reach. It was as if Edward was a sacred leader who could only lead them to victory, like Alexander. He stood on the deck of the Thomas, shouting orders, undaunted, even when a French spear struck him through his thigh. Very soon the Christopher had a grappling iron hurled on to its deck, and as the English archers on an adjacent vessel let loose volleys of arrows to pin down the Genoese crossbowmen and to curb the sailors throwing down stones from the mastheads, the English men-at-arms scrambled on board.21 A great shout went up from the English when they saw the French flag torn down from the Christopher. It was all the inspiration they needed.
Late that afternoon, when the foremost English vessels broke through the first French line, the second line was open to attack. Seeing the disaster unfolding, the third line fled that evening. The men of Flanders, who had been watching from the shore, themselves rushed to their boats and put out into the estuary. Attacked from both sides, and with very little chance of sailing around the island of Cadsand and away from the carnage, the majority of the French had no option but to fight to the death. Many threw themselves into the water and struggled to shore, where the Flemings caught and mutilated them. For many more there was no retreat, for their leather or metal armour would have drowned its wearer. And this being warfare at sea, which held special fears for men-at-arms, there were no chivalric courtesies. Probably seventeen thousand Frenchmen were killed or drowned, including both commanders of the French fleet. One of the French admirals was captured alive, but his skills rendered him too dangerous to ransom. Edward ordered the man to be hanged from the mast of his own ship.
It was the most extraordinary victory, and one for which Edward could take the full credit. Not only had he fought in the front line against heavy odds, the decision to sail had been his, the martial experience and ethos of his men had been down to him, and the strategic use of archers had been his. But even more than these, his leadership was responsible for this victory. He had inspired his men to take on a much larger and better-equipped fleet, knowing that the penalty for failure was death. He may have been half-mad with anger, frustration and worry when he had resolved to set sail; nonetheless he had convinced himself and his men that he could win. In his first great battle against the French - the battle of Sluys, as it came to be known — Edward captured 166 ships. Only twenty-four escaped. He had destroyed French naval supremacy in the Channel.
*
In London they could not believe the news. Only the previous October they had been driving piles and stakes into the Thames, fortifying the city, and arranging for church bells to be rung in warning, fully expecting to see two hundred French ships come sailing up the river to burn the city. Now that enemy fleet no longer existed. They could not believe it until a letter from Edward spelled it out for them. In Ghent too there was great rejoicing. Obviously the men he had led to victory themselves did the most celebrating, 'making much noise and much joy from the instruments they had brought'. Edward himself was deeply affected, and gave thanks to God over and over again. It was a propitious day; he had received victory by divine clemency: it was a great miracle. Thanks were given to God 'who had shown mercy to Edward in his great danger'.2'' The significance of it being the feast of S
t John the Baptist was not lost on Edward either (although it was probably a coincidence that his newborn son had been christened John shortly before). Thanks to that saint were offered in abundance. Edward could not walk or ride because of his thigh injury, and had to stay on board die Thomas for two weeks, but, if he had been able to, he would have no doubt gone on a pilgrimage straightaway. He did not neglect to send a letter to all the archbishops and bishops in England informing them of his victory and desiring their prayers. And he wrote to his son with news of the victory, stressing that the Christopher and the previously captured vessels had been retaken together with several other ships as large as die Christopher. This was news not just of a victory but of an improved platform for English trade, for it hugely increased die seaborne defences and security of the English wool fleet. As soon as he was well enough, he proceeded to the shrine of the Holy Blood at Bruges and the church of the Virgin Mary at Aardenburg to give thanks for his safe delivery.28 Only then did he progress to Ghent to see Philippa and his new son.
Edward had spent the time laid up with his injury discussing with van Artevelde how best to prosecute the next stage of the war. The sieges of Tournai and Saint-Omer, which had been planned earlier in the year, remained the top objectives. These were both French-controlled towns on the Flemish border, both of strategic significance to Flanders and of great symbolic value to Edward. Tournai in particular was fanatically loyal to Philip. There was no time to lose. Despite his recent victory, the archbishop of Canterbury had written to say that the council was having difficulty in gathering the wool to fund the expedition. The Peruzzi and Bardi banks were also failing to meet part of a loan agreed for the expenses of the royal household. Edward knew he had to keep the momentum going to avoid a repetition of the 1339 fiasco. He split his army into two parts. One, the smaller, was to attack Saint-Omer under the command of Robert d'Artois. He himself would command the other in an assault on Tournai when he was fit enough.
The expedition began badly. Robert d'Artois was an old man unused to Edward's new strategic thinking and unable to organise and inspire the English archers and men-at-arms. He was not trusted by the Flemish infantry either. He sought to take on the French with traditional methods, and was heavily defeated. Many valuable troops were lost to the alliance, and only remnants of the army made their way back to Edward. The siege did not just fail, it did not begin.
Edward reached Tournai on 23 July, one month after Sluys. As he and his allies were taking up positions around the city, it became clear that it was well-prepared to sustain a siege. Its massive walls had been built for just such a purpose. The River Scheldt ran through the centre of die city, making it impossible to deprive it of water. No attempt to take it by force had ever succeeded. More recently, Philip had stationed a strong French garrison there to galvanise the resistance of the twenty thousand inhabitants. The suburbs had been burnt in advance of the allies' arrival. It looked as though it would be a long siege.
Edward, still high after his victory at Sluys, decided the best way to keep the momentum going would be to challenge Philip to a duel. This was what he claimed to have done already in his letter to the Venetians. Now he actually issued such a challenge. On 26 July he sent a letter to Philip, 'count of Valois'. In it he demanded the throne of France, and complained that Philip had violently withheld from him his rightful inheritance. He went on to say that, since the quarrel was between the two men themselves, 'let the controversy between us be fairly decided by ourselves, body to body, that the great nobility and valour of each other may be seen before all men'. Failing that, he offered a pitched battle between each king and a hundred men. And failing that, a pitched battle between their two armies before the walls of Tournai. The sooner Edward could have a positive and decisive victory on land, the less the cost to him, and the sooner he could advance negotiations into his real object: the return of all the lands he had lost since his coronation.
Philip's reply was to pretend that he knew no one who answered to the name of Philip de Valois. It was a dull response, and it frustrated Edward, who clearly took pride in his being prepared to issue a personal challenge as a king. Everything now pointed to Tournai as where the great land battle would take place. It fell to Edward and his allies to subdue the city as quickly as possible. Against a city whose burghers themselves manned its defences and who volunteered to go out on raiding parties to attack the English, that was not going to be an easy task. It was 26 August - a whole month later - before any determined assault was made on the city walls. Two thousand Flemish sought to break through the northern defences. Despite its weakening state, they failed. They failed again a week later.
As the siege went on, Edward grew more and more disillusioned and angry. His money supplies had again dried up. The German allies who were doing nothing on the east of the city were reprimanded for their slackness. They resorted to the reasonable defence that Edward had not yet paid them. The Hainaulters on the southern fringe of the city were engaging often and having successes in ravaging the countryside. But they too were disillusioned by the inactivity of their allies. The Brabanters fell out with van Artevelde, feeling that he was winning the favouritism of the English king. Matters worsened after a Brabant lord told van Artevelde to 'go back to Ghent and brew beer', prompting van Artevelde to draw his sword and kill him. And still the defences of the city had not been breached. The French army under Philip, with the sixteen-year-old King David of Scotland in tow, was drawing close. Edward knew he would have the greatest difficulty resisting them, but there was no alternative. All the allied armies were drawn together, regardless of their squabbles, to face the French advance on 7 September. The citizens of Tournai took arms and prepared to launch themselves on the rear of the allied troops when the battle was underway. Edward stationed a rearguard to protect his armies, and readied his archers.
In one of the most prescient acts of his pontificate, Pope Benedict had sent secret messengers to both Philip and Edward two weeks earlier. To Philip he had sent the low-ranking William Amici, provost of Lavaur. For once we have a secret messenger's instructions written down, for a copy was kept in Pope Benedict's own register. The reason for sending a low-status messenger was to be explained to Philip; it was so he might move more freely than the cardinals sent in the past. He was to set before Philip the pope's fears for his safety and the safety of his eldest son, John, duke of Normandy. He was to stress how successful the English had been at sea, and how the tide in Gascony was beginning to turn in favour of the English. He was to accentuate the size of the Flemish army with Edward, and to underline the dangers of a revolt in the French nobility against Philip, about which the pope had obviously heard mutterings. Finally, there was a renewed danger of a Moorish invasion. Considering all these things the pope heartily desired there to be peace between the two sides, and suggested that Aquitaine should remain in Philip's overlordship with Edward offering fealty and homage for it, as he had before the war. To Edward he sent his chaplain, William Bateman, a trusted agent of Edward's, explaining that just because he had won one crushing victory did not mean he would always be victorious, Tor one who was conquered seventeen times won the eighteenth battle and another who won two victories was totally defeated in the third engagement'. He also made William write down a series of good reasons why Edward should want peace, namely the problems he was facing through being away from his own kingdom, and the danger of the huge army Philip was bringing against him.
Although the seeds of Pope Benedict's advice had always fallen on stony ground before now, and these low-ranking clerics were not directly successful, both kings listened to these emissaries. Their words prepared the ground for a more personal appeal, on the night of 22 September. At the pope's request, Jeanne de Valois, dowager countess of Hainault and an abbess since her husband's death, came to Edward in his tent. As Edward's mother-in-law and sister of King Philip, and mother to the count of Hainault (whom Philip was threatening to decapitate), she was well-placed to gain access to the lead
ers and able to beg for peace. She had already wept on her knees before Philip. Now she begged Edward to think of Hainault and the destruction and damage that was being done to her son's dominions. She implored Edward for the love of God to desist from fighting.
Normally Edward would have paid scant attention to such pleas. But he faced a very serious dilemma. A messenger from Tournai to Philip had been caught escaping from the city and had informed the English that the people were close to surrendering. That was certainly the feeling in the French camp; many French nobles were gathering with Philip in fear that their relatives in the city were starving to death. Edward desperately wanted to take Tournai. He saw it as a test of his military capability. But at the same time his army was falling apart. If the city lasted out another two weeks, he would lose altogether, and his army would begin to desert. Money from England had entirely dried up, and he was having to borrow at very high rates of interest just to keep going. Thus Jeanne de Valois' pleas and protestations - made by a holy woman, and a special emissary from the pope - gave Edward an honourable way to begin negotiations with Philip. He could pretend that he was agreeing to parley out of benevolence. He agreed that he would send an embassy to treat with Philip at the chapel of Esplechin, about three miles away.