The Perfect King

by Ian Mortimer

  It seems utterly extraordinary to us - as it did to contemporaries — that this woman could betray the king who had given her so much. To look at the matter from her side, we must realise that she was living in fear. As soon as Edward died she would be nothing, and liable to attack from her political enemies. When the king died she could hardly expect members of the royal family to defend her: they would throw her to the dogs. Hence, to marry William Windsor secretly was to guarantee that she would have a protector after Edward's death. She may have even coerced him: if he did not marry her, she would allow the courts to find him guilty of embezzlement and extortion in Ireland. If this was the case, there would have been very little Windsor could have done. Not even an appeal to the king would have worked, for Edward in his mindlessly smiling state, was besotted with Alice.

  The high point of Alice's public position came in 1375, when she attended a tournament at Smithfield with the king. She rode from the Tower through the city dressed as the Lady of the Sun, to the amazement of the Londoners. Ladies led knights on silver chains: a fitting image, in view of Alice ruling Edward in his old age. She planned further tournament displays for the following year, and manipulated her position to be able to acquire whatever she wanted: clothes, jewels, bed-hangings, tapestries. Edward was wholly in her power. His world had shrunk to his immediate horizons, his ambitions dissipated. He was conscious only of Alice, his household servants, and his few surviving family members. With them he participated in hunting, hawking and civilised, courtly entertainment. All else had failed.

  The Good Parliament met at Westminster on 28 April 1376. Edward remained at Havering, and did not attend (except for the opening ceremony). Nor did the prince, physically too weak for business of any sort. So it fell to John of Gaunt to represent the royal family in the Painted Chamber as the magnates, clergy and knights of the shire gathered for the first time in two-and-a-half years. Edward, so obvious by his absence, became the subject of debate.

  There are many ironies about the reign of Edward III, but none more obvious than those which arose in this parliament. The leadership fell to the commons, and especially to the first ever Speaker of the house of commons: Sir Peter de la Mare. He was the steward of the earl of March, Edmund Mortimer, great-grandson of the Roger Mortimer whom Edward had ousted in 1330. The steward of the Mortimers was now lecturing Edward on his adultery, half a century after a Mortimer had been committing adultery with Edward's mother. And the word which de la Mare used more often than any other to describe the self-seekers around Edward was 'covyne' (coven); it was a word which Edward himself had used repeatedly in accusing the first Mortimer and his henchmen of their crimes. The judge had become the criminal, the criminal's heir the judge. But the biggest irony lay in the fact that Edmund Mortimer himself was now a member of the royal family, having married Philippa, Lionel's daughter, in 1368. Through his steward, the great-grandson and heir of Roger Mortimer was now speaking up for royal legitimacy and openly decrying an adulterous influence on the Crown.

  De la Mare and his associates in the commons had been able to seize the initiative for one very powerful reason. The Bruges treaty only provided for a year-long suspension of hostilities, and without further taxation England would not be able to send an army to France to keep the war on foreign soil. So, when the commons met and flatly refused the subsidy, they were in a very strong position indeed. When John of Gaunt realised that their motive in refusing was a concerted will to move against those who were poorly advising the king, he was furious, and threatened to crush the rebels in the commons. It had to be pointed out to him that, although de la Mare might be a commoner, he had the protection of one of the mightiest men in the land. This was something which John had to consider carefully, for although he was the royal representative at that parliament, the earl of March was now the father of a boy who had a rival claim to the throne. Roger Mortimer, Lionel's grandson, was arguably next in line after the young Richard of Bordeaux. Gaunt had not yet been formally recognised as second-in-line. Thus he was forced to acknowledge that the political will of parliament, including the commons, could not be stifled.

  It is impossible not to be impressed by de la Mare's courage. With death threats being muttered around him, and John of Gaunt steaming in his pent-up. anger above him, he proceeded to accuse Latimer of a string of crimes, including misrule and extortion in Brittany, theft of Breton revenues from the king, negligence in the defence of Saint-Sauveur and Becherel, seizure of wine and money taken from enemy ships which should have come to the king, embezzlement of four-fifths of the ten thousand marks compensation paid by Sir Robert Knolles for the failure of the 1371 campaign, and embezzlement of four-fifths of the ten thousand pound sum paid by the citizens of Bristol to protect their liberties. He was further charged, along with the London merchant and master of the royal mint, Richard Lyons, of taking interest from the Treasury for money which had been given by foreign merchants to the Crown. Both were also charged with sequestrating imported goods for sale through price-fixing monopolies. The immediate dismissal of Latimer was demanded as an absolute condition, as well as that of Lyons. Some called for them to be executed.

  John of Gaunt could not dismiss charges of this magnitude, but nor could he simply acquiesce to the demands. He therefore ordered an adjournment. Lyons, seeing his life at risk, sent a bribe of a barrel of gold worth a thousand pounds to the prince of Wales, who had once been his protector. Prince Edward, now drawing close to death, wanted nothing to do with him, and was suspicious of his brother's motives in adjourning parliament. He refused the bribe. Lyons accordingly sent the gold to the king, whose reputed response was to accept the gift with a smile, saying that he gladly accepted it as Lyons was simply returning what he had stolen from him. 'He has offered us nothing which is not our own', Edward said.'5

  Edward remained largely unaware of the proceedings at Westminster. He would not have known, for example, that Lord Neville, his steward, had tried to make a stand in defending Latimer. Such actions cut no ice with de la Mare. 'You should not be so concerned with other people's actions when you may soon find it very difficult to defend your own,' declared de la Mare. 'We have not yet discussed your case, nor touched upon your conduct.' That shut Lord Neville up. But as Neville and Latimer were still in charge of who had access to the king, Edward heard little or nothing about the total of sixty serious charges brought against them until they were dismissed from their offices, arrested, and had all their possessions confiscated. Richard Sturry, one of Edward's chamber knights, came to tell him of their plight and to plead for his friends. He phrased the news in a way calculated to cause Edward maximum distress. Parliament was seeking his deposition, he told him. They were trying to do to him what they had done to his father.

  Deposition. With dishonour. It was what Edward had dreaded all his life. He had strained to do all he could to be a king above criticism in order to avoid that ever happening to him. And yet now, in his feeble-minded state, he saw his worst nightmare coming true. He sought advice from Sturry, who urged him to take immediate action to stop the proceedings in parliament. This would have been very dangerous, and Edward knew it. But what could he do? His distress was exacerbated when it emerged that Alice was being implicated in the accusations levelled against his officers. He saw himself losing those few people whom he trusted, being separated from the one woman he loved, and he himself losing the Crown. He saw himself being left alone, like his father. He implored those with him to take him to Kennington to see his son, the prince, to consult with him. They did so. But on a day which must have torn his heart in two, when he arrived at his son's palace, he found him dying

  The disease which had debilitated the prince for the last seven years was now about to claim his life. The sight of his bedridden son in agony can only have added to Edward's pains. He had already buried seven of his children; it was now clear he would soon bury an eighth, his favourite. Edward ordered the prince to be taken to Westminster where they could spend the final days
together.

  Edward watched his son die in his chamber at the Palace of Westminster. On 7 June the prince made his will, dictating it in French. He desired to be buried in Canterbury Cathedral, in the undercroft beneath the shrine of St Thomas the Martyr. He chose a French poem to be inscribed on his tomb, and gave details of how he wanted his funeral to be conducted. He asked for his shield, helmet, sword and surcoat to be placed above his grave. He appointed his brother John one of his executors, the others being ecclesiastics and members of his household. After these details were seen to, he turned to his father and begged him to grant him three last requests. He asked him to confirm all the gifts he had made to members of his household, friends and family, including his illegitimate son, Roger of Clarendon. He asked him to make sure all his debts were paid. And lastly he asked him to protect his nine-year-old son, Richard, his heir.

  Edward assented to the requests. The scene was reminiscent of Philippa's last days, seven years before, when she charged him with a similar series of final duties. As with Philippa, the prince was a part of Edward's whole life. Roger Mortimer had still ruled England when he had been born. Edward may have recalled the four-year-old boy on his first horse, his little tournament coats made to match those of his father and Lord Montagu. All through the years, his son had made him proud. He may have failed as an administrator in Gascony but he had succeeded in the one field of human endeavour which Edward respected above all others: the battlefield. It had been the prince who had held the English army together that day twenty years earlier, at Poitiers, and brought King John of France as a prisoner to England. And in dying, Prince Edward asked for a simple thing which reminded his father of perhaps the greatest day of his life. He asked that his badge of three ostrich feathers, which he had picked up after the battle of Crecy, would be carved on his tomb, together with the motto he had used that day, 'Ich Dien’ I serve. Prince Edward died the following day.

  Across the nation the outpouring of grief was genuine and extreme. At St Albans, Thomas Walsingham expressed his pain through literary tears:

  Oh what a death to be mourned by the whole kingdom of England. How untimely you are, death, in robbing us of whatever might be seen to be bringing succour to the English. How sad you make the old king, his father, by robbing him of the desire which not only he had, but which the whole nation had, that his firstborn son might sit upon the throne after him and judge the people righteously. What great grief you cause his country, which believes that now he has gone it is bereft of a protector.

  But nowhere was the death of the prince more keenly felt than in Edward's heart. He too had lost his protector, his son and heir, his last hopes for the future.

  Edward was in mourning, grief-stricken and hardly able to communicate with the world. So we can only guess at how he greeted the news that parliament had moved against Alice. Sir Peter de la Mare informed parliament that she had relieved the royal purse of between two and three thousand pounds per year. Her use of maintenance was notorious, and, lest there be any doubt about it, parliament stipulated that she and all women were to be prohibited from protecting those accused in the king's courts. Then it was revealed that she had secretly married William Windsor. As a marriage had to be consummated in order to be legal, it was universally assumed - and probably true - that they had slept together.

  It was shocking, appalling. Had she not been Edward's mistress, impeachment would surely have followed. But Alice avoided prison and further prosecution on condition that she no longer visited or saw the king. If she did see him, she would lose everything she possessed in England and suffer perpetual exile. Hence we may be certain that there came a day when Edward expected Alice to be with him, and asked for her. And he would have been told that his beloved mistress, his Lady of the Sun, could not be brought to him. He could never see her again. She had married another man. Edward had been committing adultery.

  This was too much for Edward. The loss, personal and emotional, hurt him deeply, but the sinfulness too, even though he had loved her in good faith. He was lonely and afraid. In a sorrowful scene he swore an oath by the Virgin Mary that he did not know she was married. In his confused and lamentable state he begged for parliament to show her mercy, not to have her executed, both out of love for him and to preserve some vestige of honour. As for William Windsor, Edward summoned him from Ireland. He wanted him prosecuted. He now knew that he had been used. Anger tore through his grief-stricken soul. On 18 July he purchased a chest in which he locked up the accusations against Windsor whom he regarded as the true culprit. If Edward had any power left him, he would make the man sorry for his betrayal.

  *

  Among the resolutions of the Good Parliament was a declaration that a council of twelve should advise the king on all matters of weight, thereby reducing the risk of a 'coven' appropriating the royal power again. Edward himself sank into a mood of unfocused remorse and grief. He dwelt on the idea that his son's illness and death were somehow a penance inflicted on him for his treatment of his own father. His loss of Alice seems to have given rise to further grief for his wife. On 6 August he gave instructions to the keeper of the wardrobe to deliver cloths of gold and torchbearers' clothes for commemorating the anniversaries of the deaths of his mother and Philippa. Visitors came and went: some Florentines in exile persuaded him to give them somewhere to stay in London, despite a sentence of excommunication hanging over them. The duke of Brittany left the country without informing him. Edward did not care. He was now waiting for just two things: the burial of his son, which was to take place on 5 October, and his own death.

  At the end of September, Edward fell ill at Havering, suffering from an 'enpostyme'. All his physicians despaired of his recovery. Letters were sent out to the clergy on 2 October asking for them to pray for the king. On 5 October, the day of his son's funeral, he appointed trustees to look after his estates. Three days later he gave orders for no fewer than fifty-seven cloths of gold to be offered at churches where his son's obsequies were being celebrated. That same day he made his will. For a man who had achieved so much, it is a very modest list of requests. He asked to be buried in the abbey church at Westminster. He asked that sufficient funds be provided to complete the endowment of the Collegiate Church of St Stephen at Westminster, his Cistercian foundation of St Mary Graces by the Tower of London, and the Dominican priory of King's Langley. He especially gave money to pay for the singing of masses for the souls of himself and Philippa. He confirmed his grandson, Richard of Bordeaux, as his heir and bequeathed him his best bed with all its armorial hangings, as well as four lesser beds and hangings for his hall. To Joan, princess of Wales, he gave a thousand marks, and the free restitution of jewels she had pledged to him. To his Very dear daughter' Isabella, he gave an income of three hundred marks per year until her daughters were married. Everything else he left to his executors to dispose of as they saw fit. His two youngest sons, Edmund and Thomas, were not mentioned, except for a reference in a supplementary document by which Edward settled the inheritance of the throne. After his death, only males were to inherit: first Richard, then John of Gaunt and his sons, and then, failing them, Edmund and his sons, and finally Thomas and his sons. In this way Edward attempted to destroy any claim his granddaughter, Philippa, might have had on the throne, thereby revoking the royal status of the Mortimer earls of March. It was an act of revenge for the proceedings of the Good Parliament, which he believed had been instigated by the Mortimers. But it was also a sign of how bitter and sad the dying king had become, that he should disinherit his own granddaughter.

  In the fourteenth century, wills were normally only made when the sufferer genuinely feared death was close. Thus everyone around him now believed that Edward was about to die. Latimer, whom Edward had appointed one of his executors, was recalled and pardoned. Alice too returned to court at his request. With a council of twelve to guard against maladministration, and Latimer and Neville safely out of office, it was felt that this great king should be allowed some last
wishes in his final days. On 16 October a long gown was ordered for him, to guard him against the cold weather. More warm clothes, lined with lambskins and furs, were ordered for him three days later. And three days after that, despite so shamefully betraying him, Alice returned to him, and received his pardon.

  The remaining eight months of Edward's life and reign are a sorry tale of his poor health deteriorating further and the country sliding into acrimony and hatred. Had he died shortly after making his will, as he himself expected, no one would have begrudged him having Alice at his bedside. But that she was so easily restored to him, and remained with him for the next eight months, provoked scandal and widespread anxiety. Parliament's will had been flouted. What had changed? Latimer was with the king, and John of Gaunt was hunting down the key figures from the Good Parliament. Sir Peter de la Mare was arrested and flung into a dungeon in Nottingham Castle, with no prospect of a trial.28 William of Wykeham lost all his temporal estates. Even the earl of March was forced to surrender his marshal's staff in view of John of Gaunt's threats against him. In November Alice tried to secure Edward's pardon of Richard Lyons. Edward's chamberlain, Roger Beauchamp, would not let her near the king, but she made such a commotion outside Edward's chamber that he heard her, shuffled to the door, and opened it. He accepted the petition, and there was nothing Beauchamp could do to stop him reading it. In his simple state, he pardoned Lyons. In Walsingham's words,

  the whole populace desired Alice's condemnation when they saw that no action was being taken to remedy her wrongdoings, but realised that this evil enchantress, exalted above the cedars of Lebanon, was enjoying extraordinary favour, and all the people of the realm passionately longed for her downfall.