The Greatest Knight

by Thomas Asbridge

  In spite of the ferocious tactics employed on both sides, the campaigning through the late summer and early autumn proved inconclusive. Henry II withdrew to Le Mans in Maine and began to experience more frequent bouts of illness, with some form of tumour developing in his groin. As winter approached, the fighting petered out and the Old King, Richard and Philip Augustus sought to settle their differences through a series of diplomatic exchanges and gatherings. The Capetian king used this period to re-establish contact with Richard, and seems to have stirred up the Lionheart’s discontent and suspicions, urging him to turn on his father. The rift might still have been repaired, had Henry made a decisive move to declare Richard his heir in England, but the Old King was plagued by doubts about his intentions and now began to regard young John as his one faithful son.

  This rupture at the heart of the royal family would have far-reaching consequences. Had Henry and his offspring stood shoulder to shoulder, King Philip’s dreams of reasserting Capetian authority would surely have been foiled. As it was, the fissures within the Angevin dynasty gave the French king a crucial opening – one that, in the words of the History, would prove ‘injurious to all the heirs to the realm of England’. The decisive break came on 18 November 1188, at an assembly at Bonsmoulins (in southern Normandy). William Marshal travelled to this peace conference with Henry II and witnessed the Old King’s dismay when Richard and Philip arrived together. This public display of their renewed amity confirmed Henry’s worst fears and ‘he knew then for certain that he had been betrayed’. On that day, the Lionheart went down on his knees before King Philip and paid him homage for Normandy, Aquitaine, Anjou, Maine and Berry – an act of ritual subservience that confirmed their alliance. Denied power by his father, Richard was now willing to unite with the enemy and seize the Angevin realm by force.

  The Old King had been roundly outmanoeuvred. He had been the scourge of international affairs for more than thirty years – a scheming mastermind, able to read his opponents and plot their downfall. Now, weakened by ill health and advancing age, he seemed paralysed by shock and fury; backed into a corner from which he could see no escape. Henry’s brusque refusal to confirm the Lionheart as heir to the English crown in the wake of Bonsmoulins made a direct confrontation all but inevitable. In these foreboding days of winter, the Old King turned to his inner circle, calling ‘Marshal and the others whom he loved and trusted the most [and asking] them for their advice in the matter’. As a result of this meeting, William was sent on an urgent mission to follow Richard and recall him to his father’s side, so that their feud might finally be settled. The Lionheart had been brought to heel in the summer of 1187 and the vain hope was that open conflict might yet be averted. William tracked Richard as far as Amboise (east of Tours), but discovered that the Lionheart had been up half the preceding night urgently preparing more than 200 letters calling his supporters across the Angevin realm to arms. With the wheels of war in motion, Marshal ‘sent word to the king [of this] cruel act of treachery’.

  The Old King’s isolation

  Henry II retreated into the Angevin heartlands of Maine and Anjou through the winter and early spring, seething with rage, but immobilised by illness. Sensing the Old King’s weakness, many of his supporters began to melt away. A number of notable barons absented themselves from Henry’s Christmas Court at Saumur in December 1188, and in the New Year Henry tried to flush out any turncoats by issuing a general summons to his nobles, instructing them to come ‘without delay and to offer no pretext for not doing so’. Ranulf Glanville (justiciar of England) remained loyal, but fearful of leaving the kingdom unprotected, sent his well-regarded clerk and deputy Hubert Walter in his stead. Others simply ignored the request.

  With each passing week, the list of Henry’s friends and supporters grew shorter. His youngest son John stood firm alongside a diminishing circle of barons, as did the king’s military household. Marshal remained by Henry’s side through Lent, witnessing his slow decline, moving with the fractured remnants of the royal court between the mighty fortress of Chinon and the city of Le Mans. At one point, William was sent on another embassy to Paris, this time to see if a wedge could be driven between Philip Augustus and Richard by offering to agree a separate peace with the Capetian king on terms of his naming. When Marshal arrived in the city, however, he found that the Lionheart’s ‘wise and crafty’ representatives, including the ‘artful’ William Longchamp, were already closeted with the French monarch, and had to return empty-handed.

  With the onset of spring, Henry began to prepare for an invasion, strengthening the defences of Le Mans and placing his remaining troops on a war footing. By this stage, those retainers who continued to show unfaltering loyalty were fast rising in the Old King’s esteem and favour. William had moved from the edge of Henry’s inner circle, to stand among a handful of men like William Mandeville, still trusted to offer counsel and lead troops in the field. The king chose to reward this fidelity. The previous summer, Marshal had been promised Châteauroux, but that castle remained in French hands. In its place, Henry offered William another crown ward, one whose wealth and prospects left Lady Heloise of Lancaster in the shade. This eminent heiress was Isabel of Clare, ‘a worthy and beautiful girl’, the eighteen-year-old daughter of the late Earl Richard Strongbow of Striguil. Her hand in marriage would bring Marshal a powerful lordship, with lands on the Welsh March (border), and title to other territories in west Wales, Normandy and Ireland. He would become, at a stroke, a great baron of England.

  The Old King’s pledge makes it clear that he now placed a high value on William’s service. There can be no doubt that Marshal’s star had risen at a formidable rate in the three years since he returned from the Holy Land, partly through his own qualities, but also because the tumult of this period had given him ample opportunity to shine. Nonetheless, a nagging question remains. Was this royal gift simply an unbidden act of gratitude from an ailing king, or the mercenary price specified by Marshal in return for his continued allegiance? Henry’s 1188 letter proved that William was not above pleading for, and perhaps even demanding, recompense; and there can be no doubt that he aspired to join the upper ranks of England’s aristocracy. Nonetheless, it would have been obvious to Marshal, even in the first months of 1189, that the Old King’s power was faltering, his reign drawing to a close. William must have known that he was fighting on the losing side of this conflict; that the promise of Isabel of Clare’s hand might well prove worthless once a new monarch came to power, with Henry’s pledge disregarded and the heiress reapportioned. Perhaps Marshal was gambling on the embattled Old King’s ability to struggle on long enough for an actual wedding to be arranged, but if so, this was a rather forlorn hope. Had self-interest been paramount then the obvious choice would have been to abandon Henry, as so many others had, and seek promotion from either Richard or Philip Augustus. As it was, Marshal remained at Henry’s side.

  By early summer the Old King had recovered enough strength to consider attending yet another peace conference. With the Third Crusade about to begin, the papacy was distraught at the prospect of further war in France when, it believed, all eyes should be on the Holy Land. A papal legate thus arranged a meeting for early June 1189 between Henry, Richard and Philip near La Ferté-Bernard (some twenty-five miles north-east of Le Mans, on the border of Maine), hoping to orchestrate a reconciliation. It turned out to be a predictably bad-tempered affair. ‘Both sides came fully armed on horseback’, according to the History, and the chronicler Ralph of Diss admitted that after hours of pointless quarrelling ‘they withdrew as enemies’.

  It seems likely that Philip and Richard never had any expectation or intention of reaching an accord, but agreed to the meeting merely to draw the Old King out into the open. Instead of peacefully retreating eastwards out of Maine as custom required, they launched an immediate offensive, sending thousands of troops pouring into Angevin territory. La Ferté-Bernard fell in short order, only to be followed by a series of other strongholds, m
any of which seem to have willingly surrendered to the Lionheart. Henry II was said to have been ‘furious about losing his lands’, but now had no option but to beat a hasty path to Le Mans, the great city of Maine.

  Le Mans is most famous today for its twenty-four-hour car race, but at the heart of this bustling modern city lies a well-preserved medieval quarter – now known as the ‘Cité Plantagenet’. Much of this picturesque warren of cobbled streets and huddled, timber-framed buildings dates from the later Middle Ages. But two remnants of the Le Mans to which Henry and William retreated in June 1189 are still in evidence, and they help to explain why the Old King chose this city as the site of his last stand.

  The first is the towering cathedral of St Julien, begun in the eleventh century and dedicated by Henry himself in 1158. This was the burial place of Geoffrey Plantagenet, Henry’s father, and it stands as a potent reminder of the intimate associations between Le Mans and the Angevin dynasty. This was the city of the Old King’s own birth and childhood, a bastion of his family’s pride. It was also a redoubtable, perhaps even impregnable fortress, enclosed within a towering circuit of ancient Roman walls. One long stretch of these mighty, red-stone fortifications remains in place, replete with a succession of looming towers, a well-defended gate and a deep moat. Standing at the foot of these battlements it is easy to understand why Henry sought sanctuary in Le Mans, and in 1189 he could also fall back on the formidable stone keep that lay within. In addition, the city enjoyed a strong degree of natural protection in the twelfth century, being located in the fork between two rivers: the broad Sarthe and its tributary, the Huisne, flowing in from the east. Only the latter could be crossed with ease, via its one major bridge, and Le Mans’ south-eastern walls were further guarded by a marshy ravine.

  The Old King had taken further steps to reinforce Le Mans that spring: digging a series of deep ditches to form an outer perimeter, driving sharp stakes into the riverbed at any possible fords of the Huisne and even pulling down some of the houses that had sprung up between the city walls and the two rivers. All of this helped to engender a strong sense of security when Henry, William Marshal and the rest of the Angevin army arrived near dusk on 10 June. According to one contemporary, the Old King even went so far as to promise the citizens of Le Mans that he would never abandon the city.

  The defence of Le Mans in 1189

  Once safely installed in Le Mans, Henry II summoned William and instructed him to conduct a tour of the outer defences at first light. As dawn broke the next day, Marshal rode out at the head of a small, lightly armoured scouting party. The rolling landscape south of the city was cloaked in a dense fog, so it was difficult to see any great distance as they crossed the River Huisne. Before long, however, they spotted a group of French scouts picking their way northwards. One of William’s fellow knights, Robert of Souville, urged an immediate return to the city to raise the alarm, but Marshal refused, unsure of whether the enemy force they had seen represented an advance guard or merely a long-range patrol. Determined to get a better view, he rode to the crest of a low hill and it was only then, as the fog slowly lifted, that ‘the whole army of the king of France’ came into view ‘riding in vast numbers’ alongside Richard the Lionheart’s forces. They were no more than half a mile away and heading ‘straight for Le Mans’.

  William raced back to the Old King and the decision was taken to cut down the bridge over the Huisne. Philip and the Lionheart made camp to the south of the river, just out of arrow shot, and the rest of the day passed in a tense stand-off, as both sides readied themselves for the battle to come. Henry seems to have been convinced at this point that the impassable waters of the Huisne would thwart any major enemy assault, though the precautionary decision was taken to torch the remaining buildings south and west of the city walls should the river somehow be crossed. Marshal was less certain of their security. At daybreak on 12 June he insisted on donning full armour with the assistance of his squire, John of Earley, while a number of others – the Old King included – remained un-armoured.

  Marshal was detailed to hold the main southern gate, while Henry made the day’s first patrol alongside his youngest son John, and a party of knights including Robert Tresgoz, Gerard Talbot and Baldwin of Béthune. Once down by the Huisne, they discovered the French vanguard milling around on the southern banks, examining the wreckage of the bridge that had been ‘broken to pieces’ and scanning the slow-moving river for any possible crossing point. According to the History: ‘Nobody imagined that there was a ford there, but they tested the waters with their lances and discovered the best ford in the world.’ Ten mounted knights immediately ploughed into the river, drove forward and launched themselves up the opposite bank. Caught completely by surprise, the warriors in the Old King’s troop charged forward to stem their advance, but with more French knights now streaming across the Huisne they were soon driven back and forced to lead Henry to safety.

  With the Huisne breached, it now fell to William Marshal to hold the southern gate, as the Capetian forces streamed through the jumbled streets of Le Mans’ outer suburb. As ‘the French rode up to him to launch a fierce attack’, a vicious skirmish erupted, not unlike that he had fought at Neufchâtel more than twenty years earlier. Rallying what Angevin knights he could, Marshal tried to hold his ground, but the mêlée surged back and forth. In the midst of this ‘hard-fought onslaught’, one of the Old King’s knights, Hugh of Malannoy, was driven, man and horse, into the ravine south of the city. William also came face-to-face with a leading member of Richard the Lionheart’s retinue, Andrew of Chauvigny, ‘a man renowned for his deeds of great valour’. Marshal tried to employ his old tournament trick, seizing Andrew’s bridle and dragging him towards the gate and possible captivity, but Chauvigny managed to wrestle free, though he broke his arm in the process.

  By this stage the suburbs had been torched and with flames spreading fast through the crowed houses, the sense of chaos only intensified. At some point a general retreat was sounded, and William drew back within the southern gate, but elsewhere Philip’s and Richard’s troops were able to pour in before entrances were barred. To make matters worse, strong winds were whipping up the fires of the burning suburbs, and the raging conflagration eventually spread to the city itself. With smoke pouring into the streets and enemy forces now at large inside Le Mans, bedlam reigned.

  Henry II, Marshal and William Mandeville seem to have regrouped in the north of the city, probably not far from the Cathedral of St Julien. Any thought of retreating within the keep was quickly rejected. In spite of the Old King’s grand proclamation just two days earlier, a decision was made to relinquish the city and ride hard for the north in the hope of escape. The History glossed over the details of this bitter setback, noting only that the remaining Angevins left ‘as one body’, but other chroniclers like Roger of Howden indicated that in the course of this harried flight, Henry left many household servants and knights behind, and hundreds of his Welsh mercenaries were hunted down and butchered.

  The remaining members of the royal household now formed a close bodyguard around the Old King – the last line of protection ‘against death or capture’ – determined to see their monarch and his son John to safety. They had covered some two to three miles when it became apparent that another party of knights was in hot pursuit, racing along the road behind and closing fast. Marshal and another household warrior, William des Roches (literally William ‘of the Rocks’), reined in and turned to bar their path, only to find none other than Richard the Lionheart bearing down upon them. As des Roches moved to intercept one of the duke’s knights, William charged forward to confront Richard himself. The great tournament champion was about to meet the Lionheart in single combat.

  Only the History of William Marshal described this encounter in close terms, though the broad details of its account were confirmed in other contemporary sources. One thing seems certain. This was to be no fair fight. So intent had Richard been upon hunting down his father, that he had begun
his chase wearing only a doublet and light helm. This added speed to his pursuit, but left him dreadfully exposed to attack. Worse still, the Lionheart was armed with only a sword. Marshal, by contrast, had a shield and lance. The biographer described how:

  [William] spurred straight on to meet the advancing [Duke] Richard. When the [duke] saw him coming he shouted at the top of his voice: ‘God’s legs, Marshal! Don’t kill me. That would be a wicked thing to do, since you find me here completely unarmed.’

  In that instant, Marshal could have slain Richard, skewering his body with the same lethal force that dispatched Patrick of Salisbury in 1168. Had there been more than a split second to ponder the choice, William might perhaps have reacted differently. As it was, instinct took over. Marshal simply could not bring himself to kill an un-armoured opponent, let alone the heir-apparent to the Angevin realm, King Henry II’s eldest surviving son. Instead, he was said to have shouted in reply: ‘Indeed I won’t. Let the Devil kill you! I shall not be the one to do it’, and at the last moment, lowering his lance fractionally, he drove it into Richard’s mount. With that ‘the horse died instantly; it never took another step forward’ and, as it fell, the Lionheart was thrown to the ground and his pursuit of the king brought to an end.

  The Old King made good his escape that day, but his power had been shattered nonetheless. Once at a safe distance, Henry was said to have ridden to a hilltop and looked back on the burning city of Le Mans in shame, cursing God for the ruin of his reign. In the days that followed, Marshal was sent on north to Normandy with a platoon of fifty knights in a half-hearted attempt to rally support for the king, while John seems to have stayed in Maine and Henry himself arced back south towards the security of Anjou’s mighty castle, Chinon. The hopelessness of the Old King’s predicament was only confirmed when Tours – site of the Angevin treasury – fell to Richard and Philip. Now a broken man, Henry’s infirmity returned in force. ‘Sorely troubled by his illness and his pain which grew worse with every passing day’, he took refuge in Chinon and ordered William to return to his side.