Edward II: The Unconventional King (24 page)

The day after the Ordinance was issued, Edward turned his attention to the important business of his elder son’s marriage, and wrote to Count William of Hainault to arrange a marriage between young Edward and the count’s eldest daughter, Margaret – not her sister Philippa, who did marry Edward III in 1328, as has often been assumed.
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Edward also asked the pope to issue a dispensation for Edward of Windsor and Margaret to marry, as they were second cousins, both great-grandchildren of Philip III of France, and in November 1319 once again raised the issue, this time naming William’s daughter as Sibilla, which was either an error – his careless clerk addressed the count as Robert – or a reference to another daughter who died young.
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Edward spent the entire period from 9 January to 21 July 1319 in York, except for a few days at nearby Kirkham Priory in early April. The
Flores
reports that Queen Isabella gave birth to a daughter, Joan, while at York this year; no other source mentions this, however, and it is unlikely that a royal child could be born and leave no traces in the historical record – no funerary arrangements, for example.
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It is probable that the author confused the date of birth of their daughter Joan of the Tower, who was born in 1321.

Parliament opened on 6 May 1319 at York. Hugh Audley and his wife Margaret audaciously claimed the earldom of Cornwall as Margaret’s inheritance from her late husband Piers Gaveston, a claim parliament refused, on the grounds that the lands which Edward had granted to Gaveston had been revoked.
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On 2 and 12 June, Edward sent letters to Haakon V of Norway regarding debts which the Norwegian king owed to eight English merchants, unaware that Haakon had died on 6 May.
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The king appointed his barber Laurence Elmham custodian of the royal forest of Galtres in Yorkshire, also granting him permission to appoint a deputy, as he was unable personally to perform his duties owing to his attendance on the king. Elmham claimed in 1330 to have served as Edward’s barber for twenty-six years, though in 1325/26 a man called Henry is named as such in the king’s chamber account.
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In November 1318, Edward had summoned men to muster at Berwick-on-Tweed, to besiege the port and take it back into English hands from Robert Bruce, who had seized it the year before. The campaign should have begun on 10 June 1319, but on 22 May, it was postponed until 22 July.
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Although on 20 July Edward asked the two archbishops and all the bishops of England to pray for him on his way to Scotland, he didn’t arrive at Berwick until 7 September, spending the whole of August in and around Newcastle.
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The necessity of retaking the vital port of Berwick meant that even the earl of Lancaster co-operated with Edward for once, and the earls of Pembroke, Surrey, Arundel, Hereford, Atholl and Angus also joined the king. The nineteen-year-old Thomas of Brotherton, earl of Norfolk, attended, and Edward knighted his half-brother on 15 July.
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Predictably, the siege was unsuccessful. Despite the importance of capturing the port, the
Vita
implies that Edward decided to attack only on the spur of the moment.
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Given such a slapdash approach – no one had even thought to bring siege-engines – it is hardly surprising that the attack failed.
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Edward ordered a simultaneous attack by land and sea, and although his force ‘almost scaled the wall in the first assault delivered with great fury … the inhabitants regained their courage and defended themselves with spirit’.
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Edward kept himself amused during the siege, and paid his minstrel ‘King’ Robert and two musicians sent to him by his brother-in-law Philip V of France for playing before him, ordered hunting dogs sent from Wales, and had two of his falcons brought from London. The falcons were named Damory, after his friend, and Beaumont, after his French cousin Henry Beaumont, and had probably been gifts from these men.
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His father had in 1305/06 owned falcons called Blanchepoune, Skardebek, d’Engayne, Durham and Parson.
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As a decoying tactic, James Douglas and Thomas Randolph, earl of Moray, led an army into England and reached as far south as Boroughbridge, near York. According to a captured Scottish scout, there was a plan to seize Queen Isabella, who was staying at a small manor of the archbishop of York, either Brotherton or Bishopthorpe.
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The queen hastened to York, from where she escaped by water to the safety of Nottingham. A mortified Edward later gave her jewels and other gifts in consolation.
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The
Vita
points out that ‘if the queen had at that time been captured, I believe that Scotland would have bought peace for herself’, and accuses the earl of Lancaster, almost certainly falsely, of plotting with the Scots to capture his niece in exchange for £40,000.
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Perhaps to divert attention from himself, Lancaster in turn accused Hugh Despenser, though Despenser hardly had any compelling motives for wishing the queen to be taken hostage either, and this may represent Lancaster’s awareness that Despenser, placed close to the king by the barons a few months before, was not nearly as malleable or safe as he had thought.
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The fact remained, though, that someone had betrayed the queen’s whereabouts to the Scots, and the culprit was probably a knight named Edmund Darel.
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On 12 September, the Scottish force defeated an English army hastily cobbled together by Edward’s friend William Melton, archbishop of York, near the village of Myton-on-Swale.
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So many clerics died –
Lanercost
says 4,000, with another 1,000 who drowned in the Swale – that the battle became known as the Chapter of Myton.
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The abbot of St Mary’s in York later founded a chapel in the village, ‘in honour of the Transubstantiation and the flesh and blood of Our Lord’, to pray for the souls of the men who died.
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News of this latest military disaster reached Berwick on 14 September 1319, and the earl of Lancaster left the port two days later, though whether to protect his lands, to cut off the Scots’ retreat or out of disgust with Edward is not clear.
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Hugh Despenser, an enthusiastic letter-writer, told the sheriff of Glamorgan that

the Scots had entered his [Edward’s] land of England with the prompting and assistance of the earl of Lancaster. The earl acted in such a way that the king took himself off with all his army, to the great shame and damage of us all. Wherefore we very much doubt if matters will end so happily for our side as is necessary.
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Once again, relations between the king and his powerful cousin deteriorated, thanks in part to the actions of Edward’s favourites, and the Bridlington chronicler also claims that some people deliberately fostered dissent and conflict between Edward and Lancaster, falsely reporting Edward’s words to the earl and vice versa.
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Although relations between the two most powerful men in the kingdom were, prior to the siege, outwardly amicable, Edward proved what was really on his mind by ominously announcing, ‘When this wretched business is over, we will turn our hands to other matters. For I have not forgotten the wrong that was done to my brother Piers.’
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Edward had not forgiven Lancaster for Gaveston’s death, and still had vengeance in mind. Gaveston remained in his thoughts, as always, and seven years after his friend’s death, he paid for a turquoise cloth to cover his tomb.
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Trokelowe
says that Edward lay in wait for the Scots at Newminster, a Cistercian priory near Morpeth in Northumberland, and Edward’s itinerary does indeed place him there on 19 September, but they eluded him by returning to their homeland by the western route.
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By this time, Hugh Despenser had become close to Edward; the king promised to make his chamberlain keeper of the castle once Berwick fell. He also promised with his ‘usual foolishness’ to make Roger Damory constable of the town, thus presumptuously handing out favours he hadn’t yet won.
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Although Edward had consented to send Damory away from him the previous year, the knight evidently still remained high in the king’s affections, and the
Flores
calls Edward’s friends – presumably referring to Damory and Despenser – ‘despicable parasites’.
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Thomas Randolph and James Douglas invaded England again at the beginning of November 1319, laying waste to much of Westmorland and Cumberland and returning to Scotland with ‘a very large spoil of men and cattle’.
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Therefore, Edward granted powers on 1 December to several men including Hugh Despenser to make a truce with Robert Bruce.
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On this day, according to the Sempringham annalist, ‘there was a general earthquake in England, with great sound and much noise’.
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Robert Bruce confirmed a truce on 22 December, to run until Christmas 1321; it may have been Edward’s frequent truces, at least in part, which led the
Flores
to condemn his notorious infamy and cowardice and declare that the king was a slave to idleness.
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On 8 January 1320, John XXII republished the bull of excommunication against Bruce for his murder of John ‘the Red Comyn’ and his uncle in 1306.
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Edward spent Christmas 1319 at York, having invited the warden and thirty-two scholars of King’s Hall, his foundation at Cambridge, to join him. Most of them arrived late, on 28 December, and one joined in an assault by the prior of the Dominicans of Pontefract on a William Hardy and was left behind in disgrace when the scholars returned to Cambridge.
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The king remained at York for New Year, and gave Queen Isabella expensive jewels and other gifts.
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Parliament opened on 20 January 1320, and perhaps the attendees saw the ‘wonderful eclipse of the moon of many various colours’ on the morning of 26 January, as recorded by the Sempringham annalist.
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Edward told his magnates that he had arranged to meet his brother-in-law Philip V at Amiens on 9 March, in order to perform homage for Gascony and Ponthieu, and ‘because time was getting on and the way was long, he could not remain there to complete all the business concerning the said parliament, if he wished to speed on his way’.
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His half-brother Edmund of Woodstock, now eighteen and a first cousin of Philip V and Queen Isabella through his mother Queen Marguerite, was sent to Paris to arrange a safe-conduct for the king, and on 19 February Edward informed Philip that he would meet him at Amiens, and sent out commissioners to find lodgings for him in the town.
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After parliament, Edward set off for London. On his way through Pontefract, Lancaster’s retainers once again jeered at him, and Isabella, from the safety of the castle.
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This time, however, Edward sensibly ignored – though certainly didn’t forgive – this discourteous behaviour. The king and queen arrived in London on 16 February 1320, where the mayor and other senior officials of the city met them at Kilburn.
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On 17 April 1320, the pope canonised Thomas Cantilupe, bishop of Hereford, who had died in August 1282. This was due in part to the efforts of Edward himself, who wrote to Clement V and John XXII half a dozen times between December 1307 and January 1319, asking them to canonise Cantilupe.
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The two archbishops and all the bishops of England asked Edward to be present at the ‘translation of the holy body’ in Hereford Cathedral on 14 June 1321, and he responded, ‘It pleases the king to be there.’
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Edward was at Lambeth on the day of Cantilupe’s canonisation, when, according to the Sempringham annalist – who had a fondness for recording the weather – ‘about midnight, there were frightful thunders heard, with lightning, and immoderately high wind’.
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Sometime in 1320, the king provided further proof of his eccentricity by taking possession of a cottage within the precincts of Westminster Abbey, which he called Borgoyne, Burgundy. According to the disapproving Westminster chronicler the
Flores
, he jokingly took to calling himself ‘king of Burgundy’ rather than ‘king of England’. The
Flores
goes on to comment that Edward’s occupation of the cottage, which had a large garden, ditches encircling it and its own keeper, was ‘not without sacrilege’.
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Later in his reign, Edward spent a few days there on occasion, shunning his more luxurious accommodation, while most of his household lodged in more conventional locations at Westminster or at the Tower. The king said farewell on 17 May to the archbishop of Vienne, a papal nuncio who had come to England to negotiate with the Scots at Bamburgh, and gave him a pair of silver dishes and a silver-gilt basin, ‘chased and enamelled, with ewer’, worth seven pounds and ten shillings.
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The earl of Gloucester’s widow Maud died sometime in 1320, taking her motives for faking a three-year pregnancy to the grave, and her dower lands were divided out among her late husband’s sisters and their husbands, making Hugh Audley, Hugh Despenser and Roger Damory richer by about £900 each per year.

Edward finally sailed from Dover to France on 19 June 1320, with, among dozens of others, Queen Isabella, Donald of Mar, Hugh Despenser, Roger Damory, the teenaged William Montacute, son of Edward’s dead friend of the same name, and John Hastings, nephew and co-heir of the childless earl of Pembroke. Pembroke’s wife Beatrice of Clermont-Nesle, who died later that year, accompanied Queen Isabella, while Pembroke himself remained in London as keeper of the realm.
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Roger Damory was still in Edward’s favour, but as events later in the year would prove, he was losing his position to the king’s ruthless young chamberlain, Despenser. At Amiens, Edward stayed in the house of one Peter du Garde, and later paid him ten marks in compensation for ‘all damage to his dwelling’ caused during his stay. The king’s chapel was placed in the house of John le Mouner, his offices in the house of Sanxia, the storeroom for his kitchen in the house of Margaret, and the passage between his chamber and chapel in the house of William le Mouner. Edward paid Peter le Peyntour a shilling and sixpence to paint shields of the king’s arms in the streets of Amiens, ‘in order to make known where the king’s liveries were’, and four pounds to a master carpenter to repair ‘damage done by carpenters and others in the state rooms’ of the court.
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