1450

1451

Murder of the Duke of Suffolk and Jack Cade's rebellion.
Loss of the last French possessions except Calais

1. Bedford and Gloucester. 1422.-In England Henry V. was succeeded in 1422 by his son, Henry VI., a child of nine months. In the same year, in consequence of the death of Charles VI., the infant was acknowledged as king of France in the north and east of that country. The Dauphin, holding the lands south of the Loire, and some territory even to the north of it, claimed to reign over the whole of France by hereditary right as Charles VII. Henry V. had appointed his eldest surviving brother, John, Duke of Bedford, regent in France, and his youngest brother, Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, regent in England. In England there were no longer any parties banded against the Crown, and the title of the Earl of March had not a single supporter; but both the Privy Council and the Parliament agreed that the late king could not dispose of the regency by will. Holding that Bedford as the elder brother had the better claim, they nevertheless, in consequence of his absence in France, appointed Gloucester Protector, with the proviso that he should give up his authority to Bedford if the latter were to return to England. They also imposed limitations upon the authority of the Protector, requiring him to act by the advice of the Council.

2. Bedford's Success in France. 1423-1424.The English nation was bent upon maintaining its supremacy in France. Bedford was a good warrior and an able statesman. In 1423 he prudently married the sister of Philip of Burgundy, hoping thereby to secure permanently the all-important fidelity of the Duke, His next step was to place difficulties in the way of the Scottish auxiliaries who poured into France to the help of Charles. Through his influence the captive James I. (see p. 295) was liberated and sent home to Scotland, on the understanding that he would prevent

his subjects from aiding the enemies of England. Bedford needed all the support he could find, as the French had lately been gaining ground. In 1424, however, Bedford defeated them at Verneuil. In England it was believed that Verneuil was a second Agincourt, and that the French resistance would soon be at an end.

3. Gloucester's Invasion of Hainault. 1424.-Bedford's progress in France was checked by the folly of his brother Gloucester, who was as unwise and capricious as he was greedy of power. Gloucester had lately married Jacqueline, the heiress of Holland

and Hainault, though her husband, the Duke of Brabant, was still living, on the plea that her first marriage was null on the ground of nearness of kin. In 1424 Gloucester overran Hainault, which was under the government of the Duke of Brabant, thereby giving offence to the Duke of Burgundy, who was a cousin and ally of the Duke of Brabant, and who had no wish to see the English holding a territory so near to his own county of Flanders. The Duke of Brabant recovered Hainault and

captured Jacqueline, who had already been abandoned by Gloucester. A coolness arose between the Duke of Burgundy and the English which was never completely removed.

4. Gloucester and Beaufort. 1425-1428.-In England as well as on the Continent Gloucester's self-willed restlessness roused enemies, the most powerful of them being his uncle, the Chancellor, Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester (see pp. 301, 335), a wealthy and ambitious prelate not without those statesmanlike qualities which were sadly lacking to Gloucester. If Beaufort ruled the Council, Gloucester had the art of making himself popular with the multitude, whose sympathies were not likely to be given to a bishop of the type of Beaufort, who practised no austerities and who had

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GLOUCESTER AND BEAUFORT

309

nothing in him to appeal to the popular imagination. So bitter was the feud between Gloucester and Beaufort that in 1426 Bedford was obliged to visit England to keep the peace between them. Before he returned to France he persuaded Beaufort to surrender the chancellorship to Kemp, the Bishop of London, and to leave England for a time. Moreover, in 1427 he himself swore that as long as the king was under age the Council and not the Protector was to govern. When Gloucester was asked to take the same oath, he signed it, but refused to swear. In 1428, after Bedford had returned to France, Beaufort came back, bringing with him from Rome the title of Cardinal, and authority to raise soldiers for a crusade against heretics in Bohemia. A storm was at once raised against him. A Cardinal, it was said, was a servant of the Roman See, and as no man could serve two masters, he ought not to hold an English bishopric or to sit in the English Council, far less to send to Bohemia English troops which were needed in France. Gloucester fancied that the opportunity of overthrowing his rival had come. Beaufort, however, was too prudent to press his claims. He absented himself from the Council and allowed the men whom he had raised for Bohemia to be sent to France instead. Before the end of the year the outcry against him died away, and, Cardinal as he was, he resumed his old place in the Council.

5. The Siege of Orleans. 1428-1429. The time had arrived when the presence of every English soldier was needed in France. Bedford had made himself master of almost the whole country north of the Loire except Orleans. If he could gain that city it would be easy for him to overpower Charles, who kept court at Chinon. In 1428, therefore, he laid siege to Orleans. The city, however, defended itself gallantly, though all that the French outside could hope to do was to cut off the supplies of the besiegers. In February 1429 they attempted to intercept a convoy of herrings coming from Paris for the English troops, but were beaten off in what was jocosely styled the Battle of the Herrings, and it seemed as though Orleans, and with it France itself, were doomed. Frenchmen were indeed weary of the foreign yoke and of the arrogant insolence of the rough island soldiers. Yet in France all military and civil organisation had hitherto come from the kings, and unfortunately for his subjects Charles was easy-tempered and entirely incapable either of carrying on war successfully or of inspiring that enthusiasm without which the most careful organisation is as the twining of ropes of sand. It would need a miracle to inspire Frenchmen with the belief that it was possible for them to defeat

the victors of Agincourt and Verneuil, and yet without such a miracle irretrievable ruin was at hand.

6. Jeanne Darc and the Relief of Orleans. 1429.-The miracle was wrought by a young maiden of seventeen, Jeanne Darc, the daughter of a peasant of Domremi, in the duchy of Bar. Her home was at a distance from the actual scenes of war, but whilst she was still little more than a child, tales of horror, reaching her from afar, had filled her with 'pity for the realm of France' and for its young king, whom she idealised into the pattern of every virtue. As she brooded over the thought of possible deliverance, her warm imagination summoned up before her bright and saintly forms, St. Michael, St. Catherine, and St. Margaret, who bade her, the chosen of God, to go forth and save the king, and conduct him to Reims to be crowned and anointed with the holy oil from the vessel which, as men believed, had been brought down from heaven in days of old. At last in 1428 her native hamlet was burnt down by a Burgundian band. Then the voices of the saints bade her go to Vaucouleurs, where she would find a knight, Robert de Baudricourt, who would conduct her to Charles. Months passed before Baudricourt would do aught but scorn her message, and it was not till February 1429, when the news from Orleans was most depressing, that he consented to take her in his train. She found Charles at Chinon, and, as the story goes, convinced him of her Divine mission by recognising him in disguise in the midst of his courtiers. Soldiers and theologians alike distrusted her, but her native good sense, her simple and earnest faith, and above all her purity of heart and life disarmed all opposition, and she was sent forth to lead an army to the relief of Orleans. She rode on horseback clothed in armour as a man, with a sword which she had taken from behind the altar of St. Catherine by her side, and a consecrated banner in her hand. She brought with her hope of victory, enthusiasm built on confidence in Divine protection, and wide-reaching patriotism. 'Pity for the realm of France' inspired her, and even the rough soldiers who followed her forsook for a time their debaucheries that they might be fit to follow God's holy maid. Such an army was invincible; but whilst to the French the maid was an instrument of the mercy of God, to the English she was an emissary of hell and the forerunner of defeat. On May 7 she led the storm of one of the English fortified posts by which the town was hemmed in. After a sharp attack she planted her standard on the wall. The English garrison was slain to a man. The line of the besiegers was broken through, and Orleans was saved. On the 12th the English army was in full retreat.

1429

THE MAID OF ORLEANS

311

7. The Coronation of Charles VII. and the Capture of the Maid. 1429-1430.--The Maid followed up her victory. She had at her side brave and skilful warriors, such as La Hire and the Bastard of Orleans, the illegitimate son of the murdered Louis of Orleans, and with their help she pressed the English hard, driving them northwards and defeating them at Patay.

She insisted on

conducting Charles to Reims, and he, indolently resisting at first, was carried away by her persistent urgency. Hostile towns opened their gates to her on the way, and on July 17 she saw with chastened joy the man whom she had saved from destruction crowned in the great cathedral of Reims. For her part, she was eager to push on the war, but Charles was slothful, and in a hurry to be back to