Agincourt 1415: The Archers' Story E-Book

Anne Curry

• Herausgeber: The History Press
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 377

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Beschreibung

'Attempts to see the conflict from the perspectives of those who fought.' – History Today The Battle of Agincourt still rings down through the centuries as a quite incredible victory by the outnumbered, happy few of England, enfeebled by disease and exhaustion, against the might of French chivalry. For many commentators then and now, it was the English archers who won the day for Henry V. This history re-tells the story of the battle and Henry V's Normandy campaign from the perspective of the reputed commander of the English archers, Sir Thomas Erpingham. Sir Thomas, an experienced warrior from Norfolk with military experience dating back 40 years, is known for his brief but pivotal appearances in Shakespeare's Henry V, where he is correctly portrayed as an elderly, white-haired veteran. At 57 he was one of the oldest there and a close personal confident of the King. But what was his background? How did he command his archers to such a place in history? And what role did the longbow and battlefield tactics play in the final analysis of victory? Copiously illustrated with reproductions of original muster rolls and other material, Agincourt 1415: The Archers' Story steers the reader through the history of the most important battle of the Hundred Years War from an entirely fresh perspective.

Leseprobe

About the Editor

Anne Curry is Professor of Medieval History at the University of Southampton, editor of the Journal of Medieval History and the world’s leading authority on the Battle of Agincourt. She was advisor to the Battle of Agincourt Battlefield Centre in Picardy and was historical consultant for the ITV documentary of the battle in the Battlefield Detectives series. Her other books include The Battle of Agincourt: Sources and Interpretations and The Hundred Years’ War. Professor Curry is a member of the Société de L’Historie de France and the Society of Antiquaries, and is currently a Vice-President of the Royal Historical Society.

Notice: The information in this book is true and complete to the best of our knowledge. It is offered without guarantee on the part of the author or The History Press. The author and The History Press disclaim all liability in connection with the use of this book.

First published 2000

This edition first published 2008 and reissued 2024

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ISBN 978 1 80399 833 6

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Contents

Foreword

Acknowledgements

List of Illustrations

1    Henry V: A Life and Reign

2    The Battle

3    The Bowman and the Bow

4    Sir Thomas Erpingham

5    Chivalry at Agincourt

6    The Heraldry of Agincourt

7    Shakespeare’s Agincourt: Sir Thomas Erpingham and the Missing Archers

List of Contributors

Further Reading

Foreword

In Norwich Cathedral in October 1996 there happened a remarkable event, a symposium organized by the Norfolk Heraldry Society on the subject of Henry V’s marshal of the archers at Agincourt in 1415, Sir Thomas Erpingham. A Norfolk man, around 58 at the time of the battle, an unwavering supporter of the Lancastrian dynasty, Shakespeare’s ‘good old knight’ who in the play Henry V lends the cloak as a disguise when Henry goes among the soldiers encamped the night before the battle; it was he who on the actual day organized the five thousand or so archers, and who rode out in front of the English lines and threw his baton in the air with the cry ‘Nestroque’, as the French hear it – ‘Now strike!’ or ‘Knee stretch!’ as English commentators have interpreted it since. Often have I stood on that famous field, in fact and in imagination, and strained to hear that far cry, which unleashed the first deadly volleys into the packed mass of the French.

For half a century, Agincourt has been at the centre of my studies concerning British military archery, and though I feel I have gone about as far as anyone can into the contemporary accounts of this much documented battle, I also feel that if by some magic one suddenly awoke from a deep sleep into the middle of that October day and that fearsome engagement, it would all happen around one in a shockingly different fashion from any we have deduced and imagined. But the very best chance of being guided towards an understanding of what the lamenting French called ‘the Picardy affair’, when up to ten thousand of their countrymen perished, and the flower of their nobility was culled, was to be at the 1996 Norwich Heraldry Society meeting of some of the finest medieval historians in Britain or now to read this resulting volume.

Erpingham was at the core of the day’s investigations, partly because the gathering was to celebrate the life and loyalty, the military and civil prowess of a local magnate, but, because of his position of influence in the Lancastrian cause, they also embraced the battle itself, the contemporary concepts of chivalry, the heraldry of the battle, its victor and Erpingham’s master, Henry V, and importantly, Erpingham’s command – which represented five-sixths of the total English and Welsh army – the longbowmen. None can be sure exactly how the English were deployed: the sources themselves offer differing suggestions. Matthew Bennett and I will perhaps forever disagree about archer positions, but none will dispute the salient and inarguable facts, that the archers were deployed to best advantage, that they destroyed the initial French cavalry attacks, made life hideous for the advancing masses of French infantry and, when the two armies crashed together, turned on the instant into men-at-arms and inflicted merciless destruction among the French at close quarters.

Here in this collection of the best of the talks delivered in Norwich Cathedral, supplemented by additional contributions by members of the Norfolk Heraldry Society and others, you may follow the most lucid and elegant of minds into the dark nightmare of that famous victory, illumined by some of the shining characters who were the cause and the centre of one of the greatest moments of our Island story.

Robert Hardy CBA, FSA, Hon. D.Litt. (Durham),Hon. D. Litt. (Reading)

Acknowledgements

The first thanks must be to the Norfolk Heraldry Society who organised the Erpingham Symposium in 1996, and to the Dean and Chapter of Norwich Cathedral for hosting the event within the Cathedral and Close. Thanks are due especially to Tony Sims for assistance as picture editor, and to the following who have generously allowed use of their pictorial materials: David Laven (figs 3–5); Paul Hitchin (plates 1–11, figs 10–13); Anne Curry (plate 12, figs 7–9, 31–2); Ken Mourin (plates 18–22, figs 26, 30); Tony Sims (figs 14, 15, 37–42, 44–5); Brian Kemp (figs 51–5); Simon Eager (fig. 56); Sarah Cocke (plate 13, fig. 27); Henry Paston-Bedingfeld (plate 23); Robert Hardy (plate 24). The contributors would also like to thank the staff of the Norfolk Record Office for assistance with sources; Simon Walker for advice on Erpingham’s career; Joan Hurrell for advice on heraldry and ships; Monsieur Claude Songis for his help in connection with French coats of arms; Jonathan Reeve and Tempus Publishing for encouragement and support.

Plate 16 and figure 6 are reproduced by permission of the British Library; figs 16–22 and 25 by permission of the Public Record Office; plate 15 and figs 46–8 by permission of the Victoria and Albert Museum; plate 14 by the permission of the Burrell Collection, Glasgow; and figs. 33–5 by permission of the Eastern Daily Press. Figure 24: © Crown copyright 2000; reproduced by permission of the Public Record Office on behalf of the Controller of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office.

List of Illustrations

1

Psalter of Humphrey, duke of Gloucester, believed to show Henry V, p. 22

2

Royal portrait of Henry V, p. 29

3

The English march to Agincourt, p. 39

4

The French march to Agincourt, p. 41

5

The battle of Agincourt, p. 44

6

Letter of Henry V, c.1419 (British Library Cotton MS, Vespasian F iii, folio 8), p. 51

7

View of the battlefield of Agincourt, p. 55

8–9

Monuments commemorating the battle, 1870s and 1960s, p. 56

10

Archer and page, p. 63

11

The bow, p. 70

12

Contemporary arrow heads, p. 75

13

Selection of sidearms, p. 84

14

Brass of Sir John Erpingham, Erpingham church, Norfolk, p. 92

15

Seal of Sir Thomas Erpingham, p. 95

16

The crown’s copy of Sir Thomas’s indenture for service (PRO E101/69/360), p. 110

17

Sir Thomas’s copy of his indenture for service (PRO E101/47/20), p. 110

18

Quittance by Sir Thomas for payment of wages (PRO E101/47/20), p. 113

19

Indenture recording delivery of royal jewels (PRO E101/47/20), p. 113

20

Muster recording Sir Thomas’s troops (PRO E101/44/30, piece 3), p. 114

21

Account, and particulars of the account, re Sir Thomas’s service (PRO E101/47/20), p. 115

22

Brass of Thomas, Lord Camoys, p. 119

23

Exchequer account bag (PRO E101/47/20), p. 121

24

Retinue list (PRO E101/47/20), p. 123

25

Sites in Norwich associated with Sir Thomas, based on Taylor’s map of the city, 1821, p. 126

26

The window from St Martin’s at Palace Plain, p. 128

27

Sir Thomas’s house on World Lane End in 1851, Winter’s Norfolk Antiquities (1885–8), p. 129

28

Blackfriars Church, now St Andrew’s Hall, Dugdale’s Monasticon (1718–23), p. 132

29

Map of Sir Thomas’s possessions in Norfolk, p. 135

30–1

Cley Church, Norfolk, p. 141

32–4

Decoration from the tower of Erpingham church, p. 142

35

The Erpingham gate, Thomas Browne’s Repertorium, 1712, p. 147

36

The north side of the gate, p. 148

37

The south side of the gate, p. 149

38

Effigy of Sir Thomas today, p. 153

39

Detail of the effigy, p. 153

40

St Petronilla or St Sitha, p. 156

41

Erpingham’s motto ‘yenk’ as carved on the gateway, p. 156

42–3

The Erpingham window, once in the north choir isle of Norwich Cathedral, p. 157

44

Carving of Sir Thomas’s arms on the choir stalls of Norwich Cathedral, p. 160

45

Boss of Robert Knollys and his wife Constance Beverley, Norwich Cathedral, p. 161

46

The Erpingham Chasuble, front, p. 164

47

The Erpingham Chasuble, back, detail of the Erpingham emblem of a falcon rising, p. 167

48

The Erpingham Chasuble, back, detail of Sir Thomas’s coat of arms, p. 167

49

Monument to Sir John Hawkwood, Florence Cathedral, p. 178

50

Brass of Sir Hugh Hastings, Elsing church, Norfolk, p. 181

51

Elsing Church, Norfolk, p. 182

52–3

Tomb of Sir Oliver de Ingham, d.1344, Ingham Church, Norfolk, p. 183

54–5

Tomb chest and effigy of Sir Edmund de Thorpe, d.1418, Ashwellthorpe, Norfolk, p. 185

56

William Wilcotes (d.1411), detail of monument in North Leigh Church, Oxon, p. 189

57

The duke of Orléans in the Tower of London, p. 199

58

Brass of Sir Simon Felbrigg and his wife, Felbrigg Church, Norfolk, p. 206

59

The earl of Warwick being created a knight of the Garter, Warwick Pageant, p. 211

60–1

Views of the tomb and chantry chapel of Henry V, Westminster Abbey, p. 222

62

The earl of Warwick received at Venice, Warwick Pageant, p. 225

63

The earl of Warwick in Jerusalem, Warwick Pageant, p. 226

64–5

Equestrian figures, probably of Henry V, Westminster Abbey, p. 229

66

Saddle of Henry V, Westminster Abbey, p. 232

67

Tilting helm of Henry V, Westminster Abbey, p. 235

Colour section

1

Henry V at the battle of Agincourt

2

Sir Thomas Erpingham

3

Mounted archer on the march from Harfleur

4

Bowman preparing defensive stakes

5

Well-equipped bowman drawing back his bow

6

Two archers at full draw

7

Jean, sire d’Aumont, ‘the brawler’

8

Guillaume Martel, sire de Bacqueville

9

Paul Hitchin prepares to draw

10

Close-up of a modern reproduction of a bascinet

11

Modern reproductions of the equipment of the medieval archer

12

Erpingham Church

13

The Erpingham gate

14

Fragment of glass bearing the arms of Sir Thomas Erpingham (Burrell Collection, Glasgow)

15

The Erpingham Chasuble, back

16

William Bruges, first Garter king-of-arms, kneeling before St George, (British Library, Stowe MS 594 folio 5b)

17

The Garter stall plate of Sir Thomas Erpingham

18

French battle banners

19

English battle banners

20

French royal banners

21

English Knights

22

English royal banners

23

Henry Paston-Bedingfeld, York Herald of Arms

24

‘Lend me thy cloak, Sir Thomas’: portrait of Robert Hardy as Sir Thomas Erpingham, by Howard Morgan

25

The Erpingham banner, Norwich Cathedral

1

Henry V: A Life and Reign

Anne Curry

‘Take him all round and he was, I think, the greatest man that ever ruled England.’ So wrote K.B. McFarlane in 1954, and try as they might, subsequent commentators have not been able to discredit this image of greatness. In customary fashion, academics have whittled away at the king’s reputation, accusing him of over-stretching English resources, of negotiating an unworkable peace treaty with the French at Troyes in 1420, and thus of sowing the seeds of defeat overseas and civil war at home – features which colour much of the remainder of the fifteenth century. Yet for every bad thing one can say about Henry V, there are dozens of good things to say in his defence. Perhaps his only real offence was to die too soon, leaving an heir only nine months old, but blame for this can hardly be placed at the king’s door.

So Henry remains the golden boy of fifteenth century history – strong, decisive, athletic, energetic, pious, and above all successful. Of all the kings of the fifteenth century, Henry V is unique. Unlike his father, he did not usurp the English throne, nor did he usurp the French. He was not deposed like his son, and it is unlikely that he ever came anywhere near deposition even in the supposed plots against him early in his reign. Moreover, unlike the other kings of the century, he came to the throne when neither too young nor too old, experienced but still in his full prime.

So, a royal success story. And our continuing admiration has a long pedigree. A fair reflection of the reputation of a king is the number of biographies written in his lifetime or soon after. For Henry we have more such works than for any king of England since William the Conqueror, though perhaps the Black Prince might have made it into this first division had he outlived his father. The first biography, the Gesta Henrici Quinti, was compiled as early as 1417 and gives us a full account of the Agincourt campaign. A single quote will suffice as an illustration of this contemporary view of Henry. Here he is on his return to England three weeks after the battle:

Nor do our older men remember any prince having commanded his people on the march with more effort, bravery, or consideration, or having, with his own hand, performed greater feats of strength in the field. Nor, indeed, is evidence to be found in the chronicles or annals of kings of which our long history makes mention, that any king of England ever achieved so much in so short a time and returned home with so great and so glorious a triumph.

This was surely God’s work. The feeling that God had shown his favour for England through such a king permeates the whole of the Gesta as it does the other biographical work that was written within Henry’s lifetime, the versified Liber Metricus of Thomas Elmham. The adulation continues in the biographies written in the next generation and into the sixteenth century with, in particular, the First English Life of 1513. Indeed Henry V is the only monarch to remain basically unscathed by the Tudor’s derogatory treatment of their fifteenth-century predecessors.

Anyone interested in history knows, however, that one should never take evidence at face value, and that biographies written within or near the lifetime of their subject are only marginally less subjective than autobiographies. The narrative sources for the reign of Henry V are no exception to this rule. Like many medieval narrative writings they were interdependent, borrowing shamelessly from each other but without giving credit, and they embroidered the truth, particularly those which were composed furthest from Henry’s own day. Any legend in his own lifetime easily lends itself to further embellishment. Just as the Gospel writers and later theologians may have sought to fill in the gaps in the life and personality of Christ, so the biographers of Henry flesh out the bare bones with anecdotes of his childhood and youth, and with flashes of human rather than kingly personality. So through the sixteenth-century writers come the features of Henry that we know and love so well in Shakespeare: the brave but boisterous youth spent in the Boar’s Head Tavern, the reconciliation with his father and the conscious abandonment of his former wicked ways at his own accession, and the love and courtship of Catherine. But in defence, many of the myths have some root in actual, known events. The king undoubtedly did offer much personal encouragement ‘calmly and heedless of danger’ (Gesta) to his tired and worried troops on the eve of Agincourt; we can surely forgive Shakespeare and even the much lamented Sir Larry their ‘little touch of Harry in the night.’

Of course Henry’s biographers were biased. The Gesta may even have been a work of propaganda commissioned to show Henry in a good light in the international scene of the Council of Constance; a Church council held to settle the problem of papal schism and where the English were attempting to cement anti-French alliances with the Germans. A good son of the Church – such as Henry claimed to be – should not be causing so much bloodshed by war between Christian nations. The onus was therefore on him, or at least on his biographer who was probably a royal chaplain, to justify the war with France and in particular the king’s decision to launch a new campaign of conquest in the summer of 1417. Not such a difficult matter, of course, for the very success of the war effort so far showed that God himself fully endorsed the English war aims and methods.

Moreover was not Henry the most Christian of princes, a man of great personal piety and a founder of two monasteries and potentially a third, all for the new orders dedicated to a return to the pure and original character of the true religious life? The Carthusian house at Sheen (April 1415) and the Brigittine house at Syon (March 1415) were in fact the last monasteries to be founded in Pre-Reformation England. Most of all, had Henry not shown himself to be a valiant friend and supporter of orthodoxy in his firm repression of the English heretical sect, the Lollards, particularly at the time of their armed rebellion in 1414?

A man who had revealed himself as a true son of the true Church could not fail but to be treated well by the monastic writers who in the first quarter of the fifteenth century still dominated historical writing in England. For Thomas Walsingham, the last of the long tradition of Benedictine chroniclers at St. Albans, here was the ‘athleta Christi’, the active defender of the faith. Thomas Elmham, monk of Canterbury and author of the verse biography composed within Henry’s lifetime, placed even greater emphasis on the king’s religious stance. Having likely served Henry as his chaplain in 1414, and writing his complex Latin panegyric of the king for a clerical audience, the tone of his work is hardly surprising.

The nature of bias in later works is also easily identified. The Vita (Life) written by the Italian Titus Livius Frulovisi in the late 1430s was commissioned by Henry’s last surviving brother, Humphrey duke of Gloucester, motivated not only by affectionate brotherly memory but also by a desire to remind the growing numbers of those who wished to call an end to the Anglo-French war of the rightness and glory of Henry’s campaigns. How could the English contemplate a peace which would destroy all that Henry had ever fought for? Our other mid-fifteenth century life, the Pseudo-Elmham, was sponsored in its first recension by Walter Lord Hungerford, Henry’s close associate in war and peace, steward of the household, diplomat and one of the leading captains in France. In its later version, it was commissioned by John Somerset, Henry VI’s physician. Both Hungerford and Somerset were of the Gloucester way of thinking. Moreover both promoters had their own reminiscences of the late king, seen as much through rose-tinted spectacles as through the mists of uncertain memory. Our first English life, c.1513, even further removed in date, also relied upon the transmission of the memories of an ageing retainer and companion in arms, the earl of Ormonde.

Do we have any chance at all of seeing the real Henry? Our biographers are known to be biased and all that survives from the king’s own hand are two rather inconsequential letters. Much other contemporary or near contemporary evidence is equally adulatory and the king himself was an adroit and conscious user of propaganda both in France and England. However, we must not suppose that because the sources are problematic the legend itself is erroneous. Henry was the subject of much writing, of all kinds and for all types of fifteenth-century audience, and the amount of coverage in the vernacular town chronicles is also worth a mention here. He captured the attention of these commentators primarily because he was such an impressive ruler, indeed an exemplary ruler, whose career was worth recording and embellishing. Henry met all the characteristics expected of a medieval king. He was a military hero in his lifetime, he was actively pious, he was renowned for justice and he was praised for ruling firmly but without oppression or partiality. All kings were feared, but Henry was admired and appreciated by his people as a whole, by his friends who knew him more intimately, and even by his enemies, for some French chroniclers admit his military genius, his chivalric behaviour and his wise rule of their country.

We may never fathom out the man himself. We can scarcely understand those living and close to us today, so what chance with a monarch who lived over five hundred years ago. But let us consider some of the principal features and characteristics of this remarkable reign.

The child maketh the man. How did Henry’s early experiences affect him? Henry was born into the leading family in England on 16 September 1387. As the eldest child in a family of eventually four boys and two girls, he led a predictable aristocratic childhood until his father, Henry Bolingbroke, then duke of Hereford, was exiled by Richard II in 1397. The young Henry faced a very real dilemma of loyalty, a dilemma exacerbated by his father’s return in 1399 to claim the throne. In the intervening two years Henry had been hostage at Richard’s court for his father’s good behaviour, but there is some evidence to suggest that the relationship between Richard and the young prince – particularly on the Irish trip of 1399, where Henry was knighted by the king – was amicable. This has fuelled speculation about the early origins of the later awkward relationship between Henry and his own father. Did Henry feel more for Richard than he did his own father?

We can know little of the young Henry’s reaction to Richard II’s deposition, although some later chroniclers claim that he departed from Richard with great sorrow and only when the latter ordered him to follow his filial duty. At the outset of his own reign, he arranged the reburial with full kingly ritual of the body of Richard II, which Henry IV had ordered to be buried without ceremony at Langley. Henry V had of course attended the funeral of his own father at Canterbury Cathedral earlier, but the odd way in which the chronicler Walsingham records his attendance (‘at the feast of the Trinity the solemn exequies of Henry IV were celebrated at Canterbury, Henry the king’s son and heir being present’) implies that his presence was worth a notice, perhaps as being unexpected.

By 1413 Henry did not have a good relationship with his father; he even failed to carry out the wishes of his will. There is, however, a considerable danger in placing the break too far back. The reburial of Richard II in December 1413 was an act of conciliation and, as such, a political masterstroke aimed at establishing the Lancastrian dynasty once and for all. It belongs more properly to the policies of Henry V as king rather than as prince, as we shall see. Although several other things happened in the young Henry’s maturity to effect the apparent breach with his father, what is more significant is that the events of 1399 suddenly changed the position of the young prince. Now no longer a potentially disinherited hostage, separated from the rest of his family, but heir to the kingdom itself, and in his own right prince of Wales, earl of Chester, duke of Cornwall, duke of Lancaster and duke of Aquitaine; no mean landed endowment. He thus stands as unique again amongst fifteenth century kings because of the length and significance of the ‘apprenticeship’ before his accession. Indeed to find a comparable example one has to look as far back as Edward I, for the Black Prince died without putting his long experience as prince of Wales into practice as king.

Henry of Monmouth was his royal father’s heir for nearly fourteen years, between his first year of teenship and his accession as a man of twenty five. These were the formative years, initially years of uncertainty as his father contended with successive rebellions and faced the difficult choice between conciliation and repression. Henry gave his father full support in the suppression of the Percy rebellions and first distinguished himself at the battle of Shrewsbury in 1403: the arrow wound in his knee was more than proof of his courage. He gained nine years of military experience dealing with the Glendower rebellion in Wales, primarily very much under the tutelage of his father’s trusted nominees, but subsequently taking full charge. It was here that he learnt valuable lessons about command, military finance and siege warfare, and not least how to deal with a rebellious but finally defeated people, experiences which clearly influenced his later strategies in Normandy. It was in Wales too that he came into contact with many of the men who were to form the basis of his later royal household and army.

The fall of Harlech in February 1409 released him from active service and led to his first central appearance in politics. By this time his father’s state of health was causing intermittent crises in government, which the prince began to exploit despite his father’s apparent resentment and obstruction. From early in 1410 to November 1411 the prince and his nominees dominated the royal council and royal policies, but at the king’s recovery and apparently up to the end of the reign they appear to have gone into the political wilderness. It is in these years that father and son are seen at their most distant. Differences over foreign policy are the most obvious manifestation. Such were the violently opposed policies of Henry and his father that the former sent an army in 1411 to assist the Burgundian party in France, whilst in 1412 the latter sent troops to fight against the Burgundians.

A phenomenon known to students of the eighteenth century as the ‘reversionary interest’ can be observed as a party built up around the prince, in apposition if not direct opposition to the king. The serious nature of the rift is revealed by a letter given in Walsingham, supposedly sent to his father by Henry on 17 June 1412. Rebutting charges that he was aiming to seize his father’s crown (though there probably were some rumours, possibly even princely plans, concerning abdication), Henry claimed that there were others, ‘certain sons of iniquity… sowers of wrath and instigators of discord who, with something like the guile of the serpent’ (probably implying that they had the ear of the king) were attempting ‘to disturb the line of succession’. We can see clearly that, in the last two years of his reign, Henry IV was much closer to his second son, Thomas, than to his heir, but surely no usurper would consider himself tampering with the rightful succession within his own dynasty. Perhaps the young Henry’s accusations in 1412 were in effect a form of blackmail, an attempt to remind the king of his eldest son’s rightful position and to restore him to it by bringing the king to his senses, for – as the prince implied in his letter – rumours and dissensions would only serve to damage the kingdom and its present king. Whatever the case, Henry was certainly outmanoeuvred by his father in 1411 and 1412.

1. Miniature from the Psalter of Humphrey, duke of Gloucester, believed to show his brother, the young Henry V, kneeling before the risen Christ.

Whether Henry was ever reconciled with his father or not – and in a way it is immaterial, for he succeeded unchallenged – there can be no doubt that the new reign began with a general feeling of optimism, quite to be expected for here was a young and dynamic ruler replacing a care-worn invalid. There can be no doubt that Henry was intelligent, even relatively bookish by the standards of the age, although it is unlikely that he went to Oxford as some have claimed. Was there a change in his character at his accession? The change noted by chroniclers may not have been merely one of lifestyle – drinking, whoring and the like – but of ‘liberalism’. Like many young men whose fathers do not understand them, Henry may have had a slightly anti-establishment view, for instance over religion (for example the Lollards and Oldcastle) though he had shown himself a true son of the Church in the Badby case during his father’s reign. Perhaps there is some degree of ‘modernity’ in his religious stance even as king: for example in his favouring of the new more reflective and mystical orders; in his acting upon criticisms of the Benedictine order, criticisms undoubtedly put forward to him by Carthusians; or in his own stress on personal prayer and humility.

All in all, hopes were high at his accession. ‘Now spring had come to melt the winter snows’, as Walsingham wrote, commenting on the significance of the late and unexpected snow which accompanied Henry’s coronation on 8 April 1413. In response to parliamentary petitions, the new king made the right noises about reforming abuses, remedying the ills of the preceding years. Henry seems to have taken on the duties of kingship with ease, enthusiasm and – a virtue often lacking in medieval kings – tact. Indeed there are three aspects of his rule which first manifest themselves in these crucial early days and which appear fundamental to Henry’s success as king. The first is his willingness to conciliate, to patch up old quarrels and wipe the slate clean, although as we shall see this was always on his terms, and this did not prevent him acting savagely when he was opposed. The second element was his stress on justice and ‘good governance’, and the third was the high degree of his personal involvement in government.

Henry knew the importance of conciliation. Fair enough, a king is in the happy position of being able to conciliate on his own terms, but I think it would be true to say that Henry was a good man-manager. There was no witch hunt against his father’s advisors, although inevitably the former prince’s associates were introduced to the principal offices of state; not surprisingly as these offices were still very much based on the personal household of the monarch. Henry recognized talent, and throughout the reign, offices both high and low in England and in France were filled by men of competence. He also rewarded loyalty, including the loyalty of men who had served the two previous generations of Lancastrians. He even gave Oldcastle chances to recant his Lollard views for the sake of friendship and past service.

He soon made moves to reinstate the heirs or survivors of those who had initially opposed the deposition of Richard II. But we must not forget that he moved slowly on this and that he rarely forgave without imposing conditions or without expecting much service and benefit to himself in return. For example, Salisbury was only restored to part of his inheritance in 1414 and not declared to be entitled to all his father’s lands until after his service in Normandy in 1421; Huntingdon had his lands restored in 1416 after military service; Percy petitioned for the restoration of his estates in 1414 but this was not completed until 1416 when the earldom of Northumberland was in fact created anew. The estates of Cambridge, York and March were similarly carefully withheld by the king, while the restoration of the dukedoms of Norfolk to the Mowbrays did not occur until his son’s reign. Like all successful kings, Henry kept tight personal control of patronage.

It is worth remembering that his peerage creations were extremely limited. Examples of life peerages were Cambridge, Bedford and Gloucester at the May 1414 parliament and Exeter in 1416. Those in receipt of royal annuities were expected to fight and the king was clearly unimpressed by the excuses put forward by those asked to give service in 1419. He kept the royal demesne largely intact at least until his marriage, as he needed all the money he could get and no doubt was aware of parliamentary criticism in his father’s reign of the king’s inability to live ‘of his own’. Indeed one wonders whether a reputation for meanness may not have emerged for Henry V had it not been for the new found availability of land to grant out in Normandy.

Henry did reward but without being extravagant. He kept the nobility under control, but by personal connection and example rather than by flattery and purchase. He expected men to enrich themselves at the expense of others and not the crown. Moreover he could be cruel in the face of opposition: for example, the executions of Cambridge, Scrope and Heton; the killing of prisoners at Agincourt; the treatment of Henry Beaufort over the issue of his proposed cardinalcy in March 1418, excused only by a very large loan of £22,000. Note also Henry’s treatment of the French towns of Harfleur and Caen (even their records were burnt), and his attitude to those thrown out of Rouen during the siege. But he was not vengeful.

This firmness without repression came from his strong sense of justice. Indeed ‘justicia’ even appears to have been his nickname amongst some of the legal fraternity. Complaints of a breakdown in law and order had mounted in the last years of Henry IV, with certain areas of the country (most notably Staffordshire and Shropshire) being marked out as particularly lawless. Although there had been earlier attempts to remedy the problem, the restoration of good order was largely due to the efforts of Henry V in the first two years of his reign. Special circuits were undertaken by Kings Bench – the principal criminal court normally based in Westminster – and other commissions combined investigations into local disorder with enquiries into Lollard activity. In addition, the Statute of Additions at the May 1413 parliament attempted to tighten up the wording of summonses whose earlier looseness had let many a suspect off the hook. The king himself presided over some cases but was prepared to be lenient where necessary. A particularly useful royal tool was the general pardon or amnesty issued in December 1414, for not only did it sweep the board clean but it also raised vital revenue, with the 5,000 or more takers paying for their pardon.

Henry’s reign stands out as one of the few periods of comparatively good order in the generally disorderly fifteenth century, although certain problems – such as counterfeiting – were almost impossible to eradicate. Some earlier commentators have suggested that the renewal of the war with France did much to help public order, in particular by channelling magnate ambition into military activity abroad rather than political activity at home. This view is of course too simplistic: in some ways Henry’s absence generated new problems, and we hear plenty of complaints about the excesses of departing and returning soldiers. But it is worth emphasizing Henry’s stance on military discipline praised even by French chroniclers as part of his undoubted chivalric virtue. For all his campaigns he issued lengthy disciplinary ordinances, not decidedly innovatory but enforced as closely as possible. Shakespeare’s reference to the summary execution of a soldier who stole a pyx is probably true, and we know of other cases where Henry acted swiftly and savagely to protect the civilian population in France against his soldier’s excesses.

Henry was a hard task master who expected a high standard of behaviour from himself as well as from others. Fortunately he usually managed to instil such standards, but heaven help the transgressor. For example, Sir Hugh Annesley took wages to sail in the 1421 expedition but failed to cross and was thus put in the Tower by the king. Even Henry’s brother Gloucester was penalized for shipping costs when his retinue fell two short. Henry had a strong sense of the contractual element in justice: so long as one kept one’s side of the bargain then he was an active protector. But any transgression, particularly after the king had offered clemency or had laid down codes of behaviour, would most certainly lead to punishment. Hence the king offered full protection, pardon and restitution of rights to those French prepared to take an oath of obedience to himself and later to the Treaty of Troyes. Those who refused were traitors and could expect no clemency. ‘Ruthless but fair’ would perhaps best sum up the king’s attitude to the behaviour of all of his subjects.

Mention of matters such as law and order raises an important question, that of the degree of Henry’s personal involvement in government. When we look at medieval monarchs we have to be careful not to attribute everything that happened, even in the minutiae of government, to their hands directly. Already there was much in the conduct of government that was impersonal and bureaucratic. There were administrative systems which operated often surprisingly smoothly irrespective of the monarch. Henry was not one of those ‘reforming’ kings so beloved of constitutional historians. He had a trusted and competent council and team of administrators both in England and France. Moreover, he was absent from England for about half of his reign, for about three months in 1415 and then for three and a half years from July 1417 to February 1421, and again from July 1421 to August 1422.

He was, however, no mere cipher for he kept a close scrutiny over all aspects of government even in his absence. Evidence suggests that he was well informed about what was going on, that if he felt it necessary he could turn his attention to even routine matters. On one occasion he even appears to have checked through the accounts of the keeper of the wardrobe himself, adding marginal annotations requesting clarification and explanation of income and expenditure.

Whilst he did delegate to his brothers, who acted as Protectors of England in his absence, he never released the reins of government completely. He required all petitions to be sent to him, and warrants issued continued to need the king’s approval. There was a steady stream of instructions sent back to England even when embroiled in intense military action. We can see his personal activity at its sharpest definition in the letters issued under the most intimate of seals: the king’s signet. Two of these are in the king’s own hand. The others were dictated by him and many are crouched in the king’s distinctive style: abrupt, to the point, clear and unequivocal. There was a certain brusqueness about Henry which indicates a man who grasped the issues quickly, a man used to thinking on his feet, a man who didn’t like wasting time. Henry offered decisive and clear-cut government. He was a king who led from the front.

Little has been mentioned about the main concern of Henry’s reign and indeed the main aspect of his historical reputation: the war with France. However, it would seem that our understanding of Henry’s military success is enriched by what we have gleaned so far about the nature of his government in general and about his personality.

There can be no doubt that Henry was a man who enjoyed life on campaign, whose adrenalin only really started to flow in fighting and in preparing to fight. After all, he had spent most of his formative years on campaign in Wales and took a strong interest in proposed military involvement in France in his father’s reign. Whilst many domestic matters occupied him in the first two years of his own reign, we must not forget that preparations for the 1415 expedition began long before, even whilst diplomatic negotiations were taking place. His 12,000 strong army (very large by medieval English standards) embarked in August 1415, and Henry led it throughout the siege of Harfleur, on the march northwards across the Somme to the fateful meeting with the French at Agincourt on 25 October (with Shrewsbury Henry’s only experience of a pitched battle and fought essentially at the behest of the French), and then brought it back to England in victory in November, an absence on active military service of three months.

2. Royal portrait of Henry V.

Over the next two years Henry remained in England, leaving the defence of Harfleur and the naval actions in the Channel to his uncle Exeter and middle brother, Bedford, whilst he himself pursued negotiations with the emperor and the French. But even in this period of truce, Henry’s thoughts continued to concentrate on the next move against the French. The resulting campaign launched on 1 August 1417 was intended as a serious long-term venture quite different from the customary form of English campaigns in France. He and his army would spend the winter in the field instead of returning home at the end of the campaigning season. For the aim was to conquer territory systematically by gaining control of the defensive centres. We can only assume that right from the start Henry envisaged a lengthy personal absence from England (although what would have happened if he had met with less success in Normandy we cannot tell).

The military actions of this campaign lasted right up to the final negotiations which led to the signing of the treaty of Troyes on 21 May 1420. Whilst some military initiatives in this period were delegated to his leading captains (indeed various campaigns were being conducted at the same time) Henry remained in overall command of strategy and was himself present at many major sieges and assaults. After his marriage to Catherine on 2 June 1420, he cut short the celebrations to begin the siege of Montereau, only returning to England in February 1421, his absence now totalling three and a half years. Even after his return to France in July 1421, when he also had to see to his new role as Regent, he spent much of his time in the field. It was at the siege of Meaux that he contracted the dysentery which was to bring about his premature death at the château of Vincennes on 31 August 1422.

Henry was fortunate in having many able captains under his command, some – like him – with military experience gained in Wales, and others whose skills developed as the French campaign progressed. There is ample evidence that Henry frequently consulted his chiefs of staff and that charge of many military initiatives was delegated to others. We also know that, in preparing for war, the king deliberated with his council in England and successfully negotiated parliamentary approval and taxation: eleven parliaments were held in nine and a half years, granting more taxation than in any other reign, and well-managed in the king’s interests. He also made considerable use of propaganda and the personal touch in the country as a whole through proclamations, royal pageants and in 1421, by the fifteenth century equivalent of the royal walkabout, a tour of the towns and religious shrines of the Midlands and North. Indeed, all the way through we can see attempts to involve the whole community in the war effort, partly for the sake of material requirements, money, men, shipping, but also for less tangible needs, such as prayers, political obedience, morale boosting and national unity. Through such widespread involvement, the nation was united behind its king by the war effort.