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Chapter 1: The Barons War (1215-1219)
King Philip II of France and King John I 'Lackland' of England
Chapter 1: The Barons War (1215-1219)

There are four major kings who come to dominate our view of the very beginning of the Capetian Empire and the events that would lead to the unification of the Kingdoms of France and England at the beginning of the 13th Century and whose conflicts will, in time, threaten to tip both countries into anarchy. The first of these kings are King John I of England, the younger brother of King Richard I (whose death in 1199 left a succession dispute between John and his nephew, Arthur of Brittany), and King Philip II of France, the French counterpart to Richard 'the Lionheart' whose reign, from 1180, saw the inclusion of much of the Angevin lands into the growing French kingdom. Philip and John couldn't have been more starkly contrasted, Philip brought stability to France, expanded the boundaries of his kingdom and checked the power of the nobility while John's reign saw the loss of vast tracts of land, the growing power of the nobility and the country descend into anarchy and civil war. Following Philip's victory over the joint forces of the Holy Roman Empire, Flandres, Boulogne and England at the Battle of Bouvines, Western Europe saw a series of political changes with the overthrow of Otto IV of the Holy Roman Emperor by Frederick II. In France, the battle would play a major role in the process by which France started becoming a much stronger, much more centralised monarchy than it had been previously while, conversely, John's authority began to fall apart and resistance to his rule began to grow throughout England. As tensions began to grow in England, John played for time until he could attempt to garner papal support for his rule which he hoped might quell the increasingly rebellious vassals who, by April 1215, had elected Robert Fitzwalter (a man whose name will come to play a huge role in the events to come) as their leader and captured London, Lincoln and Exeter in quick succession. The two sides soon came to the negotiating table in June 1215 and, due to the mediation of Stephen Langton (Archbishop of Canterbury from 1207 to 1228), signed a peace treaty that would soon come to be known as the Magna Carta. Much more than just a peace treaty, the Magna Carta was a document of political reform under which the rights of free men were to be secured. This document effectively protected the rights of the church and the nobility, especially in regards to taxation, scutage and imprisonment by the king and would, in time, come to be one of the defining political documents of the 13th Century. Needless to say, given the events that followed, this document wasn't upheld for long. Later that year, Pope Innocent III declared, on John's behalf, the treaty to be illegal and excommunicated the barons. War was now upon them.

The next two kings who deserve mention, although less explanation here, are the (future) Kings Louis VIII of France, the son and heir of Philip II who would ascend to the throne of France in 1223, and Henry III of England, the son and heir of John whose birth in 1207 meant he was only 8 at the time of John's death in 1216. In many ways, the bulk of the upcoming conflict comes to be defined by these two as the fight for the throne of England rages between Louis and Henry for years after the conclusion of the Barons War and will spill over to later claimants even after the death of Henry III. Louis, of course, is the first of these to come into play here, having been invited to become King of England by the various barons after a series of defeats at the hands of John's forces throughout 1215. He landed in May 1216 without opposition on the Isle of Thanet before marching straight for London, with Canterbury opening its gates to him as he approached and Rochester Castle falling after a short siege. John, fearing the approach of the prince, fled to Winchester leaving the route to London wide open for the encroaching baronial forces under Louis. In London, Louis was given a warm welcome by a number of rebel subjects and barons and was soon proclaimed king in St Paul's Cathedral by the rebelling nobles as well as by King Alexander II of Scotland. With the fall of Winchester to Louis on June 14th, it was felt by many that John's defeat was by now more or less inevitable and John began to lose large numbers of supporters.

Taunted by his father for having tried to secure England without first having seized Dover, the key to reinforcements from France, Louis turned from London and marched to Dover Castle, besieging it on the 25th July 1216. However, finding the castle prepared for a siege, Louis' attempts to take the castle soon began to falter and after 3 months of the siege, he signed a truce and returned to London in October. However, with John's death only 4 days after the truce was signed, a change began to take place in the fortunes of the loyalist forces. With the ascension of the 8-year-old Henry III, who had the significant support of the papacy, and the efforts of his regent William Marshal, the Earl of Pembroke, a number of nobles who had initially been supporting Louis' cause began to switch sides and swear loyalty to the new English king. This is where Louis began to realise the large outstanding problem of the papacy's support for Henry III, Louis controlled London but he couldn't be crowned king, whereas the young Henry was crowned immediately in Gloucester Cathedral by Peter des Roches, the Bishop of Winchester. Meanwhile, in Kent, Louis found his control of the area constantly challenged by one William of Cassingham, a squire who was leading a large guerilla band of archers in resistance to Louis' position. In many ways, the war in England was all about winning over the nobility and it seemed that in this regard, Louis was constantly on the losing end. In November, the Magna Carta was reissued by Marshal who promised to uphold and treaty. Henry's position was further strengthened by the support of Pope Innocent who had had a cardinal preside over the coronation of the king and who had already excommunicated Louis, thus lending his support and legitimacy to the loyalist forces.

This didn't mean that Louis' successes failed entirely, he captured Hertford Castle on the 6th of December and, later that month, Berkhamsted Castle. But, in desperate need of further soldiers, Louis was forced to make a return trip to France in February 1217 and his return to the coast was by no means unchallenged. En route, he faced loyalist resistance in Kent and Surrey and was ambushed at Lewes by Cassingham with his army pursued to Winchelsea where only the timely arrival of the French fleet under Eustace the Monk saved him from starvation. Things grew ever worse when Cardinal Guala declared Henry's war against Louis to be a religious conflict and Louis suffered ever more defections as well as disagreements within his army during his absence. Returning to England in April, Louis determined that it was time to make a real effort to turn the war around and decided to split his army in two, one force under Thomas, Count of Perche to march North to besiege Lincoln while another under his own command to strike up a second siege of Dover Castle, determined to stop the loyalists within from continuing to cut off communications and supply routes to France.

Realising that the baronial forces were split in two, Marshal decided it was time to make a move to try and break the siege of Lincoln and thus cut off a significant portion of Louis' force. In Lincoln, the situation was at a critical point for Thomas who had managed to capture the city but was unable to capture the castle which refused to surrender. As Marshal advanced on the city, he was left with two options:

-Fight Marshal in the field at the base of a nearby hill
-Or defend the town

While keeping a force to besiege the castle and hold down the defenders, Perche led the majority of his forces to garrison the outside of the city against the approaching loyalist forces. Marshal had led his forces to the northern gate of the city where, under the command of Falkes de Breaute, they made a number of assaults against the gate, repelled every time by the defenders. As the day wore on and casualties mounted (including Falkes himself), Marshal began to realise that the city was not going to fall and chose instead to fall back and break the siege of the city. This defeat would prove crucial for Perche, as the moral detriment suffered by the defenders of the castle at the defeat the relieving forces would prove decisive and by the end of the May 1217, the castle had fallen. The capture of Lincoln was of huge strategic importance as it lay on the crossroads of Fosse Way (cutting from East to West through a number of important settlements) and Ermine Street (which cut from North to South, reaching London itself). Not only were these important centres of trade and government, but the capture of the city and castle would allow further consolidation and strengthening of Louis' position in the South-East.

Bolstered by the victory at Lincoln and hearing reports of approaching reinforcements and supplies with the French fleet under Eustace Busket, Louis continued to push forward the siege of Dover Castle despite staunch resistance by the defenders under one Hubert de Burgh, the constable of Dover. Eustace was sailing at the head of 80 ships (10 naval ships and 70 supply ships) and brought with him a significant investment by King Philip whose successes in France had allowed him to all but push the English off the continent complete with the conquest of Normandy. Eustace is a fascinating figure of the time, a skilled naval commander but a monk turned pirate reputed to practice black magic and who had spent a sizable portion of his life on a quest for vengeance against Renaud de Dammartin whose siding with King John was the very reason Eustace was fighting for Louis. Renaud, at the time, was currently rotting in a prison having sided once too often with King John against Philip and having been captured at the Battle of Bouvines in 1214 but Eustace continued to fight for the French for the time being. As Thomas pushed along the Fosse Way, capturing Newark on the 16th June, Eustace was preparing his ships and left France in August of 1217 sailing for the Cinque Ports in Kent. With Thomas moving South-West to cut Henry off from the South-East of the country, Henry sent 38 ships under Philip d'Aubigny, a major landholder and supporter of Henry who had fought at Lincoln in May, to intercept the French fleet. The two forces met on the 24th August, the French led by Eustace and his ally Robert of Courtenay and the English led by Philip. Eustace's greater naval skill and larger ships (both in size and numbers) led to him wreaking havoc on the English fleet as he outmanoeuvred the ships and his archers cut the marines to pieces. Finally, the English fleet retreated back to the South-West (loyalist territory) with heavy casualties including Philip himself who was found dead after the battle, supposedly pierced with dozens of arrows. Most of Philip's lands had been in the South-East and were constantly threatened by Louis' forces, despite this, they were, at least nominally, transferred to his brother Philip the Younger after his death by Henry III. Eustace's victory at the Battle of Dover effectively opened up the channel to French control, enabling reinforcements and supplies to be transported from the continent much easier than they could before.

However, Louis' position hadn't entirely been saved from the fire. His siege of Dover Castle came under constant harassment by Cassingham's forces resulting in heavy casualties as the siege dragged on with the staunch resistance of Hubert and his forces and the preparedness of the castle itself. These factors took a heavy toll on the besiegers and the siege began to stall as winter of 1217 closed in. Meanwhile, the loyalist forces were gearing up for a counter-attack. Possibly fearing being cut off from the South-East entirely or even a move by Perche to actually attack Henry's position in the South-West, Marshall and Ranulf de Blondeville, the Earl of Chester began marching North-East towards Newark in another attempt to shatter Thomas' forces and cut off a significant portion of Louis' army. It is possible that their intention was to force Louis to an ultimatum, break the siege of Dover Castle or lose Thomas and his army at Newark. The siege of Newark in November 1217 threatened to do exactly that. Throughout Kent, Cassingham's fight against Louis continued to gain momentum as he extended his operations beyond simply attacks on Louis' forces but into the realms of actually raiding towns that had shown support for Louis and the barons. In turn, Eustace continued his frequent supply runs and even launched a series of raids along the southern coast of England against towns in territory still held by the loyalists. Throughout the winter of 1217, as the respective forces of the loyalists and the rebels settled down for continued winter siege, the war began to settle into a familiar dance of raids and counter-raids, often prosecuted by Eustace and Cassingham respectively. Eustace terrorised the seas, cutting off large amounts of trade income to England and even, for a period, controlling a number of Channel Islands. On land, meanwhile, Louis was engaged in frequent fighting with the forces under Cassingham and, occasionally, raids from the castle itself.

Marshal had arrived relatively late in the year, a fact that proved to be fortunate in the extreme for Louis as he needed time to prepare siege weapons to properly prosecute the siege come spring while at the same time Louis himself began to gear up for his own attacks on Dover Castle once the winter ended. This isn't to say that siege operations ended entirely or even stalled during the winter months, raids and engagements still continued but the majority of the work in most sieges was simply waiting and, with food far less available during the winter, it is probable that neither side wished to expend their soldiers too much in large assaults until spring came and supplies were more available. Needless to say, the onset of spring brought with it a flurry of activity including a number of failed and costly assaults on Dover Castle by Louis. But these failures, costly as they were, began to betray the fraying defenders as the walls continued to suffer damage and erosion under the attacks and there were even a few minor breaches of the defences. While casualties suffered at the hands of Cassingham remained high, Louis had learnt from many of his mistakes from the previous year and greater defences around his camp evened out the engagements and raids that took place between the two. Despite increasing casualties and dwindling morale, Hubert's forces would continue to put up resistance to Louis until the castle finally fell in November 1218 resulting in Hubert's death at the hands of the besiegers.

Thomas had spent the winter in feverish activity, doing whatever he could to try and repair and prepare the defences of Newark so that he might manage to hold out until Louis could relieve the defenders while, opposite him, Marshal and Blondeville continued to prepare their siege works in the hope that they would be able to take Newark before Louis had a chance to take Dover and move to relieve Thomas. As said previously, it has been argued that Marshal's purpose in the siege was to try and force Louis to break the siege of Dover Castle in favour of relieving Newark. Whether Louis' choice to continue the siege rather than relieve his forces shows his faith in Thomas' ability to defend the castle after his victory at Lincoln or simply shows that Louis felt capturing Dover to be more important is also up for debate. Nevertheless, the events to follow are quite clearly shown. Louis refused to abandon the siege of Dover and Thomas was forced to cobble together whatever defence he could in a desperate attempt to hold out until reinforcements could arrive. His repairs were by no means of high quality as a lack of resources forced him to often demolish houses for stone to use to patch the walls up and these areas were often the first to fall. Furthermore, his army's actions within Newark didn't exactly endear them to the populace who threatened at some points to let Marshal and Blondeville into the city. Yet Newark held, the city itself fell a number of times to the besiegers and the castle was breached in a number of assaults throughout 1218 but it never fell. Despite dwindling resources, Thomas continued his resistance up until the siege began to settle with the onset of winter in November. News of the fall of Dover, naturally, unnerved Marshal and Blondeville who began to fear the approach of Louis' army and the possibility that they might end up being caught between two opposing forces.

Marshal was aware of one opportunity, however, the onset of winter meant that Louis only marched as far as London in November where he halted for the winter and instead chose to consolidate his position choosing, however, to resume his march earlier in the year in February. While situated in London, he had been able to continue to feed his army via supplies from France but his march in late February was largely fed from whatever remaining food could be found in granaries or personal stores. The obvious side effect of this was that people began to starve as vast amounts of food that might have been used to feed hungry people at the very end of winter went to feeding a marching army and, in turn, resistance in the South-East continued to grow. Cassingham is a perfect example of this and his guerilla force saw a massive uptake in numbers throughout the winter. Had Henry been in a better position to do so, such a decision might have possibly prepared the ground for him to make a counter-attack into the South-East to oust Louis from his foothold there. As it was, however, Louis was able to push onwards and arrived at Newark in early April of 1219. By this point, Marshal and Blondeville were gone, abandoning the siege in March and heading South-West to Henry's refuge in Cornwall.

The lull in fighting that took place after the Siege of Newark Castle ended in April 1219 was time needed by both sides. On one hand, Louis' position in the South-East was becoming more and more unstable and, while his victories kept his supporters loyal, he began to wonder if this war was unsustainable. The Siege of Dover Castle is a perfect example of this given the amount of men and resources that Philip and Louis had had to invest into the siege just to take the castle, Philip couldn't sustain this economically forever and the seeming lack of real results seemed to be making the French nobility anxious to end the war. Those soldiers and nobles who were in England were anxious to return home while many back in France began to wonder if these resources might not be better suited elsewhere. Even Philip is said to have had his doubts about whether England was worth it and a supposed correspondence between him and his son had Philip questioning Louis about his ability to even hold England should he manage to actually capture it in the first place. Philip was by no means wrong, England would indeed prove to be a massive sink of resources for the early kings such as, most famously, Louis IX who would spend significant amounts of time trying to actually pacify England and her nobles. These are problems we will very much return to later, the concerns were being raised at the moment but they are concerns that do come into play later in the narrative.

For now, Louis took the time to consolidate his position and make preparations to try and end the war as quickly as possible. His biggest fears were that Henry might try to retake the South-East, thus cutting Louis off from supplies from the continent or that Henry might flee to the North and thus prolong the war in what might turn into a bloody campaign in Northern England. At this point, much of the Fosse Way had still to be properly captured and Louis knew all too well that the South-East was potentially vulnerable as a result. Marshal, meanwhile, was 70 years old and almost on his death bed and, fearing that Louis was about to march straight on Henry, moved the young king west from Corfe Castle to
Tremarton Castle and from there to Restormel Castle. Marshal arrived at Restormel in July but wouldn't last much longer. His devotion to Henry and loyalty the cause had kept him going so far but his body now began to fail. Now on his deathbed, Marshal summoned his son (William), the barons loyal to Henry, Pandulf Veraccio; the Papal Legate to England, and Peter des Roches. Here he would appoint Veraccio as the next regent of Henry III, overruling the claims to the regency of other nobles, such as Ranulf, and bishops, such as the Bishop of Winchester. Veraccio is quite starkly contrasted to Marshal. Marshal was a knight and, according to many, an exemplary example of what a knight should be, he was strong, militarily skilled, noble and loyal the very end even though many of his sons, even his heir William, had initially sided with Louis (but defected over time). Veraccio was, in comparison, a divisive figure whose arrogance and appointment over, arguably, better claims did not endear him to the nobility. He was accepted, thus far, due to the critical problems that Henry was facing and the desperate need for a regent and it's likely that Marshal appointed him due to his distrust of the barons, many of whom had initially sided with Louis, and the need for a stabilising figure not too tied up in local politics. But the choice would be neither popular nor particularly successful.

As for himself, Marshal's death in July 1219 would be an event remembered for centuries to come. His loyalty to the Plantagenets would become a defining part of his figure which, a century or so later, had more or less become a near-legendary character in England. Maybe more importantly for our narrative, his opposition to Louis would make him an important political figure alongside Cassingham as a symbol of resistance to Capetian rule in England and as pretenders came and went, these two figures more than anyone would be invoked time and again to rally people to their cause in an attempt to dislodge the French kings who sat on the throne of England.

The Barons War now entered its final stage as Louis left Newark in August 1219 and swept South-West along Fosse Way towards Cornwall, hoping to entrap Henry and Veraccio in the area and thus prevent any attempts to retake the South-East. On the way, Louis captured a number of loyalist strongholds throughout the Midlands although these would prove hard to hold due to the still strong support for Henry's position as king in the area and, due to his distraction capturing important strongholds and securing the road, Louis wouldn't arrive in Dorset until October 1219. Upon his arrival, Louis immediately sent Saer de Quincy, Earl of Winchester and Robert Fitzwalter to capture Corfe Castle which left Louis free to move on Henry. News of Louis' movements reached Veraccio quickly who, not wanting to risk making a stand in Cornwall that might risk Henry's capture by Louis, chose to flee from Cornwall that very month. Veraccio, Henry and his younger brother Robert (who had previously been the High Sheriff of Berkshire) made their way to Ireland where they set up their court in the English Lordship of Ireland. Many of the other nobles scattered throughout the country or took refuge abroad.

The flight of Henry III in October 1219 is effectively considered the end of the Barons War and a clear victory for Louis and the Barons who were now left in control, at least nominally, of England. That isn't to say that Louis actually controlled England but for the time being he was the only claimant left standing on English soil with an army and in possession of most of the South, however weak it may have been in some areas. So here we leave off the war, Louis has emerged victorious and Henry is in exile in Ireland with his supporters scattered to the wind. This isn't the end, however, and the fight for England has only just begun.

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