Flanders 1793: A Tale of Two Diaries

By Dominic Fielder

‘Somewhere there was a fault.’

The British campaign in Flanders, between 1793 and 1795, feels like an often-overlooked footnote in British military history. A disaster, that if we somehow look away, will be neatly swept under a rug, and we can return to the familiar narrative of a series of coalitions against France until the victory of Waterloo. Fortescue’s British Campaigns in Flanders is still the seminal work for understanding this campaign and sets the two diaries in context. The anonymous writer known as ‘Officer of the Guard’, was a member of the Duke of York’s staff and is a mixture of beautiful verse and pithy prose. Robert Brown’s account as corporal in the Coldstream Guards, is observant of the everyday. A shared war from very different social strata. 

Terra Firma at length, thank my stars! We have gain’d,
And our raptures, believe me, can scarce be explain’d.
With more transport the breast of a debtor ne’er heav’d,
From straw and his fourpence per diem reliev’d,
Than ours when we shook all our friends by the hand,
As they joyfully leap’d from the decks on dry land.
                                                                Officer of the Guards Vol 1

In February 1793, the French Convention declared war on Great Britain. In response, Great Britain sent a small army, a brigade initially with more men to follow. It was necessary to be on the continent, to be seen to be ‘doing our bit’ to restore the French monarchy; there were after all, political prizes to be had! While the Guards’ officers were no doubt keen to be rid of an overcrowded ship, Corporal Brown makes no mention of the hardship, instead comparing the villages around the port of Helleveotsluis to the country he had just left, ‘The streets are regular and kept remarkably clean, as well as the outside of their houses, which they are continually washing’.

The gaining of Terra Firma was an obvious relief to all the Duke’s soldiers. It had been a less than auspicious start.
 

The port of Hellevoetsluis at Hollands Diep  

The parade of two thousand guardsmen which had set off along the Mall had turned into a drunken ramble by the time it had reached Greenwich. Soldiers were loaded into three overcrowded transports. A soldier slipped on a gang-plank, fell and shattered his leg. Amongst the doctors in the three battalions, no medical supplies could be found. None had been loaded but at least the campaign furniture of the Guards officers had. Some consolation at least. The young officer from York’s inner circle foreshadowed the days ahead, “Somewhere there was a fault.”

The epitaph of the Flanders campaign.

The ships that sailed into Hollands Diep narrowly avoided a storm that would have surely wrecked them. Such an auspicious start was compounded by the constraints of operational orders sent by the government, and Henry Dundas in particular, which attempted to shackle the Duke’s army to a protection of the landing places along Hollands Diep. In early March 1793, there were around 2000 men under the Duke’s command. Two weeks earlier, the French convention had passed a law to levy 300,000 men to be added to a standing army that John Lynn in The Bayonets of the Republic suggested had shrunk from 450,000 in November to 290,000 in February 1793.

While the French were fighting on every border, the Army of the North, under General Dumouriez was around 23,000 with the Army of the Ardennes also nominally under his control. Fortescue paints Dumouriez as the supreme chancer, his aims with the Army of the North uncertain. It seems more likely that Dumouriez had designs on capturing Amsterdam and its gold rather than The Hague and the seat of the Dutch Stadtholder.

The war for Corporal Brown is one that any soldier across the ages could identify with. Marching, waiting, marching again. In fact, there was to be no major engagement in Holland. The French had begun a siege of Willemstadt, a fortress on the south bank of Hollands Diep, but the arrival of a strong Austrian army under Prince Josias, drew Dumouriez and the bulk of his men in the direction of Brussels and a fateful battle.

As the moment of high drama approached, the tempo of the ever present politicking increased. The Duke of York was given license to move further inland but strict instructions from Dundas that the ‘British army’ was not to become just another corps in Josias’ ranks. Two thousand men would barely constitute an Austrian corps but that was being rectified. Hanover was to supply 15,000 infantry and around 5,000 cavalry. More Germans, Hessian troops, would follow as well as several squadrons of British cavalry. All this due by May, but by then the emergency and the chance to secure the peace dividend and political prize could well be lost.

The Duke of York. The King's choice as the commander
of the British army on the continent in 1793.

Dunkirk might seem a strange choice as compensation for Great Britain’s efforts but, along with other French colonies in the West Indies, Fortescue suggests that such a deal had been brokered by Austria. The Imperials from Vienna were playing a much greater endgame, to ensure both its close ties with the restored House of Bourbon but also to expand north into Saxony. By greasing the palms and soothing the consciences of other nations, Prussia was also to receive French territory in the Austrian plan, who could deny Austria a rightful prize when she alone asked nothing of France. Pitt’s embattled administration thought that possessing a little part of France would play well at home with the mob.

Such manoeuvring was scarce confined to the allies. Dumouriez, the master strategist, had a foot firmly planted in both worlds and a step light enough to stay one move ahead of the guillotine. He was perhaps the last man to hold a private counsel with Louis XVI before the King’s execution. A courtier of some thirty years but also the Revolutionary Minister for War and now Commander of the Army of the North. Dumouriez believed that his men were more loyal to him than to France, much as Lafayette had done, the year before. A miscalculation that had nearly cost his predecessor his life.

When the negotiations between Dumouriez and Prince Josias first occurred, I cannot be certain. On the 18th March 1793, the two armies fought at Neerwinden. The Austrian victory sent the French reeling back towards their northern border. Somewhere in that time frame, the Convention in Paris heard that Dumouriez planned to defect. By the 1st of April, a delegation had arrived from Paris to arrest the traitorous general, only for Dumouriez to have them arrested and sent to the Austrian camp.

The timeframe is too tight for these events to play out consecutively. Eleven days for secret negotiations to be discovered, reported to Paris, a decision made and a delegation dispatched to the frontier? Which draws the obvious conclusion of collusion between Dumouriez and the Austrian Prince Josias before Neerwinden, making the battle a bargaining chip and the treachery to have been relayed to Paris from within the General’s close circle. If Dumouriez won, he had more choice. Amsterdam could still be taken. And with money, why restore an unpopular monarchy when a new-style of revolutionary leader might be more acceptable to the masses? The defeat weakened his hand but would the ultimate gambit of changing sides bear fruit?

So he sent the commissioners, under arrest,
To the Austrian encampment, and stood forth confess’d,
A friend to their cause, undertaking to bring
His army to publish young Louis their King.
And instantly mounting the modest cockade,
The power of his rhet’rick the Champion essay’d.
To his florid narration the answer reciev’d
Was, “Vive Dumouriez” Sounds he fondly believed. 

Five thousand Frenchmen followed Dumouriez into exile, less than one in eight that had taken the field at Neerwinden. The rest of the Army of the North could return to France on the swearing of oaths by officers that its men would not bear arms again. Prince Josias was roundly condemned by his allies, even publicly by his own Emperor for the attempts to woo Dumouriez. For the rest of April, the Allies bickered about how best to impose peace, without it seems, the smallest concern that they still had to beat the French to accomplish such lofty goals. At the end of April, Prussia proposed its own negotiations with the Army of the North, to affect a mass defection, and found itself on the end of various verbal attacks from rest of the coalition.

Dumouriez, a man for all seasons? 

A plan was eventually agreed, the capture of the fortress at Valenciennes, which opened a route to Paris. The battle itself, called the battle of Camp Famars, foreshadowed the events of 1794. There were no maps of the terrain. If any reconnaissance had been undertaken, that information failed to reach the frontline. What it did expose was the propensity of the troops to plunder, a scene that appalled Corporal Brown “Every house was plundered in a most unseemly manner, by the Austrians and others of the foreign troops; whose hardened hearts, neither the entreaties of old age, the tears of beauty, the cries of children, nor the moving scenes of the most accumulated distress can touch with pity.” 

Valenciennes fell in a protracted siege at the end of July. The Army of the North, whose leaders had either defected, died at its helm or faced the guillotine for their ‘failures’, retreated. The allies pursued and Paris was just eleven days march away. But the coalition faltered again. The fortress of Lille would be at the backs of the allied forces and the Austrians feared having their supply lines severed. The Duke of York, with two brigades of British infantry and his Hanoverian and Hessian contingent was under pressure to secure Dunkirk before it was too late. After all, grabbing the city once the revolution had been beaten might look a little disingenuous. There was a last meeting between Prince Josias and the Duke of York before the British, with a corps of 10,000 Austrians acting as corps of communications, moved north.

With this moment of separation, the coalition lost the momentum and tempo of the war and would never regain it.

If ever you do attempt to follow the machinations of this campaign, do invest in a map of northern France. How the Austrian corps that accompanied the Duke was meant to protect communications between Josias and York has baffled my understanding. Lille and Dunkirk are around 50 miles apart. That is just one of the many farces that this rich campaign has still to reveal.

The story of Dunkirk and the fateful days of September 1793 are for another post.

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The King’s Germans is a project that has been many years in the making. Currently Dominic Fielder manages to juggle writing and research around a crowded work and family life. The Black Lions of Flanders (set in 1793) is the first in the King’s Germans’ series, which will follow an array of characters through to the final book in Waterloo. The King of Dunkirk will soon be released and Dominic hopes that the response to that is as encouraging as the reviews of Black Lions have been.
Dominc lives just outside of Tavistock, in Devon where he enjoys walking on the moors and the occasional horse-riding excursion as both inspiration and relaxation.

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Hero's Journey: Royal Brothers and the Great Fire of London

by Sally A. Moore

351 years ago on September 2, 1666, the Great Fire changed the face of London forever. Its advance ignited the spirits of its people for good and bad, and tested the mettle of the two brothers who governed England: Charles II and his brother, James, Duke of York.

By Anonymous [Public domain],
via Wikimedia Commons

Sometime between the hours of midnight and 2 a.m, a flame sprung up in the baker’s oven of Thomas Farriner. 

By daylight, most of Pudding Lane and Fish Street Hill were destroyed and the fire showed no signs of stopping. Samuel Pepys, an administrator for the Royal Navy, arrived at Whitehall to report to the King. 

“So I was called for, and did tell the King and Duke of Yorke what I saw, and that unless his Majesty did command houses to be pulled down nothing could stop the fire. They seemed much troubled, and the King commanded me to go to my Lord Mayor [Sir Thomas Bludworth] and command him to spare no houses, but to pull down before the fire every way.” (1)

Charles II and his brother James had returned to London in 1660 on the invitation of Parliament to end the Commonwealth and restore the throne of England. In those first six years of Charles’ reign, the Stuart brothers had garnered a reputation for a dissolute lifestyle with a people still in the throes of a Puritan hangover.

“The loose morals of Charles’s court were an unfailing source of public scandal, and as early as August 1661 Pepys was commenting on ‘the lewdness and beggary of the court, which I am feared will bring all to ruin again’.” (5)

King Charles II, by Unknown artist
National Portrait Gallery (NPG 1313)

Charles and James kept many mistresses and their profligate spending drew the criticism of his people. Contrary to Puritan doctrine, the Merry Monarch and his band of favourites spent long hours gambling and drinking, and the King’s courtiers publicly engaged in duels and verbal attacks one another. 

“These high-spirited gentlemen… diverted themselves at times with poetry, plays and literature in general, at times with sardonic comment on everything about them, couched, very often, in scabrous language.” (4)

Who was this self-indulgent Stuart king with a brother to mirror him, and why should the English people tolerate such pleasure-seekers as the governors of their nation? Wasn’t the plague two years before and the recent severe drought evidence enough of God’s displeasure?

The fire was to challenge the worth of these men at home and earn them notoriety abroad. Pepys, despite noting; the indulgence of Charles’ court; the mistresses of both men at hand; the King in his bed with dogs everywhere; and his nobles in the outer chamber at cards on a Sunday, also recorded the King’s immediate action upon hearing news of the fire.

“A clerk was summoned and the King dictated and signed a parchment. He handed it to Pepys, instructing him to find Sir Thomas Bludworth and give him the royal orders.” (3)

In addition to the instructions for the Mayor, the King promised the assistance of the King’s Royal Guard. The Duke of York informed Pepys that if soldiers were needed by the mayor, he would have them.

Duke of York, by Peter Lely
[Public domain], Wikimedia Commons

Pepys hastened to find Bludworth, but upon handing him the royal orders, the poor man, more suited to enjoying the royal favour of his appointment than in carrying out its duties, expressed himself overwhelmed.

“To the King’s message he cried, like a fainting woman, ‘Lord! what can I do? I am spent: people will not obey me. I have been pulling down houses; but the fire overtakes us faster than we can do it.’ That he needed no more soldiers; and that, for himself, he must go and refresh himself, having been up all night.” (1)

Bludworth retired without carrying out the King’s orders to continue the effort of pulling down houses. The King and the Duke of York took a barge on the Thames to see the extent of the damage. What they found was a city in dire threat of destruction.

“In the eighteen hours or so since the fire had broken out at the Farriner’s, it had destroyed twenty-two alleys and wharves, nearly a thousand homes and ships, and six Livery Company Halls, including those of the Vintners, the Watermen and the powerful Fishmongers... Nine churches were in ruins along with the parishes they served.” (2)

It was evident to the royal brothers that the fire would not be contained without immediate and sustained effort. Watching the flames devour the city, street by street, Charles and James became convinced that their intervention was crucial to saving the city.

“In a risky move which showed how seriously he viewed the situation, Charles overrode the Lord Mayor’s authority as chief magistrate and told Browne [London Alderman, Sir Richard Browne] to [continue the effort to] pull down buildings, concentrating on the area below London Bridge towards the Tower, where the presence of large quantities of gunpowder was making everyone nervous. He also ignored Bludworth’s refusal to ask for troops.” (2)

In spite of these actions, the fire took on a demonic momentum, devouring homes, shops, warehouses, and even spilling onto the Thames on slicks of oil and tar. The people fled in panic, unable to comprehend the destruction that seemed without end. Black smoke hung over the city and the sky turned blood red in reflection of the flames.

“Beside the dreadful scenes of flames, ruins and desolation, there appeared the most killing sight under the sun, the distracted looks of so many citizens, the wailings of miserable women and the cries of poor children and decrepit old people with all the marks of confusion and despair.” (3)

Faced with the loss of life and every material thing they had, the people gathered in the street and made a pitiful appeal to their king.

“The glow of the fires and the spurts of flame soaring into the heavens had lit up the windows of the Palace of Whitehall during the night. Citizens gathering outside the walls of his palace, held back by the company of Guards stationed before the gates, had woken Charles with their pleas of ‘God and the King save us.’ ” (3)

The hapless Bludworth was nowhere to be found, and Pepys noted that he was not seen for three days. While the mayor fled, the “dissolute” Charles and his brother sprang into action, declaring themselves stewards of the city. Recognizing the dire nature of this threat, they left the comforts of Whitehall on Monday morning, September 3, and spent most of the day and night fighting the fire.

“The streets were a bedlam of noise: the rumble of iron wheels, the cracking of whips, the rattle of carts jolting over the cobbles, the stamp of hooves, the sound of running feet and a cacophony of shouts and yells, voices raised in curses or prayers, and ‘the fearful cries and howlings of undone people’.” (3)

By Unknown- Display in Museum of London,
copy from Pepys Library in Magdalene College,
Cambridge [Public domain]

Wading into the fray without regard for personal safety, the brothers toiled alongside the citizens, alternately encouraging the people and the troops and passing off buckets of water or pulling down houses and calming the residents, acting with the determination of men of who would not shrink from the responsibility of saving the city that had welcomed them home six years before.

“By the end of the day the King’s clothes were soaking, his face black, his whole person muddy and dirty. But there were many testimonials to his bravery and resolution as he stood up to his ankles in the water, joining in the work with a will, wielding a bucket and spade with the rest, and encouraging the courtiers to do likewise.” (4) 

Their efforts were frustrated by changing winds and empty water reservoirs as a result of a drought, as well as the panicked flight of people. Charles carried a bag of coins to entice men into joining the effort, adding his personal royal plea to stand and fight. There were few takers, and even the royal guards were balking at their duty in the face of the growing wall of fire.

“By mid-morning on Tuesday the pall of smoke hanging over the city had grown to biblical proportions. It was so great, claimed Thomas Vincent, ‘that travellers did ride at noon-day some miles together in the shadow thereof, though there were no other cloud beside to be seen in the sky’. On the rare occasion when the sun did manage to break through the gloom, it was as red as blood.” (2)

Pepys described the fire from his garden as “…extremely dreadful, for it looks just as if it was at us; and the whole heaven on fire.” (1)

By Wednesday night, September 5, the fire was quelled, leaving a smouldering heap of destruction that covered up to 80 percent of the city and an estimated 100,000 homeless. In all, 13,000 homes, 89 churches including St. Paul’s Cathedral and 52 Guild Halls were destroyed.

The fact that anything was still standing and the loss of life estimated to be low was a miracle of heroic proportion. Without the courage of the royals it is likely that the fire would have consumed the rest of the city. The veneer of Charles’ court had burned away and exposed the men beneath who claimed the ruling class. While so many minor officials ran away, the royal brothers led their courtiers and people to triumph over the engulfing flames.

The Paris Gazette, in spite of relief on the part of the French that the fire would prevent an impending attack by the English, published a glowing story about the role of the Stuart brothers.

“[The Gazette] had nothing but praise for Charles II, crediting him with personally organising the firefighting and, through his kindness and courage, earning the lasting tenderness and veneration of his people.” (2)

James, too, was cited for his bravery and his ability to stay calm in the crisis, organizing the destruction of buildings to create a break for the fire.

“ ‘Next, Princely York, with sweat and dirt besmear’d/ (More glorious thus than in his Robes appear’d. James was seen ‘handling Bucketts of water with as much diligence as the poorest man did assist’. John Rushworth, a witness who wrote these words, went on to point out that ‘if the Lord Maior had donn as much, his example might have gone far to saveing the Citty’.”

In London, superstitions, despair and anger caused riots, the people blaming alternately the Dutch, the French or the wrath of God toward the ways of the King and his court for the catastrophe.

“Charles was anxious to reassure his subjects. So he addressed the crowd, telling them that the Fire had been an accident, and not a plot. It had come from the Hand of God. Just why God should have chosen to punish London in such a dramatic fashion he declined to say, although in the coming weeks and months there would be plenty who thought it an obvious and well-deserved judgement on Charles’s dissolute ways.” (2)

The aftermath of the fire was a period of hard-earned growth for England, with the new building slowly revitalizing London and a renewed respect between king and his people that lasted, with a few notable bumps, throughout his reign.

“…pleasure-loving, easy-going as the Court of Charles II was, it was not a bad and certainly not an evil place.” (4)

Charles never lost his taste for the pleasure-loving life that his people both loved and criticized him for. He continued to collect mistresses as some collect coins. But he and his brother had proven what Charles had professed to the people during the Great Fire: that they had the will and the means to protect their kingdom, a promise that was to test Charles’ resolve again in the years to come.

References:
1. The Diary of Samuel Pepys, 1660 – 1669

2. Permission of Heaven, the Story of the Great Fire of London, by Adrian Tinniswood, Pimlico, Random House UK, 2004 

3. The Dreadful Judgement, the True Story of the Great Fire of London, by Neil Hanson, Doubleday, 2001

4. Charles II, His Life and Times, by Antonia Fraser, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1993

5. The Life and Times of Charles II, by Christopher Falkus; Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1992

This Editor's Choice was originally posted September 2, 2016

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Sally A. Moore is an award-winning writer from Kingston, Ontario in Canada. Represented by The Rights Factory Literary Agency in Toronto, she is currently writing a historical fiction/fantasy trilogy. Her writing credits include fiction and creative nonfiction, as well as poetry prizes from the Ontario Poetry Society and the Montreal International Poetry Prize. Sally is Past President of the Writers’ Community of Durham Region (WCDR), a member of the Historical Novel Society, and the recipient of the Len Cullen Writing Scholarship. Sally holds certificates of achievement from Humber School for Writers and a diploma with Distinction in Commercial Communications. 

Connect with her through Twitter (@SallyMoore11), LinkedIn, and her Website. For more information about her work, check out her portal, Legend of Three Crowns.

Henry VI: Part Two

by Derek Birks

Henry VI

At the end of my first post about Henry VI (click here for Part One), I posed the question: would Henry VI learn from his mistakes? 

I think you might already suspect the answer but let’s give him the benefit of the doubt and see what he does after 1450.

King's College, Cambridge: Endowed by Henry VI

After the failure of Cade’s rebellion in 1450, Henry was given another chance to get it right. Up to 1450 his rule was characterised by the three Ps: prayer, piety and peace which underpinned not only his spiritual life but also his kingship. There is nothing wrong with the three Ps at all, except that a successful king had to consider other aspects of life too. Most medieval kings thought prayer and piety very important, but they also knew they must understand what their subjects – especially their leading subjects – wanted from them.

I don’t believe Henry was a fool but I do think he was an idealist. In fact, the influence of his ideals on his policies meant that at times of crisis he sometimes made the wrong call. I see this as perhaps the most important failure of his disastrous reign.

What factors dominated politics after 1450?

By 1450 Henry had been married to Margaret of Anjou for five years without producing an heir to the throne. A male heir is what every king needed. Though it has been suggested that Henry’s apparent awkwardness with the naked body made his marital relations difficult, it seems to me that Henry took his royal duties seriously enough.

Of course, if Henry did not have a child then the crown would most likely pass to Richard, Duke of York. When, in the troubled summer of 1450, most of Henry’s inner circle of advisers were killed, rebel manifestos already argued that the Duke of York should play a greater role in advising the king. Yet York had been recalled from France in 1447 and sent to Ireland where he was very far indeed from the political epicentre.

Clearly Henry mistrusted or feared the Duke of York but, up to 1447, York appears to have been a loyal crown servant. Supplanting York as a commander in France was Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset – a man with modest qualifications as a military leader. After the rebellion in 1450, Somerset was brought home and became a close royal confidant.

Beaufort was not just any old peer. His family, like those of the king and York, was descended from Edward III. He was closer in blood to Henry than York was, though barred from the succession by letters patent of Henry IV. We do not know whether Henry wanted to restore the Beaufort line to the succession, but he must have considered the possibility and York saw Somerset as a clear rival. No, not just a rival; he was the enemy, for he was receiving the very rewards that York believed his status warranted, whilst York had acquired only debts from his government service.

How did the Rivalry between York and Somerset cause Henry problems?

Henry probably thought it best to leave York in Ireland – out of sight, if not entirely out of mind – but I fear he should have paid attention to the maxim: ‘Keep your friends close but your enemies closer.’

As I’ve pointed out in a previous post, Richard, Duke of York, took his position in the state very seriously indeed and whilst he remained loyal to the king, he did not wish to see his status eroded by the presence of Edmund Beaufort at court. He must have been spitting blood in Ireland, looking on during Cade’s rebellion as Henry’s government floundered.

So, in September 1450 York returned to England without Henry’s permission and arrived at Westminster with a large retinue. He had come, he said, to proclaim his loyalty and offer himself publicly as the man to lead the king’s government and remove corruption. This was a popular, if rather elusive - and illusory - aim. York waged a propaganda war against Somerset, posing as the champion of justice. He called in favours from his many clients, raising their hopes of gaining advancement in a ‘new order’ with York at the helm. His influence in parliament was especially strong but sadly parliaments were called only at the bidding of the king.

How did Henry respond to York’s Challenge?

Henry, not unreasonably I would suggest, issued a response which declined York’s kind offer and emphasised that he preferred the collective advice of a council to that of one man.

Whilst this sounds laudable enough, it did not stop Somerset’s rise and his appointment in 1451 as Captain of Calais gave him access to a powerful military garrison. Yet, at the same time, the war with France went from bad to worse and soon Gascony was lost.

By February 1452, York had had enough. Action was required and he launched another propaganda campaign to muster support. A surviving letter from the Duke of York to the folk of Shrewsbury shows us clearly his attitude to both the king and Somerset. He cited the: “envy, malice and untruth of the Duke of Somerset” and stressed: “it not being my intent to displease my sovereign lord, but seeing that the said duke ever prevaileth and ruleth about the king’s person and that by this means the land is likely to be destroyed, I am fully determined to proceed in all haste against him with the help of my kinsmen and friends.”

However you dress it up, York was talking rebellion. He raised an army and camped at Dartford. The king also raised an army and camped at Blackheath. This is 1452 remember – before the first battle at St Albans in 1455 which is often regarded as the start of the Wars of the Roses. Two armed camps then, with cannons and so on, but no battle. Why not? Well mainly because York’s support amongst those who mattered – i.e. lords – was minimal. Those we know as the great Yorkist supporters of a few years later, the earls of Salisbury and Warwick, were firmly in the king’s camp. Besides, no-one really had the stomach for a fight. The councillors talked York out of it in the end and, on a promise that Somerset would be arrested and put on trial, York capitulated. However, having disbanded his army, he found that Somerset was neither arrested nor tried.

Whether by luck, good judgement or the diplomacy of the Neville lords, Henry had averted rebellion. Yet, had the Duke of York not committed open treason and escaped unpunished?

Herein lay a critical failure of Henry VI: he did not have a ruthless bone in his body. York walked free having brought the kingdom to the brink of chaos. Was this because Henry was a simpleton? No. Was it because he was in the thrall of Somerset? Hardly! It was the three Ps again. Henry wanted peace between his warring factions. A more ruthless man, a more pragmatic king, would have realised that York had overstepped too far and had to go. One could say it was admirable on Henry’s part, but it was a genuine political risk to leave such a powerful man at large. For the time being York went away to lick his wounds, whilst Somerset found ways of punishing his followers if not the man himself.

If York was humiliated and rebellion averted, what went wrong?

Margaret of Anjou from the Talbot Shrewsbury Book

In the latter part of 1452, things were actually looking up for Henry with victories in France and then in the spring of 1453 came the news that Queen Margaret was finally pregnant. It seemed Henry’s fortunes had turned, but it was not to be. In July the English army in France was annihilated at Castillon and its heroic general, the Earl of Shrewsbury, killed.

Shortly after this catastrophe, the king himself suffered a breakdown. Perhaps it was prompted by news of the defeat, or perhaps by the reality of his wife’s pregnancy, but in truth we’ll never know. It may just have been lying in wait in his genes ready to pop out and cause maximum disaster – well it certainly did that!

Henry was incapable of movement, let alone thought. In a personal monarchy this meant there was a vacuum at the centre of power. Nothing important could be done without the king’s approval, so effectively nothing important could be done… For two months the king’s condition was kept secret but that could not go on forever. It’s ironic in a way that despite all the frequent criticisms of Henry’s weakness or folly, it is his absence that propels the government of England into the abyss.

In mid-October 1453 the queen gave birth to a son, the heir Henry so desperately needed. But later in October the King’s Council met to discuss what to do about Henry’s condition. Somerset clearly intended to rule as some sort of regent, hoping that the council would be swayed in his favour by York’s previous misdemeanours. If York was allowed to return to the council, there would not be room for both of them.

In 1452 York was isolated but in the year since then, far away from the royal court, something very important had happened: York had found some powerful friends.

This new development will be the focus of my next post in this series, which will focus on Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick.

Previous posts in the series, see The Magnificent Seven...in the War of the Roses, and Henry VI: Part One.

Media:
Henry VI: By Unknown - National Portrait Gallery: NPG 2457 [Public Domain]
King's College Chapel, Cambridge: By Dmitry Tonkonog (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0], via Wikimedia Commons
Margaret of Anjou: By Talbot Master (fl. in Rouen, c. 1430–60) - Cropped image of File:Presentation of the Book of Romances.jpg, a scan of the manuscript illuminated by the Talbot Master (British Library, Royal 15 E VI, f. 2v), Public Domain

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Derek Birks was born in Hampshire in England but spent his teenage years in Auckland, New Zealand, where he still has strong family ties. For many years he taught history in a secondary school but took early retirement to concentrate on writing. Apart from his writing, he spends his time gardening, travelling, walking and taking part in archaeological digs at a Roman villa.

Derek is interested in a wide range of historical themes but his particular favourite is the late medieval period. He writes action-packed fiction which is rooted in accurate history. His debut historical novel, Feud, is set in the period of the Wars of the Roses and is the first of a series entitled Rebels & Brothers which follows the fortunes of the fictional Elder family. The fourth and final book of the series, The Last Shroud, was published in the summer of 2015.

The Elders will return in Scars from the Past, the first of a new series, in November 2016.

Connect with Derek through his Website, Blog, and Twitter (@Feud_writer). The Rebels & Brothers series is available on Amazon UK and Amazon.com. 

Edmund Beaufort, a mover and shaker in the Wars of the Roses

by Derek Birks

First of all, it is important to remember that there were at least four Beaufort Dukes of Somerset populating the period and two of them were called Edmund. Get over it. This is the Wars of the Roses and it was never simple.

The Edmund Beaufort I’m writing about here was the grandson of John of Gaunt, one of the many sons of Edward III.  Both Edmund and his king, Henry VI, therefore had Lancastrian royal blood in their veins, but the Beauforts by law could not inherit the throne. Their line of descent came from an illegitimate liaison between John and Katherine Swynford. Though they were later legitimised, Henry IV barred them from the succession by letters patent.

Edmund was the younger brother of John Beaufort and became Duke of Somerset after his brother’s death.

Alright, so why do we care? What part does he play in all the carnage?

Well, if you were to regard the Wars of the Roses as a barrel of gunpowder, Edmund Beaufort was the fuse – completely harmless of course, until…

Why Did Somerset Become a Problem?

King Henry VI was well-disposed towards the Beauforts in the 1440s at a time when Henry’s government was dominated by William de la Pole, Duke of Suffolk.

Edmund was appointed to a command in France where he replaced Richard, Duke of York. York did not take it well, resenting Somerset’s rise. His annoyance was compounded by the fact that Somerset was not a very competent commander. His resentment was further fuelled by the fact that Somerset was promised £25,000 to fund his campaign whereas York had received nothing and was owed many thousands. York was then sent to rule Ireland – far from the centre of power.

Why Was the Rivalry Between York and Somerset a Problem?

Richard, Duke of York

In 1450 a wave of popular unrest caused several attacks against Suffolk’s corrupt government, culminating in the murder of several members of the king’s inner circle, including Suffolk. This left a void at the heart of the government. Whatever happened next there would be a new regime.

York was an obvious candidate for advancement since he was the most prominent nobleman and, if King Henry were to die childless, then York was the heir presumptive. York, keen to take what he saw as his rightful place, returned from Ireland unbidden and began a propaganda campaign against the king’s corrupt councillors, especially Somerset.

Undoubtedly Henry preferred Somerset and recalled him from France, where the war was going badly, to bring him back to the centre of his government. He could of course, if he wished, remove the legal impediment to Somerset inheriting the throne. If he did so then Somerset, not York, could be seen as the heir presumptive.

York feared exactly that. He posed as a seeker after justice and had notable support in the House of Commons. Henry’s response in May 1451 was to dissolve parliament. In the end, the only opinion that mattered was Henry VI’s.

Meanwhile Somerset was appointed Captain of Calais, a prestigious post reserved for trusted men. So Henry trusted Somerset where he did not seem to trust York, possibly because he feared that York wanted the throne.

Somerset’s new appointment and dominance incensed York. Once more he embarked on an extensive campaign against government corruption, hoping to rise on a tide of popular support. He raised troops and marched to London intending to remove Somerset by force if necessary.

Henry VI

The king and Somerset rallied some support too and their small army also camped outside the city.
Few nobles supported York. Most had no stomach for taking up arms, even against Somerset. So negotiations followed and the councillors agreed that if York dissolved his army, then Somerset would be imprisoned and tried for his poor conduct of the French war. It seemed that the king agreed to this but after York sent his men away, he found that Somerset was still there by the king’s side. Instead York was treated like a prisoner – after all, what he had done certainly amounted to treason.

In the end though, Henry VI let him go and York retired from London to lick his wounds for royal service had beggared him. Later in the year Somerset could not resist rubbing York’s nose in his failure when he presided over the trial of some of York’s followers at Ludlow in the very heart of York’s powerbase. Somerset now had the king in the palm of his hand.

What went wrong then for Somerset?

It started in June 1453 when the king gave Somerset some estates in south Wales. Somerset was desperate for landed income since the Beaufort family did not have much. His income came otherwise from the various royal pensions and grants he received from the king and the profits from any offices he held.

Unfortunately, the lands Henry gave him belonged to Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick. When it came to land grabbing, Warwick was up there with the best and he strongly resented losing estates in an area where he was keen to build up influence. From then on, Somerset was a legitimate target as far as Warwick was concerned, but poor Somerset carried on oblivious to his peril.

Edmund in France (Rouen)

The really bad news though was to come in July 1453 when the French war – always the elephant in Henry VI’s chamber – took a turn for the worse. A military catastrophe occurred when the heroic John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, was defeated and killed at Castillon. England’s last significant army in France, apart from the Calais garrison, was destroyed.

Even worse was to follow. The king suffered a debilitating breakdown which left him immobile. Whether it was brought on by the news from France is not clear, but England now lacked a king at the helm. For the queen, soon to give birth to a male heir, and Somerset, it made government almost impossible. For a few months Somerset muddled through by putting off matters upon which only the king could decide. But by October the king’s council agreed that someone must be appointed with authority to rule for the king.

They recalled York from the political wasteland to re-join the council. There, for various reasons, not least the little matter of estates in south Wales, York found support from the powerful Neville family. Somerset suddenly found himself confined to the Tower whilst the council argued over who should rule. The queen, worried for her new son if York should take charge, tried to have herself declared regent, but the council refused and in 1454 chose York as Protector of the Realm.

How then did Somerset extricate himself from the Tower?

The start of the Wars of the Roses. York picks white
flowers, Somerset red (Henry Arthur Payne)

It was quite simple really: the king recovered – at least enough to tell the difference between York and Somerset. By February 1455, York had to step down. Somerset was released from the Tower and at once contrived to forge an alliance with all those who were rivals of the Nevilles and York. The rivalry between York and Somerset, if left to continue, would destroy the kingdom; something had to give. York and his allies left London in haste to prepare for war.

Somerset and the queen were of one mind: York had to go. A Great Council was summoned to meet at Leicester on 21st May, 1455. It was hand-picked and the hand didn’t pick York or any of his allies because, of course, the purpose of this Council was to condemn them. The Council, however, never met.

Somerset was a poor strategist – as his French exploits had proven. Thus, he was slow to react when York left London and only began to muster troops when York was already on his way south with an army.

On 21st May, Somerset and the king set off for St Albans to await the arrival of the retinues they had summoned. They spent the night of 21st at Watford. Overnight there was an exchange of messages with York. The latter stressed his loyalty and desire for a council without Somerset in it. Early on the morning of 22nd May a final message came from York. It said little new but the king summoned his council to discuss what to do.

Somerset, surprised by the speed of York’s advance, advised waiting at Watford until they had gathered more strength. A more moderate councillor, the Duke of Buckingham, proposed continuing to St Albans, arguing that York was merely exerting pressure and would not push for a fight. Henry took Buckingham’s advice not Somerset’s and continued to St Albans, arriving about 9am. York and the Neville lords were already camped in the fields on the outskirts of the town but King Henry continued into the town centre.

What happened at St Albans?

Many of those with Henry assumed that, after all the posturing, there would be negotiations and the matter would be settled peacefully. Heralds were sent to and fro to see if such a process could be started. This was normal procedure – a sort of last ditch effort to avoid actual fighting. But even whilst the heralds were still working, the skirmishing began and by 10am York was on the attack. He did not find it easy though to break through the town’s defences. His men toiled for an hour or so to no avail.

York had got nowhere but Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, was a little more creative in his tactics. Driven on by his desire to resolve his differences with Somerset by force, he broke through some gardens and houses of the town, taking the King’s household by surprise. Many were not even wearing armour and they scattered across the town seeking refuge wherever they could. The Duke of Buckingham fled to the abbey and Somerset dived into the Castle Inn. York’s men now broke into the town and, once victory was achieved, he ensured the safety of the wounded king who was hiding in a tanner’s cottage.

The Duke of Somerset, trapped in the inn, knew very well that York and Warwick would not let him live. So, with his loyal retinue, he tried to fight his way out. It is said that Somerset killed four men before he himself was hacked to death.

The events of 22nd May 1455 are sometimes referred to as the First Battle of St. Albans. Some have argued over the term “battle” suggesting it was only a skirmish. Casualties probably amounted to less than a hundred, but York’s objective was achieved: Somerset and the northern rivals of the Neville lords, Northumberland and Clifford, were not just removed but killed.

This was a coup d’etat more than a battle and soon after a bill passed through parliament blaming Somerset for causing the affray.

What then was Somerset’s contribution to the Wars of the Roses?

Few nobles were especially enamoured with either Somerset or York as individuals. Most accepted that factions in a king’s council were inevitable. A strong king might have dealt more even-handedly with York and not showered so many honours upon Somerset. Was that Somerset’s fault? Not really for he, like York, was playing his hand in the game as all nobles did.

Somerset’s government was corrupt and he was a poor war leader but, by killing him, York changed the rules of the game. It appeared that on Henry VI’s watch, it was alright to use force of arms to gain political advantage – NB. Political advantage, not the throne, because in 1455 it was not yet a “Game of Thrones.” Not yet.

All images in the Public Domain via Wikipedia

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Derek Birks was born in Hampshire in England but spent his teenage years in Auckland, New Zealand, where he still has strong family ties. For many years he taught history in a secondary school but took early retirement to concentrate on writing. Apart from his writing, he spends his time gardening, travelling, walking and taking part in archaeological digs at a Roman villa.

Derek is interested in a wide range of historical themes but his particular favourite is the late medieval period. He writes action-packed fiction which is rooted in accurate history.

His debut historical novel, Feud, is set in the period of the Wars of the Roses and is the first of a series entitled Rebels & Brothers which follows the fortunes of the fictional Elder family.
The fourth and final book of the series, The Last Shroud, was published in the summer of 2015.

Find out more about Derek on his website, on his blog, or on his Amazon page.

A Most Successful Bigot - of Politics & Religion in 17th Century England

by Anna Belfrage

It is easy to sit on the lofty pinnacle of hindsight and condemn people who have lived long since for being bigoted. I guess there will come a time when the people of the future will sit on their equally lofty pinnacles and laugh softly at us and our stupid mistakes – assuming of course, that there will be a future world with people to build hindsight pinnacles.

This does not mean that our ancestors weren’t bigoted. Of course, they were. But their beliefs and prejudices were the consequences of the world they lived in, which is why it makes little sense to accuse a 16th century man of being a misogynist, or bemoan the lack of strong independent female role models in the 17th century. (Although, in actual fact, there were plenty of strong women in the 17th century – as in all preceding centuries. If not, the human race would have died out long ago…)

Today’s post is about a man I don’t like. And yet, I find him fascinating – plus I can’t help but admire just how adroitly the man shifts his allegiances, managing always to stay ahead in times as tumultuous as those of the 17th century. So, with no more ado, I give you Anthony Ashley Cooper – not always likeable, but always a man true to his own interests, which, of course, is a doubtful quality at best.

Anthony Ashley Cooper

Our hero entered the world in the summer of 1621, into a comfortable life of well-to-do gentry. His father was a Sir John Cooper, but before the age of nine, our Tony was an orphan, left in the tender care of guardians. These guardians would ensure Anthony got a good, Christian education, mostly at the hands of Puritan tutors – something which would affect Anthony’s outlook on life significantly in the future.

A bright and ambitious boy, Tony matriculated at Exeter College in Oxford at the tender age of 15, but was kicked out within the year due to having “fomented a riot”. Tony was destined to go through life fomenting riots of one type or the other, so this early start should not come as a surprise – the fledgling man was merely flexing his wings.

So, no degree at Oxford, and instead Anthony was admitted to Lincoln’s Inn, there to study – unsurprisingly – the law. He was probably happy to be able to combine his studies of the temporal with further advancement of the spiritual, and was yet again exposed to Puritan beliefs, this time at the hand of two zealous chaplains.

One could see where this was leading: an intelligent, independently wealthy young man, influenced by the beliefs of the Puritans – wow, we had a Commonwealth man in the making! Except that we didn’t. At 19, young Tony married Margaret Coventry, who came with the obvious advantage of being the daughter of Thomas Coventry, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal. No matter his religious preferences, young Tony had thereby entered the royal circle – a good place to be, for a man who had every intention of leaving his mark on the world.

While still a minor, Anthony was elected an MP for Tewkesbury in the Short Parliament. As the name indicates, this was a short parliament – very short, even – and when elections were called for the Long Parliament, Tony was asked not to stand. He did anyway, won the seat, but was blocked from taking it because it was suspected Antony would prove too sympathetic to the king.

Charles I - by divine right

By now, England was already sliding down that very muddy slope leading to Civil War. Charles I had his own ideas as to how to rule, most of them based on the fact that he was king by divine right and therefore had little reason to listen to Parliament. This was not an opinion appreciated by the MPs – or a majority of the landed gentry. But from a genuine desire to rein in the king to actually challenging him on the battlefield, the step was huge. And yet, in 1642, England exploded into war, with our Tony firmly in the royalist camp – despite a strong belief in Parliament as an institution. I guess at the time he believed the king would prevail…

Handsome Maurice

In 1643 he raised his own troop, fought bravely at various battles – and ended up in a major quarrel with Prince Maurice, yet another of the king’s Palatinate nephews, but (deservedly) of much less fame than handsome dashing Prince Rupert. Anthony was miffed, to say the least, and maybe this was why he defected to the Parliamentarian side in 1644. Or maybe Anthony, ever the opportunist, realised how things would end. Whatever the case, our Tony shifted allegiances for the first – but not the last – time in his life.

The Parliamentarians viewed their new recruit with some suspicion – until Anthony explained he just couldn’t stand it, how the Catholics were influencing the king. Well, every good Puritan knew just how evil the papists were, and for a man to attempt to flee their control was totally understandable. This is a first instance of what would become a tiresome chorus in Anthony’s future political life – a deep-seated fear of all those who clung to the Catholic faith.

The war ended. Anthony was probably among those who opposed the regicide of Charles I, but was savvy enough to keep his head down, which resulted in him working closely with the interregnum government. He also found time to replace his dead first wife with a new, nubile little thing named Frances Cecil, with whom he was to experience three years or so of contentment before she died in 1652, leaving him a widower with two toddlers of which only one would survive into adulthood.

Our Anthony had other matters with which to concern himself than the raising of his children. He was an up-and-coming man, forgiven the sin of once having been a royalist, and a member of the Council of State. He had the ear of Oliver Cromwell – even voted for having Cromwell acclaimed as king in 1654 – but remained a firm believer in Parliament as the cornerstone in governing England. When Cromwell showed tendencies to want to rule without Parliament – after all, Cromwell had a huge Army at his disposal – Anthony broke with Cromwell. The man, it seemed, had some backbone, as he would show over the coming years when he opposed several of Cromwell’s proposals.

Tony spent some years out in the cold. The impoverished and exiled Charles Stuart contacted him, promising all sorts of things if Anthony were to re-join the royal camp, but in 1655 only a fool would bet on Charles against Oliver – Cromwell was too powerful and capable to be overthrown by a royalist rabble.

However, Cromwell died sooner than expected. His son was a pathetic failure, and all over the country closet royalists sniffed the air and hoped for change. Ever sensitive to changing moods, Anthony therefore decided to throw his lot in with Charles Stuart – rather late in the day, one would think, seeing as this was 1660, but the new king was grateful and Anthony was created Baron Ashley – after being pardoned for his support of the English Commonwealth.

From Anthony’s perspective, the new king ascended his throne under a huge burden of gratitude towards the Parliament who had invited him to return. Expectations were therefore that Charles II would do little without consulting this august body – but Charles’ advisors had other ideas (as did Charles himself: he may have deplored some of his father’s actions, but wasn’t about to roll over and play dead at the say-so of Parliament)

Charles II - restored

Once the king was happily crowned, Anthony returned to politics with fervour – and a tendency to bite the hand that fed him. He opposed the king’s marriage to Catherine of Braganza, he opposed any policy that moved England in the direction of popish France, and out of principle he opposed anything Charles’ Lord Chancellor, the Earl of Clarendon, might propose.

He was a vociferous opponent of the Clarendon Code – the act of legislation whereby it would be forbidden to adhere to any church other than the Church of England. He even went as far as recommending that not only Protestant non-conformists, but also loyal Catholics (assuming they kept well to the background) should be excluded from penalties. The king agreed; Parliament did not.

In general, for the first few years, Charles found Anthony an able servant. But by 1666 they had their first serious falling out over Irish politics, and in 1667 they clashed again – this time over Clarendon. At the time, Clarendon was out of favour – he had failed miserably in convincing Parliament to deliver to Caesar what Caesar wanted, whether it be money or laws. Charles was angered – and sick and tired of Clarendon’s tendency to treat him as if he were a mindless boy – so he didn’t exactly protest when some of his nobles banded together in an effort to impeach Clarendon.

One would have thought Anthony would have joined the band-wagon, but instead he seemed to take a perverse pleasure in supporting the under-dog – and aggravating the king, especially in view of the fact that Anthony and Clarendon had been at loggerheads for years. Whatever the case, there was no impeachment. Instead, Clarendon was run out of the country.

In Clarendon’s place, the King now relied on the Cabal Ministry, so called because it consisted of the Lords Buckingham, Ashley, Arlington, Lauderdale and Clifford. Not that the Cabal ever really worked together – initially Anthony was in the dog-house for supporting Clarendon, while Buckingham and Arlington were busy tearing at each other.

The Cabal quickly acquired a reputation for lewdness and debauchery. Buckingham, as an example, duelled openly with the husband of his mistress (!), and, even worse, insisted his illegitimate son with said mistress be baptised in Westminster Abbey. Lauderdale was a larger than life character whose behaviour rarely conformed to what was expected of a statesman. Anthony, on the other hand, was a man who rarely gave way to private indulgences, his focus always on the one thing he truly coveted: power.

Anthony Ashley Cooper

In 1672, Anthony was created Earl of Shaftesbury and Lord Chancellor of England. He had reached his pinnacle, and an element of gratitude on his side would not have come amiss. Our Tony did not reason quite like that – he was the most capable man around, and the king was damned lucky to have him. Besides, Anthony wanted more: he wanted an England happily rid of Catholics in position of power and was irritated by the king’s less than enthusiastic reaction to this oh, so important undertaking.

The king, unfortunately in Anthony’s opinion, was married to a Catholic – a barren Catholic to boot. Even worse, Anthony was beginning to suspect that the Duke of York, Charles’ brother and heir apparent, was a closet papist. Not good, as per Anthony.

He wasn’t alone in voicing that opinion. While others proposed the king legitimise his eldest bastard son, the Duke of Monmouth, Anthony instead suggested the king divorce his useless wife and marry a fertile Protestant princess. The king’s saturnine face set in a mask of displeasure at these suggestions. Charles loved his son, but he had no intention of legitimising him, as he saw this as potentially weakening the royal position – plus he had serious doubts as to his son’s ability to rule. And as to his wife, Charles was more than aware of how hurt she was by his constant infidelities. He wasn’t about to add the humiliation of divorce to her heartaches.

Anthony retaliated by supporting the 1673 Test Act, legislation aimed at barring Catholics from holding civil or military offices in England. In brief, the Test Act required that all holders of such office take communion as per Anglian rites at least once a year.

The Duke of York did not take communion. Instead, in September of 1673, the Duke married Catholic Mary of Modena, a pretty fifteen-year-old branded “the Pope’s daughter” by the English. Suddenly, there was a real possibility that the by now openly Catholic Duke might sire a son – a Catholic son who would, in all possibility, inherit the English throne. A catastrophe in the making, in Anthony’s opinion, and for the rest of his life he dedicated a significant part of his talents and energies to attempting to stop the Duke of York from ever becoming king. Obviously, this didn’t exactly endear him to the king.

Useless Catherine...

Nor was the king all that pleased by Anthony’s insistence that he divorce his Catholic wife and remarry, which is why in 1673 he removed Anthony from the post of Lord Chancellor. He may have pulled Anthony’s claws, but not his teeth, and in 1674 an incensed Anthony gave a speech in the House of Lords, warning his peers that the 16 000 Catholics living in London were on the verge of rebellion. Not true, but the speech was well received in these anti-papist times, and the poor Catholics were forcibly expelled from London.

Anthony went further, suggesting to Parliament that any king or prince of the blood who married a Catholic was effectively committing high treason. The king was livid. The Duke of York was apoplectic. Anthony sat back and smirked, fanning the flames of bigotry in Parliament until there was serious intent of accusing the Duke of York of treason. The king prorogued Parliament to protect his brother. Charles also sacked Shaftesbury (Anthony) from all royal offices – the rift between the two was never to be healed.

In 1678, things came to a head. This was the year when that despicable creature Titus Oates rose to prominence by disclosing the Popish Plot. Not that there was any plot – Titus had made it all up – but the resulting furore created just the platform our boy Tony needed. “I will not say who started the Game, but I am sure I had the full hunting of it,” he said. He most certainly did, using Oates’ twisted inventions to purge Parliament of papists and to launch his final effort to permanently bar the Duke of York from the succession, the Exclusion Bill.

Once again, Anthony suggested the king divorce his wife and marry someone younger and fertile. Once again, Monmouth was put forward as a far more palatable heir than the Duke – merely because he was Protestant. Not that Anthony held Monmouth in high regard – he considered the young man vain and spoiled, and initially scoffed at the notion of having a bastard ascend the throne. At the same time, there was something very tempting about the idea of having a king permanently beholden to Parliament for his title – after all, should he not perform, all one had to do was to bring up the bastardy issue.

Anthony underestimated the king. In fact, most of his contemporaries committed the same mistake, failing to recognise that on some issues, this flexible king would not be moved, and these issues included the succession, his refusal to legitimise Monmouth, and his approach to his marriage – divorce was not an option.

Anthony also underestimated his companions. Not all of them wanted to be tethered to a man described by Dryden as “Restless, unfixed in principles and place”. Below Anthony’s feet, the ground began to shift, old loyalties dissolving, new ones forming. The excesses fuelled by the Popish Plot, resulting in the death of innocent men such as Oliver Plunkett, Archbishop of Ireland, were laid (justly) at Anthony’s feet.

In 1681, Anthony ended up kicking his heels in the Tower – accused of treason. The charges, however, could not be made to stick, and in 1682 he was released, but the mood of the country had changed, the Whig party to which Anthony belonged (he’d more or less founded it) challenged by the emerging Tories.

Feeling isolated and threatened – and still convinced it would be a disaster to the country to have a Catholic king – Anthony urged Monmouth and fellow conspirators to raise the flag of rebellion. The others weren’t all that keen, so instead Anthony began to toy with the idea of assassinating the king – and the Duke of York. Our hitherto intelligent – if bigoted – hero was losing it, finding little support for this radical idea. (A year or so later, in 1683, others would attempt to murder the Stuart brothers in the so called Rye House Plot, but by then Anthony was dead and no longer in a position to care about the English succession.)

By November of 1682, things were becoming sticky for our Tony, which is why he fled the country, seeking refuge in Amsterdam, where he died alone in January of 1683 after an extended illness. I don’t think all that many mourned his loss – least of all the Duke of York.

Anthony Ashley Cooper

Anthony Ashley Cooper was a crass and unsentimental character, quick to jump ship when his personal interests so required, incapable of rising above his religious prejudices. But in some things he was fanciful, such as in his belief that the souls of dead men rose through the skies to animate a distant star, forever tied to heaven’s firmament. If so, his star must be singularly dark, as red as the blood of the poor Catholics he spent a lifetime persecuting. But then, as I said in the beginning, it is easy to claim the moral high-ground from the perspective of three centuries and more. Who knows what any of us would have said or done, had we been born in a time so defined by religious tension and political instability as the 17th century?

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Anna Belfrage is the successful author of seven published books, all of them part of The Graham Saga. Set in 17th century Scotland, Virginia and Maryland, this is the story of Matthew Graham and his wife, Alex Lind - two people who should never have met, not when she was born three centuries after him.

Anna's books have won several awards and are available on Amazon, or wherever else good books are sold.
For more information about Anna and her books, please visit her website. If not on her website, Anna can mostly be found on her blog.