Henry of Monmouth Volume I Part 13

By the obliging kindness of Sir Henry Ellis, the Author is enabled (p. 250) to enrich his work by authentic representations of the Great and Privy Seals of Owyn Glyndowr as Prince of Wales; he borrows at the same time the clear and scientific description of them, with which that antiquary furnished the Archaeologia.[245] The originals are appended to two instruments preserved in the Hotel Soubise at Paris, both dated in the year 1404, and believed to relate to the furnis.h.i.+ng of the troops which were then supplied to Owyn by the King of France.

[Footnote 245: Vol. xxv.]

"On the obverse of the Great Seal, Owyn is represented with a bifid beard, very similar to Richard II, seated under a canopy of Gothic tracery; the half-body of a wolf forming the arms of his chair on each side; the back-ground is ornamented with a mantle semee of lions, held up by angels. At his feet are two lions. A sceptre is in his right hand; but he has no crown. The inscription, OWENUS ... PRINCEPS WALLIae. On the reverse Owyn is represented on horseback in armour: in his right hand, which is extended, he holds a sword; and with his left, his s.h.i.+eld charged with four lions rampant: a drapery, probably a _kerchief de plesaunce_, or handkerchief won at a tournament, pendent from the right wrist. Lions rampant also appear upon the mantle of the horse. On his helmet, as well as on his horse's head, is the Welsh dragon. The area of the seal is diapered with roses. The inscription on this side (p. 251) seems to fill the gap upon the obverse, OWENUS DEI GRATIA ... WALLIae.

The Privy Seal represents the four lions rampant, towards the spectator's left, on a s.h.i.+eld, surmounted by an open coronet; the dragon of Wales as a supporter on the dexter side, on the sinister a lion. The inscription seems to have been SIGILLUM OWENI PRINCIPIS WALLIae.

No impression of this seal is probably now to be found either in Wales or England. Its workmans.h.i.+p shows that Owyn Glyndowr possessed a taste for art far beyond the types of the seals of his predecessors."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Seal]

CHAPTER XII. (p. 252)

REPUTED DIFFERENCES BETWEEN HENRY AND HIS FATHER EXAMINED. -- HE IS MADE CAPTAIN OF CALAIS. -- HIS RESIDENCE AT COLDHARBOUR. -- PRESIDES AT THE COUNCIL-BOARD. -- CORDIALITY STILL VISIBLE BETWEEN HIM AND HIS FATHER. -- AFFRAY IN EAST-CHEAP. -- NO MENTION OF HENRY'S PRESENCE. -- PROJECTED MARRIAGE BETWEEN HENRY AND A DAUGHTER OF BURGUNDY. -- CHARGE AGAINST HENRY FOR ACTING IN OPPOSITION TO HIS FATHER IN THE QUARREL OF THE DUKES OF BURGUNDY AND ORLEANS UNFOUNDED.

1409-1412.

Henry of Monmouth, whose years, from the earliest opening of youth to the entrance of manhood, had chiefly been occupied within the precincts of his own Princ.i.p.ality in quelling the spirit of rebellion which had burst forth there with great fury, and had been protracted with a vitality almost incredible, is from this date to be viewed and examined under a totally different combination of circ.u.mstances. Early in the year 1409 he was appointed Warden of the Cinque Ports and Constable of Dover for life, with a salary of 300_l._ a year. Thomas Erpyngham, "the King's beloved and faithful knight," who held those offices (p. 253) by patent, having resigned them in favour of the King's "very dear son."[246] He was made on the 18th of March 1410, Captain of Calais, by writ of privy seal; and he was const.i.tuted also President of the King's Council.

[Footnote 246: MS. Donat. 4599.]

The character of Henry having been a.s.sailed, not only in times distant from our own, but by writers also of the present age, on the ground of his having behaved towards his father with unkindness and cruelty after the date of his appointment to these offices, it becomes necessary, in order to ascertain the reality of the charge and its extent, as well as the time to which his change of behaviour is to be referred, to trace his footsteps in all his personal transactions with his father, and in the management of the public affairs of the realm, more narrowly than it might otherwise have been necessary or interesting for us to do. Every incidental circ.u.mstance which can throw any light on this uncertain and perplexing page of his history becomes invested with an interest beyond its own intrinsic importance, just as in a judicial investigation, where the animus of any party bears upon the question at issue, the most minute and trifling particular will often give a clue, whilst broad and striking events may not a.s.sist in relieving the judge from any portion of his doubts. On this principle the following facts are inserted here. They may perhaps appear too (p. 254) disjointed for a continuous narrative; and they are cited only as separate links which might form a chain of evidence all bearing upon the question as to Henry's position from this time with his father.

Early in the year 1409, the King, in a letter to the Pope, when speaking of the Cardinal of Bourdeaux says, "He came into the presence of us and of our first-born son, the Prince of Wales, and others, our prelates."

At this period we are informed by the dry details of the royal exchequer, that the King was anxiously bent on the marriage of his son. To Sir William Bourchier payment is made, (17th May 1409,) on account of a voyage to Denmark and Norway, to treat with Isabella, Queen of Denmark, for a marriage between the Lord Henry, Prince of Wales, and the daughter of Philippa of Denmark; and on the 23rd of the same month[247] a payment is made to "Hugh Mortimer, Esq., lately twice sent by the King's command to France, to enter into a contract of marriage between the Prince and the second daughter of the King's adversary, the King of France." In the August of 1409 the council a.s.sembled at Westminster, resolved, with regard to Ireland, that, should it be agreeable to the King and the Lord Thomas, it would be expedient for Lord John Stanley to be appointed Lieutenant, he paying a stipulated sum every year to the Lord Thomas. Before the council broke up, the Prince, who presided, undertook to speak on this (p. 255) subject, as well to the King his father, as to his brother the Lord Thomas. At this time it would appear that, so far from any coldness, and jealousies, and suspicions existing between the Prince and the members of his family, he was deemed the most fit person to negociate an affair of much delicacy between the council and his father and his brother.

[Footnote 247: The payments prove nothing as to the dates of the debts incurred.]

On the 31st of January 1410, the King, in the palace of Lambeth, "delivered the great seals to Thomas Beaufort, his brother, in the presence of the Archbishop, Henry of York, and my lord the Prince."[248] On the 5th of March following, the King's warrant was signed for the burning of John Badley. The Prince's conduct on that occasion, which has been strangely misrepresented, but which seems at all events to testify to the kindness of his disposition, and his anxiety to save a fellow-creature from suffering, is examined at some length in another part of this work, where his character is investigated with reference to the sweeping charge brought against him of being a religious persecutor. On the 18th of that month, when he was appointed Captain of Calais, his father at the same time made him a present for life of his house called Coldharbour. It must be here observed that the disagreement which evidently arose and (p. 256) continued for some time between the King and the Commons, though the Prince was compelled to take a part in it, seems not to have shaken the King's confidence in him, nor to have alienated his affections from him at all. On the 23rd of March the Commons require the King to appoint a council; and on Friday, the 2nd of May following, they ask the King to inform them of the names of his council: on which occasion this remarkable circ.u.mstance occurred.[249] The King replied that many had been excused; that the others were the Prince, the Bishops of Worcester, Durham, and Bath, Lords Arundel, Westmoreland, and Burnell.

The Prince then, in the name of all, prayed to be excused, if there would not be found money sufficient to defray the necessary charges; and, should nothing adequate be granted, then that they should at the end of the parliament be discharged from all expenses incurred by them. Upon this they resolved that the Prince should not be sworn as a member of the council, because of the high dignity of his honourable person. The other members were sworn. It is to this stipulation of the Prince that the King refers at the close of the parliament in 1411, when, after the Commons had prayed the King to thank the Prince and council, he says, "I am persuaded they would have done more had they had more ample means, as my lord the Prince declared when they were appointed."

[Footnote 248: These insulated facts may be thought to prove little of themselves; but they throw light (it is presumed) both on Henry of Monmouth's occupations, through these years of his life, and especially on the point of any rupture existing between himself and the King his father.]

[Footnote 249: Parl. Rolls, 1410.]

It has often been a subject of wonder what should have brought (p. 257) the Prince and his brother so often into East-Cheap; and the story of the Boar's Head in Shakspeare has long a.s.sociated in our minds Henry Prince of Wales with a low and vulgar part of London, in which he could have had no engagement worthy of his station, and to which, therefore, he must have resorted only for the purposes of riot and revelry with his unworthy and dissolute companions. History records nothing of the Prince derogatory to his princely and Christian character during his residence in Coldharbour; it does indeed charge two of the King's sons with a riot there, but they are stated by name to be Thomas and John. Henry's name does not occur at all in connexion with any disturbance or misdoing. The fact, however, (not generally known,) of Henry having his own house, the gift of his father, in the heart of London, near East-Cheap, (the scene indeed of Shakspeare's poetical romance, but really the frequent place of meeting for the King's council whilst Henry was their president,) might seem to call for a few words as to the locality of Coldharbour and its circ.u.mstances.

The grant by his father of this mansion, dated Westminster, March 18th, 1410, is couched in these words: "Know ye, that, of our especial grace, we have granted to our dearest son, Henry Prince of Wales, a certain hostel or place called Coldharbour, in our city of London, with its appurtenances, to hold for the term of his life, without (p. 258) any payment to us for the same."[250] These premises, we learn, came into Henry IV.'s possession by the right of his wife. Stowe, who supplies the materials from which we safely make that inference, does not seem to have been aware that it was ever in the possession of either that King or his son. He tells us it was bought in the 8th of Edward III. by John Poultney, who was four times mayor, and who lived there when it was called Poultney Inn. But, thirteen years afterward (21 Edward III.), he, by charter, gave and confirmed it to Humfrey de Bohun, Earl of Hereford and Ess.e.x, as "his whole tenement called Coldharbour, with all the tenements and key adjoining, on the way called Haywharf Lane (All Saints ad foenum), for a rose at Midsummer, if demanded. In 1397, John Holland, Earl of Huntingdon, lodged there; and Richard II, his brother, dined with him. It was then counted a right fair and stately house."[251]

[Footnote 250: Rym. Foed. vol. vii.]

[Footnote 251: Stowe's London, ii. 206.]

We are led to infer, though the formal grant of this house to Prince Henry was made only in the March of this year, yet that it had been his residence for some time previously; for, on the 8th of the preceding February, we find a council held there, himself present as its chief.

It does not appear by any positive statement that the Prince visited Calais immediately on his appointment to its captaincy, but we (p. 259) shall probably be safe in concluding that he did so; for, very soon afterwards, we find letters of protection[252] for one year (from April 23) given to Thomas Selby, who was to go with the Prince, and remain with him at Calais. At all events, he was resident in London by the middle of June, and had apparently engaged most actively in the affairs of government. On the 16th of that month we find him president at two sittings of the council on the same day:[253] the first at Coldharbour, in which it was determined that three parts of the subsidy granted to the King on wools, hides, &c. should be applied to the payment of the garrison of Calais and of the marches thereof; the second, at the Convent of the Preaching Friars, when an ordinance was made for the payment of the garrison of Berwick and the East March of Scotland.

[Footnote 252: Rymer's Foed.]

[Footnote 253: Acts of Council.]

The Prince presided at a council, on the 18th of June, in Westminster; and, on the 19th, in the house of the Bishop of Hereford. To this council his brother Thomas of Lancaster presented a pet.i.tion praying for reformation of certain tallies, by default of which he could not obtain the money due to him. The preamble, as well as the body of this pet.i.tion, proves that at this time the Prince was regarded not merely as a member of the council, but as its president, to be named and addressed individually and in contradistinction to the other (p. 260) members. "The pet.i.tion of my lord Thomas of Lancaster, made to the very honourable and puissant lord the Prince, and the other very honourable and wise lords of the council of our sovereign lord the King. First, may it please my said lord the Prince, and the other lords of the council," &c.--That up to this time no jealousy had arisen in the King's mind in consequence of the growing popularity and ascendency of his son, is evidenced by the record of the same council.

That doc.u.ment tells us plainly that the King was cordial with him, and employed him as his confidential representative: it shall speak for itself. "And then my said lord the Prince reported to the other members of the council, that he had it in command from his very good lord and father to ordain, with the advice of the others of the said council, that the Lord Thomas Beaufort, brother of our said lord the King and his chancellor of England, should have such gratuity for one year beyond his fees as to them should seem reasonable. On which, by our said lord the Prince, and all the others, it was agreed that the said chancellor should receive for one year, from the day of his appointment, 800 marks."

The next council, at which also we find the Prince acting as president, was held on the 11th of July. Between the dates of these two last councils, that disturbance in the street took place which the Chronicle of London refers to merely as "an affray in East-Cheap (p. 261) between the townsmen and the Princes Thomas and John;" but which Stowe records with much of detail and minuteness. Many, it is believed, may be disposed to regard it as the foundation chosen by Shakspeare on which to build the superstructure of his own fascinating imagination, and on which other writers more grave, though not more trustworthy as historians, have rested for conclusive evidence of the wild frolics and "madcap" adventures of Henry of Monmouth. Stowe's account is this: "In the year 1410, upon the eve of St. John the Baptist, (i.e. June 23,) the King's sons, Thomas and John, being in East-Cheap at supper, or rather at breakfast, (for it was after the watch was broken up, betwixt two and three of the clock after midnight,) a great debate happened between their men and other of the court, which lasted an hour, even till the mayor and sheriffs, with other citizens, appeased the same: for the which afterwards the said mayor, aldermen, and sheriffs were sent for to answer before the King; his sons and divers lords being highly moved against the city. At which time, William Gascoigne, chief justice, required the mayor and aldermen, for the citizens, to put them in the King's grace.[254] Whereunto they answered that they had not offended, but according to the law had done their best in stinting debate and maintaining of the peace: upon which answer the King remitted all his ire and dismissed them." (p. 262) It must be observed that not one word is here said of Prince Henry having anything whatever to do with the affray: whether "other of the court" meant some of his household, or not, does not appear; neither are we told that the two brothers had been supping with the Prince.

And yet, unless some facts are alleged by which the mayor and the chief justice may be connected with him in reference to some broil, we may well question whether the current stories relating to his East-Cheap revelries have any other foundation than this. At all events, the Prince seems to have been most regular during this summer in his attendance at the council-board. On the 22nd, 29th, 30th of July, we find him acting as president. The last council was held at the house of Robert Lovell, Esq. near Old Fish Street in London; at which 1400_l._ was voted to the Prince for the safeguard of Calais, to be repaid out of the first receipts from the duties on wools and skins.[255]

[Footnote 254: That is, that they should ask the King's pardon.]

[Footnote 255: On the 7th of September the King commissions his very dear son the Prince, or his lieutenant, to punish the rebels of Wales.]

On the 18th of November we find a mandate directed to the Prince, as Warden of the Cinque Ports, to see justice done in a case of piracy; and on the 29th, the King, being then at Leicester, issues to Henry the Prince, as Captain of Calais, and to his lieutenant, the same commission, to grant safe-conducts, as had been given to John (p. 263) Earl of Somerset, the late captain.[256]

[Footnote 256: The Earl died on Palm Sunday, 16th of March 1410; immediately on whose demise the Prince was appointed captain. Minutes of Council, 16th June 1410.]

Where the Prince pa.s.sed the winter does not seem to be recorded. In the following spring we find this minute of council. "Be it remembered, that on Thursday, the 19th of March, in the twelfth year of our sovereign lord the King, at Lambeth, in presence of our said lord the King, and his very dear son my lord the Prince, the following prelates and other lords were a.s.sembled."[257] It cannot escape observation, that, instead of the Prince being mentioned as one of the council, or as their president, his name is coupled with the King's as one of the two in whose presence the others were a.s.sembled.[258]

[Footnote 257: There are many curious items of expenditure in the minutes of this council; one which few perhaps would have expected: "Item, to John Rys, for the lions in his custody per annum 120_l._"]

[Footnote 258: In a minute of the council, about April this year, we find an item of expense which proves that Wales still required the presence of a considerable force: "Item, to my lord the Prince, for the wages of three hundred men-at-arms and six hundred archers who have lived and will live for the safeguard of the Welsh parts, from the 9th day of July 1410, to the 7th day of April then next ensuing, 8000_l._"

In this month the King implores the Archbishops of Canterbury and York to pray for him, and to urge all their clergy to supplicate G.o.d's help and protection of himself, his children, and his realm.

And many prayers, and processions, and ma.s.ses are ordered; and all in so urgent a manner as would lead us to think that there was some especial cause of anxiety and alarm, or some severe affliction present or feared.--Rymer.

On the 18th of August, a warrant is issued for the liberation of Llewellyn ap David Whyht, and Yon ap Griffith ap Lli, from the Tower.--MS. Donat. 4599.

In the parliament, at the close of this year, grievous complaints are made by the Border counties against the violence and ravages and extortions of the Welsh; and an order is sought "to arrest the cousins of all rebels and evil-doers of the Welsh, until the malefactors yield themselves up; for by such kinsmen only are they supported."

The cruelties of the Welsh are described in very strong colours by the pet.i.tioners; but it is not evident what was the result of their prayer. The rebels and robbers, they say, carry the English off into woods and deserts, and tie them to trees, and keep them, as in prison, for three or four months, till they are ransomed at the utmost value of their goods; and yet these malefactors were pardoned by the lords of the marches. The pet.i.tioners pray for more summary justice. Rolls of Parl.]

Early in the autumn of this year a negociation was set on foot (p. 264) for a marriage between Prince Henry and the daughter of the Duke of Burgundy. Amba.s.sadors were appointed for carrying on the treaty; and on September 1st, 1411, instructions were given to the Bishop of St. David's, the Earl of Arundel, Lord Francis de Court, Hugh Mortimer, Esq. and John Catryk, Clerk, or any two or more of them, how to negociate without finally concluding the treaty, and to report to the King and Prince.

The instructions may be examined at full length in Sir Harris Nicolas'

"Acts of the Privy Council" by any who may feel an interest in (p. 265) them independently of Henry of Monmouth's character and proceedings; to others the first paragraph will sufficiently indicate the tenour of the whole doc.u.ment. "First, inasmuch as our sovereign lord the King, by the report of the message of the Duke of Burgundy, understood that the Duke entertains a great affection and desire to have an alliance with our said sovereign by means of a marriage to be contracted, G.o.d willing, between our redoubted lord the Prince and the daughter of the aforesaid Duke, the King wishes that his said amba.s.sadors should first of all demand of the Duke his daughter, to be given to my lord the Prince; and that after they have heard what the Duke will offer on account of the said marriage, whether by grant of lands and possessions, or of goods and jewels, and according to the greatest offer which by this negociation might be made by one party or the other, a report be made of that to our said lord the King and our said lord the Prince by the amba.s.sadors." The other instructions relate rather to political stipulations than pecuniary arrangements. These negociations met with the fate they merited; and all idea of a marriage between the Prince and the daughter of the Duke of Burgundy was abandoned. But since Henry's behaviour in the transaction has been urged as proof of his having then discarded parental authority, and acted for himself in contravention of his father's wishes, thereby incurring his royal displeasure, and sowing the seeds of that (p. 266) state of mutual dissatisfaction, and jealousy, and strife which is said to have grown up afterwards into a harvest of bitterness, the subject a.s.sumes greater importance to those who are anxiously tracing Henry's real character; and must be examined and sifted with care, and patience, and candour.

The question involved is this: "In the quarrel between the Dukes of Burgundy and Orleans, did Prince Henry send the first troops from his own forces under the command of his own friends to the aid of the Duke of Burgundy, against the express wishes of his father; or did the contradictory measures of England in first succouring the Duke of Burgundy, and then the Duke of Orleans his antagonist, arise from a change of policy in the King himself and the English government, without implying undutiful conduct on the part of the Prince, or dissatisfaction in his father towards him?" The former view has been recommended for adoption, though it reflects upon the Prince's character as a son; and it has been thereupon suggested that, "instead of denying his previous faults, we should recollect his sudden and earnest reformation, and the new direction of his feelings and character, as the mode more beneficial to his memory."[259] But in this work, which professes not to search for exculpation, nor to deal in eulogy, but to seek the truth, and follow it to whatever consequences it might lead, we must on no account so hastily (p. 267) acquiesce in the a.s.sumption that Henry of Monmouth was on this occasion undutifully opposed to his father.[260] However rejoiced we may be to find in a fellow-Christian the example of a sincere penitent growing in grace, it cannot be right to multiply or aggravate his faults for the purpose of making his conversion more striking and complete. We may firmly hope that, if he had been a disobedient and unkind son in any one particular, he repented truly of that fault. But his biographer must sift the evidence adduced in proof of the alleged delinquency; instead of admitting on insufficient ground an allegation, in order to a.s.similate his character to general fame, or to heighten the dramatic effect of his subsequent course of virtue.

[Footnote 259: Turner's Hist. Eng.]

[Footnote 260: The character of the ma.n.u.script, on the authority of which this and another charge against Henry of Monmouth have been grounded, will be examined at length, as to its genuineness and authenticity in the Appendix.]

In discussing this question it will be necessary to attend with care to the order and date of each circ.u.mstance. By a temporary forgetfulness of this indispensable part of an historian's duty, the writers who have adopted the view most adverse to Henry as a son, have been led to give an incorrect view of the whole transaction, especially as it affects the character and filial conduct of the Prince.