[CHAPTER X]
INVASION OF ENGLAND AND IRELAND
The battle of Bannockburn might well have been the historical, as well as the dramatic, close of the struggle. But Edward refused to be taught by experience, and the desultory welter of war was miserably prolonged for nearly half a generation to come. The disaster rankled in Edward's mind, ever craving vengeance, impotently. With childish wilfulness, he would not even concede to Bruce the formal title of King of Scots, though the Lanercost chronicler admits that the victory at Bannockburn extorted a general recognition of his right by conquest.
Edward retired from Berwick to York. It was plain that Bruce would instantly follow up his victory, and already there was anxiety on the Border. Berwick was not only vexed by the Scots, but still more seriously menaced by the violence of the Northumbrians, who had been exasperated by the hanging of a number of their countrymen for alleged treachery; and the storm burst upon the north of England before Edward could send up reinforcements. Before the middle of July, Sir Andrew de Harcla, the constable of Carlisle, was in daily expectation of an attack, and complained that he was hampered by lack of promised support. Bishop Kellawe could not attend Parliament, so busy was he in preparations for the defence of his episcopate; 'all the people say that, if he now leave the district, they will not venture to stay behind.'
Immediately after the battle, Sir Philip de Mowbray surrendered Stirling Castle, and passed over to the side of the victor. Towards the end of July, Sir Edward Bruce and Douglas, with other Scots nobles, crossed the eastern Border and ravaged Northumberland, leaving the castles unassailed. They spared the episcopate of Durham from fire in consideration of a large sum of money. Crossing the Tees, they penetrated beyond Richmond, the people fleeing before them to the south, to the woods, to the castles. They turned up Swaledale, and on Stainmoor severely handled Harcla, who had seized the opportunity of quietness at Carlisle to make a luckless raid upon them. On their northward march they burnt Brough, Appleby, Kirkoswald, and other towns, and trampled down the crops remorselessly. Coupland bought off a visitation. They re-entered Scotland with many prisoners of price, and with great droves of cattle. They had met with no resistance, except Harcla's futile effort. 'The English,' says Walsingham dolefully, 'had lost so much of their accustomed boldness that a hundred of them fled from the face of two or three Scots.'
On September 9, Edward held a parliament at York. He readily confirmed the ordinances, changed ministers, even retired Despenser—anything for the military help of his barons. But further operations against Scotland were postponed till Hereford and the other prisoners of note could be ransomed home. About a week later, Edward had a communication from Bruce expressing a strong desire for accord and amity. Safe conducts were issued, and truce commissioners were appointed. Meantime, however, the negotiations were too slow for the Scots; for, on the very day that Edward appointed his commissioners, the Prior and Convent of Durham signed a bond for 800 marks to Randolph for a quiet life till the middle of January. Randolph, in fact, penetrated Yorkshire, committing the usual depredations. Still the negotiations, which apparently had been entered into at the instance of Philip of France, went forward. But in November the English envoys returned from Dumfries with empty hands, and with the news of the likelihood of another invasion of the Scots, 'owing to the lack of food in their country.' Already, indeed, a body of Scots had occupied Tyndale, and were pushing down towards Newcastle. About Christmas they again ravaged Northumberland, and let off Cumberland till midsummer day next year for the sum of 600 marks. The Archbishop of York, whose manor of Hexham had suffered, vigorously denounced the invaders; and at York Minster on January 17, barons and clergy resolved on making a stand at Northallerton three days later. But the only serious effort of the season was Harcla's valorous November raid on Dumfriesshire, where he was well punished, despite the local knowledge of his recreant lieutenant, Sir Thomas de Torthorwald. About the beginning of February, indeed, John of Argyll overpowered the Scots in the Isle of Man, and recovered it for Edward. But 'the terror that prevailed throughout the north of England,' as Canon Raine says, 'was something unexampled'; 'with the exception of a few fortresses, two or three of the northern counties were almost permanently occupied by the Scots.'
On April 26, 1315, a Parliament was held in the Parish Church of Ayr, to consider 'the condition, defence, and perpetual security of the Kingdom of Scotland.' The business was to settle the succession to the throne. It was enacted that, failing lawful male heirs of King Robert, Sir Edward and his lawful male heirs should succeed; failing these, Marjory; and failing Marjory, the nearest lineal heir of the body of Robert. In case the heir were a minor, Randolph was to be guardian of both heir and realm. Failing all these heirs, Randolph was to be guardian until Parliament should determine the succession. Presently Marjory married Sir Walter the Steward. She died in her first confinement on March 2, 1315–16, leaving a son, who became Robert II. of Scotland.
The settlement no doubt was influenced by the imminence of a large expansion of policy—the ill-starred Irish expedition. On May 25, 1315, Sir Edward Bruce landed at Carrickfergus with 6000 men. On his staff were some of the foremost Scots knights—Randolph, Sir Philip de Mowbray, Sir John de Soulis, Sir John the Steward, and many others. The true motives of the enterprise are by no means clear. There was no immediate object in dividing the English forces, and in any case there was involved a like division of the Scots forces. The suggestion of the discontentment of the Scots with their territorial boundaries, growing out of repeated successes in the field and a superfluity of money, seems to be a mere speculation of the Lanercost chronicler. There is more probability in Barbour's assertion that Sir Edward Bruce, 'who stouter was than a leopard, thought Scotland too small for his brother and himself.' It may be that this particular outlet for his restless and ambitious spirit was opened up by an offer of the crown of Ireland by independent Ulster kinglets either in the first place to King Robert or directly to Sir Edward himself. It is not improbable, however, that the movement may have been a serious attempt at a great flank attack on England. Walsingham mentions 'a rumour that, if things went well in Ireland, Sir Edward would at once pass over to Wales.' 'For these two races,' he says, 'are easily stirred to rebellion, and, taking ill with the yoke of servitude, they execrate the domination of the English.'
The Irish expedition despatched from Ayr, King Robert and his lieutenants again turned to the Border. In the end of May, a meeting of the clergy and magnates of the north had been convened at Doncaster by the Archbishop of York, at the instance of the Earl of Lancaster and other barons, who appear to have been in a conciliatory mood; and on June 30, Edward issued his summons for the muster at Newcastle by the middle of August. But already, on June 29, Douglas had entered the episcopate of Durham. Pushing on to Hartlepool, he occupied, but did not burn the town, the people taking refuge on the ships; and he returned laden with plunder. Sir Ralph Fitz William had given Edward a week's warning, but nothing had been done in consequence. It does seem odd, therefore, to stumble on an account of payment to nineteen smiths of Newcastle for 'pikois,' 'howes,' and other instruments sent to Perth in August.
On July 22, Bruce himself invested Carlisle, which was held by the redoubtable Harcla. His army was amply supplied by forays into Allerdale, Coupland, and Westmorland. Every day an assault was delivered upon one of the three gates of the city, and sometimes upon all at once; but the besieged replied manfully with showers of stones and arrows. On the fifth day of the siege, the Scots brought into action a machine that hurled stones continuously at the Caldew gate and the wall, but without effect; and the defenders answered with seven or eight similar machines, as well as with springalds for hurling darts and slings for hurling stones, 'which greatly frightened and harassed the men without.' The Scots next erected a wooden tower overtopping the wall; whereupon the besieged raised over the nearest tower on the wall a similar wooden tower overtopping the Scots one. But the Scots tower proved useless, for its wheels stuck in the mud of the moat, and it could not be got up to the wall. Nor could the Scots use their long scaling ladders, or a sow they had prepared to undermine the wall; they could not fill up the moat with fascicles; and, when they tried to run bridges of logs on wheels across the moat, the weight of the mass, as in the case of the tower, sank the whole construction in the mud. On the ninth day, Bruce abandoned his engines, and delivered a general assault; but still the besieged made manful defence. Next day the attack was renewed with special vigour on the eastern side, while Douglas with a determined band attempted to scale the wall on the west, at its highest and most difficult point, where an assault would not be expected. His men mounted the wall under the protection of a body of archers; but the English tumbled down ladders and men, killing and wounding many, and baffling the attack. On the morrow (August 1), the siege was raised. The Lanercost chronicler, who writes as if he had been present, affirms that only two Englishmen were killed and a few wounded during the eleven days' investment.
Whether Bruce was hopeless and disgusted, or had been informed of the approach of a relieving force under Valence, or had heard the false report of the defeat and death of Sir Edward in Ireland, at any rate he hurried back to Scotland. Harcla promptly sallied in pursuit, harassing flank and rear, and making two important captures—Sir John de Moray and Sir Robert Baird. Moray had been conspicuous at Bannockburn, and had been enriched by the ransom of twenty-three English knights, besides squires and others, who had fallen to his share. Baird is described as 'a man of the worst will towards Englishmen.' Harcla delivered the prisoners to Edward, receiving (November 8) a guerdon of 1000 marks; but the money was to be raised from wardships, and the accrual of it was spread over eight years. The King's treasury was low.