Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II

by Charlotte M. Yonge

In the following year, on the 17th of November, the final decision was made. Nine of the claimants had such frivolous claims, that no attention was paid to them, and the only ones worth consideration were those derived from David, Earl of Huntingdon, the crusading comrade of Coeur de Lion, and son of Henry, son of St. David. This Earl had left three daughters, Margaret, Isabel, and Ada. Margaret had married Allan of Galloway, and John Balliol was the son of her only daughter Devorgoil. Isabel married Robert Bruce, and her son, Robert, Earl of Carrick, was the claimant; and Ada had left a grandson, Florence Hastings, Earl of Holland.

A baron leaving daughters alone would divide his heritage equally among them, and this was what Hastings desired; but Scotland was pronounced indivisible, and he retired from the field. Bruce contended that, as son of one sister, he was nearer the throne than the grandson of the other, although the elder; but this was completely untenable, and Balliol, having been adjudged the rightful heir, was declared King of Scotland, was crowned, and paid homage to Edward.

He soon found that the fealty he had sworn was not, as he had hoped, to be a mere dead letter, as with the former kings. Edward used to the utmost the suzerain’s privilege of hearing appeals from the vassal-prince—a practice never put in force by his predecessors, and excessively galling to the new Scottish King, who found himself fettered in all his measures, and degraded in the eyes of his rude and savage subjects, who regarded him as having given away the honor of their crown. Whenever there was an appeal, he was cited to appear in person at the English court, and was treated, in fact, like a mere feudal noble, instead of the King of a brave and ancient kingdom. Indeed, the Scots called him the “toom tabard,” or empty herald’s coat—a name not unsuited to such a king of vain show.

By and by a war broke out between England and France, and Edward sent summonses to the Scottish barons to attend him with their vassals. It was no concern of theirs, and many flatly refused to come, whereupon he declared them to have forfeited their fiefs, and thus pushed his interference beyond their endurance. John Balliol, their unfortunate King, who was personally attached to Edward, and at the same time greatly in dread of his fierce vassals, was utterly confused and distressed; and finding no help in him, his subjects seized him, placed him in a fortress, under the keeping of a council of twelve, and in his name declared war against England.

Robert Bruce, Earl of Carrick, to whom his father’s claims had descended, remained faithful to King Edward, who, to punish the rebellion of the Scots, collected an army of 30,000 foot and 4,000 horse, and, with the sacred standards of Durham at their head, marched them into Scotland. Berwick, then a considerable merchant-town, closed her gates against him, and further provoked him by the plunder of some English merchant-ships. He offered terms of surrender, but these were refused; and he led his men to the assault of the dyke, that was the only defence of the town. He was the first to leap the dyke on his horse Bayard, and the place was won after a brave resistance, sufficient to arouse the passions of the soldiery, who made a most shocking massacre, without respect to age or sex.

The report of these horrors so shocked John Balliol, that he sent to renounce his allegiance to Edward, and to defy his power. “Felon and fool!” cried Edward, “if he will not come to us, we must go to him.”

So frightful ravages were carried on by the English on one side and the Scots on the other, till a battle took place at Dunbar, which so utterly ruined the Scots, that they were forced to make submission, and Balliol sued for peace. But Edward would not treat with him as a king, and only sent Anthony Beck, the Bishop of Durham, to meet him at Brechin. He was forced to appear, and was declared a rebel, stripped of his crown and robes, and made to stand with a white rod in his hand, confessing that he had acted rebelliously, and that Edward had justly invaded his realm. After this humiliation, he resigned all his rights to Scotland, declaring himself worn out with the malice and fraud of the nation, which was probably quite true. He was sent at first to the Tower, but afterward was released, lived peaceably on his estates in France, and founded the college at Oxford that bears his name and arms.

The misfortunes endured by this puppet did not deter the Earl of Carrick from aspiring to his seat; but Edward harshly answered, “Have I nothing to do but to conquer kingdoms for you?” and sent him away with his eldest son, a third Robert Bruce, to pacify their own territories of Carrick and Annandale. Edward did nothing without law enough to make him believe himself in the right, and poor Balliol’s forfeiture gave him, as he imagined, the power to assume Scotland as a fief of his own. He caused himself to be acknowledged as King of Scotland, destroyed the old Scottish charters, and transported to Westminster the Scottish crown and sceptre, together with the stone from Scone Abbey, on which, from time immemorial, the Kings of Scotland had been placed when crowned and anointed. All the castles were delivered up into his hands, and every noble in his dominions gave him the oath of allegiance, excepting one, William, Lord Douglas, who steadily refused, and was therefore carried off a prisoner to England, where he remained to the day of his death.

Edward did not come in as a severe or cruel conqueror; he gave privileges to the Scottish clergy, and re-instated the families of the barons killed in the war. Doubtless he hoped to do great good to the wild population, and bring them into the same order as the English; but the flaw in his title made this impossible; the Scots regarded his soldiery as their enemies and oppressors, and though the nobles had given in a self-interested adhesion to the new government, they abhorred it all the time, and the mutual hatred between the English garrisons and Scottish inhabitants led to outrages in which neither party was free from blame.

As Hereward the Saxon had been stirred up against the Norman invaders, so a champion arose who kept alive the memory of Scottish independence.