In 1351, “it happened on a day that Sir Robert de Beaumanoir, a valiant knight and commandant of the castle which is called Castle Josselin, came before the town and castle of Ploermel, whereof the captain, called Brandebourg [or Brembro, probably Bremborough], had with him a plenty of soldiers of the Countess of Montfort. ‘Brandebourg,’ said Robert, ‘have ye within there never a man-at-arms, or two or three, who would fain cross swords with other three for love of their ladies?’ Brandebourg answered that their ladies would not have them lose their lives in so miserable an affair as single combat, whereby one gained the name of fool rather than honorable renown. ‘I will tell you what we will do, if it please you. You shall take twenty or thirty of your comrades, as I will take as many of ours. We will go out into a goodly field where none can hinder or vex us, and there will we do so much that men shall speak thereof in time to come in hall, and palace, and highway, and other places of the world.’ ‘By my faith,’ said Beaumanoir, ‘tis bravely said, and I agree: be ye thirty, and we will be thirty, too.’ And thus the matter was settled. When the day had come, the thirty comrades of Brandebourg, whom we shall call English, heard mass, then got on their arms, went off to the place where the battle was to be, dismounted, and waited a long while for the others, whom we shall call French. When the thirty French had come, and they were in front one of another, they parleyed a little together, all the sixty; then they fell back, and made all their fellows go far away from the place. Then one of them made a sign, and forthwith they set on and fought stoutly all in a heap, and they aided one another handsomely when they saw their comrades in evil case. Pretty soon after they had come together, one of the French was slain, but the rest did not slacken the fight one whit, and they bore themselves as valiantly all as if they had all been Rolands and Olivers. At last they were forced to stop, and they rested by common accord, giving themselves truce until they should be rested, and the first to get up again should recall the others. They rested long, and there were some who drank wine which was brought to them in bottles. They rebuckled their armor, which had got undone, and dressed their wounds. Four French and two English were dead already.”
It was no doubt during this interval that the captain of the Bretons, Robert de Beaumanoir, grievously wounded and dying of fatigue and thirst, cried out for a drink. “Drink thy blood, Beaumanoir,” said one of his comrades, Geoffrey de Bois, according to some accounts, and Sire de Tinteniac, according to others. From that day those words became the war-cry of the Beaumanoirs. Froissart says nothing of this incident. Let us return to his narrative.
“When they were refreshed, the first to get up again made a sign, and recalled the others. Then the battle recommenced as stoutly as before, and lasted a long while. They had short swords of Bordeaux, tough and sharp, and boar-spears and daggers, and some had axes, and therewith they dealt one another marvellously great dings, and some seized one another by the arms a-struggling, and they struck one another, and spared not. At last the English had the worst of it; Brandebourg, their captain, was slain, with eight of his comrades, and the rest yielded themselves prisoners when they saw that they could no longer defend themselves, for they could not and must not fly. Sir Robert de Beaumanoir and his comrades, who remained alive, took them and carried them off to Castle Josselin as their prisoners; and then admitted them to ransom courteously when they were all cured, for there was none that was not grievously wounded, French as well as English. I saw afterwards, sitting at the table of King Charles of France, a Breton knight who had been in it, Sir Yvon Charnel, and he had a face so carved and cut that he showed full well how good a fight had been fought. The matter was talked of in many places, and some set it down as a very poor, and others as a very swaggering business.”
The most modern and most judicious historian of Brittany, Count Daru, who has left a name as honorable in literature as in the higher administration of the First Empire, says, very truly, in recounting this incident, “It is not quite certain whether this was an act of patriotism or of chivalry.” He might have gone farther, and discovered in this exploit not only the characteristics he points out, but many others besides. Local patriotism, the honor of Brittany, party spirit, the success of John of Montfort or Charles of Blois, the sentiment of gallantry, the glorification of the most beautiful one amongst their lady-loves, and, chiefly, the passion for war amongst all and sundry— there was something of all this mixed up with the battle of the Thirty, a faithful reflex of the complication and confusion of minds, of morals, and of wants at that forceful period. It is this very variety of the ideas, feelings, interests, motives, and motive tendencies involved in that incident which accounts for the fact that the battle of the Thirty has remained so vividly remembered, and that in 1811 a monument, unpretentious but national, replaced the simple stone at first erected on the field of battle, on the edge of the road from Ploermel to Josselin, with this inscription: “To the immortal memory of the battle of the Thirty, gained by Marshal Beaumanoir, on the 26th of March, 1350 (1351).”
With some fondness, and at some length, this portion of Brittany’s history in the fourteenth century has been dwelt upon, not only because of the dramatic interest attaching to the events and the actors, but also for the sake of showing, by that example, how many separate associations, diverse and often hostile, were at that time developing themselves, each on its own account, in that extensive and beautiful country which became France. We will now return to Philip of Valois and Edward III., and to the struggle between them for a settlement of the question whether France should or should not preserve its own independent kingship, and that national unity of which she already had the name, but of which she was still to undergo so much painful travail in acquiring the reality.
Although Edward III. by supporting with troops and officers, and sometimes even in person, the cause of the Countess of Montfort, and Philip of Valois by assisting in the same way Charles of Blois and Joan of Penthievre, took a very active, if indirect, share in the war in Brittany, the two kings persisted in not calling themselves at war; and when either of them proceeded to acts of unquestionable hostility, they eluded the consequences of them by hastily concluding truces incessantly violated and as incessantly renewed. They had made use of this expedient in 1340; and they had recourse to it again in 1342, 1343, and 1344. The last of these truces was to have lasted up to 1346; but, in the spring of 1345, Edward resolved to put an end to this equivocal position, and to openly recommence war. He announced his intention to Pope Clement IV., to his own lieutenants in Brittany, and to all the cities and corporations of his kingdom. He accused Philip of having “violated, without even sending us a challenge, the truce which, out of regard to the sovereign pontiff, we had agreed upon with him, and which he had taken an oath, upon his soul, to keep. On account whereof we have resolved to proceed against him, him and all his adherents, by land and sea, by all means possible, in order to recover our just rights.” It is not quite clear what pressing reasons urged Edward to this decisive resolution. The English Parliament and people, it is true, showed more disposition to support their king in his pretensions to the throne of France, and the cause of the Count of Montfort was maintaining itself stubbornly in Brittany, but nothing seemed to call for so startling a rupture, or to promise Edward any speedy and successful issue. He had lost his most energetic and warlike adviser; for Robert d’Artois, the deadly enemy of Philip of Valois, had been so desperately wounded in the defence of Vannes against Robert de Beaumanoir, that he had returned to England only to die. Edward felt this loss severely, gave Robert a splendid funeral in St. Paul’s church, and declared that “he would listen to nought until he had avenged him, and that he would reduce the country of Brittany to such plight that, for forty years, it should not recover.” Philip of Valois, on his side, gave signs of getting ready for war. In 1343 he had convoked at Paris one of those assemblies which were beginning to be called the states-general of the kingdom, and he obtained from it certain subventions. It was likewise in 1343 and at the beginning of 1344, that he ordered the arrest, at a tournament to which he had invited them, and the decapitation, without any form of trial, of fourteen Breton and three Norman lords whom he suspected of intriguing against him with the King of England. And so Edward might have considered himself threatened with imminent peril; and, besides, he had friends to avenge. But it is not unreasonable to suppose that his fiery ambition, and his impatience to decide, once for all, that question of the French kingship which had been for five years in suspense between himself and his rival, were the true causes of his warlike resolve. However that may be, he determined to push the war vigorously forward at the three points at which he could easily wage it. In Brittany he had a party already engaged in the struggle; in Aquitaine, possessions of importance to defend or recover; in Flanders, allies with power to back him, and as angry as he himself. To Brittany he forwarded fresh supplies for the Count of Montfort; to Aquitaine he sent Henry of Lancaster, Earl of Derby, his own cousin, and the ablest of his lieutenants; and he himself prepared to cross over with a large army to Flanders.
The Earl of Derby met with solid and brilliant success in Aquitaine. He attacked and took in rapid succession Bergerac, La Reole, Aiguillon, Montpezat, Villefranche, and Angouleme. None of those places was relieved in time; the strict discipline of Derby’s troops and the skill of the English archers were too much for the bravery of the men-at-arms, and the raw levies, ill organized and ill paid, of the King of France; and, in a word, the English were soon masters of almost the whole country between the Garonne and the Charente. Under such happy auspices Edward III. arrived on the 7th of July, 1345, at the port of Ecluse (Sluys), anxious to put himself in concert with the Flemings touching the campaign he proposed to commence before long in the north of France. Artevelde, with the consuls of Bruges and Ypres, was awaiting him there. According to some historians, Edward invited them aboard of his galley, and represented to them that the time had come for renouncing imperfect resolves and half-measures; told them that their count, Louis of Flanders, and his ancestors, had always ignored and attacked their liberties, and that the best thing they could do would be to sever their connection with a house they could not trust; and offered them for their chieftain his own son, the young Prince of Wales, to whom he would give the title of Duke of Flanders. According to other historians, it was not King Edward, but Artevelde himself, who took the initiative in this proposition. The latter had for some time past felt his own dominion in Flanders attacked and shaken; and he had been confronted, in his own native city, by declared enemies, who had all but come to blows with his own partisans. The different industrial corporations of Ghent were no longer at one amongst themselves; the weavers had quarrelled with the fullers. Division was likewise reaching a great height amongst the Flemish towns. The burghers of Poperinghe had refused to continue recognizing the privileges of those of Ypres; and the Ypres men, enraged, had taken up arms, and, after a sanguinary melley, had forced the folks of Poperinghe to give in. Then the Ypres men, proud of their triumph, had gone and broken the weavers’ machinery at Bailleul, and in some other towns. Artevelde, constrained to take part in these petty civil wars, had been led on to greater and greater abuse, in his own city itself, of his municipal despotism, already grown hateful to many of his fellow-citizens. Whether he himself proposed to shake off the yoke of Count Louis of Flanders, and take for duke the Prince of Wales, or merely accepted King Edward’s proposal, he set resolutely to work to get it carried. The most able men, swayed by their own passions and the growing necessities of the struggle in which they may be engaged, soon forget their first intentions, and ignore their new perils. The consuls of Bruges and Ypres, present with Artevelde at his interview with King Edward in the port of Ecluse (Sluys), answered that “they could not decide so great a matter unless the whole community of Flanders should agree thereto,” and so returned to their cities. Artevelde followed them thither, and succeeded in getting the proposed resolution adopted by the people of Ypres and Bruges. But when he returned to Ghent, on the 24th of July, 1345, “those in the city who knew of his coming,” says Froissart, “had assembled in the street whereby he must ride to his hostel. So soon as they saw him they began to mutter, saying, ‘There goes he who is too much master, and would fain do with the countship of Flanders according to his own will; which cannot be borne.’ It had, besides this, been spread about the city that James Van Artevelde had secretly sent to England the great treasure of Flanders, which he had been collecting for the space of the nine years and more during which he had held the government. This was a matter which did greatly vex and incense them of Ghent. As James Van Artevelde rode along the street, he soon perceived that there was something fresh against him, for those who were wont to bow down and take off their caps to him turned him a cold shoulder, and went back into their houses. Then he began to be afraid; and so soon as he had dismounted at his house, he had all the doors and windows shut and barred. Scarcely had his varlets done so, when the street in which he lived was covered, front and back, with folk, and chiefly small crafts-folk. His hostel was surrounded and beset, front and back, and broken into by force. Those within defended themselves a long while, and overthrew and wounded many; but at last they could not hold out, for they were so closely assailed that nearly three quarters of the city were at this assault. When Artevelde saw the efforts a-making, and how hotly he was pressed, he came to a window over the street, and began to abase himself, and say with much fine language, ‘Good folks, what want ye? What is it that doth move ye? Wherefore are ye so vexed at me? In what way can I have angered ye? Tell me, and I will mend it according to your wishes.’ Then all those who had heard him answered with one voice, ‘We would have an account of the great treasure of Flanders, which you have sent to England without right or reason.’ Artevelde answered full softly, ‘Of a surety, sirs, I have never taken a denier from the treasury of Flanders; go ye back quietly home, I pray you, and come again to-morrow morning; I shall be so well prepared to render you a good account, that, according to reason, it cannot but content ye.’ ‘Nay, nay,’ they answered, with one voice, ‘but we would have it at once; you shall not escape us so; we do know of a verity that you have taken it out and sent it away to England, without our wit; for which cause you must needs die.’ When Artevelde heard this word, he began to weep right piteously, and said, ‘Sirs, ye have made me what I am, and ye did swear to me aforetime that ye would guard and defend me against all men; and now ye would kill me, and without a cause. Ye can do so an if it please you, for I am but one single man against ye all, without any defence. Think hereon, for God’s sake, and look back to bygone times. Consider the great courtesies and services that I have done ye. Know ye not how all trade had perished in this country? It was I who raised it up again. Afterwards I governed ye in peace so great, that, during the time of my government, ye have had everything to your wish, grains, wools, and all sorts of merchandise, wherewith ye are well provided and in good case.’ Then they began to shout, ‘Come down, and preach not to us from such a height; we would have account and reckoning of the great treasure of Flanders which you have too long had under control without rendering an account, which it appertaineth not to any officer to do.’ When Artevelde saw that they would not cool down, and would not restrain themselves, he closed the window, and bethought him that he would escape by the back, and get him gone to a church adjoining his hostel; but his hostel was already burst open and broken into behind, and there were more than four hundred persons who were all anxious to seize him. At last he was caught amongst them, and killed on the spot without mercy. A weaver, called Thomas Denis, gave him his death-blow. This was the end of Artevelde, who in his time was so great a master in Flanders. Poor folk exalted him at first, and wicked folk slew him at the last.”
It was a great loss for King Edward. Under Van Artevelde’s bold dominance, and in consequence of his alliance with England, the warlike renown of Flanders had made some noise in Europe, to such an extent that Petrarch exclaimed, “List to the sounds, still indistinct, that reach us from the world of the West; Flanders is plunged in ceaseless war; all the country stretching from the restless Ocean to the Latin Alps is rushing forth to arms. Would to Heaven that there might come to us some gleams of salvation from thence! O Italy, poor father-land, thou prey to sufferings without relief, thou who wast wont with thy deeds of arms to trouble the peace of the world, now art thou motionless when the fate of the world hangs on the chances of battle!” The Flemings spared no effort to re-assure the King of England. Their envoys went to Westminster to deplore the murder of Van Artevelde, and tried to persuade Edward that his policy would be perpetuated throughout their cities, and “to such purpose,” says Froissart, “that in the end the king was fairly content with the Flemings, and they with him, and, between them, the death of James Van Artevelde was little by little forgotten.” Edward, however, was so much affected by it that he required a whole year before he could resume with any confidence his projects of war; and it was not until the 2d of July, 1346, that he embarked at Southampton, taking with him, besides his son, the Prince of Wales, hardly sixteen years of age, an army which comprised, according to Froissart, seven earls, more than thirty-five barons, a great number of knights, four thousand men-at-arms, ten thousand English archers, six thousand Irish, and twelve thousand Welsh infantry, in all something more than thirty-two thousand men, troops even more formidable for their discipline and experience of war than for their numbers. When they were out at sea none knew, not even the king himself, for what point of the Continent they were to make, for the south or the north, for Aquitaine or Normandy. “Sir,” said Godfrey d’Harcourt, who had become one of the king’s most trusted counsellors, “the country of Normandy is one of the fattest in the world, and I promise you, at the risk of my head, that if you put in there you shall take possession of land at your good pleasure, for the folk there never were armed, and all the flower of their chivalry is now at Aiguillon with their duke; for certain, we shall find there gold, silver, victual, and all other good things in great abundance.” Edward adopted this advice; and on the 12th of July, 1346, his fleet anchored before the peninsula of Cotentin, at Cape La Hogue. Whilst disembarking, at the very first step he made on shore, the king fell “so roughly,” says Froissart, “that blood spurted from his nose. ‘Sir,’ said his knights to him, ‘go back to your ship, and come not now to land, for here is an ill sign for you.’ ‘Nay, verily,’ quoth the king, full roundly, ‘it is a right good sign for me, since the land doth desire me.’” Caesar did and said much the same on disembarking in Africa, and William the Conqueror on landing in England. In spite of contemporary accounts, there is a doubt about the authenticity of these striking expressions, which become favorites, and crop up again on all similar occasions.