A City loan of £5,000.
He had come to the end of his resources and was in want of money to carry on the war. The City was asked to lend him £20,000. It offered 5,000 marks. This was contemptuously refused, and the municipal authorities were bidden to re-consider the matter, or in the alternative to furnish the king with the names of the wealthier inhabitants of the City. At length the City agreed to advance the sum of £5,000 for a fixed period, and this offer the king was fain to accept.[521] At the close of 1339, the chief towns of Flanders had entered into an offensive and defensive alliance with Edward, and an arrangement was made for paying the sum of £1,500 out of the £5,000 to Jacques van Arteveldt, the king's agent at Bruges.[522] Three aldermen and nine commoners were appointed to make the necessary assessment for the loan, for the repayment of which John de Pulteney was one of the king's sureties.[523]
The king again sets sail, June, 1340.
Provided with this and other money supplied by parliament, Edward again set out for the continent (June, 1340). With him went a contingent of 283 men-at-arms, furnished by the City, 140 of them being drawn from that part of the city which lay on the east side of Walbrook, and 143 from the western side. It had been intended to raise 300 men, and the better class of citizens had been called upon to supply each a quota, or in default to serve in person; but eleven had failed in their duty and, on that account, had[pg 186] been fined 50 shillings each, whilst six others, making up the deficit, had set out in the retinue of Henry Darcy, the late mayor.[524]
The battle of Sluys, 24 June, 1340.
The names of the transport ships and the number of men-at-arms supplied by each city, the number of mariners and serving-men (garzouns), which were about to take part in the great battle fought off Sluys (24 June), are on record.[525] Although the French fleet was superior to his own in numbers and equipment, Edward did not hesitate to attack. The struggle was long and severe, lasting from noon on one day until six o'clock the next morning. If any one person was more conspicuous for valour on that occasion than another, it was William Haunsard, an ex-sheriff of London, who came with "a ship of London" and "did much good."[526]
An account of the battle was despatched by the king to his son the Prince Regent, dated from his ship, the "Cogg Thomas," the 28th June.[527]