[216a] The defective construction of guns during very many years after the battle of Crescy, and the want of skill in the art of gunnery, as well as the silence of the English and French historians, seem almost conclusive against the use of them at that battle, although the contrary has been asserted.
There is an interesting and valuable paper, which was written by the Rev. Joseph Hunter, F.S.A., and published in the Archæologia, vol. xxxii. p. 379, which contains many proofs of the use of gunpowder and cannons in the time of Edward III.; but, although it must be admitted that the evidence which he adduces is quite sufficient to show that they were then in use for the purpose of besieging towns and fortresses, he does not bring forward any proofs, or even any strong reason, for our supposing that they were ever used in the open field, during the reign of Edward III.
[216b] Rot. Parl. 1 Richard II., 1377, vol. iii. p. 10. It also furnishes another proof, in addition to others, of the French employing Genoese cross-bowmen in their wars; as 700 of them are there mentioned, as employed by the French at the siege.
[216c] Philip de Commines, book 1, ch. v. pp. 13 and 14.
[216d] Ibid. book 7, ch. xv. p. 215.
[217a] Grose’s Military Antiquities, vol. i. p. 168, and vol. ii. p. 291.
[217b] It is by no means improbable, that the “bastons à feu,” the nature of which, is not clear, adverted to by Monstrelet, as with the convoy brought up by the English, in besieging Orleans in 1428, were some kind of portable firearms. He several times uses that expression, particularly in describing the wars of the Burgundians and French. It ought, however, to be mentioned here, that with reference to the attack by the Burgundians upon Paris, in 1460, he uses the expression, “canons serpentines, et autres bastons de pouldre et a feu, avec trait de bastons inuasibles a main.” During the early part and middle of the fifteenth century, if gun-carriages were occasionally used, they certainly were not always adopted; and when cannons had to be transported from place to place, they were frequently conveyed in carts or waggons; and we learn from the ancient historical writers, that at that period, for want of carts and waggons, the besiegers were occasionally obliged, on raising a siege, to abandon their cannons.
[218a] Philip de Commines, in book 5, c. iii. p. 118, in enumerating the strength of the Swiss army, and the other confederates, against Charles Duke of Burgundy, in 1476, before Morat, says, that they had “dix mille coulevrines,” by which, as has been correctly observed by Mr. Grose, it is impossible that he could have meant 10,000 of such unwieldly engines as cannons; he evidently meant hand-guns or firearms, sufficiently light to be portable. It is also certain that firearms (haquebuts or harquebusses), so small as to be used on horseback (the origin of the modern carbine and pistol), were used on the Continent, in the year 1495; because on the retreat of the French after the battle of Fernova, in Italy, fought in that year, the rear of their army was defended by 300 Germans, many of whom had “coulevrines,” and others on horseback were armed with “haquebutes.”—Philip de Commines, book 8, c. 7, p. 235.
[219a] The bombard appears, however, occasionally to have been used to denote any kind of cannon.
[219b] Rymer’s Fædera, vol. viii. fo. 159.