The Life and Reign of Edward I.

by Robert Benton Seeley

The earls Simon de Montfort, grandfather, father and son, were pre‐eminently soldiers of this class. In 1165 Simon the Bald obtained in marriage a daughter of Blanchmaines, earl of Leicester, and his son and grandson always put forward a claim to that earldom. The son of Simon the Bald went to France, took up the crusade against the Albigenses, and died count of Toulouse. One of his sons, calling himself “earl of Leicester,” came to England and gained, some said clandestinely, the affections of the princess Eleanor, daughter of king John, and sister of Henry III. Thus connected with the royal family, we find him, all through the middle portion of this century, either trusted and employed by the king, or else heading a combination of the barons against him. He became at last a popular leader, admired and sometimes almost idolized by the people; and when he died, he was held by them to have been a martyr to their cause. We are scarcely able to form a decided opinion of his whole character. Some of his later acts are not reconcilable with the obligations of loyalty to his sovereign, who was also, by marriage, his relation; but we must admit that the difficulties of his position were considerable. The most favourable feature in the case is, that this great soldier seems to have possessed and valued the friendship of Grosstête, “holy bishop Robert,” who is, perhaps, the purest and brightest character presented to us in the records of that day.

Up to a certain point the prince concurred with the discontented faction among the barons, and with earl Simon their leader, whose consort was his aunt. But, as we might have anticipated, when their plans and purposes began to border upon treason, Edward, whose affection for his father never varied, soon withdrew from their society. “The Barons’ war,” as it has been called, lasted from 1258 to 1265. “A concilium,” held in London in the first of these years, led to a much larger and more important assembly at Oxford about Midsummer. The barons came to that city with great numbers of armed retainers, and forced from the king an assent to “the provisions of Oxford,” which did, in effect, put the royal authority “into commission,” or share it with a selected number of great lords. The prince, we are told, “being brought to it with great difficulty, at last submitted himself to the ordinance and provision of the barons.” He saw, we cannot doubt, the degradation of the royal authority which was implied in those provisions; but he saw no available way of escape. He consented, therefore, though unwillingly; but a pledge once given was, with him, a solid reality.

Through life, the motto which, doubtless by his own command, was afterwards inscribed upon his tomb, was his constant rule: Pactum serva. Having entered into an engagement, he would adhere to it. Accordingly, we find that in 1259 the poor king was alarmed by rumours that the prince and the barons were confederating for his dethronement. One chronicler tells us that certain evil advisers created distrust between the father and the son; and that when the prince would have vindicated himself, the king exclaimed, “Let him not approach me, for if I were to see him, I should not be able to help kissing him.”[15] Such was the affection which had always existed between the two.

But again we find, about a year later, that the uprightness of the prince, and his adherence to his engagements, created a new difference between Henry and his son. Matthew of Westminster tells us, that “Edward, receiving full information concerning the king’s vain counsels and counsellors, became enraged against the latter, and withdrew himself from his father’s sight, and in all good faith declared his adherence to the barons, in conformity with his oath. The king shut himself up with his evil advisers in the Tower, and Edward remaining outside with the barons, things assumed a threatening aspect.”

Two years of fluctuating prospects and of great trouble followed. But Edward began to see, on the part of earl Simon, designs which he could not possibly approve or tolerate. The earl, on one occasion, actually threatened Windsor Castle; and when the prince agreed to meet him at Kingston to confer upon the position of affairs, the earl “was too circumspect to allow him to get into Windsor again.” He “detained the prince” until, to regain his liberty, he consented to surrender the royal fortress to the earl.

Such proceedings as this must have alienated the prince from earl Simon and the barons; and at last, in 1263, it was agreed that all questions should be submitted to king Louis of France (St. Louis), to whose decision all parties bound themselves to conform. At the commencement of 1264, Louis held a great court, and heard the arguments on both sides; and then, by his final sentence on the 23rd of January, he “annulled and made void the provisions of Oxford,” and discharged all persons from any obligations to the same.

At last, then, the prince was morally and legally at liberty. The obligation by which he had so long felt bound was at an end; but earl Simon and the discontented barons refused to abide by their engagement. They had sworn that “whatsoever the king of France should ordain concerning the matters in dispute they would faithfully observe,” but when the decision was against them, they refused to submit to it. From this moment Edward takes his place by his father’s side. Hostilities commenced in April, 1264, and in May a battle was fought at Lewes. The prince defeated the forces opposed to him, but earl Simon broke up and dispersed the centre and left wing of the royal army, and forced the king to shut himself up in the Priory of Lewes. Edward, to extricate his father, agreed to terms; and for a time both the king and the prince were in a sort of honourable captivity, attended everywhere by earl Simon, who now acted in the king’s name, and did, in almost every matter, merely what he pleased.[16]

This state of things lasted about a year, when at last the prince escaped from the guards whom earl Simon had placed around him, was joined by the earl of Gloucester and Roger Mortimer, and once more raised the royal standard. At Evesham, in August, 1265, the final struggle took place. Earl Simon, seven lords of his party, and one hundred and sixty knights, perished, and “the Barons’ war” was ended. A year or two was required to restore tranquillity; but during the rest of Henry’s life, which lasted seven years longer, the realm was for the most part at peace.

A parliament was held at Marlborough in 1267, for the settlement of questions arising out of the civil war. And now, seeing the country again in tranquillity, Edward listened to the earnest entreaties of Louis of France, and consented to accompany him on the last great Crusade.