Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 17.djvu/100

Edward and seventeen castles (another letter of Sir J. Wingfield, ib. p. 224).

On 6 July the prince set out on another expedition, undertaken with the intention of passing through France to Normandy, and there giving aid to his father's Norman allies, the party headed by the king of Navarre and Geoffrey Harcourt. In Normandy he expected, he says, to be met by his father (letter of the prince dated 20 Oct., Archæologia, i. 212;, iv. 196). He crossed the Dordogne at Bergerac on 4 Aug. (for itinerary of this expedition see Eulogium, iii. 215 sq.), and rode through Auvergne, Limousin, and Berry, plundering and burning as he went until he came to Bourges, where he burnt the suburbs but failed to take the city. He then turned westward and made an unsuccessful attack on Issoudun, 25-7 Aug. Meanwhile King John was gathering a large force at Chartres, whence he was able to defend the passages of the Loire, and was sending troops to the fortresses that seemed in danger of attack. From Issoudun the prince returned to his former line of march and took Vierzon. There he learnt that it would be impossible for him to cross the Loire or to form a junction with Lancaster, who was then in Brittany. Accordingly he determined to return to Bordeaux by way of Poitiers, and after putting to death most of the garrison of the castle of Vierzon set out on the 29th towards Romorantin. Some French knights who skirmished with his advanced guard retreated into that place, and when he heard it he said: 'Let us go there; I should like to see them a little nearer.' He inspected the fortress in person and sent his friend Chandos to summon the garrison to surrender. The place was defended by Boucicault and other leaders, and on their refusing his summons he assaulted it on the 31st. The siege lasted three days, and the prince, who was enraged at the death of one of his friends, declared that he would not leave the place untaken. Finally he set fire to the roofs of the fortress by using Greek fire, reduced it on 3 Sept., and on the 5th proceeded on his march through Berry. On the 9th King John, who had now gathered a large force, crossed the Loire at Blois and went in pursuit of him. When the king was at Loches on the 12th he had as many as twenty thousand men-at-arms, and with these and his other forces he advanced to Chauvigny. On the 16th and 17th his army crossed the Vienne. Meanwhile the prince was marching almost parallel to the French and at only a few miles distance from them. It is impossible to believe Froissart's statement that he was ignorant of the movements of the French. From the 14th to the 16th he was at Châtelherault, and on the next day, Saturday, as he was marching towards Poitiers, some French men-at-arms skirmished with his advance guard, pursued them up to the main body of his army, and were all slain or taken prisoners. The French king had outstripped him, and his retreat was cut off by an army at least fifty thousand strong, while he had not, it is said, more than about two thousand men-at-arms, four thousand archers, and fifteen hundred light foot. Lancaster had endeavoured to come to his relief, but had been stopped by the French at Pont-de-Cé (Chronique de Bertrand du Guesclin, p. 7). When the prince knew that the French army lay between him and Poitiers, he took up his position on some rising ground to the south-east of the city, between the right bank of the Miausson and the old Roman road, probably on a spot now called La Cardinerie, a farm in the commune of Beauvoir, for the name Maupertuis has long gone out of use, and remained there that night. The next day, Sunday, the 18th, the cardinal, Hélie Talleyrand, called 'of Périgord,' obtained leave from John to endeavour to make peace. The prince was willing enough to come to terms, and offered to give up all the towns and castles he had conquered, to set free all his prisoners, and not to serve against the king of France for seven years, besides, it is said, offering a payment of a hundred thousand francs. King John, however, was persuaded to demand that the prince and a hundred of his knights should surrender themselves up as prisoners, and to this he would not consent. The cardinal's negotiations lasted the whole day, and were protracted in the interest of the French, for John was anxious to give time for further reinforcements to join his army. Considering the position in which the prince then was, it seems probable that the French might have destroyed his little army simply by hemming it in with a portion of their host, and so either starving it or forcing it to leave its strong station and fight in the open with the certainty of defeat. Anyway John made a fatal mistake in allowing the prince the respite of Sunday; for while the negotiations were going forward he employed his army in strengthening its position. The English front was well covered by vines and hedges; on its left and rear was the ravine of the Miausson and a good deal of broken ground, and its right was flanked by the wood and abbey of Nouaillé. All through the day the army was busily engaged in digging trenches and making fences, so that it stood, as at Crécy, in a kind of entrenched camp (, v. 29;, vii. c. 16). The prince drew up his men in three divisions, the first