Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 17.djvu/51

Edward II fortune of his favourite into activity, and cleverly took advantage of the want of harmony between the various elements arrayed against him to prepare the way for Hugh's return. An accident favoured his design. On 13 Oct. 1321 the queen, on her way to Canterbury, requested the hospitality of Lady Badlesmere in Leeds Castle. The doors were closed against her; six of her men were slain in the tumult that ensued. Edward was terribly roused by this insult to his wife. He at once took arms, and besieged Leeds Castle with such vigour that on 31 Oct. it capitulated. During this time an army, said to be thirty thousand strong, had gathered round Edward's standard. Six earls and many magnates were in his camp. Lancaster, in his hatred of Badlesmere, had taken no measures to counteract Edward's plans. The fall of Leeds gave Edward courage to unfold his real designs. On 10 Dec. he extorted from the convocation of clergy their opinion that the proceedings against the Despensers were illegal. He ordered the seizure of the castles of the western lands, and himself marched westwards at the head of his forces and kept his Christmas court at Cirencester. His object now was to cross the Severn; but Gloucester was occupied by the barons, and at Worcester he found the right bank guarded by armed men. At Bridgnorth, Shrophire, the Mortimers headed the resistance, and in the struggle that ensued the town was burnt. Thence he proceeded to Shrewsbury, where the Mortimers, afraid to risk a battle in the absence of the long-expected Lancaster, allowed him to cross the river, and finally surrendered themselves into his hands. Edward now wandered through the middle and southern marches, and took without resistance the main strongholds of his enemies. At Hereford he sharply reproved the bishop for his treason: thence, returning to Gloucester, he forced Maurice of Berkeley to surrender that town and Berkeley itself. On 11 Feb. 1322 Edward issued at Gloucester writs for the recall of the Despensers (Parl. Writs, II. i. 276). He thence proceeded to the midlands, where the northern lords, thoroughly frightened into activity, were now besieging Tickhill. On 28 Feb. the royal levies assembled at Coventry, but Lancaster, after endeavouring to defend the passage of the Trent at Burton, fled to the north, where Sir Andrew Harclay was turning against the traitors the forces collected against the Scotch. The king's triumph was now assured. Tutbury and Kenilworth surrendered, Lancaster's most trusty officers deserted him, and Roger D'Amory fell dying into the king's hands. Lancaster and Hereford, unable to find shelter even at Pontefract, hurried northwards to join the Scots. On 16 March they were met by Harclay at Boroughbridge, Yorkshire, where Hereford was slain and Lancaster captured. Five days later Edward presided over Lancaster's hasty and irregular trial at his own castle of Pontefract. Refused even a hearing, he was beheaded the next day. The perpetual imprisonment of the Mortimers and Audley,the hanging of Badlesmere at Canterbury, the execution of about thirty lesser offenders, completed the signal triumph of Edward and the Despensers. On 2 May a full parliament met at York, finally revoked the ordinances, and, in opposition to the baronial oligarchy that had so long fettered the action of Edward, laid down the principle that all weighty affairs of state should proceed from the counsel and consent of king, clergy, lords, and commons. The issue of some new ordinances of Edward's own was perhaps intended to show that the king, no less than Earl Thomas, was willing to confer the benefits of good government on his people.

The troubles were no sooner over than, at the end of July (1322), Edward undertook a new expedition against Scotland, the truce having already expired; but the invasion was no more successful than his other martial exploits. Berwick was besieged, but to no purpose. Bruce withdrew over the Forth, leaving Lothian desolate. Before September Edward was defeated by pestilence and famine rather than by the enemy ( pp. 247-8), On his return to England Bruce followed in his wake. About Michaelmas Edward was nearly captured at Byland Abbey. He fled as far as Bridlington. The parliament, summoned to Ripon on 14 Nov., was unable to meet further north than York. In January 1323 Harclay turned traitor, making his private treaty with the Scots (ib. p. 248), justified, it was thought in the north, by the king's inability to defend his realm. At last, on 30 May (Fœdera, ii. 521), a truce for thirteen years ended Edward's vain attempts to subdue Scotland.

From 1322 to 1326 Edward reigned in comparative tranquillity under the guidance of the Despensers. Some slight attempts to assail the Despensers were easily put down; but the deplorable condition of the country and the miserable poverty of the royal exchequer were from the beginning the chief dangers of the new government. The Despensers showed little capacity as administrators, and their greed and insolence soon caused old hatreds to be revived. In particular. Queen Isabella became a furious enemy of the younger Despenser, by whose counsel, it was believed, she was on 28 Sept. 1324 deprived of her lands and servants, and