Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 17.djvu/99

Edward took part in the jousts and other festivities of the court, and was invested by the king with the new order of the Garter. He shared in the king's chivalrous expedition to Calais in the last days of 1349, came to the rescue of his father, and when the combat was over and the king and his prisoners sat down to feast, he and the other English knights served the king and his guests at the first course and then sat down to meat at another table (, iv. 82). When the king embarked at Winchelsea on 28 Aug. 1350 to intercept the fleet of La Cerda, the prince sailed with him, though in another ship, and in company with his brother, the young Earl of Richmond (John of Gaunt). His ship was grappled by a large Spanish ship and was so full of leaks that it was likely to sink, and though he and his knights attacked the enemy manfully, they were unable to take her. The Earl of Lancaster came to his rescue and attacked the Spaniard on the other side; she was soon taken, her crew were thrown into the sea, and as the prince and his men got on board her their own ship foundered (ib. p. 95;, Royal Navy, ii. 112). In 1353 some disturbances seem to have broken out in Cheshire, for the prince as earl marched with the Duke of Lancaster to the neighbourhood of Chester to protect the justices, who were holding an assize there. The men of the earldom offered to pay him a heavy fine to bring the assize to an end, but when they thought they had arranged matters the justices opened an inquisition of trailbaston, took a large sum of money from them, and seized many houses and much land into the prince's, their earl's, hands. On his return from Chester the prince is said to have passed by the abbey of Dieulacres in Staffordshire, to have seen a noble church which his grandfather, Edward I, had built there, and to have granted five hundred marks, a tenth of the sum he had taken from his earldom, towards its completion; the abbey was almost certainly not Dieulacres but Vale Royal (, c. 2606; Monasticon, v. 626, 704;, p. 468).

When Edward determined to renew the war with France in 1355, he ordered the prince to lead an army into Aquitaine while he, as his plan was, acted with the king of Navarre in Normandy, and the Duke of Lancaster upheld the cause of Montfort in Brittany. The prince's expedition was made in accordance with the request of some of the Gascon lords who were anxious for plunder. On 10 July the king appointed him his lieutenant in Gascony, and gave him powers to act in his stead, and, on 4 Aug., to receive homages (Fœdera, iii. 302, 312). He left London for Plymouth on 30 June, was detained there by contrary winds, and set sail on 8 Sept. with about three hundred ships, in company with the Earls of Warwick, Suffolk, Salisbury, and Oxford, and in command of a thousand men-at-arms, two thousand archers, and a large body of Welsh foot (, p. 201). At Bordeaux the Gascon lords received him with much rejoicing. It was decided to make a short campaign before the winter, and on 10 Oct. he set out with fifteen hundred lances, two thousand archers, and three thousand light foot. Whatever scheme of operations the King may have formed during the summer, this expedition of the prince was purely a piece of marauding. After grievously harrying the counties of Juliac, Armagnac, Astarac, and part of Comminges, he crossed the Garonne at Ste.-Marie a little above Toulouse, which was occupied by the Count of Armagnac and a considerable force. The count refused to allow the garrison to make a sally, and the prince passed on, stormed and burnt Mont Giscar, where many men, women, and children were ill-treated and slain (, iv. 163, 373), and took and pillaged Avignonet and Castelnaudary. All the country was rich, and the people 'good, simple, and ignorant of war,' so the prince took great spoil, especially of carpets, draperies, and jewels, for 'the robbers' spared nothing, and the Gascons who marched with him were specially greedy (, ii. 188;, iv. 165). Carcassonne was taken and sacked, but he did not take the citadel, which was strongly situated and fortified. Ourmes (or Homps, near Narbonne) and Trébes bought off his army. He plundered Narbonne and thought of attacking the citadel, for he heard that there was much booty there, but gave up the idea on finding that it was well defended. While he was there a messenger came to him from the papal court, urging him to allow negotiations for peace. He replied that he could do nothing without knowing his father's will (, p. 215). From Narbonne he turned to march back to Bordeaux. The Count of Armagnac tried to intercept him, but a small body of French having been defeated in a skirmish near Toulouse the rest of the army retreated into the city, and the prince returned in peace to Bordeaux, bringing back with him enormous spoils. The expedition lasted eight weeks, during which the prince only rested eleven days in all the places he visited, and without performing any feat of arms did the French king much mischief (letter of Sir John Wingfield,, p. 222). During the next month, before 21 Jan. 1356, the leaders under his command reduced five towns