Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1

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[Footnote 73: M. Creton says (and in this he is
followed by others) that the King, on the very day
of his accession, created his eldest son Prince of
Wales, who in that character stood on the right
hand of the King at the coronation, holding in his
hand a sword without any point, the emblem of peace
and mercy. But in this he seems to have been
partially mistaken. Henry was not created Prince of
Wales till after his father's coronation, and he
bore in right of the Duchy of Lancaster, and by
command of the King, the blunted sword called
Curtana, which belonged to Edward the
Confessor.--Rot. Serv.]

[Footnote 74: In the same Parliament he was
invested also with the titles of Duke of Acquitaine
and Duke of Lancaster.]

[Footnote 75: The Parliament had no voice in the
creation of a dignity. The Lords and Commons were
consulted on this occasion only out of courtesy by
the King.]

[Footnote 76: The proposal, of which Froissart has
left a graphic description, that Isabella, the
widow (if that be the proper designation of the
child who was the espoused wife) of Richard II,
should remain in England and be married to the
Prince of Wales, was not made till after Richard's
death.]

About the close of the present year, or the commencement of the
following (1400), the Prince makes a direct appeal to the council,[77]
that they would forthwith fulfil the expressed desire of his royal
father with reference to his princely state and condition in all
points. He requires them first of all to determine upon his place of
residence, and the sources of his income; and then to take especial
care that the King's officers, each in his own department and post of
duty, should fully and perfectly put into execution whatever orders
the council might give. "You are requested (says the memorial) to
consider how my lord the Prince is utterly destitute of every kind of
appointment relative to his household." The enumeration of his wants
specified in detail is somewhat curious: "that is to say, his
chapels,[78] chambers, halls, wardrobe, pantry, buttery, kitchen, (p. 075)
scullery, saucery, almonry, anointry, and generally all things requisite
for his establishment."

[Footnote 77: Minutes of Privy Council, vol. ii. p.
42.]

[Footnote 78: "Ses chapelles." Under this word were
included not only the place of prayer, but the
books, and vestments, and furniture, together with
the priests, and whatever else was necessary for
divine worship. Indeed, the word has often a still
wider signification. We shall see hereafter that
Henry was always attended by his chapel during his
campaigns in France.]

* * * * *

It has been already intimated in the Preface, that an examination
would be instituted in the course of this work into the correspondence
of Shakspeare's representations of Henry's character and conduct with
the real facts of history, and we will not here anticipate that
inquiry. Only it may be necessary to observe, as we pass on, that the
period of his life when the poet first describes him to be revelling
in the deepest and foulest sinks of riot and profligacy, as nearly as
possible corresponds with the date of this petition to the council to
supply him with a home.

It was in the very first week of the year 1400 that Henry IV.
discovered the treasonable plot, laid by the Lords Salisbury,
Huntingdon, and others, to assassinate him during some solemn justs
intended to be held at Oxford, professedly in honour of his accession.
The King was then at Windsor; and, immediately on receiving
information of the conspiracy, he returned secretly, but with all
speed, to London.[79] The defeat of these treasonable designs, and (p. 076)
the execution of the conspirators, are matter of general history; and,
as the name of the Prince does not occur even incidentally in any
accounts of the transaction, we need not dwell upon it. Probably he
was then living with his father under the superintendence of Henry
Beaufort, now Bishop of Winchester, from whom indeed up to this time
he seems to have been much less separated than from his parent. We
have already seen that, whether for the benefit of the "young bachelor,"
or, with an eye to his own security, unwilling to leave so able an
enemy behind, King Richard, when he took the boy Henry with him to
Ireland, caused his uncle and tutor (Henry Beaufort) to accompany him
also.[80] The probability also has been shown to approach demonstration
that his residence in Oxford could not have taken place at this time;
but that it preceded his father's banishment, rather than followed his
accession to the throne. Be this as it may, history (as far as it
appears) makes no direct mention of the young Prince Henry through the
spring of 1400.

[Footnote 79: Some chroniclers say, that the
conspiracy was made known to the Mayor of London,
who forthwith hastened to the King at Windsor, and
urged him to save himself and his children. The
same pages tell us that John Holland Earl of
Huntingdon was seized and beheaded in Essex by the
Dowager Countess of Hereford.--Sloane MS.]

[Footnote 80: Pat. p. 3, 22 Ric. II.]

Soon, however, after the conspiracy against his father's life had been
detected and frustrated, an event took place, already alluded to, which
must have filled the warm and affectionate heart of Henry with feelings
of sorrow and distress,--the premature death of Richard. That Henry
had formed a sincere attachment for Richard, and long cherished (p. 077)
his memory with gratitude for personal kindness, is unquestionable;
and doubtless it must have been a source of anxiety and vexation to
him that his father was accused in direct terms of having procured the
death of the deposed monarch. He probably was convinced that the
charge was an ungrounded calumny; yet, with his generous indignation
roused by the charge of so foul a crime, he must have mingled feelings
of increased regret at the miserable termination of his friend's life.

The name of Henry of Monmouth has never been associated with Richard's
except under circumstances which reflect credit on his own character.
The bitterest enemies of his house, who scrupled not to charge Henry
IV. with the wilful murder of his prisoner, have never sought to
implicate his son in the same guilt in the most remote degree, or even
by the gentlest whisper of insinuation. Whether Richard died in
consequence of any foul act at the hand of an enemy, or by the fatal
workings of a harassed mind and broken heart, or by self-imposed
abstinence from food, (for to every one of these, as well as to other
causes, has his death been severally attributed,) is a question
probably now beyond the reach of successful inquiry. The whole subject
has been examined by many able and, doubtless, unprejudiced persons;
but their verdicts are far from being in accordance with each other.
The general (though, as it should now seem, the mistaken) opinion
appears to be, that after Richard had been removed from the Tower (p. 078)
to Leeds Castle, and thence to other places of safe custody, and had
finally been lodged in Pontefract,[81] the partisans of Henry IV.
hastened his death. The Archbishop of York directly charged the King
with the foul crime of murder, which he as positively and indignantly
denied.[82] The minutes of the Privy Council have not been sufficiently
noticed by former writers on this event; and the reflections of the
Editor,[83] in his Preface, are so sensible and so immediately to the
point, that we may be contented in these pages to do little more than
record his sentiments.[84]

[Footnote 81: The Pell Rolls contain several
interesting entries connected with this subject.
Payment for a thousand masses to be said for the
soul of Richard, "whose body is buried in Langley."
(20th March, 1400.) Payment also for carrying the
body from Pomfret to London, &c.]

[Footnote 82: See Henry's answer to the Duke of
Orleans, as recorded by Monstrellet, in which he
solemnly appeals to God for the vindication of the
truth.]

[Footnote 83: Sir Harris Nicolas. "Proceedings and
Ordinances of the Privy Council of England."]

[Footnote 84: Mr. Tytler, in his History of
Scotland, maintains with much ingenuity the
paradoxical position, that Richard escaped from
Pontefract, made his way in disguise to the Western
Isles, was there recognised, and was conducted to
the Regent; that, taken into the safe keeping of
the government, and sick of the world and its
disappointments, he lived for many years in
Stirling Castle; and that he there died, and there
was buried. It falls not within the province of
these Memoirs to examine the facts and reasonings
by which that writer supports his theory, or to
weigh the value of the objections which have been
alleged against it. The Author, however, in
confessing that the result of his own inquiries is
opposed to the hypothesis of Richard's escape, and
that he acquiesces in the general tradition that he
died in Pontefract, cannot refrain from making one
remark. Whilst he is persuaded that Glyndowr, and
many others, believed that Richard was alive in
Scotland, yet he thinks it almost capable of
demonstration that Henry IV, with his sons and his
court, in England; and Charles VI, with his court
and clergy, and Isabella herself, and her second
husband, had no doubt whatever as to Richard's
death. If they had, if they were not fully assured
that he was no longer among the living, it is
difficult to understand Henry IV.'s proposals to
Charles VI. for a marriage between Isabella and one
of his sons; or how, on any other hypothesis than
the conviction of his death, the Earl of Angouleme,
afterwards Duke of Orleans, would have sought her
in marriage; how her father and his clergy could
have consented to her nuptials; or how she could
for a moment have entertained the thought of
becoming a bride again. She had not only been
betrothed to Richard, but had been with all
solemnity married to him by the Archbishop of
Canterbury in the face of the church; and she had
been crowned queen. Yet she was married to
Angouleme in 1406, and died in childbed in 1409.
Had she believed Richard to be still alive, she
would have been more inclined to follow the bidding
which Shakspeare puts into her husband's mouth at
their last farewell, than to have given her hand
before the altar to another:

"Hie thee to France,
And cloister thee in some religious house."

Froissart says expressly that the French resolved
to wage war with the English as long as they knew
Richard to be alive; but when certain news of his
death reached them, they were bent on the
restoration of Isabella.]

"Shortly after the attempt of the Earls of Kent, Salisbury, and (p. 079)
Huntingdon to restore Richard to the throne, a great council was held
for the consideration of many important matters. The first point was
'that if Richard the late king be alive, as some suppose he is, (p. 080)
it be ordained that he be well and securely guarded for the salvation
of the state of the King and of his kingdom.' On which subject the
council resolved, that it was necessary to speak to the King, that, in
case Richard the late king be still living, he be placed in security
agreeably to the law of the realm; but if he be dead, then that he be
openly showed to the people, that they may have knowledge thereof."
These minutes (observes Sir Harris Nicolas) appear to exonerate
Henry[85] from the generally received charge of having sent Sir Piers
Exton to Pontefract for the purpose of murdering his prisoner. Had
such been the fact, it is impossible to believe that one of Henry's
ministers would have gone through the farce of submitting the above
question to the council; or that the council would, with still greater
absurdity, have deliberated on the subject, and gravely expressed the
opinion which they offered to the King. A corpse, which was said to be
that of Richard, was publicly exhibited at St. Paul's by Henry's
direction, and he has been accused of substituting the body of some
other person; but these minutes prove that the idea of such an
exposure came from the council, and, at the moment when it was
suggested, they actually did not know whether Richard was dead or
alive, because they provided for either contingency. It is also (p. 081)
demonstrated by them that, so far from any violence or ill-treatment
being meditated in case he were living, the council merely recommended
that he should be placed in such security as might be approved by the
peers of the realm.[86] It must be observed that this new piece of
evidence, coupled with the fact that a corpse said to be the body of
Richard was exhibited shortly after the meeting of the council,
strongly supports the belief that he died about the 14th of February
1400, and that Henry and his council were innocent of having by unfair
means produced or accelerated his decease."

[Footnote 85: It is painful to hear the Church
historian, without any qualifying expression of
doubt or hope, call Henry IV. "the murderer of
Richard."--Milner, cent. xv.]

[Footnote 86: Froissart expressly says, that,
though often urged to it, Henry would never consent
to have Richard put to death.]

Such we may hope to have been the case: at all events, the purpose of
this work does not admit of any fuller investigation of the points at
issue. If Henry were accessory to Richard's death, (to use an
expression quoted as that unhappy king's own words,)[87] "it would be
a reproach to him for ever, so long as the world shall endure, or the
deep ocean be able to cast up tide or wave." It is, however,
satisfactory to find in these authentic documents evidence which seems
to justify us in adopting no other alternative than to return for
Bolinbroke a verdict of "Not guilty." The corpse[88] of Richard was
carried through the city of London to St. Paul's with much of religious
ceremony and solemn pomp, Henry himself as King bearing the pall, (p. 082)
"followed by all those of his blood in fair array." After it had been
inspected by multitudes, (Froissart[89] says by more than twenty
thousand,) it was buried at Langley, where Richard had built a Dominican
convent. Henry V, soon after his accession, removed the corpse to
Westminster Abbey, and, laid it by the side of Ann, Richard's former
queen, in the tomb which he had prepared for her and himself.[90]

[Footnote 87: See Archaeologia, xx. 290.]

[Footnote 88: M. Creton.]

[Footnote 89: Froissart asserts that the corpse was
exposed in the street of Cheap to public inspection
for two hours, at the least.]

[Footnote 90: A manuscript in the French King's
library (No. 8448) states that Sir Piers d'Exton
and seven other assassins entered the room to kill
him; but that Richard, pushing down the table,
darted into the midst of them, and, snatching a
battleaxe from one, laid four of them dead at his
feet, when Exton felled him with a blow at the back
of his head, and, as he was crying to God for
mercy, with another blow despatched him. This
account is supposed to be entirely disproved by the
fact that, when Richard's tomb was accidentally
laid open a few years ago in Westminster Abbey, the
head was carefully examined, and no marks of
violence whatever appeared on it. (See Archaeologia,
vol. vi. p. 316, and vol. xx. p. 284.) On the other
hand, it is equally obvious to remark, that, if
Henry IV. did exhibit to the people the body of
another person for that of Richard, it was the
substituted body which was buried, first at Langley
and afterwards at Westminster. The absence,
consequently, of all marks of violence on that
body, till its identity with the corpse of Richard
is established, proves nothing. But surely there is
no reason to believe that any deception was
practised. There could have been no motive for such
fraud, and the strongest reasons must have existed
to dissuade Henry from adopting it. The only object
wished to be secured by the exposure of Richard's
corpse, (and it was exposed at all the chief places
between Pontefract and London,--at night after the
offices for the dead, in the morning after mass,)
was the removal of all doubt as to his being really
dead. The false rumours were, not that he was
murdered, but that he was alive. Among the
thousands who flocked to see him were doubtless
numbers of his friends and wellwishers, familiarly
acquainted with his features, many of whom, it is
thought, must have detected any imposture, and some
of whom would surely have been bold enough to
publish it. Still, on the other hand, it is
suggested that a very short lapse of time after
dissolution effects so material a change in a
corpse, that the most intimate of a man's friends
would often not be able to recognise a single
feature in his countenance. And certainly many of
Richard's friends remained unconvinced.]

Henry IV. had no sooner gained the throne of England, than he was made
to feel that he could retain possession of it only by unremitting
watchfulness, and by a vigorous overthrow of each successive (p. 083)
design of his enemies as it arose. In addition as well to the hostility
of France (whose monarch and people were grievously incensed by the
deposition of Richard), as to the restless warfare of the Scots, he
was compelled to provide against the more secret and more dangerous
machinations of his own subjects.[91] After the discovery and defeat
of the plot laid by the malcontent lords in the beginning of January
(1400), he first employed himself in making preparations to repress
the threatened aggressions of his northern neighbours. His council (p. 084)
had received news as early as the 9th of February of the intention of
the Scots to invade England; indeed, as far back as the preceding
November, the petition of the Commons informs us that they considered
war with Scotland inevitable. On this campaign Henry IV. resolved to
enter in his own person, and he left London for the North in the June
following. Our later historians seem not to have entertained any doubts
as to the accuracy of some early chroniclers, when they state that
Henry of Monmouth was sent on towards Scotland as his father's
representative, in command of the advanced guard, in the opening of
the summer[92] of 1400. Elmham states the general fact that Henry was
sent on with the first troops, but in the manuscript there is a
"Quaere" in the margin in the same hand-writing. And the querist seems
to have had sufficient reasons for expressing his doubts as to the
accuracy of such a statement. The renown of the Prince as a youthful
warrior will easily account for any premature date assigned to his
earliest campaign; whilst the age of his father, who was seen at the
head of the invading army in Scotland, might perhaps have contributed
to a mistake. The King himself, at that time personally little known
among his subjects, was not more than thirty-four years old.[93] (p. 085)
Be this as it may, we have great reason to believe that Henry IV, when
he proceeded northward, left the Prince of Wales at home. In the first
place, we must remember that, among their primary and most solemn acts
after the King's coronation, the Commons, anticipating the certainty
of this expedition into Scotland, preferred to him a petition, praying
that the Prince by reason of his tender age might not go thither, "nor
elsewhere forth of the realm." The letter too of Lord Grey of Ruthyn,
to which we must hereafter refer, announcing the turbulent state of
Wales, and the necessity of suppressing its disorders with a stronger
hand, can best be explained on the supposition that the King was absent
at the date of that letter,[94] about Midsummer 1400, and that the
Prince was at home. Lord Grey addresses his letter to the Prince, and
not to the King; though the King, as well as the Prince, had commissioned
him to put down the rising disturbances in his neighbourhood.[95] Some,
perhaps, may think this intelligible on the ground that Lord Grey wrote
to Henry as Prince of Wales, and therefore more immediately (p. 086)
intrusted with the preservation of its peace. But his suggestion to
the Prince to take the advice of the King's council,--"with advice of
our liege lord his council,"--is scarcely consistent with the idea of
the King himself being at hand to give the necessary directions and a
"more plainer commission."

[Footnote 91: Chroniclers give an account of an
extraordinary instrument of death laid in Henry's
bed by some secret plotter against his life. The
Sloane Manuscript describes it as a machine like
the engine called the Caltrappe; and the Monk of
Evesham says that it was reported to have been laid
for Henry by one of Isabella's household.]

[Footnote 92: Modern writers have erroneously
referred to this year Monstrelet's account of Henry
of Monmouth's expedition to Scotland.]

[Footnote 93: A curious item in the Pell Rolls (14
December 1401) intimates that Henry IV. amused
himself with the sports of the field, and at the
same time tells us that such amusements were by no
means unexpensive in those days: "Sixteen pounds
paid by the King to Sir Thomas Erpyngham as the
price of a sparrow-hawk."]

[Footnote 94: June 14, he wrote to his council from
Clipstone in Nottinghamshire: July 4th, he was at
York.--Min. Council.]

[Footnote 95: "By our liege Lord his commandment,
and by yours."]

* * * * *

Be this however as it may: whether Henry of Monmouth's noviciate in
arms was passed on the Scotch borders, (for in Ireland, as the
companion of Richard, he had been merely a spectator,) or whether, as
the evidence seems to preponderate, we consider the chroniclers to
have antedated his first campaign, he was not allowed to remain long
without being personally engaged in a struggle of far greater magnitude
in itself, and of vastly more importance to the whole realm of England,
than any one could possibly infer from the brief and cursory references
made to it by the historians who are the most generally consulted by our
countrymen. The rebellion of Owyn Glyndowr[96] is despatched by Hume in
less than two octavo pages, though it once certainly struck a (p. 087)
panic into the very heart of England, and through the whole of Henry
IV.'s reign, more or less, involved a considerable portion of the
kingdom in great alarm; carrying devastation far and wide through some
of its fairest provinces; and at one period of the struggle, by the
succour of Henry's foreign and domestic enemies, with whom the Welsh
made common cause, threatening to wrest the sceptre itself from the
hands of that monarch. The part which his son Henry of Monmouth was
destined to take personally in resisting the progress of this rebellion,
and the evidence which the indisputable facts recorded of that protracted
contest bear to his character, (facts, most of which are comparatively
little known, and many of which are altogether new in history,) seem
to require at our hands a somewhat fuller investigation into the origin,
progress, and circumstances of this rebellion, than has hitherto been
undertaken by our chroniclers.

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