Armies of Plantagenet England, 11351337 by Gabriele Esposito;

Author:Gabriele Esposito;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History / Military / Medieval
Publisher: Casemate Publishers & Book Distributors, LLC
Published: 2022-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Infantryman with padded gambeson and chapel de fer helmet. (Photo and copyright by Confraternita del Leone/Historia Viva)

During 1242 and 1243, Henry III was involved in a new French conflict, known as the Saintonge War from the name of the region where it was fought. After having been lost by King John, the County of Poitou had been ruled by the French. Louis VIII had given it to his second oldest son, Alphonse, while as we have seen, his first son became his successor on the French throne as Louis IX. The Poitevin barons were unhappy with the idea of having the King of France’s brother as their feudal overlord, and when Alphonse came of age, they revolted against him. The rebellion was led by the most powerful of the Poitevin nobles, Hugh X of Lusignan. The barons of Poitou wanted to have Richard of Cornwall, the younger brother of Henry III, as their count, and asked the English monarch to support them in their rebellion. Louis IX assembled a very large army to help his brother and marched against the castle of Montreuil-Bonnin that was the main stronghold of the Lusignan family. Meanwhile, Henry III raised a force of 30,000 soldiers and set sail from Portsmouth. The King of England wanted to retake Poitou, which he considered to be a first step towards the restoration of the empire that had been lost by his father. On 20 July 1242, a decisive battle was fought between the forces of Henry III and Louis IX at Taillebourg, near the River Charente. Both sides deployed some 20,000 infantry, but the French had 4,000 heavy knights and the English just 1,600. The English attacked first, but were soon repulsed, after which a counter-attack by the French knights proved devastating and decided the outcome of the clash, with the strategic bridge crossing the Charente being occupied by Louis’ men. After their victory the French took the rebel city of Saintes and obliged Hugh of Lusignan to surrender. Fearing that Louis IX could now also invest his possessions in Aquitaine, Henry III organized a naval blockade of the French port city of La Rochelle in order to distract part of the French army. However, this operation also failed and Henry was forced to ask for a truce. Following defeat in the Saintonge War, Henry III had to abandon his plans for the reconquest of Angevin lands in France. On 4 December 1259, he signed a lasting peace treaty with Louis IX in Paris, according to which the English monarch was given the territory of Guyenne in exchange for renouncing all his claims on other French lands.

Infantryman with helmet with nasal and kite shield. (Photo and copyright by Confraternita del Leone/Historia Viva)

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