The Shadow King by Lauren Johnson

Author:Lauren Johnson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Epub3
Publisher: Pegasus Books

28

‘Rejoice, England, in concord and unity’1

Sandwich

28 August 1457

Early morning broke over the small Kentish port of Sandwich in a welter of clanging alarm bells, screams and dancing flames. Before dawn had roused the citizens from their beds, 3,000 Frenchmen had poured into the town, from land and sea. They had sailed from Honfleur, under the command of Pierre de Brézé, Charles VII’s trusted seneschal of Normandy, and anchored overnight in the Downs, ready to launch their attack at first light. Facing no effective resistance, the French ransacked the port, pillaging the wealthy merchants’ homes, seizing Englishmen as prisoners and then torching the town. John Benet’s Chronicle reported that as a mocking show of defiance the triumphant French spent the rest of the day playing tennis.2 It was evening before an English defence could be mounted and the French driven back into the sea, over 100 of them drowning as they attempted to board their ships.3

The attack may have been little more than a harrying expedition, but it left a deep impact on the English. For the first time in generations their shores had been invaded. It was yet another demonstration of how English fortunes had deteriorated since the glorious 1420s, when their soldiers had occupied most of northern France and their allies had lined the continental shoreline. It was widely believed that the attack on Sandwich was the precursor to a full-scale French invasion, perhaps even an attack on two fronts. For years, James II of Scotland had been trying to persuade Charles VII to join him in a combined assault on Henry’s realm.4

With such threats looming, it was vital that the English put aside their differences. Henry called on all his noblemen to unite against their common enemy and protect England’s borders. To defend the marches towards the Scottish border he needed the support of York, the Nevilles and their Percy rivals. The south coast, meanwhile, was put in the control of Lancastrian loyalists. In November Richard Woodville, Lord Rivers, a long-term Lancastrian servant married to Henry’s aunt Jaquetta, was made constable of Rochester Castle. Henry Beaufort, the young duke of Somerset, was given his first military command, inheriting his father’s role as custodian of Carisbrooke Castle and lieutenant of the Isle of Wight.5 If it seemed that the enemies of the House of York were being given too much authority, the role Henry accorded the earl of Warwick countered accusations of favouritism. During the second protectorate Warwick had been appointed captain of Calais and Henry had not overturned his appointment. By May 1457 Warwick and his countess, Anne Beauchamp,* were living in the last outpost of English rule in France, so it was a logical extension of his maritime authority to make him keeper of the seas in December 1457.6 Unfortunately this appointment offended Henry’s erstwhile supporter, the thin-skinned duke of Exeter, who viewed the extension of Warwick’s powers to the seas as a diminishment of his own position as lord admiral.7

The spectre of foreign invasion, rendered a

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