Henry of Grosmont, Duke of
Lancaster (c.1310 – 23 March 1361), also Earl of
Derby and Leicester, was a member of the English nobility in the
14th century, and a prominent English
diplomat, politician, and
soldier. The son and heir of
Henry Plantagenet, 3rd
Earl of Lancaster and
Maud
Chaworth, he became one of
Edward III’s most trusted Captains in
the early phases of the
Hundred Years' War, and
distinguished himself with victory in the
Battle of Auberoche. He was a founding
member of the
Order of the
Garter, and in 1351 was promoted to the title of duke. Grosmont
was also the author of the book
Livre de seyntz medicines;
a highly personal devotional treatise.
He is remembered as
one of the founders and early patrons of Corpus Christi
College, Cambridge
, which was established by two of the guilds of the
town in 1352.
Family background and early life
Grosmont's uncle,
Thomas of
Lancaster, was the son and heir of
Edward I’s brother
Edmund Crouchback.
Through his inheritance and a fortunate marriage, Thomas became the
wealthiest peer in England, but constant quarrels with King
Edward II led to his execution
in 1322. Having no heir, Thomas’s possessions and titles went to
his younger brother
Henry – Grosmont’s father. Earl
Henry of Lancaster assented to the deposition of Edward II in 1327,
but did not long stay in favour with the regency of
Queen Isabella and
Roger Mortimer. When
Edward III took personal
control of the government in 1330, relations with the Crown got
better, but by this time the older Henry was already struggling
with poor health and blindness.
Little is
known of Grosmont's early years, but it seems clear that he was
born at the castle of Grosmont
in Monmouthshire, and
that he was born c.1310, not around the turn of the
century as previously held. According to his own memoirs he
was better at the
martial arts than at
academic subjects, and did not learn to read until later in life.
In 1330 he was knighted, and represented his father in
parliament.
The next year he is
recorded as participating in a Royal tournament, at Cheapside
.
In 1333 he
took part in Edward’s Scottish
campaign,
though it is unclear whether he was present at the great English
victory at the Battle of Halidon Hill
. After further service in the north
, he was
appointed the King's lieutenant in Scotland in 1336. The
next year he was one of the six men Edward III promoted to the
higher levels of the peerage. One of his father’s lesser titles,
that of
Earl of Derby, was bestowed
upon Grosmont.
Service in France
With the
outbreak of the Hundred Years'
War in 1337, Grosmont's attention was turned towards France
. He
took part in several diplomatic missions and minor campaigns, and
was present at the great English victory in the naval
battle of Sluys in 1340. Later the same
year, he was required to commit himself as hostage in the
Low Countries for the king’s considerable
debts. He remained hostage until the next year, and had to pay a
large ransom for his own release.
On his return he was made the king's
lieutenant in the north, and stayed at Roxburgh
until
1342. The next years he spent in diplomatic
negotiations in the Low Countries, Castile and Avignon
.
In 1345 Edward III was planning a major assault on France.
A
three-pronged attack would have the Earl of
Northampton attacking from Brittany,
the King himself from Flanders, while
Grosmont was dispatched to Aquitaine
to prepare a campaign in the south. Moving
rapidly through the country he confronted the
comte d’Isle at
Auberoche on 21 October, and here
achieved a victory described as 'the greatest single achievement of
Lancaster's entire military career'. The ransom from the prisoners
has been estimated at £50,000.
The next year, while Edward was carrying out
his Crécy campaign, Grosmont
laid siege to, and captured, Poitiers
, before returning home to England in
1347.
Duke of Lancaster
Coats of Arms of Edmund Crouchback,
Earl of Lancaster, and his successors
In 1345, while Grosmont was in France, his father died. The younger
Henry was now
Earl of Lancaster –
the wealthiest and most powerful peer of the realm. After
participating in the
siege of Calais
in 1347, the king honoured Lancaster by including him as a founding
knight of the
Order of the
Garter in 1348. A few years later, in 1351, Edward bestowed an
even greater honour on Lancaster, when he created him
Duke of Lancaster. The title of
duke was of relatively new origin in England; only one
other ducal title existed prior.
In addition to this, Lancaster was given
palatinate status for the county of
Lancashire
, which entailed a separate administration
independent of the crown. This grant was quite exceptional in
English history; only two other counties palatine existed: Durham, which was an ancient ecclesiastical
palatinate, and Chester
, which was crown property. It is a sign of
Edward’s high regard for Lancaster that he would bestow such
extensive privileges on him. The two men were also second cousins,
through their great-grandfather
Henry III, and practically coeval
(Edward was born in 1312), so it is natural to assume that a strong
sense of camaraderie existed between them. Another factor that
might have influenced the king’s decision was the fact that Henry
had no male heir, so the grant was made for the Earl’s lifetime
only, and not intended to be hereditary.
Further prestige
Lancaster spent the 1350s intermittently campaigning and
negotiating peace treaties with the French.
In 1350 he was
present at the naval victory at Winchelsea
, where he allegedly saved the lives of the Black Prince and John of Gaunt.
The years 1351-2 he spent on
crusade in
Prussia. It was here that a quarrel with
Otto,
Duke of Brunswick, almost led to a duel between the two men,
narrowly averted by the intervention of the French King,
Jean II. In the later half of the decade
campaigning in France resumed.
After a chevauchée in Normandy in 1356 and the siege of Rennes
in 1358,
Lancaster participated in the last great offensive of the first
phase of the Hundred Years’ War: the Rheims
campaign of
1359-60. Then he was appointed principal negotiator for the
treaty of Brétigny, where
the English achieved very favourable terms.
Returning
to England in November 1360 he fell ill early the next year, and
died at Leicester
Castle
on 23 March. It is likely that the cause of
death was the
plague, which that year
was making a second visitation of England.
Private life
Lancaster was married to Isabella, daughter of
Henry, Lord Beaumont, in 1330. The two had
no sons, but two daughters:
Maude and
Blanche. While Maude was married to the
Duke of Bavaria, Blanche
married Edward III’s younger son,
John of Gaunt. Gaunt
ended up inheriting Lancaster’s possessions and ducal title, but it
was not until 1377, when the dying King Edward III was largely
incapacitated, that he was able to restore the palatinate rights
for the county of Lancaster. When Gaunt’s son
Henry of Bolingbroke usurped the crown
in 1399 and became Henry IV, the vast Lancaster inheritance was
merged with the crown as the
Duchy of
Lancaster.
We know more of Lancaster's character than of most of his
contemporaries, through his memoirs the
Livre de seyntz
medicines (Book of the Holy Doctors). This book is a highly
personal treatise on matters of religion and piety, but it also
contains details of historical interest. It, among other things,
revealed that Lancaster, at the age of 44 when he wrote the book in
1354, suffered from
gout. The book is primarily
a devotional work though; it is organized around seven wounds which
Henry claims to have, representing the seven sins. Lancaster
confesses to his sins, explains various real and mythical medical
remedies in terms of their theological symbolism, and exhorts the
reader to greater morality.
Ancestry
Notes
a. In his early
years Henry was named, as was the custom of the age, after his
birthplace, Grosmont. In 1336 he was invested with one of his
father’s minor Earldoms – that of Derby, and became Henry, Earl of
Derby. Then, with his father’s death in 1345, he finally became
Henry of Lancaster – the main family name and title (Earl of
Lancaster until 1351, Duke of Lancaster thenceforth). However, to
avoid confusion with the father, it is customary to refer to the
son as Henry of Grosmont throughout his career.
b. This was the
Duke
of Cornwall, a title created for
Edward, the Black Prince in
1337.
Citations
References
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