show how weak and incompetent a King Henry III. was, and how disorganised was the state of the nation.
With the exception of a piratical quarrel between the Bretons and the Channel Islanders in 1241,[1] there were no naval events of much importance until 1242, when, Henry having decided to assist his step-father. the Count de la Marche, against the King of France, and the king's brother, Richard, Earl of Cornwall, one of the best warriors of his age, having returned to England from a crusade, begun two years earlier, an expedition to Poitou was undertaken.
In January the barons of the Cinque Ports were ordered to assist the Sheriff of Kent in impressing ships for the king's service;[2] and they were subsequently empowered to arrest foreign vessels for the same purpose. On February 20th, the bailiffs of the ports were instructed to arrest all ships capable of carrying fifteen or more horses;[3] and persons were sent to each port with the object of securing a force of two hundred of the best vessels, each capable of carrying at least twenty horses, all of which were to be at Portsmouth by Palm Sunday, ready to transport the king's army.[4] The royal galleys from Ireland, Winchelsea, and other places were also ordered thither; and on March 21st, twenty of the best ships were directed to be reserved for the use of the king and of his suite, and to be stored and victualled accordingly.[5] The Cinque Ports furnished their proper quota. Henry went down to Portsmouth on April 21st.[6] He embarked with thirty casks filled with money,[7] and weighed on May 15th, accompanied by the queen, Richard, Earl of Cornwall, seven other earls, and three hundred knights; but the wind dropped, and the squadron did not get to sea until the 16th. It made Point Saint Mathieu, Finistère, on or about the 18th, and proceeded to the mouth of the Gironde, where the king landed, and went to Pons in Saintonge.[8] The French had ordered twenty-four well-armed galleys to La Rochelle to resist the invasion,[9] but the English expedition was not interfered with at sea.
The campaign, like the previous one, was futile and contemptible,
- ↑ Rotuli de Liberate, 25 Hen. III., m. 6.
- ↑ Pat. Rolls, 26 Hen. III., m. 11.
- ↑ Close Rolls, 26 Hen. III. m. 9; Pat. Rolls, i. m. 9.
- ↑ Ib., m. 7.
- ↑ Pat. Rolls, i. m. 8.
- ↑ Matt. Paris, 395.
- ↑ Close Rolls, 26 Hen. III. m. 7.
- ↑ Hemingford, 574; Matt. Paris, 395; Wilkes's Chron. 45; 'Annals of Waverley,' 203.
- ↑ Matt. Paris, 394.
