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The Battle of Leipzig: The Dividing line.

26/8/2017

On the 16th October in 1813, the Battle of Leipzig, also known as the Battle of the Nations began, it was to last for three days.
This battle was fought by the coalition armies of Prussia, Russia, Austria and Sweden against the French. By the end of this battle between 90,000 and 100,000 men lay dead or wounded.

The Battle of Leipzig was the single largest battle of the Napoleonic Wars. The total amount of men taking part numbered between 625,000 soldiers, 430,000 coalition forces against 195,000 French. At the end of the battle the French were defeated and Napoleon returned home. A year later the coalition forces invaded France forcing Napoleon to abdicate and into exile. The Battle of Leipzig, with a fire power of 2,200 guns, was the biggest military engagement in Europe until the First World War.

I always think of the Napoleonic Wars in terms of 'modern warfare,' a dividing line between the medieval and modern battles fought from 1914 on wards, but what sets these battles apart from what I think of as modern combat are the relative proximity of the armies to each other upon the battle field. In this they were fought just like many a medieval battle, on a single field with units in close formation, massed ranks stretching out over the rolling countryside and opposing sides facing each other fighting over a short period of time. Modern warfare however is highly complex, it is military theatre fought with increasingly high tech conventional weapons for reasons that completely flummox me.

Of modern warfare Ernest Hemingway wrote:

"They wrote in the old days that it is sweet and fitting to die for one's country. But in modern war,
there is nothing sweet nor fitting in you dying. You will die like a dog for no good reason."

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Battle of Crecy

25/8/2017

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Today in 1346, at Crecy-en-Ponthieu in northern France, a battle was fought that historians argue was the most important battle of the Hundred Years war.

Dr Ian Mortimer wrote of Crecy:

"In July 1346 Edward landed at St Vaast-la-Hogue with about twelve thousand men and proceeded to fight his way across Normandy. He knew that a French army, when it gathered, was bound to outnumber him; but he knew that if he could force the French men-at-arms to charge uphill within range of his carefully arranged archers, he would be able to destroy them with the minimum of actual hand-to-hand fighting. Edward’s victory over the French at Crécy on 26 August 1346 astounded all of Christendom. It was doubly astonishing, for it was not just unexpected, it had obviously been carefully planned. Edward had achieved a military superiority over all his enemies. In later campaigns in France and Scotland in the 1350s he sought to repeat his success; he was never defeated."

An account of the Battle of Crecy, was written by a Colins de Beaumont, who may have been a witness to the battle. The poem is in the form of a dream where soldiers mourn the deaths of the fallen and recall their heroic deeds.

There I saw cast in the middle of the floor
Many a ragged standard
And many a defouled coat,
And many a shield so shattered and so scratched
That no colour nor hue appeared upon them
Ah, Lord! I was so anguished
That I was seeing so many insignia there
And none that I could recognize,
Whether it were a little pennant or a standard,
A shield, a surcoat, or a pommel ornament:
All were dismantled and all were broken.

Colins de Beaumont “On the Crecy Dead”

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Death of a Mystic

25/8/2017

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On the 26th August 1785, a body of a dead man was extracted from a shaft that had been sunk into the darkest depths of an Italian fortress, the man's name was Giuseppe Balsamo.

To the authorities, the man known as Count Alessandro di Cagliostro was a forger and a fraud, to the easily lead he was an alchemist, a healer and a wizard, but of himself he said

“I am not of any time or of any place; beyond time and space my spiritual being lives an eternal existence."

Giuseppe Balsamo was born in the old Jewish quarter of Palermo in Sicily to a family who had suffered from the bankruptcy of an earlier generation. Despite the family lack of money, Balsamo had a good education at a local Catholic monastery where he had a interest in chemistry and physics but an even keener interest in the dark arts, probably the reason he was later expelled. At the age of seventeen, he took his first step into the world of crime, convincing a wealthy goldsmith to part with seventy pieces of silver to fund a venture to find buried treasure that would make them both rich. The goldsmith only received a very large bump on his head and Balsamo, a first class ticket to Malta. It was here in 1766 that he honed his skills as a pharmacist employed by the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, a Catholic religious order and the worlds oldest surviving order of chivalry.

Two years later, Balsamo was in Rome working for the Orsini family, it was here that his 'career' really began, unsatisfied and bored Balsamo began leading a double life, selling magical Egyptian amulets and forged engravings that he passed off as 'antiques.' Now married, he traveled to London, where he met the Comte de Saint Germain, an eighteenth century Walter Mitty, who had an interest in science and the arts and like Balsamo, a practicing occultist.

After travelling through much of Europe, Balsamo eventually arrived in France and in 1780 played a major part in what was to become known as The Affair of the Diamond Necklace, a scandal in the court of Louis XVI which severely damaged the reputation of Louis's queen, Marie Antoinette. By implication, she had participated in a crime to defraud the crown jeweler's of the cost of a diamond necklace, as had Balsamo, but no evidence was found to connect him. He was acquitted but made to leave the country. He sailed for England and later he made his way back to Rome where he continued with his criminal activities, but this time associating himself with the wrong people, two of which were spies of the Inquisition.

On 27 December 1789, he was arrested and imprisoned, firstly in the Castle of Santangelo on a charge of freemasonry, his death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. After many attempts to escape his judges said

"let him be in placed in perpetual imprisonment in some fortress, closely guarded, with no hope for pardon.”

Balsamo prison turned out to be the Fortress of San Leo, whose high towers can be seen from the valley below. Giuseppe Balsamo had been lowered from a hatch into a narrow, ten metre square room and left to die.

No amount of spells or incantations helped him this time.

You may have seen the 2001 film entitled The Affair of the Necklace where the wonderfully sinister Christopher Walken played Count Cagliostro/Giuseppe Balsamo.

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The Bloody Assizes Begins

25/8/2017

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It was on this day in 1685, that trials began in Winchester that have come to be known as the Bloody Assizes.

On trial were over one thousand men - rebels who took part in the Monmouth Rebellion. Nearly all would die the horrible death by hanging, disembowelling and quartering, others were transported to the West Indies.

The judges were Sir Henry Pollexfen, Sir Creswell Levinz, Sir Francis Wythens, Sir Robert Wright and Sir William Montague and at their head, Lord Chief Justice George Jeffreys.

Judge Jeffreys was a hard, bitter and vengeful man, who Gilbert Burnet in his History of My Own Time writes of Jeffrey.

"His behaviour was beyond anything that was ever heard of in a civilized nation. He was perpetually either drunk or in a rage, liker a fury that the zeal of a judge. He required the prisoners to plead guilty. And in that case he gave them some hope of favour, if they gave him no trouble; otherwise he told them, he would execute the letter of the law upon them in its utmost severity."

Whether you were old and female made no difference as Lady Alice Lisle would find out to her cost.

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James Watt

25/8/2017

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James Watt was a Scottish engineer, famous for his improvements to the steam engine.

The steam or Atmospheric Engine was used to pump water from coal mines. This steam engine had been invented in 1712 by Thomas Newcomen, but it is Watt who is remembered as one of the great engineers of the industrial revolution.

Watt was born to a wealthy shipwright from Greenock on the 19th January in 1736. At the start of his engineering career he began making mathematical instruments, but was soon branching out into the world of mechanics.

At the age of twenty-eight, Watt was given one of Newcomen's engines to repair, but he soon came to the conclusion that it was far from efficient and Watt's changes doubled fuel efficiency.

Thomas Newcomen's engine could be found in hundred of coal mines, but it was soon replaced with Watt's new design, and as stated previously, it was Watt, not Newcomen who is credited with the advances in the mining industry. Of course mine owners welcomed the change, for there was a greater demand for coal, they felt the benefits in their pockets. However, improved efficiency has its draw backs, and as a result coal mines got deeper and deeper and coal mining became more and more dangerous, for instance, in one year in an unnamed coal mine, 58 deaths out of a total of 349, involved children thirteen years or younger.

James Watt died on the 25th August 1819 and is buried at Handsworth near Birmingham.

You can read about life in the coal mines by clicking on the link below.

meanderingthroughtime.weebly.com/taylor-of-yorkshire.html

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Deaths of Richard Empson and Edmund Dudley

15/8/2017

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Thomas Penn, in his book The Winter King, referred to Henry VII as a miser and stated that ‘money was dearest to his heart.’

In the image below we can see Henry with two of his ministers, Edmund Dudley and Richard Empson, no doubt discussing fiscal policy.

Richard Empson was in charge of recovering money owed to the king and was associated with Edmund Dudley in this capacity, both men, despite following Henry's orders, were hated by the kings subjects, they also had a number of person within court who they may have crossed. When Henry VII died in the April of 1509 and his son ascended England's throne, both Empson and Dudley's days were numbered, who was whispering in the new king's ear?

Henry VIII had both men arrested the day after he became king, and they were the first to fall victim to Henry ridding the court of men who were disliked in his fathers time, and who he considered would damage to his new reign.

Dudley, whose descendants would go on to do rather well in the reign of Edward VI and Elizabeth I, was thought to pay too much attention to feathering his own nest and both men were considered to be tough enforcers of the law.

Following their arrest they were convicted of treason in the October of 1509 and executed this day in 1510 on Tower Hill.

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Marriage of Margaret Tudor to Archibald Douglas

5/8/2017

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The death of King James IV of Scotland in the September of 1513, whilst he was leading his troops in the Battle of Flodden, left Margaret a widow with an infant son. Just under a year later Margaret would marry Archibald Douglas, Earl of Angus.

Of this marriage Polydore Virgil wrote

"This year also Margaret, queen of Scots, wife of James IV killed at Flodden in the fifth year of the king's reign, and elder sister of the King, after the death of her husband married Archibald Douglas, Earl of Angus, without the consent of the King her brother or the council of Scotland, with which he was not pleased. But after that there arose such strife between the lords of Scotland that she and her husband came into England like banished persons, and wrote to the King for mercy and comfort. The King, ever inclined to mercy, sent them clothing and vessels and all things necessary, wishing them to stay in Northumberland until they knew further of his wishes. And the queen was there delivered of a fair lady called Margaret, and all the country were commanded by the King to do them pleasure."

Her marriage to Douglas gave the Scottish Parliament an excuse to replace her with John Stewart, Duke of Albany.

In this extract from a 1950's tale of Margaret defending herself and the rights of her son.

"My lord," she said, her fingers clutched together to still their trembling, "be you sure no person in the world desires the good of my bairns so much as I do. No man will I support who seeks to harm the rights and privileges of my son's crown, but rather will I do all in my power to bring him justice." She looked round at the lords, her adversaries, but the most of them, playing nervously with quill or sand-box, would not meet her gaze. Only Albany stared at her steadfastly, his thoughts hidden behind the curtain of his eyes. "Do not think," she went on, "that I ever consented to such things as you accuse me of. It will never be found that I did aught to hurt the privilege of my son's crown or mine own honour. I pray you, therefore, my lord Duke, give no credence to such vile slanders of me."

With Douglas, Mary would have one child, a daughter, Margaret who would later give birth to Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, the ill fated husband of Mary Queen of Scots.

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The Battle of Evesham

2/8/2017

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4th August 1265

Following King John to the throne of England in 1216 was his son Henry III. Henry turned out to be an intelligent man who was quick to master the problems of administration and government, he was also seen as an

"uncomplicated, almost naive man, and a lover of peace."

It seems then that England would, at last, be a calm and peaceful country, however this was not to be.

In our tales of history, the events of 1258 to 1265, were played out through the actions of a man who would come to be known as "the father of the English parliament" - Simon de Montfort, who Chronicler Matthew Paris describes as dictatorial and a military strategist, stating he was charismatic, plain spoken and fair.

Many of Henry III's barons had become a law unto themselves and they were now seeing Henry as weak, David Carpenter writes that Henry “failed as a ruler due to his naivety and inability to produce realistic plans for reform” and Henry did not do himself any favours, his personal extravagances that had resulted in large taxes and a major fall out with de Montfort did not help matters either. In 1238, in a blatant piece of favouritism towards de Montfort (interestingly, one of the reasons de Montfort took a dislike Henry III was because of his favouritism towards foreign nobles - it seems he conveniently forgot that he was a favoured foreigner himself !) Henry had approved de Montfort’s marriage to his sister Eleanor, and both Henry and de Montfort chose to ignore the condemnation of the marriage by the Archbishop of Canterbury along with the protest made by Henry's brother, the greedy Richard of Cornwall, who made a song and dance of the whole episode, however he was eventually bought on side for a couple of bags of gold. Henry also appointed de Montfort as Governor of Gascony, a mistake that cost him dearly. In Gascony, Montfort was disliked, but he was powerful and he abused his position and this forced Henry to intervene. On Montfort's return to England, he too perceived Henry as weak and with the barons eager for a fight, Simon de Montfort stepped into take charge.

It was Simon de Monfort who lead the rebellion against his one time friend, and after the Battle of Lewes in 1264 both the king and his son Edward, later Edward I, were captured and it was de Montfort who ruled in his name. Eventually though,de Montfort lost the support of many of Henry's disaffected barons, this along with Edward's escape would be the beginning of the end of Simon de Montfort's rule.

Edward had raised an army that outnumbered de Montfort's forces and had pursued them through the Welsh Marches to the Worcestershire town of Evesham. Edward arrived there on the morning of the 4th of August 1265. This arrival had taken de Montfort by surprise, but he was quick to respond and taking the king along with him engaged Edward's army, however within hours the battle turned into what can only be described as a massacre, one historian writing that it was "an episode of noble bloodletting unprecedented since the Conquest." quickly followed by Simon de Montfort's grizzly end, a fact that bears witness to the slaughter.

Of de Montforts death there is a contemporary account that is attributed to a London chronicler name Arnald FitzThedmar.

"The head of the Earl of Leicester, it is said, was severed from his body, and his testicles cut off and hung on
either side of his nose. In this state, the head was sent to the wife of Roger de Mortimer, at Wigmore Castle.
Simon de Montfort’s hands and feet were also cut off, and sent to many of his enemies as a great mark of dishonour
to the deceased. The trunk of his body, however, and that alone, was given for burial in the church of Evesham."

Also losing their lives that day were Simon's son Henry, and Peter de Montfort who both died in the battle. Hugh Despencer, Chief Justiciar of England, grandfather of the more famous Hugh Despencer the younger, was slain at the hands of Roger Mortimer.

Roger Mortimer holds up the severed head of Simon de Montfort by artist Matthew Ryan. http://matthewryanhistoricalillustrator.com/

By 1267 the problems between Henry and his barons, that were based on the 1258/9 provisions, had still not settled down and a new set of laws were needed. On the 18th or 19th of November 1267, in a Parliament at Marlborough the twenty nine chapters that made up the Statute of Marlborough, was passed. The kings last few years saw his power restored and it was a relatively peaceful one following the signing of the Dictum of Kenilworth. Henry was sensible enough to pass many of Simon de Montfort's ideas and changes to government, and this act was brought into play by the end of October 1266.

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