The Hundred Years War - Desmond Seward [106]
On 31 July 1449 Charles VII sent 30,000 troops into Normandy. They attacked from three directions—north, south and east. Instead of at least trying to concentrate his scattered handfuls of ill-paid, mutinous soldiers, Somerset left them in a score of garrisons and told them to hold on for as long as possible. Yet as he himself had reported that because of inadequate maintenance most English strongpoints ‘though they were stuffed with men and ordnance, they be so ruinous that they be unable to be defended’. In the north Pont-Audemer, Pont-l’Evêque and Lisieux had fallen by mid-August ; in the centre Verneuil, Mantes, Vernon and Argentan by early October; and in the south Coutances, Carentan, Saint-Lô and Valognes. Some commanders, especially the native Normans, opened their gates to the French without any attempt at resistance.
On 9 October Charles and the Bastard of Orleans (now Count of Dunois) encamped on the Seine only a few miles above Rouen. On 16 October the Bastard nearly rushed the walls, but Talbot managed to beat off the assault. However, the Rouennais had no intention of undergoing another siege like 1418 and rioted in the streets. Three days later a mob opened the gates and the entire English garrison took refuge in the citadel. Somerset had only 1,200 men, while ‘no corn, wood, meat or wine had been brought into the city for more than six weeks’ and he had no proper provisions. On 22 October Charles invested the citadel, digging trenches and erecting batteries. ‘Not a little alarmed‘, the Duke went out under a flag of truce to parley with the King, accompanied by forty knights and esquires and wearing ‘a long robe of blue figured velvet lined with sable fur and a hat of crimson velvet trimmed with sable’. Charles was unimpressed and sent him back. The French refused any terms which would not give them Talbot as a hostage. After twelve days of haggling, a surrender was agreed ; Somerset was allowed to retreat to Caen after handing over Talbot and promising to pay a large indemnity. Talbot had to watch glumly from a window as the French King made his ceremonial entry into Rouen, attended by his Garde Ecossaise. Shrewdly Charles issued an amnesty, pardoning the city’s clergy, nobles and burgesses. But all English houses, estates and movable goods were confiscated, the new French Seneschal receiving Somerset’s hôtel.
During the winter the French captured Harfleur, Honfleur and Fresnoy, Bureau’s excellent artillery battering down the walls. Bribery was another powerful weapon. Richard des Epaules, Captain of Longuy in Perche, received £450 tournois for surrendering his fortress, together with a confirmation of his captaincy—in Charles’s name. John Merbury, Captain of Gisors obtained £58 tournois for yielding Gisors. The Welshman John Edwards extracted no less than £4,500 tournois (£500 sterling) for La Roche Guyon. By the following spring the English retained little more than the Cherbourg peninsula.
The invasion of Normandy had taken all England by surprise. There was an outcry at the loss of Rouen. £10,000 was sent to Somerset, but no immediate reinforcements. In October 1449 Sir Thomas Kyriell KG, a former Captain of Gisors, began to assemble a force at Portsmouth. Billeted in the hospice called ‘God’s House’, the troops got completely out of control, drinking and robbing, so that because of mutinies and adverse winds Sir Thomas was unable to sail for several months.
Eventually Kyriell landed at Cherbourg on 15 March 1450, with a mere 2,500 men. Instead of marching to relieve Bayeux as ordered, he delayed in the Cotentin to besiege Valognes. (Later Sir John Fastolf was highly critical of this ‘negligently tarrying’, which allowed