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EDWARD II. 



EDWARD II. 



Langton, bishop of Lichfield, who was lord high treasurer, was 

 imprisoned In Wallingford Castle, as having been the principal pro- 

 moter of Gaveston's banishment. In October the new Earl of Corn- 

 wall married the king's niece, Margaret de Clare, the daughter of his 

 sister Joanna, countess of Gloucester. He was also made guardian 

 during his minority to her brother, the young earl. The grant of 

 several other lordships followed immediately, and it is even said that 

 the reckless prodigality of the weak king went the length of making 

 over all the treasure his father had collected for the Scottish war, 

 amounting to nearly a hundred thousand pounds, to the object of his 

 insane attachment. Finally, he left him guardian of the realm while 

 be set out for Boulogne in January 1303, to marry Isabella, the 

 daughter of the French king, Philip V., to whom he had been 

 affianced ever since the treaty concluded between Philip and his 

 father in 1299. The marriage took place on the 25th of January, 

 and on the 25th of February the king and queen were crowned at 

 Westminster. 



The history of the kingdom for the next five years is merely that of 

 a long struggle between the king and his disgusted nobility about this 

 Gaveston. The banishment of the favourite being insisted upon by a 

 formidable league of the barons, Edward was obliged to yield ; but 

 instead of being ignominiously sent out of the country, Gaveston was 

 merely appointed to the government of Ireland. In June his royal 

 master accompanied him as far as Bristol on his way to that country. 

 Even from this honourable exile however he returned in October 

 following. The barons immediately again remonstrated, and in March 

 1310 the king found himself compelled to sign a commission by which 

 he resigned the government of the kingdom for the ensuing year into 

 the hands of a committee appointed by the parliament. A sentence 

 of banishment was soon after passed upon Gaveston, and he retired to 

 France; but by the close of the year 1311 we find him again in 

 England. The Earl of Lancaster, the king's cousin, now placed him- 

 self at the head of the malecontents : finding petitions and remon- 

 strances unattended to, he and his associates at length openly rose in 

 arms. Gaveston was besieged in Scarborough Castle, and having been 

 forced to surrender, his career was ended by his summary execution 

 at Warwick on the 19th of June 1312. Having thus attained their 

 main object, the insurgent barons made their submission to the king, 

 and a peace was finally concluded betweeu the parties in December. 



In the course of the last two or three years, Robert Bruce, left 

 unmolested in Scotland, had not only nearly recovered every place of 

 strength in that country, but had been accustomed to make an annual 

 plundering inroad across the borders. It was now determined to take 

 advantage of the cessation of domestic dissensions to effect the re-con- 

 quest of the northern kingdom ; and in June 1314 Edward set out 

 for that purpose at the head of the most numerous army that had 

 ever been raised in England. The issue of this expedition was the 

 signal defeat sustained at the battle of Baunockburn, fought the 24th 

 of June, at which the magnificent host of the English king was com- 

 pletely scattered, he himself narrowly escaping captivity. After this 

 the few remaining fortresses in Scotland that were still held by 

 English garrisons speedily fell into the bands of Bruce ; the predatory 

 and devastating incursions of the Scots into England were renewed 

 with more audacity than ever; and Bruce and his brother Edward 

 even made a descent upon Ireland, and for some time contested the 

 dominion of that island with its English masters. At length, in 

 September 1319, a truce for two years with the Scots was arranged 

 with difficulty. Nor was it long observed by the party most interested 

 in breaking it. The Scots easily found pretences on which to renew 

 their attacks, and Edward's efforts to check them proved as impotent 

 as before. 



Meanwhile, a new favourite began to engross him, Hugh le 

 Despencer, the son of a nobleman of the same name. Upon him 

 Edward now bestowed another daughter of his sister, the Countess of 

 Gloucester, in marriage, and many large possessions. Another armed 

 insurrection of the barons was the consequence; and in July 1321 the 

 Deapencers, father and son, were both banished by act of parliament. 

 Before the end of the same year however they were recalled by the 

 king ; and now for a short time the fortune of the contest changed. 

 The E*rl of Lancaster was taken and beheaded at Pontefract on the 

 23rd of March 1322; and the sentence against the Despencers was 

 soon after formally revoked by parliament. About twenty of the 

 leaders of the insurrection in all were put to death ; but the estates 

 of many more were forfeited, and most of the immeuse amount of 

 plunder thus obtained by the crown was at once bestowed upon the 

 younger Despencer. Edward, imagining that he had now an oppor- 

 tunity of which he might take advantage, set out once more for the 

 conquest of Scotland in August 1322; but after advancing as far as 

 Culross, in Fife, he returned without having accomplished anything 

 more than the destruction of a few religious houses ; aud on the 30th 

 of March 1323 he concluded another truce with the Scots, to last for 

 thirteen yean. 



. New Horins however were already rising against the unhappy king. 

 Charles IV., called the Fair, the youngest brother of Edward's queeu, 

 bad recently succeeded to the French throne, and had begun his reign 

 by quarrelling on some pretence with hi* brother-in-law, and seizing 

 Guienue and Edward's other territories in France. After some other 

 attempts at negociation, it was resolved that Queen Isabella should 

 moc. Diy. VOL. n. 



herself go over to France to endeavour to bring about an arrange- 

 ment. The queen had been already excited against the Despeucers ; 

 she had long probably despised a husband who wag the object of such 

 general contempt, and who besides openly preferred his male 

 favourites to her society. At the French court she found collected 

 many English nobles and other persons of distinction, whom their 

 dissatisfaction with the state of affairs, or the enmity of tho 

 Despencers, had driven from their country. AH these circumstances 

 considered, it is easy to understand how she might naturally become 

 the centre and head of a combination formed by the discontented 

 exiles among whom she was thrown, and their connections still in 

 England, for the professed object of compelling her husband to change 

 his system of government and of removing the pernicious power that 

 stood between the nation and the throne. Amongst the foremost 

 figures of the association with which she thus became surrounded was 

 the young Roger de Mortimer, a powerful baron, who had made his 

 escape from England after having been condemned, for taking part in 

 the former confederacy against the Despencers, to imprisonment for 

 life. There is no doubt that the connection between Isabella and 

 Roger de Mortimer became eventually a criminal one. The plot 

 against the king was begun' by the conspirators contriving to get the 

 heir-apparent, Prince Edward, into their power. It was arranged 

 that King Charles should restore Guienne upon receiving from tho 

 prince the homage which his father had refused to render. On this 

 Prince Edward, now in his thirteenth year, was sent over to France 

 to his mother. The first use Isabella made of this important acqui- 

 sition was to affiance the boy to Philippa, the daughter of the Earl of 

 Hainault, who in return agreed to assist her and the confederates 

 with troops and money. Thus supported, she set sail from Dort with 



a fores of 3000 men, under the command of the earl's brother, and 



Edward, deserted by all except the two Despencers aud a few of their 



creatures, left London, and took refuge at first in Bristol : he then 



embarked for Ireland, or, as another account says, with the design of 



making for the small isle of Lundy, at the mouth of the Bristol 



Channel ; but being driven back by contrary winds, he landed again 



in Wales, and shut himself up in Neath Abbey, in Glamorganshire. 



Meanwhile the queen's forces attacked the castle of Bristol, where the 



elder Despencer, styled Earl of Winchester, had been left governor 



by the king. When the siege had lasted only a few days, the garrison 



rose in mutiny and delivered up the old man ; he was ninety years of 



age ; but his grey hairs did not save him ; he was immediately 



executed with every circumstance of barbarous insult the ingenuity of 



his captors could devise. The next day (26th of October) the prelates 



and barons in the queen's camp declared Prince Edward guardian of 



the kingdom. The king was discovered in his place of concealment 



about three weeks after, and was conducted in custody first to the 



castle of Monmouth, and then to that of Kenilworth. The younger 



Despencer was also taken ; he was hanged and quartered at Hereford 



on the 24th of November. The parliament assembled on the 1st of 



January 1327; and after going through some forms of negociation 



with the imprisoned king, it was resolved on the 25th of that mouth, 



that the crown should be taken from him and conferred upon his son 



Prince Edward. A deputation announced this resolution to the 



deposed monarch. He remained for some months longer at Keuil- 



worth : he was then transferred successively to Corfe, Bristol, and 



Berkeley Castles. At length when it was found that mere insult 



would not kill him, he was, on the night of the 20th of September, 



murdered in the last-mentioned place by his keepers Sir Thomaa 



Gournay and Sir John Maltravers. 



Edward II. left by his queen, Isabella of France, two sons, Edward, 

 who succeeded him, and John, born at Eltham, 15th of August 1316, 

 created Earl of Cornwall, in 1327, who died at Perth in October 1336 ; 

 and two daughters, Joanna, married 12th July, 1328, to Prince 

 David, eldest son of Robert Bruce, afterwards King David II. of 

 Scotland, and Eleanor, who became the wife of Reginald Count of 

 Guelders. 



Some attempts have been made in modern times to dispute tho 

 justice of the character which has been generally given of this king, 

 and to throw the blame of the civil distractions which rendered his 

 reign so unhappy and so ignominious a oue, rather upon his turbulent 

 nobility than himself. Hume has written the history of tho reigu 

 with a studied endeavour to put the barons in the wrong throughout, 

 and to represent Edward as the victim, not of his own weakness and 

 vices, but rather of the barbarism of the age. The facts however on 

 which the common verdict rests cannot be thus explained away. It may 

 be admitted that_ among the motives which excited and sustained the 

 several confederacies against the king, and in tho conduct of some of 

 those who took the lead in them, there was violence and want of 

 principle enough ; it is of the nature of things that the baser passions 

 should mix themselves up and even act an important part in all such 

 conflicts, however righteous iu their origin and general object; but 

 nothing that cau be alleged on this head can afl'ect the question of 

 Edward's unfitness to wear the crown. That question must bo con- 

 sidered as settled, if not by the course of outrage against all decency 

 manifested by his conduct in the matter of Gaveston, certainly by his 



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