Franco-English War 1224-1225
The Franco-English War of 1224 to 1225 , also known as the French conquest of Poitou , was a military conflict between France and England . During the war, France conquered Poitou, which had previously belonged to the English king, with the port city of La Rochelle .
background
After the lost war from 1202 to 1214, the English kings still owned the Duchy of Aquitaine with Gascony and the county of Poitou as the remainder of the Angevin Empire in south-west France . In February 1220, the English Regency Council was able to negotiate an extension of the armistice concluded in 1214 with the French King Philip II by four years, which the minor King Henry III. Confirmed on March 5th.
French conquest of Poitou and Gascony
In 1224 Heinrich III. put down the Falkes de Bréauté rebellion in England . The French King Louis VIII , who had succeeded his late father to the throne in 1223, exploited the weakness of the English king and prepared an attack on the Poitou. On June 24, 1224, he gathered his army at Tours , and after he had drawn Aimery VII, the Viscount de Thouars, to his side, he invaded the Poitou. After a two-day siege, he conquered Niort on July 5 and subsequently other cities, whereupon Savary de Mauléon , the English Seneschal of Poitou, withdrew to La Rochelle . On July 15, Ludwig began the siege of the city. La Rochelle surrendered on August 3rd, because the citizens had not received any support from the English king in years of guerrilla warfare with the Viscount de Thouars and other vassals of the French king and had therefore lost confidence in his rule. The English occupation was allowed to leave the city. Savary de Mauleon also probably traveled to England to plead his innocence in the surrender. There he was made responsible for the conquest of Poitou, so he fled to France and entered the service of the French king.
The French king confirmed the rights of La Rochelle and appointed Gottfried de Builli as his Seneschal des Poitou, after which he retired to Poitiers and finally to Paris. De Builli and Count Hugo von Lusignan invaded Gascony with French troops, where they conquered Blaye , Bourg , La Réole , Saint-Macaire , Langon and Bazas by the end of September , leaving only Bayonne , Dax and Bordeaux in English hands stayed. However, these had strong English garrisons and the citizens, unlike in Poitou, benefited from the rule of the English king. The French then concluded an armistice limited to Easter 1225 and initially withdrew.
England recaptured Gascony in 1225
The Justiciar of England, Hubert de Burgh , had initially approached Pope Honorius III. turned to get support against the French king. Pope Honorius, however, was unwilling to intervene in this conflict, and when envoys from the French king arrived in Rome in December 1224, they even threatened a possible invasion of England. This news strengthened de Burgh's attempt to raise a parliamentary tax to finance an English expedition to the south of France . Ultimately, the young King Heinrich III. confirm the Magna Carta again in February 1225 , after which the government was granted the tax. Parliament commissioned Richard of Cornwall , the 16-year-old younger brother of the King, to lead the campaign to recapture Gascony. After Richard had been appointed Count of Poitou , he set out in March together with the experienced William Longespée, 3rd Earl of Salisbury and with an army for south-west France. From Bordeaux they were able to quickly recapture large parts of Gascony, especially since the French had not stationed any garrisons in the cities. The British army was able to recapture Bazas and other cities by May 2, before they ran out of money and the soldiers could no longer be paid. It was only when more money arrived from England in August 1225 that Richard and Longespée were able to continue the attack on La Réole. When Hugo voh Lusignan attempted relief, the English interrupted the siege and undertook a surprising counterattack into the Dordogne , whereupon Hugo von Lusignan broke off his advance. Thereupon the powerful nobleman Elias Rudel von Bergerac changed sides and joined Richard of Cornwall. On November 13, 1225, La Réole surrendered to the English troops, but Longespée had previously started the journey home to England sick, he died in March 1226.
consequences
Of the 60,000 marks brought in by the tax of the Fifteenth in 1225, over 52,000 marks were spent on the war in southwestern France. Gascon was recaptured through the campaign of Richard of Cornwall and Longespée. In the years that followed, Gascony benefited significantly from wine exports to England and remained in English hands for over 200 years. La Rochelle and Poitou, on the other hand, remained under French occupation. The French King Louis VIII did not resume the war with England in 1226, but concluded a temporary armistice with England in order to be able to lead an Albigensian crusade against the county of Toulouse . This had come closer to England under the influence of the Pope. Louis VIII died during the campaign in November 1226. The armistice was extended for a limited period of one year in 1227 and 1228. During the minority of Ludwig's son Ludwig IX. France was shaken by internal power struggles, which the English king wanted to take advantage of to recapture the Angevin Empire in a campaign in 1230 .
literature
- Joseph M. Tyrrell: A history of the estates of Poitou (= Studies in European History. 16, ZDB -ID 1100861-1 ). De Gruyter-Mouton, Den Haag et al. 1968.
Individual evidence
- ^ David A. Carpenter: The minority of Henry III. University of California Press, Berkeley CA et al. 1990, ISBN 0-520-07239-1 , p. 372.
- ↑ Nicholas Vincent: Peter des Roches. An alien in English politics, 1205-1238 (= Cambridge Studies in Medieval Life and Thought. Ser. 4, 31). 1st paperback edition. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge et al. 2002, ISBN 0-521-52215-3 , p. 218.
- ^ A b David A. Carpenter: The minority of Henry III. University of California Press, Berkeley CA et al. 1990, ISBN 0-520-07239-1 , p. 378.
- ^ Björn KU Weiler: Henry III of England and the Staufen Empire, 1216–1272. Royal Historical Society, Woodbridge 2006, ISBN 0-86193-280-3 , p. 23.