La Pucelle

In the following year Salisbury went home to seek additional reinforcements. He returned to France with money, 450 men-at-arms, 2,25O archers and more artillery. He also brought miners, masons, carpenters and bowyers, such men as would be useful in a siege.

And so the English mustered their power for the final mighty push to crush the faltering Dauphinist resistance once and for all. The Dauphin had no commanders the equal of Bedford and his lieutenants, no army that could stand against the dreaded arrows of the English archers. No city in France had yet withstood an English siege.

But on the border of Lorraine, just outside the little village of Domremy, a flock of sheep in the care of a peasant girl cropped placidly at the grass. The girl was not watching the sheep. She was looking up at the silent sky in the manner of one listening intently. After a time she nodded, and she smiled.

In mid-august on the Loire River the English offensive began. Beaugency, Meung and Jargeau quickly fell. These fortified towns lay upriver and downriver from Orleans, the last sizable city left to the Dauphinists. On the twelfth of October the 5,000 man field army under Thomas, Earl of Salisbury, laid siege to

Orleans

Q."Why did God send you to save the French ?"

A."Because he took pity on them."

Proceedings of the Holy Inquisition

A barrage that hurled gunstones as heavy as 116 pounds into the city opened the siege. Since the Duke of Orleans had been a captive in the Tower since Agincourt, the defense was conducted by his illegitimate son, the Bastard of Orleans, later to become the count Dunois.

On the left bank of the Loire two flanking towers, the Tourelles, guarded access to the bridge onto which the main gate of the city opened. Capture of the bridgehead would block aid from Dauphlnist lands south of the Loire. Access to the bridge was further guarded by two other fortifications on the left bank.

On the twenty-first of October the English mounted an assault on a rampart of earth-covered faggots constructed before the Tourelles. When assault failed the miners were set to work and when the French realized that the English were beneath their feet, they demolished and burned the rampart and withdrew to a rampart before the city gate. The English took the now battered and indefensible Tourelles. They could still be used as elevated gun platforms.

Salisbury estimated that the city, subjected to continual bombardment and starvation, could hold for three months. As he studied the city from one of the Tourelles to determine the best use of his guns, a gunstone accidentally fired from the wall of Orleans dislodged an iron window grate that tore off half his face and he died in agony. The less capable Earl of Suffolk took command. Some noted French military men came to aid Orleans but the English reinforcements under Ta1bot and Scales arrived with food and more cannon and the bombardment increased. Six stockaded wooden fortifications were built around the city, cavalry patrols ranging the intervening ground.

As the bombardment took its toll and. food. grew scarce, hope faded for the inhabitants of Orleans. Relief and supplies were desperately needed but around Orleans now stood the wooden towers of the English, atop which waited the seemingly invincible English archers, each of them the center of an unseen circle that spanned more than half a mile, within which any foeman became a mark for the dreaded bodkin pointed clothyard arrows. Scanty were the supplies that got through, But the English too were growing short of food.

In February the Dauphinists learned that an English supply convoy was to bring Lenten food from Paris to the besieging army. The opportunity could not be passed up.

Under the command of SIr John Fastolf the supply train of three hundred carts and small carts loaded with barrels of salt herring as well as cannon, bows, bundles of arrows and other things, left Paris. With the wagons rode an escort of many knights and esquires and fifteen hundred combatants includIng archers, Parisian militia, and some Picards and Normans. As the convoy passed through the village of Rouvray, Fastolf ‘s scouts brought news of approaching Dauphinists. Fastolf halted on a ridge a mile outside the town. The wagons were formed in a circle with two entrances in which the archers set their pointed stakes by way of barriers. Only archers and baggage bearers were to dismount. Within their barricade the English awaited what came to be known as

The Battle of Herrings

‘...Sir John Falstaff, with other brave English captains, by the grace of God, and terrible shot of arrows, overthrew the bastard of Orleans...'

CERTAINE DISCOURSES

Sir John Smythe

1590

The Dauphinist force of some 4000 men outnumbered the English. Dunois and his knights had joined with a Scottish force under John Stewart of Darnley, Constable of Scotland.. The Dauphinists had small cannon with them and gunstones soon began to crash into the wagons and herring barrels as the Dauphinists awaited the tardy arrival of reinforcements led by the Count of Clermont. "Between two and three o'clock in the afternoon the French archers drew near to their adversaries, of whom some had already come out of their park" and "whom they forced to withdraw hastily..." John Stewart, seeing the English standing shoulder to shoulder in their ranks could at last restrain himself no longer. Against orders he dismounted his Scots who raised sword and ax and, supported by mounted French men-at-arms, charged the wagon barricade on foot. They charged into a hail of arrows from the wagons while the horsemen were blocked by the stakes and as the charge faltered, Fastolf mounted his archers and sent his riders through the openings of the barricade. They charged out swiftly from their park and struck among the Dauphinists who were on foot and put them to rout and flight pursuing them in all directions. Some sixty or eighty Dauphinists under la Hire and Poton rallied and struck at the scattered .English, killing some.

Dunois had been wounded by an arrow in the foot. Two of his archers dragged hIm with great difficulty out of the press, put him on a horse and thus saved him. The Count of Clermont, nominal commander of the Dauphinist force had never actually entered the fighting. The Dauphinists retired in disgrace leaving on the field some six score of great lords and 500 other dead, mostly Scots. As the English moved on, vlllagers from Rouvray came out to gather herring spilled from smashed barrels.

In Orleans only one gate, facing English territory, remained open. The people of Orleans, their offer of a surrender to Burgundy rejected by the English, had one last recourse; to pray to God for a miracle. And the weeks passed.

But one day, Dunois, Bastard of Orleans, stood on the south bank of the Loire east of Orleans to meet a new Dauphinist commander bringing relief troops and desperately needed supplies Dunois had some misgivings. The convoy escort seemed insufficient to defend the supplies, and besides, it would be necessary to sail upstream against the prevailing contrary wind to tow the laden barges into the city past English forces within �a bowshot or two. Dunois greeted the relief commander and was asked why he had chosen this route rather than one straight through Talbot and the English.. Dunois lamely answered that he and others wiser had thought to do what was best and safest. "You thought to deceive me," he was told, "and are yourself deceived, for I bring better succor than you have before had from any soldier or any city. It is succor from the King of Heaven."

As Dunois wondered just what this cryptic pronouncement might imply, he suddenly noticed that something odd had happened to the wind.

The contrary wind had changed and now blew from the opposite direction.

The raised sails filled with wind and while Dauphinists made a diversionary attack from the city, the supply barges entered into Orleans. Dunois began again to hope.

At nightfall the new commander, in gleaming white armor and preceded by a white banner blazoned with a representation of Christ in his Glory, and figures of angels and lilies of France, rode on a white charger into the wildly rejoicing city.

The Maid

For they had never been so afraid of any captain or commander in war as they had been of the Maid.

MONSTRELET"S CHRONICLES

Year fourteen hundred and twenty- nine,

Came out again the sun.

Good times anew came with its shine

As long they had not done.

Christine de Pisan

1429

On the next day the new commander stood on the rampart before the gate facing the rampart across the bridge to address the English, and in particular Glasdale, their commander. They were chided for the suffering they were inflicting on the townspeople and were asked, whether archers or men of the companies of war or gentlemen or others, to depart to their homes or to risk the judgement of God.

The English gaped in astonishment that soon changed to coarse mockery and howls of laughter."I'll burn you if I get my hands on you!" Glasdale shouted.

In anger now came the response to his threats and insults; "Your men will leave whether you will or no, but you will not be here to see it and neither will many of your men!" and the Dauphinist commander left the rampart in tears of rage and hurt. Glasdale had used the terms "Armagnac whore" and "cow-girl", for the new commander was indeed a girl; strong looking but only sixteen or seventeen, and a peasant at that, a dark haired girl with a pleasant voice from the border of Lorraine.

Her name was Jehanne, but the French called her simply "La Pucelle", the Maid, and some spoke of a prophecy that France, having been lost by a whore, would be recovered by a virgin. She believed herself on a divine mission to save France, instructed by the voices of saints that only she could hear. The mission was twofold; to raise the siege of Orleans and to see to it that the Dauphin would be anointed and crowned King of France at Rheims.

For several days no action could be taken in the absence of Dunois who had gone to fetch the reinforcements that had come with the Maid, and she chafed at the inactivity.

On Wednesday Dunois returned with the reinforcements while the Maid slept.

He immediately mounted an assault on St. Loup, one of the strongest English bastions and as the fighting began, the Maid tossed fitfully in her slumber. St. Loup had already withstood several futile French assaults and again this time the French retreated in disorder but suddenly the Maid was there in her bright armor, banner upraised, her horse picking its way among the French wounded, and the French raised their shouts and followed where she led. Saint Loup fell and the French put the garrison to the sword except for a few that the Maid was able to save. The French had lost only two men and the Maid said, "The siege of Orleans will be raised within five days".

On Thursday she sent the English a letter, her final warning. "She took an arrow, tied the letter with a thread to the end of the arrow and ordered an archer to shoot the arrow to the English, crying "Read, it is news!" The English received the arrow with the letter and read it. And having read it they began to utter great shouts, saying, "News of the Armagnac's whore!" And the Maid wept and called on the King of Heaven for aid.

On Friday morning she and her men and horses crossed the Loire in boats to stand before the bastion of the Augustins, into which the English had withdrawn. Her men thought it impossible to take the bastion and began to retreat. The English, seeing the backs of their enemies, charged forward as far as two crossbow shots from the bastion,

but the Maid and la Hire couched their lances and clapped the spurs to their mounts charging into the English, scattering them and breaking up the attack. The Dauphinists returned to the assault, driving the English back to the safety of theirbastion and the Maid planted her standard in the ditch before the walls of the fort. It was taken by assault, all but a few English killed or taken. Now there were no more English soldiers between the Maid's men and Glasdale's rampart thrown up before the looming twin towers of the Tourelles and the bridge.

After dinner that evening a knight came to Jehanne. He explained that the knights and captains had held counsel. They had decided that since there were so many English and Orleans now had sufficient food, the garrison could well await reinforcements from the dauphin. The soldiers were not to go out on the morrow.

"You have been at your counsel," said the Maid, "and I at mine, and know that my Lord's counsel shall prevail and that other counsel shall perish!"

So next morning the Maid led the assault against the rampart of the bridge. It was held by six hundred fighting men under two banners and the standard of Chandos and the English held firm. After midday, leaping into the ditch with her men, the Maid placed the first scaling ladder. As it touched the rampart, she was already going up the rungs, but atop the parapet an English archer marked and loosed. The arrow drove through her armor where neck meets shoulder and she fell from the ladder. Englishmen were leaping down to capture her as her men carried her to safety. After she pulled out the arrow herself, her wound was dressed with olive oil and lard and she made confession to her priest, weeping and lamenting. All day the fighting continued and the English held strong, while the Maid went alone with her horse to a nearby vineyard, to pray.

In the evening Dunois ordered the trumpets to sound retreat for the day, but the Maid returning, said; "In God's name we shall this day enter the town by the bridge." And she returned to the assault calling for surrender. As her banner again reached the rampart, the English strangely seemed to lose their strength to resist, even appeared to panic. As they abandoned the rampart and made for the Tourelles they heard behind them a feminine voice crying out; "Yield thee Classidas! yield to the King of Heaven!" As Glasdale fled, unheeding, a portion of the weakened drawbridge fell away beneath his feet and he and thirty of his best knights, encased in full armor suddenly become steel coffins, dropped into the swirling waters of the Loire, and the Maid wept for their unshriven souls. Few prisoners were taken, and the Maid and her men entered Orleans by the bridge.

On Sunday morning, the English army stood before the gate of Orleans in battle order. They were not laughing any more and smoke and flame rose from their wooden towers that they themselves had put to the torch. The Maid and her men went forth and likewise ranged themselves in battle order, facing the defiant English and quite close to them. Because it was Sunday the Maid's men were forbidden to strike the first blow but were to defend themselves strongly if attacked. An hour passed so, some Frenchmen and Englishmen almost close enough to touch each other, then the English turned and marched away in good order to garrison the captured towns of Jargeau, Meung and Beaugency. Some men of the city garrison followed them, later returning with bombards and cannon, bows, arbalests and other artillery. The siege of Orleans had been raised.

Following their victory the Maid and other commanders had audience with the Dauphin to request aid for the taking of the Loire castles to clear the way to Rheims. It was easy now to find men who flocked to their banners. And it came to pass that at Jargeau, where Suffolk commanded the largest English force, twelve hundred French lances came together under the banner of the Duke of Alencon, now ransomed from captivity. The first assault was beaten back and French guns and siege engines began a bombardment. D'Alencon thought it yet too early for assault, but the Maid said "Doubt not, the time is come when it pleases God'. And she carried her banner forward to the assault and shortly Jargeau was taken. As the English withdrew toward the bridge more than eleven hundred were killed by the pursuing French. Suffolk was taken prisoner.

But meanwhile, Bedford was sending reinforcements. Talbot had slipped out of Beaugency with 40 lances and two hundred archers as the siege began. Upriver at Janville he joined Fastolf's relief column and with a thousand men-at-arms they marched together towards Beaugency.

The French army spent the night near Meung and the following day joined with new arrivals and made attack on the English in Beaugency, who withdrew into the castle, and the French set guards around it to prevent their exit. Then the French scouts brought word of the ap�proaching English army.

When they came in sight of each other the two armies prepared themselves for attack. The French formed ranks in battle order on a little hillock while the English, a league distant from Patay, gave order particularly issued by King Henry of England that every man dismount and that all the archers have their stakes stuck into the ground before them as they are accustomed to do when they expect to be attacked. D'Alencon and Dunois watched these preparations and many were afraid, for they knew that the formidable Talbot was with the army. D'Alencon asked the Maid what should be done. "Have all good spurs".she said. A young captain bridled. "What? Are we going to turn our backs on them ?" "No," she answered, "but it will be the English who will not defend themselves and will be vanquished and you will need good spurs to run after them."

When the French made no move, English heralds rode forward to offer challenge for single combat on behalf of three knights, but the Maid's people made answer: "Go to your quarters for today, for it is rather late. But tomorrow, if it please God and Our Lady, we shall take a closer look at you." Then the English remounted to ride to Meung, which still held, to force a passage over the bridge that was in French hands, while Richemont sent 20 lances and some archers to help defend it. If the English could capture the bridge and cross the Loire, they could relieve Beaugency. Both armies spent a tense night in fear of attack but the Maid assured her men that King Charles would that day have a greater victory than he had ever had. And the English commanders received bad news.

The Beaugency castle had surrendered.

Then the English captains, deciding to return to Janville, hastily ordered their men to make their way out into the fields and form battle orders and they rode forth in good order on the wooded road to

Patay

"My counsel has told me they are all ours !"

Jehanne

First went the vanguard, led by an English knight who bore a white standard. Then came the supply wagons and ordnance followed by the battle commanded by Talbot and Fastolf. Last rode the English rear guard. As the army reached Patay, scouts reported that the French in great strength were approaching swiftly by another route. The vanguard, sutlers, supplies and artillery were to go forward to take up position along the woods near the town while Talbot halted the main battle between two strong hedges to dismount with five hundred picked archers to hold the narrow passage until the army prepared itself for the attack.

But the French were so close that their skirmishers flushed a stag that bounded off toward Patay and blundered into the English battle. The English, sportsmen all, gave a great shout. Now the French knew their position. They indecisively hesitated, not quite knowing what to do about the English now that they had located them, but the Maid, re1egated to the rearguard, cried out that they should not try to form a line but should attack at once. In a headlong gallop they struck just as the English rearguard, hurrying to make the woods, reached the hedges guarded by Talbot's archers. Seeing Fastolf and the main battle hurrying to join them, the men of the vanguard, thinking that Fastolf was fleeing the French, broke and fled. So sudden and fierce had been the attack that the French could already kill or capture whoever they wished.

Talbot's 500 archers, who had not yet set their stakes and scarcely had the chance to loose an arrow, were taken on the flanks by men of La Hire's vanguard and killed. Talbot, who had already removed his spurs to fight on foot, tried to remount but was thrown to the ground by Poton de Xantrailles's archers and made prisoner. Fastolf reluctantly decided to save himself. With Jehan de Wavrin, now a captain of Burgundian mercenaries, and a very small company, he made his escape. The English had lost about two thousand men, the French admitted to only three men killed. The English foot soldiers, not worth any ransoms, had been slaughtered.

Fastolf returned to Paris to make his report to the regent. Bed�ford was furious. Things were not going well at all. Orleans and the Loire castles had been lost, two English armies had been destroyed, three of his four best commanders had been killed or captured and English morale had reached its lowest ebb since the wars had begun ninety years before, all this in less than three months. Bedford had no one on whom to vent his rage but the hapless Fastolf. Later he re�lented. Fastolf, his only remaining commander, was after all not at fault.

As for the Maid, she was now ready to undertake the second part of her mission; the coronation at Rheims.

The Maid insisted that the dauphin's coronation and anointing at Rheims, where French kings were traditionally invested, would make it impossible for the English to remain in France. In response to the Maid's urging, the still apathetic dauphin finally agreed to the journey. But Rheims lay to the northeast of English-held Paris and castles and towns along the road were garrisoned by Burgundian and English soldiers.

The dauphin's army assembled at Gien as new recruits continued to arrive. Gentlemen unable to afford suitable mounts and arms came mounted on ponies as archers or ordinary soldiers. Though the dauphin had no money to pay his men, they said that they would follow the Maid, wherever she went.

On the way, Auxerre submitted to the rule of the dauphin. At Troyes, the gates remained closed and cannon belched rude greeting from the walls. A sally by the Anglo-Burgundian garrison was repulsed. During days of fruitless negotiations the army's food was nearly used up before the vacillating dauphin let the Maid take charge. Immediately she ordered cannon placed and called for faggots to fill the moat in preparation for a determined assault. The gates opened. The men of the garrison were allowed to leave with their possessions and the Maid entered the town to line the streets with archers, then took her place in the triumphal entry of the Dauphin into the city. Such was the submission of Troyes.

And so the dauphin came to

Rheims

Q. "Why was your standard more carried in the church at Rheims at the consecration of the King than those of other captains ?"

A. "It had bourne the burden, it was quite right that it receive the honour."

Proceedings of the Holy Inquisition

The burgesses of the town came forth in submission and the coronation took place without interference as the Maid, holding her banner, stood by the dauphin as he was anointed and crowned King Charles VII of France, and to some it seemed that her banner floated about him.

On the return to Gien, town after town rendered joyous obedience to the new king, but for a time, it seemed that the Maid's optomism was mistaken. King Charles was not fond of warfare, preferring the ways of diplomacy, but in this too, he was not of the best. He signed an unconditional two week truce that Bedford made use of to strengthen the defenses of Paris and to bring in reinforcements from England; three thousand five hundred fresh knights and archers.

On August 7, Bedford sent King Charles a formal challenge to choose a place of combat at which to appear with his men and the Maid. This time Bedford would lead his soldiers personally, and there was no question of his military experience, resolution or personal bravery.

With an army of eight or nine thousand, including seven hundred Picards loaned by the Duke of Burgundy, Bedford arrived first at the appointed place and set up camp on the river bank near the village of

Montepilloy

...and of unlevefulle doubte that thei hadde of a disciple and lyme of the Feende, called the Pucelle, that used fals enchauntements and sorcerie.

John, Duke of Bedford

King Charles with the Maid, d'Alencon, and six or seven thousand fighting men, arrived that evening and set up camp a league and a half from the English while French skirmishers attacked. Men on both sides were killed, wounded or taken. Through the night the English, backs to the river, prepared their fortifications of stakes, ditches and their wagons placed before them. In the morning skirmishing resumed but the English remained within their forti�fication. The Maid, carrying her standard at the head of an attacking force called the English forth to give battle, even offering to withdraw to give the English room to order their forces, but only skirmishers came out of the camp. At nightfall King Charles, apparently bored, took his army to Crepy and the Duke of Bedford fell back to Paris.

By the end of the month Armagnac forces had advanced to the gates of the largest city in Europe,

Paris

Q"What arms did you offer up in the church of Saint Denis of Paris?" A. "I gave a white harness entire such as is fitting for a man of arms

with a sword which I had won before the town of Paris."

Proceedings of the Holy Inquisition

Each day the Maid sent out skirmishers until she determined the best point of attack, the Saint Honore gate. Carts, horses and barrows brought bundles of faggots to fill the moat and on the eighth of September, before noon, the assault began. Dismounted, accompanied by her standard bearer, the Maid went into the first ditch, a dry one, with Giles de Rais and other chosen fighters leading the assault. From the wall came the din of thundering cannon and culverins, and the air was thick with gunstones, bolts and arrows. But some French�men knocked down by gunstones, arose unhurt. It seemed that the English were short of powder. And French missles too were shot so thickly as to cause the defenders to duck down. With the placement of scaling ladders the first assault might carry.

At the edge of the water-filled moat the Maid tested the depth of the water with her lance even as she called for the defenders immediate surrender. "Here's for you,"cried one, "Cackling bawd ! " and he shot straight at her with his crossbow. The bolt pierced her thigh, but she forced herself to remain standing and called more loudly for faggots and scaling ladders to be brought forward. A bolt nailed her standard bearers foot to the ground and when he raised his visor to try to withdraw the bolt, another shot mortally wounded him between the eyes. Under an increased deluge of gunstones and arrows the French assault faltered and commanders disa�greeing about the attack began withdrawing their men. The Maid was fetched back against her will. "By my martin! " she cried "The place would have been taken ! "

On the next day the Maid, though wounded, rose early and asked the Duke of Alencon to have the trumpets sound to arms and to horse. But the dauphin called the commanders before him to announce that he was calling off the attack and returning to the Loire region. The Maid and her captains accepted his will without pleasure but before she left, she offered in the church of Saint Denis a white harness with sword as was the custom among men of war when they were wounded.

On Sept. 21, King Charles, to the horror of the Maid and the other captains, disbanded his army. The Duke of Alencon was sent home to his ancestral lands and his wife. Perhaps the royal advisor considered the increasing fame and following of the Maid and d'Alencon a threat to the authority of the incompetent king.

The Maid stayed on with a few loyal followers, and continued to do what she could. The war continued, and the Maid took part in the siege of Saint-Pierre-le-Moutier, a fortified village held by mercenaries in the pay of the Anglo-Burgundian alliance. In the face of strong resistance the French fell back. One Jean d'Aulon, so severely wounded in the heel that he could not stand or walk without crutches, saw that the Maid and a handful of her men remained where they were. He rode forward and warned her that she was in danger. "Faggots and withies, everybody," she shouted, "so that we can make a bridge! " And they were immediately brought and put into position. "The whole thing utterly astonished me," d'Aulon wrote," for the town was immediately taken by assault, and at that time there was no great resistance."

But the month long siege of La Charite, held by a brigand chief, failed. The Maid would not permit her men to forage or plunder, and when King Charles failed to provide money for pay or food, she abandoned the siege in disgust and departed before Christmas. For a time, little is known of her activities.

They were only several hundred and some said they were too few but the Maid said; "By my martin, we are enough; I shall go and see my good friends of Compiegne." And they armed themselves and readied the horses to set forth near midnight, for the town was under siege, encicled by Burgundian and English armies.

But at sunrise the Maid and her men were within the moated walls of

Compiegne

Q. When you leapt, did you think to kill yourself ?

A. No, in leaping I commended myself to God and I thought in making that leap to escape so that I should not be delivered to the English.

Proceedings of the Holy Inquisition

On that day fighting began before the town and the Maid and her men sallied forth. The Burgundians fell back before them in disorder but as they did so, the English with a desperate effort fought their way to the drawbridge. The commander of the town, fearing their entry, had the drawbridge raised. The Maid was now trapped in the midst of the enemy host. When her men insisted on returning to the bridge, the Maid angrily retorted; "Be silent! Their discomfiture depends on you. Think only of striking hard at them!" But her men would not heed, and the Maid, last in retreat, was bearing the brunt of the attack when a Picard archer, a rough man and sour, full of spite because a woman of whom so much had been heard should have overthrown so many valiant men, dragged her to one side by her cloth-of-gold cloak and pulled her from her horse throwing her flat on the ground..

Her men could not remount her and so the Maid was taken by the Burgundians. Imprisoned in a tower belonging to John of Luxembourg, she nearly escaped. She locked up her two guards, commended herself to God and leaped from the high tower but, badly injured, was soon retaken.

For ten thousand gold crowns she was sold to the English who took her to Rouen in Normandy where she was imprisoned in irons under English guards and her examination by officials of the In�quisition began. She was questioned for several hours each day but no irregularities could be found to support the charge of witchcraft that the English pressed for. For months she foiled attempts to trap her into unwise answers but at last, under threat of being burned alive, she signed a letter of abjuration. She was not to bear arms or wear men's clothing again.

But back in her cell, in the face of attempted rape by English soldiery and given no women's clothing, she donned men's garments again. She was instantly declared a relapsed heretic and taken to the Old Market of

Rouen

"If you were well informed about me, you ought to wish that I were out of your hands."

Jehanne

Eight hundred of the Earl of Warwick's soldiers stood by with axes and swords. Not even waiting for the sentence to be read, the executioner siezed her and bound her to the stake piled high with faggots. As the flames rose, she screamed "Jesus!" Among the spectators many, soldier and civilian alike, were seen to weep openly, and one of the soldiers handed her a crude cross he had made of sticks. She screamed several times more before she died. After all, she was only a girl, only nineteen, but there were those who now believed that a saint had been burned that day.

The executioner, who had volunteered for the job, had been instructed to burn the body and to throw the ashes into the Seine. But though he used charcoal, oil, every means he could think of, the heart and entrails would not burn. In terror now, siezed with a great dread for his soul, he threw them into the river anyway and the Maid was gone, except for the memories.

The captains who had fought at her side would not forget her cheerful smile, her ready tears, her military skill and her magni�ficent courage. D'Alencon remembered too seeing her lovely breasts when the captains prepared for sleep in their tent. And men re�membered her message. "Act, and God will act." she had said, and she had shown that if one, even a peasant girl, would only fight with all ones strength, the course of history could be changed.

She had said something more. "Before seven years be passed, the English will lose a greater gage than they had at Orleans, and they will lose all in France."

And so the Maid died a cruel death and her brief incredible career came to an end, but the tide had inexorably turned against the English.

And what of the judgement of God of which she had once warned the "godons"? No lightning bolts struck her tormenters and nothing interfered with her execution on that day in Rouen. But if the soldier who made the crude cross for Jehanne lived to a ripe old age, he would hear in his lifetime of events to give him cause to remember that day with blanched face and trembling hand.

He would hear of the violent extinction of the line of the Dukes of Burgundy, who had sold the Maid to the English, and of the annihilation of the entire superbly equipped army of that powerful nation, and of the Duchy of Burgundy wiped off the map, its lands divided among foreign rulers.

And what of England? England is still on the map, but the English would be driven into the sea by the French, losing their former continental possessions; Aquitaine, Normandy and Brittany, retaining only Calais. The soldier would hear of the complete and violent extinction of the lines of the Plantagenet, Yorkist and Lancastrian kings who had ruled England for three centuries, of the slaughter of much of the adult male nobility, and of England coming under the rule of a "foreigner".

A most curious parallel. Both countries escaped the devastation of the countryside that had been France's lot and for once the peasantry came off virtually unscathed. Perhaps it was all merely a series of odd coincidences.

Now let us see what all this has to do with archery.

Article added: 2008-02-17 @ 2:52 pm

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