Diana talks to Elizabeth Chadwick

Hello Elizabeth. It is really lovely to talk to you. Thank you very much for agreeing to chat with me.

 

I am sure that you are tired of being asked the usual questions that would be interviewers ask authors, so hopefully this interview is an interview with a difference and I have come up with some unusual questions!

If your latest book The Autumn Throne was adapted into a TV show or a film, who would you like to play the lead role?

I have no preconceived ideas.  As long as the actress bore some resemblance to the character and did them justice I would be happy. The best ever portrayal of Eleanor of Aquitaine in my opinion is by Jane Lapotaire in the BBC production from the 1970’s The Devil’s Crown.  You can find the episodes on Youtube.  Recently Jane wrote to me to say how much she had loved my novels about Eleanor, which was a wonderful surprise and a lovely reciprocation because I had admired Jane’s portrayal of her for so long.

What made you choose this genre?

I became interested in Medieval history at school when an enlightened teacher got us to act out scenes from our lessons in front of the class.  This was then compounded by falling in love with French actor Andre Lawrence playing the knight Thibaud in a BBC children’s TV programme titled Desert Crusader. I began writing a sort of fan fiction that developed a life of its own.  I wanted my medieval story to feel as real as possible and began immersing myself in the life and times of the 12^th century.  The more I learned the more interested I became and the more I wanted to write historical fiction set in that period.

How do you get ideas for plots and characters?

Initially by reading primary sources.  There are so many fascinating stories to be told.  It is often said that the truth is stranger than fiction, and the truth is a brilliant hunting ground for a novelist.  I also find inspiration from music.  All of my novels have soundtracks that have helped me explore plot elements, emotional moments, landscapes, personalities. For example I am writing this and listening to the soundtrack of my recently completed novel Templar Silks and one of the tracks is the Bangles If She Knew What She Wants – about a woman who can’t make up her mind.  The lyrics perfectly sum up the personality of one of my characters. I find the patterns, resonance and lyrics in music very inspirational.

If, as a one off, (and you could guarantee publication!)  you could write anything you wanted, is there another genre you would love to work with and do you already have a budding plot line in mind?

Oh yes.  I’d write ghost stories.  If I said above that the truth is stranger than fiction I have plenty to go at.  My husband once had a long conversation with a ghost and regularly sees an old car drive up a lane near us that is now a cul de sac, and then disappear.   I have so much background material – like yarn to be knitted into a garment, that I’d never run out. 

Was becoming a writer a conscious decision or something that you drifted into (or even something so compelling that it could not be denied?) How old were you when you first started to write seriously.

I was born telling stories.  My first memory of storytelling comes from when I was three years old. I can remember lying in bed on a warm summer evening and telling myself a story about the fairies printed on the cotton handkerchief under my pillow.  I told myself stories verbally throughout my childhood and early teens.  I began writing my first full length historical novel when I was 15.  Once I’d finished it, now 16, I knew that it was what I wanted to do for a living.  So although it was a pastime it was also a serious intent to make it into a career if I could.  I went to night-school to learn to touch type for example with that career in mind. I saved my money to buy reference books and a good type-writer and then later an Amstrad Green-screen.  So for me it wasn’t a drift into thing.  It was a serious game plan from my teens. As far as I was concerned it was what I was meant to do.

Marmite? Love it or hate it?

Love it.  Toast and marmite with a poached egg provided by the free-range hens at the farm down the road is a favourite breakfast – and nutritious!

Do you have any rituals and routines when writing? Your favourite cup for example or ‘that’ piece of music...??

Nope.  I have mundane usuals such as check e-mails, Twitter and Facebook and post material such as a research book of the day, but these are daily tasks rather than rituals. I do like a nice mug, but I don’t have a special one. Just now I’m drinking from a lovely, chunky oatmeal-coloured earthenware mug that I bought as part of a pair in a charity shop because I liked them!

I promise I won’t tell them the answer to this, but when you are writing, who is more important, your family or your characters?

Family is very important of course, but one has to set boundaries.  Working from home doesn’t mean that you are at their beck and call. There would soon be a ruckus if I walked into their work place and expected them to drop everything!  But within those parameters, of course family has to come first.  So, for example, lots of us had birthdays recently, so we all took a day off to go out together for the day. And if someone is poorly or needs help, then it’s a given that I’ll be there.   I do have the gift of being able to multi task and switch the writing on and off like a tap.  I have never suffered from writers’ block and that does help.

Other than writing full time, what would be your dream job?

I’d be an archaeologist – a long-term dream.  Or a historian.

Coffee or tea? Red or white?

Tea, but I like coffee too.  Not keen on wine except in cooking.  But I like gin and have several on the go depending what I fancy.  We also make our own home made fruit vodkas.  The apple and cinnamon one is going down a treat at the moment!

How much of your work is planned before you start? Do you have a full draft or let it find its way?

It depends.  I always know the beginning and the end.  I always know the major destination points along the way. But the scenery or the roads to those points will often only emerge as I write. Another analogy would be like coming to a new house with lots of rooms. You know there’s a basement, a kitchen, an attic, but you have to see them for the first time and turn on the lights.  And the house is bare so you need to furnish it, but that will come as you look at the shape and acquire a feel and decide what kind of impression each room needs to make.  Successive drafts are like painting the walls and trying out colours.  Putting in appliances and furniture and shifting it around until you get the result you want.  I write a fairly detailed synopsis for my editor and agent (like house ground plans) and I write the first 3 chapters in good depth. After that I just follow the rough plan and I don’t look back or correct.  In the 6-9 months it takes me to write that very rough draft, my subconscious is busy at work in the background, and has had time to work on the raw material ready to spruce it up.  The rough draft is followed by as many more drafts as it needs, including a read through on paper and a read through aloud, because each process is slightly different in a neurological sense.

If you had free choice over the font your book is printed in, what font/fonts would you choose?

Never think about it. I leave that entirely to the publisher. I know some people are very font sensitive, but as long as it’s clear to read, I don’t care.  I do think it’s daft to have ‘Old English’ medieval fonts on a book cover though because they can be unreadable.

Imagine that you could get hold of any original source document. What would it be?

Well it would depend if it existed in the first place.  A signed confession by whoever did in the Princes in the Tower would be dynamite!  It would have been very interesting if Odo of Deuil had written a continuation of the chronicle of the second crusade continuing from Antioch – then we might have seen more of what happened between Eleanor of Aquitaine and her first husband Louis VII of France.

Have any of your characters ever shocked you and gone off on their own adventure leaving you scratching your head??? If so how did you cope with that!?

Yes, when I was writing The Champion.  My hero, Alexander, had a brother called Hervey who had been a major secondary character.  My plan was to kill him off somewhere around the middle of the book.  However, he refused to die.  I’m not squeamish about killing off my characters.  If they have to go, they have to go.  But Hervey was determined he was not going to shuffle off the mortal coil. In the end, he suffered a life changing injury but lived on to make a vital contribution to the novel.  So there was definitely a reason that he had to live!

How much research do you do and do you ever go on research trips?

I have been researching this period since I was 15, and I’m a few decades older than that now – cough.   This means that I have a good base line working knowledge of my period.  I am never not researching, although often I’ll just read a book on my period at random because that way I often pick up information and nuances that I wouldn’t otherwise do.  I have an extensive research library because while one should never, never, never dump information into one’s novel, one should always know one’s historical world intimately in detail. How else are you going to be able to move around in it?  Our family holidays are often research trips at the same time.  This year I am spending some time in Ireland researching the hero and heroine for my next novel.

Fiction authors have to contend with real characters invading our stories. Are there any ‘real’ characters you have been tempted to prematurely kill off or ignore because you just don’t like them or they spoil the plot?

Not really.  Every character brings their own set of traits to a plot and the ones you don’t like can be just as fascinating as the ones you do.  King John for example.  He’s hardly hero material but he does have a certain horrifying charisma.  Sometimes I have started a novel quite liking someone, but by the time I have finished my research, my opinion has changed.  I used to be quite a fan of Henry II.  I still do feel he was a great king, but having finished my Eleanor trilogy, although I pitied him at times, I wound up thoroughly disliking him.

Are you prepared to go away from the known facts for the sake of the story and if so how do you get around this?

The short answer to this is no. The slightly longer answer is that sometimes one has to question whether the known facts are correct – sometimes ‘known’ facts are actually ‘assumed facts’ or even fantasy.  I had such a headache over the appearance of Eleanor of Aquitaine for example.  Her biographers have made an astonishing variety of claims as to her appearance. I found her as a blond, a brunette, a red-head.  And all without any kind of provenance, or else provenance based on total misunderstanding of historical detail.  I stick to the facts that my gut instinct and my knowledge tells me are right. I’ve been researching the Middle Ages for 45 years, so I have a good knowledge base from which to assess those facts.  People say that you can’t let facts get in the way of a good story.  Of course you can’t. But you also can’t see facts as an insurmountable obstacle. A challenge, yes. If a fact is blocking your way, then quite simply you need to work with it, not around it.  It’s a fascinating challenge, like doing an interesting jigsaw puzzle.  If you can’t find a way to integrate the fact and the fiction for the reader then either you are writing the wrong thing or you are not a good enough writer yet. There’s always a way.

Do you find that the lines between fact and fiction sometimes become blurred?

Yes, and it’s not necessarily a bad thing as long as the blurring is actually a blending and not a distortion. The Romans said there was truth in wine. Sometimes there is true in fiction and untruth in fact but it’s up to the writer to do that blurring with integrity and authenticity and then reveal in that author’s note where the blurring has occurred.

Have you ever totally hated or fallen in love with one of your characters?

Yes. I fell in love with John Marshal, father of William Marshal when I came to write A Place Beyond Courage.  Initially I was curious – that’s how it always starts out – I want to know things about my characters, things that they have told no one else, or that are unknown about them.  John Marshal is infamous for having turned his back on his five year old hostage son – the future great William Marshal, and is supposed to have said that his captors could go ahead and hang the little lad because he the father had the anvils and hammers to get better sons than him.  I began to wonder what kind of man would have said such a thing. What I uncovered in the throes of detailed research was a very different story and it led me to a deep admiration and abiding affection for John Marshal.  I am still studying him now.  Since writing my novels about Eleanor of Aquitaine, I have to say that King Henry II, while I pity him, has become slightly persona non grata with me, again down to the research. He had many great qualities but it didn’t include people skills with his family – and no, I’m not thinking in modern mindset here either.

What do you enjoy reading for pleasure?

I don’t read medieval fiction for pleasure because after a day immersed in that world, and also researching that world, I need a break. I tend to read modern thrillers, ghost stories, tales from other countries that take me far away from my own doorstep, historical novels from other periods, some modern dramas and a judicious dose of literary fiction as long as it’s not too heavy.  Some biography too.  I’ve just read Diana Athill’s Alive Alive oh!  I’m currently reading Val McDermid’s The Skeleton Road (Scottish thriller). I like Leah Fleming’s engrossing relationship novels. I really enjoy J.K. Rowling writing as Robert Galbraith.   I like books that take me away from my own doorstep and usher me into different worlds.

What drink would you recommend drinking whilst reading your latest book?

Whatever takes your fancy. Everyone will bring a part of themselves to reading the novel and I am not going to tell them what to drink.  For me it would be tea – because I love tea. But then again, if I’m settled in for the evening it might be an ice-cold gin and tonic or some home made plum vodka.

Favourite author?

Too many to mention but Dorothy Dunnett is a genius and a classic. 

Last things last!  I am sure there is a question that you have always longed to be asked. Now is the chance. Ask your own question and answer it!

Name 3 nice things that would not have happened to you if you hadn’t become an author

The first would be being nominated for a Betty Trask Award for my first published novel The Wild Hunt. Before that I had been filling shelves in a supermarket to help make ends meet, and it was a bit surreal to go from the cat food aisle in my local Co-op, to shaking hands with HRH Prince Charles at the Banqueting Suite in Whitehall and receiving my cheque from him.

The second, would be having a reader write to me and tell me that he was an usher at the House of Lords, and offering to take me and my agent for a private guided tour of the House of Lords and the House of Commons.  We spent a wonderful morning going around Westminster, seeing all the places that the tourists don’t get to see!  I was able to tell our usher guide the names of the men who would have been doing his job back in 1138 – how wonderful is that?  Job continuity for a thousand years!

The third is sharing my love of history via novel writing.  It has inspired many to go and delve further into the history for themselves, and to even go to university to study various aspects of medieval history for degrees.  Not having a degree myself, I enjoy their pleasure and success vicariously!

 

 

New York Times bestselling author Elizabeth Chadwick has written over 20 historical novels sold in 18 languages worldwide. Her first novel, The Wild Hunt, won a Betty Trask Award, and The Scarlet Lion was nominated by Richard Lee, founder of the Historical Novel Society, as one of the top ten historical novels of the last decade. Elizabeth's nineteenth novel, To Defy a King, won the RNA Historical Novel Prize in 2011. THE SUMMER QUEEN, the first novel in her stunning Eleanor of Aquitaine trilogy, has now been followed by THE WINTER CROWN and THE AUTUMN THRONE.

© Diana Milne January 2017 © Elizabeth Chadwick May 2017

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Magna Carta Week: The Marshals and King John

The Marshals and King John

Lecture paper given by Elizabeth Chadwick at the 2015 Mortimer History Society Conference 

at Hereford Academy Saturday May 16^th

^[Excerpts]

I am going to begin with a quote from the Histoire de Guillaume le Mareschal.

“Sire, I beg the Lord our God that, if I ever did anything to please him, that in the end he grant you to grow up to be a worthy man. And if it were the case that you followed in the footsteps of some wicked ancestor, and that your wish was to be like him, then I pray to God, the son of Mary, that he does not give you long to live and that you die before it comes to that.”

These are the words spoken to the 11-year-old King Henry III by William Marshal on his deathbed. The moment is reported in the Histoire de Guillaume le Mareschal, a 20,000 line poem commissioned by the Marshal family, specifically, it is thought, by the Marshal’s eldest son William II, to commemorate his father’s great life and to glorify the family. It was completed around 1226. That “certain wicked ancestor” was the young king’s father, King John, who had died two and a half years earlier, leaving the country in almost bankrupt turmoil and rife with civil war.

The Marshal Histoire was intended to be read aloud on the anniversary of William’s death, to his family, and to those who shared their affinity, which rather demonstrates that in the mid-1220s and for a while afterwards, the reputation of King John was set at nought even while his son Henry III was entering manhood. 

Photo ©2015 Rosemary Watson

Courtesy of the author

Despite William Marshal’s  damning deathbed remarks in 1219,  he had served King John and indeed John’s brothers and father in a military capacity through thick and thin for more than 50 years. In some ways they were the reason for his being. No Henry II, no Richard and John, and there would have been no William Marshal Lord of Chepstow, Earl of Pembroke, ruler of Leinster, Lord of Bienfait, Longueville and Orbec in Normandy. All of these and more, plus various posts and fiscal rewards were payment for loyal and intelligent service, both on the battlefield and off it and all were dependent on the favour and patronage of the Angevin kings.

My main thrust today is William Marshal’s relationship with King John. The Histoire may be damning in those parting comments of the Marshal to the boy king,  and yet the Marshal had stood by John when everyone else was deserting him.

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William Marshall was about 20 years old when King John was born in December 1166 at Oxford [… W]hen John was in the care of his wet nurse Agatha, William was coming to young knighthood in Normandy under the tutelage of his distant kinsman William de Tancarville, who was the hereditary Chamberlain.

William entered Queen Eleanor’s household in 1168 after saving her from ambush at the cost of his own wounding and capture by the Lusignan family who were in rebellion. Patrick Earl of Salisbury was killed in the attack. Eleanor [, John's mother,] took a shine to William, paid his ransom and rewarded him with money, horses and weapons from her own purse. He became her man and entered her household. In 1170 he was promoted to the role of tutor in chivalry and marshal of the household of her eldest son Henry, known as the Young King because his father had had him crowned in his own lifetime. 

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Basically William would have watched John growing up from the sidelines with occasional moments of contact between child and man. Whether he had any sympathy for a younger son who would have to make his own way in the world, we don’t know but his main responsibility at this time was the Young King.

The brotherly love between John and young Henry became strained when their father stated his intention of endowing John with three castles that belonged to the Young King. It was one of the reasons that led to a rebellion of the older sons against their father, rebellion that swiftly spread to become a general civil war and resulted in the imprisonment of Eleanor of Aquitaine, who was accused of fomenting an uprising with her three older sons. John, too young to be involved, remained out of it on the sidelines. Although Henry II prevailed and  reconciliations were made, the cracks were still deep and ugly. John seems to have remained in favour with his father, sometimes being found in his company and sometimes under the tutelage of Ranulf de Glanville, one of Henry’s able courtiers and lawyers. Throughout this time William Marshal would have continued to be an observer towards his lord’s attitude to his youngest brother and would have encountered John on occasion at gatherings.

The Young King rebelled against his father again in 1183, and this time died during the conflict.  

William Marshall (Drawing)
by Diana Popovic Disco
Photo ©2015 Elizabeth Chadwick
Courtesy of the author

Following his death, William Marshal went on pilgrimage to Jerusalem and when he returned took up employment with Henry II. During the period between 1186 and Henry II’s death in 1189, William would have had further time to get to know John as the king’s youngest son developed into young manhood. William was with Henry II at the bitter end when the king died. Richard was now in rebellion against him and had actively hounded him. At one point William had had to face down the hotly pursuing Richard by killing his horse under him and stopping him in his tracks. But at least Richard’s intentions were clearly signaled.

When Henry II died, he was alone. His naked corpse had been robbed by his servants while his household was elsewhere. John by this time had seen the writing on the wall and had deserted the sinking ship. His father is supposed to have asked for a list of those who had betrayed him, and on seeing John’s at the top of it, had turned his face to the wall and died.

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Richard, however, was preparing to go on crusade and left William Marshal as one of several justiciars to help run things in Richard’s absence […] Without going into too much convoluted political detail,  Richard had left the government of England partially in the hands of his chancellor, William Longchamp, bishop of Ely […] William and the other justiciars had to try and maintain a balance of power […T]hen came the news that Richard had been captured while returning from crusade, and a massive ransom for his return was being demanded by the Emperor of Germany.

John tried to persuade everyone that Richard was dead and that he wasn’t coming back. His mother, meanwhile, convinced that Richard was very much alive, was scrambling to raise the enormous ransom demanded of 150,000 marks. For a time John played along but in secret was negotiating a deal with Philippe of France to try and keep Richard imprisoned. The men offered  Emperor Heinrich various monetary bribes that they couldn’t possibly fulfil in order to keep Richard incarcerated. 

When that didn’t work and Richard started out for home, John decamped to France and tried to make further deals with King Philippe that basically resulted in him selling out Normandy from under Richard’s feet.

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William, however, weathered Richard’s return and continued in the king’s high favour. He accompanied him to Normandy where Richard was reconciled with John. Richard’s way round the problem of his rebellious brother was to call John a child who had been badly advised. John was by this time heading for 30 and hardly a child, so it may have galled him to have this attitude taken toward him, but at the same time it got him off the hook.

Between 1194 and 1199 William’s relationship with John was a working one as Richard strove to restore the damage done while he was on crusade. John served him to all intents and purposes faithfully and well during this time – indeed was an asset. He and William Marshall worked together and were at the Siege of Milly where they captured the castle - this is the one where William supposedly ran up a siege ladder and then, tired after his exertions on the battlements and a fight with the constable whom he defeated, sat on him to keep him down while William recovered. This is reported in the Histoire de Guillaume le Mareschal as being an event where Richard was present, but in actual fact John was the other military commander there. The Histoire, however, seldom has anything good to say about John, and avoids mention of him in a positive military role. The fact stands though, despite the Histoire, that William and John worked well together during the years between 1194 and 1199, and would have built up a working relationship and even rapport.

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Photo ©2015 Rosemary Watson

Courtesy of the author

In 1199 Richard died while besieging the Castle of Chalus in the Limousin. He was struck in the area of the collarbone by a crossbow bolt which festered and he died soon after of blood poisoning or gangrene. While still lucid, he sent word to William Marshal and Hubert Walter, Archbishop of Canterbury, who were in Rouen telling them to secure the Treasury there. The Histoire de Guillaume le Mareschal tells us that William and Hubert Walter had a discussion about who should inherit the throne – Arthur of Brittany who was Richard’s teenage nephew, or John who was 33 years old, a man and an accomplished warrior. Hubert Walter thought that Arthur had the better right to the Crown but William Marshall argued for John. In the event William Marshal won out and John was chosen. 

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His own honeymoon with John at the outset of the reign was not to last […] John lost Anjou, Maine and Normandy to the French. Whereas his brother Richard had won the battle for the hearts and minds of his people, John did not have the same propensity nor the same leadership qualities and military nous.

He did have a stroke of luck when he captured his nephew Arthur who was besieging his grandmother, John’s mother, Eleanor of Aquitaine, at the Castle of Mirebeau, 20 miles from Poitiers,  but afterwards John ruined the advantage by treating those he captured with such shocking cruelty that men were horrified at his behaviour. “The king kept his prisoners in such a horrible manner and such abject confinement that it seemed an indignity and a disgrace to all those with him who witnessed his cruelty,”  says the Histoire. 

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William was in the act of building up a patrimony for his sons and to this end when John’s grip on Normandy went down the pan, William did a deal with Philippe of France to try and keep his estate intact but it meant swearing allegiance to Philippe for his lands on the Norman side of the channel. John took a dim view of this and the relationship between him and the Marshal became strained. John saw William’s action as a desertion of duty and moreover double-dealing. William saw it as a prudent act to preserve his land, but even so was sailing close to the wind. When John planned an invasion of France in 1206, William refused to go. In the event so did most of John’s nobility but John knew who the ringleader was. The Marshal said to the other barons at the height of the quarrel at Portsmouth, “My lords look at me, for, by the faith I owe you, I am for you all this day an exemplar and model. Be on your alert against the king: what he thinks to do with me he will do to each and every one of you, or even more if he gets the upper hand over you.” That John did not move against William was largely down to the fact that William had a mass of support behind him, and at this stage John didn’t feel strong enough to test men’s loyalty.

Not long after this, William requested permission to go to Ireland [… John] demanded a hostage of William Marshal - his oldest son before he would let William cross […] in 1206. William handed over the youth and continued preparations to leave. John, not wanting William to sail at all, demanded his second son, too […] William’s handing over of his children probably saved his skin. When a son was demanded of de Braose’s wife she replied that she would not hand any child of hers over to the man who had murdered his own nephew. That sealed her death sentence and John went after her with a vengeance. She and her eldest son were eventually to starve to death in the dungeon of Corfe Castle, or some say Windsor […] William Marshal’s own wife Isabel de Clare was not happy at handing over their sons, but William’s will prevailed.

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William was left after that to his own devices in Ireland for several years. It wasn’t exactly retirement, but it was a retreat from the fray, like entering one of the refuges at a tourney. His sons, however, were still hostages and one has to wonder how they were being brought up away from the Marshal enclave and what their opinion of King John was. And William himself: did he want his boys being raised away from his influences among men he did not trust? Learning ways he might consider not to be good for them? Certainly their mother would have been concerned. She didn’t want them to go and left to her own devices might have refused to hand them over with disastrous consequences.

By 1212, with interdicts and rebellions happening on the mainland, John requested William’s help, and offered to return his sons to their family – they’d been away around five years. William agreed and moved back to England to serve John in both a military and diplomatic capacity and was received back into the fold. Why this volte face by the king? Perhaps he realised how few allies he had in his pocket.  William could have refused the summons. Or he could have accepted, taken his sons and run, and then declared for the rebels, but he didn’t. He chose to stand by John and act as a military commander and adviser. It could be that, presented with a sow’s ear he was willing to take the challenge of making it into a silk purse. Someone had to trouble shoot and repair this terrible fix they were in.

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Now that the crisis was over a large rebellious faction of barons were protesting about the harshness of John’s rule – the unfair taxes, the abuses of rights, the ridiculous fines. What had been a half mark fine in the days of Henry II and Richard now sometimes amounted to hundreds of marks. John would impose multi-thousand pound fines on barons to keep them in their place, and if they couldn’t pay, he’d use it as an excuse to take over their castles. He employed mercenaries to do his bidding. He demanded money with menaces basically and receiving justice depended on how much you could pay to get it.  This was the birth of the notion of Magna Carta, to bring the king under the law and stop these abuses.

Magna Carta
Wikipedia

King John was clearly against the Magna Carta – anything that limited his powers was not going to be flavour of the month, but with the French threatening and his barons in rebellion, he had little choice but to negotiate. This I think is where William comes in. John had used him before as a diplomat when it came to negotiating with the King of France and the way William had woven his way through the tricky mid years of the 1200’s was a testament to his cool head and diplomatic abilities. He also had strong Templar connections and the Templars were a kind of neutral party – like the United Nations today, where both sides could meet to discuss their differences. I believe that while William had no say in drafting the clauses of Magna Carta, he did have input in negotiating the terms and at least bringing King John to the table at Runnymede.  Without William driving the diplomacy, there might not have been a Magna Carta at all. In other words both sides were willing to trust him. He had been through the fire with King John, and the king’s relationship with him was now cordial – as far as the king was concerned. Everyone knew about his trouble with the king, and that while acting on John’s behalf, he was also one of them. Ever the diplomat, William maintained a neutral façade.

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William continued to stick by King John as the French landed and the battle for England became a civil war. He never wavered. It wasn’t out of love for John, whom he made clear on his death bed that he detested, but possibly it was for the monarchy as a whole – for who had the right. Perhaps even out of loyalty to Eleanor of Aquitaine, the liege lady who had given him his first boost up the ladder and is one of the few women mentioned in the Histoire de Guillaume le Mareschal. This was her last remaining son, for better or worse.

When John was dying, he named William Marshal one of the executors of his will and the Histoire puts its hero in the forefront and has John asking William to take care of the country for him. The wording is clearly propaganda bigging up its hero, but there is a germ of truth there, too. William was one of the stalwarts and one of the few people capable of repairing the hole in the fabric. 

Although in his 70’s William took on the job of regent to the young Henry III and reissued Magna Carta, removing or moderating the clauses that were proving to be sticking points, and gradually drawing everyone back into the fold and dealing with the French, both by battle at Lincoln and Sandwich in 1217, and by diplomacy in making a peace treaty with Prince Louis of France. 

William Marshal
Cast Court replica effigy
Victoria and Albert Museum
Photo ©2015 Elizabeth Chadwick

Courtesy of the author

William’s role as caretaker of the realm and of the young Henry III came to an end when he fell ill in either late 1218 or early 1219 and was borne home to his manor of Caversham to slowly die as winter turned to spring and spring looked toward summer. Here too, the Young King Henry III was brought from Reading to William’s sickbed and the words uttered about the “wicked ancestor.”

To sum up the relationship between William Marshal and King John, I would say that it was one of reciprocity that at times faltered because of ambition and suspicion, but was weathered by the diplomacy of the Marshal. The latter had no love or even liking for his liege lord, but he had a wider loyalty to the monarchy, a pattern perhaps set in his own childhood by his father’s sacrifices at Wherwell and Newbury, and then his own early service to Eleanor of Aquitaine and the Young King. It was a default in the Marshal that wasn’t to translate to his sons and their relationship with Henry III.  

Were I to compare the Marshal with a modern-day political leader, I’d have to say Nelson Mandela. What strikes me is their ability to cut through the personal dislikes and past injuries to see the big picture and do their best for national stability.

To read in its entirety Elizabeth Chadwick's fascinating article about the relationship between King John and William Marshal, please follow the link to her blog, Living the History. 

Elizabeth Chadwick developed a fascination for the Middle Ages in her teens and began writing historical fiction as a hobby. In her thirties that hobby became a career when she was taken on by a leading literary agent and her first novel, The Wild Hunt, won a Betty Trask Award. Her novel The Greatest Knight was a New York Times bestseller, and its sequel, The Scarlet Lion, was nominated as one of the top 10 historical novels of the decade by Historical Novel Society founder Richard Lee. To Defy a King won the Romantic Novelists' Association (RNA) Best Historical Fiction of the Year Award in 2011. She is currently writing the third novel in a trilogy about Eleanor of Aquitaine, stripping back the years of old varnish and embellishment before adding fresh colours and nuances to that particular area of historical storytelling.

Chadwick has also reviewed Dan Jones's Magna Carta: The Making and Legacy of the Great Charter, which can be found at The History Girls. You can learn more about this author and her works at her website; her blog, Living the History; on Facebook and at Twitter. She also runs a Facebook group dedicated to William Marshal, his life and times, which is open to all.

Magna Carta Week: The Eternal Legacy of Magna Carta

The Eternal Legacy of Magna Carta

By Sharon Bennett Connolly

On 1 April 2015 Lincoln Castle reopened its doors after an extensive refurbishment. The renovations included a new purpose-built, state-of-the-art, underground vault for its most prized possession: one of only four surviving copies of the original 1215 Great Charter – the Magna Carta.

The Magna Carta’s new home cannot fail to emphasise the importance of this charter in the history of not only England, but also the rest of the world. Two films - Magna Carta: Challenging the Power of the King and Magna Carta: Meaning and Myth – reconstruct the events leading up to Magna Carta and chart its significance through the centuries, respectively.

But what is Magna Carta? And what makes it so important?

In many ways, the reign of King John had been a continuation of that of his father, Henry II, and of his brother, Richard I, with one significant difference. Early in his reign John had lost the French part of the great Angevin empire: Normandy and Aquitaine were now held by France. In 1214 King John returned to England following his defeat by the French at the Battle of Bouvines. The battle ended the king’s hopes of regaining the lost empire.

Added to this catastrophe was the character and personality of John himself. By nature John was paranoid, secretive and distrustful. John’s cruelty is widely known. He is accused of killing his nephew and rival claimant to the English throne, Arthur of Brittany; he hanged 28 Welsh hostages (sons of rebel chieftains) and he hounded William de Braose and his family all the way to Ireland and back. De Braose’s wife and son died in one of John’s prisons, probably from starvation.

The History of William Marshal, a biography of the great knight and statesman, states of John: ‘He kept his prisoners in such a horrible manner, and in such abject confinement that it seemed an indignity and a disgrace to all those with him who witnessed such cruelty’.

Although John faced the fallout of Magna Carta, many of the injustices targeted by the barons can be seen in the reigns of his predecessors. Heavy taxes, arbitrary fines and the exploitation of wardships were long-established royal revenue earners. However, where Henry and Richard had a whole empire to exploit, John’s need for money had to be met by England alone.

Even John’s disagreement with the Church can see parallels in the reign of Henry II and his clashes with Thomas Becket. John opposed the election of Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury, and refused to allow his consecration. Pope Innocent III went so far as to excommunicate John and place England under interdict; in 1213 Philip II of France was even invited to depose him.

John finally came to an agreement with the Church in May 1213, swearing that the liberties established under Henry I would be strictly observed and allowing Langton to take up his post as archbishop. However, John broke his oath almost immediately and Langton became one of the leaders of the opposition to the king.

The barons’ objections to John were almost beyond number. He had failed to face the French and had lost not only his family’s Continental possessions, but also those of his barons. Few had forgotten his treachery against his brother – his attempt on the throne whilst Richard was away on Crusade. His barons even complained that he forced himself on their wives and daughters.

The barons had had enough.

The rebels were ready to fight. After occupying London they made one final attempt to prevent war, presenting the king with a list of their demands.

Following further negotiations a long detailed document was produced, dealing with particular grievances of the time and with injustices in general. It touched on the whole system of royal government. And it was granted to ‘all free men of the realm and their heirs forever’.

Magna Carta

Of its 63 clauses, some terms were asking for immediate remedies, such as the removal of corrupt administrators and the sending home of foreign mercenaries. The clause stating that fighting outside of the kingdom could not be imposed by the king was a reaction to John’s recent attempts to force his English barons to help him recover his Continental domains.

Others had long-term aims. The document sought to guarantee the privileges of the Church and the City of London. Restrictions were placed on the powers of regional officials, such as sheriffs, to prevent abuses. The royal court was fixed at Westminster, for justice to be obtainable by all, and royal judges were to visit each county regularly. Taxes could no longer be levied without the consent of the Church and the barons.

Clauses included the fixing of inheritance charges and protection from exploitation for under-age heirs; the king was to take only what was reasonable from an estate (although ‘reasonable’ remained undefined). From henceforth a widow was to be free to choose whether or not to remarry and her marriage portion (dowry) would be made available to her immediately on her husband’s death. Another clause sought to prevent the seizure of land from Jews and the king’s debtors.

Magna Carta even went so far as to regulate weights and measures. It also reduced the size of the king’s forests and limited the powers of forest justices.

Although most of the 63 clauses of Magna Carta are now defunct, three still remain as major tenets of British law, including ‘to no one will we sell, to no one will we deny or delay right or justice’. That no person could be imprisoned, outlawed or deprived of his lands except by judgement of his peers and the law of the land has remained the cornerstone of the English legal system ever since.

Magna Carta was sealed at Runnymede, Berkshire, on 15 June 1215. John ordered that the charter be circulated around the towns and villages.

As a peace agreement between King John and his rebellious barons, however, it failed miserably. By July John was appealing to the Pope for help. Pope Innocent III’s response arrived in England in September. The treaty was declared null and void; it was 'not only shameful and demeaning but also illegal and unjust'. By the time the letter arrived in England, the dispute had already erupted into the Barons’ War.

Deciding they could no longer deal with John’s perfidy, the rebel barons invited the King of France, Philip II, to claim the throne. Philip’s son and heir, the future Louis VIII, accepted the offer. Having landed on the south coast, he marched for London, where he was proclaimed King of England on 2 June 1216.

John’s fortuitous death at Newark in October 1216 turned the tide against Louis and the rebels. The highly respected knight and statesman, William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke, was appointed regent for John’s nine-year-old son, Henry III. Marshal’s staunch loyalty was renowned throughout Europe; he was the embodiment of the chivalric code. Many barons who had previously sided with Louis saw the opportunity to come back from the brink, and rally around the young king. Marshal reissued Magna Carta and faced and defeated the joint French and rebel army at Lincoln on 20 May 1217.

Afterwards, the English were able to dictate peace terms to Louis, and the French went home. Magna Carta was issued a third time, along with a new Forest Charter (also on display at Lincoln Castle). Its reissue in 1225, on Henry III attaining his majority, is the one that made it onto the statute books.

The Legacy of Magna Carta

It is hard to overstate the enduring significance of Magna Carta. Although it was initially a document conceived by rebel barons, the regents of Henry III exploited Magna Carta as a royalist device to recover the loyalty of the rebel barons. However, once it was issued it was used as a curb to all regal excesses. In 1265 it was invoked to create the first parliament.

By the late 1200s Magna Carta was regarded as a fundamental statement of English liberties.

Magna Carta set the precedent for future reform programmes, such as the Provisions of Oxford of 1258, the Ordinances of 1311, the Petition of Right of 1628 and the Grand Remonstrance of 1641.

The influence of Magna Carta has spread far beyond England’s shores. It can be seen in the United States’ 1791 Bill of Rights, in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights.

Although a failure in the short term, in the long term, Magna Carta established defined limitations to royal rights, laying down that standard to be observed by the crown and its agents.

It is the closest thing England has to a Constitution.

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Sharon Bennett Connolly has a lifelong fascination with history, and has recently discovered a love of writing. She has combined these two in her blog, History…the interesting bits!