MORE GENERAL ISSUES
The Parliament of England was the legislature of the Kingdom of England. Its roots can be traced back to the early medieval period. In a series of developments, it came increasingly to constrain the power of the monarch, and went on after the Act of Union 1707 to form the main basis of the Parliament of Great Britain, and later the Parliament of the United Kingdom. This makes the modern Parliament of the United Kingdom one of the oldest legislative bodies in the world, arguably the oldest, and for this reason it is sometimes referred to as the "Mother of all Parliaments".
The Causes of the Hundred Years' war: Its basic cause was a dynastic quarrel that originated when the conquest of England by William of Normandy created a state lying on both sides of the English Channel. In the 14th century the English kings held the duchy of Guienne in France; they resented paying homage to the French kings, and they feared the increasing control exerted by the French crown over its great feudal vassals. The immediate causes of the Hundred Years War were the dissatisfaction of Edward III of England with the nonfulfillment by Philip VI of France of his pledges to restore a part of Guienne taken by Charles IV; the English attempts to control Flanders, an important market for English wool and a source of cloth; and Philip's support of Scotland against England.
The Black Death:
Origins: In 1347 a Genoese ship from Caffa, on the Black Sea, came ashore at Messina, Sicily. The crew of the ship carried with them a disease so virulent that it could kill in a matter of hours. It is thought that the disease originated in the Far East. When it became clear that ships from the East carried the plague, Messina closed its port. The ships were forced to seek safe harbour elsewhere around the Mediterranean, and the disease was able to spread quickly. Theories about the cause of the disease were numerous, ranging from a punishment from God to planetary alignment to evil stares. Not surprisingly, many people believed that the horrors of the Black Death signaled the Apocalypse, or end of time. Others believed that the disease was a plot by Jews to poison the entire Christian world, and many Jews were killed by panicked mobs.
The truth: The Black Death is a bacteria-born disease; the bacteria in question being Yersinia pestis, which was carried in the blood of wild black rats and the fleas that lived off the rats.
The symptoms: Bubonic produces fist-sized swellings, called bulboes, at the site of flea bites - usually in the groin, armpits, or neck. The swellings are intensely painful, and the victims die in 2-6 days. The buboes are red at first, but later turn a dark purple, or black. This black colouring gives the "Black Death" its name. Pneumonic plague occurs when the infection enters the lungs, causing the victim to vomit blood. Infected pneumonic people can spread the disease through the air by coughing, sneezing, or just breathing! In Septicemic plague the bacteria enters the person's bloodstream, causing death within a day.
The Black Death reaches England: The summer of 1348 was abnormally wet. Grain lay rotting in the fields, due to the nearly constant rains. It isn't clear exactly when or where the Black Death reached England. Some reports at the time pointed to Bristol, others to Dorset. The disease may have appeared as early as late June or as late as August 4. On November 1 the plague reached London, and up to 30,000 of the city's population of 70,000 inhabitants succumbed. Over the next 2 years the disease killed between 30-40% of the entire population. One of the worst aspects of the disease to the medieval Christian mind is that people died without last rites and without having a chance to confess their sins. Pope Clement VI was forced to grant remission of sins to all who died of the plague because so many perished without benefit of clergy. People were allowed to confess their sins to one another, or "even to a woman".
Peasants fled their fields. Livestock were left to fend for themselves, and crops left to rot. The Border Scots saw the pestilence in England as a punishment of God on their enemies. An army gathered near Stirling to strike while England lay defenseless. But before the Scots could march, the plague decimated their ranks. Pursued by English troops, the Scots fled north, spreading the plague deep into their homeland. By the end of 1350 the Black Death had subsided, but it never really died out in England for the next several hundred years. It was not until the late 17th century that England became largely free of serious plague epidemics.
Consequences: With the population so low, there were not enough workers to work the land. As a result, wages and prices rose. The Ordinances of Labourers (1349) tried to legislate a return to pre-plague wage levels, but the overwhelming shortage of labourers meant that wages continued to rise. The standard of living for labourers rose accordingly. Land that had once been farmed was now given over to pasturing, which was much less labour-intensive. This helped boost the cloth and woolen industry. With the fall in population most landowners were not getting the rental income they needed, and were forced to lease their land. Peasants benefited through increased employment options and higher wages. Society became more mobile, as peasants moved to accept work where they could command a good wage. In some cases market towns disappeared, or suffered a decline despite the economic boom in rural areas.
The Peasant's Revolt:
The revolt was precipitated by heavy-handed attempts to enforce the third poll tax, first levied in 1377 supposedly to finance military campaigns overseas — a continuation of the Hundred Years' War initiated by King Edward III of England. The young King, Richard II, was also another reason for the uprising, as he was only 14 at the time, and therefore unpopular men such as John of Gaunt (the acting regent), Simon Sudbury (Chancellor and Archbishop of Canterbury) and Sir Robert Hales (the Lord Treasurer, responsible for the poll tax) were left to rule instead, and many saw them as corrupt officials, trying to exploit the weakness of the King. A longer-term factor was the way the Statute of Labourers of 1351 was enforced. The Black Death that ravaged England in 1348 and 1349 had greatly reduced the labour force, and, as a consequence, labourers were able to demand enhanced terms and conditions. The Statute attempted to curb this by pegging wages and restricting the mobility of labour, but the probable effect was that labourers employed by lords were effectively exempted, but labourers working for other employers, both artisans and more substantial peasants, were liable to be fined or held in the stocks.
In June 1381, two groups of common people from the southeastern counties of Kent and Essex marched on London. The most vociferous of their leaders, Walter, or "Wat" Tyler, was at the head of a contingent from Kent. When the rebels arrived in Blackheath on June 12, the renegade Lollard priest, John Ball, preached a sermon including the famous question that has echoed down the centuries: "When Adam delved and Eve span, who was then the gentleman?". The following day, the rebels, encouraged by the sermon, crossed London Bridge into the heart of the city. Meanwhile the 'Men of Essex' had gathered with Jack Straw at Great Baddow and had marched on London, arriving at Stepney. Instead of what was expected from a riot however, there was only a systematic attack on certain properties, many of them associated with John of Gaunt and/or the Hospitaller Order. On June 14, they are reputed to have been met by the young king himself, and, led by Richard of Wallingford to have presented him with a series of demands, including the dismissal of some of his more unpopular ministers and the effective abolition of serfdom.
At the same time, a group of rebels stormed the Tower of London— probably after being let in— and summarily executed those hiding there, including the Lord Chancellor (Simon of Sudbury, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who was particularly associated with the poll tax), and the Lord Treasurer (Robert de Hales, the Grand Prior of the Knights Hospitallers of England). The Savoy Palace of the king's uncle John of Gaunt was one of the London buildings destroyed by the rioters. Richard II agreed to reforms such as fair rents and the abolition of serfdom.
At Smithfield, on the following day, further negotiations with the king were arranged, but on this occasion the meeting did not go according to plan. Wat Tyler left his army and rode forth to parlay with the King and his party. Tyler, it is alleged by the chroniclers, behaved most belligerently and dismounted his horse and called for a drink most rudely. In the ensuing dispute, Tyler drew his dagger and William Walworth, the Mayor of London, drew his sword and attacked Tyler, mortally wounding him in the neck. King Richard, seizing the opportunity, promised the rebels that all was well, that Tyler had been knighted, and that their demands would be met - they were to march to St John's Fields. But the King broke his promise. The nobles quickly re-established their control with the help of a hastily organised militia of 7000, and most of the other leaders were pursued, captured and executed, including John Ball. Following the collapse of the revolt, the king's concessions were quickly revoked, and the tax was re-levied.
Although the most significant events took place in the capital, there were violent encounters throughout eastern England.
The doctrines of Wycliffe
He rejected the doctrine that tradition is equal in authority with the Scriptures.
He rejected transubstantiation and indulgences.
He believed the Bible to be the Word of God without error from beginning to end.
He thought that men have the right to have the Bible in their own languages and was willing to endure the wrath of the Catholic authorities by translating the Scriptures into English. When Wycliffe began the translation work, the Pope in Rome issued “bulls” against him.
There is some evidence that Wycliffe rejected infant baptism, at least toward the end of his life.
The Wars of the Roses
The Wars of the Roses were series of civil wars fought in medieval England from 1455 to 1487 between the house of Lancaster and the House of York. The name Wars of the Roses is based on the badges used by the two sides, the red rose for the Lancastrians and the white rose for the Yorkists.
Major causes of the conflict include:
Both houses were direct descendants of King Edward III;
The ruling Lancastrian king, Henry VI, surrounded himself with unpopular nobles;
The civil unrest of much of the population;
The availability of many powerful lords with their own private armies;
The untimely episodes of mental illness by king Henry VI;
The Red Rose of Lancaster is the county flower of Lancashire. The rose was first adopted as an heraldic device by the first Earl of Lancaster and became the emblem of Lancashire following the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485.
The White Rose of York (Rosa alba) is the symbol of the House of York and latterly of Yorkshire.
Names of most important battles
First Battle of St. Albans - May 22, 1455 (Yorkist victory)
The battle of Northampton - July 10, 1460 (Yorkist victory)
Battle of Wakefield - December 30, 1460 (Lancastrian victory)
Battle of Towton - March 29, 1461 (Yorkist victory)
Battle of Barnet - April 14, 1471 (Yorkist victory)
Battle of Tewkesbury: May 4, 1471 (Yorkist victory)
The Very Brief Summary
Following the usurpation of the throne in 1399 by a junior line of the Plantagenet family, the third of these Lancastrian kings proved to be both incompetent and mentally unstable. After a few years of gradually escalating warfare, the throne was taken by the Yorkist line of the Plantagenets in 1461. The Lancastrians, with the help of the Kingmaker, took it back in 1470and lost it again in 1471. The popular Yorkist King Edward held the throne until his death in 1483. The king's younger brother, Richard, put the king's sons in the Tower of London and took the crown himself. In 1485, Henry Tudor, a collateral heir of the Lancastrians, invaded from France and won the Battle of Bosworth killing King Richard. Thus Henry became the first king of the Tudor dynasty.
Henry VII
Henry was the son of Edmund Tudor, earl of Richmond, who died before Henry was born, and Margaret Beaufort, a descendant of Edward III through John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster. Although the Beaufort line, which was originally illegitimate, had been specifically excluded (1407) from all claim to the throne, the death of the imprisoned Henry VI (1471) made Henry Tudor head of the house of Lancaster. At this point, however, the Yorkist Edward IV had established himself securely on the throne, and Henry, who had been brought up in Wales, fled to Brittany for safety.
Henry VII was a fiscally prudent monarch who restored the fortunes of an effectively bankrupt exchequer by introducing ruthlessly efficient mechanisms of taxation. In this he was supported by his chancellor, Archbishop John Morton. Royal government was also reformed with the introduction of the King's Council that kept the nobility in check.
Henry VII's policy was both to maintain peace and to create economic prosperity. Up to a point, he succeeded in both. He was not a military man, and had no interest in trying to regain the French territories lost during the reigns of his predecessors; he was therefore only too ready to conclude a treaty with France at Etaples that both directly and indirectly brought money into the coffers of England, and ensured that the French would not support pretenders to the English throne, such as Perkin Warbeck. Henry had been under the financial and physical protection of the French throne or its vassals for most of his career prior to his ascending to the throne of England.
He created the Committee of the Privy Council (a forerunner of the modern cabinet) as an executive advisory board; he established the Court of the Star Chamber to increase royal involvement in civil and criminal cases; and as an alternative to a revenue tax disbursement from Parliament, he imposed forced loans and grants on the nobility. Henry's mistrust of the nobility derived from his experiences in the Wars of the Roses - a majority remained dangerously neutral until the very end. His skill at by-passing Parliament played a crucial role in his success at renovating government.
Henry was a very difficult opponent. He was a clever man who was determined not to lose his throne. He quickly identified the main problem he faced - the powerful barons of England. They were rich and they had their own private armies. During the Wars of the Roses, they had not been loyal to either side - renting out their private armies to the family that paid the most. Henry had to control them.
Henry had a three-way plan to bring the barons under his control. First, he banned all private armies. Any baron who disobeyed this royal command would be committing treason which carried the death penalty. Secondly, he heavily taxed the barons to reduce their wealth. The third way of controlling the barons was to use the Court of Star Chamber run by men who were loyal to Henry VII and they could be relied on to severely punish any baron who angered the king. Unlike many kings before him, Henry took a keen interest in financial matters as he knew that a wealthy king was a strong king and a poor king was a weak one. He also knew that money would expand his army and the larger his army was, the more powerful he was in the eyes of the barons.
To develop better relations abroad, and to avoid costly foreign wars, he had arranged for his eldest son - Arthur - to marry a Spanish princess called Catherine of Aragon. Aragon is in north-east Spain. Such political marriages were common among the children of royal families. Neither Arthur nor Catherine would have had the opportunity to say no to the marriage. The marriage lasted only five months as Arthur died. To maintain a friendship with Spain, Henry arranged for Catherine to marry his second son, Henry, the future king of England.
Elisabeth I
Elizabeth I - the last Tudor monarch - was born at Greenwich on 7 September 1533, the daughter of Henry VIII and his second wife, Anne Boleyn. Her early life was full of uncertainties, and her chances of succeeding to the throne seemed very slight once her half-brother Edward was born in 1537. She was then third in line behind her Roman Catholic half-sister, Princess Mary. Elizabeth succeeded to the throne on her half-sister's death in November 1558. She was very well-educated (fluent in six languages), and had inherited intelligence, determination and shrewdness from both parents. Her 45-year reign is generally considered one of the most glorious in English history. During it a secure Church of England was established. Its doctrines were laid down in the 39 Articles of 1563, a compromise between Roman Catholicism and Protestantism. Although autocratic and capricious, Elizabeth had astute political judgement and chose her ministers well. Overall, Elizabeth's administration consisted of some 600 officials administering the great offices of state, and a similar number dealing with the Crown lands. Social and economic regulation and law and order remained in the hands of the sheriffs at local level, supported by unpaid justices of the peace.
The arts flourished during Elizabeth's reign. Country houses such as Longleat and Hardwick Hall were built, miniature painting reached its high point, theatres thrived - the Queen attended the first performance of Shakespeare's 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'. Composers such as William Byrd and Thomas Tallis worked in Elizabeth's court and at the Chapel Royal, St. James's Palace.
The image of Elizabeth's reign is one of triumph and success. However, Elizabeth's reign was one of considerable danger and difficulty for many, with threats of invasion from Spain through Ireland, and from France through Scotland. Much of northern England was in rebellion in 1569-70. A papal bull of 1570 specifically released Elizabeth's subjects from their allegiance, and she passed harsh laws against Roman Catholics after plots against her life were discovered. One such plot involved Mary, Queen of Scots, who had fled to England in 1568 after her second husband's murder and her subsequent marriage to a man believed to have been involved in his murder. As a likely successor to Elizabeth, Mary spent 19 years as Elizabeth's prisoner because Mary was the focus for rebellion and possible assassination plots, such as the Babington Plot of 1586. In 1588, aided by bad weather, the English navy scored a great victory over the Spanish invasion fleet of around 130 ships - the 'Armada'. The Armada was intended to overthrow the Queen and re-establish Roman Catholicism by conquest, as Philip II believed he had a claim to the English throne through his marriage to Mary.
Elizabeth chose never to marry. If she had chosen a foreign prince, he would have drawn England into foreign policies for his own advantages (as in her sister Mary's marriage to Philip of Spain); marrying a fellow countryman could have drawn the Queen into factional infighting. Elizabeth used her marriage prospects as a political tool in foreign and domestic policies. Overall, Elizabeth's always shrewd and, when necessary, decisive leadership brought successes during a period of great danger both at home and abroad. She died at Richmond Palace on 24 March 1603, having become a legend in her lifetime. The date of her accession was a national holiday for two hundred years.
The English Civil War consisted of a series of armed conflicts and political machinations that took place between Parliamentarians and Royalists between 1642 and 1651. The first (1642-1646) and second (1648-1649) civil wars pitted the supporters of King Charles I against the supporters of the Long Parliament, while the third war (1649-1651) saw fighting between supporters of King Charles II and supporters of the Rump Parliament. The Civil War ended with the Parliamentary victory at the Battle of Worcester on 3 September 1651.
Charles hoped to unite the kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland into a new single kingdom, fulfilling the dream of his father, James I of England (James VI of Scotland). Many English Parliamentarians had suspicions regarding such a move, because they feared that setting up a new kingdom might destroy the old English traditions which had bound the English monarchy. He considered any questioning of his orders as, at best, insulting. This trait, and a series of events, each seemingly minor on their own, led to a serious break between Charles and his English Parliament, and eventually to war.
The first pitched battle of the war, fought at Edgehill on 23 October 1642, proved inconclusive, and both the Royalists and Parliamentarians claimed it as a victory. The second field action of the war, the stand-off at Turnham Green, saw Charles forced to withdraw to Oxford. This city would serve as his base for the remainder of the war.
In 1643 the Royalist forces won at Adwalton Moor, and gained control of most of Yorkshire. In the Midlands, a Parliamentary force under Sir John Gell, 1st Baronet besieged and captured the cathedral city of Lichfield, after the death of the original commander, Lord Brooke. This group subsequently joined forces with Sir John Brereton to fight the inconclusive Battle of Hopton Heath (19 March 1643), where the Royalist commander, the Earl of Northampton, was killed. Subsequent battles in the west of England at Lansdowne and at Roundway Down also went to the Royalists.
In general, the early part of the war went well for the Royalists. The turning-point came in the late summer and early autumn of 1643, when the Earl of Essex's army forced the king to raise the siege of Gloucester and then brushed the Royalist army aside at the First Battle of Newbury (20 September 1643), in order to return triumphantly to London. Other Parliamentarian forces won the Battle of Winceby, giving them control of Lincoln. Political manoeuvering to gain an advantage in numbers led Charles to negotiate a ceasefire in Ireland, freeing up English troops to fight on the Royalist side in England, while Parliament offered concessions to the Scots in return for aid and assistance.
With the help of the Scots, Parliament won at Marston Moor (2 July 1644), gaining York and the north of England. Cromwell's conduct in this battle proved decisive, and demonstrated his potential as both a political and an important military leader. The defeat at the Battle of Lostwithiel in Cornwall, however, marked a serious reverse for Parliament in the south-west of England. Subsequent fighting around Newbury (27 October 1644), though tactically indecisive, strategically gave another check to Parliament.
In 1645 Parliament reaffirmed its determination to fight the war to a finish. It passed the Self-denying Ordinance, by which all members of either House of Parliament laid down their commands, and re-organized its main forces into the New Model Army ("Army"), under the command of Sir Thomas Fairfax, with Cromwell as his second-in-command and Lieutenant-General of Horse. In two decisive engagements — the Battle of Naseby on 14 June and the Battle of Langport on 10 July — the Parliamentarians effectively destroyed Charles' armies.
The Civil War led to the trial and execution of Charles I for treason, and replacement of English monarchy with first, the Commonwealth of England (1649-1653), and then with a Protectorate (1653-1659), under Oliver Cromwell's personal rule. Constitutionally, the wars established the precedent that a British monarch cannot govern without Parliament's consent, although this concept was established only with the Glorious Revolution later in the century.
The two major battles:
The Battle of Marston Moor - When: July 2, 1644; Where: Long Marston, Yorkshire; Who: Royalist troops under the Marques of Newcastle and Prince Rupert vs. an allied army of Parliamentary and Scottish troops led by Sit Thomas Fairfax and Lord Manchester; Why: The Civil War was going badly for Royalist forces in the North of England. The Marques of Newcastle was forced to fall back on the fortfield city of York, where he was besieged by Parliamentary armies under Sir Thomas Fairfax. Prince Rupert led a relief force of perhaps 7000 cavalry and as many footsoldiers north to the relief of the city. Fairfax broke off the siege and marched his men south to prevent Rupert from reaching the approaches to York. The everdaring Rupert surprised the Parliamentary generals by marching around their positions and reaching the city anyway.
The Battle: Never one to pull back from the fight, Rupert now ordered his tired men out from York to surprise the enemy. They met a numerically superior force numbering perhaps 27,000 men. By the time the armies were in position late in the day, and Rupert, convinced that his foe would not attack until the morning, left the field in search of his supper. Lord Newcastle, perhaps more reprehensibly, retired to his coach for a quiet smoke. The Parliamentary army surprised the royalists totally by an attack which must have begun just as dusk was falling at 7pm. The fierce fighting lasted for several hours, early illuminated by a harvest moon. The royalist cavalry under the returned Rupert was ousted after fierce fighting, but it wan an infantry that won the day.
The result: The Royalist lost as many as 3000 men, plus their artillery train. York was forced to surrender to Parliament and the north of England was effectively lost to the king. Prince Rupert lost his glowing reputation of invincibility in battle, but Marston Moor made the reputation of another man, Oliver Cromwell made a name for himself for his role in defeating the Royalist cavalry.
The Battle of Naseby: When: June 14, 1645; Where: Naseby Northamptonshire; Who: Royal army under Prince Rupert vs. Parliamentary troops under Sir Thomas Fairfax. Why: The English Civil War was in full swing. The north of England appeared lost to the Royalist cause, but Prince Rupert convinced King Charles to march from his base in Oxford to the relief of Chester and then thrust north. The royal plans were thwarted by the delaying tactics of Oliver Cromwell and his cavalry. This allowed the New Model Army time to finish assembling. The king changed his plans several times, and split his forces to send 3000 men to the southwest. Prince Rupert sacked Leicester with an appalling fury. , drawing Sir Thomas Fairfax north from his short-lived attempt to besiege Oxford. Fairfax was joined by Cromwell and a small force of his horsemen. With some 13,000 troops Fairfax brought the king to the bay at Naseby.
The Battle: Prince Rupert took up a strong defensive position atop a high ridge at East Farndon, but rather than attack across rough, wet ground, Cromwell and Fairfax ordered their men to move to Naseby Ridge some 4 miles away. Prince Rupert saw the troops marching and immediately decided to attack while his enemy was exposed. Thus the Royal army left their strong elevated position to charge a numerically superior enemy. The Parliamentary cavalry was initially pushed back, and the infantry soon followed. The Parliamentary cause looked shaky, but Cromwell's horse wheeled to attack the royalist flank. The royal momentum was broken, and the superior numbers of the roundheads began a total rout of their Cavalier enemies. They chased the royalist for a good 12 miles from Naseby, and slaughtered the men they cought. They captured the entire royal commissariat, with great supplies of powder, arms and food. More importantly, they found the king's private papers, including details of his plans to bring Irish papists and foreign mercenaries to England. Parliament immediately published these papers.
The results: The battle effectively marked the end of Royal chances to win the Civil War. Although the King dragged matters out until Oxford surrendered in 1646, the royal military machine was broken irrevocably.
Aftermath
The wars left England, Scotland and Ireland amongst the few countries in Europe without a monarch. In the wake of victory, many of the ideals (and many of the idealists) became sidelined. The republican government of the Commonwealth of England ruled England (and later all of Scotland and Ireland) from 1649 to 1653 and from 1659 to 1660. Between the two periods, and due to in-fighting amongst various factions in Parliament, Oliver Cromwell ruled over the Protectorate as Lord Protector (effectively a military dictator) until his death in 1658. Upon his death, Oliver Cromwell's son Richard became Lord Protector, but after seven months the Army removed Richard, and in May 1659 it re-installed the Rump. However, military force shortly afterwards dissolved this too.
As they resulted in the restoration of the monarchy with the consent of Parliament, the civil wars effectively set England and Scotland on course to adopt a parliamentary monarchy form of government. This system would result in the outcome that the future Kingdom of Great Britain, formed in 1707 under the Acts of Union, would avoid participation in the European republican movements that followed the Jacobin revolution in 18th century France and the later success of Napoleon. Specifically, future monarchs became wary of pushing Parliament too hard, and Parliament effectively chose the line of royal succession in 1688 with the Glorious Revolution and in the 1701 Act of Settlement. After the Restoration, Parliament's factions became political parties (later becoming the Tories and Whigs) with competing views and varying abilities to influence the decisions of their monarchs.
James II of Scotland (October 16, 1430, at Holyrood Palace, Edinburgh - August 3, 1460) reigned as king of Scots from 1437 to 1460. He gained the nickname "Fiery face" because of a conspicuous vermilion birthmark on his face. James had six sisters, who married into various European royal dynasties.
Between 1455 and 1460 James II proved to be an active and interventionist king. Ambitious plans to take Orkney, Shetland and the Isle of Man did not succeed. The king travelled the country, and has been argued to have originated the practice of raising money by giving remissions for serious crimes, and that some of the unpopular policies of James III originated in the late 1450s. In 1458 an Act of Parliament commanded the king to modify his behaviour, but one cannot say how his reign would have developed had he lived longer. James enthusiastically promoted modern artillery, which he used with some success against the Black Douglases. His ambitions to increase Scotland's standing saw him besiege Roxburgh castle in 1460, one of the last Scottish castles still held by the English after the Wars of Independence. On August 3, one of his cannon exploded, killing the King. The Scots carried on with the siege and took the castle. Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie wrote in his Historie concerning the accident that befell King James II, that as he stood near a piece of artillery "his thigh-bone was dug into two with a piece of misframed gun that broke in shooting, by which he was stricken to the ground and died hastily". It should be noted, however, that Pitscottie was writing a century after the events he was describing.
The War of the Spanish Succession:
The precarious health of the childless King Charles II of spain left the succession open to the claims of three principal pretenders:
Louis XIV, on behalf of his eldest son, a grandson of King Philip IV of Spain through Philip's daughter, Marie Therese, to whom Louis XIV had been married
The electoral prince of Bavaria, Joseph Ferdinand, a great-grandson of Philip IV
Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I who had married a younger daughter of Philip IV, but claimed the succession on behalf of his son by a second marriage, Archduke Charles (Later Holy roman Emperor Charles VI)
England and Holland were opposed to the Union of French and Spanish dominions, which would have made France the leading world power and diverted Spanish trade from England and Holland to France. On the other hand, England, Holland, and France were all opposed to Archduke Charles, because his accession would reunite Spanish and Austrian branches of the Hapsburg family. Louis XIV, exhausted by the War of the Great Alliance, sought a peaceful solution to the succession controversy and reached an agreement (1698) with King William III of England. This First partition Treaty designated Joseph Ferdinand as the principal heir; in compensation, the French dauphin was to receive territory including Naples and Sicily, and Milan was to fall to Archduke Charles. Spain opposed the partition of its empire, and Charles II responded by naming Joseph Ferdinand sole heir to the entire Spanish Empire. The unexpected death of Joseph Ferdinand rendered the Anglo-French treaty inoperative and led to the Second Partition Treaty (1700), agreed upon France, England and Netherlands; under its terms, France was to receive Naples, Sicily and Milan, while the rest of the Spanish dominions were to go to Archduke Charles. The treaty was acceptable to Louis XIV but was rejected by Leopold, who insisted upon gaining the entire inheritance for his son. While the diplomats were still seeking a peaceful solution, Spanish grandees, desiring to preserve territorial unity, persuaded the dying Charles II to name as his sole heir the grandson of Louis XIV - Philip, Duke of Anjou, who became Philip V of Spain. Louis XIV, deciding to abide by Charles' will, broke the partition treaty. England and Holland, although willing to recognize Philip as king of Spain, were antagonized by France's growing commercial competition. The French commercial threat, the reservation of Philip's right of succession to the French crown, and the French occupation of border fortresses between the Dutch and the Spanish Netherlands led to an anti-French alliance among England, Leopold, and the Dutch.
The course of the war:
Hostilities between the French and the imperial forces began in Italy, where the imperial general, Prince Eugene of Savoy, defeated Nicolas Catinat and the Duke of Villeroi. The general war began in 1702, with England, Holland, and most of German states opposing France, Spain, Bavaria, Portugal and Savoy.
The Duke of Marlborough, though ill-supported by the Dutch, captured a number of places in the Low Countries (1702-03), while Eugene held his own against Villeroi and his successor, Louis Joseph, duc de Vendome. The duke of Villars, however, defeated Lois of Baden at Friedlingen (1702).
The success of the French in Alsace enabled them to menace Vienna (1703), but the opportunity was lost by dissension among their chiefs.
In 1704, Marlborough succeeded in moving his troops from the Netherlands into Bavaria, where he joined Eugene and won the great victory of Blenheim over the French under the count of Tallard, and the French lost Bavaria.
Meanwhile, Portugal and Savoy had changed sides (1703), and in 1704 the English captured Gibraltar. In 1705 Marlborough in the Netherlands and Eugene in Italy had modest successes, although Vendome defeated Eugene at Cassano. The year 1706 was marked by Eugene's victory at Turin, which resulted in French evacuation of Italy and by Marlborough's triumph at Ramilies, which compelled the French to retreat in the Low Countries.
In the same year, Louis XIV proposed peace to the Dutch, but English interference forced the continuance of the war.
In 1707, Marlborough made little progress in the north and Eugene's expedition into Provence resulted in the loss of 10,000 men; but in the following year Marlborough and Eugene won another great victory at Oudenarde, took Lille, and drove the French within their borders.
Peace negotiations failed, and the allies won (1709) another success, though a costly one, at Malplaquet. Meanwhile the indecisive allied campaigns in Spain (1708-10) did little to weaken Philip V.
The death of Holy Roman Emperor Joseph I, who had succeeses Leopold, and the accession of Charles VI led to the withdrawal of the English, who were as much opposed to the union of Spain and Austria as to that of Spain and France.
Peace of Utrecht:
It put an end to French expansion and signaled the rise of the British Empire.
By treaty between England and France (April 11, 1713), Louis XIV recognized the English succession as established in the house of Hanover and confirmed the renunciation of the claims to the French throne of Louis' grandson, Philip V of Spain.
The French fortification of Dunkirk wee to be razed and the harbor filled up, and the Hudson Bay territory, Acadia, St. Kitts, and Newfoundland were ceded to England. By a commercial treaty England and France granted each other most-favored-nation treatment.
By a treaty with the Netherlands (April 11, 1713) France agreed to surrender to Austria the Spanish Netherlands still in French hands; these were to be held in trust by the Netherlands until the conclusion of a treaty between the Netherlands and the Holy Roman Emperor.
A commercial treaty between France and Netherlands was also signed. France furthermore restored Savoy and Nice to Victor Amadeus II, recognizing him as king of Savoy. France also signed a treaty with Portugal and one with Prussia confirming the kingship of the Prussian rulers. The Anglo-Spanish treaty (July 13, 1713) confirmed the clauses of the Anglo-French treaties relating to the English and French successions.
Spain ceded Gibraltar and Minocra to Great Britain and ceded Sicily (exchanged in 1720 for Sardinia) to Savoy.
Britain and Spain signed the Asiento, an agreement giving Britain the sole right to the slave trade with Spanish America.
The Seven Years' War, 1756-63, was the first global war. The protagonists were Britain, Prussia and Hanover against France, Austria, Sweden, Saxony, Russia and eventually Spain. Britain declined to commit its main forces on the continent, where it depended on the Prussians and German mercenaries to defend George II's Electorate of Hanover. Britain's war aims were to destroy the French navy and merchant fleet, seize its colonies, and eliminate France as a commercial rival.
The Seven Years' War may be viewed as a continuation of the War of the Austrian Succession, in which King Frederick II of Prussia had gained the rich province of Silesia. The political map of Europe had been redrawn in a few years. During the so-called Diplomatic Revolution of 1756, century-old enemies France, Austria and Russia formed a single alliance against Prussia. Prussia had the protection only of Great Britain, whose ruling dynasty saw its ancestral Hanoverian possession as being threatened by France. In Great Britain's alliance with Prussia the two powers complemented each other. Empress Maria Theresa of Austria, whose knowledge of military affairs shamed many of her generals, had pressed relentlessly for reform. Her interest in the welfare of the soldiers had gained her their undivided respect. The second cause for war arose from the heated colonial struggle between the British Empire and French Empire which, as they expanded, met and clashed with one another on two continents.
Great Britain planned a "descent" (an amphibious demonstration or raid) on Rochefort, a joint operation to overrun the town and burn the shipping in the Charente. The expedition set out on September 8, 1757, Sir John Mordaunt commanding the troops and Sir Edward Hawke the fleet. The operation failed, but some others were prepared in a later time.
The British-French hostilities were ended in 1763 by the Treaty of Paris. European boundaries were returned to their status quo ante bellum by the Treaty of Hubertusburg (February 1763).
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