Durham palatinate into a bulwark against the Scots, despite repeated
injunctions to do so.^46
The groundwork had thus been laid for a breach between Edward
and the Beaumonts. It is possible that nothing would have come of it,
however, had it not been for the truce that the king agreed with the Scots
in the spring of 1323. Although Henry himself had been involved in
negotiating such agreements at various earlier stages in the conflict,
now, it seems, he was implacably opposed to it.^47 Presumably, he saw
the truce not just as a pause in hostilities, but as a significant step on the
road to a permanent peace with King Robert. Such an accord would do
tremendous damage to Henry’s chances of recovering the lands that
he claimed in Scotland–above all, the earldom of Buchan. Indeed, it
seems that Henry’s opposition was well-known even before the truce
wasfinalized.^48 When the terms were presented to the king’scouncil
at Bishopthorpe, it was Henry’s reaction, in particular, that attracted
attention. It is clear what was really happening, despite the delicate
phrasing of the chronicler:
And when the king enjoined each of those present...including Henry, to give
their advice, the said Henry, with an excessive motion and [an] irreverent mind,
answered the king frequently that he would not counsel him in this behalf. The
king, being moved by such an answer, ordered him to leave his council, and
Henry, in leaving the council, said as he had said before, and that it would please
him more to be absent from the council than to be present.
This was not the end of the matter, though. The king had Henry com-
mitted to prison, from which he was released only at the intercession of
eight other councillors.^49
On the surface, at least, it looks as if the rupture healed remarkably
quickly and well. Perhaps the saving grace was the‘War of Saint-Sardos’,
which broke out in Aquitaine in 1324. It seems that Henry was too useful
to be sidelined for long, especially when he was urgently needed in the
sphere of Anglo–French relations. Although Henry was one of several
envoys who were selected to cross the Channel, in the end, it seems, he
(^46) The text can be found inFoedera, conventiones, literae, et cujuscunque generis acta publica,
compiled by T. Rymer, 17 vols. (London, 1726–35), ii, part 1, 506.
(^47) For the earlier truces, see the brief summaries in Maddicott,Thomas of Lancaster,
109, 183.
(^48) See C. McNamee,The Wars of the Bruces: Scotland, England and Ireland, 1306– 1328 (East
49 Linton, 1997), 236.
Calendar of the Close Rolls: Edward II, iii, 717. Henry’s imprisonment was one of a litany
of charges that were later hurled against the king’s favourite, Hugh Despenser‘the
Younger’(Phillips,Edward II, 517).
The Coming of the Hundred Years’War 153