Kingdom itself was greatly enfeebled by the
loss of honour, of reputation, and power: and it
should be noted that if the English had pursued
their enemy as they [did] afterwards at Poitiers,
many more would have been killed or taken, in-
cluding the King of France.The French army was destroyed at Crécy: Histori-
ans believe that some 15,000 French died in the struggle,
including John, the king of Bohemia, who was blind but
fought for the French, and Philip VI was wounded as
he fled. Edward’s son Edward, also known as the Black
Prince, displayed great courage during the fight, and
after the battle he reputedly took the crest of the dead
king of Bohemia, three ostrich feathers, as his own (al-
though some historians discount this legend).
Crécy solidified Edward’s gains in France, allowing
him to move onto and lay siege to the fort at Calais,
which held out until its surrender in August 1347. Ed-
ward now controlled much of northern France. How-
ever, the rigors of warfare and the Black Death that was
ravaging both England and Europe affected his army,
and financial needs meant he was forced to return home
to England to oversee affairs.
Continued battles with the Scottish had led to an-
other war, culminating in the battle of Neville’s Cross
(17 October 1346), near Dunham, when English forces
under Henry Percy and Ralph de Neville, fourth Baron
Neville of Raby utilized archers and men at arms (non-
cavalry infantrymen) to defeat a Scottish force led by
David the Bruce, king of Scotland, who was captured.
Edward had left his son Edward in charge of the
war in France. The Black Prince would later win a bril-
liant victory at Poitiers (19 September 1356), in which
the French king John II (who had succeeded Philip VI in
1350) was captured; in 1359, John was forced to sign the
Treaty of London. When the French rejected the terms
of the treaty, Edward again invaded France, besieging the
town of Rheims in an attempt to have himself crowned
king of France. However, the town held out, and he was
forced to sign the Treaty of Calais (1360), renouncing
his claims to the French throne. A third English invasion
of France in 1369, led by Edward’s son John of Gaunt,
the duke of Lancaster, led to the Treaty of Bruges, which
left only small amounts of France, including Bordeaux
and Calais, in English hands.
Two more attacks of the Black Death in England
in 1361 and 1369 devastated the country and Edward
was forced to deal with extremely difficult economic
circumstances. Religious divisions in England were
dealt with in several pieces of legislation enacted by
Parliament, including the Statutes of Provisors (1351),
which controlled the activities of foreign clergy in En-
gland. In 1366, Edward resisted papal demands for
compulsory financial contributions, a measure that
set a precedent for Henry VIII (1507–47). When the
Black Prince returned from France in 1371 in ill health,
Edward led an army into France in 1372 when he was
60 years old, but strong winds forced his ships to sail
back to England.
In 1375, Edward retired to his estate at Richmond,
where he died on 21 June 1377 at the age of 62; he
was buried in Westminster Abbey. With Edward’s death,
succession of the English crown passed not to his son the
Black Prince, who had died on 8 June 1376, but to his
grandson Richard II (ruled 1377–99).
Historian David Bongard sums up Edward’s legacy:
“Edward III was a ruler of unusual strategy and abil-
ity, far closer to his grandfather [Edward I] than to his
father [Edward II]. As a general he was a fine tactician
but lacked Edward I’s strategic insight. In the affairs of
his own realm, he strove to be just, open-handed, and
kind, although he abdicated many of his responsibilities
toward the close of his reign, much to the detriment of
his kingdom. Personally brave and an eager soldier, he
was at heart a knight.”References: “Edward III,” in Command: From Alexander
the Great to Zhukov—The Greatest Commanders of World
History, edited by James Lucas (London: Bloomsbury
Publishing, 1988), 37–38; Warburton, Rev. William, Ed-
ward III (New York: Scribner, 1887); Mackinnon, James,
The History of Edward the Third (1327–1377) (London:
Longmans, Green, 1900); Longman, William, The His-
tory of the Life and Times of Edward the Third (London:
Longmans, Green and Co., 1869); Barnes, Joshua, The
History of that Most Victorious monarch Edward III. King of
England and France, and Lord of Ireland... (Cambridge,
U.K.: Printed by J. Hayes for the Author, 1688); Nichol-
son, Ranald, Edward III and the Scots: The Formative Years
of a Military Career, 1327–1335 (Oxford, U.K.: Oxford
University Press, 1965); Bruce, George, “Halidon Hill,”
in Collins Dictionary of Wars (Glasgow, Scotland: Harper-
Collins Publishers, 1995), 106; Hewitt, H. J., The Orga-
nization of War under Edward III, 1338–62 (Manchester,
U.K.: Manchester University Press, 1966); Ayton, Andrew,0 eDwARD iii