Let’s jump back a little in time now, almost exactly five hundred years in fact, to a time when England was once again at war with her old enemy, France, and had been for nearly a century at this point. Seems down through history England was always at war with someone: if it wasn’t the French it was the Scottish, if not them the Spanish, or the Dutch, or the Germans. I suppose it comes from having both a large standing army that had to be kept busy, rivalries between kings and old grudges over land, religion or both. If, as I stated in my History of Ireland journal, we are a nation of begrudgers, then the same can certainly be said of the English, who did not allow sleeping dogs to lie, and to muddy the metaphor slightly, were always looking for an excuse to stir up the hornet’s nest.
Timeline: 1415
The Battle of Agincourt
Era: Fifteenth Century
Year: 1415
Campaign: The Lancastrian War
Conflict: The Hundred Years’ War
Country: France
Region: Agincourt (Azincourt) near Calais, Northern France
Combatants: France and England
Commander(s): (English) King Henry V, Edward, Duke of York, Sir Thomas Camoys, Sir Thomas Erpingham (French) Constable Charles d’Albret, Jean de Maingre, Charles, Duke of Orleans, John, Duke of Alencon, Jean, Duke of Bourbon
Reason: King Henry had been trying to take back land in France he believed to be England’s by right. Negotiations between France and England had stalled, and Henry, perceiving an insult in the French response to his demands, moved to invade France.
Objective: Ostensibly, to claim the throne of France, which Henry believed to be his by right of his great-grandfather, Edward III, but in reality just to provoke the French and secure better terms to allow him to renounce his claim.
Casualties (approx): (English) Up to 600 killed (French) Up to 8000, of which up to 6000 killed
Objective Achieved? Yes
Victor: England
Legacy: The battle destroyed much of the French nobility, led to the fracturing of power structures and the collapse of alliances within the country, and showed the value both of the use of longbows and the choice of terrain, as well as the folly of being too heavily armoured, to say nothing of overconfidence. Agincourt also quickly established Henry V as one of England's finest commanders and most respected kings.
England and France had been at war for literally almost a hundred years, hence the name given to the war, which had seen the rise and fall of four separate monarchs both of England and France over its duration, and would see too one more on each throne before it came to an end. The war as usual was about territory and perceived rights, with England demanding its lands in France, particularly Aquitaine, Normandy, Brittany, Flanders, Anjou and Touraine and France wishing to claim them back for the Crown. Of course, the war had not been going for a century non-stop; there were periods of peace, or truce, which lasted decades in some cases, but by 1415 the last truce was over, and the period known to history as The Lancastrian War had begun. This would last till 1453, when it would bring to a close the final phase in the longest war in European history.
Having only succeeded to the throne two years earlier, Henry V was anxious both to stamp his authority on his new realm and to avenge what was seen as the humiliation of his forebears as their lands in France were taken back by the French Crown while they were otherwise engaged, fighting Scotland or Spain. After a period of peace, a truce lasting twenty-six years, Henry was tired of negotiating with the French king and decided to sue for war. He accordingly invaded France on August 13 with a fleet reported to have been over a thousand ships strong. However due to bad weather, disease and a siege that took longer than expected, he had only taken one town, the port of Harfleur, by the time winter began drawing in. Having a stronghold in Calais he decided to march there, to make his presence known and hopefully to tempt the French into battle.
They didn’t quite take the bait, but did move to block him at - wait for it - the River Somme. He managed to find a way through though and continued on north while the French army shadowed him, unwilling to force a pitched battle. A sense of overconfidence, even contempt of the English army seems to have contributed to the French army’s downfall, as did the terrain. Content to wait out Henry, the French commanders did not force a battle, allowing the English king time to have his men construct obstacles of sharpened wooden stakes which would deflect their cavalry. They would have reason to rue this later. They did outnumber the English though - some accounts claim a ratio of ten French soldiers to every English, though accounts of the French army totalling around fifty thousand men to the English’s nine makes this more likely to have been five to one - and largely ignored their archers, who were in fact to prove critical to the success of the English. Mostly, the French nobles seemed more eager to capture and ransom the high-ranking English lords and considered them beneath them as an adversary, believing the battle would be a foregone conclusion.
They were, of course, very much mistaken.
Although technically on home ground, the French were hampered by the wooded terrain, and the rain made the ground thick and mucky, which in turn made progress for the more heavily-armoured French knights difficult. The armour tended to drag them down, and made it all but impossible to rise once they had fallen. Reports speak of knights actually drowning inside their helmets. The narrow woodland forced the French to send only their infantry forward, with no way for their archers to provide covering fire without hitting their own men, while the narrow defile in turn created an easily-defended area for the English to hold. When the French surged forward, so great was their combined momentum that as men at the front fell and died, the ones coming up behind could not stop and fell on top of them, many of them sharing the same fate, or being trampled by even more coming behind them.
The cavalrymen fared little better. Although on horseback and therefore (as long as they remained there) not subject to the sucking mud, they were unable to charge the English longbowmen due to the sharpened stakes set before them. The Englishmen had no such restriction, and as their arrows hit the French horses the animals panicked and charged back through the French lines, many trampling advancing infantry who could not get out of the way. Those who managed to continue pressing forward towards enemy lines had to lower their heads so as to protect their eyes and mouths from the hail of arrows filling the sky from the English lines, as these were the weak points in their helmets. This made both breathing and progress difficult, and tired the French knights out even more; by the time they had made it to the woodland fortification, it’s said many had not the strength to even lift their weapons, exhausted by the trek through mud, arrows and heat.
With so many prisoners captured, Henry feared the French would realise their superiority in numbers and would turn against their captors, so in a move that perhaps should have shocked the medieval world, but seems to have been generally accepted by historians as understandable, he had thousands of the French prisoners slaughtered, going against the ancient laws of chivalry that governed both his and the French knights. Though many of his men balked at such an order, he threatened to kill anyone who disobeyed, and all but the most senior (and therefore most valuable for ransom) were executed. Of course, this was half a millennium ago and so accounts may not be reliable, but there are those who maintain the order to slay the prisoners was merely a terrorising tactic, designed to prevent the French from attacking from within his own lines, and that Henry countermanded the order when the main force of the French army retreated and the day was won.
Why will this battle be remembered?
Mostly, it will be looked to as a glorious victory for England against overwhelming odds, a battle they were expected to lose, being outnumbered, in a foreign land and almost under siege. It is also pointed to as an example of terrain deciding the turn of the tide, and the folly of the French in persisting in wearing heavier armour, whereas the English, in lighter armour, were able to deal with the treacherous conditions more effectively. It is feted as the time when an all but newly-crowned king personally led his forces to a decisive and unexpected victory, and when, due to his St. Crispin’s Day speech, a king identified with his men as being more than just employees or servants, leading to Shakespeare’s famous “band of brothers” dialogue nearly two hundred years later.
But it will be mostly remembered for the use of the longbow by the English and the frustration of the superior French cavalry by the use of the sharpened spikes. Had either or both not been effectively employed by Henry’s men, the battle could easily have turned against them. Cavalry was a tried and trusted way to win battles, men on horseback either running down and routing infantry, or cavalry fighting it out against other cavalry, but at Agincourt this did not work, as related above, and in fact the horses of the French were turned into weapons against their own people. The French archers were next to useless, unable to fire into the narrow space through which their countrymen attacked for fear of hitting their own forces, and though the French held the high ground, which should always be the superior position, the usage by the English of the woodland frustrated their opponents and made them hard to get at.
It will not be remembered, as such, though perhaps it should, as a war crime. The decision of King Henry V to massacre his prisoners is almost a footnote in the history of the Battle of Agincourt, overshadowed by the amazing victory, and while this reprehensible action has not quite been airbrushed out of the account, it seems to be viewed by historians now as excusable, understandable, even necessary. Are these apologists who make such claims? Possibly: it won’t be to anyone’s surprise to find that few if any commentators who excuse or explain the slaughter are French. No doubt they would have a different view on the matter. And no doubt, too, that had it been the English who had been slaughtered after having been taken prisoner by the French, the event would have gone down in English history as one of unmitigated horror and savagery. To the victor, the spoils, after all.
Though Agincourt was a massive victory for the English, it didn’t lead to more successes, at least not right away. Henry had been essentially on his way home, and he continued there after the rout at Agincourt, returning as a hero and a saviour, one of the first and most important victories of his relatively short reign. However, the cream of the French nobility had been decimated by the battle. With losses said to be ten times that suffered by the English, the Kingdom of France lost most of its top men - dukes, counts, other nobles - including three of the commanders of the French forces at Agincourt. After Henry left, internal strife began to tear the French factions apart, weakening their strength and leaving them primed for a fresh attack by the victorious English two years later.
Agincourt also demonstrated that England was indeed a power to be reckoned with, having defeated a far better armed and more numerous contingent of what was, at the time, one of the most powerful kingdoms on Earth. The Hundred Years’ War would end in 1453 in a victory for the French, but civil war, famine and social unrest would work to destabilise the old seats of power, leading to the rise of Napoleon and the eventual French Revolution, while on the English side peace would not last long either, as anger over the right of succession to the English throne would lead in two short years to the Wars of the Roses, when England would be plunged into bloody conflict for thirty years.