Page 35 - All About History - Issue 11-14

Prayer
While lined up for battle,
Henry led his troops in
prayer, asking for God
to grant them victory
against the French forces.

AGINCOURT, FRANCE

25 OCTOBER 1415

hile his father, Henry IV, had been with about 1,500 noblemen taken prisoner, while
preoccupied with consolidating – and in the English forces’ casualties are numbered at
the process effectively legitimising – his around 112, with high-ranking noblemen like
rule, his son, King Henry V of England, the Duke of York and the Earl of Suffolk being
Wsaw the opportunity to expand the counted among the dead. Even more French
British Empire by taking back lands he believed prisoners were originally taken, but in a show of
rightfully belonged to him, starting with France. calculated – but arguably justifiable – ruthlessness,
In 1415, he proposed to marry Catherine, Henry had ordered many of them to be put to
the daughter of the French king Charles VI, in death in order to avoid the possibility of them
addition to audaciously demanding the handover linking up with the remnants of the French forces
of the Plantagenet lands of Normandy and Anjou in order to carry out a retaliatory attack.
as his dowry. Unsurprisingly, Charles refused Proving that this decisive victory was no fluke,
this offer from the upstart young king, with one Henry followed up this stunning victory with the
account claiming that he sent the young Henry conquest of Normandy – a campaign that lasted
a case of tennis balls – the upshot being that his for three years. By June 1419, Henry controlled
time would be better spent playing games than most of Normandy. Agincourt had not only been a
attempting to invade France. military triumph; it had been a moral victory too,
Unperturbed by Charles’ taunting, Henry set sail galvanising the English both abroad and at home.
for France, determined to capture the throne for Facing defeat, Charles agreed to the Treaty of
himself. As well as the prospect of regaining the Troyes, which formally recognised Henry as the
lost lands of his ancestors, success abroad would heir to the French throne – at the expense of his
have the effect of galvanising support back home, own son – and finally allowed Henry to marry
and in the process focus attention away from his Catherine. Flushed with success, in February 1421
cousins’ royal ambitions. he returned to England for the first time in three
His success was almost instant. Immediately and a half years, arriving in his homeland as a
upon landing, he captured the port of Harfleur, conquering hero.
although while on the way to the port of Calais, His successful conquest of much of the his
he found his path blocked by an army that country’s hated enemy had made him extremely
substantially outnumbered his own. Faced with popular back home, and the Battle of Agincourt
this much-larger French army, he put his superior in particular would forever serve as a poignant
tactical acumen to good use, decimating the example of his strength, tactical skill and
French forces via the use of vast quantities of ingenuity in battle – yet another example of the
longbow archers to devastating effect. Between plucky underdog spirit and ability to triumph
7,500 and 10,000 French soldiers are estimated against the odds that future British forces would
to have been killed according to various accounts, demonstrate in the future.
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