Edward Balliol

“ The patriots, who had always dominated the open country, now attacked the castles and fortified towns, which were the bulwarks of the Edwardian power. Within three years all the more important of these fell into their hands. In 1339 Edward Balliol's capital of Perth was beset by Robert, the Steward of Scotland, who had recently undertaken the regency for his uncle David. On the approach of danger, Balliol was ordered to England, and Sir Thomas Ughtred, an English knight and one of the disinherited of 1332, was entrusted with the command. ”

“ At Berwick Edward received Balliol's formal defiance. "Has the fool done this folly?" the king cried in haughty scorn; "if he will not come to us, we will come to him." The terrible slaughter however had done its work, and his march northward was a triumphal progress. Edinburgh, Stirling, and Perth opened their gates, Bruce joined the English army, and Balliol himself surrendered and passed without a blow from his throne to an English prison. No further punishment however was exacted from the prostrate realm. ”

“ Scotland having been thus subdued by a handful of men, the nobles one by one came to make their submission. Young King David and his affianced bride were sent over to France for security, and Edward Balliol was crowned King at Scone on September 24, 1332, two months after his disembarkation in Scotland. As Balliol was thus actual (de facto) King of Scotland, Edward could now form an alliance with him without a breach of the treaty; and there seemed to be many arguments in favour of espousing his cause. ”

“ But real as the resentment of his barons may have been, it was not Scotland which really spurred Balliol to this defiance. His wounded pride had made him the tool of a power beyond the sea. The keenness with which France had watched every step of Edward's success in the north sprang not merely from a natural jealousy of his greatness but from its bearing on a great object of French ambition. One fragment of Eleanor's inheritance still remained to her descendants, Guienne and Gascony, the fair lands along the Garonne and the territory which stretched south of that river to the Pyrenees. ”

“ From Calais he was speedily recalled to England by an incursion of the Scots, the usual diversion now of the French kings. Edward appeared before Berwick in the middle of winter, January, 1356, and, as usual, at his appearance the Scots withdrew. Edward, determined this time, if possible, to finish the subjugation of Scotland, made a contract at Roxburgh, on the 20th of January, with Edward Balliol, by which he purchased all the rights of Balliol to the Scottish throne for 5,000 marks and an annuity of £2,000. ”

“ But his father abandoned Bruce, and was driven into England, where he held the Kentish barony of Chilham, and sat in the English parliament under his Scottish title. The younger Athol was son-in-law to the titular Earl of Moray, and all three kinsmen were bound by common interests to embrace the policy of Edward Balliol. Many lesser men associated themselves with the three earls and the claimant to a throne. Nearly every nobleman of the Scottish border made himself a party to a scheme of adventure which had its best parallels in the Norman invasions of Wales and Ireland. ”

“ Balliol was required to submit himself absolutely to the mercy of the conqueror, and to renounce his kingly state under circumstances of the utmost humiliation. In the presence of an assembly of bishops and nobles the King of Scotland was stripped of crown and sceptre, and was compelled, with a white rod in his hand, to perform a feudal penance. The date of this disgraceful transaction was the 7th of July, 1296. Balliol placed his son Edward in the king's hands as a hostage, and the youth, with his father, was sent to England, where both remained for three years imprisoned in the Tower. ”

“ And the experience of forty years might well have convinced Englishmen that no land was more difficult to hold than the stubborn and impenetrable northern kingdom, with its strenuous population, ever willing to cry a truce between local feuds when there was an opportunity of uniting against the southerners. Edward overshot his mark in grasping too eagerly the fairest portions of Balliol's realm. He needed for his policy a Scottish king, strong enough to maintain himself against his subjects, and loyal enough to remain true to the English connexion. ”

“ Edward would have granted as freely as Balliol himself that though Scotland was a dependent kingdom it was far from being an ordinary fief of the English Crown. By feudal custom a distinction had always been held to exist between the relations of a dependent king to a superior lord and those of a vassal noble to his sovereign. At Balliol's homage indeed Edward had disclaimed any right to the ordinary feudal incidents of a fief, those of wardship or marriage, and in this disclaimer he was only repeating the reservations of the marriage treaty of Brigham. ”

“ He then decided in favor of Balliol, who did homage to Edward, and became king of Scotland. Edward was an exacting lord, and wished to have cases, which had been tried before Scotch courts, taken to English courts for final settlement, and this demand the Scotch resented. Very soon Balliol found his position very unpleasant, and taking advantage of a war going on in France between Edward and the French king, threw off Edward’s yoke, crossed the border, and ravaged Cumberland. ”

“ He stood aloof from Balliol, and, in spite of marked snubbing, steadily adhered to Edward. From October 1295, he was for two years governor of Carlisle Castle. After the collapse of Balliol at Dunbar, he is said to have plucked up courage to claim fulfilment of a promise of Edward's, alleged to have been made in 1292 immediately after the decision in favour of Balliol, to place his father eventually on the Scottish throne. ”

“ Edward did nothing without law enough to make him believe himself in the right, and poor Balliol’s forfeiture gave him, as he imagined, the power to assume Scotland as a fief of his own. He caused himself to be acknowledged as King of Scotland, destroyed the old Scottish charters, and transported to Westminster the Scottish crown and sceptre, together with the stone from Scone Abbey, on which, from time immemorial, the Kings of Scotland had been placed when crowned and anointed. ”

“ Scotland was now completely tranquil, and entirely reduced. Every noble had sworn allegiance, every castle was garrisoned by English. Balliol was in Normandy, Bruce in the English army, and at last, in August, 1305, the brave outlaw, Sir William Wallace, was, by his former friend, Monteith, betrayed into the hands of the English. He was brought to Westminster, tried as a traitor to King Edward, and sentenced to die. ”

“ Its first part is based on earlier sources, and it is, for lack of better, a prime authority for north-country history and Anglo-Scottish relations; the continuation contains the best account of Edward Balliol's attempts on the Scottish throne. (3) Vita Edwardi II., from 1307 to 1325, attributed by Hearne on slight grounds to a MONK OF MALMESBURY, with many notices of the history of Gloucestershire and Bristol, of which the famous rising is described at length. The writer is the most human of the annalists of the reign, prolix, self-conscious, moralising, and somewhat incoherent. ”

“ But all thought of accommodation was roughly ended by the refusal of Balliol to attend the Parliament, by the rout of a small body of English troops, and by the Scotch investment of Carlisle. Taken as he was by surprise, Edward showed at once the vigour and rapidity of his temper. His army marched upon Berwick. The town was a rich and well-peopled one, and although a wooden stockade furnished its only rampart the serried ranks of citizens behind it gave little hope of an easy conquest. Their taunts indeed stung the king to the quick. ”

“ The subsidies granted by the Parliament of 1295 furnished the king with the means of warfare with both Scotland and France while they assured him of the sympathy of his people in the contest. But from the first the reluctance of Edward to enter on the double war was strongly marked. The refusal of the Scotch baronage to obey his summons had been followed on Balliol's part by two secret steps which made a struggle inevitable, by a request to Rome for absolution from his oath of fealty and by a treaty of alliance with Philip the Fair. ”

“ But the Scots had not yet found a leader whom they could follow. The cause of de Balliol was lost at the battle of Dunbar, where, on April 28th, the Earl of Warenne won a complete victory. King Edward then began a progress through Scotland, exacting fealty from the nobles, and receiving their renunciation of homage to de Balliol and of the French alliance. ”

“ In the war which followed between Balliol and Bruce he took part on the side of Bruce. He attended in 1290 the parliament at Brigham at which a marriage was arranged between Prince Edward of England and the Maid of Norway; but her death in Orkney in October of the same year completely altered the political outlook. Being continued one of the guardians of the kingdom after her death, he agreed with the other guardians to submit the rival claims of the competitors for the Scottish throne to the arbitration of Edward I of England ”

“ Sir Andrew Moray of Bothwell, who had been made guardian after the battle of Dupplin, and was captured in April, 1333, had now been ransomed, and he was again recognized as regent for David II. So strong was the Scottish party that Balliol had to flee to England for assistance, and, in 1336, Edward III again appeared in Scotland. ”

“ But it happened to be peculiarly inconvenient at that particular moment, as King Edward was probably fully aware, for de Balliol (his reign was so short and inglorious that it is hardly necessary to refer to him as King John any more) had entered into secret negotiations with Philip. He had, no doubt, been convinced by the proceedings in the appeal cases that his relations with Edward could not endure very long, so he sagaciously set about cultivating the friendship of Edward's foe. ”

“ In the desperate state of things, with Balliol and Edward ravaging Scotland at will, none showed more resolution than Bruce’s sister, who held Kildrummie Castle; and Randolph’s daughter, “Black Agnes,” who commanded that of Dunbar. By vast gifts Balliol won over John, Lord of the Isles. The Celts turned to the English party; Edward III. harried the province of Moray, but, in 1337, he began to undo his successes by formally claiming the crown of France: France and Scotland together could always throw off the English yoke. ”

“ The young Bruce and his dynasty represented the troublesome spirit of Scottish independence, and were closely allied with France, whose king, as will be seen, lost no opportunity of stimulating and supporting the party of resistance to England. Balliol, on the other hand, admitted in a secret despatch to Edward that the success of the expedition was owing to that King's friendly non-intervention, and the aid of his subjects; offered to hold Scotland 'as his man,' doing him homage for it as an English fief ”

“ For three years longer there was much fighting on the Border with pretty equal success, until the French wars drew the attention of Edward the Third from Scotland, and then the national party began to get the upper hand. David, Earl of Athole, Balliol's chief supporter, was defeated and slain at Culbleen, in the Highlands; and when Robert the High Steward became Regent in 1338, he won back the strongholds. Soon after, Balliol left the kingdom, and in 1341 David and his Queen Joan of England came home from France, where he had been sent to be out of the way of the troubles. ”

“ In the same year, Barbour obtained permission from Edward III., at the request of the Scottish King, to travel through England with three scholars who were to study at Oxford, probably at Balliol College, which had, a hundred years nearly before, been founded and endowed by the wife of the famous John Balliol of Scotland. Some years afterwards, in November 1364, he got permission to pass, accompanied by four horsemen, through England, to pursue his studies at the same renowned university. In the year 1365, we find another casual notice of our Scottish bard. ”

“ As soon as Edward learned that such a negotiation was in progress he demanded that, until peace should be made between Philip and himself, the border castles of Scotland should be placed in his hands. This was at once refused, and war broke out. In March, 1206, Edward took and sacked Berwick, and the Scots threatened [Pg 258] Carlisle. The unfortunate Balliol seeing himself at last compelled to choose between the two evils, renounced his allegiance to Edward, and almost immediately paid the penalty of his temerity. ”

“ Edward seems to have proceeded with the full intention of giving a just and legal judgment, and after several meetings, in November 1292, a decision was arrived at in favour of John Balliol. Meanwhile, during the settlement of the question, Edward had taken possession of the Scotch castles, had appointed the great officers of the kingdom, and had caused the regents to exact an oath of fealty to him as superior lord. The new King accepted the throne distinctly as a vassal of England, and finally, to make his dependence perfectly clear, did homage after his coronation. ”