Nothing left to lose

Who were the Disinherited? Confusingly, this term applies to two sets of baronial rebels within the British Isles. These were the rump of the Montfortian resistance in England after the battle of Evesham in 1265, and a group of Anglo-Scottish magnates who continued to fight for the Balliol cause in Scotland in the early fourteenth century.

My focus is on the English rebels, who are the subject of my new book: Rebellion against Henry III, the Disinherited Montfortians 1265-1274, hot off the press (if somewhat delayed thanks to Covid-19) and published by Pen & Sword.

The rebellion in England resulted from the decision of Henry III and his advisors to disinherit all surviving Montfortians, after Earl Simon and most of his chief supporters had been obliterated at Evesham. At first there were hopes of a peaceful settlement to the war, but any tentative efforts at reconciliation were soon dashed. Henry and his heir Edward were under severe pressure from their supporters, who wanted to be compensated for their loyal service. The tension was ratcheted up by Simon’s son, Simon the Younger, who refused to surrender. At the same time his mother, the widowed Countess Eleanor, continued to hold out at Dover. Pirates from the rebel-held Cinque Ports attacked royal shipping in the Channel.

Long before Henry announced his new policy, many of his supporters had already started to prey on the defeated rebels. On 6 August, two days after Evesham, the rapacious Earl Gilbert de Clare instructed his tenants to help his officers in their work of seizing ‘the lands of our enemies’. Clare had worked out a strategy: he was far more concerned with money than land, and his general practice was to seize the rent money for Michaelmas (29 September). He might have taken the rents as a reward for his labours on behalf of the king, or Edward may have promised them to him as a bribe for his support.

Thus the process of disinheritance was well underway before the re-opening of parliament on 13 October. It could be argued that all Henry did was formalise it, and that he had little choice in the matter. Nevertheless, the consequences were disastrous. Within a few weeks England was in the process of a territorial revolution, in which confiscated land and property was carved up among the king’s supporters. This left hundreds of men destitute, including many who had never supported the Montfortian regime in the first place. In the general scramble for free land and cash, such niceties were swept aside.

Inevitably, those who lost out snatched up the swords they had so recently laid at the king’s feet. They had nothing left to lose, and men in such a position may as well go down fighting. The war of Saint Simon was over; the war of the Disinherited had begun.

 Rebellion on Amazon UK