Henry, Earl of Derby (ca.1366/7-1413, esp. 1390-1393)

by John G. Ramsey (See Chinese translation)

Henry of Derby, also known as Henry Bolingbroke (see alternative names), reigned as King Henry IV of England from 1399 to 1413.

The eldest son of John of Gaunt (Duke of Aquitaine and Lancaster), Henry made two expeditions to Prussia and the Holy Land before becoming king, during the so-called Northern Crusades. One was in 1390-1391 and the other in 1392-1393. In the first of these expeditions, he supported the unsuccessful siege of Vilnius (capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania) by the Teutonic Knights against the indigenous pagan populations and Eastern Orthodox Christians. In the second, also to Lithuania, in 1392, he led a small army of over 100 men, including longbow archers and six minstrels to subdue Vilnius, but his efforts and those of his English crusaders still did not bear fruit. In fact, members of the Lithuanian royal house had already become Christians in 1386 through marriage.

In 1392-1393 Henry undertook a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, where he made offerings at the Holy Sepulchre and at the Mount of Olives. His travels can be reconstructed by the financial accounts kept by his treasurer, Richard Kyngeston.

Henry of Derby briefly went to Jerusalem as a pilgrim but the stay was short and there is no account of interactions there of a commercial or trade type nor any interactions with cultures along the Silk Road. What may be of some interest is the list of goods Henry obtained during his expeditions, such as from Venice where he acquired silks, among other things. There may be some value in searching through the items bought to see what may have come from the Silk Road trade, although the financial accounts do not record the ultimate origin of the goods, but only the place where they were purchased. Thus it may be hard to determine whether they have any specific connection with the Silk Road.

A full biography of Henry can be found in Thomas Frederick Tout, “Henry IV”, in the Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900. Online at https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Henry_IV_(DNB00) Accessed 21 March 2019.

The overview of his pilgrimage to Jerusalem included below is largely taken from Lucy Toulmin Smith, ed., Expeditions to Prussia and the Holy Land made by Henry Earl Derby (AFTERWARDS KING HENRY IV.) In the Years 1390-1391 and 1392-1393. Being the Accounts kept by his Treasurer during two years. (Camden Society, 1894). This work is referred to as the Derby Accounts in what follows.

Overview of his Expeditions as recorded in the Derby Accounts

Devotion to the church had always been hereditary in the Lancastrian house, and Henry prepared to join the crusade of Bourbon, Boucicault, and the Genoese to Barbary, though at the last moment he allowed his brother John Beaufort to go alone. The statement of the Saint-Denys chronicler that Derby actually went on this crusade (Chroniques, i. 650) has misled most later writers.[1].

Instead of this, however, Henry determined to join the Teutonic knights on an expedition into Lithuania, which still counted as a crusade, although the Lithuanians had just become Christian. John of Gaunt gave him 3,500 l. for his expenses. Ships from Danzig were hired to transport him and his three hundred followers. On 20 July 1390 the expedition set sail from Boston, and three weeks later landed at Rosenhain in Further Pomerania.

The financial accounts of Henry's treasurer, Kyngeston, give a full itinerary of ‘le reys’.[2]

Derby reached Danzig on the 10th of August and Königsberg on the 16th. The ordens-marschall, Engelhard Rabe, started upon his arrival an alliance with Vitovt, the exiled claimant to the duchy, and in co-operation with the master of the knights of the Sword of Livonia. The crusaders gained a complete victory on the 28th of August, and the Prussian historians acknowledge the good service of ‘der herczoge von langkastel’ [the Duke of Lancaster] and his archers.[3]

They besieged Vilna, the Lithuanian capital, in September. The English archers won great glory; but sickness caused the siege to be abandoned. On the 20th of October. Derby was back at Königsberg, where he remained till the 9th of February 1391, keeping up a great feast between Christmas and Twelfth Night 'in the English way'. He returned to Danzig, remained there till after Easter 1391, receiving presents from the new hochmeister, Konrad von Wallenrod, and treating [i.e. negotiating] with Poland for the delivery of two captive English knights. The severity of the winter prevented another 'reys'.

Henry became involved in acrimonious disputes with the Teutonic knights,[4] and his uncle Gloucester was prevented from joining him by bad weather. By redeeming captives and pious offerings, he obtained from Boniface IX absolution from his crusading vow, and at the end of March he sailed for England, landing at Hull before the 30th of April.[5] On the 3rd of November he was in London attending parliament, and acting as a trier of petitions.[6]

In July 1392, Henry again embarked at Lynn for a second crusade in Prussia. Landing at Leba in Pomerania, he entered Danzig on the 10th of August. His followers killed a German,[7] and were so disorderly that the Teutonic knights were glad to get rid of him. He then went to Königsberg, but early in September was back in Danzig, having given up his plan of a new 'reys' altogether.

He sent most of his followers home, and on the 23rd of September started on a pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre. Richard Kyngeston's expenses roll again preserves his itinerary. He stayed at Prague from the 13th to the 25th of October 1392, passed three days with King Wenzel at his castle of Bettlern; spent the first four days of November at Vienna, meeting Archduke Albrecht III and Sigismund of Hungary; and, crossing the Semmering, reached Venice on the 29th of November, and was splendidly entertained at the expense of the state, which presented him with a fully equipped galley.[8]

He spent Christmas day at Zara, and also landed at Rhodes, whence he sailed to Jaffa. Thence he made a flying visit to Jerusalem, one donkey carrying his provisions, and returned by Cyprus,[9] reaching Venice towards the end of March 1393, where the council voted one hundred ducats 'that he might return home contented with us'. After a month's stay at his old quarters at San Giorgio, he travelled by Milan (the 13th of May) and Pavia and the Mont Cenis to Paris, where he arrived on the 22nd of June.[10]

He reached London on the 5th of July, having industriously visited churches and other sights throughout his journey.[11] Froissart's statement that he visited Cairo and St. Catherine's[12] is wrong.

There is a comprehensive summary by Smith in the introduction to Derby Accounts, pp. xxv-lxxx.

Notes

1. The whole question is discussed by J. Delaville Le Roulx, La France en Orient, Expéditions du Maréchal de Boucicault, i. 176 sq. in Bibliothèque de l'École Française d'Athènes, fascicule 44, Paris, 1886.) Henry's own treasurer, Richard Kyngeston, speaks in his accounts of the ‘viagium ordinatum versus partes Barbarie’ (Deputy-Keeper's Thirtieth Report, p. 35)

2. Compotus R. Kyngeston Thesaurarii Dom. Hen. Com. de Derby pro viagio suo versus partes Pruc. in Records of the Duchy of Lancaster, No. xxviii., first bundle, No. 6, R. O.; see Deputy-Keeper's Thirtieth Report, p. 35; and summary by Dr. Pauli in pp. 406-17 of the Monatsberichte der königliche Preuss. Acad. der Wissenschaften, Berlin, 1857, reprinted in Beilage ix. of vol. ii. of Hirsch, Scriptores Rerum Prussicarum, Leipzig, 1861-74).

3. Johann von Posilge in Script. Rer. Pruss. iii. 164-5; Lindenblatt, Jahrbücher, ed. Voigt, 1823; cf. Voigt, Geschichte Preussens, v. 541; Walsingham, ii. 197-8, gives the best English account of the whole journey.

4. Ann. Thorun. p. 168, in Script. Rer. Pruss.

5. Capgrave, De Illustribus Henricis, p. 99.

6. Rot. Parl. iii. 284.

7. J. von Posilge in Script. Rer. Pruss. iii. 182.

8. Riant, Archives de l'Orient Latin, II. ii. 238-40; Cal. State Papers, Venet. i. Nos. 107-8.

9. Stubbs, Lectures on Mediæval and Modern History, p. 198; Raine, Papers from the Northern Registers, p. 198.

10. cf. Luce, Chronique des Quatre Premiers Valois, p. 335, Soc. de l'Hist. de France.

11. Kyngeston's accounts in Lancaster Records, class xxviii. first bundle No. 7; summarised by Dr. Pauli in Nachrichten von der königlichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, No. 8, pp. 329-40, 1880, and No. 14, pp. 345-357, 1881; cf. Capgrave, De Illustribus Henricis, pp. 99-101.

12. xvi. 107, ed. Kervyn.