[MR] Wikipedia: Assassination of John the Fearless

[Garth Groff and Sally Sanford]

Noble Friends,

On this day in 1419, John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, was assassinated.
His death was to have a major effect on the Hundred Years War between
England and France.

To understand all this, we must go back to the madness of French king
Charles VI. Because Chuckie was a minor when he inherited the throne, a
regency council was in order. The regency council was made up of "Princes
of the Blood", mostly Charles' uncles, the most powerful of which was
Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy. Shortly after reaching his majority,
Charles went completely bonkers, so the regency council went back into
operation. Philip the Bold was often opposed by the Duke of Orleans, Louis
I, the king's younger brother. Depending upon King Charles' lucidity,
Philip or Louis alternated as head of the council.

Philip the Bold died in 1404, and his son John the Fearless rose to the
title of Duke of Burgundy. John and Louis hated each other right from the
start. John seems to have been something of a prig, and probably a prude as
well. OTOH, Louis was among the greatest letchers in French history. He was
even suspected of having it off with Queen Isabeau, his sister-in-law, and
was said to be the real father of the Dauphin (later Charles VII). When
Louis  seduced or raped the wife of a Burgundian knight, John had enough.

John organized a hit team who caught up with Louis as he was coming out of
the Queen's Paris townhouse. Dragged from his saddle, Louis was stabbed
repeatedly and his corpse left in the gutter. John never denied ordering
the murder, but paid an important preacher to give a sermon justifying the
act as "tyrannicide". Louis' son, now the next Duke of Orleans, another
Charles, went whining to his father-in-law, the Duke of Armagnac, and soon
open warfare erupted between the Armagnacs and Burgundy. This seriously
depleted French forces, and allowed the English a free hand, especially
after Agincourt. John, who owned Flanders and was rich from the wool trade,
didn't want to antagonize the English, which suited Henry V just fine.

The civil war continued until the Dauphin summoned John to a summit with
the Armagnacs at Montereau Castle. A special room had been built on the
bridge to the castle with a door on each end. Each of the two principals
was allowed 10 retainers. As John entered, the door was slammed behind him,
cutting off most of his escort. Confused, he bowed to the Dauphin, and as
he rose an Armagnac retainer, Tanneguy du Châtel, whipped an axe from under
his cloak and whacked John in the face. The rest of the Burgundians in the
room were overwhelmed and taken prisoner, while several Armagnacs plunged
their daggers into John's dying body. The men left outside had to make a
fighting retreat off the bridge under a hail of crossbow bolts from
Armagnacs in a fortified mill at the end of the bridge. The whole mess was
a perfectly . . . uh . . . executed death trap.

The Dauphin Charles always claimed he knew nothing of the plot, however he
rewarded Tanneguy du Châtel and another of the plotters with lucrative
offices. For the rest of his life, Charles had a mortal fear of crossing
bridges.

The effect of John's murder was almost immediate. His son and next Duke,
Philip the Good, made a treaty with the English. For the following decade
the English were almost unstoppable. It wasn't until Joan of Arc arrived on
the scene that the French could regain the initiative. It was the
Burgundians who actually captured Joan, and shopped her to the English.
Philip the Good did not repudiate his treaty with the English until 1435
when it became clear that France was finally going to win the Hundred Years
Wars.

More about John the Fearless' assassination is at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_the_Fearless

Yours Aye,

Mungo Napier, Arch Burgundy Geek
Continuing a crusade to keep the original Merry Rose relevant and in
business.