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      III

       THE PRELIMINARIES OF THE BATTLE

       Table of Contents

      The manœuvres of the French and English armies preliminary to the Battle of Crécy are so instructive upon many points, involved movements so hazardous and so complex, gave rise to so sharp a series of engagements, and form in general so large a part of our subject, that they merit a far larger study than do the approaches to most battles.

      They illustrate the comparative lack of thought-out plan which characterised medieval warfare; they afford a contrast between the compact and fairly well organised command of Edward III., and the chaotic host of the King of France. They show the effect upon the military profession of a time without maps and without any properly managed system of intelligence; and, above all, they show the overwhelming part which chance plays in all armed conflict between forces of the same civilisation and approximately the same aptitudes.

      The situation upon Wednesday the 23rd of August (at which point we concluded the survey of Edward III.’s great raid through Normandy, and of his retreat down the line of the Somme) is already known to the reader, and will be the clearer if he will look at the map upon page 28.

      Edward had made a very fine march indeed, not only averaging something like twelve miles a day, or more, but arranging for expeditions to leave the main host during the latter part of this rapid retreat, and attempt to force, at various points, the passages of the River Somme. We have seen that he was compelled, if possible, to force a passage because he would otherwise find himself shut up between the Somme and the sea, with a much superior force cutting him off to the south. In case of defeat he would have no line of retreat, and even in case of success, unless that success were overwhelming, he would find himself strategically stalemated, still caught in a trap, and still doomed to await the next onslaught of the enemy. We have further seen that with every mile that he proceeded towards the sea his ability to cross the Somme decreased. The river runs through a marshy valley which, even to-day, is a mass of ponds and water meadows, and which then was a belt of marsh. It is bounded on either side by fairly steep banks, rising to heights of 60, 70, and 100 feet, and inland to 150, between which the flat swamped land grows broader and broader as one approaches the sea. At Picquigny this level belt of swamp through which the Somme twines is quite 500 yards across. At Long Pré it is nearer 800, below Abbeville it is 1000, and at the point whence Edward overlooked it when he was halted at bay on the evening of that 23rd of August, it is well over 2000 yards in width and nearer 2500.

      Boismont, a village climbing the southern bank of the estuary, was the spot on which the King had gathered the army upon the evening of that Wednesday, and, not a day’s march behind him, the most advanced mounted men of his pursuers, with the King of France among them, were camping. The peril was extreme, and an issue from that peril as extremely doubtful.

      It was hopeless for the army to attempt to retrace its steps to the upper river. To have done so would have been to march with the flank of its march exposed to an immediate advance of French forces, and almost certainly to be caught in column; and Edward had already suffered such repulses before Long Pré, Pont Rémy, and Picquigny as left him no hope for success should he attempt these bridges again. His only chance was to find, if it were possible, some practicable ford across the broad estuary itself that lay before him.

      The moon was within a few hours of the full that night, the highest of the spring-tides was making—in the open sea they were at their full height of 25 feet, an hour before midnight—and though where he would strike the estuary he might hope for a tide more tardy, Edward had before him as he watched, his only avenue of escape, a great flood that appeared to deny him all access to the further shore.

      Every effort was made to discover from local knowledge whether any passage existed. The highest rewards were offered, in vain, for in all that countryside a feeling which if not national was at least strongly opposed to the invader, forbade treason, and the near presence of the French King’s great force was an active reminder of the punishment that would attend it. Late in this period of suspense a guide was found.

      A man of the name of Gobin Agache, who had been taken prisoner by the army, was that guide. His was that “invaluable” capture which I mentioned in the last section. He was a peasant of those parts, and a native of Mons-en-Vimieux, through which the army had marched from Acheux to Boismont. He yielded to temptation when all others had refused. He was promised a hundred pieces of gold (say £500 of our money), his own liberty, and that of twenty of his companions. For that price he sold himself, and promised to discover to the King and to his army the only practicable ford across the estuary.

      Just at the end of the night the host set out and marched during the first hours of the moonlit Wednesday morning along the old road which still leads over the hills that separate Boismont from Saigneville and marked the southern bank of the valley. The marshalling was long; the full ordering of the force, now that it was all gathered together and marching along one narrow way, inexpeditious; and the two miles that separated the head of its column from the neighbouring village were not traversed by its last units, nor was the whole body drawn up at the foot of the hills against the water until the sun of that late August day was beginning to rise, and to show more clearly the great sheet of flood-water and the steep distant bank beyond it.

      The place to which their guide had led them was the entry to the ford of Blanchetaque, a name famous in the military history of this country. Hidden beneath the waters which, though now ebbing strongly, were still far too deep for any attempt at a crossing, ran the causeway. By it, upon the faith of the traitor, they could trust to gaining the opposite shore. As the racing ebb lowered more and more, the landward approaches of that causeway appeared in a lengthening white belt pointing right across towards the further bank, and assured them that they had not been betrayed. It was built of firm marl in the midst of that grassy slime which marks the edges of the Somme valley, and they had but to wait for low water to be certain that they could make the passage. Beyond, upon the northern shore which showed in a high, black band (for it was steep) against the broadening day, they could distinguish a force that had been gathered to oppose them.

It was mid-morning before the ebb was at its lowest,9 and they could begin to march “twelve abreast, and with the water no more than knee-high,” across the dwindled stream now at its lowermost of slack water, and running near the further bank with a breadth not a fifth of what it had been at the flood. But before proceeding further and describing the assault shore, I would lay before my readers the process by which I have established the exact locality of this famous ford. It has been a matter of considerable historical debate. It is and will always remain a matter of high historical interest, and this must be my excuse for digressing upon the evidence which, I think it will be admitted, finally establishes the exact trajectory of Blanchetaque.

      The site of Blanchetaque is one which nature and art have combined to render obscure: nature, because a ford when its purpose disappears and it is no longer kept up, that is, an artificial ford, tends to disappear more rapidly than any other monument; art, because the old estuary of the Somme has of recent years been further and further reclaimed. It was, when I first began studying this district, already banked across below Boismont, and, if I am not mistaken, the great railway bridge right across the very mouth of the river has, in the last few months, been made the boundary of the reclaimed land.

      Now, Blanchetaque was an artificial ford. We know this because there is no marl formation