The English and the Normans (continued)

To continue my mildly alternative take on the Norman Conquest…

In 1073 William the Conqueror took an army overseas to deal with an invasion of Maine by Fulk le Rechin, Count of Anjou. William's conquest of England tends to overshadow the wars he fought on the continent after 1066.

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records the English troops William took with him, and the damage they caused:

“1073. This year King William carried an army of English and French over sea, and conquered the province of Maine: and the English did great damage, for they destroyed the vineyards and burned the towns, and they laid waste that province, the whole of which submitted to William...”

Other chronicles emphasised the role of the English in this campaign. William of Malmesbury wrote:

“At this time too, beyond sea, being never unemployed, he [William] nearly annihilated the county of Maine, leading thither an expedition composed of English; who, though they had been easily conquered in their own, yet always appeared invincible in a foreign country.”

Florence of Worcester:

“William, King of England, reduced to subjection the city of Mans, and the province belonging to it, chiefly by the aid of the English whom he had taken over with him.”

And so on. Thus, only seven years after Hastings, William felt secure enough to take a large number of English troops overseas to fight his enemies in Maine. This was only two years after he had suppressed the last serious English resistance in the Isle of Ely.

This reminded me of Edward I's decision to take a virtually all-Welsh army to Flanders in 1297, only two years after a major revolt in Wales. It is not unreasonable to suppose that many of the English and Welsh who fought against these kings ended up fighting for them.

In 1075, when his own Norman earls revolted against him, William would once again turn to the English. To be continued...