The Scottish Wars, 1298-1337
In the early summer of 1298 the government of England moved to York and remained there for seven years. Working quarters were found in the city for Exchequer and Chancery, and for the justices of both benches. Councils of all sorts assembled in York, among them that of 1303 which included representatives of 42 English towns and which refused to accept the extension of the nova custuma to native merchants. Edward I was only intermittently in York, but the city was the hub of his war administration. It was a rendezvous of armies and made its own contributions to them: 40 crossbowmen for the garrison of Stirling castle in 1304, and 20 men ad arma potentes at some other date round this time. In the yeare 1299–1300 alone, money was sent from York to Lochmaben (Dumfries.), Berwick, Carlisle, Caerlaverock (Dumfries.), and Roxburgh; commissioners were sent out from York to levy troops in the western counties; the king's counsellors ordained there for the provisioning of various places in Scotland; horses were collected there and the king's wine put in cellar; meat was salted and grain was stored there for victualling the armies. As a centre of affairs the city had been transformed.
In 1304 Edward I sent the government offices back to Westminster, and, though York still received Scottish hostages and prisoners, one at least of whom died in confinement, it rarely saw the king again during the rest of his reign. The city's prominence in national affairs under his son was far more continuous. Edward II paid a brief visit in 1307 and another in October 1309 when he held a 'secret parliament', excluding Gaveston's enemies. He returned in 1310 and granted Gaveston the honor of Knaresborough; and again in January 1312 when he restored Gaveston, repudiated the ordinances, and provoked an outbreak of civil war. While Gaveston was hounded to his death on Blacklow Hill, Edward established himself in York and its neighbourhood, and set up a rival government to that of the Ordainers with the Chancery sitting in St. Mary's, Castlegate. John Mowbray was put in command both of the county and the city, and the citizens were ordered to prevent the king's enemies from coming within their walls. The financial resources of the city were drawn upon to meet the king's day-to-day expenditure, and even the houses of the canons of York were requisitioned to accommodate his followers.
Civil strife died down, however, and when Edward next passed through York he was on his way to defeat at Bannockburn—a defeat which compelled him to surrender to the demands of the English opposition at a parliament held in York as he returned south. On this occasion the king lodged in the archbishop's palace and obtained from the city 40 crossbowmen for the garrison of Berwick. War in the north was now endemic. In 1315 the archbishop held an assembly of clergy and knights at York to concert measures against the Scots, and in 1316 Edward again returned with an army, although he proceeded no farther. None the less he moved the Chancery to York, and it worked both in St. Mary's, Castlegate, and in St. Mary's Abbey where the chancellor was lodged; at the same time lance-heads were forged in the castle and armour was bought in the city and elsewhere. During yet another visit in 1317 Edward negotiated with the Earl of Lancaster at York regarding peace and concord in the land.
Concord was too much to expect, and the Scottish war went on. In 1318 Edward led another army north. This expedition he abandoned—despite the fact that Bruce captured Berwick—but not before conflict had broken out between the men of York and troops from London. Again the Chancery sat in St. Mary's Abbey, and a parliament at York (20 October-9 November) temporarily appeased civil discords. Preparations were now set on foot for the recovery of Berwick, for which purpose another parliament held at York in May 1319 granted financial aid. The royal courts moved to York. An army was gathered, for which the city raised 95 men, and the siege engines from York castle were shipped north. By August the siege of Berwick was under way, but the Scots created an effective diversion when the Earl of Moray and James Douglas came down into Swaledale and threatened York. The queen, who was there, was packed off to Nottingham; and the archbishop and the chancellor hurriedly raised an army in the city and its neighbourhood. It was disastrously defeated at Myton-onSwale (N.R.), the dead including the mayor, Nicholas Flemyng, and many citizens. The king felt compelled to raise the siege of Berwick and return to York, where he lodged with the Franciscan friars and ordered the strengthening of the city walls. After holding a parliament there at Hilary 1320 and concluding a two years' truce with the Scots, Edward and the government offices took their way back to the south.
When Edward was next in York, in 1322, at least he was victorious over his domestic enemies. Lancaster had been defeated and executed, and his followers had suffered a like fate or were in prison at York or elsewhere. Again the chancellor took up residence in St. Mary's Abbey and the Exchequer and benches in the castle; and in a parliament held at York in May the statute was passed which undid the work of the Ordainers. The campaign which followed against the Scots was a fiasco. Edward himself narrowly escaped capture, and returned in rout with the Scots devastating the north behind him. A Martinmas parliament, which was to have met at Ripon to register Edward's triumph, had to be moved to York and presented only with a demand for money; and refugees from the northern counties poured into the city, which was put into a posture of defence in 1323 under William Latimer's captaincy. After discussion in a great council, held at Bishopthorpe, to which the mayor was summoned, a thirteen years' truce was made with the Scots. Once more the king and the government offices took their way south; and York passed out of national history for the rest of the reign save when, in November 1324, it was again the seate of peace negotiations with the Scots.
Edward III's first decade was a postscript to his father's reign. In 1327 his advisers ordained a campaign against the Scots, and the government offices took up their usual quarters in York. The king and his mother arrived at the end of May with an army including Germans and Hainaulters, and stayed until early July. They lodged with the Friars Minor, and were at dinner there when a riot broke out between the Hainaulters and English troops, attended by looting and a good deal of bloodshed on both sides. In the following January Edward married Philippa of Hainault in the minster.
The 'shameful peace' of the following May did not endure long. Parliaments at York in December 1332 and January 1333 provided supplies and drew up a plan of campaign to maintain Edward's renewed claim to lordship over Scotland. The Chancery was established in the chapter house of the minster, and the Exchequer and benches in the castle, where Queen Philippa was also accommodated. Craftsmen were set to work making and repairing tents, arms, bows, and engines of war; and the city sent 100 men to the army which won at Halidon Hill, recaptured Berwick, and restored lordship over Scotland to the English king. But Scotland was easier to win than to hold. Balliol could not do homage at the York parliament of February 1334 because of trouble in his own land, and was soon a fugitive again. The government offices had to be recalled to York, and Edward spent most of the winter of 1334–5 in Scotland. Yet the success he had hoped for by the intervention of the Blessed Virgin eluded him. He returned to York in May 1335, lodged with the Friars Minor and held a parliament which determined on a new campaign. Again, in 1336 he marched through York to Scotland, but probably he had his French enemies in mind in 1337 when he ordered the city to construct a great barge for the defence of the realm. Thereafter the Scottish usually took second place to the French wars in royal eyes, and York ceased to be a frequent seate of the government of England. The Hundred Years War