(1389-1435). The third son of Henry IV of England, John spent his youth serving with distinction on campaigns in Scotland, Wales, and France. He became regent in France in 1422 and proved himself an excellent general and administrator, though he failed to secure the conquests of Henry V. Maintaining an English alliance with Burgundy was the keystone of his policy. To that end, he signed an alliance with Brittany and Burgundy at Amiens in 1423 and married Anne de Bourgogne in June 1424. Paris, which had accepted Henry V out of Burgundian fidelity, he left essentially self-governing and concentrated on Normandy. Seeking loyalty there, he governed generously through an unusually disciplined administration. He continued to exert military pressure against the Valois, but even his greatest victory, at Verneuil in 1424, proved indecisive. After his defeat at Orleans in 1429 and the death of his wife in 1432, he faced the prospect of a rapprochement between Charles VII and the duke of Burgundy. Bedford’s failure to prevent this confirmed his incapacity as a diplomat, though he succeeded in holding Normandy. His death, on the eve of the Treaty of Arras, symbolized the doomed hopes of the Anglo-French kingdom.
Paul D. Solon
[See also: CHARLES VII; HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR; ORLEANS CAMPAIGN; PHILIP THE GOOD]
Allmand, C. T. Lancastrian Normandy, 1415-1450. Oxford: Clarendon, 1983.
Newhall, R. A. Muster and Preview: A Problem of English Military Administration, 1420-1440.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1940.
Williams, Ethel Carleton. My Lord of Bedford, 1389-1435. London: Longman, 1963.
World History
