Edward Howard (admiral)

Sir Edward Howard, (1476/1477 – 25 April 1513), son of Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk and Elizabeth Tilney, younger brother to Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk. Edward was the first of the Howards to win fame as a great admiral, beginning his naval career very young (participating in his first naval battle in his teens). He was in command during the Battle of St. Mathieu, which might have been the first sea battle fought by ships with cannons deployed through ports. He was killed shortly after, leading an assault on French galleys.

Life

Early life

Howard's father had been deprived of his titles following the Battle of Bosworth, but the earldom of Surrey was restored to him in 1489. Howard started in his military career at the age of fifteen under Sir Edward Poynings at the reduction of Sluys. ["Sir Edward Howard", D.Loades, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2007)] In 1497 Surrey went to Scotland having been given a command and his sons went with him. No fighting took place, but he was able to engineer the knighting of them both at Ayton Castle in September 1502. In 1503 Surrey and the entire Howard family escorted Margaret Tudor to her marriage in Scotland.

In 1506 the Howard brothers Edward and Thomas, and several other men were pardoned for an illegal entry upon a manor belonging to the estate of the late John Grey, 2nd Viscount Lisle.

At the death of Henry VII of England on 21 April 1509, Edward carried the king's banner in the funeral procession, riding a horse trapped with the royal arms.

In the tournament held to celebrate the coronation of Henry VIII of England, Edward and his brothers Thomas and Edmund, as well as men including a brother-in-law to the Howards, Sir Thomas Knyvett, and Charles Brandon rode as challengers against Henry's answerers. Howard was made King's Bannerer on 20 May 1509 [Loades] with a fee of £40, which suggests that he may have been a close companion of the future king, though no direct evidence for this exists. [Loades] .

Naval career

In the summer of 1511, Howard paid out £600 for the fitting out of naval vessels. There is a tradition, reported by Holinshed and the "Ballard of Andrew Barton" that he and his brother Thomas fought and defeated the Scottish adventurer Andrew Barton, capturing his ships. Barton was a favourite sea captain of James IV of Scotland, who, sailing with letters of marque against Portugal, captured several English ships on the pretext that they were carrying Portuguese goods. No contemporary reports of this action exist, [Loades] , but two Scottish ships, "Lion" and "Jennet of Purwyn", were captured then. The victory was celebrated in a song, one line of which is:

"Lord Howard he took sword in hand And off he smote Sir Andrew's head"

On the entrance of England into the War of the League of Cambrai, Howard was made "Admiral of the Sea during this voyage and enterprise to be made against the French King in Guyen" [http://www.maryrose.org/history/history4.htm] , the 3000 men in the fleet treated as part of Howard's private retinue. Under Howard, the English fleet gained naval superiority in the English Channel, capturing ships of several countries on the pretext that their cargoes were French. Howard then escorted an English army on its way to Guyenne (now Aquitaine) as far as Brittany. [http://www.maryrose.org/history/history4.htm] On its return, the English fleet ravaged Brittany, burning Le Conquet and Crozon,

The King's fleet under Lord Howard has recently distinguished itself by taking many of the enemy ships and invading his lands. For four days the English remained in Brittany, won several battles, slew many enemies, captured many knights and other gentlemen, burnt the towns and villages for thirty miles around and with their small force of 5,000 challenged 15,000 French and Bretons. The latter declined; saying that it was only by compulsion that they were defending the French King against the Pope. Since then Lord Howard was with the King at Hampton, where he is said to remain in consultation, retaining the fleet. He took many ships with wealth of various kinds and artillery sent by the French King to the Duke of Guelders, for an invasion of Flanders. [http://www.maryrose.org/history/history4.htm]

During June and July 1512, Howard claimed to have captured over sixty vessels. After a refit, Howard engaged the fleet that was slowly being assembled by the French in what may have been the first battle between ships using cannon though ports at the Battle of St. Mathieu on the 10 August 1512. The battle itself was indecisive, but Howard succeeded in driving the French fleet into Brest, leaving him able to continue his operations. During the battle, Sir Thomas Knyvett was killed. As a result of the action, Henry VIII gave Howard an annuity of 100 marks and made Howard the Lord Admiral. ["Shock and Oar. Mary Rose and the fear of French galleys", D. Childs, "History Today", p. 41 (April 2007)]

The following spring, Howard set out from the Thames on 19 March, reaching Plymouth on 5 April. Having had difficulty with victualling, he left without meeting his supply ships on the 10 April. On 12 April, 1513, Howard found the French fleet outside Brest, into which they retreated. Without local knowledge of the coast Howard could not directly assault the French fleet, and without supplies he could not blockade them. Furthermore, during the winter, the French king had transferred six galleys under Prégent de Bidoux from the Mediterranean. When Howard blockaded Brest, they were at St Malo, and on the 22 April they arrived at Brest. Howard had been confident that he could counter galleys (against which the English had no experience) using small vessels; in fact, on his arrival Bidoux sunk one English ship and badly damaged another. [Childs, p.42]

The French galleys retired to a nearby bay, called Whitesand Bay by the English, near Le Conquet. They fortified the entrance to the bay, and from there they could operate indefinitely against the English fleet. Howard tried to land troops to attack the galleys from the shore, but was prevented by a feint from the main French fleet. [http://www.maryrose.org/history/history6.htm] Aware that to return to England defeated or empty handed would lose Royal favour, Howard decided to attack by sea. The result is described in a letter from Edward Echyngham, captain of the English victualler "Germyn", to Cardinal Wolsey:

On St Mark's day, 25 April, the Admiral appointed four captains and himself to board the [galleys] . The Admiral himself, with 160 men, went in [the one galley] and in the other [my lord F] erris; and in one of two small crayers [went Thomas Cheyne and Wa] lop and in the other went Sir Henry [Shirborne] and [Sir] William Sidnaye. These enterprised to win the French galleys with the help of boats, the water being too shallow for ships. The galleys were protected on both sides by bulwarks planted so thick with guns and crossbows that the quarrels and gonstons came together as thick as hailstones. For all this the Admiral boarded the galley that Preyer John was in, and Charran the Spaniard with him and 16 others. By advice of the Admiral and Charran they had cast anchor into... of the French galley, and had fastened the cable to the capstan, that if any of the galleys had been on fire they might have veered the cable and fallen off; but the French hewed asunder the cable, or some of our mariners let it slip. And so they left this [noble Admiral in the] hands of his enemies. There was a mariner, wounded in eighteen places, who by adventure recovered unto the buoy of the galley, so that the galley's boat took him up. He said he saw my lord Admiral thrast against the rails of the galley with morris pikes. Charran's boy tells a like tale, for when his master and the Admiral had entered, Charran sent him for his hand gun, which before he could deliver, the one galley was gone off from the other, and he saw my lord Admiral waving his hands, and crying to the galleys, "Come aboard again! Come aboard again!" which when my lord saw they could not, he took his whistle from about his neck, wrapped it together and threw it into the sea. [http://www.maryrose.org/history/history6.htm]

The French raised Howard up on their pikes and threw him overboard so that, weighed down by his armour, he drowned. Howard was aged 35 at his death. The French recovered his body three days later and sent his armour to the French princess, Claude, [Loades] and his badge of rank, the silver whistle, to the French queen, Anne. [http://www.maryrose.org/history/history6.htm] Bidoux had Howard's body embalmed, but it is not known where it is buried, though Howard's wife provided for a tomb for him in Brittany in a will of 1518. [Loades]

Howard had been elected a Knight of the Garter in 1513, but died before being installed.

The English fleet, demoralised by Howard's death, short of supplies, and suffering from disease, abandoned the blockade, and straggled home to Plymouth, where Sir Thomas Howard took command. The French were unable to exploit Howard's death, and after successful English campaigns in Picardy and Scotland, a truce was agreed in March 1514.

Marriages and issue

He married twice, but died heirless. His first wife was the twice-widowed Elizabeth Stapleton, but she died in 1504 or 1505. He then married Alice, the heir and daughter of William Lovel, Lord Morley at some point in 1505. [Loades] . He wrote to her during his campaigns, but in his will he provided for two unnamed bastard sons, commending one to the care of the king and willing him a ship, and the other to Charles Brandon and leaving him 100 marks. [Loades] As a younger son with a living father, he only held the manor of Morley, which he willed to his stepson, Henry Parker, after his widow's life interest had run out. [Loades]

References