A famous commander, a famous name
Edward of Woodstock, eldest son of Edward III, was one of the best-known soldiers of the fourteenth century. He was born in 1330 and died in 1376. The nickname “the Black Prince” is not found in sources from his own lifetime; it appears later, and historians do not agree on its origin. Suggestions include black armor and a darker reputation in France, but none is certain. In his lifetime he was usually called Prince Edward, Prince of Wales, or later Prince of Aquitaine.
Crecy, 1346: a prince at sixteen
The first great test came during the Crecy campaign. Edward III landed in Normandy in the summer of 1346 and marched toward Calais, pursued by a larger French army under Philip VI. On 26 August, near the village of Crecy, the English took up a defensive position on a slope. The young prince, then sixteen, was given nominal command of one of the three divisions, supported by experienced advisers such as the earls of Warwick and Oxford.
The French attacked in waves, and the English longbowmen and dismounted men-at-arms broke them. A well-known story says the king, asked for reinforcements for his son’s hard-pressed division, replied that the boy should win his spurs. Chroniclers tell it with relish, but it may be embroidered, and the story should be treated as legend rather than record. What is safer to say is that the prince took part in the main fighting and that the victory was credited partly to him. The battle remains a standard example of how disciplined foot soldiers and archers could defeat mounted knights, as the Battle of Crecy shows in more detail.
Among the dead on the French side were the blind king John of Bohemia, who according to tradition fought in the battle despite his blindness. His emblem of feathers is often linked, again by tradition, to the prince’s badge, though the connection is debated.
Gascony and the campaign of 1355 to 1356
Edward was placed in charge of English forces in Gascony in 1355. He led a long mounted raid from Bordeaux across southern France to the Mediterranean coast near Narbonne, which was meant to damage French resources and prove that the French king could not protect his people. The tactics and consequences of that expedition, together with its darker side, belong to the story of his chevauchees.
The following year he led another expedition northward. The French king, John II, caught up with him near Poitiers. On 19 September 1356 the English, outnumbered and short of supplies, chose a strong defensive position among hedges and vineyards, and again used archers and dismounted men-at-arms. The French attack failed, and John himself was captured. The Battle of Poitiers made Edward famous across Europe, because a prince had taken a reigning king prisoner.
The aftermath: ransom and Brittany
The capture of John II shaped the Treaty of Bretigny in 1360, in which the king’s ransom was set very high. Ransom was an ordinary part of medieval war, and a successful commander could expect large sums from prisoners. Many English knights profited from the war in this way, which is part of why the campaigns found willing recruits.
The Spanish campaign
In 1367 Edward crossed the Pyrenees to restore the exiled King Pedro of Castile. At the Battle of Najera his army defeated Pedro’s rival, Henry of Trastamara, and a French-backed force. The victory was a tactical success but a financial disaster. Pedro did not pay what had been promised, the army suffered from sickness, and the prince returned to Aquitaine in poor health with large debts. Historians often see this expedition as the start of his decline, though the exact nature of his illness is uncertain.
How contemporaries praised him
The most important writers praising the prince were Jean Froissart, a chronicler who spent time at the English court, and the Chandos Herald, who wrote a verse life of the prince that was linked to Sir John Chandos’s household. Both present him as courteous, generous and fearless, a model of medieval chivalry. Froissart’s well-known scene of the prince serving the captive French king at dinner and refusing to sit with him is typical of that tone, although the details may have been polished for effect.
It helps to remember who wrote these sources. Chroniclers relied on knights and heralds who admired their patrons, and they wrote for audiences who loved heroic stories. French writers were often much less kind, particularly after the chevauchees, and later English writers made him a national hero. The Order of the Garter, founded by his father around the late 1340s, also created an atmosphere in which the prince’s reputation was carefully shaped.
Why the label “hero” needs care
By the standards of his age, the prince was an effective commander. He was cautious on defense, bold when it counted, and kept his men supplied by plunder. But the same methods that won campaigns brought suffering to civilians, and his later years in Aquitaine were marked by heavy taxation and unrest. “Hero” is best understood as the verdict of admirers rather than a settled judgment.