Such Cruel Fate by Stuart Gough

Sir Richard Pembridge - died 1375 - tomb Hereford Cathedral

Sir Richard Pembridge KG (died 1375) sat in front of the fire and mourned his dear Elizabeth. He’d always loved her. He loved her when they were children, before she had met his friend Edmund. They were both of local stock. He remembered with some pain as to how her eyelids did flutter so, when in the presence of Edmund. He remembered her in many ways. He knew her as the beautiful young girl of his youth, as the wife and widow of his friend and then as a woman widowed for a second time. His final memory was that of her as the graceful woman that had become his lover, his wife and the mother of his son. She had known their only son for just two short years, before her own passing. A life taken too soon and not without its share of sorrow along the way.

He remembered his old friend Edmund St John who had died at the Siege of Calais in the year of our Lord 1347. He’d promised his friend that he would take care of Elizabeth. He tried to shake off the guilt he felt for his own life, whilst so many others had lost theirs. She’d married Gerard de Lisle, before his return from France.  He never blamed her for that. Gerard was a reasonable but slightly dull, man. He and Elizabeth did however, share their own guilt. Their old friendship and memories of fonder times had been hard to contain. By Elizabeth he had one son, Henry. Most accepted the notion that the boy was delivered early and by the good grace of God alone, survived that ordeal. He knew some didn’t, as the boy was born in the same year of Gerard’s death. Their love was just, he told himself uneasily. ‘Twas born innocently from an oath taken in battle and before the sight of God’. He told himself, yet remained nervously unconvinced as to his own reasoning.

He mourned his son. Henry Pembridge had died earlier that year, at the age of 15. A tear ran down the old man’s cheek. He gripped the arms of his chair tightly as he tried to come to terms with God’s will. No child should predecease their mother or father.

King Henry III was still annoyed with him. He knew that. One did not simply refuse King’s request to take up the post of Lieutenant of Ireland and think it could be any different. It was only due to his service with the King, throughout their hard years in France that Henry finally acquiesced. Henry allowed him to return to Hereford and live in peace with his new wife and their son. Some were already calling it the “Hundred Years War”. It was a ghastly thought. He remembered the mud and the arrows. Their rough, hedge-born, bowmen had won the day at Crecy and at Poitiers. The English arrows had swarmed the sky like angry bees. He remembered the French knights being cut down like summer hay. He remembered the hard winter and the sight of their own emaciated bodies during the siege at Calais. He remembered Henry’s murderous anger there, which was only placated by the intervention of his Queen.

Yet now, everyone he cared about had now passed on and he was alone. In this year of our Lord 1375, it was not time to doubt the will of God. He knew that soon he would join them in the Kingdom of Heaven. The thought was not an easy one. Whilst his son would remain an eternal youth, he would also re-unite with his wife and in turn her two previous husbands. Edmund would understand. Gerard probably would not. Would his accession be barred by his indiscretion with Elizabeth? Would her way be looked upon poorly in the sight of God? His body was wracked with pain these days. He’d unstrapped his wooden leg and cast it aside. He pulled the cowl more tightly around his shoulders, in spite of the heat from the fire. Death itself held no fear. Over the years, he’d seen enough of it both at sea and on land. His old dog stirred stiffly before placing its head in his lap. “Do you feel like I do?” he asked. He smiled at the grey-muzzled animal and stroked its head. “I’ll meet death as a man who has faithfully served God and his King. I’ll face it as a man who has lived and loved as he saw fit in the sight of God. I’ll face it with no regrets.” 

(First published March 2023)