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Wednesday, 30th January

So after ‘my quest’ what have 1 discovered? The real story!

The mystery begins with the inability of Richard 1 to sire and then to choose a successor. On his deathbed Richard’s nephew, the 12-year old Arthur, Duke of Brittany, had a strong claim to the throne having been declared heir in 1190. However Arthur had been in the care of Philippe Augustus 11, the French King, since 1196 having not been given to Richard 1 by the Bretons. Richard seems to have finally declared his younger brother, Count King John (aged 32), heir on his deathbed, although this is by no means certain and was in fact a myth propagated by Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine who deeply distrusted Constance, her Breton daughter-in-law and advocate of Capetian kingship. King John ‘seized’ the English throne in April 1199.

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English tradition of primogeniture would have said that all lands held by the former king would go to the declared successor, King John in this instance; however the Norman tradition (from which the English court drew most of its strongest traditions) of parage, meant that the lands of the King would normally have been divided between his remaining heirs, including Duke Arthur of Brittany. For many English lords Duke Arthur, as a vassal of the French King, Philippe 11, represented an unpalatable choice for the English throne. 16 years later, after the troubles that followed, many thought differently. William Marshall (1st Earl of Pembroke) spoke for the majority when he said “1f we put him [Duke Arthur] at our head, we will cause trouble, as he has no love of the English.” Archbishop Hubert Walter, who had originally backed Duke Arthur’s right to be king, declared that the community of the realm (universitas regni) had a right to elect “one

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from the dead king’s stock, who is more outstanding than the others”, a principle that would be applied later against King John by rebel Lords.

Born:

Michael Moore 1954

Tim McVeigh 1968

Died:

Ethelred of Wessex 871

Ethelred II of E

ngland 1016

William Shakespeare 1661

Boris Yeltsin 2

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War followed between Philippe’s Capetian France and King John’s Anglo-Norman and Angevin lands, then truce, then war again, culminating in the capture of Duke Arthur by King John in the siege of Mirabeau in 1202, where Duke Arthur was holding his grandmother, Eleanor of Aquitaine, hostage. 1nitially Duke Arthur was imprisoned at Falaise, guarded by Hugh de Burgh, Earl of Kent. At this time his sister Eleanor was also captured and imprisoned at Corfe where she died in 1241, still a prisoner, forgotten by everyone except her attendants. The following year (1203) Duke Arthur was transferred to Rouen, under the charge of William de Braose (4th Lord of Bramber), who rose and then fell under the capricious rule of King John. 1n April of that year the 16 year old Arthur, Duke of Brittany, a rightful heir to the Angevin throne of England, vanished from view in his prison at Rouen on the banks of the Seine. Many contemporaries suggest that this was under

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the orders of King John, by his loyal lieutenant and Duke Arthur’s gaoler, Hugh de Burgh. Shakespeare’s account is different, suggesting that Duke Arthur attempted to escape from the walls of a castle but died falling from the castle’s wall with the words “O me! My uncle’s (Richard 1) spirit is in these stones: heaven take my soul and England keep my bones.” Another account was that Duke Arthur’s gaolers were afraid to harm him, and so he was murdered by King John directly and his body dumped in the Seine. The Margam annals provide the following account of Duke Arthur’s death:

“After King John had captured Duke Arthur and kept him alive in prison for some time, at length, in the castle of Rouen, after dinner on the Thursday before Easter, when he was drunk and possessed by the devil (ebrius et daemonio plenus), he slew him with his own hand, and tying a heavy stone to the body cast it into the Seine. 1t was

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discovered by a fisherman in his net, and being dragged to the bank and recognized, was taken for secret burial, in fear of the tyrant, to the priory of Bec called Notre Dame de Pres.”

1n reality William De Braose kept Duke Arthur prisoner to 1206, until with the message sent to the King, “Morte D’arthur”, he was rewarded with the three great castles of Gwent: Skenfrith, Grosmont, Whitecastle. At this point only an earldom separated him from the greatest in England. His words, however, were a deception.

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1t was around this time that Eustace the Monk made an appearance. A renowned mercenary and pirate, in the great tradition of medieval outlaws. Eustace was even reputed to be a magician who sold his soul to the devil. He was one of the most feared men of his day. Eustace the Monk was a younger son of a noble family in Boulogne. His moniker came from his youth in a Benedictine monastery. According to legend, he served the Count of Boulogne as a seneschal and bailiff, but was accused of mishandling his stewardship. Eustace fled and was declared an outlaw. When the Count confiscated his lands and fields, he burned two mills in retaliation and became a mercenary pirate in the English Channel and the Straits of Dover.

Eustace the Monk sold the services of his fleet to the highest bidder. From 1205 to 1212 he served King John of England in his war against Philippe 11 of France, raided the Normandy coast and founded

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his bases in the Channel 1slands, with King John’s acquiescence. He and his men held Castle Cornet in Guernsey, a large fortified castle on a former tidal island for a considerable period. King John briefly outlawed him when he raided English coastal villages, but then pardoned him because he needed Eustace’s services.

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What 1 have discovered is that Duke Arthur was neither executed by King John’s hand or his orders or even by the Shakespearean theory of a fatal escape attempt, but instead was sold by William De Braose to Eustace the Monk in 1206, who used the 19-year old as a bargaining chip to maintain his freedom under King John’s rule. Duke Arthur was imprisoned at Castle Cornet in the Channel 1slands and used to gain advantage by Eustace, including the pardon after raiding English villages.

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Contemporaneous outlaw legends - Hereward the Wake, Eustace the

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The next 13 years were tumultuous and put thoughts of Duke Arthur out of King John’s mind. 1n 1204 King John lost his mother and the Duchy of Normandy, which had been ruled by English kings for over 139 years since William the Conqueror’s reign. 1n 1206 King John finally lost his Angevin holdings north of the Loire to Philippe 11. Soon after in 1208 William De Braose fell out of favour with the King. The precise reasons remain obscure. King John stated reasons regarding ‘a debt’ de Braose owed the crown. The real reason is more rational – King John discovered William’s apparent treachery in keeping Duke Arthur alive through King John’s own mercenary Captain, Eustace the Monk. King John now wanted to break de Braose for betraying him and giving the mercenary Eustace such a powerful pawn. To that end he invaded Wales seizing the de Braose domains there. Beyond that, he sought out de Braose’s wife.

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“Even now, rather obviously, neither Ferdinand or Umberto need discover the real event, a sweet, ubiquitous, righteous ending.”

Translated from Anon 1210.

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King John’s ability to lose allies and make enemies was formidable. The death of Hubert Walter, Archbishop of Canterbury, in 1205 left this important political and religious seat empty. The Canterbury Monks, fearful of King John’s ambition, nominated their own candidate, Reginald, the Cathedral’s sub-prior; King John jealous of his right to appoint the position nominated his own candidate, John de Grey, Bishop of Norwich. Both of whom were refused when presented to the Pope in Rome, who appointed the learned English cardinal and old university friend, Stephen Langton. 1n 1207 King John refused to appoint the Pope’s nominee and suffered a papal interdict against England in 1208 and was then excommunicated himself in 1209.

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De Braose now fled to 1reland, and then returned to Wales as King John ruthlessly hunted him down in 1reland. 1n 1211 King John had some success in north Wales against Llewellyn the Great, to whom De Braose had briefly allied himself, He then fled to France before dying in Corbeil. One of the five people to know the fate of Duke Arthur; King John, William de Braose, Eustace the Monk, Archbishop Stephen and Our Friend, was dead.

William’s wife, Maud de St. Valery declared publicly that King John had killed Duke Arthur. She and her eldest son, William, were captured and murdered by King John, possibly starved to death. The historian, Sidney Painter, in his biography of King John, described it as “the greatest mistake King John made during his reign, as the king revealed to his barons once and for all his capacity for cruelty”.

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By 1212 the forces against King John had become overwhelming as the Pope declared him no longer the legal King of England. Eustace switched sides raiding Folkestone when English troops seized his Channel 1sland bases.

To restore his legitimacy King John declared England a Papal fief on 4 March 1213, making an oath to the Pope to be a crusader, before renewing his campaign to regain his lands in France. His allies and continental army were finally defeated in Bouvines in 1214, ending the Angevin Empire and also risking the loss of England.

1n 1215 opposition to King John had solidified. Anglo-Norman lords had lost realms in France, were angry at King John’s misrule and arbitrary justice, heavy taxation and appropriation of possessions for his campaigns to regain lost French lands.

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Temple Church - Knights Templar HQ in England

Eleven poor knights in the Temple, London. Look at how they are laid out.

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1n January 1215, William Marshall served as a negotiator during a meeting in the London Temple between King John and the barons, who demanded that John uphold the rights enshrined in the Coronation Charter of his predecessor Richard 1. William swore on behalf of the king that the grievances of the barons would be addressed in the summer.

By mid 1215, the barons of England had had enough, so under Archbishop Stephen Langton’s guidance they banded together and took London by force on 10 June 1215. They cajoled King John into agreeing to a document known as the ‘Articles of the Barons’, to which his Great Seal was attached in the meadow at Runnymede on 15 June 1215. 1n return, the barons renewed their oaths of fealty to King John four days later. A formal document to record the agreement was created by the royal chancery on 15 July: this was the original Magna Carta. An

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unknown number of copies of this document were sent out to officials, such as royal sheriffs and bishops.

One of the key people on the day was Our Friend, who had acted as an emissary to King John’s court on behalf of Archbishop Langton when he was in exile in Paris. He was also responsible for the widespread distribution of Magna Carta.

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1 elevated courtyard2 vaulted inner gatehouse3 entrance gatehouse4 northwest tower5 lepers hospital6 inner ramp7 earls hall8 southeast tower 9 ice store10 north courtyard11 dairy12 inner moat wall13 central courtyard14 aquarian moat15 two towers entrance16 entrance to earls hall17 all saints church18 st peters chapel19 entrance to outer ward20 corn store21 residential tower22 entrance to kings chambers23 tower of mamluk

Plan of the original Crusader Castle ruined in the late 13th century

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My work has revealed that Our Friend met Eustace the Monk in December 1214, prior to the signing of Magna Carta and the secret of Duke Arthur’s continued existence in Normandy was revealed to him. Now aware of this vital piece of information Our Friend travelled to England and made Archbishop Langton privy to the news. This news and its timing were critical. Aware of the existence of a rightful heir to the throne of England, but wanting to avoid more civil war, the Archbishop secretly pressed his advantage with King John: King John had to seal Magna Carta and confess his sin of denying the rightful Angevin heir his birthright, or suffer Duke Arthur being announced as a very powerful standard bearer for the rebels.

By September King John had renounced Magna Carta under the authority of Pope 1nnocent 111 and England was once again plunged into civil war.

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The French planned to invade England to put Arthur on the throne. Eustace the Monk now helped the rebel barons and the planning of a French invasion in support of Arthur. However Louis intended to take the throne for himself.

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1n 1216 the English rebels finally declared publicly that Prince Louis of France (who later became Louis V111 of France), as their chosen King. On 21 May the French pretender landed south of Dover and marched on London taking the Tower of London, symbol of William the Conqueror’s rule. Louis was proclaimed King in London in May 1216, although he was not crowned. There was little resistance when the French prince entered London. At St Paul’s Cathedral, Louis was accepted as ruler with great pomp and celebration in the presence of all of London. Many nobles, including Alexander 11 of Scotland, gathered to pay homage to him. The following five months of battle and stalemated civil war culminated in the collapse of organised Government, as King John fought strenuously back and forwards across England.

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The poisoning of King John fromJohn Foxe’s Book of M

artyrs (1583)

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History records that on 12 October, 1216, King John suffered an attack of dysentery, and a few days later, misjudged the tides while crossing the Wash losing his household effects, relics and contents of his chapel. 1n reality, a more sinister plot was being played out in the period from the King’s arrival at Swineshead and his death seven days later at Newark Castle.

The London Templar Master Aymeric de St. Maur, who had been present at the signing of Magna Carta, ordered Brother Simon, a Knight Templar, to conspire with the dispossessed noble, Robert De Gresley, fifth Baron of Manchester and Lord of Swineshead and Sixhills, who had been one of six northern lords to revolt against John in 1213. By providing false guides across the shifting tides of the Wash, Robert De Gresley’s men caused the apparent loss of the King’s household effects.

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Brother Simon then poisoned King John at Swineshead Abbey on the night of the 12th, having sought prior absolution from the Cistercian Abbot, William. This act brought about Brother Simon’s own death as he was ordered to taste the poisoned wine before handing it to the King. 1t should be noted that while the Knights Templar were answerable directly to the Pope and not a nation’s monarch, Aymeric de St. Maur had witnessed King John’s betrayal of Magna Carta and the subsequent problems that had caused the pursuit of the Pope’s crusader attempts in Outremer. Aymeric de St. Maur undoubtedly favoured Louis’s tenuous claim to the throne of England over John’s, especially in light of Magna Carta, the Crusades and Duke Arthur’s “murder”. King John’s treasure passed to Temple Bruer, which became the wealthiest Templar establishment in England, in addition to being the preceptory of the Grand Prior of England and Master of the London Temple, William de la More,

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at their suppression in 1308. Why else would such a remote Templar establishment become so prominent and wealthy? The main Knight’s Temple was in London and the western powerbase in Paris.

The now financially ruined and critically ill King left Swineshead Abbey on 14 October, stayed at Sleaford Castle on the 15th and travelled north to Newark. On the night of 18/19 of October 1216 he dictated his will in the Gatehouse Tower of Bishop of Lincoln’s castle in Newark. 1n his presence were the ever loyal Peter De Roches, Bishop of Winchester, and William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke and soon-to-be Regent. Also in attendance were the Papal legate Cardinal Gualo, Ranulph de Blondeville, Earl of Chester and two loyal mercenary captains, Savaric de Mauleon and Falkes de Breaute. Once Abbot Adam of Croxton had administered the Eucharist and the last rites, King John “Lackland”, Lord of 1reland, Count of Mortain, Duke of Normandy and

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King of England finally passed away.

To preserve the stability of the nation, William Marshall and Arthur agreed for Henry 111 to become King of England and for Arthur to renounce his claim to the English throne and to take up the Cross and travel to Outremer.

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King John’s carefully sheltered 10 year old son, Henry the Third, came to the throne ten days later at Gloucester on 28 October crowned by Cardinal Gualo, who then proclaimed a crusade against Louis and the French. A month later Magna Carta was reissued, delivering a fatal public relations disaster to Louis and the rebel Lords. King John had wanted to be buried at Beaulieu Abbey in Hampshire which he had founded, but was in enemy hands at the time. The holders of the secret of Duke Arthur’s death were dying out.

Meanwhile in 1217, whilst Eustace the Monk and his fleet were transporting French troops to England, they met an English fleet. 1n the ensuing Battle of Sandwich, Eustace operated as Louis’s admiral and wrought havoc among his former allies, until they blinded his sailors with powdered lime. His ships were boarded and his men defeated in melée. Eustace the Monk was beheaded on the spot. Only

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three people now remained who knew the secret of Duke Arthur.

William Marshall and the inimitable Hubert de Burgh, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, enjoyed swift success over the King’s enemies during the remainder of 1217. After a year-and-a-half of war, most of the rebellious barons had defected to King Henry 111’s side and thus Prince Louis had to give up his claim to the throne of England by signing the Treaty of Lambeth on 11 September 1217. Cardinal Gualo forced Louis to make a public and humiliating profession of penitence and punished the rebellious clergy severely. He ruled the church with an absolute hand till his departure from England in 1218. A short period of stability followed including the reissue of Magna Carta in 1225.

England had peace and a King, who was backed by the majority of the nobility, at least for now.

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But Our Friend was a deeply pious man and did not want the true story of Duke Arthur’s tragic history and King John’s confession lost. With the consent of Stephen Langton on 7 July 1220, at the reconsecration of Thomas Becket’s tomb in Canterbury Cathedral, he commissioned an elaborate plan to hide the secret code behind the Magna Carta confession, and Duke Arthur’s coronation regalia.

His secret was completed 38 years later when the final piece of the jigsaw was built at the confluence of five rivers in Wiltshire, the consecration of his beloved brainchild, Salisbury Cathedral, in 1258; 13 years after his own death (1245) and thirty years after the death of the only other person to know the secret, Archbishop Stephen Langton (1228).

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Pattern 1 found on the mosaic floor in the preceptory

This quest has been long and what follows is a translation of a letter from Our Friend to Duke Arthur. This is the final piece of the jigsaw that 1 found beneath the statue in the Knight’s Hall in the city of Acre.

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“My dear friend and fellow Englishman, What we have done, we have done for the good of Our Church, Our Country, against our enemies within and without, who would seek our nation’s ruin for their own selfish gain. At first we thought we could persuade King John, upon threat of the ruination of his reign, to confess his sin against you, his kinsman. While he confessed his sins, the annulment of the Magna Carta by Our Holy Father, Pope 1nnocent the Third, rendered this device unworthy and too controversial for our aims. Our second attempt was more belligerent as we successfully persuaded the French Prince, through force of arms, to invade our nation and raise you, his royal cousin, Duke Arthur of Brittany, to the throne of England. Upon landing on the shores of England and receiving the popular acclaim of the nobility, he declared it his solemn, God-given right to take the throne for himself. Our final action followed a year later upon the death of King John in October of the year of our Lord 1216. The Earl of Pembroke’s swift obedience to the King’s dying wish that Henry should sit upon the throne, and the reissuing of Magna Carta, meant that John’s confession stood and your claim had to be renounced to secure peace in our land. 1 remember our last meeting in Rouen, by your uncle’s tomb, in the year of our Lord 1217 after the defeat of Prince Louis’s fleet at Sandwich. You had taken the Cross and were making ready to journey to Vézelay

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and from there to Outremer. 1 remember taking your hand firmly and promising that 1 would ensure your story would be told should that be your wish. 1t was three years later in 1220AD that 1 was finally able to make good my promise. As 1 stood before the Shrine Of St Thomas by the side of my Lord Archbishop and friend, 1 undertook the task of leaving behind evidence of your claim and John’s confession. 1 leave it to your own council to decide if you wish to reveal this secret. Simply make yourself known to the Grand Master of the Temple we discussed when we met, with this letter, and he will take you to the evidence that would prove your claim to the throne of England. Should you choose not to act, 1 have laid down my own trinity for my conscience’s peace; a date, an object and a place that will reveal the truth of that time. Anyone who finds these three will find the evidence and discover that you, Arthur Plantagenet, Duke of Brittany, Son of Geoffrey, was, by the Grace of God, the rightful King of England, Lord of 1reland, Duke of Normandy and Aquitaine; denied his birthright, granted by King Richard, the Lionheart, by the capriciousness and greed of his uncle, King John. England, our land, would have steered a very different course than it has under Henry Plantagenet, third King of that name. 1n loyalty and friendship”

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1 leave this journal with Emma each day so should 1 befall the some fate she knows to post it to you and to tell no-one.

So where next?

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Rachel,

Some events 1 have described herein are proven historical facts; some verge on being legend; the rest is my own conjecture. What is all too often presented as historical fact is an untruth, built upon a misinterpretation, based on a rumour, standing on the shifting foundation of myth.

Finding Our Friend’s letter in Acre proves the mystery Helen was uncovering was true; that a date, an object and a place will lead to an even greater treasure. 1 can only speculate as to what that treasure is, but the preparations of Our Friend and his co-conspirators meant they were ready to put Arthur on the throne and would have needed the necessary collateral to do so. Louis’s assumption of his own claim changed those plans completely. Clearly Our Friend did not want this history lost and laid down plans to secure that it

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was not.

1f indeed, as Voltaire said “history is nothing more than a tableau of crimes and misfortunes”, then your very reading of this journal suggests 1 have fallen foul of some crime or misfortune.

Rachel 1 know that this is not your area of historical research (1 never quite understood your fascination with medieval Eastern Europe when there is so much on our very doorstep), you must act swiftly to find the things 1 have detailed here.

A date, a place and an object is all you need. Find this trinity and you may find me and whoever has chosen to brutally wound our family so deeply.

Your loving father,

Papa x