Guillaume Cale

Guillaume Cale (sometimes anglicised to William Kale, also known as Guillaume Caillet, popularly known as Jacques Bonhomme ("Jack Goodfellow") or Callet.) was a wealthy peasant from the town of Mello in the Beauvais north of Paris, who rose to fame as the leader of the Peasant Jacquerie which exploded into violence in May 1358 and rampaged for a month unchecked until the Battle of Mello on the 10 June. Cale's origins are unknown, it is not clear how old he was at the time of the uprising, nor is anything known about his family and business ties, except that he was a reasonably well-off farmer.

The Jacquerie

In 1358 the Beauvais was perhaps the only region of France not utterly ravaged by twenty years of warfare with England. It was still remarkably prosperous despite the attentions of the Black Death, and maintained its wealth under the protection of the household troops of the French king and the other nobles who lived in and around Paris and depended on the region for their food and for taxation. However, in 1356, King John II was captured by the English at the battle of Poitiers. His exorbitant ransom began to drain the already depleted French treasury and the noble protection began to slip. In the spring of 1358 Paris exploded into violence, as a clothier named Étienne Marcel seized the city with an army of townsmen and drove out the Dauphin and formed a revolutionary commune, presided over by Marcel.

Cale was sympathetic to the Parisiens, and so when a similar rebellion began to ferment in the Beauvais, he rose to become its leader, directing the ragged bands of brigands that emerged from every village and forming a cohesive if rough raiding force, which was able to drive out the scattered opposition from noble bodyguards and retainers and take control of the region. Under his rulership this force ran amok, killing hundreds of nobles, retainers, and their wives and families amid scenes of appalling brutality. He was joined by contingents from the towns of Senlis, Clermont and Creil and eventually could field 5,000 men, including several minor nobles, whose military expertise gave his force structure.

Cale conducted a campaign of reduction against local castles and forts designed to give his army more mobility, and his troops were substantial enough that the were able to menace local towns into feeding them under threat of destruction. The rebellion spread all around Paris, it was said flames could be seen from the walls on all sides. Amongst the castles taken was a royal dwelling at Montmorency, which was burnt to the ground.

On the 7 June, just a few weeks after the uprising began, Cale drew his forces up on a hill near his hometown of Mello and awaited the arrival of a force of nobles and mercenaries commanded by King Charles II of Navarre, which had been despatched to crush the rebellion. In an attempt to distract the advancing force, Cale sent 800 men to Meaux, where the Dauphin was sheltering with his family. Dauphin Charles fled, leaving his wife and daughter to be besieged in the castle of Marché. This did not however distract the King of Navarre, whose force arrived on the 10 June. Promising safe passage, Charles of Navarre offered Cale a chance to discuss treaty terms in his camp, an opportunity Cale accepted. He left his lines, having prepared an efficient defence and entered the noble forces, from which he never emerged. Charles of Navarre was a true medieval aristocrat and as such never considered his promisies to a peasant to be bound by honour. The army of Jacques was destroyed in the ensuing Battle of Mello.

Cale was dragged in irons to Clermont where, following brutal torture, he was beheaded in the town square, along with the remnants of his army. (Some accounts offer that he was tortured to death by being crowned with a red-hot crown.)

The Jacquerie was destroyed and the nobles enacted a bloody vengeance against the peasants who had threatened the social order of medieval France.

References

* Sumption, Jonathan, "Trial by Fire", Faber and Faber, Great Britain: 1999. ISBN 0-571-13896-9