HENRY V

Thought to have been written in about 1599 and first performed sometime between March and June that year. It tells the story of Henry’s campaign in France and centres around the Battle of Agincourt.

In terms of history, and indeed irony, the tennis balls which appear early in the first act as a mocking gift from the French to imply Henry’s immaturity were sent by the 17-year-old Dauphin, Lewis de Guyenne, in 1414 when Henry was 28. 

Poor young Lewis died unheroically from dysentery the following year, just months after Agincourt. 

The play ends with Henry’s marriage to Katherine de Valois on June 2nd 1420.

English soldiers storming the breach in the bastion walls of Harfleur during its siege in 1415 by the forces of King Henry V. Painted by Thomas Grieve as part of the theatre design for Charles Kean’s procuction of Shakespeare’s ‘Henry V’ in London, 1859.

3:1 FRANCE BEFORE HARFLEUR

Henry is urging his men to make a last, valiant attack on the break in the wall surrounding Harfleur and thus take the town they’ve been besieging.

The next stop will be the siege of Harfleur…

HARFLEUR, SEINE-MARITIME, FRANCE

The siege of Harfleur lasted for just over a month between August 18th and September 22nd  1415. Henry had brought over twelve huge guns to deal with any siege he might decide to lay. Heavy bombardment smashed a hole in the walls next to the Port de Leure, the gate into the town from the south west.

The site of the Port de Leure can be identified nowadays by a circular, concrete compound containing three large bushes and bearing the name of the gate itself.

The breach in the walls may have remained uncelebrated had Shakespeare not written his famous speech about it. As it is, the French have also marked the site of that adventure. They’ve named a bus stop after it – ‘La Brecque’.

You can still see the line of fortifications along the street by following the houses rebuilt after Henry’s artillery had reduced the town to rubble.

It’s a lovely little town to walk around, with its narrow streets and the magnificent church of St Martin, to where Henry walked barefoot and gave thanks for his victory at Agincourt. The church dates from the 15th century but centuries of alterations have quite changed its appearance since Henry knew it.

The site of the Porte de Leure at Harfleur. The breach in the wall was to the left of the picture.

The church of St Martin.