the maid of Orleans lives

Cease cruel troop, leave innocence alone/Fell violators; fear just Heav'n, fear Joan. - Voltaire from La Pucelle d'Orléans

...

To my honored Lord, Charles VII, by God's grace King of France -

Ten years have passed since Jeanne's unjust and cruel execution. It seems only right in my mind to remember on this unhappy anniversary that many of us fought and died for her courageous cause.

And why, those who dare disparage her deeds and forthright example now ask? What did the French soldiery gain by obeying the commands of a teenage girl? She did not give us land or spoils. She drove off our whores and took away our hard drink.

But she restored French pride and national fervor after decades of defeat at the hands of our British oppressors. We once trembled at the names of Edward the Black and King Henry. We wished to remember not the fields of strife where they bested our finest knights: Crécy, Poitiers, Agincourt.

Jeanne made us believe in ourselves again and follow crown and banner royal with heads held high. She gave us the promise of God and the hope of His salvation.

No other captain was ever served with greater loyalty than ours. No other captain was ever more fiercely loved by her soldiers. No mass of soldiery more greatly feared the lash of their captain's tongue than we feared Jeanne's righteous indignation and wrath. We fought for France, but the Maid of Heaven fought for God.

And because we feared Jeanne La Pucelle d'Orléans, in city after city, British soldiery cast down their arms at the sound of our fierce tread upon the field of battle.

We would have followed her to the ends of the earth and beyond.

We fought in thirteen engagements and bested the arrogant English in nine of them. Whenever our cannon and soldier numbers equaled our enemy's and sometimes when ours were lesser, we were the victors.

Thirty garrisons threw down their arms without a single cannonade. Once when a garrison refused to surrender, they quickly raised the white banner when they witnessed in horror how ably Jeanne placed our French cannon.

And yet some wonder why we followed her for naught but the hope of glory. They only wonder because they did not know her. They spoke ill of her only because they envied her fame and honor.

After Philip the Good, the Duke of Burgundy, captured Jeanne and sold her to the English for a Judas price and they put her to execution - may the heavens forever blot out his name - no soldiers ever grieved a fallen captain more greatly than we grieved our beloved La Pucelle d'Orléans.

But in her time of trial and suffering, why, my mighty sovereign Lord, why did you make no ransom, no midnight ambuscade, no great marching against Philip the Traitor to free her? How did all of France so quickly abandon the Maid of Heaven to such an ignoble and undeserved fate?

Never did she take or commend to herself any glory. At God's feet she laid every French victory. And for that, the church above every other principality jealous of her success, hated her, and accused her of heresy and congress with the Devil.

And when the church condemned and demanded that Philip turn Jeanne over to them for the inquisitor's lash and trial, her star fell from the heavens, and many began to revile her.

How quickly the vile chatter began that she had grown too powerful for her station. People who once wept for joy at her victories, viciously branded her heretic, mad woman, witch, and man hater. Too soon others began to take credit for her leadership and slander the angel who once attended her. No devils consorted with the Maid of Heaven, I swear upon my life!

How many voices have tried to silence the memory of the brave Maid of Orléans? How many dismissed her warcraft, her contempt for defense, her reckless aggression as borrowed greatness? Why were so many men threatened by the exploits of a teenage girl?

In France we should have known better.

Are thou remembered, my great Lord, of Jeanne leading thy grace with thine Army through enemy territory to Rheims to crown thee king of all France? Are thou remembered of her prophesying thy ascension to the throne? Are thou remembered of how the La Pucelle did what no one in all of France dared to do?

The tender maid walked under the strict commandment of God to thee to beg the leadership of thy army. When she first came to me at Vaucouluers even I did not believe.

But when she prophesied a French defeat four days before the news reached me in our great walled Keep, instead of sending her home or confining her to a lunatic house as other men might, I led her to bow before thee and make her mad request.

Mighty king, thou believed her word by proofs only thee and God could have known, commending her to thine army to command and drive out the British oppressor and defeat their Burgundian vassals.

I have heard of treacherous voices at court who swear that the Maid's many victories were stolen from her betters. But I did not hear tales of her prowess or spread those heard from other men, these I witnessed for myself.

If thou had only seen her with an enemy dart buried below her shoulder and just above her breast, the banner she stoutly held high waving bravely in the wind, thou too would have believed rather than scoffed.

But she is long dead and her exploits all but forgotten. Those of us who fought for her remember but no one listens or cares to hear the bleatings of the past from a few old men.

Other men have stolen her great mantel and lived to boast of borrowed greatness. Think you that Jeanne is dead and her ashes scattered to the cruel winds? Believe it not!

Even her brothers, chevaliers both, believed Jeanne dead and burned till they beheld her living again and she beheld and recognized them. John the Esquire ran through the streets of Orléans exclaiming to everyone he met Our beloved Jeanne La Pucelle is returned to us whole! She who bore the sword dipped in Britian's gore and held aloft for fair France our banner bold!

Of course, thou knowest as well as I, that she was not our Maid. And she would be only the first of many girls to claim that they were the Maid escaped from the flames by God's merciful providence.

In this false manner the memory of the Maid was truly preserved in the face of all those who spurned her name. Like a candle guttering in the breeze, her deeds continue to burn in the hearts of us who still believe.

Already the chroniclers conspire to reduce her role to inspiration rather than the impetus that must with God's grace forever drive the British oppressor from our fair shores. I beg of thee, great King, to chasten them to record the truth and the hope she once gave us all.

Never forget my Lord, the Maid of Orléans lives. Let her memory live too.

- Robert de Baudricourt, captain of Vaucouluers