Charles Martel had vanquished the Saracens, the hiding-place of which,
under the altar of the parish church of the village of Ste Catherine de
Fierbois, the "voices" had revealed to her; she carried a white standard
of her own design embroidered with lilies, and having on the one side
the image of God seated on the clouds and holding the world in His hand,
and on the other a representation of the Annunciation. Joan succeeded in
entering Orleans on the 29th of April 1429, and through the vigorous and
unremitting sallies of the French the English gradually became so
discouraged that on the 8th of May they raised the siege. It is admitted
that her extraordinary pluck and sense of leadership were responsible
for this result. In a single week (June 12 to 19), by the capture of
Jargeau and Beaugency, followed by the great victory of Patay, where
Talbot was taken prisoner, the English were driven beyond the Loire.
With some difficulty the dauphin was then persuaded to set out towards
Reims, which he entered with an army of 12,000 men on the 16th of July,
Troyes having yielded on the way. On the following day, holding the
sacred banner, Joan stood beside Charles at his coronation in the
cathedral.
The king then entered into negotiations with a view to detaching
Burgundy from the English cause. Joan, at his importunity, remained with
the army, but the king played her false when she attempted the capture
of Paris; and after a failure on the 8th of September, when Joan was
wounded,[2] his troops were disbanded. Joan went into Normandy to assist
the duke of Alençon, but in December returned to the court, and on the
29th she and her family were ennobled with the surname of du Lis.
Unconsoled by such honours, she rode away from the court in March, to
assist in the defence of Compiègne against the duke of Burgundy; and on
the 24th of May she led an unsuccessful sortie against the besiegers,
when she was surrounded and taken prisoner. Charles, partly perhaps on
account of his natural indolence, partly on account of the intrigues at
the court, made no effort to effect her ransom, and never showed any
sign of interest in her fate. By means of negotiations instigated and
prosecuted with great perseverance by the university of Paris and the
Inquisition, and through the persistent scheming of Pierre Cauchon, the
bishop of Beauvais--a Burgundian partisan, who, chased from his own see,
hoped to obtain the archbishopric of Rouen--she was sold in November by
John of Luxemburg and Burgundy to the English, who on the 3rd of January
1431, at the instance of the university of Paris, delivered her over to
the Inquisition for trial. After a public examination, begun on the 9th
of January and lasting six days, and another conducted in the prison,
she was, on the 20th of March, publicly accused as a heretic and witch,
and, being in the end found guilty, she made her submission at the
scaffold on the 24th of May, and received pardon. She was still,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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