Henry also now took upon him the whole executive power of the government. The governors of towns, the officers of state, the magistrates and the dignitaries, were placed and displaced at his pleasure. The currency of the country was altered at his suggestion, and his counsels swayed everything in France. However, England was still at his heart, and leaving a country that his sword and his policy had conquered, as soon as he could do so with any security, he carried his beautiful bride to be crowned in London.
The moment, however, that his foot was out of France, his interests in that country declined; and the rashness of his officers brought confusion and ruin into his affairs. Town after town was taken by the Dauphin; and at length the Duke of Clarence, the English monarch's brother, with all the chivalry that accompanied him, were defeated at Baugé, in Anjou, and the duke himself, as well as three thousand of his men, remained dead upon the field. This news, accompanied by the further tidings that the Dauphin was advancing to besiege Chartres, called upon the king imperatively to return to France; and leaving the queen to follow at a future time, Henry set out for Calais accompanied by four thousand men-at-arms and twenty-four thousand archers.
His coming gave new courage to the Burgundian faction, and struck fear into the followers of the Dauphin. Scarcely pausing at all in the capital, the English monarch advanced direct toward Chartres, before which the Dauphin had already been encamped three weeks; but long ere the English reached the town the gates were free, and the adverse army with all speed retreated toward Touraine. Thither the English monarch followed, breathing revenge for the death of his brother. Dreux and Beaugency-sur-Loire were conquered by the way; but after pursuing the Dauphin ineffectually for some time, the scarcity of provisions obliged him to return toward Normandy. On his march back, he is said to have fallen in with a party of the Armagnac faction, who retreated before him into a castle called Rougemont, which was instantly assailed and taken by the English. All who were within, the French historians assert, to the number of sixty persons, were, by the king's order, drowned in the Loire, a fact which accords too well with the manners of the time and some parts of the monarch's own character. The town of Meaux was the next object of attack, and a long and courageous defence was made by the Dauphinois within.