Note 14 — Chapter XXVIII · THE ELIZABETHAN SETTLEMENT IN CHURCH AND STATE 1558-1570

11. The French War. 1562-1564.—Elizabeth and Mary were not merely personal rivals. The deadly struggle on which they had entered was a European one, and the success or failure of the Catholic or the Protestant cause in some Continental country might determine the future history of Britain. In 1562 a civil war broke out between the French Protestants—or Huguenots,[14] as they were usually called in France—and their Catholic fellow-subjects. The leaders of the Huguenots obtained Elizabeth's aid by offering her Havre, which she hoped to exchange for Calais. The Huguenots were, however, defeated at the battle of Dreux, though Guise, who commanded the Catholics, was in the moment of victory shot dead by an assassin. In 1563 peace was patched up for a time between the French parties, but Elizabeth refused to surrender Havre, till a plague broke out amongst the English garrison, and drove the scanty remnants of it back to England. In 1564 Elizabeth was forced to make peace without recovering Calais. The war thus ended was the only one in which she ever took part except when absolutely no alternative was left to her.