The
Savoyards bought their safety by accepting it; but the Poitevins,
seeing that flight or resistance were the only alternatives before
them, were spirited enough to prefer the bolder course. They were
specially dangerous because Edward and his cousin, Henry of Almaine,
the son of the King of the Romans, were much under their influence. In
the Dominican convent at Oxford the baronial leaders formed a sworn
confederacy not to desist from their purpose until the foreigners had
been expelled. There were more hot words between Leicester and William,
the most capable of the Lusignans. The Poitevins soon found that they
could not maintain themselves in the face of the general hatred. On
June 22 they fled from Oxford in the company of their ally, Earl
Warenne. They rode straight for the coast, but failing to reach it,
occupied Winchester, where they sought to maintain themselves in
Aymer's castle of Wolvesey. The magnates of the parliament then turned
against them the arms they professed to have prepared against the
Welsh. Headed by the new justiciar, Hugh Bigod, they besieged Wolvesey.
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