Charles VII (22 February 1403 – 22 July 1461), called the Victorious (French: le Victorieux) or the Well-Served (le Bien-Servi), was King of France from 1422 to his death in 1461. His reign saw the end of the Hundred Years' War and a de facto end of the English claims to the French throne.
During the Hundred Years' War, Charles VII inherited the throne of France under desperate circumstances. Forces of the Kingdom of England and the duke of Burgundy occupied Guyenne and northern France, including Paris, the capital and most populous city, and Reims, the city in which French kings were traditionally crowned. In addition, his father, Charles VI, had disinherited him in 1420 and recognized Henry V of England and his heirs as the legitimate successors to the French crown. At the same time, a civil war raged in France between the Armagnacs (supporters of the House of Valois) and the Burgundian party (supporters of the House of Valois-Burgundy, which was allied to the English).
With his court removed to Bourges, south of the Loire river, Charles was disparagingly called the "King of Bourges", because the area around this city was one of the few remaining regions left to him. However, his political and military position improved dramatically with the emergence of Joan of Arc as a spiritual leader in France. Joan and Jean de Dunois led French troops to lift the siege of Orléans and other besieged strategic cities on the Loire river, and to defeat the English at the Battle of Patay. With local English troops dispersed, the people of Reims switched allegiance and opened their gates, which enabled Charles VII to be crowned at Reims Cathedral in 1429. Six years later, he ended the Anglo-Burgundian alliance by signing the Treaty of Arras with Burgundy, followed by the recovery of Paris in 1436 and the steady reconquest of Normandy in the 1440s using a newly organized professional army and advanced siege cannons. Following the Battle of Castillon in 1453, the French recaptured all of England's continental possessions except the Pale of Calais.
The last years of Charles VII were marked by conflicts with his turbulent son, the future Louis XI.
Born at the Hôtel Saint-Pol, the royal residence in Paris, Charles was given the title of Count of Ponthieu six months after his birth in 1403. He was the eleventh child and fifth son of Charles VI of France and Isabeau of Bavaria. Isabeau was known to be unfaithful to her husband and had a scandalous affair with her brother-in-law Louis I, Duke of Orléans. Charles allegedly doubted his own parentage, and after he became Dauphin of France his enemies questioned his legitimacy. However, Charles's modern biographer Malcolm Vale writes that there is "absolutely no concrete evidence to suggest that Charles was not the king's son", and even his supposed doubts can be connected instead with his later disinheritance by his own father in January 1421.
On 18 December 1413, Charles was betrothed to Marie of Anjou, daughter of Duke Louis II of Anjou and Yolande of Aragon. This match connected the large House of Valois-Anjou to the Crown. In his early years, Charles was under the influence of his future mother-in-law, and he began a life-long association with his future brother-in-law René of Anjou. Charles's four elder brothers, Charles (1386), Charles (1392–1401), Louis (1397–1415) and John (1398–1417) had each held the title of Dauphin as heirs apparent to the French throne in turn. All died childless, leaving Charles with a rich inheritance of titles.
Charles began his political career at a difficult time for France. Henry V of England, who claimed the French throne and had recently defeated the French at the Battle of Agincourt, was about to begin another campaign in Normandy. Meanwhile, France was divided between the hostile Armagnac (supporters of Charles's cousin Charles I, Duke of Orléans) and Burgundian (partisans of John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy) parties, who fought for control over the insane King Charles VI. As Dauphin, Charles became the figurehead of the Armagnac party, which controlled Paris since 1413; in fact, he was under the influence of Bernard VII, Count of Armagnac (father-in-law to the Duke of Orléans). Charles quarreled with his mother and exiled her from Paris. On 29 May 1418, he was taken away from Paris by his servants Tanneguy du Châtel and Guillaume d'Avaugour after the Burgundians entered the city and staged a coup d'état against the Armagnacs, securing control over the King. The Count of Armagnac was murdered along with around 2,500 of his supporters. The fifteen-year-old Charles became the Armagnac leader and on 29 June took the title of lieutenant-general of France. On 26 December 1418, he claimed the title of Regent of France, proclaiming himself a sovereign ruler.
Charles established his own court in Bourges and a Parlement in Poitiers. John the Fearless thought the Dauphin was weak and trusting and sought a peace that would allow them to rally against the English. On 11 July, Charles and John the Fearless attempted a reconciliation on a small bridge near Pouilly-le-Fort, not far from Melun where Charles was staying. They signed the Treaty of Pouilly-le-Fort in which they would share authority of the government, assist each other and not to form any treaties without the other's consent. Charles and John also decided that a further meeting should take place the following 10 September. On that date, they met on the bridge at Montereau. The Duke assumed that the meeting would be entirely peaceful and diplomatic; thus, he brought only a small escort with him. The Dauphin's men reacted to the Duke's arrival by attacking and killing him. Charles's level of involvement has remained uncertain to this day. Although he claimed to have been unaware of his men's intentions, this was considered unlikely by those who heard of the murder. The assassination marked the end of any attempt of a reconciliation between the Armagnac and Burgundian factions, thus strengthening the position of Henry V of England. Charles was later required by a treaty with Philip the Good, the son of John the Fearless, to apologize for the murder of the previous duke, which he did through a representative.
At the death of Charles' father Charles VI in October 1422, the succession was cast into doubt. Under the Treaty of Troyes, signed by Charles VI on 21 May 1420, the throne would pass to Henry V or his heir. Henry had died in July 1422: his heir was the infant King Henry VI of England, son of Henry and Charles VI's daughter Catherine of Valois. However, Frenchmen loyal to the Valois regarded the treaty as invalid on grounds of coercion and Charles VI's diminished mental capacity. Those who did not recognize the treaty and believed the Dauphin Charles to be of legitimate birth considered him the rightful heir to the throne. Those who considered Charles illegitimate recognized as the rightful heir Charles, Duke of Orléans, cousin of the Dauphin, who was in English captivity. Only the supporters of Henry VI and the Dauphin Charles were able to enlist sufficient military force to press effectively for their candidates. The English, already in control of northern France, enforced Henry's claim in the regions of France that they occupied. Northern France, including Paris, was thus ruled by an English regent, Henry V's brother, John of Lancaster, Duke of Bedford, based in Normandy (see Dual monarchy of England and France).
On 25 June 1421, he took Gallardon and executed the garrison as traitors. By the end of June, he had invested Chartres. He then went south of the Loire River under the protection of Yolande of Aragon, known as "Queen of the Four Kingdoms" and, on 18 December 1422, married her daughter, Marie of Anjou, to whom he had been engaged since December 1413 in a ceremony at the Louvre Palace.
Charles claimed the title King of France for himself, but failed to make any attempts to expel the English from northern France out of indecision and a sense of hopelessness. Instead, he remained south of the Loire River, where he was still able to exert power, and maintained an itinerant court in the Loire Valley at castles such as Chinon. He was still customarily known as the "Dauphin", or derisively as the "King of Bourges", after the town where he generally lived. Periodically, he considered flight to the Iberian Peninsula, which would have allowed the English to capture even more territory in France.