The Captain's Men

by Martin Archer

  The noose tightens.

  Within minutes of Michael and his men joining us, we had dispatched food and assistance to his two wounded men, fed Michael and his able-bodied men with some of the bread and burnt sheep meat we were carrying, and were once again on our way riding towards the barons’ army. Almost immediately one of our outriders galloped in from the north to report that an hour or so earlier he had seen a large force of foragers turn off onto a cart path leading towards one of Devon’s large coastal villages to the east of us.

  There were, the breathless outrider reported, three empty wains accompanied by a hundred or more walking men carrying swords and shields with only a handful of mounted men riding in front of them as outriders—an altogether very different and much stronger force of foragers than those we had previously encountered.

  “Well now, what should I make of that?” I mused out loud as our outrider turned away and rode off to re-join his file. I had said it to myself and did not expect an answer. But I got one from my apprentice sergeant.

  “Perhaps they have come to know the size of our fighting groups and have adjusted their foraging parties to fit them?” my apprentice sergeant offered.

  I was surprised to hear him speak up. Richard rarely did more than listen and jump with an “aye Lieutenant” when I told him to do something.

  “Then why did they send armed men to their own village yesterday and not very many of them?” I asked rather disdainfully to put him in his place.

  But he was not cowed.

  “Could it be that the men the barons sent foraging always carry weapons and they were sent out before the barons realized the size, or even the existence, of the forces you were sending out to stop them—and now they do?”

  Hmm. Richard’s a smart lad. Maybe being able to scribe and gobble church-talk does not hurt a man’s head as much as everyone thinks.

  ******

  It did not take long to organize my men to go after the big foraging party. I would take Michael and John and their men and harass them from the south; everyone else would harass them from the north.

  “Stay with them as long as its daylight,” I told the sergeants going north. “And be sure to have your men to pick up all the spent arrows they can find; I will be doing the same to the south.”

  We ambled and cantered down the cart path with the outrider who had seen the foragers leading the way until we finally caught up with the foraging party. It was bigger company of men than I would have expected, and it was just entering a distant village when we first saw them.

  “Best to enter the village carefully and not let them jump out and surprise your men,” I announced loudly to the sergeants so that their men could hear as well.

  “Keep your distance and do not push your arrows at them unless you can mark your man. We will meet back here after it gets too dark to fight.”

  It did not work out the way I expected.

  We surrounded the foragers in the village, but nothing happened. The mounted foragers moved their horses into a barn and they all formed up around the nearby village well in a turtle with their shields held up and overlapping to prevent our arrows from reaching them. Our knights had done the same thing to protect themselves from the arrows of the Saracen horsemen when I was a crusader.

  We, of course, rode closer to put more accuracy on our arrows. The foragers let us ride up quite close before they sprung their surprise—some of them had crossbows. All of a sudden, someone in their turtle gave a shout and a number of crossbows loosed their quarrels all at the same time. Four of our men and two of our horses were immediately hit.

  In the blink of an eye three of my men were on the ground within easy shooting distance of the crossbow men sheltering under the turtle’s shields and so was a screaming horse. The horse took about ten steps before it went down and took its rider with it, one of John’s men. It was chaos with great cheers coming from the enemy turtle and shouts of alarm and confusion from our men.

  Things quickly went from bad to worse. Our men galloped their horses forward to aid their fallen fellow archers as was expected of them and they had been learnt to do. Some of them jumped off their horses and began dragging their friends to safety.

  Others rushed to those who had fallen and tried to pull them up behind them on their horses so they could ride away with them. John was one of those.

  He galloped up to the archer whose screaming horse had fallen and was leaning over to pull him up to sit behind him, when he himself was struck in the side by a quarrel, and fell over on top of the man he was trying to rescue.

  What saved many of our men was that it takes so long to reload a crossbow. By the time we got out everyone out of crossbow range we had lost three men killed, including John, and seven men wounded including one who would almost certainly need a mercy. We also lost four horses so that several men will have to ride double the way the Templars sometimes do.

  ******

  After the battle, we withdrew some distance from the village and spent an anxious night camping in the dark and tending to our wounded. We were worried about a counterattack with the foragers creeping up and falling on us while we slept. There was no doubt about it, we would have been quite vulnerable had the men of our enemy's foraging party known where to find us in the dark. As you might imagine, we lit no fires to attract them and the men took turns staying awake and on guard all night long.

  In the morning we watched from afar as the foragers left the village and began marching back towards the Exeter road on the cart path. We never did see their riders. They must have slipped out of the village in the night with their horses.

  Because we were burdened with our wounded men and had no way to carry them to safety, we were all more than a little relieved to see the enemy foragers begin walking towards the road instead of towards us.

  At the very least, had they known where to find us and come for us, they would have almost certainly been able to catch and kill those of our wounded men who were too badly wounded to ride or run—and likely many more or all of us because the company contract, on which every one of us had made his mark, required each of us to burn in hell forever if we ever abandoned a fellow archer while he was still alive.

  There was nothing we could do when the foragers began marching away except temporarily leave our four seriously wounded men behind and begin harrying the foragers once again. We did not in any way abandon our wounded, however; as soon as dawn broke, Richard gobbled a prayer at them in church-talk and I sent a galloper named Alex, a fisher man from one of the islands off the coast, to retrieve the outriders’ horse cart and the two wounded men in it.

  Alex Fisher was told to use the cart to carry all of our wounded men to the safety of the temporary camp where we had our captured wains and sheep herd. We also left the wounded men some of the flower paste that kills pain, some bread and burnt sheep strips to eat, and a couple of bowls for the less-wounded among them, those that did not have crossbow quarrels stuck in them, to use to get water from the little stream that runs near our temporary camp.

  Everyone seemed pleased that our wounded men would be so well taken care of, and we all promised to return to make sure they had been rescued. The only thing we did not have was a barber to bleed them.

  ******

  Our wounded men were left where they could not be seen from the cart path, and we caught up with the foragers rather quickly—and began riding with silent menace along both sides of the foragers' closely packed marching column. They had horses pulling the three wains filled with sacks of corn they had taken from the village, and they walked close together so they could raise their shields to form turtle shells to protect themselves from our arrows.

  We, of course, rode far enough away so we would not be hit by the crossbow men among them. It was a sight I had never seen before, not even in the Holy Land—a turtle shell of thirty or forty shields walking in front of each wain.

  The turtle shells worked for the barons’ men until I offered five copper coins t
o anyone who pushed an arrow into one of the horses pulling the wains. My men, particularly the young ones, responded with enthusiasm to my offer. They began galloping along the column of marching foragers and pushing their arrows at the three wain horses as they rode past them. Pushing arrows while riding was something they knew how to do; one of the wain horses was hit almost immediately.

  The foragers stopped marching when our men began riding past, raised their shields to form a turtle, and their crossbow men responded with their bolts. It took a while to get the other two wain horses because the foragers responded by trying to shield them as well. But one after another they were hit to the sound of great cheers from our men.

  It was not without cost; one of our archers galloping past the column took a quarrel that went right through his leg and struck his horse, which promptly began screaming and threw him off. Two others of our horses were hit as well and the man who took the quarrel in his leg fell so hard that he broke his arm most painful.

  Killing the wain horses did not cause the foragers’ to abandon the wains as I had hoped. To my surprise, the wains suddenly began moving down the cart path once again with the foragers themselves pulling them and their wounded sheltering in the wains behind the sacks of corn. The three shield turtles, each in front of a wain its shield carriers were pulling, moved off down the cart path leaving behind the hooves and heads of their quickly butchered wain horses.

  For several hours my men and I contented ourselves with riding just out of crossbow range on either side of the cart path the foragers were travelling. The foragers’ crossbows made it too dangerous for my horse archers to continue riding in to launch their arrows, particularly since the chance of successfully hitting one of the foragers was low because they would quickly raise their shields to remake their turtle.

  The foragers easy passage ended when the cart path went through a wooded area just before it reached the Exeter road. It was Richard’s idea.

  ****** Apprentice Sergeant Richard

  My horse was stuck in the side by a crossbow quarrel while I was dismounting to try to save one of our men who hit his head and went to sleep when he fell off his wounded horse. It happened when the man was trying to earn a coin by pushing an arrow into one of the wain horses.

  I was one of the archers riding behind him and saw him fall. So I pulled up my horse and jumped down to help him as I had been learnt to do. I grabbed the poor fellow under his arms and began pulling him away from the foragers. While I was pulling on him, my horse was wounded and a quarrel hit the sleeping archer in the back of his leg up near his arse.

  It all happened very fast and I was not at all afraid until I got him behind a tree so the crossbow men in the foragers’ turtle could not see to shoot at us. Then I began shaking like I did at school when it was cold and I was trying to sleep without enough sleeping skins. I did not recognize or even know the name of the archer who almost got me killed. He must have been one of the riders who joined up with us yesterday.

  ******

  After the foragers moved on, I was given a wounded man’s horse as a replacement. It was a gelded black and the stirrups hanging from its saddle were too short and could not be adjusted. I was happy to have enough stripes to get it because we had lost so many horses that some of the men with only one stripe were riding double.

  All the foragers’ wain horses had been hit and everything had quieted down by the time one of the archers brought my new horse to me and handed me the reins. He said it had belonged to his best mate—and he would seen me save Charlie and was glad I would be riding him. The horse’s name, he said, was “Brownie.” Charlie? Of course, that must be the name of the archer who went to sleep when his horse went down and almost got me killed.

  “How is Charlie?” I asked as he handed me the reins and I swung myself aboard my new horse.

  “Oh he is fine now that you saved him. He is awake and staggering around like he is had too much ale.”

  I looked at the foragers and their wains in the distance as I climbed into Brownie's saddle and listened to the good news about Charlie. Sitting on Brownie, I could see a great stand of trees before the cart path the foragers were travelling reached the Exeter road. I kept looking at the trees and thinking about them as I rode my new horse to catch up with Lieutenant Raymond so I could resume fetching and scribing for him.

  ******

  “You did good, Richard, real good. The men were cheering you and you deserved it.”

  “Thank you, Lieutenant. Thank you” ... “uh, Lieutenant, would you consider allowing me to take a few of the men out ahead of the foragers and wait for them where the cart path goes through that stand of trees there in the distance?”

  I asked my question most respectfully as I pointed towards the distant trees.

  Lieutenant Raymond was a tough looking old greybeard, one of the original archers I had been told. He had rarely before even acknowledged that I existed. This time he eyed me intently and listened as I explained what I had in mind.

  Five minutes later we I was galloping off at the head of the nine surviving outriders who had recently joined us. They were quite angry with the foragers for the loss of their fallen sergeant and wounded friends.

  They listened and nodded with grim satisfaction when I explained what I had in mind.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Fighting in the forest.

  We did not ride straight up the village cart path to the forest through which the cart path passed. To the contrary, I led my newly assigned men to the left of the stand of trees and we rode all the way around them until we reached the cart path again—and began riding down the path towards the on-coming foragers. We could not see them yet, but we were now galloping hard because we knew they would soon reach us.

  “Here. This will do for us.”

  That was what I shouted to the outriders’ chosen man riding by my side as I reined in Brownie. My horse was not the only one tired from our hard ride. I was so stiff and tired that I staggered for a second as I leaped down from Brownie and handed his reins to the outriders’ chosen man. His name was Joe. I do not remember the rest of his name except that his accent suggested he was from somewhere in the midlands. As things turned out, he would never see home again.

  The rest of the outriders were right behind us. They galloped up and began dismounting all around me. There were ten of us in all. Joe and another man stayed mounted and handed around most of their quivers for us to use or hold until they returned. They would lead our horses back up the cart path, tie them up where they could not be seen, and then try to ride back double on one horse in time to re-join us. If they did not return in time, it would be the eight of us against the foragers and their turtles; if they did get back in time, we would be ten.

  ******

  Our horse holders had not returned by the time we could see and hear the approaching foragers. They came around a bend in the cart path and there they were—walking and talking and still pulling the three wains loaded with sacks of corn and their wounded. They did not see us at first because we were hiding behind trees on the south side of the cart path where it narrowed as it passed through the thickest of the forest. Each of us was behind a tree to give us some shelter in case their crossbow men still had quarrels left to shoot.

  I picked out a man carrying a crossbow and waited to give my men a chance to mark their targets. And while I waited I realized I had made a great mistake—I should have told my outriders to push their arrows at men carrying crossbows whenever possible.

  “No sense waiting, lads; get the crossbow men,” I shouted and began cheering as I stepped out from behind the tree and pushed an arrow deep into the chest of a crossbow man. He was less than twenty paces away and I clearly saw the bloody arrow tip come out of his back as it knocked him sideways and he went down screaming and flailing about. I would swear he saw me and opened his eyes in disbelief as I pushed my arrow into him.

  There were loud cheers and shouts all around me as the eight of us poured
arrows into the cluster of surprised men in the road as fast as we could push them out. For a brief moment, some of them attempted to raise their shields to form a turtle. They were too late; they either went down or disappeared into the trees in front of us almost like magic.

  When they were gone, we ran through the trees along the cart path to find new victims at the other wains further down the path. This time the foragers did not even try to protect themselves by putting up a turtle shell of shields. They just screamed and shouted, and then ran, as we pushed out arrows and shot them down left and right. It did not take long before the whole column dissolved and it was once again every man for himself.

  Eight good archers shooting at close range can push arrows into a lot of people in a very short period of time, and we did. Two or three minutes later there were only dead and wounded men on the cart path and three abandoned wains with the wounded men in them desperately trying to climb out in order to follow their friends who were attempting to escape.

  Many of the foragers, particularly the wounded, ran into the nearby trees on the other side of the road; others ran up the road—to find Lieutenant Raymond waiting for them with the rest of our men.

  The barons’ foragers left seven dead men on the road and five who were too wounded to flee into the trees. I am sure we wounded many more who managed to hide themselves because the trees were so close to the road and the forest so thick.

  My men and I were too busy to chase the barons’ foragers very far when they scattered and ran. A couple of my men started to plunge into the dense stand of trees after the fleeing foragers, but I called out to them and ordered them to return to the cart path to help unload the barons’ wounded men who were still in the wains. We unloaded them and left the barons’ dead and wounded men on the cart path for their friends to find.

  While we were doing that, Lieutenant Raymond and his men finished off the foragers who had run up the cart path to escape and then rode down it to see what had happened when we ambushed the wains. He was very pleased with what we had done and immediately ordered some of his men dismount so their horses could be used to pull the wains back to what everyone is now calling “our sheep camp,” the one in the trees on the west side of the Exeter road where we had stashed our wains and wounded men and flock of sheep.