In Freedom's Cause : A Story of Wallace and Bruce

by G. A. Henty

  Chapter X

  The Battle of Falkirk

  While Wallace was endeavouring to restore order in Scotland, Edwardwas straining every nerve to renew his invasion. He himself wasupon the Continent, but he made various concessions to his baronsand great towns to induce them to aid him heartily, and issued writscalling upon the whole nobility remaining at home, as they valuedhis honour and that of England, to meet at York on January 20th,"and proceed under the Earl of Surrey to repress and chastise theaudacity of the Scots." At the same time he despatched specialletters to those of the Scottish nobles who were not already inEngland, commanding them to attend at the rendezvous.

  The call upon the Scotch nobles was not generally responded to.They had lost much of their power over their vassals, many of whomhad fought under Wallace in spite of the abstention of their lords.It was clear, too, that if they joined the English, and anotherdefeat of the latter took place, their countrymen might no longercondone their treachery, but their titles and estates might beconfiscated. Consequently but few of them presented themselves atYork. There, however, the English nobles gathered in force. TheEarls of Surrey, Gloucester, and Arundel; the Earl Mareschal andthe great Constable were there; Guido, son of the Earl of Warwick,represented his father. Percy was there, John de Wathe, John deSeagrave, and very many other barons, the great array consistingof 2000 horsemen heavily armed, 1200 light horsemen, and 100,000foot soldiers.

  Sir Aymer de Vallance, Earl of Pembroke, and Sir John Sieward, sonof the Earl of March, landed with an army in Fife, and proceededto burn and waste. They were met by a Scotch force under Wallacein the forest of Black Ironside, and were totally defeated.

  Surrey's army crossed the Border, raised the siege of Roxburgh,and advanced as far as Kelso. Wallace did not venture to opposeso enormous a force, but wasted the country on every side so thatthey could draw no provisions from it, and Surrey was forced tofall back to Berwick; this town was being besieged by a Scottishforce, which retired at his approach. Here the English army haltedupon receipt of orders from Edward to wait his coming. He had hastilypatched up a peace with France, and, having landed at Sandwich,summoned the parliament, and on the 27th of May issued writs toas many as 154 of his great barons to meet him at Roxburgh on the24th of June. Here 3000 cavalry, men and horses clothed in completearmour; 4000 lighter cavalry, the riders being armed in steel butthe horses being uncovered; 500 splendidly mounted knights andmen-at-arms from Gascony; and at least 80,000 infantry assembledtogether, with abundance of materials and munition of war of allkinds. This huge army marched from Roxburgh, keeping near the coast,receiving provisions from a fleet which sailed along beside them.But in spite of this precaution it was grievously straitened, andwas delayed for a month near Edinburgh, as Wallace so wasted thecountry that the army were almost famished, and by no efforts werethey able to bring on a battle with the Scots, whose rapid marchesand intimate acquaintance with the country baffled all the effortsof the English leaders to force on an action.

  Edward was about to retreat, being unable any longer to subsist hisarmy, when the two Scottish Earls of Dunbar and Angus sent news tothe king that Wallace with his army was in Falkirk forest, aboutsix miles away, and had arranged to attack the camp on the followingmorning. The English at once advanced and that evening encamped atLinlithgow, and the next morning moved on against the Scots.

  Late in the evening Archie's scouts brought in the news to Wallacethat the English army was within three miles, and a consultationwas at once held between the leaders. Most of them were in favourof a retreat; but Comyn of Badenoch, who had lately joined Wallace,and had been from his rank appointed to the command of the cavalry,with some of his associates, urged strongly the necessity forfighting, saying that the men would be utterly dispirited at suchcontinual retreats, and that with such immensely superior cavalrythe English would follow them up and destroy them. To these argumentsWallace, Sir John Grahame, and Sir John Stewart, yielded their ownopinions, and prepared to fight. They took up their position sothat their front was protected by a morass, and a fence of stakesand ropes was also fixed across so as to impede the advance orretreat of the English cavalry. The Scotch army consisted almostentirely of infantry. These were about a third the number of thoseof the English, while Comyn's cavalry were a thousand strong.

  The infantry were formed in three great squares or circles, thefront rank kneeling and the spears all pointing outwards. In thespace between these squares were placed the archers, under Sir JohnStewart.

  The English army was drawn up in three divisions, the first commandedby the Earl Marechal, the Earl of Lincoln and Hereford; the secondby Beck, the warlike Bishop of Durham, and Sir Ralph Basset;the third by the king himself. The first two divisions consistedalmost entirely of knights and men-at-arms; the third, of archersand slingers.

  Wallace's plan of battle was that the Scottish squares should firstreceive the brunt of the onslaught of the enemy, and that whilethe English were endeavouring to break these the Scotch cavalry,which were drawn up some distance in the rear, should fall uponthem when in a confused mass, and drive them against the fence orinto the morass.

  The first division of the English on arriving at the bog made acircuit to the west. The second division, seeing the obstacle whichthe first had encountered, moved round to the east, and both fellupon the Scottish squares. The instant they were seen roundingthe ends of the morass, the traitor Comyn, with the whole of thecavalry, turned rein and fled from the field, leaving the infantryalone to support the whole brunt of the attack of the English. Soimpetuous was the charge of the latter that Sir John Stewart andhis archers were unable to gain the shelter of the squares, andhe was, with almost all his men, slain by the English men-at-arms.Thus the spearmen were left entirely to their own resources.

  Encouraged by Wallace, Grahame, Archie Forbes, and their otherleaders, the Scottish squares stood firmly, and the English cavalryin vain strove to break the hedge of spears. Again and again thebravest of the chivalry of England tried to hew a way through. TheScots stood firm and undismayed, and had the battle lain betweenthem and the English cavalry, the day would have been theirs. Butpresently the king, with his enormous body of infantry, arrived onthe ground, and the English archers and slingers poured clouds ofmissiles into the ranks of the Scots; while the English spearmen,picking up the great stones with which the ground was strewn,hurled them at the front ranks of their foes. Against this stormof missiles the Scottish squares could do nothing. Such armouras they had was useless against the English clothyard arrows, andthousands fell as they stood.

  Again and again they closed up the gaps in their ranks, but at lastthey could no longer withstand the hail of arrows and stones, towhich they could offer no return. Some of them wavered. The gapsin the squares were no longer filled up, and the English cavalry,who had been waiting for their opportunity, charged into the midstof them. No longer was there any thought of resistance. The Scotsfled in all directions. Numbers were drowned by trying to swim theriver Carron, which ran close by. Multitudes were cut down by thehost of English cavalry.

  Sir Archie Forbes was in the same square with Wallace, with a fewother mounted men. They dashed forward against the English as theybroke through the ranks of the spearmen, but the force opposed themwas overwhelming.

  "It is of no use, Archie; we must retire. Better that than throwaway our lives uselessly. All is lost now."

  Wallace shouted to the spearmen, who gallantly rallied round him,and, keeping together in spite of the efforts of the English cavalry,succeeded in withdrawing from the field. The other squares wereentirely broken and dispersed, and scarce a man of them escaped.

  Accounts vary as to the amount of the slaughter, some Englishwriters placing it as double that of the army which Wallace couldpossibly have brought into the field, seeing that the whole of thegreat nobles stood aloof, and that Grahame, Stewart, and Macduff ofFife were the only three men of noble family with him. All thesewere slain, together with some 25,000 infantry.

  Wall
ace with about 5000 men succeeded in crossing a ford of theCarron, and the English spread themselves over the country. Thedistricts of Fife, Clackmannan, Lanark, Ayr, and all the surroundingcountry were wasted and burnt, and every man found put to the sword.The Scotch themselves in retreating destroyed Stirling and Perth,and the English found the town of St. Andrew's deserted, and burntit to the ground.

  No sooner had Wallace retreated than he divided his force intosmall bands, which proceeded in separate directions, driving off thecattle and destroying all stores of grain, so that in a fortnightafter the battle of Falkirk the English army were again broughtto a stand by shortness of provisions, and were compelled to fallback again with all speed to the mouth of the Forth, there to obtainprovisions from their ships. As they did so Wallace reunited hisbands, and pressed hard upon them. At Linlithgow he fell upon theirrear and inflicted heavy loss, and so hotly did he press them thatthe great army was obliged to retreat rapidly across the Border,and made no halt until it reached the fortress of Carlisle.

  That it was compulsion alone which forced Edward to make hisspeedy retreat we may be sure from the fact that after the victoryof Dunbar he was contented with nothing less than a clean sweepof Scotland to its northern coast, and that he repeated the sameprocess when, in the year following the battle of Falkirk, he againreturned with a mighty army. Thus decisive as was the battle ofFalkirk it was entirely abortive in results.

  When the English had crossed the Border, Wallace assembled the fewgentlemen who were still with him, and announced his intention ofresigning the guardianship of Scotland, and of leaving the country.The announcement was received with exclamations of surprise andregret.

  "Surely, Sir William," Archie exclaimed, "you cannot mean it. Youare our only leader; in you we have unbounded confidence, and innone else. Had it not been for the treachery of Comyn the field ofFalkirk would have been ours, for had the horse charged when theEnglish were in confusion round our squares they had assuredly beendefeated. Moreover, your efforts have retrieved that disastrousfield, and have driven the English across the Border."

  "My dear Archie," Wallace said, "it is because I am the only leaderin whom you have confidence that I must needs go. I had vainly hopedthat when the Scottish nobles saw what great things the commonaltywere able to do, and how far, alone and unaided, they had clearedScotland of her tyrants, they would have joined us with theirvassals; but you see it is not so. The successes that I have gainedhave but excited their envy against me. Of them all only Grahame,Stewart, and Macduff stood by my side, while all the great earlsand barons either held aloof or were, like Bruce, in the ranks ofEdward's army, or like Comyn and his friends, joined me solely tobetray me. I am convinced now that it is only a united Scotland canresist the power of England, and it is certain that so long as Iremain here Scotland never can be united. Of Bruce I have no longerany hope; but if I retire Comyn may take the lead, and many atleast of the Scottish nobles will follow him. Had we but horsemenand archers to support our spearmen, I would not fear the issue;but it is the nobles alone who can place mounted men-at-arms inthe field. Of bowmen we must always be deficient, seeing that ourpeople take not naturally to this arm as do the English; but withspearmen to break the first shock of English chivalry, and withhorsemen to charge them when in confusion, we may yet succeed, buthorsemen we shall never get so long as the nobles hold aloof. Itis useless to try and change my decision, my friends. Sore griefthough it will be to me to sheathe my sword and to stand aloofwhen Scotland struggles for freedom, I am convinced that only by mydoing so has Scotland a chance of ultimate success in the struggle.Do not make it harder for me by your pleadings. I have thought longover this, and my mind is made up. My heart is well nigh broken bythe death of my dear friend and brother in arms, Sir John Grahame,and I feel able to struggle no longer against the jealousy andhostility of the Scottish nobles."

  Wallace's hearers were all in tears at his decision, but they feltthat there was truth in his words, that the Scottish nobles werefar more influenced by feelings of personal jealousy and pique thanby patriotism, and that so long as Wallace remained the guardianof Scotland they would to a man side with the English. The next dayWallace assembled all his followers, and in a few words announcedhis determination, and the reasons which had driven him to takeit. He urged them to let no feelings of resentment at the treatmenthe had experienced, or any wrath at the lukewarmness and treacherywhich had hitherto marked the Scottish nobles, overcome their feelingof patriotism, but to follow these leaders should they raise thebanner of Scotland, as bravely and devotedly as they had followedhim.

  Then he bade them farewell, and mounting his horse rode to theseacoast and passed over to France.

  Although he had retired from Scotland, Wallace did not cease fromwar against the English; but being warmly received by the Frenchking fought against them both by sea and land, and won much renownamong the French.

  After returning to England, Edward, finding that the Scottish leadersstill professed to recognize Baliol as king, sent him to the popeat Rome, having first confiscated all his great possessions inEngland and bestowed them upon his own nephew, John of Brittany;and during the rest of his life Baliol lived in obscurity in Rome.A portion of the Scotch nobles assembled and chose John Comyn ofBadenoch and John de Soulis as guardians of the kingdom. In theautumn of the following year Edward again assembled a great armyand moved north, but it was late; and in the face of the approachingwinter, and the difficulty of forage, many of the barons refusedto advance. Edward himself marched across the Border; but seeingthat the Scots had assembled in force, and that at such a seasonof the year he could not hope to carry his designs fully intoexecution, he retired without striking a blow. Thereupon the castleof Stirling, which was invested by the Scots, seeing no hope ofrelief, surrendered, and Sir William Oliphant was appointed governor.

  The next spring Edward again advanced with an army even greaterthan that with which he had before entered Scotland. With him wereAlexander of Baliol, son of the late king, who was devoted to theEnglish; Dunbar, Fraser, Ross, and other Scottish nobles. The vastarmy first laid siege to the little castle of Carlaverock, which,although defended by but sixty men, resisted for some time theassaults of the whole army, but was at last captured. The Scotsfell back as Edward advanced, renewing Wallace's tactics of wastingthe country, and Edward could get no further than Dumfries. Here,finding the enormous difficulties which beset him, he made a pretenceof yielding with a good grace to the entreaties of the pope and theKing of France that he would spare Scotland; he retired to Englandand disbanded his army, having accomplished nothing in the campaignsave the capture of Carlaverock.

  The following summer he again advanced with the army, this timesupported by a fleet of seventy ships. The Scots resorted to theirusual strategy, and, when winter came, the invaders had penetratedno further than the Forth. Edward remained at Linlithgow for atime, and then returned to England. Sir Simon Fraser, who had beenone of the leaders of the English army at Carlaverock, now imitatedComyn's example, and, deserting the English cause, joined hiscountrymen.

  The greater part of the English army recrossed the Border, and theScots captured many of the garrisons left in the towns. Sir JohnSeagrave next invaded Scotland with from 20,000 to 30,000 men, mostlycavalry. They reached the neighbourhood of Edinburgh, when Comynand Fraser advanced against them with 8000 men, chiefly infantry.The English army were advancing in three divisions, in orderbetter to obtain provisions and forage. After a rapid night marchthe Scotch came upon one of them, commanded by Seagrave in person;and conceiving himself sufficiently strong to defeat the Scots unaidedby any of the other divisions, Sir John Seagrave immediately gavebattle.

  As at Falkirk, the English cavalry were unable to break throughthe Scottish pikes. Great numbers were killed or taken prisoners,Seagrave himself being severely wounded and captured, withtwenty distinguished knights, thirty esquires, and many soldiers.Scarcely was the battle over when the second English division, evenstronger than the first, arrived on th
e field. Encumbered by theirprisoners, the Scots were at a disadvantage; and fearing to be attackedby these in the rear while engaged in front, they slaughtered thegreater portion of the prisoners, and arming the camp followers,prepared to resist the English onslaught. This failed as the firsthad done; the cavalry were defeated with great loss by the spearmen,and many prisoners taken--among them Sir Ralph Manton.

  The third English division now appeared; and the Scots, worn outby their long march and the two severe conflicts they had endured,were about to fly from the field when their leaders exhorted themto one more effort. The second batch of prisoners were slaughtered,and the pikemen again formed line to resist the English charge.Again were the cavalry defeated, Sir Robert Neville, their leader,slain, with many others, and the whole dispersed and scattered.Sir Robert Manton, who was the king's treasurer, had had a quarrelwith Fraser, when the latter was in Edward's service, regardinghis pay; and Fraser is said by some historians to have now revengedhimself by slaying his prisoner. Other accounts, however, representManton as having escaped.

  The slaughter of the prisoners appears, although cruel, to havebeen unavoidable; as the Scots, having before them a well appointedforce fully equal to their own in number, could not have riskedengaging, with so large a body of prisoners in their rear. None ofthe knights or other leaders were slain, these being subsequentlyexchanged or ransomed, as we afterwards find them fighting in theEnglish ranks.

  Seeing by this defeat that a vast effort was necessary to conquerScotland, King Edward advanced in the spring of 1303 with an armyof such numbers that the historians of the time content themselveswith saying that "it was great beyond measure." It consisted ofEnglish, Welsh, Irish, Gascons, and Savoyards. One division, underthe Prince of Wales, advanced by the west coast; that of the king,by the east; and the two united at the Forth. Without meeting anyserious resistance the great host marched north through Perth andDundee to Brechin, where the castle, under the charge of Sir ThomasMaille, resisted for twenty days; and it was only after the deathof the governor that it surrendered.

  The English then marched north through Aberdeen, Banff, and Morayinto Caithness, carrying utter destruction everywhere; towns andhamlets, villages and farmhouses were alike destroyed; crops wereburned, forests and orchards cut down. Thus was the whole of Scotlandwasted; and even the rich abbeys of Abberbredok and Dunfermline,the richest and most famous in Scotland, were destroyed, and thewhole levelled to the ground. The very fields were as far as possibleinjured--the intention of Edward being, as Fordun says, to blotout the people, and to reduce the land to a condition of irrecoverabledevastation, and thus to stamp out for ever any further resistancein Scotland.

  During the three years which had elapsed since the departureof Wallace, Archie had for the most part remained quietly in hiscastle, occupying himself with the comfort and wellbeing of hisvassals. He had, each time the English entered Scotland, taken thefield with a portion of his retainers, in obedience to the summonsof Comyn. The latter was little disposed to hold valid the grantsmade by Wallace, especially in the case of Archie Forbes, the Kerrsbeing connections of his house; but the feeling of the people ingeneral was too strongly in favour of the companion of Wallace forhim to venture to set it aside, especially as the castle could notbe captured without a long continued siege. Archie and many of thenobles hostile to the claims of Comyn obeyed his orders, he beingthe sole possible leader, at present, of Scotland. Edward, however,had left them no alternative, since he had, in order to inducethe English nobles to follow him, formally divided among them thelands of the whole of the Scotch nobles, save those actually fightingin his ranks.

  Archie was now nearly three-and-twenty, and his frame had fullyborne out the promise of his youth. He was over the average height,but appeared shorter from the extreme breadth of his shoulders;his arms were long and sinewy, and his personal strength immense.

  From the time of his first taking possession of Aberfilly he hadkept a party of men steadily engaged in excavating a passage fromthe castle towards a wood a mile distant. The ground was soft andoffered but few obstacles, but the tunnel throughout its wholelength had to be supported by massive timbers. Wood, however, wasabundant, and the passage had by this time been completed. Whenever,from the length of the tunnel, the workmen began to suffer fromwant of air, ventilation was obtained by running a small shaftup to the surface; in this was placed a square wooden tube of sixinches in diameter, round which the earth was again filled in--afew rapidly growing plants and bushes being planted round theorifice to prevent its being noticed by any passerby.