As time passed I was shocked to hear countless stories of brutality and oppression from Norman lords towards the English. Many Normans believed in firm rule, but acted with decency. Indeed, in Norwich we were fortunate that both the Earl and the Bishop were fair in their treatment of the local people. However, in many parts of the country, especially in the more remote areas and the border regions, Norman lords did just as they pleased, regardless of the law and even of human decency.
Their crimes went unrecorded: people disappeared, never to be seen again, and every imaginable cruelty was meted out to the local people, none of whom had any means to defend themselves. Retreat into the wildwood, or escape to the uplands and fenlands, was often the only recourse. Even then, they were ruthlessly hunted down, often for sport, their bodies brought back and displayed like hunting trophies. We were told that one particularly vicious lord in Northumbria kept a pack of wolves in a pit so that he could entertain his guests by throwing English captives into it after dinner. Another liked to disembowel anyone to whom he took a dislike.
In some places, huge tracts of land that had been sequestered by the new Norman lords from their old English landlords had been left to go wild and the villages that once were thriving homes lay derelict. Stories of tyranny and destitution were legion from every part of the country and strengthened our desire to find a way to resist – especially among the young, who knew that their English birthright meant they were unlikely ever to play a prominent role in the affairs of their own land.
I was the only member of the group without a female companion, but I tried to catch the eye of several of the unattached younger girls, sometimes with modest success. But then I could never be sure whether the smile or look returned was simply a gesture of kindness or the more enticing signal I hoped it would be.
Some of the older men began to make serious plans to disrupt the comfortable lives the Normans were leading: poaching livestock to give to the peasants, stealing from granaries to redistribute the spoils to the poor, and there was even talk of mounting raids on small garrisons and linking up with bands of outlaws we knew lived in the remote parts of the wildwood. Not having any real sense of what the risks would be, I was a vociferous advocate of such plans and, to the credit of my companions, was humoured with gracious smiles and only the occasional look of disdain.
However, in September of 1113, the real world suddenly exposed the pretence of our Sundays of sedition. It was late in the afternoon, all the food had been eaten and the usual animated debate about future schemes and plots, fuelled by plentiful flasks of ale, had subsided. The rabble-rousing had been replaced by slumber for most, but a few of the more spirited ones had found discrete spots in the greensward for a little frolicking.
The distinct neighing of horses was the first sign of danger. Hunting was forbidden in the forest and farm horses would not be working on the Sabbath, so horses – especially several of them – signalled impending menace. Then came the animated cries of men-at-arms and the rumbling of hooves. They were Norman cries, and they were coming from all directions. Everyone was soon on their feet and running in panic in different directions.
All I could hear was the impassioned cry, ‘Run!’
I ran as I had never run before. My heart raced; I seemed to have the speed and agility of a stallion and leapt over brushwood and fallen tree trunks as if they were not there. I saw only two Normans, as I passed between them, each several yards from me. The late summer undergrowth was high and helped conceal my dash for safety and, to my immense relief, the two soldiers did not see me. They did not see the young couple who had been romping in the long grass either, but I did – I bowled over the lad as he was pulling up his leggings. His all-but-naked partner was still on the ground, screaming in terror. With shrieks and shouts ringing in my ears behind me, my impetus hardly stalled, I continued my desperate sprint, not really slowing until I saw Norwich’s Eastgate ahead of me.
Then I stopped suddenly and dived for cover at the side of the road. The gate was barred by a patrol of mounted Normans, on guard, their distinctive conical helmets glinting in the setting sun. They had seen me, and three of them closed on me at a gallop. I ran again; my only chance was the deep forest, which would be too dense for the horses to pursue me at speed. But this time fatigue soon caught up with me and my lungs started to strain in panic and exhaustion. I stopped, in part to get my breath, but also to see if I could hear my pursuers.
I held my breath to confirm what I suspected, and heard the distinct sound of horses moving through the dense forest, the swish of their riders’ swords slicing through the foliage. They were close, too close for me to attempt to run; they would surely hear my movements. Then I heard the barking of dogs in the distance. A new beast was hunting me – one I could not outrun.
I was agile and had no fear of heights – I had climbed the high scaffolding of the cathedral many times. My only hope was to scale the tallest tree I could find before the hunting dogs fixed on my scent. I disappeared into the heavy canopy of the towering elm just as the Normans appeared in view below. One of them dismounted to take a piss and they began to chat idly about ‘English pigs, will they never learn …’ and other such invective. Although I spoke their language fluently, as many Englishmen did, Norman always sounded guttural and threatening. These were harsh men, sons of an unforgiving race.
Then the dogs and their huntsmen arrived. The hounds yelped, barked and ran around in circles, desperate to be let off their leashes. I was certain they had already sensed my presence and I hunched on my perch, petrified, not daring to breathe. Then came the piercing scream.
Pursued by several riders, the couple I had fallen over as I made my escape stumbled into view. They were bedraggled and exhausted and were soon surrounded by more than a dozen horsemen, including those who had been about to discover me in my lofty refuge. My good fortune was a death warrant for the two lovers. I did not know the girl’s name – she had only been to a couple of gatherings – but the boy was Wulfnoth, an excellent carpenter from Thetford, who had shown me much kindness when I first joined the group.
He was cut down without a moment’s hesitation by a vicious blow from the sword of the first Norman to reach him. He cried out in agony as he hit the ground, blood spewing from a wound that ran from his shoulder to his midriff. More assailants speared him with their lances as he lay on the ground. He lived for what seemed like an eternity, squirming like a snake, trying to avoid the lethal blades. The hounds then bit and tugged at him before, mercifully, his life spent, he lay still. The dogs, rabid for their kill, then pulled him into the undergrowth and began to devour him.
The girl’s demise was just as horrific. She was one of the pretty ones I had smiled at expectantly several times, until I realized she was enjoying Wulfnoth’s amorous attentions. Hysterical after witnessing the slaughter of her lover, she ran around in a circle, her head in her hands, wailing. When the first Norman dismounted, she seemed to gather herself and tried to escape, but an ever-tightening circle of men and horses made that impossible. One by one they dismounted, their mood changing from animated ferocity to a more measured menace.
I suddenly felt ashamed that I did not know the girl’s name; perhaps it was better that I did not, given what I was about to witness. She began to plead with them, in English and Norman, but they just sniggered. She said she worked in Bishop de Losinga’s kitchen and that he would condemn them to Hell if they harmed her. It made no difference. As they circled her, leering and taunting, she tried to compose herself and took deep breaths, hoping to reason with them. It was all in vain.
They slowly stripped her and mauled her, flinging her from one to the other, before throwing her on to the ground and invading her body in ever
y possible way. The humiliations lasted for at least an hour, at the end of which the girl was barely conscious. Perhaps that was a good thing because, having sated their lust, one of them knelt over her and sliced her throat from ear to ear, leaving her to die in a pool of blood.
I learned a lot about the savagery of men that day. I turned away from the spectacle many times, but kept looking back, callously fascinated by their cruelty. I realized how terrifying it must be to live as a woman in a world where women could be treated so brutally. Now I understood why my parents and grandparents had fought so courageously against evil and lawlessness. I vowed to espouse their cause with all my heart and soul, and to fight for freedom and justice for all men and women, wherever they are denied.
It was all but dark when the Normans moved off towards Norwich, allowing me to clamber down from my sanctuary. I did not dare look for the grisly remains of Wulfnoth, but I felt compelled to pull the girl into the undergrowth. I turned her on to her side and tried to arrange her hair around her face in a token gesture to restore her modesty. She was at peace, her ordeal over. I gently pushed a strand of hair behind her ear, revealing a now serene profile that gave no hint of what had just happened to her. I vowed to remember her like that – not as I had seen her, contorted by the torment of the assault. I retrieved her clothes and covered her with them, before finally spreading a cloak of leaves over her. It was all I could do.
For what seemed like half the night, I hid in the undergrowth, trying to come to terms with what had just happened. It must have been near to dawn when I ran to our modest abode in the shadow of the mighty cathedral. Thankfully, the sentries had gone and the old gatekeeper let me in at the burgh’s Eastgate. He looked distressed and pleaded with me to get off the streets.
My mother was waiting for me, slumped at her churchwright’s table, a nearly exhausted candle barely flickering. I rushed into her welcoming arms, feeling more like a frightened child than a confident young man hoping soon to become a knight of the realm.
‘Thank God you’re safe. I have been sick with fear, thinking you had been caught. Or worse …’
I told her what had happened, laying the blame at Hugh Bigod’s door.
‘There has been mayhem here too, but they were not the Earl of Norwich’s men. They came from London on the King’s orders. Somebody had sent word about treason among the masons, and the King sent a squadron of his cut-throats to deal with it.’
‘We only talked … it was only bluster. Why would anybody tell the King?’
‘To gain favour, for money, out of jealousy – there are many temptations to seduce the feeble.’
‘It must have been an Englishman.’
‘Or an Englishwoman! Earlier, there were four masons’ bodies swinging from the scaffolding of the nave. They had been dragged from Lion Wood and hanged on sanctified ground. I hear that there are many more bodies in the wood. Most of the surviving masons are in hiding. There has been trouble on the streets all day – even usually calm people who avoid trouble are incensed. The houses of some of the Norman merchants have been burned and also the houses of the Jewish goldsmiths.’
‘The Earl must have been involved.’
‘I don’t think so. He is furious and has had the bodies cut down. He called out his retinue and ran the King’s squadron out of the burgh. The Bishop has already left for London to protest to the King. I know that the Bishop and the Earl are both Normans, but they are better men than that and would not commit such brutality.’
It was then that my mother told me what had happened to my second mother, Adela, at Bourne all those years ago, when she was abused by King William’s henchmen in an act of vengeance following the Siege of Ely.
‘My poor boy, I’m so sorry that you saw what you saw today. Adela was scarred for life by her experience, but it also made her determined to fight for what is right. I hope the same thing happens to you.’
‘Don’t doubt that, mother. You have told me about evil many times and now I’ve seen it for myself. I will never forget.’
I never did forget. And while I did not blame the many Normans I knew in Norwich – who were not the kind of men who would commit such atrocities – I knew then with an unwavering certainty and a renewed passion that the English cause my family had defended over forty years would also be my cause.
My mother had recognized my warrior ambitions from an early age – after all, she was her mother’s daughter, both of whom had lived adventurous lives in the company of warriors – and had sent me to be trained as a knight as soon as I was old enough. I continued my training with Hugh of Bigod, until a year had passed since the trauma of Lion Wood and calm had returned to Norwich.
Paradoxically, although I was still determined to challenge our Norman masters one day, the only way I could acquire the skills to become a warrior was by undergoing the training regime of our Norman lords and become a knight of their realm. So, in 1114, at the age of sixteen, I accompanied King Henry Beauclerc on a punitive expedition against the Welsh, who had been causing mayhem in the Marches.
I was spoiling for a fight, and soon found one. But it was not the breathtaking adventure I had imagined.
2. Atrocity in the Marches
King Henry’s major concern in 1114 was the situation in Wales. Both during the period of Norman rule and under the English kings before them, the Welsh princes were a thorn in the side of English magnates – especially those on the western borders, and those who had built fortifications within Wales to try to pacify them. Norman lords had been murdered, their families abducted and tortured, their women raped and mutilated. The Welsh also fought amongst themselves, and there were hostile feuds between those princes who had made alliances with the English kings and those who had not.
In Mid Wales, Madog, son of Rhirid ap Bleddyn, had been blinded and mutilated by his cousin Owain ap Cadwgan, who was the most notorious of the Welshmen that King Henry was determined to subdue. This act of revenge between cousins led to an outbreak of tribal bloodletting. In the north, the King of Gwynedd, Gruffudd ap Cynan, had been raiding the lands of the Norman Marcher Lord Richard, Earl of Chester, who had complained to the King, as had Gilbert FitzRichard, Lord of Ceredigion.
Henry Beauclerc had had enough and decided to teach the Welsh a lesson. With himself at its head, a large force advanced deep into Wales. He split his soldiers into three main armies, each over 2,000 strong, including archers and heavy cavalry. In the south, Gilbert FitzRichard commanded an army from Cornwall and South Wales. In the north, Richard of Chester advanced to Penant Bachwy, while the King led the third group into Merionethshire. Alexander, King of the Scots was with the King, in large part to demonstrate to the Welsh that the Scots had succumbed to the power of the Norman King of England and had accepted Henry as their overlord.
I had been taken to Wales in the King’s retinue as a favour to my mother, granted by Hugh Bigod, Earl of Norfolk, one of the main benefactors of the new cathedral at Norwich. I was put under the care of Olaf Godredsson, heir to the Kingdom of the Isles and Mann, who had lived at Henry’s court since he was a boy, as part of the King’s treaty with Olaf’s father, Godred Crovan.
Olaf had been made constable of the King’s cavalry for the expedition into Wales, an assignment that filled him with pride. A man in his mid thirties, nicknamed ‘The Red’ or ‘Bites your Leg’ based on his bright red hair and diminutive stature, he was, despite first impressions, a kind and thoughtful man and an excellent soldier. He did tend to bellow his orders and to intimidate those around him, but those close to him knew him to be loyal and generous to all who served him. He was also a brilliant horseman and cavalry officer, particularly fond of mass charges in close formation.
I joined the army at Oxford an
d my status as a junior knight of the realm meant that Olaf made me a messenger in his personal troop. He seemed to like me – especially after I was able to stumble through a conversation in Norse with him, and I explained my Norse ancestry on my mother’s side. It was Olaf who told me about Owain ap Cadwgan on our long march to Wales.
‘Is this your first expedition?’
‘It is, sir.’
‘How old are you?’
‘Sixteen, sir.’
‘That’s about right, let’s hope you learn from it. Do you want to join the King when you are of age?’
‘I’m not sure, my Lord. I just know that I must find what awaits me in the world.’
‘So, you believe in destiny?’
‘I do, sir. My mother taught me that we each have a destiny, but that most people don’t find theirs and live their lives unfulfilled and resentful.’
‘Your mother is very wise. Perhaps you can win your colours chasing this rogue, Owain ap Cadwgan?’
‘Sir, what has he done to annoy the King so much?’
‘Well, the King wants to teach several of the Welsh princes a lesson, but this one is a particular villain. A long time ago, when William Rufus was King, a young Welsh princess, Nest, daughter of Rhys ap Tewdwr, King of Deheubarth, was captured by Arnulf of Montgomery – one of the King’s most ferocious warriors – and brought to the King’s court. She is still very beautiful, but as a young woman she caught the eye of everyone at court – especially young Henry, now our Lord King, Henry Beauclerc. She bore him a child, rumoured to be the renowned Robert, Earl of Gloucester, before he tired of her and married her off to Gerald of Windsor, Lord of Cenarth Bychan. Five years ago, Owain ap Cadwgan heard about the beautiful Nest at a drunken feast and became obsessed by her, particularly given that she had become a concubine of the Normans. He convinced himself that Henry Beauclerc had raped her and that she was now trapped in a remote castle by her equally rapacious Norman husband.’
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