Conquest moe-1

by Stewart Binns

  On the holy remains of the martyr, St Etheldreda, and in the sight of God, I swear to assert the rights of all Englishmen to live in peace and justice.

  By wearing this amulet of the ancients, I attest to my belief in truth and wisdom.

  By this salute, I enter the Brotherhood of St Etheldreda and do solemnly commit my life to it and its noble cause.

  So help me God.

  Hereward’s family were the last to take the Oath. As they finished, Thurstan appeared with the entire community of Ely Abbey, all of whom asked to take the Oath.

  When it came to Thurstan’s turn, he was helped to the tomb. ‘Hereward of Bourne, I humbly offer myself to your cause. I am one of the many who has submitted to the King, but there is no contradiction in submitting to a rightful king and seeking to be governed with fairness and equanimity. Thus, I will happily take the Oath of the Brotherhood.’ He turned to Hereward and addressed him in a voice loud enough to be heard way beyond the confines of the chapel. ‘Your fellowship needs a chaplain. I offer myself to you as its priest and confessor.’

  Hereward suspected evil intent in Thurstan’s conversion, but knew that he could hardly refuse his gesture. ‘Your offer is accepted, Abbot Thurstan.’

  Hereward placed the Talisman over Thurstan’s head. For reasons only the Abbot knew, the Talisman did not sit well with him. As he took the Oath, he seemed very agitated by it, his eyes darting around in their sockets and his face twitching even more than usual.

  Finally, Hereward took the Oath himself. As he did so, the monks formed into a choir around the cloisters and raised their voices in a majestic canticle of celebration. Every Christian soul present hoped and prayed that the Brotherhood would find favour with God and the King.

  Thus the Brotherhood of St Etheldreda was sworn; its deeds would soon become legend.

  Hereward immediately set about reinforcing the fortifications of the burgh. Paying well for them, he commandeered all the boats in the area, built watchtowers around Ely’s walls and posted sentries around the perimeter of the island.

  Within a couple of days, the Danes arrived. Their entire fleet had made its way from the Humber to Wisbech, where it anchored. King Svein Estrithson, his brother Prince Osbjorn, his three sons and Christian, Bishop of Aarhus, travelled to Ely in ceremonial style. The King was accompanied by his hearthtroop and was heralded by the Danes’ distinctive hunting horns and the measured beat of their war drums. Flying his royal standard, the Eagle of the Skagerrak, and wearing his heavy bearskin cloak, he was the epitome of his renowned Viking ancestors.

  As he had no Great Hall to accommodate the royal delegation, Hereward had benches brought from St Etheldreda’s chapel and met the King in the open.

  After the usual formalities, Svein Estrithson began. ‘I hear you have become like the slave Spartacus – a man who fights against the tyranny of his rulers?’

  ‘Yes, my Lord King, I fight for the freedom to live in peace and with justice.’

  ‘So you reject the rule of kings?’

  ‘I do not, sire. I simply ask that they rule with wisdom and fairness.’

  ‘And who decides that?’

  Beginning to resent the tone of Svein’s questions, Hereward bristled. ‘The people do.’

  Estrithson continued to goad. ‘I’m sure King William will think that he should decide what is wise and fair.’

  ‘Sire, that is his prerogative; it is ours to disagree with him.’

  ‘An interesting philosophy.’

  Estrithson looked around at his companions, the elite of the Danish aristocracy. ‘But I’m not sure it’s an idea we would embrace in Denmark.’

  The King’s companions began to snigger, except for Osbjorn, who was watching the exchange intently.

  Hereward had had enough of the teasing, even from a king. ‘You are not in Denmark; you are in England, in the presence of the Brotherhood of St Etheldreda. You have come here for a purpose, King Svein of Denmark.’

  The King stiffened in anger.

  Prince Osbjorn quickly intervened. ‘My brother, Hereward is a man I respect. He responds tersely because he is a man of principle. Besides, I suspect he no longer needs our support; what he fights for now needs faith, not an army.’

  ‘That doesn’t excuse an insult to me!’

  Hereward stepped forward. ‘Svein, King of the Danes, you are welcome in Ely. The Brotherhood and I are honoured by the presence of a great warrior and a noble king.’

  Hereward’s conciliatory tone defused the King’s anger.

  Prince Osbjorn continued the discussion. ‘By not keeping his word, King William owes us a debt – not the Danegeld that he duly paid, but compensation for the harm he has done to us and the insult of his indifference. Winter was harsh on the Isle of Axholme and the supplies he promised did not arrive. We suffered badly; disease spread throughout the camp, and those who were fit enough to hunt found their quarry gone to ground. We lost many men and we mean to extract recompense from the King’s Exchequer.’

  ‘I am sorry to hear of the hardship your men have suffered. How can we help?’

  ‘There is an agreement we could reach. William is robbing the English earls of their titles and lands and emptying the abbeys and monasteries of their treasures. Is this not so?’

  ‘It is, my Lord Prince.’

  ‘We intend to raid Peterborough Abbey and remove all its treasures. It is one of the richest in England and would yield fair compensation for William’s dishonour. We are told that a new Norman abbot, Thurold, has been installed and that he has recruited a force of a hundred and sixty men so that he can strip bare the abbey’s treasures to pay William for his appointment.’

  ‘And you want us to help in this?’

  ‘Yes, we presume that it makes no difference to you whether the treasures of Peterborough fall into Danish hands or Norman. Our offer is simple: if we attack, there will be resistance, especially from the monks, and there will be bloodshed on both sides. If you help us and explain our purpose to the people of the burgh and the monks of the abbey, the resistance will be much less.’

  ‘And what do we get out of this?’

  ‘William will think it is another rising and that we are supporting you. Also, we will leave you with as many weapons as you need. We have a great surplus from our dead comrades on Axholme and my brother, our noble King, offers them to you in support of your campaign, a cause he doesn’t agree with but thinks is honourable. He will also order his sappers and boatswains to help you prepare the defence of Ely. After the raid, William will come for you and you will have the confrontation you seek.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘We will continue to give the appearance of being prepared to fight for you, and William will negotiate with us again. He will pay us another large Danegeld, which, after protracted negotiation to maximize its worth, we will accept as sufficient and set sail for Denmark!’

  Hereward had to smile at the Dane’s cunning. ‘So we face the onslaught of King William, and you sail off to Denmark with yet more geld and the riches of one of the great abbeys of England.’

  King Svein broke his silence. ‘If you choose not to help us, we will attack anyway, burn the abbey to the ground and kill anyone who gets in our way.’

  Hereward looked at the King; he knew the Dane’s threat was no bluff. He had little choice in the matter. His own force was too small to stop the Danes, and William was too far away to prevent an attack. Although they had their original Danegeld from the previous year, King Svein must have put another severe strain on his coffers by making a second crossing and would not contemplate going home without further booty.

  Hereward thought about a compromise. ‘There are some conditions: no one is to be harmed; you may take all the gold and silver and any of the treasures which have monetary value, but the relics of saints may only be taken under the custody of Christian, Bishop of Aarhus. They must be accompanied by several monks of the abbey and kept under their protection as curators until such time as they
can be returned to Peterborough. Finally, you must forego five one-hundredth parts of the geld, which will be distributed among the Chapter of the Abbey, who will receive one hundredth, and the local people, who will receive four hundreths.’

  The Danes looked at one another. After some murmuring, Svein turned to Prince Osbjorn.

  The Prince nodded his agreement, before turning to Hereward with a broad smile lighting up his face. ‘Like Spartacus, you are truly a man of the people. It is agreed; we have an understanding, Hereward of Bourne.’

  ‘We have, Lord Osbjorn.’

  The sack of Peterborough was executed as planned. The monks and the retiring Abbot reluctantly accepted Hereward’s negotiation. As they said they would, the Danes then retreated to Wisbech to count their riches, leaving a corps of engineers to help with the defences of Ely.

  When William heard of Hereward’s support for the sack of Peterborough, it had the desired effect. Fearing the beginnings of another rising, he made haste to East Anglia. In due course, William asked to parley with King Svein at Bytham, a Norman fortification on the River Nene, where, after much haggling, William paid a sizeable geld. A month later, after their sappers and boatswains had retuned from their work at Ely, the Danes sailed home, laden with a substantial part of William’s treasury.

  A few days after the Danes had left, Hereward’s intuition that Prince Osbjorn was a man of honour was confirmed. A small chest arrived containing two handfuls of English gold – a significant sum of money, sufficient for a knight to live comfortably for the rest of his life.

  It also contained a message in Latin:

  Accept this gift to your cause. May it serve as my personal Oath to your Brotherhood.

  Osbjorn, Prince of Denmark

  Hereward drew great strength from the Prince’s message. Even though he and the Brotherhood were alone on a small island, isolated in a remote corner of a land where few were prepared to rally to his cause, Osbjorn’s testamonial reinforced his belief in the justice of his crusade.

  The Brotherhood continued to send its bulletin to all England’s earldoms, monasteries and burghs: peace and justice for all under a wise and fair King.

  With the defences of Ely well under way, Hereward met with Martin, Einar and Alphonso to discuss what to do about the women and girls. First of all, they decided that the orphans of Bourne should be recognized as full members of the family, meaning that there were now eleven non-combatants to worry about. Secondly, after much soul-searching, it was agreed that the women and children must escape to Aquitaine as soon as the situation in Ely became untenable.

  A boat would be secreted away on the north side of the isle, in a place known only to them. It would be fully provisioned and checked regularly. At any time from when William’s attacks began, they would be ready to leave at only a moment’s notice. At the last minute, Edmund, Edwin and Gohor would be told of the plan and ordered to join them. Einar, Martin and Alphonso would execute the escape as soon as they feared the family was in imminent danger.

  When the strategy was explained to the girls, it was Gunnhild who asked her father the obvious question. ‘But, Father, what about you?’

  Then Estrith. ‘It sounds like you’re staying, no matter what.’

  They both started to shed tears of exasperation, exhausted by the endless fight their father was engaged in.

  ‘You said we would go home soon.’

  ‘Very soon, you said.’

  Hereward was at a loss to know how to answer his girls, hoping to avoid the conclusion they had already arrived at. ‘You are going home soon, just as I promised.’

  They shouted their response in unison. ‘But you’re not coming with us!’

  ‘I’m sorry, but I must do this; for you, for your mother and for all good people everywhere.’

  Maria and Ingigerd took the girls away to try to comfort them.

  Hereward turned to the three men. ‘When the time comes, get them away. Don’t hesitate, and don’t look back; think only of them and your own children.’

  Einar spoke for the three of them. ‘Nobody else has to die to prove the justice of our cause; it is undeniable. This damned crusade must have driven you insane if you can even think about letting the girls go while you remain here.’

  His loyal friends looked at Hereward, each knowing in his own heart that Hereward’s mind was made up and that nothing would deflect him from his course of action.

  29. The Siege of Ely

  Over the next few weeks, and as Easter of 1071 approached, something remarkable began to happen on the Isle of Ely.

  First, entirely alone in the middle of a bleak, cold afternoon and with no personal belongings to speak of, a man appeared on the causeway who could easily have been the father of most of the defenders and the grandfather of many. He had no military experience, but carried a battle-axe that had belonged to his father, a former housecarl with the old Danish King, Harold Harefoot. He said he had heard the call to join the Brotherhood and had walked from Essex to take the Oath. Two brothers from Mercia came three days later. Next came a group eight fearsome-looking men from Richmond and the valley of the Swale, who had escaped from William’s cull of the North. They had heard that Hereward and his men had rescued Edgar the Atheling from his plight in Swaledale and felt it was their duty to join his cause.

  At first it was a trickle of men, then it became a constant flow and by May it was a deluge rushing to join the Brotherhood. They came with and without weapons; some came on horseback, but many walked; some brought money, but most came with only what they wore or carried. The majority were trained soldiers, a few had land and wealth and an important number were artisans: carpenters, blacksmiths, chandlers and shipwrights. As each man took the Oath, his name was added to the Roll of Honour of the Brotherhood.

  In addition to the survivors of the original contingent that Hereward had met on the River Ribble almost two years earlier – men like Gohor, Brohor the Brave and Wulfric the White – were added the names of new followers: Leofric the Black, Alveriz, the son of a mason from Spain, Azecier, a good friend of Alveriz, Matelgar, Alsinus, Wulric, Ailward the White, and Hugo, a Norman priest born in Rouen but with a parish near Winchester.

  Soon there were 2,500 members of the Brotherhood on the Isle of Ely. If that were not remarkable enough, early one morning, emerging through the mist of the distant horizon, an even more unlikely group of men appeared. Hereward had been woken before dawn to be told that a large column of men was approaching from the west. At first, the scouts assumed it was a contingent of Normans, but then realized that they were English.

  As they came into view across Ely’s causeway, Hereward recognized at once that the two men at the head of the column were England’s most senior surviving nobles, Edwin and Morcar, the Earls of Mercia and Northumbria.

  Accompanying them was a substantial phalanx of housecarls and several senior members of England’s gentry, including landowners, clerics and thegns. They included Thorkill of Harringworth, a wealthy thegn from the East Midlands; Siward of Maldon, a rich merchant who was a major benefactor of Ely Abbey; Ordgar, Sheriff of Ramsey Abbey; Godric of Corby; Tostig of Davenesse; and Acore ‘the Hard’ of Lincoln. The last man to cross the causeway was Siward Bjorn, the only English magnate from the attack on York not to have submitted to William. True to the promise he had made to the Atheling in the Swale, he brought yet more men – over 150, a contingent he had been recruiting ever since he left Edgar over a year earlier.

  Siward also brought news from the Atheling. The Prince was effusive in his praise for the Brotherhood, but asked to be excused from its stand at Ely. He was in Europe encouraging opposition to William and spending time with Philip of France, trying to persuade him of the threat posed by William to all men of decency and honour. Also, as he still regarded himself as the rightful heir and had ambitions to claim the crown for himself, he could not acknowledge William as King, even though he understood Hereward’s new position and admired the principles it represented.
He sent the Brotherhood his full support and looked forward to the day when it would form his honour guard at his coronation at Westminster.

  Siward was accompanied by a notable companion, Aethelwine, Bishop of Durham, who was to have crowned Edgar as King at York. Aethelwine was not originally a supporter of the rising, but the actions of William in the North had appalled and frightened him. He had been initially intimidated by the King’s ruthlessness, but when he heard of the Brotherhood at Ely, he found new heart and resolved to join him.

  Edwin and Morcar, being of Danish descent, had found it difficult to accept the Cerdician domination of England. Both would have preferred a separate kingdom in the North and had been reluctant members of a federal England. However, after their ignominious defeat at Gate Fulford at the hands of Hardrada, their ambitions had been compromised. In defence of their absence at Senlac Ridge, they argued that it would have been impossible for them to get there in time. They felt it would have been much wiser for Harold to have waited, built a bigger army and then asked for their help, which they said they would have readily given.

  Nevertheless, they admitted that they had not rushed to join his cause, something they deeply regretted. Their submission to William was another act that now filled them with remorse. Having, at his insistence, been at court with him and seen and heard what he was doing to England, their distaste for him had grown immeasurably, as had their shame at their own capitulation.

  After their exhaustive and emotional account, they both stood and made a formal address to all present.

  Earl Edwin spoke first. ‘For anything we have done or not done that has put our homeland in jeopardy, or added to its pain, we beg forgiveness.’

  Earl Morcar continued. ‘We join the Brotherhood of St Etheldreda willingly and pledge our support wholeheartedly.’

  They both raised their drinking horns. ‘To the Brotherhood!’

  Their toast was immediately echoed by the assembly. ‘To the Brotherhood!’