by Griff Hosker
Hotspur had two hands on his poleaxe but I could see that his movements were awkward. I balanced myself. My sword was now blunted and was like an iron bar but I could wield it one-handed. Sir Henry needed two hands for his poleaxe and I still had my bodkin dagger. I feinted with my sword to test his reactions. He brought up his poleaxe but it was slower than it had been. When my blow failed to strike, he lunged at my chest and I turned as the blade came towards me. The spike tore through the surcoat revealing my plate beneath. I rammed my dagger at his back and found the gap between his back plate and breastplate. The dagger slipped through the mail links as though they were not even there and they came away bloody.
In anger, he swung his poleaxe and I danced out of its reach. “Trickster! You are a commoner who has neither honour nor skill!”
“Yet I will be the man who kills you and kill you I will. Do not ask for quarter. I shall not grant it. Only one of us leaves this field and it will not be you!”
I was deliberately provoking him to make him lose his famous temper. He roared at me and put all of his force behind a sweep. I saw it coming and dropped to my knee. The blade slid over the top of my helmet. Had I had an adornment as some knights affected then the helmet would have been torn from my head. I stabbed him behind his poleyn with my dagger and cut into the tendons behind the knee. His scream was feral. The light was now so bad that all around us were shadows. Surely the King had got to safety by now. I stepped back as he threw his poleaxe at me. It hit me in the chest and I tripped over a dead squire. He drew his own sword and held it in two hands. It would be sharp and I lay almost helpless on the ground. I used the only weapon I had left which could reach him; I swung my right leg and the rowel on my spur rang across the greave on his leg. He fell but had the wit to hold the sword in two hands to drive it into my body as he fell. I made a cross of my dagger and sword. Hotspur’s blade was slowed but not stopped. It clanged into my helmet. Had I not blocked it then it would have split open my skull. He lay on top of me and I felt his left arm move to pull his own dagger. When I was a boy I had wrestled and now those bouts came to my aid. I shifted my weight as he tried to reach his second weapon and threw him from me. I used my dagger to lift my weary body up and I placed the tip of my sword beneath the bottom of his breastplate. I was tired beyond words and darkness was almost upon us. If I was to escape this defeat, I had to kill him quickly and get Harry to safety! Hotspur swung his sword at my leg. It hurt as it smacked into the plate but I gritted my teeth and leaned on my own sword. The tip went into the mail and through it. It tore into his jupon and then I saw his eyes widen as it entered his body. I leaned harder and blood spurted from his mouth. I twisted and turned the blade and when I saw his sword fall from his lifeless fingers, I pulled out my bloody blade.
I turned and, in the gloom, I saw Sir John and Sir Wilfred. Of my sons, there was no sign. All around us men were engaged in mortal combat. I shouted, “Hotspur is down! Hotspur is dead!”
I was answered with cries of, “You lie!”
“Hotspur lives!”
“Speak, Sir Henry! Tell us he lies!”
I shouted, “God, St George and victory! Let us end the lives of these despicable rebels.”
From my left, I heard the Prince shout, “Aye for I am with you, Sir William!”
He ran towards me and I saw, sticking from his helmet, an arrow. Even in the dark, I could see the blood on his surcoat which made it look black. At that moment he could have been the Black Prince himself. It was that single action which ended the battle for a Northumbrian voice shouted, “It is true! We are undone and the flower of Northumberland has been plucked!”
While others cheered and chased the fleeing rebels I sank to my knees and said a prayer of thanks to God. I had survived. Now I prayed that my sons lived too!
Epilogue
The battle was a bloody one and many men had died. I had not just lost Sir Roger: Egbert Longbow, Robin Longarrow, Lol son of Wilson, Walter Longridge, Natty Longjack and Geoffrey of Gisburn had all died. Others, including Alan of the Woods and Edgar of Derby, were also wounded. Many hundreds had died. Numbers were hard to estimate for even as Sir Thomas Percy, Sir Richard Vernon and Sir Henry Boynton were being executed in Shrewsbury, men were being hunted down and slain.
Once I had found my sons and we had retired to the castle, I was more concerned with Prince Henry. He had been hit in his head by an arrow. He had raised his visor, the better to see the battle. Much Longbow suggested that the bow had not been fully drawn or it was at the end of its flight or else he would have been killed. The arrow missed his brain and his spinal cord but the first healers were little more than leeches and they broke the arrow. It took a good surgeon, John Bradmore, to remove the arrow. The castle was being used as a hospital and I was there with my two sons to watch the operation. King Henry was dealing with the aftermath of the battle.
I watched as the surgeon spent some time gradually removing the shaft of the arrow. Through it all the Prince never uttered a complaint, He bore it stoically. Harry was used as an assistant to constantly apply wine to the wound to purify it. I think that might have helped to numb the Prince’s pain. After six hours, and as dawn was breaking, the arrow shaft was finally removed from the broken shaft. King Henry entered within moments of the operation ending. I suspect that he had waited outside and was unable to bear the sight of his son suffering.
“You will take my son to Kenilworth Castle and stay with him there until he is healed. You shall be rewarded, surgeon. Now, all leave us while I speak with my son.”
Outside the three of us, Thomas, Harry and I, all spoke of the battle. “Are all battles as terrible as that, father?”
I shook my head, “Even in Spain I never saw one fought so desperately but then again this was Englishman against Englishman. Men fought, not for money, but for their leaders.”
“And you defeated one of their leaders and slew the man they say was the greatest knight of his age.”
Thomas shook his head, “No, little brother, that honour belongs to our father.”
“Do not give me that title, son, for the last thing I need is to have men trying to take it from me.”
“Harry, how do you feel about knighthood? You were behind me all the time in the battle. You stopped men from attacking me in the rear. You deserve it.”
“When I see men like Sir Walter and Sir Roger dying, I wonder if I am good enough. I will think on it and give you an answer by the time the Prince is healed.”
“And that shows that you have grown and you are ready.” I turned to Sir John, “And I think we make it a double knighting. Ralph shall be knighted for he fought as hard as any.”
The Prince was carried to a wagon. The surgeon and Prince Henry’s household knights would go with him to Kenilworth where the surgeon would have to make special tools to help him take the arrowhead from the skull. The Prince was, mercifully, asleep as he was carried. away and was not there to see justice performed on the men who would be executed. The King showed mercy and was more generous than I expected. Fewer men were executed than was expected. However, the rebels who were captured were heavily punished financially. Some had estates taken from them. The Tudur brothers were found and they were also executed. Justice had been done.
After Worcester and the others were hanged, drawn and quartered, the King took Sir George and me apart where we could talk. “I owe both of you my life. Had you not pulled me away, Sir George then I would have perished and, you, Strongstaff, took my place and killed my enemy. More you captured Douglas and I will not make the same mistake as I did before. We will share the ransom. I intend to bankrupt the Scots! They joined Hotspur and they will share his pain! To you, Sir George, I confirm that you are Earl of the March of Scotland and to you, I give Percy’s estates, Kyme and Croftes in Lincolnshire, and a house and chattels in Bishopsgate, City of London for life. To you, Sir William, I make you Sherriff of Northampton and give you an annuity of five hundred pounds a year.”
We
both nodded our thanks.
The King smiled, “You deserve more but that is all that I have to give you. This rebellion is not over. We have the Welsh to defeat. I do not doubt that the Scots and the French will try to take advantage of the rebellion and finally there is the Earl of Northumberland. I cannot let either of you go home yet. I have lost Sir Walter and the Earl of Stafford. My son cannot join us. I need you until Percy is brought to heel! This is not the end of the war but it might be the beginning of the end.”
As he left us, I realised that my new grandson might be walking and talking before I saw him for the first time. Then I realised I was being selfish. My son Thomas would be apart from his wife and his child. What we had to do was end this rebellion quickly and then we could all go back to our lives. King Henry had shown me that he was a King. He had been merciful when others expected him to be ruthless. He had defeated a dangerous enemy who sought to rule England. I was still doing that which the Black Prince had asked of me, I was protecting England and the Plantagenet family. It would be a task which would take a lifetime and, I now realised, quite possibly my life. That was my lot but who would have thought that the child of a camp follower would become a Sherriff? The stars had plotted my course and I would have to sail it.
The End
Glossary
Abermaw-Barmouth
Ballock dagger or knife- a blade with two swellings next to the blade
Begawan- a metal plate to protect the armpit
Chevauchée- a raid by mounted men
Cuisse- metal greave
Dauentre-Daventry
Dunbarre- Dunbar
Familia – the bodyguard of a knight (in the case of a king these may well be knights themselves)
Galoches- Clogs
Hovel- a simple bivouac used when no tents were available
Medeltone Mowbray -Melton Mowbray
Mêlée- a medieval fight between knights
Poleyn- a metal plate to protect the knee
Pursuivant- the rank below a herald
Rondel dagger- a narrow-bladed dagger with a disc at the end of the hilt to protect the hand
Sallet basinet- medieval helmet of the simplest type: round with a neck protector
Sennight- Seven nights (a week)
The Pale- the land around Dublin. It belonged to the King of England.
Historical Notes
The Welsh rebellion and the actions of the Tudur brothers are well documented. Percy’s involvement was a rumour, a rumour I have used. While researching the book I discovered documents which spell the Earl of March’s name as Dunbarre. Most modern books use Dunbar but I have used the contemporary spelling. The raid of 1401 did take place and led to a retaliation by the Scots in 1402. It was while the Earl of March was defeating the Scots at Nesbit Moor that Glendower captured Edward Mortimer.
Henry Percy did defeat the Scots at a famous battle: Homildon Hill where the Earl of March fought alongside him. Although a victory, the battle laid the seeds for the Battle of Shrewsbury for a cash strapped King Henry demanded the ransoms for the Douglas knights.
The battle at the Blackadder Water was called the battle of Nesbit Moor (June 22nd 1402) which lies south-east of Duns. The Earl of March caught many hundred Scots returning from a raid in Northumberland. The Scottish knights I used were at the battle. The earl and his men did not lose any and the Scots were all either captured or slain.
The French did involve themselves in the Welsh rebellion from as early as 1402 and Bretons were at the battle of Bryn Glas. King Henry sent a letter to Henry Percy which forbade him to ransom the prisoners he took. It was like pouring petrol on fire for the King had already refused to ransom Percy’s brother in law. King Henry, as I hope I have shown, was a most complicated king.
Warkworth Castle (Author’s Photographs)
Prince Henry’s wound
An arrow penetrated on the left side below the eye and beside the nose of the young prince. When surgeons tried to remove the arrow, the shaft broke, leaving the bodkin head embedded in his skull some five to six inches deep, narrowly missing the brain stem and surrounding arteries. Several other physicians had already been called on to resolve the problem but were unable to help. Bradmore instructed honey to be poured into the wound and invented an instrument to be used in the extraction. Two threaded tongs held a centre threaded tong, which could be inserted into the wound: the shape was not unlike a corkscrew inside a split cylinder. The centre rod, once it located the shaft of the arrowhead, could be inserted into the socket and it, along with the device, could be extracted. The instrument was quickly made, either by Bradmore or by a blacksmith to Bradmore's specifications. Bradmore himself guided it into the wound to extract the arrowhead successfully. The wound was then filled with wine to cleanse it. I find it remarkable that a sixteen-year-old could fight the whole battle with an arrow embedded in his head and then be awake when it was removed. It took six hours to do so!
The Battle of Shrewsbury
The Battle of Shrewsbury was an unusual battle. Not until Towton would so many Englishmen slaughter so many of their countrymen. There were no horses used. When the men of the Earl of Stafford fled, they raided the baggage train and many hundreds of horses and much treasure was taken. King Henry did, indeed, have knights dressed as him. The battle was fought at such a pace because of the negotiations which took place and meant they had only two hours to fight the battle. The Earl of Worcester did not report back the King’s message. He also stole money from Prince Henry’s house in London. Although a peripheral figure in my novel he had much to do with the battle. Hotspur’s death was a mystery. In fact, as few had seen him die, because of the dark, there was a rumour that he was still alive. King Henry had his body disinterred and his head placed on a pike so that all would know that he was dead. The two bloodiest battles fought in the mediaeval period in England were this one and Towton. Both were fought by two sides made up of Englishmen!
This was an interesting book to write for there is much we do not know. Were Glendower and Percy colluding together? Certainly, Hotspur had a Welsh squire who came from Glendower’s land. Mortimer, too, had his own agenda. This saga is not over yet. There is a northern rebellion to come and the Glendower uprising is not quashed until 1412, the year before Henry IV died.
I have tried to show the complex nature of Henry IV but he was an enigma.
Sir William, now a Sherriff, will return with his sons and Prince Henry. When I began the series, I envisaged it ending at Agincourt….
…we shall see!
For the English maps, I have used the original Ordnance survey maps. Produced by the army in the 19th century they show England before modern developments and, in most cases, are pre-industrial revolution. Produced by Cassini they are a useful tool for a historian. I also discovered a good website http: orbis.stanford.edu. This allows a reader to plot any two places in the Roman world and if you input the mode of transport you wish to use and the time of year it will calculate how long it would take you to travel the route. I have used it for all of my books up to the eighteenth century as the transportation system was roughly the same. The Romans would have travelled more quickly!
Books used in the research:
The Tower of London -Lapper and Parnell (Osprey)
English Medieval Knight 1300-1400-Gravett
The Castles of Edward 1 in Wales- Gravett
Norman Stone Castles- Gravett
The Armies of Crécy and Poitiers- Rothero
The Armies of Agincourt- Rothero
The Scottish and Welsh Wars 1250-1400
Henry V and the conquest of France- Knight and Turner
Chronicles in the Age of Chivalry-Ed. Eliz Hallam
English Longbowman 1330-1515- Bartlett
Northumberland at War-Derek Dodds
Henry V -Teresa Cole
The Longbow- Mike Loades
The Scandinavian Baltic Crusades 1100-1500
Crusader Castles of the Teutonic Knights (1)- Turnbull and
Dennis
Crusader Castles of the Teutonic Knights (2)- Turnbull and Dennis
Teutonic Knight 1190-1561- Nicolle and Turner
Warkworth Castle and Hermitage- John Goodall
Shrewsbury 1403- Dickon Whitehead
For more information on all of the books then please visit the author’s web site at http://www.griffhosker.com where there is a link to contact him.
Griff Hosker
June 2019
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by
Griff Hosker
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