by Wayne Grant
They covered the last two miles at a canter and drew up at the ford. Here the banks of the river were low and the Bann was only sixty feet wide. Roland clucked to The Grey and guided the horse out to mid-stream. There was a stiff current, but the water only rose to the horse’s belly.
“Not much of a barrier for a warhorse,” he said.
“It’s dropped a bit since we crossed a week ago,” said Declan, edging his mare up beside the big grey gelding.
As they headed back to the western bank, they saw Finn craning his neck and looking past them to the other side of the river. They turned to see a rider approaching the ford from the east. The man was in a hurry, but reined in sharply when he saw horsemen on the opposite bank. He hailed them.
“Hello at the ford!” he called out in Gaelic.
Declan stood up in his stirrups and leaned forward.
“Hello to you!” he called back. “Are ye O’Neill’s scout? I’m O’Duinne.”
The man had been sitting tensely atop his pony, ready to turn and flee if need be. Now he leaned forward and stared back for a long moment. Then he relaxed and guided his horse into the stream.
“I’m Ronan Mac Ada,” the man said as he drew near. “I recognized yer English horse. Yer that Irish knight that took Meg Maelchallain to Down.”
Declan could not help but smile at that.
“Aye, and I barely survived the journey!”
The man urged his dripping pony up on to the western bank. The tired animal struggled to make it out of the water.
“Best ye not stay around here overlong,” he said as he reined in beside them. “I sighted the English army camped eighteen miles to the east last night. They could reach the river by sunset.”
“I’m obliged for the information,” said Declan.
Roland turned to Finn.
“Give this man yer horse, lad. His looks all used up.”
Finn didn’t argue, nor did the scout. They switched mounts hurriedly.
“I’ll be on to Armagh then,” Mac Ada said.
“After ye tell O’Neill about the English, give him a message from me,” Declan said. “Tell him if he’ll give me forty men with shovels, I can give him another day before de Courcy reaches Armagh.”
The man looked puzzled for a moment, but then gave a curt nod of his head.
“Aye, I’ll tell him, just what ye said.”
“And tell him they’ll need ponies as well.”
“Aye, shovels and ponies,” he said, turning his new mount’s head to the west. Then he stopped and looked at Finn.
“Obliged to you fer the fresh horse,” he said, then headed off to the west at a fast canter.
“Forty men with ponies and shovels?” Roland asked. “It sounds like you have a plan.”
Declan shrugged.
“Not to beat de Courcy, just to slow him down.”
“That’s a start,” Roland replied, “but tell me how you’ll slow down a thousand men with forty?”
Declan turned back to the river.
“We begin by ruining this excellent ford,” he said and climbed down from the chestnut mare. “As it is, a sow with shoats could cross the river here in less than a minute.”
Roland hopped off The Grey and joined him where the road emerged from the river onto the gentle slope of the west bank.
“Aye, this is no good,” he said.
“No good at all,” Declan agreed. “So this is where we dig a trench.” He scrambled off the road and walked downstream along the bank. For fifty feet the bank was clear, but beyond that oak and beech and willow grew right up to the river’s edge. Declan stopped there.
“We dig to here,” he said.
“And to the trees there,” Roland added pointing upstream. “If we dig it wide enough and mound the earth, even The Grey would balk at making the jump!”
“Aye,” said Declan. “They’ll have to send infantry across to drive us off, then fill in the ditch before the horses can cross,”
“With forty men defending the ditch, that will take time, but we can’t hold forever,” Roland said with a frown. “Once de Courcy takes the ditch and brings over his cavalry, it will go poorly for our lads. Ponies won’t outrun English-bred horses on this open ground.”
“That’s where yer wrong,” said Declan with a grin.
He walked back up to the road and motioned for Roland to join him. He followed the road for a hundred paces and stopped. A stone’s throw from where they stood a half dozen of the shaggy Irish cattle browsed lazily on spring weeds. Roland looked across the open grassland and shook his head.
“This looks no better than the fields near Armagh,” he said. “Good ground for cavalry.”
“Looks can be deceivin’,” Declan said with a small smile. “This isn’t a pasture, Roland. It’s a lovely peat bog!”
He motioned for Finn to come up. Finn nudged his pony in the flanks with his heels and trotted up beside them.
“Finn, lad, be so kind as to drive those cows up here on the road,” he ordered.
The boy gave a little whoop, and guided the pony down off the road and into the bog. Despite its fatigue, the sturdy little horse splashed through the shallow pools and the muck with ease and the boy soon had the cows on the move. For a second time in days, Declan had the strange sensation of seeing his younger self, but now the sight of the boy did not bring melancholy, it brought hope.
He edged his own mount off the road and guided the chestnut mare in amongst the tussocks of moss and grass. A few yards in, the mare began to struggle, its hooves sinking deep into the black peat. The horse balked at going further. Declan swung around in his saddle and looked up at Roland on the road above him.
“Now this is lovely ground for heavy cavalry,” he said.
“Point taken,” said Roland.
***
It was late afternoon when they saw riders coming up the Armagh road. They counted only thirty men, but they all carried shovels, spears and axes. Cathal O’Duinne rode at the head of the column and Declan recognized most of the men behind him as warriors from his own sept. Bringing up the rear on his long-legged mare was Brother Cyril.
“Hugh would have sent more,” Cathal explained, “but there were only thirty shovels to be had at Armagh. It’s only thanks to Brother Cyril we found that many. He begged his Augustinian brethren for help and they emptied their tool shed. Felt they owed him for retrieving their bell.”
Declan nodded.
“Thirty will have to do then.”
Fight at the Ford
Men dug as though their lives depended on it. All through the late afternoon and into twilight they dug. Riders appeared on the far bank of the Bann and watched them, then turned and spurred off to the east. Night fell and still they dug, piling the black earth of the river bank behind the growing ditch. It was past midnight when Declan called a halt to their labours. The trench was six feet wide and four feet deep with another four feet of packed earth on the far side. It was a hundred feet long and slashed across the road just feet from the river’s edge.
Their work done, men set aside their shovels and lay down behind the ditch to await the dawn, their weapons close at hand. Roland sent Finn to watch the horses and with strict instructions to ride away if it looked like their ditch was being breached. The boy started to argue, but Roland cut him off.
“Squires never dispute their master’s orders,” he said.
“So I am to be yer squire, lord?” the boy asked eagerly.
“Not if you argue with me, now see to the horses, lad.”
Finn ran off to the tree line where the ponies were tethered. Roland saw Brother Cyril sitting on the newly-built berm and sat down beside him. Both men had taken their turns with the digging and both were covered in black mud.
“I had not thought to see you here,” Roland said. “Did the labours of your Augustinian brethren grow wearisome?”
Cyril laughed at that.
“Not so much wearisome as boring, lord! For a few days, I fou
nd the simple routine of the abbey to be a tonic, but by the third day…. I mean really, day after day, work, pray, pray some more, then work and finally bed, only to be roused to pray in the middle of the night? No, lord, monastic life is not for me. I think I found my calling as chaplain to the Invalids!”
“And they are lucky to have you, Cyril.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Roland slapped the monk on the shoulder.
“Best get some rest. There’ll be hot work come morning.”
Cyril yawned and slid down behind the earthen berm where he curled up in his mud-covered robes. In the darkness, he was nearly invisible against the black earth.
***
The men dozing fitfully along the ditch heard the enemy before they could see them. Across the narrow river a horse nickered and a man coughed. Soon, whispered voices could be heard, carried across the water in the dark stillness. Men reached for their spears and axes and peered over the earthwork toward the eastern bank. Slowly the darkness gave way to a ghostly predawn light and the grey shapes of trees on the far bank emerged like phantoms. A thin layer of fog hung over the water itself as men gripped their weapons and waited.
Then it came—a dozen arrows buzzed by overhead and others buried themselves in the black dirt of the berm. There was a grunt of pain from a lone man who had ill-advisedly taken that moment to stand and relieve himself. The arrow struck him in the back of the neck and he never finished his morning toilet.
“Damn! They have archers,” Declan hissed.
“Longbowmen, I’d guess, given the range,” Roland said, keeping his head down. “Probably Welsh.”
Men flattened themselves against the reverse slope of the berm and waited for another volley, but none came. Instead a new sound reached them, the sound of pounding hooves. Declan raised his head in time to see a score of men on mail-clad warhorses pounding down the road and plunging into the river.
“Here they come,” he said quietly.
Roland peeked over the berm and drew an arrow from his quiver.
“It appears the Prince does not wish to be detained,” he said as he nocked the arrow.
“Aye,” Declan replied, “he thinks to punch right through with this lot and scatter us.”
“And they will if those horses get over the ditch,” Roland said as he stood quickly and loosed a shaft at the lead rider. It struck the man full in the chest, toppling him over the haunches of his charger and into the river. He sank out of sight, but managed to gain his footing and stand up, waist deep in the river. He looked dazed, an arrow protruding from his hauberk.
“Good quality mail,” Declan observed.
There was no time to reply as the charge of the heavy cavalry reached midstream. Roland rose again and loosed a second arrow, striking a rider in the helmet. It knocked the man senseless. He toppled into the river and did not rise.
Before he could loose another shaft, an arrow struck him a glancing blow on the thigh, tumbling him backwards, but not penetrating his mail. He scrambled to his feet and drew his short sword. Declan had his broadsword ready as the wall of men and horses splashed out of the water.
Three riders in the lead whipped their mounts forward. The warhorses gathered themselves on their massive haunches and attempted to leap the ditch and berm. Only one cleared the barrier and gained any purchase on the mud of the berm. The others fell short and slid back down into the muddy trench and became hopelessly tangled with each other.
One rider was crushed beneath them as they thrashed about trying to escape. The other managed to crawl out of the ditch and stagger back toward the river. An O’Duinne clansmen leapt the trench and ran him down when he was knee deep in the river, dropping him with one vicious swing from his axe. The clansman was cut down before he could scramble back to safety.
The lone rider who gained the top of the berm was instantly attacked from both sides as O’Duinne men rose up and pulled him from his saddle. His riderless warhorse bolted off down the road toward Armagh. Seeing the chaos at the trench, the other riders drew back. A zealous few dismounted and tried to cross the ditch and scale the dirt berm on foot. They did not survive the effort, being met at the top by a wall of spears and battleaxes. Even good mail could not save the men from this onslaught. Their bodies slid back down to be trampled by the frantic horses still struggling to escape the ditch.
With six men dead, the rest turned and rode for the eastern bank of the Bann. A few of the O’Duinne men stood atop the berm to jeer at them as they retreated across the ford, but scrambled back behind their hasty earthwork as more arrows whistled past them. The warhorses floundering in the trench finally managed to haul themselves out. With their riders dead, the two horses stood about nervously at the river’s edge for a moment, then plunged back into the stream to follow the retreating riders who were nearing the opposite bank.
It had all taken less time than it took to savour a cup of good ale.
“What’s next,” Declan asked as he rested his back against the mud of the berm, “infantry?”
“I’d imagine,” Roland said and drew another arrow from his quiver.
***
“How many men hold this damned ditch?” de Courcy demanded of his cavalry commander. The man would not meet his gaze.
“I’d guess sixty or seventy, my lord.”
De Courcy mentally halved that number. Beaten commanders always exaggerated the enemy strength.
“Do you know what it costs me to keep you men in good horses, sir? Do you?”
“No, my lord,” the man croaked.
“For that expense, I expect my cavalry to produce better results, but we will do a proper accounting of your worth another time. For now, you will stand aside and let my foot shoo away these O’Neill men. Scouts say the ground west of the river looks to be pastureland. Once we are over their ditch they will scatter like so many grouse. Those my infantry don’t kill, I expect you to! Is that understood?”
“Perfectly, my lord!”
***
It was midmorning when the Irish levies made their charge. They entered the river at the run, their column six men wide and twenty deep. The front ranks carried shields and those that followed crouched as they came on.
“They must’ve heard there was a longbowman over here,” Declan said as he watched the men splash into the Bann.
Roland didn’t answer. This was a greater threat then the cavalry had been. He nocked his first arrow and loosed it into the middle of the column. One of de Courcy’s Irishmen took it in his neck and pitched forward adding a ribbon of red to the green-brown water of the Bann. Men around him crouched lower, but kept moving. At midstream, the water came to a man’s chest, and the headlong rush slowed. Three more of Roland’s arrows found their mark, but now de Courcy’s foot began to reach shallower water. A low growl came from their ranks as their charge regained speed.
Then they struck the ditch.
The front rank dropped into the trench, turned on their backs and braced their oaken shields above them. Men in the ranks behind used the shields as stepping stones over the ditch and onto the mound behind. In seconds, a dozen men had gained the berm and were scrambling up it. The men of clan O’Duinne rose to meet them. This was war as the Irish knew it. Sword and spear, axe and dagger, with nothing between a man’s heart and his enemies’ blade but cloth and skin.
Declan and Roland vaulted to the top of the berm as de Courcy’s infantry clambered up the muddy sides. Declan did not bother thrusting. There were too many targets as men came swarming across the shields bridging the ditch. He drove them back with long sweeping slashes of his broadsword. None could find a way to get inside the killing arc of that blade and survive.
“Come on!” Declan taunted them in Gaelic, his blood up. “Come see what the Cenél Eoghain have for ye!”
One eager young warrior heard the challenge a he splashed out of the river. He looked up at the swordsman on the berm. The men ahead of him had seen their comrades fall to the red-haired warrior
at the centre of the line and were edging to the left and right to avoid the man’s deadly broadsword. Declan saw the man staring at him and knew the look. This man would not shy away from his blade. Whether the lad wanted reputation or thought he could not die, he came straight in, raising his long-handled axe as he ran toward the berm. Declan watched him come and saw him plant his foot on a shield in the ditch. The edge tilted and the young man lurched off balance to the right. A moment later, he slid down into the ditch with neither life nor reputation left to him.
To his right, Declan heard Roland screaming English oaths at the Irish. None could understand the words, but none would mistake their meaning as Roland’s blade grew stained with blood. To his left, Declan saw his father hacking at men with his long-handled axe as though clearing a field of saplings. He dodged to his left as a man with a long spear jabbed at him. Below him, the trench was filling with the enemy dead and wounded, but he knew the O’Duinne men were taking losses of their own. As with all battles, the issue here would be decided by who broke first.
There was a final surge from the men from Antrim and Down that was met at the top of the berm and turned back. Finally, the carnage at the ditch was too much. Somewhere an order rang out and was repeated down the line. Men drew back from the berm and the trench, dragging wounded comrades with them back across the ford.
Declan breathed a sigh of relief and slid back down behind the mound of dirt, breathing hard. It had been a close run thing. He looked down his own lines and saw six of the O’Duinne men sprawled lifeless behind the berm and others binding up wounds. They could not sustain another attack. He rolled over and looked at Roland.
“When next they come…”
He didn’t need to finish his thought. They both knew it would be time to run.
***
Hugh O’Neill arrived at noon along with a half dozen of his own O’Neill warriors, men who formed his personal guard. With him was his herald, Keiran O’Duinne. Cathal and Declan saw the riders coming and went to meet them a hundred yards up the road from the berm.