BATTLEFIELD JOURNEYS

Despite soundly defeating the Lancastrians at the Battle of Towton in 1451, the new Yorkist king, Edward IV, was not fully in control up in the north of England and in parts of Wales. The Lancastrian resistance was centred on a trio of Northumbrian castles at Alnwick, Dunstanburgh and Bamburgh, and the mighty Harlech Castle on the Welsh coast. Although these were not battlefields as such, they did experience warfare, the Northumbrian castles changing hands a number of times over a three year period. I didn’t set off to visit any of these castles as part of my journey to all of the Wars of the Roses battlefields because I’d already been inside them at one time or another. 

Dunstanbugh clings to the cliff tops, a short walk from Craster, a small coastal village renowned for its kippers. We were staying in the area and made a special trip to purchase these tasty breakfast treats. Then we sauntered along the cliffs to find somewhere to picnic outside the castle. I was the only one to pay my money to go inside what are now ruins, returning to find my wife in a state of apoplexy. We were holidaying with another family and the two youngest boys had been playing on some nearby rocks, leaping from one spot to another until Sue wandered over to speak to them and noticed the terrifying sheer drop just a metre or so from where they were playing. If that wasn’t enough drama, a seemingly friendly Geordie gentleman engaged us in a strange conversation as we sat munching our sandwiches. It was only when we came to pack up that we realised he’d stolen one of our cameras. 

Probably more famous these days for its award winning gardens and as the location for Harry Potter filming, Alnwick Castle is a way inland and much altered since medieval times. Every year we visit the gardens and on one occasion we went around the castle as well. From its walls you are rewarded with glorious views of the surrounding countryside, a feature that made it such a good place to construct a castle. 

Bamburgh Castle is a magnificent edifice, perched on a mighty slab of rock and dominating the seashore and the village that nestles behind it. We took a tour of the apartments a couple of years ago. The King’s Hall, whilst a Victorian reconstruction on the site of the original Great Hall, does give you an idea about what life would have been like for the commanders of the castle during the 15th century. Bamburgh’s role in the Wars of the Roses encapsulates the intrigue and treachery of the times. At the start of 1462, it was in the hands of the Lancastrians, but in July it surrendered to the Yorkist supporting Earl of Warwick. Four months later, the Lancastrian Queen Margaret was back with some troops she’d collected from France and Bamburgh became Lancastrian again. Then she heard that Edward IV was on his way north so she quickly relocated to Scotland , leaving two Lancastrian nobles in charge. After a short siege in December, they surrendered the castle, pledged allegiance to the Yorkist king, only to change sides again in the following March to let Queen Margaret back in. 

A year later, it was again under siege from the Earl of Warwick. This time the commander was Sir Ralph Grey and despite threats from Warwick to execute one soldier for every shot fired, Grey refused to surrender. During the ensuing bombardment, Grey was knocked unconscious by falling masonry and his deputy quickly surrendered. Warwick didn’t carry out his threat but the revived Grey, a man who’d repeatedly changed sides, was executed. It was the first time a siege in England had been won through the use of artillery and ended the Lancastrian resistance in Northumbria. Now only Harlech held out, a castle I’d visited on my Stoker odyssey to visit all of Edward I’s Welsh castles. Now some distance from the sea, in 1461 when it was first besieged by Edward IV, the water came right up to the walls and this allowed the Lancastrians to get supplies in from Ireland and hold out until 1468, the longest siege on British soil. Eventually it fell in August of that year and it looked like the Wars of the Roses were over. Then Warwick changed sides and a year later, it all kicked off again.

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I now had four remaining battlefields to visit. One was the short encounter at Losecote field. We had been staying in a wonderful holiday home not far from Stanford with friends. On one of the few occasions we left the spacious grounds with its lakes and woods, we ambled to nearby Fotheringhay. Very little remains of the castle where Richard III was born and where, later, Mary Queen of Scots was executed, other than earthworks. Disappointingly, the magnificent church was closed for renovation but, as we approached the barriers barring our way, a friendly face appeared at the door to the church. He was a guide there and informed us that provided we kept away from one small area, we were welcome to come in and look around. He then proceeded to give us a free guided tour, pointing out the memorials to Richard, Duke of York and his second son Edmund, both killed at the Battle of Wakefield and later reinterred at Fothringhay, and showing us the Yorkist symbols in the church, especially in the stained glass windows. The following morning, I was up early to travel a few miles to the site of the Battle of Losecoat Field.

There was nothing to indicate there had ever been a battle here other than a crossed swords symbol on my map: then again, it hardly warranted the name ‘battle’. Edward IV had travelled up the Great North Road to Lincolnshire to put down a local rebellion. As the two sides faced each other, Edward brought out the rebel leader’s father and had him executed in plain sight of his son. Then he ordered a fusillade of canon shot with the result that the Lancastrian soldiers lost their nerve and fled. Allegedly, the retreating men turned their coats inside out to avoid being identified by the pursuing Yorkists, hence the name. In reality the word ‘Losecoat’ probably has far more mundane origins - still its a good story.

Two other smallish encounters took place in the far north of England. After the Battle of Towton in 1461, Edward IV was now in charge, but his predessor, the Lancastrian Henry VI was still at large, and his wife, Margaret of Anjou, was up in Scotland, causing as much trouble as she could. In addition to the mind boggling number of sieges and counter sieges that the castles of Alnwick, Dunstanburgh and Bamburgh endured during this time, there were also battles at Hedgerley Moor and Hexham. 

Hedgerley Moor provided me with some rare information boards detailing the course of the battle. There was also a small enclosure called Percy’s Leap, named after Sir Ralph Percy, the Lancastrian commander whose horse leapt between two ancient stones that remain to this day: no mean feat as they are nine metres apart!

With my odyssey almost complete, the world was engulfed by the coronavirus pandemic and the weeks of lockdown brought my explorations to an abrupt halt. Nevertheless, once there was an easing of travel restrictions, I suggested that one of our now routine daily walks could take place just outside Newark along a trail round the battlefield of Stoke Field. I first learned about this battle, where the army of Henry Tudor, now King Henry VII, destroyed a rebellion to install a Yorkist pretender on the throne, when I was at school. I would often travel through the village of East Stoke with my mother, who was the headteacher of an infant school in Newark, and not once did I miss the opportunity to tell her about the battle. I’m sure her spirits flagged every time we approached the village and she had to hear, yet again, about a young boy called Lambert Simnel who was said to have been, or might actually have been, a nephew of Edward IV and Richard III. The walk was well signposted and ran for some distance alongside the River Trent whose treacherous currents killed so many of the Simnel’s fleeing army. The battle came two years after Bosworth and brought to an end the Wars of the Roses so it was a fitting place to end my battlefield journeys.