River of Blood

Dear Folk,

English folk remember the date of perhaps only one battle; October 14, 1066 marks the Battle of Hastings.

You might remember from an earlier column (see "Derwent My Everything") that King Harold Godwin of the Saxons had been expecting an invasion from Normandy all summer. What he got, instead, was a betrayal by his brother Tostig and a Viking horde led by Harald Hadrada up at York. King Harold and his swift moving House Carls beat the Norse dudes at the Battle of Stamford Bridge. In the meantime...

William Duke of Normandy, known as the Bastard, left St.Valery in Normandy with about 600 ships and 10 to 12,000 men September 27,1066. They had been gearing up for a major campaign since the spring. It was getting late in the year. It was now or maybe 1067. William decided to go for it. He arrived in his ship, the Mora, ahead of the fleet to just make sure this was the place. The bay was wide and flat shored, perfect for landing a massive army. Pevensey was the nearest village and it was protected by an old Roman fort right behind. Behind that was a huge flat field. Willie Boy had done his homework.

As William was getting off the boat, he managed to slip and fall face-first on the beach, the story goes. He then quipped something like, "My country comes to greet me." Not bad. Everyone laughed on cue and got off the ships. A well-coordinated landing worthy of any great campaign went without a hitch. Of course, there were no enemy around either. William quickly got the men building a wooden fort inside the Roman one. The army camped on the field. William and FitzOsborn went out scouting. The land outside the beach area was not exactly what William had wanted but would have to do. William took the army around Pevensey Bay and camped them about eight miles away from the landing site. He and the troops waited. They were probably waiting to hear whom they would have to fight, Harold or Harald Hadrada.

It is said that Harold was sitting down to a victory celebration in York when he heard about William's landing. Bringing the remnants of his Army south, Harold camped outside London at Waltham. For two weeks he gathered reinforcements, and exchanged taunts, threats and counterclaims to the Crown of England with William. Their heralds were getting pretty tired of all of this. Finally Harold moved his army south to a position about six miles north of where William waited.

Harold got an incredible shock when he found out that he had been excommunicated by the pope and that William was wearing the papal ring. This was an in-job by Robert Guiscard, a Norman friend of William, who had done some major favors for His Holiness. What a nasty thing! Poor Harold had to feel crushed when he realized the whole of Christendom was against him. It would be almost five hundred years before an English king would stand up against the Catholic Church.

William moved up to Harold's position and set up in what was then the conventional European style:. archers, infantry and then cavalry in the rear. A set piece, each assigned to their own duties. Harold had been surprised at the speed of William's movement. Heck, half the troops who said they would be there to help Harold were still were trickling in. Nothing for it but to fight.

Harold and his brother Gyrth (wonder if he had a weight problem?) waited up on a spot of high ground. They packed the guys onto a ridge 8 yards by 800 yards. High ground is good but it was limiting. The troops up on the hill could hardly swing without hitting each other. William had mobility and fresh troops. The tired veterans of Stamford Bridge on Harold's side had been joined by Londoners who were not very seasoned. Still, on the very front rank were Harold's personal Hearth Troop. These were the best men of their day, heavily equipped with long mail hauberks, helmets, kite shields and the great broad-ax which had been the trademark of the House Carls since Cnut's time. They were good at what they did and the axes were much feared.

William held his Breton, Maine and Anjou contingents to the left of the line, the Normans who were the main thrust were with the Flemish and French to his right. They flanked the Saxon troops up on their hillside. This was critical.

Initial attempts to dislodge Harold's Saxons were futile. They were pretty committed to being there and being tough. A few of William's army advanced up the hill toward Harold 's troops. The Saxons quickly chased them away. William was out in front of his men, leading and threatening them. The House Carls had a great esprit de corps, and this may have been their undoing. The Normans started to ride along the Saxon line, throwing in javelins. As men fell, so the House Carls closed their ranks, not allowing the lesser men behind them to come to the front. Within a short time, the ranks of men were so tightly packed together they could not fight effectively

The wily Bastard had a large contingent of his cavalry ride up almost to the shield wall of the House Carls throw their javelins at the tight packed troops, and then ride back as though in terror. Would the Saxons follow once again? You bet! These were the troops who whopped up on the Vikings; those cowardly French were not going to get away. Despite Harold's attempt to hold them back, the House Carls ran down the slope to butcher the Normans. William sent the flanking troops to close in like two hands clapping around a fly.

There was much bitter fighting and William had three horses killed under him. At one time, the word went through the Norman lines that Duke William was slain and the heart went from the invaders. But it was not so. Remounting, he took off his helmet and rode up and down the line shouting to his men.

"See, I am not dead and with God's help we shall win this day!"

Then William directed his Breton archers to shoot up into the air, the arrows falling upon the tightly packed English who could not even raise their shields to protect themselves. Neither the technical ability nor the equipment of the archer at war at this time should not be confused with that of the English or Welsh archer four hundred years later at the time of Agincourt. The bows were of lighter draw weight. Even so, the arrow shot was withering at close range and great damage was done to the English.

Now for the first time they had access to the top of the ridge and fiercely attacked the English flank. Still the English ranks could not be broken and although the fighting continued with little pause, the sun had set before the end came. It is kind of reasonable to assume that the Fyrdsmen, a loose militia of lightly equipped men who had already given their required service to the king that year by manning the coast against the expected invasion throughout the summer, were among the first to fade quietly into the fringes of the great forest of Andraeswold that stood behind them. The men of the Select Fyrd and the House Carls fought on, broken up into isolated groups by the repeated Norman cavalry attacks.

With the relative safety of the line gone, the House Carls formed a ring around the king. With the king were the standards of England; the Dragon standard of the line of Cerdic, the ancient House of the kings of Wessex; and the fighting man, the personal marker of Harold Godwinsson, worked with silver and gold thread upon in red and white Byzantine silk by Edith, his wife.

Fighting a desperate and failing action against repeated Norman attack, the king was beset on all sides. Unlike what it showed on the Bayeaux tapestry, Harold was probably run through by William's lance. William broke through the line accompanied by three others -- Eustace, Hugo of Ponthieu and Giffard -- who were in at the kill, and who savaged Harold brutally. "They came upon the king and hewed at him with their swords. One stabbed him in the chest, another cut off his head and another slashed at his vitals, spilling them upon the ground. This last man cut off the king's thigh and carried it away, but William was much angered by this vile deed and sent the man from his service."

This battle would later be called Senlac, a river of blood. It demolished most of the remnants of the Saxon fighting men of the Island at very little cost to William.
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On Christmas day, 1066, William was crowned King of England in Westminster Abbey with great pomp and more than a little high-fiving. During the ceremony, there was a commotion outside and his soldiers set fire to a house. It is said that the king's fingers whitened as he gripped the arms of the throne, but no attack came.

William survived for twenty years after the battle that secured for him and his successors the island fortress of Europe. Of all things he was killed in a riding accident, when his saddle's high pommel was driven into his abdomen, rupturing his stomach. He lasted for four days in great pain, and when confessed, asked for absolution for the lives that had been lost at his hand since the age of eight. At the last, it seems that the subjugation of England bore hard upon his mind. His dying words were "May God forgive me, for I have taken that which was not mine." I would like to think he meant England; might have been something else: maybe that last piece of pie.

What have we learned? Arrows can win the day? Pride goeth before the fall? Darnedest things can take off kings? Kings get very touchy about others savaging fellow kings? How about sometimes we win something only to feel guilty about winning for years afterward?

So if you are out lobbing javelins at tight-packed lines, spilling a king's vitals, or just swimming in a river of blood and want to forward these missives to someone do so only please keep my name and sig. attached.

Looking for that last piece of pie,
Ellsworth Weaver

SCA – Sir Balthazar of Endor
AS – Polyphemus Theognis
TRV – Sebastian Yeats