Bosworth: the New Look

by Chris Gravett

In his recent book, Bosworth: Psychology of a Battle, Michael K. Jones has offered a new version of events, in which he places the battle much closer to Atherstone.  He also cites a fragment of letter by a pikeman in Henry’s army which, if genuine (and it very probably is) adds new detail to the sparse material available.  In March of this year Michael Jones and I hosted a study day held at the Royal Armouries at the Tower of London, to allow views for and against his new interpretation to be aired.

The debate as to whether Richard III was ever on Ambion Hill can be traced back to 1577, when Raphael Holinshed in his History says that Richard camped on Anne Beame the night before the battle.  The king then formed up the following morning, though it must be admitted that Holinshed describes the latter area as a plain.  The hill becomes central to the position in successive references.  Jones argues that this placement was supported by the Tudors because it made Richard appear defensive and uncertain.  He concedes that Ambion Hill may have had some connection with Richard, perhaps as a stopping place during his progress westwards towards Henry, and that this then grew into the story of the defensive king.

So how defensive were English kings when ordering their troops for battle?  Quite a lot, as it happens.  The idea goes back far beyond the Wars of the Roses.  In 1066 Senlac Hill was used by Harold to block the Normans, who were nearly defeated in an unusually lengthy battle.  Here it must be noted that William may have forced Harold on to the defensive by an aggressive march that caught his opponent before he could attack the Norman camp.  During the Hundred Years War the defensive stand was almost normal practice for English armies.  The use of mainly dismounted blocks of men-at-arms with wings or perhaps frontages of archers was seen again and again.  It had been honed in the wars with the Scots and proved equally successful against the French and even the Spanish.  It depended much on the devastating power of the longbow and this is reflected in the increasing ratio of archers to men-at-arms.  The idea of securing a well defended position, so allowing the enemy to do all the work in trying to break it while becoming increasingly tired and more liable to disruption in his own shifting lines, was a sensible idea, especially when the enemy was more powerful in numbers. 

During the Wars of the Roses there is evidence of the same desire to sit and allow the enemy to make the first move.  At Blore Heath in 1459 the Yorkist left and part of the front were placed on a stream with steep banks, their right protected by their baggage train.  At Northampton in 1460 the Lancastrians entrenched the position with ditches, ramparts and stakes.  At Second St Albans (1461) the Yorkists used defensive positions, enhanced by tricks such as nets with spikes. At Barnet (1471) thick hedges (perhaps with drainage ditches either side) were partly adapted by the Lancastrians who had arrived the day before the battle. 

Hills are included in such defences.  They give a commanding view, intimidate an enemy and help imbue a sense of superiority in one’s own men whilst making it more tiring for an enemy to make his attacks.  They provide impetus for a downhill charge, and give slightly greater range to archers.  Vegetius notes the merits of a hill, and Richard certainly possessed a personal copy, which survives.   At Crécy (1346) terraces were used; at Patay (1429) a ridge.  At Towton (1461) both armies seem to have made use of slight ridges either side of a shallow valley, the flanks protected on the west by the River Cock with very steep slopes and on the east by marshy ground.  At Tewkesbury (1471) the Lancastrians chose a ridge in front of the town, the frontage beyond it so irregular with hedges, ditches etc. as to impede an enemy advance.  At Stoke Field (1487) the rebels drew up on the brow of a hill.  

None of these defensive positions were seen as a sign of weakness.  Edward IV had used one at Towton, and deliberately tried to lure the Lancastrians off their own slight ridge by sending in a more effective barrage.  After a Yorkist volley the Lancastrians loosed their arrows but the blinding snow and wind in their faces resulted in their arrows falling short; the Yorkists then loosed off not only their own shafts but many of those found sticking in the ground.  The effect of this barrage dislodged the enemy who advanced to attack.

None of the foregoing can prove, of course, that Richard did decide to make a defensive stand on Ambion Hill, and Jones has argued that this very idea was promoted by the Tudors to imply that the last Plantagenet was indecisive and rather timid, traits that most are agreed seem unlikely.  However, defensive positions were good enough for Edward III and Edward  IV, who were anything but timid.  It may be argued that Richard would not take up a defensive position against a much smaller army.  Michael Bennett (The Battle of Bosworth, St Martin’s Press, New York, ppb with corrections, 1993) suggested he may have done this to intimidate Henry’s small force into losing heart and giving up, but another possibility is that Richard suspected that the Stanleys, or at least Sir William, might throw in his lot with the invaders, thereby significantly increasing their force.  It may also be remembered that the Ballad of Bosworth Field notes 150 serpentines and bombards chained together.  This is almost certainly in part a fabrication, for bombards were designed more for siege work and would not be ideal for dragging halfway across the country against a field army.  Nonetheless, the 17^th-century version, which seems to have originated in a 15^th-century account by a Stanley retainer, may include a remembrance of a secured position, rather than a fluid one.  Brackenbury had come from the Tower, with it’s royal arsenal.  In fairness, however, it should be pointed out that Edward used (presumably field) artillery together with bows and guns at Barnet and Tewkesbury.

Why then would Richard order Norfolk to break the position and charge?  Vergil states that Norfolk was ordered to attack the enemy as soon as the latter was past the marsh, first with arrows and then in close combat.  This means no more than 300 yards maximum and probably less, the extreme range for arrows.   A downhill charge will increase momentum, and such a counter-attack by English forces at Mauron in 1352 rolled back an ineffective French uphill assault, which had been hampered by brambles.  After a failed English uphill charge at Bauge (1421) Franco-Scottish forces swept the enemy into the marshy river valley and off the field.  Richard could have ordered such a charge after he saw the moderate size of Oxford’s division, Norfolk perhaps backed up by Brackenbury.  Michael Jones has pointed out that Richard was active in stopping and rolling back the downhill charge of Somerset at Tewkesbury, and would therefore be aware of the limitations of such an attack.  Here, though, lies a problem. The actual movement of Somerset is difficult to ascertain.  The Arrivall says he came via secret lanes, as though he suddenly appeared to attack the Yorkists.  Peter Hammond, however, has dismissed this notion, saying that to move such a large number of men from the hill would be virtually impossibly without the Yorkists getting wind that something was afoot; nor do there seem to be any routes the Lancastrians could have taken that could not be spotted from the high ground in rear of the Yorkist position.  It might be argued that Somerset did use a roundabout route past a small hill and trees, unaware that enemy observers were watching him; equally, as Hammond suggests, he may have simply charged down the main slope but been hampered by the broken ground, the road, hedges and ditches.  It does not prove the charge was a disastrous move.  For one thing, the author of the Arrivall says he does not know if it was done because the Lancastrians could not stand up to the missile barrage, or because Somerset thought he could pull off a winning move.  Also, Somerset had expected to be backed up by the rest of his army, which patently decided not to bother.   In that case he was bound to be outnumbered.  At Ambion Hill Richard was not facing a force the size of the Lancastrians at Tewkesbury.  Having seen the situation he may have wanted to seize the chance to roll back Oxford before the Stanleys decided to throw in their lot.  The obvious echoes with his father at Wakefield are difficult to interpret, since it is unclear exactly what was happening at the latter engagement, and the Duke of York may have been trying to sequestrate provisions rather than attack the Lancastrian army; it is also unclear how many enemy troops were visible when the attack was launched.  How, then, do we relate this to Richard at Bosworth?  What did he feel about his father’s performance and would it prevent him sending anything less than a large division against an enemy?  We simply do not know.

If Richard was on Ambion Hill, how could he launch a cavalry attack from the slopes?  Horsemen certainly need room, and the new fragment states that he led a mounted division, not a select few men.  The idea of a body of horse charging down the slopes of Ambion Hill against the distant standard of Henry may seem romantic but is quite ludicrous.  For one thing, a cavalry charge is unlikely to set off at the gallop, since this would promote a loss of cohesion by the time it reached the enemy, and result in a lot of tired horses, quite apart from the dangers of charging down a slope at full pelt.  The memoirs of Captain Nolan, who died in the Charge of the Light Brigade, describe how the lines begin at a walk and progressively increase speed, but only reach a gallop when quite close to the enemy.  Richard could have led a column of horsemen down from his position and only reached full speed when nearing Henry.  

The general argument for placing the battle near Atherstone is, however, a well laid case, and provides a better setting for Vergil’s account of Henry’s men having the sun at their backs.  The position at Ambion Hill has always caused problems and the only way around it is to suggest the marching rebel army turned to pass the marsh and move against Norfolk’s flank.  Bennett further suggested that Henry initially swung south east towards William Stanley (assuming he was in that area) to try and force him to commit his men, before making the manoeuver just described.  Some have argued that the latter is virtually impossible for troops to carry out easily, but we are not talking about men marching in step, rather a medieval formation which, even if it included professional mercenary pikemen, is likely to be more flexible.  Medieval manuscript illustrations tend to show troops marching with no regard for keeping in step.  Jones’s case does, of course, then make Richard look silly for allowing himself to be caught with the sun in his eyes, though he suggests the king tried to counter this by swinging his own army to negate the problem.

It is in the actual account of the battle that the case becomes less convincing. The new arena is flatter and, according to the new theory (based on the fragment of letter), allowed Richard to utilise a division of mounted men.  It was a new departure for the king, suggesting an influence by association with the Spanish court (and, of course, the only foreigner with him at Bosworth is the Spaniard Salazar), though his experiences at Barnet and Tewkesbury were rather of infantry battles with some cavalry involvement.  Since Jones argues that Richard would not use a downhill charge because of his experiences at Tewkesbury, by the same token it might be argued that he would remember the victories at Barnet and Tewkesbury and be expected to field large numbers of men on foot in the same way. 

The most perplexing problem in this new version is the role of Northumberland.  The Crowland Chronicle states that Northumberland’s division struck no blows and eventually marched away.  If the battlefield was flat, and many of Northumberland’s men had horses (which they must have done to arrive when they did from the north), why did they not join Richard’s great cavalry charge?  Were there no war-horses?  There seems no question of treason, since Henry arrested the earl afterwards.  Equally one might ask, if the two armies faced one another in fairly open ground, why did the larger army of Richard not simply fall on Oxford’s division and swallow it up?  The chroniclers seem to imply that Oxford managed to concentrate on Norfolk’s flank, but why did Richard not swing in reinforcements; was the marsh too close (it will be remembered that Vergil says they were ordered to attack when the enemy was past the marsh)?