Crécy

by Griff Hosker

  “Thought I had forgotten, eh, Hawkwood? I was just biding my time and as soon as I heard you would be out alone; I knew this was my opportunity.”

  Ralf was as strong as I was, and my rondel dagger was in my belt while my hands held my boots. I played for time as I worked out how to extricate myself from this predicament. “Do not be a fool, Ralf! Put the blade away and I will forget this.” Ralf was just four feet from me. I calculated that I could drop the boots and distract him. That would allow me to grab my dagger. I would have to fend off the strike from his bodkin. I knew that he would ignore my words for I saw murder in his eyes.

  “You might forget but I will not. You shall die!”

  “And you will be hunted down and hanged for others know where I went and when you are gone they will search for you! This is not England and you cannot escape justice.”

  He laughed, “No one will find your body until the morrow and I will be long gone. There are lords who will value the service of such a fine archer!”

  He was halfway through his words when I dropped the boots and reached around for my dagger. I held out my left hand, now wrapped in the cap I had taken from my head. He was also quick, every archer was, and he lunged at me. A bodkin dagger is a perfect weapon to sink into flesh, but it had no edge and the woollen hat deflected the blow. My rondel blade, however, was the one I used to shave my head and chin and I slashed across his middle. He also used his left hand, but it was unprotected, and the blade slashed across the back of it, grating off the bone.

  “There is still time, Ralf, put down the blade!”

  In answer, he lunged again but instead of using my left hand, I used my own dagger and sparks flew as the two blades rang together. We were close enough to the castle for it to be heard and a voice, one of the sentries, called out in the dark, “What ho?”

  “They will come, Ralf!”

  “And you will be dead.” This time he lunged at my eye. It was the perfect place for a bodkin to strike. It was how we ended the lives of men at arms we fought. They might be armoured but a bodkin dagger in the eye would end a life almost instantly! I punched at his hand as the blade came at me and it slid over my shoulder. His movement meant that he ran into my blade which sliced into his left side. I heard cries coming from the castle and then the sound of feet.

  Ralf heard them too and he suddenly punched at me with his wounded left hand and caught me unawares. I staggered back and he ran off into the dark. The Sergeant at arms and the sentry had torches and when they saw my face and the blood which covered it, they both thought the worse.

  “Vintenar! You are hurt?”

  I shook my head, “It is not my blood but that of Ralf the archer. He tried to murder me and fled.”

  “We will send men to look for him. Let us get you within the castle.”

  The delay meant that Ralf escaped. He had planned it all well for his gardyvyan and bows were gone. What he had not been able to take were his horse and saddle. It meant we had another horse to take to Bordeaux. I knew that I had been lucky. As with the attack on the wagon I had allowed my vigilance to drop and it had almost been my undoing. From that moment on I was always vigilant! The attack was viewed with anger by the other archers. Ralf had never been popular, but his resentment had driven away even those who had been his tentmates before. We put that behind us as we boarded the ships to sail to Gascony.

  Gascony chevauchée 1345

  Author’s Map

  Chapter 7

  We sailed down to Bordeaux across a dark and threatening sea with black clouds as permanent company; it was a rough voyage, but I had learned to cope with the sea. I had my archers spend time with their horses as they were more affected than we were. When we arrived neither man nor beast was fit for anything and the Earl of Stafford ordered that we just rest. Indeed, there was no need for us to do much else as we were the ones who warned the lords of Gascony that they were going to war soon and they had to make preparations. Megs had not suffered as much as some of the other horses and the Earl took me with four other men as an escort and we scouted out places where Lord Henry Plantagenet could attack when he arrived. We rode with a local lord, Count Guillaume de le Porge and some of his men. I was the only archer, but the count took men who were lightly armoured and, like me, could move quickly. I was close enough to hear the words of the Earl and the Count as they rode. My French had improved dramatically, and I understood every word. The count was contemptuous of the local French lords and it oozed from his words.

  “There is no border here, my lord, Gascon and Frenchmen are neighbours, and some owe allegiance to King Edward and King Philip. It is a chaotic situation for who is the lord of the land? I serve King Edward and my family always have.”

  We had crossed the Gironde and were heading along the north bank of the Dordogne towards Montravel, a castle whose lord was French and had allegiance to King Philip. As it was just under forty miles from Bordeaux it was a good place to start our campaign.

  “Perhaps, Count, your judgement is coloured by the fact that your lands are to the west of Bordeaux and far from French influence. If I was a lord who held lands in two countries, then I might be more pragmatic. When King Edward has reconquered the land that King John lost then the chaos may disappear.” He reined in. “Is that the castle of Montravel ahead?”

  The Count said, “Yes my lord.”

  Sir Ralph turned to me, “Archer, string your bow and you and I will ride forth to scout out this castle. Two men may not alarm the garrison, but your bow will be security against a sudden attack.”

  “Aye, my lord.” I dismounted to string my bow.

  I saw the Gascons looking at me with interest for the longbow was an English weapon and not a Gascon one.

  “Is this wise, Sir Ralph?” The Gascon lord did not wish to lose a senior English knight before the campaign had begun!

  “If we ride close with all of these men then they will know that there is an army coming and will summon support. Two of us have more chance of escaping observation.” I had strung my bow and remounted. I held the bow and an arrow in my left hand, and I nodded to Sir Ralph. He dug his spurs in the flanks of his courser and I followed. Megs was no courser, but she was game, and she kept up with his mount.

  The wooden castle had been built upon a high piece of ground just above the small village and the river. The Dordogne protected one side of the castle which was a larger version of the castles which were dotted around England. As we neared the castle Sir Ralph slowed and stopped and then he stood in his stirrups to gain a better view. We were two hundred paces from the village and three hundred or so from the wooden walls. I spied the ditch and the two towers over the gatehouse. There was a keep and I saw movement there which told me that they kept a watch. I dismounted for the movement suggested that they had seen us. Two men might not alarm them but the prospect of capturing a knight and holding him for ransom might rouse their interest. Sir Ralph’s spurs and fine horse marked him as a knight. He glanced down as I dismounted and nocked an arrow, but he said nothing.

  Perhaps Sir Ralph was looking for things I had not seen for he kept studying the walls and the castle for so long that five riders left the castle and galloped towards us. He looked down, “Show them your skill archer and then we shall leave!”

  I had nocked a bodkin and I saw that the man at arms who led them was mailed. I drew back and sent the arrow at him as he and his four companions passed through the village. Even as my arrow hit him in the chest and threw him from his saddle, I drew a war arrow and sent it into the shoulder of the warrior wearing a leather brigandine. I did not look to see if the other three had either slowed or stopped, Sir Ralph and I could deal with three warriors and I mounted Megs whilst still holding on to the bow. My demonstration had the desired effect and the three survivors decided to tend to the other two men. The mailed man at arms would be dead. Even if the arrow had not killed him instantly the fall and the wound would have made him bleed out. The other would survive.

 
; Sir Ralph smiled as we headed back to the others. He nodded at me, “You are a cool one, Hawkwood is it not?” I nodded. “I can see that you and your fellows will be useful, but it is a pity that there are so few of you, Lord Henry has more than a thousand with him but they are still in Southampton.”

  “When do they leave, my lord?”

  “May and they should be here by June, but you saw the weather we endured. Their departure could be delayed by as much as two or three months. We cannot afford to sit idly by. I will raise the local lords. With your archers and the men we brought we can make mischief here. If we can draw the French from Normandy and Picardy, then King Edward will have a much better chance of success. Paris is the jewel the King desires. If we have that then Gascony will be safe and both Normandy and Brittany will fall!”

  When we reached Bordeaux, Gascon lords were summoned, and the levy was mustered. Unlike in England where there was often resentment, here the Gascons could not wait to go into battle against those that they thought had tried to steal their land. I organised my archers for I knew that we would be the deciding factor. They were my company now and although there were just forty of them they had already begun to call me Captain. We called ourselves Hawkwood for that meant I could order them all to obey my words in the heat of battle. I also told them the way that we would fight. They were my men and would reflect that. I managed to procure four more sumpters so that we had six horses to carry spare arrows. I also made sure that every archer carried a spare bundle of one hundred arrows on his horse. My short time with Sir Ralph had shown me that speed was vital in this war and we could not afford to wait for a wagon. There would be a wagon which accompanied the army but that would carry our spare bow staves and even more arrows as well as food. We could wait for those. All of our archers were experienced and so I approached the Earl and asked to hire men to hold our horses.

  “We have few enough archers as it is, Lord Ralph, and if one in four holds horses then we will be a fifth of our men down before we draw an arrow!”

  I liked the Earl of Stafford for he was decisive, and he paid for fifteen men to be horse holders and to act as servants and cooks while we were on campaign. The Gascons were more than happy to supply the men for we would be, hopefully, making their lives and their land safer. A small ship arrived at the beginning of June with bad news. Storms further north had driven Lord Henry’s fleet of one hundred and fifty ships to take shelter in Falmouth. He would not now reach us in June and so we set off without him. We left Bordeaux with two thousand men at arms and five thousand infantry. Some of the Gascons had bows and others crossbows but their numbers were so small, and their effect would be so limited, that it was my archers who would be the best defence against the enemy. It was as we headed for Montravel that we begin a system which was new to all of us but became normal as years went on. Sir Richard and I formed one company, a vanguard of mounted archers and men at arms, and we were the potent strike force at the head of the column. Sir Ralph gave us the freedom to act as we saw fit. Our orders were the same ones which King Edward had given to Lord Henry, "si guerre soit, et a faire le bien q'il poet" (... if there is war, do the best you can ...). It showed the trust which existed amongst our leaders and it contrasted with the lack of trust and confusion on the other side.

  As I had scouted with the Earl it was I who led and, as we neared the castle of Montravel I saw that our first encounter with them had not increased their vigilance. In fact, as we rode towards the village, I saw that the gates of the castle were still open. Sir Richard was next to me and I said, “We can take this castle without losing a man! I will ride and take the gates!”

  There was mutual respect between us and he said, “Go!”

  Drawing my sword, I shouted, “Archers! Ride!” I was in the lead and I knew what I intended so that I had a four-horse length lead before Ned could react. I would not have made the gates in time had not the villagers heard the hooves thundering and ran, screaming and shouting towards the open gates. The sentries tried, in vain, to close them but the press of people was too great. I could hear French voices ordering people away from the gates, but they feared us. If this was a chevauchée and we could achieve this effect again then we might bring hell with us! Megs was at full speed as we approached the people and I shouted, in French, “Get out of the way or you will be ridden down!”

  The ones at the rear saw the great beast that was Megs and the shining sword held by the giant and those in the centre pushed to the side. People fell into the ditch and the press on the door diminished but by then Ned and Jack had caught up with me and it was not a solitary horseman who tried to push his way in but six archers. I had learned to make Megs rear. When I had first mounted a horse that had been an impossible dream, but I had improved, and her flailing hooves caught the gates just as they were about to close. Indeed, I think one of her hooves mashed a man’s hand to a pulp and the wooden gates flew open. As Megs galloped through, I slashed down and split open the head of one sentry and Ned drove his sword into the throat of a second. We did not stop but rode towards the inner wall and the gate there. This time it was not civilians who were running for the safety of the keep and the inner bailey but the garrison. They had been racing to man the walls of the outer bailey and had now reversed their journey. Even though we were going uphill our horses were faster than the men on the walls and as they descended the ladders to make for the gates my archers spread out to charge them down. The French arms came up in surrender for Sir Richard and his men at arms were now flooding through the gates of the castle. Ned, Jack and I galloped through the second gate, trampling men as we did so. This time the gates were not defended and the men inside the inner bailey made the keep.

  I reined in Megs as I saw crossbows peep over the top of the keep. I wheeled her around as a handful of bolts struck the ground where we had just stood. The infernal machines needed to be reloaded and I dismounted and grabbed my bow stave. I smacked Megs on the rump to make her go into the outer bailey and strung my bow. It says much about the difference between the two weapons that I managed to dismount, string my bow and nock an arrow before the crossbows had been reloaded. Ned and Edward were equally fast and as the crossbows appeared over the wooden parapet, three arrows were sent in their direction. I know not if we killed, wounded or just frightened them but only two bolts came our way and they were sent so hurriedly that they missed.

  My archers had dismounted in the outer bailey and were flooding in, I shouted, “Hawkwood, two lines.” The three of us were ready with our bows as the others strung and then nocked an arrow. When I saw crossbows begin to appear, I shouted, “Release.”

  Sixty arrows fell. The crossbowmen had to show themselves to use their weapons and that was their downfall. When the screams and shouts had subsided a French voice shouted, “We surrender! Cease! We give in!”

  “Then open the gate to the keep and come out showing us your hands!”

  Every one of my archers had an arrow nocked and as the eight men left the keep, I knew that there would be no attempt at treachery. We had taken our first castle without losing a man!

  Sir Ralph was delighted and the only disappointing part of it all was that one rider had been sent to Monbreton, the castle which was just three miles away. We could not repeat my trick and we might have to fight to take that castle. My initiative was rewarded in a number of ways. I was invited to dine with the earl and the count, and I was richly rewarded. There was treasure in the keep and I was given a share. I ensured that my archers received some of the coins I was given but I knew that I would need to find some way to keep my increasing fortune safe!

  “Monbreton will be harder to take as there is a ford across the river and they will defend it.” Sir Ralph looked at me, “Can your horses swim the river upstream from the ford and out of sight of the castle?”

  “Some can swim, my lord, but not all.”

  He looked at Sir Richard, “And your men?”

  “Some can.”

  “Then, Hawkwo
od, you will lead the archers and the men at arms who can do so and swim the river. I want you to appear at their rear and distract them. Make them think there are more of you than there actually are. We will let you attack first, and we will begin our attack when we hear you.”

  “Then if we leave when it is dark, we can be in position by dawn.” I gave the suggestion and not Sir Richard. My mind was always several steps ahead and when Sir Ralph had given me the problem then I was coming up with the solution.

  The Count asked, “Is that not dangerous, swimming a river in the dark?”

  “If we do it in daylight, my lord, then there may be men who see us, and we need to be invisible until we attack. Besides, my horse is a good swimmer and I can cross first with a rope to help any who fall into the water. If we tried that in daylight, then we would be seen.”

  This time I would be the one commanding not only archers but also men at arms. The swimmers all managed to nap for an hour or so before we took ropes from the castle and village and headed south towards the castle. The river helped us to find the castle and prevented us from getting lost. I did not rush into this. I rode Megs along the bank until I saw somewhere which was suitable for us to cross. The river appeared to be narrow and relatively shallow but, more importantly, there were a couple of trees we could use to secure the rope we would use. Tying one end of the rope to a tree I headed into the dark waters. We had had to tie a number of ropes together and that was the only weakness in my plan. If the knots gave way, then we would be in trouble. The current was strong and so I swam Megs upstream knowing that we would be driven downstream a little. We had just crossed halfway when Megs’ legs found purchase on the bottom. It felt like rock beneath her hooves. Once I reached the other bank I stopped and listened. There were no noises which alarmed me, and I rode downstream until I found a suitable tree and I tied off the rope. I headed back upstream and reached the place I had left the water. Ned was waiting for my signal and he sent the others across. We were lucky. Only three men fell from their horses. The horses swam ashore and the riders were swept down to the safety rope. They hauled themselves ashore. When this was all over the three knew that they would be the butt of jokes. We did not ride our horses but walked them until we found ourselves within three hundred paces of the castle. We led our horses into the woods there and then returned to secrete ourselves just two hundred paces from the wooden wall.