Killing Fields of Scotland

by R J M Pugh

  The sudden appearance of the Scottish vanguard out of the woods unbalanced Clifford momentarily; he was thrown into indecision. There was a heated exchange between de Beaumont and de Gray as to how the English should respond to Randolph’s challenge. Beaumont was for pulling back to draw the Scots farther away from their protective woods. Gray disagreed. Beaumont accused him of being afraid, a taunt which stung Gray who reputedly said he would not flee out of fear and proved his point by charging Randolph’s schiltron, accompanied by a single English knight, William Deyncourt, perhaps like Henry de Bohun, keen to win acclaim. In the ensuing charge Deyncourt was killed and Gray was taken prisoner.21

  Shocked into action by this spectacle, Clifford and de Beaumont – both had engaged Wallace’s schiltrons at Falkirk in 1298 – led their men forward, attacking Randolph on every side. Bruce was horrified when he arrived on the scene to ascertain how Randolph was resolving his earlier error. Sir James Douglas begged Bruce to allow him to assist Randolph; Bruce refused at first, then relented. At the sight of the Black Douglas, the English lost their grip of an opportune situation and began to disengage, falling back, then scattered. Most of Clifford’s men sought refuge and safety in the main army.

  At last the sun began to slip down behind the trees. It had been a long, gruelling and anxious day for both armies. For Bruce it had been one of unexpected success. He had achieved what he had set out to do – avoid having to commit his entire army against the might of Edward II in the open field. The Scots retired into the woods to a supper of bread and water, then a few hours of sound sleep. The English did not enjoy the same luxuries. All night they laboured in the boggy, waterlogged ground they occupied. During that short night a deserter from Edward’s army crossed over the Bannock Burn; Sir Alexander Seton defected to Bruce, advising him that all was far from well in Edward II’s camp and that if Bruce attacked the English the following day he would defeat Edward with ease.22 The only disappointment Bruce suffered that night was the defection of David de Strathbogie, the Earl of Atholl, who harboured animosity towards Bruce’s brother Edward.23

  In the English camp men were tired, yet they could not sleep. The foot soldiers were weary after a thirty-mile march from Falkirk in oppressive heat. The cavalry were dispirited by the loss of Henry de Bohun and the capture of Sir Thomas de Gray. That night Edward’s knights and men-at-arms did not lay off their armour and they kept their weapons close by, leaving their horses saddled and bridled.24

  Edward’s men were physically exhausted even before the bulk of his army had struck a blow against Bruce; they were also depressed and anxious, dispirited by the loss of two prominent knights. Only Edward II was ebullient, confident that on the morrow he would draw Bruce into the open and defeat him and his contemptible little army. Just one physical objective lay in his way – the Bannock Burn, a steep-sided, deep and marshy stream in 1314, unlike its modern descendant. Edward had to ford the stream before daybreak; he set his men the task of seeking all manner of wooden supports which would serve as walkways for his cavalry and infantrymen. Foraging parties scoured the vicinity of Stirling to obtain wooden doors, frames, roof beams from local cottages; even the thatch from these cottages was put to use to ensure a safe crossing of the Bannock Burn for Edward’s men.

  That stifling hot night of June, one of the shortest of the year, Bruce delivered a speech worthy of Winston Churchill in 1940. Bruce reminded those present of their suffering at the hands of the English; he spoke of those who had lost brothers, relatives and friends in combat as well as those who languished in English prisons, including his own wife and family. Of the English he said that their glory was in possessions, whereas for Scotsmen their glory was in the name of God and victory in battle. Heartened by the news he had received from Alexander Seton, Bruce spoke of the low morale in Edward’s army, saying that if their hearts were cast down their bodies were worth nothing. He announced to his nobles and knights that the following day he intended to stand and fight but reassured those present that if they disagreed with his decision he would withdraw from the field. It was a clever speech which had the desired effect. With one voice his men said they were willing to stand and fight at his side. Bruce reminded the nobles that Edward had brought vast riches with him and that even the poorest among his army would enrich themselves with plunder in the event of victory. This was a skilful ploy, given the massive baggage train in full view of the Scottish army. Bruce ended his speech by reminding those present that they were not only fighting for their personal freedom and lives but also those of their wives, children and families as well as for their lands, not for the power Edward craved. That night the Scots slept well; their morale was high.

  It was not so in the English camp on that shortest of nights. The reverses of that day hung heavily on the minds of some of the veteran leaders like Gloucester and Hereford. Both men knew that it was imperative that Edward’s army must be as close as possible to the Scottish army, hidden in the depths of the woods. It was imperative that the English commanders should find ground firm enough to bear the weight of war-horses and their heavily armoured riders. The Bannock Burn proved a difficult obstacle so that it took most of the night for the heavy cavalry to splash across the burn and scramble up the Scottish side. Those that crossed over got little sleep; it was feared that the Scots might make a night attack, so they stood to in full armour. The men who had negotiated the burn were exhausted physically; now the strain began to take its toll mentally. Seeds of doubt had been sown that day, with the unexpected and bloody deaths of de Bohun and Deyncourt and the capture of Gray. It was rare for horsed knights to be killed in battle but the English had lost two of their most prominent warriors in a single afternoon, even before the main battle. Furthermore, the English vanguard had been repulsed ignominiously by foot soldiers. The conscript levies of English foot knew that all was not well in their army; the common soldiers looked up to the knights both as their betters and masters, men for whom they worked and to whom they owed their livelihoods. The success of their lords in battle had elevated them, an aristocracy of warriors who had proven their worth in countless battles. But as the foot soldiers slogged their way across the Bannock Burn murmurs of discontent drifted above the quiet, running waters of the burn. Only Edward himself seemed unmoved, determined to engage Bruce in a battle he had craved for years.

  Second Day: Monday, 24 June, Feast of John the Baptist

  As the first rays of morning sunshine began to insinuate among the trees of the Torwod the English army, drawn up on the north bank of the Bannock Burn, witnessed a sight they had not expected to see. The entire Scottish army began to emerge from the woods, in full view. Then, in the growing light of the summer sun, thousands of Scots suddenly fell on their knees to celebrate Mass led by the Abbott of Inchaffray who then delivered a speech urging the Scots to fight for their freedom. The sudden appearance of the Scots took the English completely by surprise. On seeing the entire Scottish host drop to its knees, Edward asked his companion, Sir Ingram de Umfraville, a traitor Scot, if the Scots intended to fight, then he joked that Bruce’s men were begging for mercy. De Umfraville did not hesitate in his answer, saying that the Scots were not asking for mercy from Edward but from God for what they were about to do.25

  The English knights hastily made the final preparations for a battle they had not expected to fight that early morning. At the head of the vanguard flew the banners of Gloucester and Hereford; the main division led by Edward hoisted the royal standard of the Plantagenet king with its device of three gold lions or leopards on a field of crimson. Opposite, a great mast bore the royal standard of Scotland, a red lion rampant with a red bordure on a field of gold. Bruce positioned his three divisions with Randolph’s and Edward Bruce’s abreast, the two forming a Scottish front line several ranks deep, about 6,000 spearmen. Bruce took up his position in the rear along with Sir Robert Keith’s mobile unit of 500 light horse, ready to deploy wherever the English looked like outflanking Bruce’s two main columns. Then
Bruce ordered the Scots to advance at a measured pace towards the English vanguard.

  There was considerable consternation in the English front lines of horsed knights and men-at-arms. Apart from the astonishing spectacle of finding the Scots still to their front after the previous day’s skirmishing, some voiced their opinion that it was bad luck to fight on the day of the Feast of St John the Baptist and that the king should wait until the following day. Unsurprisingly, it was not the young, inexperienced knights who voiced this opinion but the veterans. Their plea for delay attracted scorn from the younger men who were anxious to gain honours for themselves. Chief among those countenancing caution was the Earl of Gloucester who made his disquiet known to Edward as to the state of mind in the army as well as arguing that Edward should respect the feast day. The English king was in no mood to entertain suggestions that he should delay the action. Edward even accused Gloucester of treachery and deceit when his leading commander begged him to wait until the next morning to attack Bruce. Gloucester responded by saying he was neither traitor nor liar, returning sullenly to the vanguard he commanded.26 It was evident that there was unrest in the high command and that veterans like Gloucester were showing signs of breaking under pressure.

  As the Scottish army slowly but steadily advanced, the knights and men-at-arms made their final preparations to engage Bruce’s men. From their position, with the sun at their backs on that longest day – it is reckoned that Bannockburn was fought and won before 9am – the English cavalry could clearly see the thousands of Scottish foot soldiers, a solid mass bristling with spears. Curiously, despite the vital role the English archers had played in earlier battles such as Falkirk, they were hardly used in the battle, although some sources credit them with a role. Barbour’s The Brus has the English bowmen driven from the field by Robert Keith’s light cavalry but this is not confirmed by other accounts. If Edwards’s archers were engaged at all, it was against the smaller formation of Scottish archers who had the benefit of striking home with their arrows more than the English bowmen, whose arrows were embedded in nothing more than the stout trees in the woods.

  Leading the vanguard of the English heavy cavalry, Gloucester and Hereford ordered their knights and men-at-arms to advance at the trot, then a canter until the order to level lances was given, probably by the sound of a recognizable trumpet call. From the outset the ground Bruce had chosen to fight the battle discomfited the English heavy horse which could neither deploy nor avoid bunching up in a heaving mass of men and horses. The already crumbling unity of Edward’s cavalry was compounded by the arrival of contingents of English foot soldiers. The Scottish schiltrons were packed so tight that they advanced like a thickset hedge which could not be breached.27 Then, suddenly, the Scottish spearmen halted, readying themselves for Edward’s by now charging cavalry, their lances levelled. The Earl of Gloucester was in the forefront; as he closed in on the Scottish vanguard he would have been close enough to see the grim, determined faces of the Scots in the front ranks, their spears bristling like a hedgehog. The English vanguard slammed into the solid phalanxes of Scots, a sickening, bone-crunching collision, with horses impaled on spears. Knights and men-at-arms were thrown to the ground, suffocating under the weight of their armour and the bodies of men and horses which began to pile up on them. Lances and spears that found their mark snapped in two, blood flew in the air, spraying both sides.

  Gloucester had engaged Edward Bruce’s division on the Scottish right wing. On the left Randolph braced himself for the coming impact, the English waves breaking on the rock that was Bruce’s army. Moments after the English vanguard had smashed into the Scottish front line the main cavalry attack was launched, which rocked the Scottish spearmen. The foremost ranks began to show signs of crumbling, but Randolph rallied his men; the schiltrons all along the line held fast. Many English knights never struck a single blow that early June morning simply because in that close-packed, heaving mass of men and horses, they had no room even to draw sword. The grass grew slippery with blood, the waters of the Bannock Burn began to change colour …

  The battle was now raging out of control of both Bruce and Edward II. It had degenerated into a desperate, vicious hand-to-hand fracas, a frenzy of men indiscriminately hacking each other to pieces. In the melee Gloucester was somehow isolated and found himself alone; a body of Scots rushed forward, slaying his horse and dragging him to the ground where he lay helpless, unable to rise on account of the weight of his armour. The Scots offered no quarter; when Gloucester’s body was retrieved later it bore a multitude of wounds.28 At the height of their blood-lust the Scots were clearly not taking prisoners, not even men as rich in ransom money as Gloucester. The English onlookers must have been devastated by the sight of a prominent noble of England being slaughtered, the first time this had occurred for many years; added to this was the ignominy of the rank of Gloucester’s slayers, mere common foot soldiers and countryfolk.

  The constricted area of the field was now beginning to tell on Edward’s army, restricting its ability to manoeuvre; weight of numbers was becoming a hindrance. Some three English cavalry divisions, numbering about 5,000, had attacked the Scottish lines but failed to shatter their ranks. Behind them the rear echelons of perhaps a further 1,000 knights and men-at-arms pressed forward in their eagerness to join the fight. Beyond them the massed infantry closed in behind. The narrowness of the field caused the cavalry to bunch up; thus disorganized and constricted, the knights and men-at-arms to the forefront were literally driven on to the spears of the Scottish schiltrons. With the weight of those pressing from behind, English casualties began to mount up dangerously. Another disaster came with the death of Robert Clifford, perhaps desperate to save face after his defeat by Randolph the previous day. In that cauldron of slaughter, the loss of one man was of little import; there was only brief mention made of his death.29

  Trouble began to accumulate for Edward II; this time it came from the distant rear where thousands of troops as yet uncommitted to battle could hear but not see what was happening in the battle raging on the north bank of the Bannock Burn. Morale among the infantrymen was already low; they had learnt of the poor showing of the knights the previous day, nor was there any prospect of booty or renown for them even if Edward won the battle. It was at this point that an unplanned,unexpected but dramatic event took place on the Scottish side. Suddenly, a fresh army – or so it seemed to the disbelieving English – appeared from behind either the nearby Coxet or Gillies’ Hills. It was the ‘Small Folk’ – those given the task of guarding the Scottish baggage train – who came streaming over the hill bearing ‘banners’ – common camp blankets nailed to poles, hoping to enrich themselves by plundering the English dead and Edward’s huge baggage train. Some imaginative students of Scottish history interested in this aspect of Bannockburn have hazarded a theory that among the ‘Small Folk’ was a contingent of Knights Templars, the Military Order which had played a large part in European conflicts in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, particularly during the Crusades. Although sworn to chastity, poverty and obedience, the Order had grown over-mighty and wealthy, which had aroused jealousy and ill-will, especially among the hierarchy of senior clergymen, including the Pope himself. Philip IV of France was resolved to enrich himself with their possessions and obtained the consent to proceed thus by Pope Clement V whom he had placed on the Papal Throne. The French Templars were arrested and subjected to extreme torture by which was extracted evidence of outrageous moral offences and grave heresies. The Order was suppressed by Clement V in England, France, Spain, Portugal, Germany and Italy but, for some reason, not Scotland. As Bruce was under excommunication for his murder of the Red Comyn in 1306, some believe that he condoned those Templars living in Scotland and even invited the excommunicated Templars in Europe to settle in Scotland. There is no evidence to support the theory that they were present on the field of Bannockburn at Bruce’s side. If they had been, the appearance of even a small group of these medieval warriors in t
heir distinctive white linen mantles with a red cross emblazoned on the left shoulder would have struck terror in the English army that day. The hard-nosed historian is unlikely to accept this theory, compelling though it is.

  By now the crumbling English morale finally collapsed. Men began to drift away from the battle, crossing the Bannock Burn in droves. Crossing is too simple a word to describe the panic of the demoralized English; many fell into the waters of the deep ditch, drowning instantly, their bodies acting as a human bridge for those following and trampling them in their haste to gain the other steep side of the burn.

  Despite the obvious fact that his battle was lost Edward II refused to concede victory to Bruce, nor quit the field. Aymer de Valence and a knight, Giles d’Argentan, entrusted with Edward’s safety, urged the King to depart the field. Were the king to be killed or taken prisoner the ignominy was too appalling to contemplate. Edward was led forcibly from the field, his guardians holding the reins of his war-horse. The Scots were menacingly close and could have easily overtaken the three men. Once Edward was joined by his royal retinue and a body of 500 cavalry, d’Argentan considered he had fulfilled his duty to the king. Turning his horse to face the Scots, he galloped into their midst and was dragged from his mount, then unceremoniously hacked to pieces.30

  Those English who managed to extricate themselves from this bloodiest of killing fields in the history of Scotland scrambled through marsh, plunging into stream and river, pursued by an uncontrollable horde of screaming Scottish spearmen intent on despatching as many as they could; they were determined that Bannockburn would finally finish the war and bring them freedom from English domination. Edward II ran with his demoralized troops, hoping to gain sanctuary in Stirling Castle. When he arrived at the gates he found them closed. The castle’s constable, Philip de Mowbray, had a ringside seat at Bannockburn; from the battlements he watched the horrifying spectacle unfold. He knew that his king had lost not only a battle but, also, under the laws of chivalry, he must in all conscience surrender Stirling Castle to Edward Bruce. De Mowbray duly did so, leaving Edward with no other option but to make his way to safety in the south as best as he could.