Somerset ordered his cannon to respond. The Lancastrian guns were fewer in number, and their crews worked furiously to make up the deficiency.
Soon the field was covered by drifting skeins of gunsmoke. Thanks to his helm, Martin avoided being deafened by the noise, but the foul reek of gunpowder assaulted his mouth and nostrils. Grimacing, he closed his visor and peered out through the narrow eye-slits.
The Yorkist guns seemed to be better-served. They were concentrating their volleys on Somerset’s division, while the Lancastrian fire was more scattered.
Martin had to grudgingly admit that the usurper’s gunners were remarkably accurate. He forced himself to watch as Somerset’s densely-packed formations were punished by a regular hail of red-hot shells and cannonballs. He saw men hurled into the air like rag dolls, or instantly crippled as a stone ripped through the ranks, whipping off legs and arms and punching through bodies with terrifying ease. With nowhere to hide, they had little choice but to stand and take it with grim fortitude.
Meanwhile scores of Yorkist archers were sent forward. They swiftly picked their way in skirmish order through the chaotic network of hedges and dykes that littered the slope. The bowmen concentrated on whittling down Somerset’s division, loosing off arrows before ducking behind cover when the Lancastrian archers responded with interest.
“Take heart,” Martin dimly heard the prince shouting to Lord Wenlock, “this cannot go on forever. The Yorkist guns must soon run out of ammunition. They will have to attack.”
This was true. Martin’s hopes revived when he pictured the Yorkist footmen labouring up that hellish slope, sorely impeded by countless natural obstacles. Then it would be their turn to suffer as arrows and cannonballs rained down on their exposed heads. Those that managed to reach the top would find a bristling line of blades waiting for them.
Martin loosened his sword in its scabbard. Including mine, he thought, vengeance for Barnet has not been long in coming. The dogs of York will hand it to us on a plate.
A celestial flourish of trumpets made him look to his left. Somerset’s great standard was advancing to the front of his division. The duke himself, a proud figure in burnished blue steel, mounted on a pale grey destrier, rode before it. His household knights followed close behind in a glittering procession of chivalric splendour.
“What is he doing?” Martin asked no-one in particular, “what in the name of hellfire is he doing?”
Similar questions were being asked urgently by Prince Edward and his officers. Lord Wenlock galloped over to the duke, and they spent a few moments in hurried conference. He returned and spoke quietly to the prince.
A ball ploughed into the ground just a few yards from Somerset, raising a great spray of mud and stones and causing his horse to buck. He skilfully brought the beast back under control, and raised his lance to signal the advance.
Martin felt like screaming in rage at the idiocy of those he had to follow. This was madness. Somerset had allowed himself to be goaded by the Yorkist fire into quitting the ridge and launching a hare-brained assault.
Nobody, it seemed, was inclined to stop him. Martin looked to the prince, but the young man’s face was set in an inscrutable expression as he watched his battered right flank pour down the slope.
Helpless to influence events, Martin could only pray that the Yorkists were caught unawares.
***
Geoffrey crouched at the edge of the tree-line, looking east towards the plain where the Yorkist army was deployed. Part of his view was obscured by a rising hillock that lay directly between the woods and the plain, but he could see the rear ranks of Gloucester’s division, and hear the sounds of battle.
Not wishing to get too near, he had sent two men to ride onto the hillock and observe the fighting. The rest of his men were spread out either side of him among the trees, waiting for his order to attack.
The thunder of cannon abruptly ceased, followed just moments later by trumpets and the deep-throated roar of hundreds of men committed to the charge.
Even the noise was enough to bring Geoffrey out in a cold sweat. Thank God, he reflected, he had had the presence of mind to suggest to the King that the woods be occupied. He was quite proud of that idea. It had the neat dual advantage of taking him to a place of safety while sounding like clever strategy.
Now the air was full of the din of close-quarter combat, the clatter of weapons and the screams and yells of murderous combat.
He gulped and closed his eyes. His fearful imagination conjured up images of slaughter, of hundreds of terrified men hacking and chopping at each other with hard-forged steel. The mangled bodies of the fallen lying sprawled in the mud, their life’s blood pumping back into the earth from which it sprang.
Geoffrey had witnessed battles before, at Northampton and Saint Albans. He knew the cruel reality that lay behind all the fine notions of chivalry and honour that his noble peers pretended to believe in. Chivalry and honour did not exist, and a battle was nothing greater than an excuse for men to surrender to their most savage impulses.
If the battle went ill, King Edward would expect him to get involved. Geoffrey had not been given command of two hundred spears so they could sit idle in the woods.
With any luck, the battle would be over before his men were needed. Geoffrey had every confidence in King Edward’s superior ability as a soldier, and most of the better Lancastrian captains were either dead or fled.
The sound of fighting was growing ever more desperate. Geoffrey bit back a yelp as hundreds of soldiers suddenly appeared on the north-west edge of the hill. Their standards displayed the Beaufort arms, which were the royal Plantagenet arms inside a blue and white patterned border.
Somerset’s men. Geoffrey watched in mounting horror as they swarmed over the crest of the hill and down the other side, straight into the exposed flank of Gloucester’s division.
Geoffrey would not have credited Somerset, that youthful hothead, with having the imagination to attempt such a clever manoeuvre.
“My lord, we must advance to Gloucester’s aid,” said the captain of the spearmen. He was a burly, experienced soldier, and clearly expected Geoffrey to order an immediate assault.
“Don’t be a fool,” Geoffrey hissed, “can’t you see how many they are? We would be swallowed up.”
The captain’s heavy brows knotted, but he said nothing.
Geoffrey’s scouts on the hill, alarmed by the sudden appearance of thousands of Lancastrians, hurriedly wheeled their horses and galloped back to the trees.
“My lord,” the foremost called out, “the Duke of Gloucester is hard-pressed. His flank is in danger of collapsing if he is not reinforced.”
Then let others reinforce him, was the reply that almost sprang to Geoffrey’s lips.
He could not play the coward here, with so many men watching his every move. If he tarried much longer, with the entire Yorkist left flank in danger of being rolled up, word of it would reach King Edward, and Geoffrey’s life would not be worth a straw.
“Fetch my horse,” he commanded his squire, “we will advance at once. Forward, my lads, for King Edward and Saint George!”
A consummate actor when he chose, Geoffrey knew how to put on a brave show. His brave words rang through the woods. Just for completeness, he drew his sword with a flourish and raised it above his head.
“On, On!” he shouted, straining to make himself heard above the cheers of his men, “we must rescue the Duke of Gloucester! Charge!”
The foremost of his spearmen raked in their spurs and streamed out of the woods. Geoffrey urged on the rest, but made no move towards his own horse.
“Don’t look at me like that, lad,” he said in response to his squire’s cynical expression, “a good commander never puts himself in harm’s way unless absolutely necessary.”
***
Somerset’s assault was working. By some miracle, his horse had retained her footing as she galloped down the obstacle-ridden slope, though one or two of his knig
hts had foundered. His mass of footmen had streamed down after him in a ragged but furious charge, eager to extract revenge for the pounding they had suffered from the Yorkist cannon.
It was only when they slammed into Gloucester’s division that Martin realised that Somerset had more than a wild charge in mind. While he led his knights and the cream of his men-at-arms against Gloucester’s forward line, his billmen swerved to the right and scaled the hill.
There were no Yorkists stationed on the crest to oppose them, and they were able to smash into Gloucester’s flank while his men were desperately fending off Somerset’s frontal assault.
For one elated, heart-stopping moment Martin thought that the Yorkists would break. Gloucester’s standard dipped, but only briefly, and his men could be seen retreating behind the cover of a low hedge at the base of the hill.
The hedge afforded them some respite from the ferocity of the Lancastrians, and the slight figure of the young duke himself was visible, frantically reorganising his men-at-arms into a line behind the barrier.
“Now is your time, my lord. Go to it!”
Martin’s attention was drawn by the sound of Prince Edward’s voice. The prince was speaking to Lord Wenlock, and pointing down the slope at the vicious melee in progress.
Wenlock failed to reply. His face was ashen, and his mouth hung open, making him look like a baffled fish.
“My lord!” Edward said more urgently, “you agreed to lead your men in support of Somerset’s attack. Order the advance!”
Still Wenlock said nothing. Baffled, Edward looked to his other officers for support, but they offered none.
“Please, gentlemen,” Edward said, sounding almost pathetic, “someone must lead our centre in support of Somerset. Must I do it myself?”
One of the lesser lords gathered around him rode forward and seized his bridle. “No, Majesty,” he said firmly, “your lady mother made us vow that you would not risk your person. If you were to fall, our cause is lost.”
Another man cried out in horror and pointed to the south-east, towards the woods on the edge of the battlefield. All eyes swung in that direction. Martin’s heart lurched as he saw horsemen thundering out of the woods, straight towards the unsuspecting Lancastrians embattled with Gloucester’s division.
“Archers!” shouted the prince, waving frantically at the bowmen to his front, “advance down the slope – repel those horsemen!”
It was too late, and none obeyed him anyway. The remainder of the Lancastrian host stood frozen on the ridge while the Yorkist reinforcements crashed into the rear of Somerset’s troops, scattering and spearing them down at will.
Only a stubborn core of Lancastrian men-at-arms stood firm, forming into wedges around the standards of their lords, hacking and thrusting viciously against the Yorkists that swirled all around them. Brave as they were, the effort was hopeless. Somerset’s billmen were fleeing in all directions, and now King Edward was ordering soldiers from his own division into the fray, closing the trap.
Most of the survivors broke and fled towards the Severn. Closely pursued by the victorious horsemen, they were ridden down and butchered on the flat meadows between the hill and Coln Brook.
Martin turned his eyes away from the massacre. With Somerset defeated, the only sensible option was for the rest of the army to attempt a fighting withdrawal north, back towards Tewkesbury.
“Majesty,” he cried, trying to get the prince’s attention, but his voice was not heeded. It was drowned by the screams of the men being killed below, and the conflicting babble of Edward’s officers. All of them, save the mute Lord Wenlock, seemed to be competing to give their master the worst advice possible.
Now the whole of the Yorkist army came to life. With the royal standards to the fore, all three divisions raised a great cheer and started to advance steadily up the slope.
They were met by a pitifully ragged hail of arrows, and a few blasts of gunfire from those Lancastrian artillery crews that had not already quit the field. Here and there a Yorkist fell, skewered by an arrow or knocked over by a lucky ball, but it was nowhere near enough to impede that grim, purposeful tide of flesh and steel.
For the first time in his life, Martin set eyes on the usurper. Edward of March was advancing on foot at the head of his knights in the Yorkist central division, a gigantic figure, almost godlike in his rich armour and golden crown, carrying a huge battle-axe that looked to have ten pounds of steel in its head. The contrast with Henry VI, who even in his prime had never cut an impressive figure, could not have been greater.
Martin’s hatred for the usurper blazed like fire inside him. For a second or two he contemplated breaking ranks and charging down the slope, careless of riding to his death. He had expected to meet it here anyway. At least, before the Yorkists cut him down, he would have a chance of reaching Edward and striking a blow that would resound through Christendom.
Then he remembered. If he threw his life away, who would protect Elizabeth and her mother? James might, but where was he? Martin had not seen him since before the battle started.
“Damn them!” he shouted, referring to his brothers. They had both left him, the youngest and last of the Bolton men, to shoulder responsibilities he did not want.
Prince Edward’s officers were now pawing at their master’s reins, trying to persuade him to leave the field.
“The battle is lost, Majesty,” one of them insisted. “We must get you out before the enemy gains the ridge.”
Edward turned on him with a calm pride Martin could not help but admire.
“You lie, fool,” he said, “if you say we can be conquered while yet I live.”
Martin recognised these words from his childhood, when his mother had read him tales of chivalry. Whether consciously or no, Edward was deliberately repeating the words of his illustrious ancestor, Edward of Woodstock, at the Battle of Poitiers over a century ago.
The comparison between them was tragic in its pathos. Edward of Woodstock had been one of the best and bravest soldiers his dynasty had produced, while this callow princeling was a mere sprig of the same mighty tree.
“Guards, follow me,” the prince shouted, drawing his sword, “we will meet our enemies to their faces and hurl them back to London. If not, at least we can make such an end, as will be worth a ballad.”
He flushed with rage as his officers failed to meet his eye.
“Cowards!” he yelled, his voice breaking into a sob, “traitors! You have taken my pay and eaten my bread, and this is how you serve me? Fie on you all, would you have me stand against the power of York alone?”
Shaking his head, Martin looked again to Lord Wenlock, hoping the old soldier had broken out of his funk. Even now, with the Yorkists flooding up the slope, something might be salvaged if the Lancastrians threw every man into a counter-attack.
Wenlock was deep in the throes of a furious row with Somerset, who had managed to extricate himself from the slaughter of his division. The young duke, bareheaded and with blood pouring from a gash on his cheek, was screaming into Wenlock’s face and demanding to know why his advance had gone unsupported.
Wenlock’s reply was slow in coming, and Somerset had no patience to hear it. He raised his axe, speckled with Yorkist blood, and struck at the other man’s head.
Wenlock was bowled off his horse. The contents of his shattered brain-pan watered the earth as he fell. He crashed onto his back and lay stone dead, his head a gory mess, one foot still caught in its stirrup.
“Well done, my lord,” Martin shouted at Somerset, “what need have we of Yorkists, when we can just as easily murder each other?”
The duke might have taken exception to Martin’s insolence, but he appeared frozen with shock at what he had just done. He stared dumbly at the axe in his hand, dirtied with Wenlock’s blood and brains.
Everywhere the Lancastrian army was crumbling. Men ignored the shouts of their lords and captains, cast down their weapons and fled back towards the open ground south of Tewkesbury.
The Earl of Devon rode the length of the Lancastrian battle-line, exhorting men to stand firm, but his words fell on fallow ground.
The Yorkists had gained the ridge, and made quick work of the few brave souls that tried to oppose them. A band of Gloucester’s men-at-arms spotted Prince Edward’s banner, still flying in the middle of the disintegrating Lancastrian line, and stormed towards it.
Edward’s officers tried to form a protective ring around him, but the youth was determined to die well. He dismounted, drew his sword and burst through them, yelling “Lancaster, God for King Henry and Lancaster!”
He sprinted at the Yorkists, his fair hair shining like burnished gold.
Duty and friendship impelled Martin to follow, but his courage failed. Demoralised by two shattering defeats in succession and the wanton folly of his leaders, he hesitated, and thus was a hapless spectator as the prince died.
Edward had been well-trained by his instructors, but sparring in an exercise yard was different to real combat. He skilfully parried the sword of the first Yorkist he encountered, and aimed a blow at the man’s helm.
Even as he struck, another Yorkist stepped forward and rammed the point of a sawn-off lance into Edward’s unprotected crotch.
The prince shrieked in unspeakable agony. He doubled over, blood pouring down the inside of his thighs. A battle-axe clanged against the back of his helm, denting the steel, and he fell onto his front. There he lay in the mud, defenceless and feebly coughing red-flecked phlegm as his enemies closed in around him.
Axes and swords and pole-arms thrashed and clanged against his armour. He tried to reach for his fallen sword, but someone stamped on his arm and a halberd sheared off three of his fingers.
Edward’s dying cries resounded inside Martin’s skull, and would forever find echoes in his nightmares.
***
James had watched the battle from the safety of the rear. As one with no armour or direct experience of war, there was little point risking his person, and from here he could keep an eye on his sister and niece.
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