Sites & Memories of "Battles Long Ago" page 2

With levelled spears the Scottish left wing, under Huntly and Home, rushed with such fury on the English right, under Sir Edmund Howard, that it was almost instantly overpowered and beaten back in a state of rout. But Lord Decies' advance with the reserve of men-at-arms checked Huntly's progress, while Home's wild Borderers scattered over the field to plunder the slain and wounded. Howard, thus reinforced, turned his attention to another Scottish division, led by the Earls of Crawford and Montrose, which he defeated after a stern and protracted contest.

On the Scottish right, commanded by the Earls of Argyll and Lennox, the Highland clans suffered severely from the galling fire of the archers of Cheshire and Lancashire. Although commanded to maintain their positions, they rushed forward impetuously with wild Celtic war cries. The impact was terrific, but the Englishmen of the northwestern counties stood firm, and after tremendous slaughter on both sides the Celts of the West were routed and dispersed.

Meanwhile, the centres of both hosts, commanded by King James and Surrey respectively, were locked in a dubious and titanic struggle, in which all discipline was entirely thrown aside. The Scottish monarch and his knights, who had dismounted before the charge, fought on foot surrounded by their spearmen, and so overwhelming was the force of their repeated assaults that the English centre was at one time practically broken and Surrey's banner almost captured. But at this critical juncture the left flank of the Scottish centre was assailed by Lord Decies and Admiral Howard. Surrounded by a much superior force, for the Highlanders and Borderers had now entirely dispersed, the Scots formed a ring round their king, composed principally of the nobility and gentry and the Lowland spearmen, and fought on obstinately till darkness fell.

In the morning Lord Home's division still occupied the field, but the centre had retreated to Scotland. Neither army was equal to further hostilities, for the English host had lost quite as many men as the Scottish, though by no means of equal rank. The aristocracy of the northern kingdom had fallen almost to a man round their quixotic monarch, whose body was discovered on the field disfigured by countless wounds and with the head almost severed. It was embalmed and taken to London, where it long remained unburied in Sheen Palace.

Field heath and watercourse mingle to-day in bleak and unfertile panorama, the rather dreary foreground to a richer hinterland, where the rout of Pinkie ended the "rough wooing" of an English boy king for the hand of a Scottish girl queen. The Scottish Estates had decreed that "our lass," the little Mary, should not wed "their lad," the young King Edward VI. Thereupon the Protector, Somerset, resolved on war, and invaded Scotland with an army of about 15,000 men, supported by a fleet. On the evening of September 8, 1547, the English encamped near Prestonpans within sight of the Scottish army, commanded by the Regent Arran, which lay at Edmonstone Edge, about three miles distant. Early next morning a cavalry skirmish, disastrous to the lightly-mounted and armed Scots, took place, and after this affair Somerset took up his position on the eminence on which the church of Inveresk now stands.

On the morning of the 10th the Protector marshalled his forces into three divisions, and these, on advancing, were met by the Scottish army, also arrayed in three great hosts. Galled by the English artillery, the Scots moved to the right, with the object of gaming Faside Brae, near the grounds of Old Pinkie House, executing the manoeuvre at extraordinary speed. An English movement to check this stratagem caused the Scottish vanguard to halt and form into phalanx, and the English cavalry, charging the almost impenetrable ranks of the spearmen, and impeded by the ploughed soil they crossed, were thrown into inextricable confusion.

But the English archers and artillery took up the argument and began to play upon the serried ranks of the schiltroms with great effect.

The English infantry now attacked, and it seemed as if the Scottish advance guard would be cut off. In order to avoid this, they began to retire in perfect order to the main body. But the Highland forces which accompanied the Scottish army, and who had been previously thrown into disorder by the artillery fire of their opponents, to which they were unaccustomed, mistook this movement for a retreat, and began to disperse rapidly in all directions. The panic spread to the centre, composed of troops from the Scottish burghs, and though at a considerable distance from the English front, these threw down their weapons and fled in the utmost confusion. The vanguard, finding itself deserted, also broke up, and a rout ensued. The English cavalry, exasperated by their previous reverse, spurred after the defenceless fugitives and cut or speared them down by hundreds as they ran toward Edinburgh or Leith. The pursuit lasted for five hours, and English records state that fourteen thousand Scots were butchered on that terrible Saturday morning.

Sedgemoor, the last battle fought on English soil, arose out of the attempt of Mon-mouth, the supposed natural son of Charles II, to obtain the crown, which he considered his by right. Landing from Holland at Lyme Regis, then a clump of narrow alleys built of blue rag-stone, and with a pier of unhewn stones named the Cobb dating from Plantagenet times, Monmouth, with about eighty men at his back, marched into the village with sword drawn on a June morning in 1688 and was rapturously received. By the time he reached Chard, in Somersetshire, he had a following of some 8,000 horse, and his declaration of an enthusiastic Protestantism daily added troops to his standard. Advancing on Bridgwater, he was proclaimed king there amid acclamations.

Marching to Bristol, which he found impregnably defended, he turned his attention to Bath, which, however, was equally well guarded. At Frome-Selwood he learned that the Earl of Feversham was marching against him, and that the local militias were gathering. The first shots were exchanged at Norton St. Philip, where Monmouth defeated his half-brother, the Duke of Grafton, who only escaped because of his close resemblance to the invader.

Feversham's army now encamped on Sedgemoor, in Somersetshire, then a dreary waste of meadow and fenny marshes, but now a rich expanse of cornfield and orchard, watered by the river Parret. Around this vast swamp Saxon, Celt and Dane had battled in former days, but in Monmouth's time only a partial reclamation of the land had been effected. Contrary to general opinion, Monmouth was no military dilettante but, though young, a leader of considerable experience in Scotland and elsewhere. But now the very Scots of whom he had previous knowledge were arrayed against him in the shape of Dumbarton's regiment, and were, in the event, to resolve his fate.

Desperate and disillusioned, the handsome Stuart boy resolved on a night action, and at eleven o'clock of a dim moonlight night, July 5, when the marsh was wrapped in thick fog, marched silently through the low rolling vapours to his destruction. In long and slender columns he defiled across the Black Ditch by a slippery causeway of rough stones. But his guide bungled, a pistol snapped, and the Royal Army immediately stirred to action. Monmouth's cavalry ran sheer into the Horse Guards at the Bussex Rhine, and almost instantly met with defeat. Monmouth, pressing at their backs with his pikemen, was brought up at a round turn by the fatal ditch. But his peasantry stood up courageously to the best cavalry in Europe, and made some havoc, only the Dumbarton Regiment and the Grenadier Guards standing their ground. Then thundered up the Life Guards and Oxford Blues from Zoyland, and though Monmouth bravely sought to rally his fighting shiremen, who held out for three hours against all that Feversham's professional troops could do, the artillery ended the argument at dawn, and the pikes and scythes sank beneath the iron storm.

One thousand of the rebels were killed on the spot, and 1,500 were taken prisoner. Monmouth, with other leaders, fled over the Mendips to the New Forest, hoping to reach the coast. But at midnight he was captured near Ringwood, in Hampshire, his beard turned prematurely grey Next day a long line of gibbets appeared on the road to Bridgwater, each with its prisoner, a work ably continued by Jeffries and his "Bloody Assize."