King Olaf's Kinsman / A Story of the Last Saxon Struggle against the Danes in the Days of Ironside and Cnut

by Charles W. Whistler

After that we knew that a hard fight was before us, and the king bade us sleep and take what rest we might. Then, very early, came men to say that the Sudbury folk had come, and Olaf and I went down to the village to meet them. Close on two hundred men had come with Prat, the son of the sheriff of Sudbury, at their head, and they were not to be despised, for they were sturdy spearmen, and many had mail, though the most wore the stout leathern jerkin that will turn a sword cut well enough.

And Prat asked that they should have the first place in the fight, seeing that they fought for their own land.

"That is the place of my own ship's crew," said Olaf, "nor will they be denied it. Now shall you fight under Redwald, your own thane, and he will have the next place to me."

That pleased both them and me well, and after that Olaf sent me on as advance guard, for we knew the country.

We were nine hundred strong in all, and when I took my men to the hilltop I met a man who said that the Danes mustered some fifteen hundred strong. There were Anglian Danes there besides thingmen. But Olaf had said that we would fight two to one if necessary, and so I held on; he would send after me if he would make any change in his plans when he heard this. It was well that we had settled with the Sudbury force already or we should have had them to deal with besides.

We left Bures hill and went down the steep valley beyond it, and I thought that the Danes might wait for us in the wood that is on the opposite slope. But there were none, and we came out on the open ground that stretches away in a fairly level upland for many a mile northward and eastward before us. There I waited, for we needed no advance guard beyond these last woodlands. One could see to the dip that is by Leavenheath, and there the Danes would be. And indeed across the open rode a few men in that direction, and I knew that they were scouts who would take the news of our coming; but they were too far away to be stopped even had I wished to do so. Olaf would not be led far from Bures and the river, but would have the foe come to him.

So we stayed just beyond the cover, and the bustards ran across the heath as we roused them, and the larks sprung up and sang overhead, and the blackbirds called their alarm notes in the copse behind us, and the men talked of these things and pointed at the rabbits that sat up to look at us before they fled, as if there were no fighting at hand; for indeed I think that one notes all these well-known things more plainly when one's mind is strung up and over watchful, as it will be before somewhat great that is looked for.

Then came Olaf at the head of his men, and as he came I saw the first sparkle of armour across the heath under the sun, for the Danes were in array, and were coming up to the level ground over which we looked.

And when Olaf saw that his face grew bright with the joy of battle in a good cause, and his hand went to his sword while he looked quickly round for the place that he would choose. Nor was he long in choosing, for he led us but a furlong from the cover's edge, and there drew us up in a half circle, with the hollow towards the cover and our horsemen on the flanks, so that the greater force could not outflank us, while we had the wood in our rear. So if one half of the curved line was forced back it would but drive us closer together, back to back, and at the worst we could not be followed into the cover except by scattered men who would be of no account.

Now the strongest part of our curved line was in the centre, and there stood Olaf's mailed shipmen, and behind them my English spearmen. That place they liked not at first, till the king told them carefully what he would have them do at the first charge of horsemen for which he looked, for now it was plain that many of the Danes were mounted.