Yorkshire Battles

by Edward Lamplough

This loss was severely felt by the English, and was bitterly resented by King Edward. It was followed by a dreadful invasion of the northern provinces of England, when Northallerton, Boroughbridge, and Skipton-in-Craven were committed to the flames, and Ripon only secured immunity from a similar visitation by the payment of a ransom of one thousand marks. The unhappy people were utterly without protection, and the Scots leisurely returned to their own country, driving their miserable captives before them “like flocks of sheep.”

Involved with his barons in those wretched complications which embittered his reign, Edward the II. was so mortified by the loss of Berwick, that he hastily came to an arrangement with the malcontents, and raising his banner prepared to invade Scotland, and attempt the recovery of the town and fortress which had so suddenly passed out of his possession.

The royal army assembled at Newcastle in the month of July, and, being very strong, Edward was hopeful of bringing the expedition to a successful termination. No measure was omitted for the securing of the object in view, and a powerful fleet from the Cinque ports followed the army with supplies of stores and warlike material. The walls of the fortress being so low that the warriors at the base could exchange stroke of lance with the defenders of the ramparts, Edward prepared to carry the place by assault, no doubt remembering the feat of his great sire in 1296, when he rode his good steed Bayard over ditch and wall, and commenced the work of pitiless slaughter with his own strong right hand.

Bruce, equally determined to retain the place, had appointed his gallant son-in-law, Walter, the high-steward of Scotland, to the command of the town and castle. The garrison was reinforced by 500 volunteers, all gentlemen, friends and relations of the steward. Provisions to serve for a year having been laid up, the gallant Scots awaited the course of events.

However sanguine Edward of Cærnarvon may have been, he certainly exhibited all reasonable prudence before Berwick, and, before commencing active operations, caused his camp to be strongly fortified. When the hour of attack arrived, the valiant Scots who manned the walls of Berwick found they had a double danger to meet, as the English mariners were bringing up one of their largest ships, which was crowded with soldiers, who clung to the masts, rigging, and spars, ready to leap upon the ramparts, as soon as the sailors brought up alongside the walls, and got the vessel in position with their grappling irons. As the vessel drew near, gleaming with steel, and presenting a most formidable appearance, she suddenly took the ground, and in a moment all was confusion, the mariners straining every nerve to get her off into deep water again. All these attempts proving in vain, and as the vessel lay stranded at ebb-tide, she was set on fire by the Scots, and consumed, to the great elation of the garrison, and equally to the disgust of the English.

While this exciting incident was being enacted, Edward was furiously assaulting the town from the land, sending his fierce stormers, who were abundantly supplied with scaling ladders, to the attack by thousands, and covering their advance by the incessant discharge of his archers, whose long and deadly shafts swept the ramparts like a hail-storm. But the Scots met the storm with indomitable bravery, fringing their walls with glittering pikes, hurling down showers of missiles upon the enemy, casting down their ladders, and sending their heavy axes through the iron skull-caps of the stormers before they could make good their foot-hold upon the ramparts. After long hours of stubborn and sanguinary toil, Edward withdrew his troops to the shelter of their entrenchments, and both parties rested after their severe and exhausting toil: but at the base of the walls, and upon the bloody ramparts many brave men slept their long death-sleep.

Untamed by their repulse, the English soldiers prepared to renew their efforts, and set to work upon the construction of a huge military machine called a “Sow”: this was framed of solid timber, and moved upon heavy rollers, the roof sloping and affording an efficient protection to the soldiers who toiled with pick and spade beneath its cover, intent upon undermining the walls of the beleaguered hold. The “Sow” was especially dangerous to the Scots in the present case, for the whole length of the walls being exposed to repeated assaults, they were so completely outnumbered that they were unable to spare any considerable number of men to guard against its action, and should once a breach be effected in the walls it would be impossible to arrest the pressure of Edward’s stormers, who kept the hardy Scots fully employed even while their ramparts were intact.

When the English engineers levelled the ground, and wheeled the heavy machine against the walls, and the miners were waiting, pick in hand, to fall to work, the contending warriors awaited the result with equal anxiety and interest. Berwick was indebted for its safety to the labours of a Flemish engineer named John Crab, who had prepared a huge catapult for the purpose of hurling heavy missiles against the terrible “Sow,” and, as it approached the wall, he discharged a huge mass of rock against it. The flight of the missile was regarded with the utmost interest by both parties, but it failed to strike the machine, and a second discharge was equally inoperative, and the “Sow” now drew near the walls, amid the exulting shouts of the besiegers; but Crab had now obtained a better idea of the power of his catapult, and, calculating the distance to a nicety, sent a large piece of rock upon the mid-roof of the doomed “Sow.” The massive stone went thundering and crashing through the solid timber, and, as cries of rage and dismay burst from the English troops, the miners came rushing wildly from the ruined machine, and sought to gain the trenches, while the Scots sent their arrows and missiles after them, exclaiming, in grim mockery and exultation, “Behold, the English sow has farrowed!”

The Scots were inspired by their success, the English aggravated by repeated disappointments and repulses, and the conflict necessarily waxed fiercer, Crab working his military engines with great vigour, hurling showers of missiles upon the assailants, and giving the unlucky “Sow” its coup de grace in the form of a quantity of blazing and highly inflammable material, which quickly set it on fire. Amid the tumult of the assault it continued to burn, sending up showers of sparks and dense volumes of smoke, until it was reduced to ashes.