Wulf the Saxon: A Story of the Norman Conquest

by G. A. Henty

There was yet a long ride before them. Following the Severn on its western side so as to avoid the passage of the Avon, they rode to Worcester, and then up through Dudley and Shrewsbury.

It would have been shorter to have passed through Hereford and Ludlow, but Harold feared that they might there come upon some marauding party of the Welsh, and any of these who escaped might carry the news across the border, when the fleet-footed mountaineers would quickly have conveyed it to the Welsh king at his castle at Rhuddlaw. Rhuddlaw, now a small village, is situated in Denbighshire, and was an important military position, situated as it was at no great distance from the sea, and commanding the Vale of Clwyd, the most important avenue into Wales from the north. From Shrewsbury they pushed forward as rapidly as possible to Rhuddlaw; but quickly as they had journeyed, the news of their coming was borne more rapidly. Griffith received the news an hour before their arrival, and mounting, rode down to the Avon and embarked on board ship.

Great was the disappointment of the earl and his followers when they found that the object of their long march across England had failed, and that the capture of the Welsh king, which would have put an end to the trouble, had been missed so narrowly. The castle was at once set on fire, the Welsh ships on the Avon were also given to the flames, and the very same day Harold led his troops away and by easy marches took them back to Gloucester. Here they halted. The housecarls from the south, who had never been in contact with the Welsh, were inclined to murmur among themselves at having been led back without striking a blow, but the contingents from the western counties, who had had experience of this wild warfare, told them that they might consider themselves fortunate.

"You know not what a war with these savages is," an old housecarl who had fought them again and again said to a listening group of Wulf's men. "You might as well fight with the evil spirits of the air as with them. Fight! there is no fighting in it, save when they have with them Danes from the North, or Norwegians. With these to bear the brunt of the battle the Welsh will fight valiantly in their fashion, but alone they know that they cannot withstand us for a moment. I have been after them a score of times, and it is a night-mare. You go up hills and through forests, you plunge into morasses, you scramble up precipices; you are wet, you are hungry, you are worn out, but never do you catch sight of one of them.

"Now and then, as you wind along the face of a hill, rocks will come thundering down; in the woods and swamps you hear their mocking yells and laughter. At the end of the day you drop down where you halt, and then just as you fall off to sleep there is a wild yell, and in a moment they are swarming among you, slashing and ripping with their long knives, crawling on the ground and springing upon you, getting among the horses and hamstringing or cutting them open. By the time those of you that are alive have got together they have gone, and all is so quiet that were it not for the scattered bodies you might believe that it was all a dream. Two or three times before morning the attack will be repeated, until you are forced to keep under arms in military array. As soon as it is light you recommence your march, and so it goes on day after day, until at last, worn-out and spent, and less in strength by half than when you started, you gather under the shelter of the walls of one of the border towns.

"I should have been glad indeed if we had caught their king, for if he had been held hostage in London we might have had peace; but well content am I that Harold has abstained from entering upon a campaign which, terrible as it is even in summer, would be beyond endurance of the strongest in winter."

"Well, for my part," Osgod, who was one of the listeners, remarked, "I would rather go on by myself and take the chance of getting a good blow at some of these wild men than ride all the way back to Steyning to be laughed at by the women there, as brave soldiers who have marched across England and back and never unsheathed their swords. Nor will I believe that Earl Harold can intend so to make a laughing-stock of us. The Bretons were just as active as are these Welshmen, but he brought them to reason there, and I warrant me he will do the same here. At any rate, he seems in no hurry to move. We have been here nigh a week already, and why should he keep us here if we are not to be employed?"

It was not very long before it became known that Harold had no intention of marching away and leaving the Welsh unpunished, and that in the spring a campaign on a great scale was to be undertaken against them. The thanes of all the western counties were ordered to hold themselves in readiness to join with their levies in the spring. The Somerset and Devon men were to gather at Bristol, and thence to be conveyed by ships to the southern coast of Wales; the troops at Gloucester were to march west, and Tostig was to bring down a body of Northumbrian horse, and to enter Wales from Chester. The housecarls, to their surprise, were ordered to lay aside their ringed armour and heavy helmets, in place of which leather jerkins and caps were served out to them; their heavy axes were to be left behind, and they were to trust to the sword alone. They were to abandon the tactics in which they had been trained of fighting shoulder to shoulder, with shield overlapping shield, and were to exercise themselves in running and climbing, in skirmishing with an imaginary foe, and rapidly gathering in close formation to resist anticipated attack. Harold himself gave them these instructions.

"You will have no foe to meet breast to breast," he said; "if we are to conquer and to root out these hornets it must be by showing ourselves even more active than they are. Speed and activity go for everything in a war like this, while our own methods of fighting are absolutely useless. Unless we make an end of this matter you may be called away from your homes once a year to repel these attacks, while if you conquer now there will be no Welsh foray again during your lifetime. Therefore it is worth while to make a great effort, and for once to lay aside our own method of fighting. Your commanders will see that all the exercises are well carried out, and will report to me regarding those who show most zeal and energy. Extra pay will be given to all, and I shall know how to reward those who are reported to me as most deserving of it."

The troops set to work with great energy, and soon recognized the advantage they gained by laying aside their heavy arms and armour. Swimming, running, and climbing were practised incessantly, and when May arrived, and with it the time for the commencement of the campaign, all felt confident of their ability to cope with the Welsh in their own methods of warfare.