In the endless warfare of the Borders the second of two short-lived periods of truce had just expired, and an organised raid on a large scale was arranged by the Scots. The main body was to ravage Cumberland; and a smaller, but picked force led by Earls Douglas, Moray, and March came southward by way of Northumberland. But Northumbrian towers and towns knew nothing of their passing; they marched rapidly and by stealth into Durham, having crossed the Tyne between Corbridge and Bywell, and began to harry and lay waste the greener pastures and richer villages of the southern county, the smoke of whose burning homesteads was the first intimation to the unlucky English of the fact that a Scottish host was in their midst.
The Earl of Northumberland remained at Alnwick in the hope that he might be able to attack the Scots on their homeward journey; but he despatched his sons Henry Hotspur and Ralph in all haste to defend Newcastle. The Scots in due time appeared before the walls.
And he marched up to Newcastel
And rode it round about;
“O wha’s the lord o’ this castel?
Or wha’s the lady o’t?”
But up spake proud Lord Percy then,
And O but he spake hie!
“I am the lord o’ this castel,
My wife’s the lady gay.”
Douglas challenged Percy to meet him in single combat, and Percy promptly accepted. In the duel Percy was unhorsed, and Douglas captured his pennon and his gauntlet gloves, embroidered with the Percy lion in pearls. This trophy Douglas vowed he would carry off to Scotland with him, and set it in the topmost tower of his castle of Dalkeith, that it might be seen from afar. “By heaven! that you never shall,” replied Percy; “you shall not carry it out of Northumberland.” “Come and take it, then,” was Douglas’ answer; and Hotspur would have attempted its recovery there and then, but he was restrained by his knights. Douglas, however, said he would give Percy a chance to recover it, and agreed to await him at Otterburn.
“Yet I will stay at Otterbourne,
Where you shall welcome be;
And if ye come not at three dayis end,
A fause lord I’ll call thee”
Next day the Scots left Newcastle and marched northward. They took Sir Aymer de Athol’s castle of Ponte-land, and the good knight Sir Aymer himself, and went on their way, harrying and burning as they went. At Otterburn they halted, and rested all night, making huts for themselves of boughs and branches. The spot they had chosen was a strong one, on the site of a former British camp; and not only was it surrounded by trees, but was near marshy ground as well. Next day they attempted to take Otterburn tower, but without success.
Meanwhile word was brought to Hotspur that the Scots would spend the night at Otterburn; and he, without waiting for Walter de Skirlaw, Bishop of Durham, who was expected that evening with a strong force, at once set off with 600 spearmen, and a force on foot which is variously given as anything from 800 to 8,000. They covered the thirty-odd miles by the time evening fell: and as the Scots were at supper in their little huts, they were startled by a tumult amongst their grooms and camp-followers, and cries of “a Percy! a Percy!” and the Englishmen were among them. The Scottish leaders had placed their camp-followers and servants at the outermost; part of their encampment, facing the Newcastle road; and Hotspur’s force, ignorant of this, mistook it for the main camp. While they were thus engaged, the Scottish knights were enabled to make a detour around the scene of the first attack, and take the English in the rear. With loud shouts of “Douglas! Douglas!” they fell upon them, and a fierce hand-to-hand struggle began. The moon rose clear and bright, and the quiet evening air was filled with the din of battle, the ring of steel on steel, the crash of axe on armour, the groans of the wounded, and the battle-cries of the combatants on each side. Sir Ralph Percy, pressing too rashly forward, was captured by a newly-made Scottish knight, Sir John Maxwell. The battle was turning in favour of Hotspur, when Douglas sent his silken banner to the front and with renewed shouts of “Douglas!” the Scots pressed forward and overbore their foes. According to Froissart, there was not a man there, knight, squire, or groom, who played the coward. “This bataylle was one of the sorest and best foughten without cowards or faynte hearts; for there was neither knight nor I squire but that did his devoyre and foughte hande to hande.” Great deeds were done, and the fame of none amongst them is greater than that of the gallant Widdrington;
“For Witherington my heart is woe,
That ever he slaine sholde be!
For when his legs were hewn in two
He knelt and fought on his knee”
Douglas rushed into the thickest of the fray, and Hotspur tried to find him, but in the dim light that was difficult, especially as Douglas had, in his haste, come to the fight without helmet or breastplate. Presently he was borne to the ground by three English spears; and as he lay guarded by his faithful chaplain, Sir John and Sir Walter Sinclair, with Sir James Lindsay, came upon him. “How fare you, cousin?” asked Sir John. “But poorly, I thank God,” answered Douglas; “for few of my ancestors died in bed or chamber. I count myself dead, for my heart beats slow. Think now to avenge me. Raise my banner and shout ‘Douglas!’ and let neither my friends nor my foes know of my state, lest the one rejoice and the other be discomforted.” His dying commands were obeyed; and while his battle-cry was raised anew, his dead body was laid by a “bracken bush,” and the fact of his death concealed from friend and foe alike. The furious onslaught of the Scots now carried all before them; and Hotspur fell a captive to the sword of Sir Hugh Montgomery, a nephew of Douglas, after a fierce hand-to-hand encounter. The two chief English leaders being captured, the day, or rather the night, was with the Scots, in fulfilment of an old prophesy that “a dead Douglas should win a field.”
“This deed was done at Otterbourne
At the breaking of the day;
Earl Douglas was buried at the braken bush,
And the Percy led captive away.”