A meadow rather in the rear of the Lancastrian position, but lying on the westward side of the turnpike road, half a mile from Tewkesbury, and within a few hundred yards of the Tewkesbury union workhouse, is called the Bloody Meadow; it belongs to Miss Shapland, and is tenanted by Mr. William Trotman, innkeeper and farmer; and an idea is generally entertained, that it derived its name from the slaughter of many of the fugitives, who fled from the battle towards the meadow, probably in hopes of getting over the Severn, as there is a ford and ferry called Lower Lode, near it. On the 27th of May, 1856, when I last visited the field of battle, a husbandman who was at work in the garden of Gupshill Farm, informed me, that when he was working a few years ago in a field near Lower Lode Ferry, in the immediate neighbourhood of the Bloody Meadow, he found a quantity of horses bones, and a considerable number of horseshoes in the ground there. Mr. William Trotman informed me, that fourteen or fifteen years ago, he found in the Bloody Meadow a long piece of iron, which from its appearance, he believed had been part of a sword-blade. He also showed me a cannon ball of small size, weighing one pound six ounces, which had been dug up in the same meadow. [153a]
Besides the importance which we may fairly attach to tradition, and to the name “Margaret’s Camp,” it is very remarkable how many strong proofs are afforded, by the works of the ancient annalists and chroniclers, that the before-mentioned spot, contiguous to the high road from Tewkesbury to Cheltenham and Gloucester, was the place where the battle was fought.
We know from one of the old writers, [153b] that Edward advanced by the road from Cheltenham towards Tewkesbury. The spot above mentioned, is on that road, on a slight eminence, which was the best position near Tewkesbury, that could have been selected by an army, with a view to giving battle to Edward’s forces, on their advance from Cheltenham.
We are also told by one of our old chroniclers, with reference to the position selected by Somerset, that he “so fyxed in a fayre parke adioning to the towne he pytched hys felde;” [153c] and we learn from another of them, that the position occupied by the Lancastrians, was, “even hard at the Town’s end.” [a/][153b] The field called Margaret’s Camp, may be very correctly said to be “adjoining to the towne,” for it is only one mile from it by the turnpike road, and is in fact “at the Town’s end,” because it is little more than half a mile in a direct line from the outskirts of the town.
We also find from the same authority, that “the Lancastrians had the town and abbey at their backs.” [154a] This also tallies precisely with the position already described, as being occupied by them, as the abbey is visible from it; and the town and abbey must of necessity, be in their rear [“at their backs”], when they faced an enemy advancing towards Tewkesbury from Cheltenham.
The field is stated in Warkworth’s Chronicle to be “not ferre from the ryver of Severne.” [154b] That account is also very important, for the place is not more than about half a mile from the river Severn.
Leland, in his Itinerary, [154c] in adverting to the battle, uses the following remarkable expression:—“Edwardus Princeps Henric VI filius venit cum exercitu ad Theokesbury, & intravit campum nomine Gastum,” &c., and again, “Nomina occisorum in bello Gastiensis prope Theokesbury,” &c. I have already mentioned that upon part of the elevated ground before noticed, and at the back of the union workhouse, near Tewkesbury, and very near the spot called Margaret’s Camp, there is a place called “the Gastons”; and after allowing for the difference in spelling at the time when Leland wrote, it can scarcely admit of a doubt, that the latter was the place which he meant, when, in adverting to the battle, he used the expression—“campum nomine Gastum,” and “in bello Gastiensis prope Theokesbury.” [154d]
We are also informed by one of the old historians, that many of the Lancastrians were drowned at “a mill in the meadow fast by the town.” [154e] This must certainly have been the Abbey Water-mills, which (although at present, in a great degree, rebuilt and altered) still stand in the meadow close to the town, in the rear of the Lancastrians, and in a place where it is almost certain that some of the fugitives from the battle, trying to escape towards the Avon and the Severn, would pass.
It is also a well-authenticated historical fact, which has not been disputed by any author, that the Duke of Somerset, John Longstrother the Lord Prior of St. John’s, Sir Thomas Tresham, Sir Gervase Clifton, and other knights and esquires, when the battle was lost, fled to the Abbey of Tewkesbury, and other places in the town. The distance was, as already mentioned, only about half a mile from the rear of the Lancastrian position to the Abbey Church and town; and if Margaret’s forces had not awaited the approach of, and given battle to, the Yorkists on the southward side of Tewkesbury, or, in other words, on the side of the town which the Yorkists must naturally approach on the road from Cheltenham, and with the abbey and the town in the rear of the Lancastrians, it would have been utterly impossible for the fugitives to have fled either to the abbey or town.