The
Battle of Bosworth Field
Primary
& Contemporary Sources
From Bennett,
Michael, The Battle of Bosworth, reprinted by kind permission
of the author. HTML markup by Judie C. Gall.
I. Government
Sources and Common Intelligence
DATE: 22-3
August, 1485. AUTHOR: King and council. TEXT: Tudor Royal
Proclamations, Vol. I. The Early Tudors (1485-1553), ed.
P.L. Hughes and J.P. Larkin (New Haven, 1964), p. 3. (English;
spelling modernized.)
'And moreover,
the king ascertaineth you that Richard duke of Gloucester, late
called King Richard, was slain at a place called Sandeford, within
the shire of Leicester, and brought dead off the field unto the
town of Leicester, and there was laid openly, that every man might
see and look upon him. And also there was slain upon the same
field, John late duke of Norfolk, John late earl of Lincoln, Thomas,
late earl of Surrey, Francis Viscount Lovell, Sir Walter Devereux,
Lord Ferrers, Richard Radcliffe, knight, Robert Brackenbury, knight,
with many other knights, squires and gentlemen, of whose souls
God have mercy.' [Back to Contemporary
and Tudor Accounts]
DATE: 23
August. AUTHOR: Mayor and aldermen of York. TEXT: York City Archives,
House Book, B2-4, f.169v. (Also printed in Extracts from the
Municipal Records of the City of York during the Reigns of Edward
IV, Edward V, and Richard III, ed. R. Davies (London, 1843),
pp. 218, 217. (English; spelling modernized.)
Memorandum
of meeting in council chamber on the Vigil of St Bartholomew,
'where it was shown by divers persons, and especially by John
Sponer, sent unto the field of Redemore to bring tidings of the
same to the city, that King Richard, late mercifully reigning
upon us, was through great treason of the duke of Norfolk and
many others that turned against him, with many other lords and
nobles of this north parts, was piteously slain and murdered,
to the great heaviness of this city.'
There is
also a summary record of the battle at 'Redemore near Leicester'.
It is followed by information obviously derived from the king's
proclamation, though a clerk has later crossed through the names
of three lords (Lincoln, Surrey and Lovell) who had been wrongly
reported dead. [Back to Contemporary and
Tudor Accounts]
DATE: November,
1485. AUTHOR: King and council. TEXT: "Rotuli Parliamentarium,"
ed. J. Strachey, 6 vols.(London, 1767-83), VI, p. 176. (English;
spelling modernized.)
The act of
attainder records that 'Richard, late duke of Gloucester, calling
and naming himself, by ursurpation, King Richard the Third.' John
late duke of Norfolk, Thomas earl of Surrey, Francis Viscount
Lovell, Walter Devereux late Lord Ferrers, John Lord Zouche, Robert
Harrington, Richard Charlton, Richard Radcliffe, William Berkeley
of Weobley, Robert Brackenbury, Thomas Pilkington, Robert Middleton,
James Harrington, knights, Walter Hopton, William Catesby, Roger
Wake, William Sapcote, Humphrey Stafford, William Clerk of Wenlock,
Geoffrey St German, Richard Watkins, Herald of Arms, Richard Revel
of Derbyshire, Thomas Poulter junior of Kent, John Walsh alias
Hastings, John Kendal, secretary, John Buck, Andrew Ratt, and
William Bramton of Burford, on 21, in 'the first year of the reign
of our sovereign lord, assembled to them at Leicester ... a great
host, traitorously intending, imagining and conspiring the destruction
of the king's royal person, our sovereign leige lord. And they,
with the same host, with banners spread, mightily armed and defenced
with all manner [of] arms, as guns, bows, arrows, spears, 'glaives',
axes, and all other manner [of] articles apt or needful to give
and cause mighty battle against our sovereign lord'. Keeping the
host together, they led them on 22 August to a field in Leicestershire,
and 'there by great and continued deliberation, traitorously levied
war against our said sovereign lord and his true subjects there
being in his service and assistance under a banner of our said
sovereign lord, to the subversion of this realm, and common weal
of the same.' [Back to Contemporary and
Tudor Accounts]
DATE: Probably
1485-6, though later copy. AUTHOR: Londoner, using civic records.
TEXT: R.F. Green, "Historical notes of a London citizen,
1483-1488" E.M.R. 96 (1981), 589 (English; spelling
modernized.)
'This year
the earl of Richmond and Jasper, earl of Pembroke ... came forth
into England and met King Richard III at Redesmore, and there
was King Richard slain and the duke of Norfolk and Lord Ferrers
and Brackenbury, with many other. This battle was the 22 August,
1485. Likewise, in this year the earl of Northumberland and the
earl of Surrey were taken and brought into the Fleet of London,
and there they were nine days, and then they were led into the
Tower of London, and there they were two days, and after had to
the castle of Queenborough in Kent.' [Back to Contemporary
and Tudor Accounts]
DATE: Probably
compiled annually, but recopied and updated in early 16th century.
AUTHORS: Citizens of London and Calais. TEXTS: London "Vitellius
A XVI": C.L. Kingsford (ed.), Chronicles of London
(Oxford, 1905), p. 193; Calais Chronicle: The Chronicle of
Calais in the Reigns of Henry VII and Henry VII to the Year 1540,
ed. J.G. Nichols (Camden Society 35, 1846), p. 1. (English; spelling
modernized.)
The London
Chronicle 'Vitellius A XVI' records that on 22 August 'this year
... was the field of Bosworth' at which King Richard, the duke
of Norfolk, Brackenbury and many others were slain, and the earl
of Surrey taken prisoner, 'by the power of King Henry the Seventh'.
The Calais Chronicle dates the battle to St. Bartholomew's eve
and locates it a 'Bosworth heath', but otherwise follows the same
pattern. In addition, it records the death of Sir William Brandon
as well as the slaying of Radcliffe, Catesby and the "gentle"Brackenbury;
it includes the earl of Northumberland, the earl of Shrewsbury,
and Lord Zouche among the prisoners; and it documents the escape
of Lord Lovell.
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